Gena shook her head and then burst into tears. “It’s too much, you know. I’m just going through it. You just don’t know what I’m going through.”
“What’s the matter?” Rik asked.
“Markita, my friend, something bad happened to her.”
“What’s going on?”
“She’s dead. I just found her body,” Gena blurted out. Her tears fell more rapidly.
Rik wrapped his arms around her. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”
Gena wrapped her arms around Rik and began bawling. “And Gah Git, my grandmom, someone beat her and raped her, Rik. She’s still in the hospital. And my cousin Gary tried to save her, and the guy shot Gary, and Bria’s boyfriend.”
“Who?”
Gena shook her head. “I don’t know. He’s trying to kill me. They all said the same thing, that this guy is looking for me.”
Rik pulled her close and walked her into the motel room. He shut the door and locked it. “Gena, what’s going on? Why would someone be trying to kill you?”
Again, she shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“You have no idea?”
Gena shook her head. “I don’t even know what he looks like. He just showed up one day asking where I was and started attacking people.”
“But why you? Why now? Why all of a sudden? What do you have that he would want?”
Gena pulled away. “I don’t know, Rik! He just showed up. Why are you questioning me like this?”
“Gena, you offered me a lot of money when I was in jail.”
“So?”
“Is he after the money?”
Gena shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“Where did you get that kinda money?” Rik asked. “And be honest with me, Gena.”
“What does it matter where the money comes from? What difference does it make?” Gena lifted the plastic bag and tossed it to Rik. “Here’s the money you asked me for.”
She turned and headed for the door. Rik grabbed her.
“Gena, did you find Qua’s money?”
“Rik, let go of me!” Gena yanked her arm away and unlocked the door. Rik pulled her back.
“Gena, do you have Quadir’s money?” Rik asked more forcefully.
“Rik, let me go! What the hell is wrong with you?”
Rik slung Gena back onto the bed. Gena fell onto the bed and rolled off onto the floor. This shit can’t be happening again. Not again; not Rik! She rose and charged at Rik, digging her nails into his eyes. Rik howled, pulled her hands out of his face, and backhanded her. Gena stumbled back a few steps, then raced for the door. This time, she was able to get it open before he grabbed her.
“Help me!” Gena screamed. “Somebody help me!”
“Shut up and just tell me where the rest of the money is,” Rik shouted. He slung Gena onto the bed and tried to kick the motel room’s door closed. The door flew back open. Rik turned to see what was blocking the door. Quadir was standing in the doorway.
Rik’s eyes bulged from their sockets and he backed up into the room.
Gena jumped onto Rik’s back. He flipped her off him onto the floor.
“Son of a bitch!” Gena shouted. She spat at Rik, missing him by a couple of feet.
“Now, now, Rik. Is that any way to treat a lady?” Quadir asked. He leaned forward and helped Gena up. “Especially your best friend’s girl?”
Rik reached for his weapon, but Quadir already had his drawn.
“Uh-uh, don’t even think about it,” Quadir told him, pointing his Glock at his friend.
“You sorry muthafucka!” Gena tried to go at Rik again, but Quadir held her back.
“Quadir, what the fuck is going on here?” Rik asked nervously. “What the fuck’s going on? This ain’t right, man. This shit ain’t right.”
“What’s not right is trying to rob Gena for my dough, nigga. Now, that ain’t right,” Quadir told him.
“Qua, man, this is some twisted shit. I saw you, Ock. I went to your funeral. I was a pallbearer. This ain’t no real shit.”
Quadir nodded. “Oh, yeah, I’m real all right, which is a whole lot more than I can say about you, Ock.”
Rik shook his head. “Man, you not understanding. I’m doing bad, Qua. Them Santero motherfuckers is going to kill me, man. If I don’t give them they bread by yesterday, I’m a dead man.”
Gena tried to spit on Rik again. “I was going to give you the money, you son of a bitch!”
“This ain’t enough, Gena!”
“I woulda given you anything you asked for!” Gena shouted.
“So, you were going to do Gena in?” Quadir asked. “Instead of being a brother to her, and protecting her, and helping her, you were going to kill her and take the money that I left for her? Damn, nigga, that’s some fucked-up shit. I can’t believe you.”
Tears fell from Rik’s eyes. “Quadir, you were dead! And she had already moved on! She moved right on to the next dope boy. She wasn’t coming around us no more; she wasn’t being part of the family! She started fucking with that same nigga that did you! What the fuck, Qua? She wasn’t family no more, and she had betrayed you with them Junior Mafia muthafuckas!”
“Regardless, you ready to kill her, Rik?” Quadir asked.
“She betrayed you, Ock! For all we know, she set you up for them niggas! She could have been setting you up the whole time! Qua, she’s brand-new to the game! But me and you, we go back to the sandbox, homie! It was us who used to be break dancing up in my yard on cardboard boxes; it was us who got our first piece together! It’s me, black.”
The three of them turned toward the window when they saw the flashing red and blue lights outside. Gena raced to the window and peered outside. The patrolman was walking into the motel room office.
“It’s just one car,” Gena told him. “Somebody probably called about the disturbance.”
“I got a plan, Quadir,” Rik told him. “I got a connect who’s willing to send us so much snow, it’ll be like January the whole year around. All I need is the money to square up what I owe. After that, they cut on the faucet, and the dope runs like water. We just set up another crew and rake in the bread.”
Quadir clasped Gena’s hand and shook his head. “Thanks, but no thanks.”
“Quadir, what is you doing? I need that money!” Rik shouted.
Gena lifted the bag of money off the floor.
“Don’t tell me you not down, Quadir. I know you, nigga, I know how you get down for that paper, homie. Come on, baby boy, ride with me. I’m your brother, Ock. You gonna let me die, Qua? What part of the game is that?” asked Rik, not realizing that Quadir was going to murder him himself.
“Qua, we gotta go,” Gena said softly. She pulled him toward the door.
“Whatever happened to being true to that game?” Rik shouted.
Gena opened the motel room door.
“I need that money, Qua!”
“Rik, don’t.”
“I need that money!”
“Rik, don’t!”
“I need that fucking money!” Rik reached for his weapon.
Quadir squeezed the trigger of his weapon several times, sending Rik flying back onto the bed. Just as the gunshots rang through the silent night air, the officer ran out of the motel office. Gena yanked him out of the motel room, and they raced through the parking lot toward her car. The officer spotted them, Gena with a bag of drug money and Quadir with a loaded weapon in his hand.
“No, we’ll never make it past that cop!” Quadir shouted. He yanked her in the opposite direction. “My car is parked around back!”
“Freeze!” yelled the officer, and without hesitation began shooting at his runaway targets. What the fuck? This guy is trying to kill me, not capture me, Quadir thought as a bullet skimmed right by him. He could feel the bullets in the air zooming by him as he made his escape. As they made their way through the dark parking lot, they wove and ducked as the officer aimed directly for them.
Quadir and Gena raced around the rear of the motel, disappearing as the police officer ran over to his squad car and yelled through the radio for backup.