Sweeter Than Honey
Page 11
Tossing the cord to the floor, I abandoned the Kirby upright vacuum in the middle of the living room and marched into the bedroom. A black man separated from his biological mother at birth wanted to be, needed to be, but never felt completely loved by any woman. I had abandonment issues and suffered from separation anxiety. Didn’t Lace see how desperately I tried to give her all of me? What I couldn’t figure out was why she wouldn’t or couldn’t do the same. I bet it had something to do with that Don dude. Or the man she was giving my pussy to.
Shaking my head, I felt my shoulders tense as anger seeped into my protruding veins, stiffening my body. I had to change my thoughts before my brain pressed fast-forward. I was heated enough to ram my fist into the wall, rip out a baseboard, and crack it over Lace’s head.
“Okay. All right. Relax, man. I’m good,” I tried convincing myself, rubbing the back of my neck.
Why was it that whenever I found someone who cared about me, that was the woman I dated? Lace became my woman simply because she wanted me as her man. The same way Tyra had become my wife. I guess subconsciously as a black man I was accustomed to being hunted, conquered, and defeated, then placed on an auction block while my genitals, teeth, and strong muscular physique passed from the slave master to the black woman waiting for either to deem me valuable enough to take home.
When I was growing up, Valentino’s mom, Mama Ruby Lee James, was a second mother to me. Everything she’d taught Valentino, I’d learned simply to gain her acceptance. Whenever she said, “Valentino, why can’t you make straight As like Benito? Or get one of them scholarships like Benito? Or stay out of trouble like Benito?” I tried harder. The only thing I couldn’t do well was handle rejection, which came in subtle and overt forms.
My parents gladly gave me hand-me-downs while Grant got the best of everything. After we graduated from Valley High, Grant went to Oxford and I went to USC, which some called the University of Second Chances, but they had the number-one football team in the nation and that’s what I strived to become, number-one, until I retired. Now all of my fans are someone else’s fans and everyone has forgotten about me.
Maybe I’ve caught that depression syndrome I saw on that commercial every day where people didn’t want to do anything. Since I’d met Lace, that person was me. Somewhere along the way I’d lost my drive to be the best. Guess I was tired of always trying to please my fans, my parents, now my woman cleaning up her place like I’m the housewife. If Valentino honestly gave me the money he’d promised, I’d kick Lace down a grand or two, then leave, move to a small town, and do what I’d never done before. Find the real Benito Bannister trapped under this not-so-tough layer of thick skin.
I’d never told anyone this before but how could a masculine quarterback, a man amongst men, say “It’s important to me that people like me” without sounding soft? Without seeming insecure? To this day I disliked swearing, not because I thought it was wrong, but because Mama James didn’t allow cussing in her presence. Some things made me wanna say, “Fuck! Nigga! Bitch, kiss my black ass!” All that shit, but I’d seen how misdirected hostility made my angry black former teammates relentlessly beat their women, then end up in some anger management class designed by a white man.
Speed-dialing Lace’s cell number, I ripped the lid off her white wicker hamper, tossed it to the floor, then removed the red lace thong she had on last night. Closely inspecting the crotch, I didn’t see any come stains, soiled streaks, crust, or anything out of the norm, so I sniffed them. A light sweet scent hit my nose. Smelled fresh and clean as always. Lace was a classy woman. She wouldn’t cheat on me. Not the way I held it down in the bedroom and licked her pussy dry.
Within five seconds I hung up and redialed her number. I’d repair the hamper later. “I’m giving her one more chance.”
Hmm, Valentino must’ve mistaken my baby for one of his prostitutes. Back in my not so long ago days, I’d fuck a fine prostitute all night long but I’d never fall in love with a whore who screwed men for a living. Marrying a prostitute was one step below dating a stripper because I’d never be caught dead at the altar waiting for either one of them to walk down the aisle, then slide their tongue down my throat. Mama James wouldn’t approve of me kissing a woman who sucked dicks like honey-filled Blow Pops.
My lips shrank to the shape of a quarter. “Fuck, I mean, darn.” This time my call went straight to voice mail. Two hundred and fifty g’s, huh? With the thought of that much money in my pockets, I relaxed a little. Lace could retire, stay home where I could keep an eye on her, and she could have my son, sons, who’d keep her busy twenty-four-seven while I hit the streets. “I wonder how my daughter is doing.” My ex-wife, Tyra, could go to hell! Lace sent her two hundred dollars a week and she still complained that that wasn’t enough.
“It’s called child…support! Not pay for everything.”
Whateva. A black man was damned, no matter what. If he didn’t pay child support he went to jail. If a black man paid child support, his baby’s mama raised hell, whining, “This ain’t enough. What am I supposed to do with this, wipe my ass?”
Nothing a black man did for a black woman was ever enough. Best if the brotha left her, moved on, and got himself a white woman who was easily satisfied and eager to please him in and out of bed.
Lace was right. I’d never admit it but a white woman couldn’t make me face my fears. I was a bit insecure ’cause my baby earned more than me, but I didn’t give a fuck how much she made, I was the man of this house and if she fucked another man I’ma have to lay hands on her and prove to her once and for all who the man is.
Clamping my hands over my temples, I fell to my knees and yelled, “Fuck!” desperately needing to know who she gave my pussy to!
As I was imagining what Valentino would say if he saw me now, his voice resounded in my ear, “Nigga, get your punk ass up!”
Hopping toward the door on one foot, I shuffled on my black Jordan tennis shoes, tied the strings in my black sweatpants into a knot, grabbed the keys to my Jaguar off Lace’s nightstand of pure ivory with eighteen-karat gold handles, then hurried into the garage.
Scared shitless wondering what the hell my boy Valentino was up to, I sped out of the driveway from zero to forty. The back end of my car fishtailed, skidding into the circular curb across the cul-de-sac. Gray clouds engulfed the rear window as the car slammed against the opposite curb. Turning the steering wheel in both directions, I regained control only to plunge the accelerator till I hit ninety miles an hour along Ann Road, racing through every red light. I damn near crashed into Valentino’s twenty-inch-high black wrought-iron gate until the sensor lights blinded me.
“Slow down, man. Chill out,” I told myself. “You don’t know what your boy is up to.”
I parked in the driveway, then sat staring at my dick. Shit always happens to me when I least expect it. I didn’t mean to rape that girl. One minute she wanted to have sex; then she said stop. The next minute she was sucking my dick; then she stopped and just sat there like a zombie. The next thing I knew she was riding my dick like a jockey. She came. I came. Her pussy was wet. My dick was limp and happy as hell. She got up like nothing had happened, so I thought everything was copacetic until she asked for five hundred dollars. I laughed in her face so long she got dressed, then yanked the knob so hard she damn near took the hotel door with her. Next thing I knew some dude dressed in an LVPD uniform banged on room 5021 so furiously I was afraid to open up. When I did all I heard was, “Benito Bannister, you’re under arrest.”
Maybe I was wrong about white women making black men feel secure.
“Wait up, Officer,” I protested, “I’m innocent.”
With everything that happened that night with that girl, I just knew something would appear in the Las Vegas Sun or the national news like MVP BENITO BANNISTER ARRESTED FOR RAPE. Not a word was printed or spoken. But those handcuffs damn near cut off my circulation and my wrists. The man who knew the right people on the force and got me out of that hid
eous situation was Valentino. My boy never hesitated. He had my back to the point that I didn’t have to explain anything to anybody, not even my stepmother. Grateful, I was in and out of central lockup before they did a body or a booty check, ’cause I’d pushed a lump of shit into my pants at the thought of a man’s finger going up my ass.
I owed Valentino big time.
I abandoned Lace’s black-on-black Jaguar in the driveway—oh yeah, if some illegal shit went down, this was not my ride. I stood outside for fifteen minutes contemplating if I should follow through with Valentino’s demand. I had my share of wrongdoings, but nothing that would land me back behind bars. Rape was one thing but murder? That was against every law.
Walking up to the front door, I glided my finger toward the doorbell. Shockingly, Valentino opened the door before I pressed the button.
“Man, get your ass in here quick,” Valentino said, locking the door behind me. Looking over his shoulder, he whispered, “Follow me.”
Glancing around, I didn’t see anything unusual. The joint was so quiet I heard myself breathing. Everything inside the mansion looked cool until—
“You gotta get this shit cleaned up in an hour before your bitch gets back to her spot and figures out something’s wrong. We have to make sure every alibi is proper. I need you and that dead ho out of here before midnight.”
Undigested steak and potatoes raced up my throat and out of my mouth, splattering onto the sparkling crystal when I saw a young girl’s brains oozing out of the hole in her skull onto the floor. Backing up, I held my hands in the air. “Aw, fuck no, man. I ain’t touching her. What the fuck did you do that for, G? I’m out.”
“Out my ass!” Valentino yelled, placing a gun to my head. “You either clean this shit up so no one traces her back to me, or you join her and I’ll pay somebody to dispose of yo’ ass too, nigga. Don’t believe me, try me.” He shoved the barrel into my mouth.
Mumbling, I said, “I’m your boy, G.”
“Nigga, that’s why I called you. Now…” Valentino lowered the gun, then pointed at the girl.
Angrily biting my sore bottom lip, I felt sweat pouring from my forehead while vomit seeped into my mouth. Swallowing, I stooped closer to the body, then gasped, “My God, she’s so beautiful and so young.”
“If it makes you feel better, nigga, you can wish the bitch a happy birthday as you’re burying her ass. She’ll be twenty-one in an hour. The body bag is in the basement in the first closet to your left. Don’t open shit else.”
CHAPTER 15
Lace
Creeping along Las Vegas Boulevard in bumper-to-bumper traffic was every car from a hooptie to a Bentley glowing beneath a billion blinding night-lights. From the Stratosphere, Wynn, Treasure Island, and Harrahs, to Beuax Virage, Le Mirage, MGM Grand, Mandalay Bay, and the Hotel, to off in the distance at the Luxor, for miles all one saw was dazzling women and flashing lights: some sparkled between water beams, thunder, and fire while others caressed ships, lions, castles, or the pyramid.
Each casino strived to outdo the next by attracting gamblers with sideshows more spectacular than those performed by the automobile racers, but the outcomes were the same. Every outdoor show in Vegas created a traffic jam. No doubt Sin City was the premier attraction worth seeing at least once in everyone’s lifetime, but right now all these damn cars needed to get the hell out of my way.
I contemplated abandoning my Jaguar in the middle of the street to get myself a stiff drink, but some shyster’s ink would dry on the pawnshop’s papers before I made it to the bar. One could buy or sell anything from sex, diamonds, furs, and cars, to the plasma in their blood because pawnshops, like prostitution, in Vegas were more plentiful than casinos.
Honk! Honk!
Leaning on my horn, I yelled out my window, “Unobservant, inconsiderate fuck! Just move up two damn inches so I can pull into the fuckin’ driveway. My goodness. I can’t take this tonight. Let me get off the Strip until these tourists finish their after-midnight sightseeing before I shoot somebody.” I had to chill for a moment until I figured out what the two Negroes in my life were up to and why. A lot of unusual shit had happened over the last few hours and my gut instinct told me things were going to get a lot worse before they got better. Finally arriving at my destination, I refused to extend courtesy to the drivers ahead of me patiently waiting for assistance from the parking attendant.
Never giving a stranger access to all of my keys, I handed my car key and a fifty to the attendant at the Bellagio. I’d already locked Valentino’s money in my trunk and activated the lock so no one could search the contents. Strutting inside, I stopped at the first place serving alcohol, the Fontana Bar, draped with a décor of blazing red curtains. Dian Diaz onstage singing “No more tears for you, and now I’m over you…” was perhaps a sign I needed to let Benito go and meet someone new. Any man who was devious enough to jeopardize my livelihood was an abusive, controlling bastard I needed to live without.
Should I wait until our relationship escalated to violence or do what I knew I had to? Embracing my inevitable breakup with Benito, I took the only empty seat at the bar next to a gorgeous woman wearing a blue sheer dress with a split parting damn near up to her pussy. Pulling back my stool, I gazed at the vivid red, green, and blue tones swirling throughout the cream-colored carpet. If I were in the mood to recruit girl number thirteen, I’d hire this diva-bitch on the spot, but quality superseded quantity.
My twelve perfect escorts were manageable and in the highest demand. Girl seven used to be a geisha. Men liked the way she draped herself in layers, painted her face highlighting her red lips, swooped her hair atop her head, and took small steps toward them. Girl eight had the bluest eyes, the blondest hair, and smiled, giggling at every word that came out of a man’s mouth. Girl eight made her men feel smart and funny. Girl nine was a Polynesian double-jointed beauty.
Pimps and madams who recruited every available woman worked ten times harder than me and made only a fraction of the money I earned. Work smarter, not harder was a motto every woman should employ.
“What would you like?” the bartender asked in a tone insinuating I could have any top-shelf liquor in view or his fine sexy ass.
“A double beautiful heated,” I requested, scanning the lounge. I recognized a dozen men who were my clients dining with their wives or girlfriends, but I pretended not to notice because some of them were probably wondering why I wasn’t at IP. Irrespective of marital status, every high roller who frequented Vegas eventually made his way to IP for unforgettable nights of sexual pleasure. Men were shallow and I’d taught my girls how to make them feel extra special. Sunny was a natural at pleasing her johns, which unquestionably made her my top girl virtually overnight.
“But of course,” the bartender replied, pivoting his nice firm butt toward me.
Of all days, why had Benito made me late for work today and why had Valentino demanded I go straight to Immaculate Perception, pick up his money, then go straight home? If Valentino weren’t so busy trying to control everyone around him, he’d know that Lace danced to the beat of her own tune, not his. I’d go home whenever, if ever, I decided to go home. Retrieving my cell phone from my purse, I dialed Sunny’s number.
The woman to my right glanced at the lighted display on my phone, then quickly looked away.
What was this bitch up to?
“Enjoy,” the bartender said, flashing a smile and setting a glass of steamed water before me as he tilted the second snifter with Grand Marnier and Courvoisier atop.
Since I wouldn’t see Sunny at work tonight, I’d wait for her at her condo and fire Sunny when she got off; then I’d go home. From this day forth, Lace St. Thomas was a woman of her every word. I was serious. This was Sunny’s last day working for Valentino. But I could start up my own operation and hire Sunny as my personal assistant. That way I could keep Sunny close enough to make sure her impulsive ways didn’t get her hurt. Or killed.
The call went directly to voice mail
, so I redialed the number this time, flipping my phone over so the nosy trick seated to my right molesting the rim of her martini glass with her tongue wouldn’t be up in my business.
Careful not to mention my name or Sunny’s, I left a brief message, “Hey, give me a call as soon as you get this.”
Whispering into the wind, the woman next to me said, “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.”
Now, that bitch was certifiably insane. Where in the fuck did that come from? And who in the hell was she talking to? Probably trippin’ over some man.
I shook my head. I’d learned a long time ago that women had to observe their surroundings at all times. Most women like the one beside me were victimized because they lived in their fucking heads, fantasizing about shit that was far from reality.
I made him hit me because I wouldn’t shut up. He really is sorry this time. He loves me. He promised he’d never beat me again, so I’ma stay with him.
Until what? He beat her ass again or killed her? Every three seconds an American woman is beaten. And thirty percent of all female homicides in the U.S. are the results of domestic violence. So a battered woman swallows her poison every second she stays with her abuser. Some women perish slowly while others die instantly.
My having gone through that bullshit for years was the reason I kept my gun loaded. Most women couldn’t tell if a fly on their nose regurgitated on them because they’d swat it away without thinking, feeling, or looking. That’s why these fucked-up millionaires and billionaires and broke-ass men swarming around women like buzzards could prey upon any one of these whores for little or nothing. For real, deal or no deal, women would offer up pussy for free!
A woman would give her precious body to a complete stranger hoping he’d like her enough to, what? Buy her something pretty, give her a dollar or two, take her home to the wife he’d never mentioned, what? Most women didn’t know and didn’t think about what they wanted, so it didn’t matter if a repulsive maggot dressed in a nice suit or sagging jeans devoured a piece of meat or degraded them. Same results. Women literally permitted men to dissolve them into manure and then those same low-life men could convince a woman that she wasn’t smart enough to wipe the shit from her own ass without his permission.