She coughed and gulped in air. “It’s not mine, Miamor… I’m good.”
I helped her to her feet and retrieved our guns.
The girl who had saved me was cutting the ties from her friends’ hands.
“Thanks,” I said as I looked her in the eye. I had every intention of killing them when I came into the room, but after what she had done, I knew that I couldn’t go through with it.
“I hope you bitches don’t think that y’all are getting what’s in they pockets. This was our lick in the first place,” the girl I had smacked spoke up. “I tried to tell your ass there was a nigga in the bathroom,” she said as she rubbed the side of her face and ice-grilled me. “Now you mu’fuckas done fucked up our money. We won’t be able to get back to the nigga house to hit the safe. It was a hundred thousand in that bitch.”
“One-hundred-thousand dollars?” Anisa asked.
“Yeah, bitch, a hunnid stacks,” the girl shot back.
“If we can take you to the safe, we split the money five ways,” Anisa said.
“Bitch, you killed everybody who knew the combo! Crazy ass bitches!” the same girl yelled.
“Bitch, I ain’t gone be too many more of your bitches,” I said seriously. “Now, can we discuss this somewhere else, before the police come in here and arrest all of us?”
I took a pillowcase off of the bed and tossed my gun inside. I then held it out for the three girls. I knew they were strapped, because the one who had helped me had pulled her gun from nowhere. “We don’t know y’all like that. As long as we talking about getting this money, ain’t nobody carrying burners,” I said. Each of the three girls put their guns inside, and then Anisa followed suit. They reluctantly followed us to our car.
The guy in the trunk kicked and screamed when he heard us start the car. The three girls were in the backseat.
“What the fuck type of shit is y’all into? Y’all got niggas in the trunk?” one of them asked. I looked at them in the rearview, but didn’t respond. We were all silent as we drove to a twenty-four-hour diner, where we came to some type of agreement regarding the money in the safe. Anisa and I didn’t say anything about what we had been paid to do. They didn’t need to know all of that. We just wanted our piece of their pie.
Robyn was the leader of their clique it seemed, and also the one I had smacked. Beatrice was a dark-skinned, weave wearing ghetto chick. I couldn’t read the two of them very well at first, but I was instantly endeared to the third girl, Aries. She was the one who had saved my life that night.
After getting to know one another, we led the girls back out to the deserted parking lot. It was the middle of the night and there was no one around, so we popped the trunk. We all burst out laughing when we saw the dude curled up like a bitch. He was so scared that he had pissed on himself.
“Damn! Me can’t believe me was actually going to give chu some,” Aries stated.
We all pulled our guns back out of the pillowcase since a low level of trust had been established. Aries pointed her gun at the dude. “Get chu bitch ass out de trunk,” she said. The dude climbed out and stared at the five of us standing around him with pistols in our hand. “Chu going to lead us to Benny Dough’s house, and chu going to help us crack de safe,” Aries instructed.
The guy didn’t respond, so Anisa cocked her gun, putting one in the chamber and pointed it at him. “Get in the car.”
Twenty minutes later, we were pulling up to a two story suburban home. “Who else lives here?” I asked.
“Nobody,” the dude responded wearily.
I turned around to look him in the eye. I knew he was afraid. I could hear the fear in his voice. “Remember that daughter you were talking about earlier. Don’t be stupid. We just want the money,” I explained.
He nodded his head and then led us into the house. The guy reached under a flowerpot and grabbed the spare key, then opened the door. He had five bitches with attitudes on his ass, so he knew not to make a bad move. He led the way up the stairs to one of the bedrooms, then removed a painting from the wall.
“What’s the combo?” Beatrice asked.
“I don’t know the combination to that man’s safe,” the guy protested.
I knew he was lying when he said it, so I shot him without hesitation. I was tired of playing games.
“Aghh!” he screamed in agony as he dropped to the floor and held onto his bleeding foot.
“If you want to keep the other one, start talking,” I instructed.
“Ha! Bitch, you really are crazy as hell!” Beatrice laughed out in amusement as she watched the dude hold his foot and cry in excruciation. “I’d fuck with her all day! That bitch ain’t scared to do shit!” she said, meaning it as a compliment.
“Thirty-four, twenty-three, ten!” he yelled. “Fuck!” His screams of pain echoed throughout the house.
Anisa tried the set of numbers and smiled as she opened the safe. “Oh shit!” she exclaimed. “This looks like more than a hundred thou.”
As soon as I saw the money stacks sitting in the safe, I pulled the trigger on that nigga. He had seen my face, and there was no way I could send him home to his daughter in any other way except for in a box. To my surprise, he got hit with three more bullets as well, because as soon as I withdrew, so did Aries, Beatrice, and Robyn. We filled him with lead, filled our pockets with paper, and disappeared into the night.
We all headed back to my apartment, where we decided we wouldn’t spend any money until we heard what the streets would say about the murders. Since we didn’t know one another, we all wanted to be in each other’s presence to make sure nobody fucked up and got loose lips.
Chapter Thirteen
I woke up early the next day and maneuvered silently throughout the apartment. I didn’t want to wake Anisa or the new tagalong bitches we had picked up the night before. I didn’t know Robyn, Aries, and Beatrice, but I was grateful that they were there. Things could have gone real bad for us last night, I thought as I shuddered at the thought of how close I had come to death. If it had not been for them, Anisa and I would have both been taking dirt naps, despite that fact I still did not trust them. Respect them, yes… trust them, hell no!
I thought that my heart would be full of dread, but strangely, my conscience wasn’t phased by what I had done the night before. It was like the higher my body count rose, the less it affected me. I was choosing to become a killer. I had made the decision to pick up where Murder left off, all in the pursuit of the American dream, and there was no turning back. It’s just business, I told myself as I made my way to my car.
My black skinny jeans looked as if they were painted on, and the white Marc Jacobs blouse revealed my cleavage and jewels. The white peep-toe Prada heels I wore completed my outfit as I climbed into my car and peeled out of the parking lot. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going, not even Anisa. I knew she’d hit the roof if I told her I was going to see Murder, but I had to check on him. Plus, I thought he deserved a cut of the money we’d made last night. I promised myself that I would keep money on his commissary and put the rest of his cut aside until he got out.
I couldn’t understand how it was so easy for Anisa to move on and just forget about all that Murder had done for her, because in the short year that I had known him, he would always be a part of me. I had feelings for him. If it wasn’t for him, I would have been locked up. Instead, he took the heat, and I felt fucked up because I was just getting around to visiting him. My bone-straight wrap and Chinese bangs ruffled as the wind whipped through my hair. I hoped I wasn’t making the trip for nothing. I didn’t even know if I was listed on his visitor’s log, but it was a chance I was willing to take.
I hit a department store first and picked up items that I thought Murder might need; a small care package that could hold him over for a while. Then taking the BQE toward Queens, I exited at Astoria Boulevard, then followed the city blocks until I hit Hazen Street. When I arrived at Riker’s parking lot, I stepped out of the car with the box of personal items in my hands as I made my way to the bus that was traveling over the bridge to the facility.