Run-Run went into the six-story building to see his bitch for the day. He didn’t know he was being watched. The man was dressed immaculately, sporting a leather jacket, bright Timberland boots, and gold jewelry. He had a clean-shaven face and beautiful dark skin. Run-Run looked more like a GQ model than a thug.
When he walked into the lobby, Kwan and several of his comrades stepped out of their vehicles, their guns concealed.
Kwan said, “Yo, y’all three come wit’ me, and the rest of y’all keep an eye out for anything. If it moves wrong, then fuck ’em up. I’m not tryin’ to make the same mistake again.”
Kwan, Asher, and the other goons crossed the street and went into the building lobby. They already knew which floor and which apartment Rose stayed in. The unfamiliar faces to the local residents in the neighborhood stormed into the stairway and hurried toward the third floor. They were itching to start chaos and pandemonium inside the project apartment. It was time for some serious payback.
Kwan’s crew picked the lock and stealthily entered the apartment.
***
“Oh shit! Oh shit! Damn, you feel so good,” Run-Run proclaimed as he thrust his dick into his number-one bitch from the back.
Rose leaned over the long dresser, grabbing it securely with her legs spread and her phat ass wiggling in the air.
Run-Run grabbed her thick hips and continued pounding her. The deep penetration felt so good to them both. He played with her tits and smacked her ass. Rose liked it rough, and they both liked it doggy-style while standing up.
“Fuck me! Yes! Fuck me!” Rose screamed out.
Kwan could hear the sexual activity coming from the bedroom. Kwan, T-Mack, Holland and Ricky all had their guns out. Gradually, the men moved toward the bedroom. The door was ajar. He peeked inside and could see Run-Run fucking the whore doggy-style, both their backs toward the door.
Kwan and his goons burst into the bedroom and completely took Run-Run and Rose by surprise. Run-Run jumped out of the pussy and tried to reach for his gun on the nightstand, but he was too late. A crowd of goons jumped on him, quickly pistol-whipping him and beating him to the ground.
Rose screamed, but Kwan immediately ended her vocals with a swift punch to the face, followed by a harsh, “Shut the fuck up, bitch!” and she tumbled off the bed and hit the floor. To Kwan, it was a sweet thing to see—people’s pain.
Run-Run was butt-naked on the floor. He scowled up at his attackers. “Y’all niggas are dead!”
Kwan shouted, “What, bitch? You got the nerve to threaten us?”
Kwan glared down at Run-Run and couldn’t help himself. The sight of Bimmy’s cousin infuriated him. He gripped his pistol tightly and went to work on the side of Run-Run’s head with the butt of the gun. The side of Run-Run’s head started to look like the color of crimson, and his eye had been split open with a deep gash. Kwan tried to control himself, but thinking about that day made him mad.
Asher had to pull Kwan off Run-Run before he killed him too soon. “We still need him to talk, Kwan.”
Kwan was breathing heavily. The urge to blow his head off was so strong, Kwan almost had an erection in his pants. Asher was right, though; they’d come there for information first, and then they could kill the nigga right after. “Yo, take that nigga into the fuckin’ bathroom,” he said.
They picked Run-Run up from the floor. He tried to resist, but he was beaten again, and they dragged him into the small bathroom to handle their business.
Kwan looked down at the naked whore on the floor. She was cowering in the fetal position, scared to death.
“Yo, Kwan, let me get some of that,” one of his goons said, thirsty to bust a nut.
“Nigga, we ain’t here for that. Watch that sneaky bitch. She move, kill her.” Kwan then marched toward the bathroom with some devious shit planned for Run-Run.
The volume to the stereo inside the apartment was turned all the way up, blaring today’s rap songs.
Run-Run’s blood coated the white tiled floor. He was on his knees and defeated. Kwan’s hands were layered with his blood, as he opened up Run-Run’s flesh with a serrated knife. Then there were cigarette burns to his skin, and a few of his fingers were broken. Still, the nigga wasn’t talking. He was a tough muthafucka, refusing to give up any information on his cousin.
While Run-Run was being tortured, his whore was being mentally tortured. Niggas were in her ear telling her that she was about to die slowly for fucking the wrong nigga, asking her to beg for her life.
“This nigga ain’t talkin’, Kwan. Fuck it.”
Kwan still wanted some information on Bimmy. Anything. But the cousin was showing true loyalty. If Kwan didn’t hate the nigga, then he would’ve respected his “gangster.” But he was never one to just give up so easily; something had to break this nigga.
Another half-hour later, they found Run-Run’s breaking point—his kids. In his wallet there was his license with his address. Kwan threatened that if he didn’t talk, then he would go to his place and murder his entire family, starting with the baby mama, and then the kids.
“Nigga, I swear, I’m gonna eat ya fuckin’ kids and shit them out if you don’t tell me somethin’ about Bimmy.”
That broke Run-Run, and he talked.
It was the end of him. Kwan cut his throat from ear to ear, and he bled out like a pig. His body lay mutilated and naked on the bathroom floor.
Then it was the whore’s turn to die. Kwan took Rose into a chokehold and squeezed the life out of her. He broke her neck too, and she dropped dead.
Twenty
Bimmy sat across from Hassan in the visiting room frowning and upset about the loss of his little cousin, Run-Run. He and Run-Run grew up together on the mean streets of Brooklyn, New York, and were like brothers. Bimmy had taken his little cousin under his wing years earlier and groomed him for the game. The love was real. Run-Run was family, not like Avery, who was a perpetual fuckup. Though Avery was Bimmy’s cousin too, he wasn’t family.
The news hit Bimmy like a ton of bricks. It hurt him. It was unbelievable, but it was real. How did they get to him? How did they know about the whore? Bimmy had underestimated his rival. It was now time to go into overdrive.
“They didn’t have to do him like that,” Bimmy said. “They did him bad.”
“We gonna find that muthafucka, Bimmy,” Hassan said quietly, “and we gonna slaughter him.”
Bimmy was in a foul mood. He ached even more to find Kwan, or anyone associated to him, and kill them slowly.
“You know I loved him like a brother, Bimmy. He was a good man.”
“Cash, we find him first. I want him!”
“You’ve been lookin’ for the nigga for a while, and he ain’t come out of his hole yet.”
“What about Pearla?” Bimmy asked.
“What about her?”
“She can find that nigga for us. She can pull that muthafucka out of his hole. She does it all the time.”
“What? No!”
“Why not, Hassan? This nigga Kwan gotta go now.”
“You don’t bring Pearla into this. She has no connection to Cash,” Hassan said.
“And you’re absolutely sure about that?”
“Nigga, I’m sure!”
Bimmy frowned even harder. Hassan was an ass. Of course, Pearla had a connection to Cash—She was fucking the nigga. His boss couldn’t see it. Bimmy wanted to follow Pearla. Maybe that bitch would lead him to Cash.
Once he found Cash, he would find Kwan, though word on the streets was Cash and Kwan were beefing with each other. Anyhow, Cash was still a valuable nigga. Bimmy was going to make him talk, find out the people close to Kwan, and then murder both those muthafuckas.
Hassan said, “I’ll pay for Run-Run’s funeral, no expenses spared. You send him off real good, Bimmy. Your cousin was definitely loved and respected.”
Bimmy was grateful, but paying for the funeral didn’t appease his hunger for revenge. He was burning up inside. There was nowhere Kwan or Cash could hide. He was determined to find them.
“But I got good news,” Hassan said, changing the subject. “My lawyer was able to get me another bail hearing . . . next week.”
“That’s good news,” Bimmy said dispassionately.
“It is. I told you that these muthafuckas ain’t gonna keep me in here. I’ll be home soon. My lawyer is working everything out on his end, and I took care of everything on my end.”
Bimmy nodded, ambivalent about Hassan’s release. It could be trouble for him if Avery fucked up, or Hassan getting out could be beneficial. Who knew?
The hour visit went by, and Bimmy felt slighted by Hassan’s lack of sympathy for Run-Run. If it had been Pearla or anyone in his family, Hassan would be beside himself. There would be no stopping his wrath. But Hassan was more concerned with his upcoming bail hearing and Pearla than with trying to annihilate the foes plotting against them. Hassan had changed since he’d been locked up. Bimmy knew it, felt it, and needed to do something about it.
He walked out of the jail and got on the bus that took visitors to the parking lot, frowning the entire time. He was aching to kill someone.
The minute he stepped off the bus and walked toward his car, he pulled out his cell phone and made a call.
The phone rang several times before Avery answered, “Yeah, cuz?”
“Where the fuck you at?”
“We still on 95, ’bout five hours away.”
“You should have been here days ago!”
“I know. Had a few mishaps though, but it’s all taken care of. We on our way.”
“The moment you get to New York, you call me. You understand?”
“Got ya.”
“I want that bitch dead by the week’s end,” Bimmy growled.
“She will be, cuz. I assure you dat.”
Bimmy hung up. Now he definitely had a motive to kill Pearla. He was willing to do what Hassan was too weak to do. Bimmy thought when Cash received the news about Pearla’s murder, it would bring him out of hiding. That’s when Bimmy’s goons would snatch him up and have a serious and rough talk with the nigga. Then they would find pieces of him all over New York, one week at a time.
***
Avery and Dalou stopped to get some gas in Randallstown, Maryland, a predominantly African American suburb in Baltimore County, about twenty miles away from Baltimore. Not only were they low on gas, but, worse, they were out of weed. They were getting bored and restless.
Dalou took his turn driving. He was itching to smoke a blunt. It was late afternoon, and they were about four hours from New York. They felt that they had some time to kill. It was time to explore Baltimore County and find some weed to purchase.
Dalou drove down Liberty Road and pulled into a gas station. Both men climbed out of the Ford Focus and looked around. It was quite a busy area: numerous gas stations, stores, and neighborhood businesses around. Traffic was moving.
Avery lit a cigarette. They needed something to get their bodies going, if not weed, then some pills or cocaine. “Put twenty-five down on pump seven,” he told Dalou.
He nodded.
Dalou walked toward the building.
Avery lingered by the pump, observing every car coming and going and locking his eyes on every male or female. He was looking for who had that look to approach and maybe ask the right thing to get them the right score.
He fixed his eyes on the old Chevrolet pickup truck that drove into the gas station and stopped at the pump across from him. The driver got out, a young white boy. He was thin, dressed raggedly in stained denim jeans, worn work boots, and a flimsy black T-shirt that said, Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms—Who’s bringing the chips? He wore a plaid hunter’s cap and sported a scraggly beard. Everything about him screamed “drugs” to Avery. If not weed, then maybe crystal meth.
Avery watched him go into the gas station and come right back out. He reached for the gas pump and started to put gasoline into his old pickup. Avery knew it was now or never. Dalou was still in the store doing God knew what.
“Funny shirt. I really like it,” Avery said, chuckling.
The young redneck glanced at Avery and said, “Thanks.”
“I’ll bring da chips, I’m just short of da tobacco, if ya know what I’m sayin’ to you, friend.”
The young boy looked at Avery. He was unsure about him. “Where you from?” the boy asked.
“De Dirty South. Georgia.”
“I can hear your accent.”
“It’s that noticeable, huh?”
“It is.”
“I have a crisis,” Avery started. “Me and my friend had a long trip, and we on our way north, but we just need one thang. We need a little pick-me-up, ya know. We need to get on dat white horse, or tweek maybe, and ya look like a guy dat can help us out.”
“Huh?”
Avery knew something that would get his attention. He pulled out the cash. It was the only clue he needed.
“Oh, that pick-me-up,” the redneck said.
“I’m willing to pay for it. You know somebody?”
He smiled. “I do.”
“Then problem solved,” Avery said, smiling too. “I’m Avery.”
“Adam.”
Dalou walked out of the store with a bag filled of junk food and things. He was caught off-guard by Avery talking to the white boy in the funny T-shirt.
“Dalou, this is Adam, and he’s our new best friend,” Avery said.
Dalou quickly caught on.
The duo followed behind Adam in his pickup with Avery driving. The duration of the ride they were plotting something sinister. They drove deeper into the country area, away from the county.
Dalou looked at Avery and said, “So, we gonna rob dis redneck white boy, right?”
“If he got da right shit. Yeah!”
“What he got?”
“Don’t know yet. We’ll see when we get thurr.”
Both men were anxious. They needed something potent in their systems. They wanted to get high like yesterday. But there was no way they were going to pay for it, especially to some white-trash, redneck white boy in a beat-up truck. To them, he was easy prey. He seemed stupid. He was the perfect mark. The farther they drove away from a heavy populated area, the better it was for them.
Forty minutes after meeting Adam at the gas station, the men were in a place called Finksburg, Maryland. Adam led them to a small, shotgun-looking home somewhere in the backwoods of Maryland. The old house looked like it was about to collapse inwardly on itself. The roof sagged, and the cedar shingles stuck up in places like wonky teeth. There was nothing but trees, high bushes, and dirt roads all around. The front yard of the run-down home was cluttered with old junk cars and outdated machinery that looked over fifty years old. The grass was uncut and unkempt. It was a redneck’s paradise.
Adam climbed out of his pickup, and Avery and Dalou climbed out of their Ford. They looked around.
Dalou joked, “We ain’t in Kansas anymore, huh?”
Avery didn’t find him humorous. He just wanted to get what they came for and leave.
“Y’all gon’ want to meet with my brother, Henry. He has just what y’all boys are lookin’ for,” Adam said.
“Boys?” Dalou repeated, somewhat offended by the word.
“Just chill. We in and we out.”
All three men walked into the house. Inside was even worse than the outside. The furniture was old-fashioned and dusty. The wood floors were creaky and unstable. Inside reeked of cigarettes and garbage. The paint on the walls was chipped, and the windows were falling apart. It was worse than their place in Georgia.
The screen door shut behind Dalou. Adam shouted, “Henry, we have u
s some company.”
The men stood in the living room. They both were armed with pistols and waiting for the right time to make their move. So far, it looked simple—two white boys that wouldn’t even see it coming.
Henry loomed from the kitchen in the back. He was a big boy with swollen arms, dressed in a soiled wife-beater with a hairy torso and a scraggly beard that matched his brother’s.
Henry was tall and looked to weigh close to three hundred pounds. He stared at the two black males in his home and asked his brother, “Adam, who these boys?”
Once again, Dalou felt offended by the use of “boys.” He kept silent, though.
“They’re looking for drugs,” Adam said.
“Drugs?” Henry said, arching his eyebrows.
“They came a long way to score some meth,” Adam said.
Henry looked at them and asked, “Y’all boys smoke meth? Y’all two look more like weedheads to me.”
“We just hurr to score something to get us by and leave,” Avery said.
Slyly, Avery did a once-over of the place. It appeared that Adam and Henry were the only occupants of the house.
“Something to get you boys by, huh?”
“Yeah, something to get us by. We still got a long drive ahead.”
“And do you boys have the cash?”
“First, what ya sellin’?”
“Crystal meth and cocaine.”
“Cocaine,” Avery repeated, shocked that he had some blow. “Coke is A-Okay for us.”
“How much cash?” Henry asked.
Avery pulled out his small wad of bills, which had been dwindling since they’d started their trip. He had about nine hundred dollars on him.
Henry smiled heavily. He had a toothless smile. He stared at Avery, and the two locked eyes with each other. Avery automatically knew that the redneck wasn’t as dimwitted as his younger brother.
“That is a lot of cash. How much you need?”
“Whatever ya got, we’ll take it,” Avery said.
Henry looked at Adam and then said, “Adam, go and get these boys the royal treatment. Them some paying folks.”
Adam nodded and disappeared from the room, while Henry stood around to keep them company.
The House that Hustle Built, Part 3 Page 11