“What happened to your dementia?” he asked, laughing, as he cleared the area to make room for the chair.
“I guess it stopped, like you must have stopped working for William, if you’re stealing his wife,” Clara countered.
“Touché,” Angelo said as he grabbed Meagan a chair.
Clara began telling them the story she had made up in her head. “William had filed for divorce, but he didn’t have the balls to go through with it. Instead of divorcing me and watching me take half of everything he had, he took the coward’s way out and decided to kill me. He was always a bitch to me, but I didn’t think the bitch was that scared of me that he’d find it easier to kill me than to get me to sign some papers that would call it quits.” She looked at Meagan. “Do you remember when he left, lying about going to get gas for his car?” she asked.
Meagan nodded. “He spent the entire day talking about his car. First, it was his tire and then gas. I’ve always thought about it.”
“Well, I found it to be strange that it would take him so long to return with some, seeing that there was a gas station less than three miles up the road. So I stepped outside to smoke and caught him covering the car with gasoline. I ran back inside to tell your mother. She had said she was going to the restroom to find out what was going on with you, but when I got back to our table, she had taken the keys off of it and left. I went back outside to find her, and she was already sitting in the driver’s seat of William’s car and was about to turn the key in the ignition. When she cranked the car, it blew up, and I watched William jump back into my car and drive off.”
“So he knew you weren’t in the car?” Angelo asked.
“No, son. I wondered about that at first too. You see, Rita and I stuck together like Siamese twins, so if she cranked up that car, that meant we both were in it. Whatever was said between Meagan and her mother must have upset Rita, because she tried to drive off and leave me.”
Clara continued to tell her story, mentioning her stay in Savannah and her being diagnosed with cancer. “When I came back for help, he almost shit his pants to see me alive. Before I could blackmail him to pay for my treatment costs, he volunteered to help so I wouldn’t tell what he had done to us.”
“He killed my mother, Clara. You should have told on him,” Meagan said through sobs.
“You’re right, but at the time I needed his help, and I was still hurt that the two of them had been having sex behind my back and the two of you.”
“So, you knew about him and my mother too?” Meagan asked, not wanting the spotlight shone on her own wrongdoing.
“Hold the fuck up! This nigga was fucking all three of y’all, and all of y’all knew it, and nobody decided to do or say shit to him about it? That’s why he thought it was okay to ask me to ho for him. The nigga felt like a pimp,” Angelo cut in.
“When did he ask you to ho for him?” Meagan asked, but Clara started talking again, and Angelo apologized for interrupting her.
“To answer your question, Georgia Peach, no, I didn’t know about him and your mom at first. I was in denial, but the truth came to light. I knew your mother was a ho . . . ,” she said, then waited for Meagan to become offended at her show of disrespect for her mother. When Clara saw that she hadn’t offended Meagan, she continued, “But I never thought she’d backstab me like she had done. Anyway, I came up with another plan, and, Junior, this is why I asked you to come.”
Angelo walked closer to his mother’s bed and grabbed her wrinkled hand softly so he wouldn’t disturb the IV she had in it.
“I not only had William pay for my treatments, but I also made him buy me property as compensation for what he had done to me.”
“The condos,” he said.
“Not only the condos, but a few other properties, too, and there is also a bank account with close to a million dollars in it from the income I generated from the properties. All of them are yours. Your aunt Camille has everything in her name and will sign it over to you once I’m gone. I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you when you were little, and when you contacted me when you were all grown up and handsome like your father. William was out to kill me, and I couldn’t bring harm to you,” she lied.
“It’s okay. The shit has been hard on me, but I love you, anyway. But that nigga William has to die,” Angelo said with determination in his voice.
“Oh no, we’re not letting him off that easy, nor will I allow him to consume your freedom like he has done mine. When I die and the coroner gets ahold of my body, they will discover who I really am, so I wrote a letter telling all of this in it. Your aunt has a copy of the letter too. You need to meet with her to get it before my body turns cold, and then you need to take it to the police station. All I want you to do for me is to make sure he dies in jail. That way me and Rita’s souls can rest in peace.” She turned her attention back to a weeping Meagan.
“Georgia Peach, I’m sorry he took advantage of you, and even sorrier that I let your nothing-ass mother bring you into our deadly childhood game, but you will benefit from all of this. With him being sentenced to murder, you’ll get everything that bastard has, so get your affairs in order. I know you love him, but he wasn’t just disrespectfully yours. He was all of ours. Rita is dead because of him, and I was forced to spend my life in hiding. Don’t let him do it to you too. You grew up to be more beautiful than I ever imagined, and I know my son will do right by you. I wouldn’t want either of you with anyone else.”
Clara squeezed Angelo’s hand with the little strength she had left. “So, Junior, is this the information you wanted to know? I know you took the job working for William to find out about me.”
Too embarrassed to answer, he nodded his head before asking, “What’s up with you and Pops? He said you’re mad at him right now.”
“Married life, son, and if you and my Peach exchange those vows, you’ll understand exactly what I mean.”
Angelo Sr. was standing by the door, listening. He had been waiting in the waiting room when his son and the young woman he had never seen before went walking by. And then he had stationed himself by Clara’s door, His only reason for listening was to see if Clara would keep her word and not tell their son about his attempt on her life. Once he was sure she wouldn’t, he made his way to the elevator. He decided to let Angelo live his life, and if Angelo wanted him to be a part of it, he’d have to come to Albany to see him.
“Clara, why didn’t I know about your son?” Meagan asked.
“Nobody knew I had a child by the pastor’s son but his father, my father, and the father. The rumor spread that the pastor found a baby on the church’s step and that his son got a word from God telling him to raise him. Your mother thought I was working a married man out of some money by going to the hospital. She didn’t bother to visit or check in on me. I never told a soul, nor did his father, until the day he introduced me to our son.”
“And what about my father? I know my mom grew up with you and William, but the two of you didn’t really know each other until you were grown. Is it possible that William is my father?” Meagan asked.
Clara didn’t answer, because the truth was, she didn’t know. She had given birth to Angelo and had been keeping her distance from the world. She hadn’t been dating William at the time, and he and Rita had been known as best friends. They could have been fucking, but why would Rita have introduced them and gassed them up so they would date if she had had William in her pocket? Clara’s heartbeat sped up at the thought, and she wanted William dead in that moment. She answered Meagan the best way she could.
“When you’re tracing the steps of hoes, the footprints will cross over one another, but in my heart, I believe William is not your daddy. He’s your goddaddy only. He loved you in a different way back then, and he would have killed anyone that put a hand on you. That’s the only relationship I want to remember the two of you having. He isn’t your husband. My son is. That’s the way it would have been if we, the parents in your life, had loved you right. Y’all were destined fo
r this. It’s your birthright.”
When Clara was done talking to the new couple that stood before her, she closed her eyes, having finally made peace with her son. Less than five minutes later, with Angelo and Meagan watching, she flatlined, and the doctors and nurses weren’t able to revive her. God must have forgiven her, because she died peacefully in her sleep.
Chapter Fourteen
Angelo stayed with his mother’s body until they moved her to the morgue. He tried to call his father, but he wasn’t answering his phone. His mother had given him directions to follow and the information he needed to contact the auntie he hadn’t known he had. After meeting up with Meagan in the waiting room and picking up the possessions his mother had on her person when she was admitted to the hospital, which was about three thousand dollars’ worth of blank money orders and the normal junk women carried in their pocketbooks, they got off the elevator on the first floor, only to walk into a crime scene.
Two security guards had tackled the woman who had helped Meagan in the bathroom, and they were putting plastic wrist restraints on her as she lay on the floor. Not more than fifty feet away from the huddle was a body lying facedown in a puddle of blood. A doctor kneeled over the body, shaking his head. When Angelo saw the overalls on the dead body, he instantly knew that it belonged to his father.
He pushed the doctor out of the way and turned his father over on his back. There was a hole in his head and chest. Anger surged through as he ran over to the killer and struck her in the face with his left and then right fist. He was quickly restrained.
“Why?” he yelled, tears and snot covering his face.
“The dog chased the cat, so the cat hired a lion,” she said over and over again.
“What in the fuck are you talking about, crazy bitch?”
“Bishop said to kill Clara because she was already dying, but Clara was smart and had more money, so I killed Bishop instead,” she said and then began roaring like a lion. Using her mouth, she went into her shirt pocket and pulled out a check for twenty thousand dollars, written by Clara. “I visited the cat to kill her, but she was nice and talked to me like a lion. She said she’d give me more than he gave me, so I killed him. The lion killed the dog.” She roared again and then mixed dog barks and roars.
The police arrived and locked down the scene. They questioned Angelo for thirty minutes or so and then told him that he was free to go.
* * *
The three-hour ride from Atlanta to Savannah seemed longer this time to William, because he spent his time thinking about Meagan. He didn’t want what they had to end like this, and he had decided he would sit her down, tell her everything, including that Clara still was alive, and see where they would go from there. He was sure his lawyer would advise him not to do it, but it was his life, and he was too old to play games with it.
He pulled up to the front of the hospital, and police cars were everywhere. One of the officers stopped the car in front of his, and seconds later the driver made a U-turn and drove back out of the hospital’s parking lot. As William pulled up, the officer flagged him down and walked over to his window.
“Is it a life-or-death emergency?” the officer asked him.
“No. I’m here to visit a patient.”
“Sir, the hospital is on lockdown at the moment. You will have to come back in an hour. We should be done by then.”
“Hey, man, listen. I drove down here from Atlanta. I don’t know anything about Savannah. Can I just park at the rear of the building and wait in my car until you all clear out?” William begged.
The officer inhaled deeply and shook his head. “Go ahead and park on the side of the building, by the emergency entrance. Do not exit your car for any reason until you get the clearance to.”
William nodded his head in understanding and made a U-turn. He rode past J. Seed and Devin, who had been in line behind him, without looking their way. He parked and sat in his car, listening to Meagan’s Teena Marie greatest hits album. Before long he began singing along with each track, like Meagan normally did. The singer’s words were infectious, and the song “Déjà Vu” hit close to home. He had been there before and was circling back to that place where love would end and a fresh start would begin, but he didn’t want it. If he couldn’t mend what he and Meagan had, he’d focus on his health and his business.
Starting over with anyone this late in his life would be a waste of time, but what hurt him the most was the notion that once he was gone, so was his bloodline. He didn’t have any children with Meagan by choice, and now that he had time to reflect on his decisions, he regretted not starting a family with her. If Meagan decided to pursue the younger man, he had no choice but to put her in jail, and that meant that everything he had worked for in his life would die with him, given that he had no one to leave it to.
A single tear rolled down his face—but there wouldn’t be another that he’d let fall from his eyes—as he watched Meagan walk out through the emergency-room exit alone. If he found out that she had been in cahoots with Clara this entire time, he’d kill them both.
* * *
J. Seed didn’t roll down his window, as they had watched William do. Instead, he made a U-turn and drove out of the parking lot before the officer could reach them.
“Where are you going now?” Devin asked, at the peak of his frustration.
“Do you see all the police cars? I’m not about to stay here. Let’s grab something to eat and then come back. It’s too hot up here.”
“What if he leaves? We don’t know shit about Savannah. How are we going to find him?”
“If he leaves before we get back, we’ll just have to try to catch his ass back in Atlanta.”
Devin squinted. “Catch him back in Atlanta?”
“Yeah, remember we have to play this shit smart. Look at where he went. What business does this nigga have at a hospital in Savannah?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care. I want the nigga dead. I don’t need to know what he came out here for.”
Devin hadn’t followed William this long to wait until they got back to Atlanta, and when they passed the side of the hospital as they drove along the street, he glanced over and happened to see William with his hands on Meagan and acting aggressively. Instinctively, he jumped out of the moving car and ran in their direction, gun in hand.
“Let me go, murderer!” Meagan yelled, hoping that Angelo or the detective he was talking to would hear her and come running.
“Murderer? What in the hell are you talking about? The only murderer I know is you,” he countered. “You thought Greg from the security-alarm company wouldn’t tell me about that nigga you had in the kitchen? Yeah, I know all about y’all planning to kill me and Angelo, so y’all could be together.”
“That’s not what happened. And, anyway, Devin was just talking. But—”
“Oh, is that the name of the little boy that got your ass whupped at the strip club last night? Devin?”
Meagan’s jaw dropped as he supplied information that he shouldn’t know anything about. “You know what, William? None of that matters anymore, because your wife, Clara—or should I say your dead wife, Clara?—told me how you killed my mother and tried to kill her before she died for a second time. I won’t give you the opportunity to kill me too.”
They swapped facial expressions, and William was now the one left with his mouth open, in shock.
“Yes, I know everything, asshole, and we’re over. Once you’re in jail for life, I hope the thought of me being married to Clara’s son, Angelo, makes your days in there harder.”
She turned her back to him and headed back inside to get Angelo, but William snatched her up by her dangling hair.
“Angelo is Clara’s son, huh? That makes sense,” he said, nodding his head. “You’re so smart, but your ass is stupid. You can’t see the setup? Clara and Angelo were playing us both.”
“Let me go!” she yelled. “You’re the only muthafucka that’s playing me.”
A
ngelo and the detective had finally heard Meagan’s yells and ran out the door. When the detective saw what looked like a domestic dispute taking place, he pulled out his Nextel device and sent a chirp that would be heard by all the uniformed officers throughout the hospital. Before Angelo could yell for William to let her go, a figure dressed in all black came running through the parked cars, as if they were a maze.
“Meagan, watch out!” Angelo yelled, and she and William both scanned the parking lot and caught sight of the masked figure running toward them.
William let her go. Meagan, thankful that she was wearing Jordans, took off running toward Angelo and the detective, while William took off running through the parked cars when he realized the masked man was coming his way. Two shots were fired at William, but both missed him. The detective pulled out his gun and let off two shots at the masked figure, but he missed the moving target.
Meagan was now in the safety of Angelo’s arms as a group of police officers made their way through the emergency room’s exit doors. Two officers pulled Angelo and Meagan to safety, and the rest went flying across the parking lot, giving the masked man chase.
“Damn, Devin. Damn,” J. Seed muttered aloud. He didn’t know what to do as he watched his hardheaded little brother hit the ground running after his target.
Cops began to appear, and with all the attention on Devin, J. Seed realized he could hit the highway back to Atlanta without being seen. He had kids, and the intention of proposing to their mother on his next big payday. He had promised his makeshift family that he was done with the dumb stuff, and that from that moment on, he’d put them first. He was done robbing mama-and-pop stores and niggas he felt were slipping. He’d be the man that his family needed. But how? How could he be in this moment with Devin and not do shit but run? He had made a promise always to be his brother’s keeper, although they were strangers by blood. But Devin was his little brother, and that was written in his heart, especially after losing his big brother, Calvin, the way he had.
J. Seed’s palms were clammy like cocoa butter on dirty hands. His heart beat harder than normal, but under these conditions, it would have been charted as stable.. Death was certain, he was sure of it. Life in jail wasn’t an option, and dying under another man’s control by lethal injection or the electric chair didn’t make the list of ways he wanted to go out, either. If death was going to lie on his chest like his bitch, it was going to be God’s way or his. Those were the only acceptable methods by which to die.
Disrespectfully Yours Page 20