by Kiki Swinson
* * *
When it was time to leave, everybody, including myself, grabbed our things and headed out the front door. I climbed in the back seat with Paul and Jason while Monty and Rich climbed into the front seat. Monty was the driver and Rich rode shotgun. “Y’all niggas ready to get this money?” Rich said with excitement.
“You damn right!” Monty said.
“Sure ’nuff,” I heard Jason say.
“Been ready,” Paul said.
Pretty much everybody in the car was ready to rob Ahmad and his family for every dime they could find. I could hear the greed in their voices. These guys meant business. And there were no ifs, ands, or buts about it.
“Think we might run into some pretty women while we’re there?” Monty asked Rich.
“What’cha trying to get married?” Rich joked.
“Nah, dawg, I just wanna fuck one of them chicks while their husband watches,” Monty replied.
“Damn, nigga, that’s some cold shit right there,” Jason commented.
“Call it what you want. I just wanna show ’em how Americans fuck their bitches,” Monty explained.
Everybody in the car laughed, like Monty had told the funniest joke in the world. Jason and Paul thought it was really funny. “Yo, dude, you say some crazy shit out of your mouth,” Jason told him.
“Yeah, man, you’s a funny nigga!” Paul commented.
“It ain’t like I try to be funny. I just be saying some real shit,” Monty explained to them.
“Look, ain’t nobody fucking nobody’s wife. We’re going in there for two reasons. One is to rob them of all their drugs and their money. And two, to leave no witnesses. Understood?” Rich said.
“Yeah,” Paul said.
“You got it, boss,” Jason said.
“You always gotta take the fun out of stuff,” Monty replied jokingly.
“Look, Monty, I ain’t got time for all that crazy shit. I just want to go in there, do what we got to do, and get out.”
“A’ight, say no more,” Monty said, and then he changed the subject. “I wonder how Mike is doing.”
“I talked to his girl last night.”
“What she say?”
“She said he was doing good. So I asked her if the police had been by there to talk to him yet and she told me no. So I told her, when they do come, to get Mike to tell them that some dude in a black hoodie tried to rob him and shot him,” Rich explained.
“What did she say?”
“She said okay.”
“Did she say when he was getting out?” Monty asked.
“She said she doesn’t know yet.”
Monty paused for a moment and then he said, “I feel so bad I shot that nigga.”
“You should,” Rich said candidly.
“I’ma look out for him after we do this job,” Monty suggested.
“I think it would only be right,” Rich agreed.
“Say no more,” Monty concluded, giving Rich the sign that he was going to look out for Mike when he was paid for his part in the upcoming robbery.
For the rest of the ride, the guys talked about what chicks they fucked, what local dudes were snitching, and how much time the cats they knew were doing in prison. Their conversation topics were dumb and meaningless. The fact that they seemed entertained by it was completely absurd. I swear, if we didn’t hurry up and get to this restaurant, I was going to go fucking crazy in this car.
“Why are you always quiet?” Jason sparked up a conversation with me.
“Because there’s really nothing to talk about,” I answered.
“There’s a lot of stuff we could talk about,” he insisted.
“Well, I guess it may be that way for you, but for me, I can only ask to trade for one thing.”
“She’s blowing you off, dude,” Monty interjected.
“Nigga, mind your business,” Jason replied.
“I think you better listen to Monty,” Paul spoke up.
“Nigga, you need to mind your business too,” Jason told Paul.
Paul and Monty both started chuckling. “Remember, chicks that help you rob the next man ain’t to be trusted,” Monty announced to everyone in the car.
“Yeah, and remember that these are the same people that kidnapped my mama and Rich’s daddy too. They don’t mean shit to me.”
“She got a point there,” Jason commented.
“Nigga, you just agreeing with her because you want to fuck her,” Monty pointed out.
“Why can’t he be agreeing with me because I’m telling the truth and I’m stating facts?”
“Bitch, don’t talk to me. I don’t fuck wit you like that,” Monty hissed at me.
“Damn, dude, you really don’t like her, huh?” Paul chimed in.
“She talks too much,” Monty told him.
“I only talk when I need to,” I interjected. Monty was really starting to get on my damn nerves again. I was trying to hold back, but he was trying my patience.
“Sound like you might have to leave her alone, dude,” Paul chimed in once more.
“Yo, dawg, why don’t you just chill out. I’ve got too much shit going on in my head to be listening to y’all going back and forth with each other. Try to figure out how we gon’ walk away with all this money we about to get,” Rich spoke up.
I was happy that he did speak up, but I was more shocked than anything. I was even more shocked that Monty didn’t say anything back to Rich. I guess he figured that he didn’t want to get on Rich’s bad side. At least while we were on our way to the restaurant. Whatever his reasoning was, it worked out for all parties involved.
* * *
We pulled up to the Indian restaurant a little after nine o’clock. It was Rich’s idea to send Monty, Paul, and Jason into the restaurant to get a table and also to check out the scenery. Rich and I sat in the car and waited for the place to close.
Rich didn’t know this, but I was also watching the scenery out here. Knowing that the DEA are actively investigating Ahmad and his family, I knew I had to look over my shoulders just to make sure that the DEA agents weren’t watching Rich and me on this very night. So far, everything looked cool; I just didn’t know how long it would stay this way.
“I wonder how many people are in there?” Rich blurted out.
“Well, I see four cars, so it can’t be any more than ten to fifteen people in there, and that’s including the staff.”
“I hope you’re right,” he said, and then he fell silent.
I let out a long sigh and said, “I sure hope I get to see my mother tonight. I swear, I miss her so much. I can’t believe that I’ve been able to hold myself together this long.”
I thought Rich would comment about my desire to see my mother, but he didn’t. Once again, he made me painfully aware that he couldn’t care less about whether or not I rescued my mother. This was a reminder that I was on my own.
One by one, the customers started leaving the restaurant. During the departure of the last white couple, Rich and I entered the restaurant and were greeted by an Arab woman dressed in hijab, covering her entire hair and her neck. “Sorry, but we are closed,” she told me. I could tell that she was a woman, in her mid- to late forties.
“Can we get takeout?” Rich chimed in.
“No, I’m sorry it’s too late. Our cook has already started cleaning the kitchen.”
“Do you have anything that’s already cooked? I would take that,” I asked her.
“No, I’m sorry. You’re gonna have to come back tomorrow when we open at eleven.” She stood firm.
Without any warning, Rich pulled out his gun and pointed it directly at the woman. She gasped. “If you scream, I’m gonna kill you,” he threatened her.
“You can have anything you want,” she told him.
“Where’s everybody?” Rich asked her.
“They’re all in the kitchen,” she replied nervously, her voice was cracking.
While Rich had the woman in front of us cornered, Paul, Jason,
and Monty went into the kitchen, where all the other staff members were. I heard a lot of commotion coming from the kitchen. Loud screaming, someone dropping pots and pans, and I even heard two gunshots sound off. Pop! Pop!
I rushed into the kitchen area to see if my mother was back there or hidden in a back office. When I entered into the kitchen, Monty had one Arab dude lying on the floor in front of him, but I could tell that he was dead. The puddle of blood around the area of his chest painted that picture very clear.
Paul and Jason had another older lady and two middle-aged guys facing the wall near the freezer. Monty had Jason grilling them about where they were hiding the money. The woman spoke up and told them that the money they made today was in the back office. She even volunteered to take him back there and give it to him if he promised not to kill anyone else and leave. Monty wasn’t going for it and started cursing the lady out.
“You don’t call no shots, lady! We do!” Monty’s voice boomed.
“What about the drugs? We want them too,” Rich said from behind me. I had no idea he was behind me until he opened his mouth and spoke. The woman that he held his gun on had come into the kitchen with him. She looked scared shitless.
“We have no drugs here. My cousin owned the pharmacy until it was closed down a few days ago,” the woman that Monty had his gun pointed at said.
“How much money do you have here?” Rich asked the same woman.
“Whatever we made today. Every time we close out the register at night, we make our drops to the bank the very next morning,” the woman continued.
“Monty, take her back to that office and get all the dough they got. Jason, take everybody else to the buffet room. Paul, you follow me.” Rich was laying out the instructions.
“Wait!” I shouted to get everyone’s attention. “What about my mother? Ahmad kidnapped my mother and her boyfriend a couple days ago. And I am looking for her. Now, can anyone tell me where she is? Where has Ahmad put her? Where does he have her hiding?” I continued. I desperately needed at least one of them to have the answer to my question.
Everyone looked back and forth at each other. “No, we don’t know where,” one of the guys facing the wall said.
“We don’t know anything about that,” the woman standing next to Rich chimed in.
I stood there, hopeless. “Are you sure? Please tell me,” I begged them all. “I promise I won’t tell the cops on you. I just want my mother. That’s it.”
“No, I’m sorry. We don’t know anything,” the woman standing by Monty replied.
“Tell me, where is Ahmad? Where does he live?” I pressed the issue. I couldn’t let up. Someone was going to answer my questions.
“We don’t know,” the chef said.
“You’re lying. You do know where he is!” I yelled at him. I was losing my patience with these fucking people.
“Look, fuck all that! They said that they don’t know where your mama is. So let it go,” Rich interjected.
“That’s really fucked up. I bet’cha if your mama had been kidnapped by one of these motherfuckers, I bet you’d kill these people on sight,” I argued.
“You damn right I would. But you ain’t me. They said they don’t know where homeboy is or your mama, so let’s move on,” Rich stated, and then he turned his focus back toward the staff of the restaurant. “I gave everybody instructions, now let’s get to it,” Rich concluded, and then he headed out of the kitchen.
Instead of following Rich to the buffet area, I followed Monty and that woman to the back office. When we got back there, she walked straight to a desk in the corner. She walked around it and pulled the top left drawer and grabbed a stack of bills. After she handed the bills to Monty, he noticed that there was a safe in the far left corner of the office. “Why the fuck didn’t you tell me that there was a safe in here?” he wanted to know. He was not a happy camper.
“No money in there,” the Arab woman told him.
“Don’t fucking lie to me. Open it up!” he roared. While the woman crawled down onto the floor to open the safe, I started searching through important documents that would list any and all real estate properties owned by Ahmad’s family. I figured by doing so, I would find a possible location of where they could be hiding my mother.
“I told you there was no money in here,” I heard the woman say.
“What’s all that paperwork in there?” Monty asked her.
My back was facing them both at this point. I was more focused on trying to find something that would help me find out where my mother was.
I heard the woman rattling pieces of paper. “It’s just our stock accounts,” she said.
By this time, I had turned around and was now facing them both. Monty had snatched the documents out of the woman’s hand and had started looking them over. “Are those bank statements?” I asked him, hoping he’d say yes. This way, I’d find out that there was a house address on the statement, and that would be where my mother was.
“Nah, it says Fisher Investments. Looks like they got stocks and bonds,” Monty told me.
“What does the home address say on it?” I asked him, and began to walk in his direction.
“It says 7113 Wisconsin Avenue, Bethesda, Maryland,” he read.
“That’s probably where the head mafia family lives,” I replied.
“Might be. But it ain’t got no money attached to it, so it does me no good,” he said, and then he flung the papers across the desk. “I know y’all got more money somewhere else. Now tell me where it is, or I’m going to kill everyone in here,” Monty threatened her.
“My husband has money at our house.”
“How much?”
“Maybe thirty-five to forty thousand dollars.”
“Well, let’s go,” he continued, and then he grabbed her by the arm and escorted her to the buffet area, which was where everyone else was. I followed.
“What’cha find?” Rich asked as soon as Monty, myself, and the woman reappeared.
“Looks like a grand, if that. But after she gave it to me, she said that she and her husband got money at their crib,” Monty stated.
“How much?” Rich wanted to know.
“She said that they got about forty thousand.”
“What we waiting for? Let’s get out of this place,” Rich instructed us.
“What are we going to do about these people?” Monty asked.
“Kill everybody but the chick that’s riding with us to her house,” Rich said, and he said it like he had no respect for humanity.
Before I could digest what Rich had just said, every one of the restaurant workers started whining and crying. “No, please don’t kill us,” one woman begged.
“Sir, please don’t kill us. We promise that we won’t call the police. Just let us go.” I watched the chef plead for his life.
“Yes, we promise not to call the police. We have children. Please . . .” Another one of the workers started sobbing.
“All y’all just shut the fuck up!” Rich shouted.
The woman that we were taking with us started crying too. “I told you that I will give you all the money at our home if you don’t kill my family. I won’t do it if you kill them,” she challenged Monty.
Monty smacked her hard. Pop! The woman stumbled, almost losing her balance. “Don’t you ever tell me what you’re going to do. Me and that man over there, we’re in charge, and we get the last word around here,” Monty explained to the woman while pointing at Rich.
“You keep your hands off my wife!” a man roared from the floor. Rich had everyone lying flat on the floor with their faces turned to the right side. At this angle, the guy was able to see his wife getting smacked by Monty.
Monty walked over to the man and kicked him in his leg. “What’cha just say to me?” Monty tested him. Everybody in the room had heard the man; Monty heard him too. I think he wanted the man to repeat himself, to prove a point.
“Don’t touch my wife anymore,” the same guy said.
After he made it clear to Monty that he wanted him to keep his hands off his wife, Monty felt disrespected by the guy and made an example of him. Without saying another word, Monty drew his pistol and shot the guy in his head, execution style. Boom! Blood spewed from the man’s head like a running faucet. Both of the Arab women cried out. “Noooo!” the guy’s wife screamed, and ran to her husband’s side. “Wake up, Faheem! Wake up!” She wept as she tried to lift his head up from the floor.
“Get that bitch under control!” Rich roared.
Monty snatched her up from the floor. “Shut that crying shit up!” Monty lashed out at her.
“Get your hands off her,” the other guy yelled from the floor. He attempted to get up, but Paul aimed his gun at him and shot him twice. Blood started oozing from his head.
The only person left alive on the floor was the other Arab woman. She cried the entire time while members of her family were being killed right before her. Rich instructed everyone to exit the restaurant and that we would head over to the house where the money was. But before anyone could leave the room, Paul asked what they were going to do with the lady that was still alive on the floor. Rich looked at Paul and told him to kill her. So that’s what Paul did. He shot her in her head at point-blank range. Boom!
25
LIVE BY THE GUN
I can’t believe that I was one step closer to finally seeing my mother. I didn’t care that I would only get to spend a few minutes with her before I traded my life for hers. All I wanted to do was see her one last time. Look into her eyes and tell her how much I loved her and how I appreciated everything she has done for me, even if I hadn’t projected it that way. She was still my mother, and I loved her.