CHAPTER 15
“So I was tellin’ her – bitch, if ya ain’t gonna pay, then get down on your knees and suck this dick.”
The glass chandelier rattled slightly at the sudden peals of laughter. There were about five men sitting around a table filled with bottles and empty glasses. A few beer cans were lying under the table, alongside the two men who’d had a little too much alcohol. The remaining ones were discussing their latest affairs, counting their money, and laughing at the occasional jokes.
All in all, it was a pretty chill evening in one of Malik’s houses on South 16th Street. The crew liked to call it, The Pit.
Suddenly, a loud bang at the door interrupted their laughter.
“Who the fuck is it?” one of the men asked, cocking his gun.
No answer.
They all looked at each other and then back to the exit, most of them having their guns ready.
“If ya don’t answer,” the same man continued, “we’ll come out and pop a cap in yo ass.”
Still no reply. They got tense. They knew that whenever one of their men would visit the house, he wouldn’t even bother knocking. He’d just come in, toss his gun on the table and grab a beer or whatever. As for Malik, that couldn’t have been him either. He had gone to Atlantic City to sort out some business.
Before they knew it, the door slammed into the wall, and five armed men stormed in. Their bullets were useless against the heavily protected intruders who didn’t waste a second and started shooting each and every one of Malik’s hustlas.
“Shoot on sight,” Brandon had told his men as they had been waiting for his orders. “Leave no motherfucker alive, be it man or woman.”
He was pleased to see that they had listened to him. After a few moments, the men were dead and the ones who had been lying under the table were executed while unconscious.
Once they made sure everything was safe, they took off their helmets and went to search the house. All except for Brandon who took a seat at the round table, grabbing all the money in front of him. A cigar was still lit and he took a puff. Cuban, he thought, blowing out the thick smoke. Good shit.
“How much?” Chris asked, nudging one of the bodies with his foot.
“About 30 grand. We’ll split, as always.”
Chris nodded. Despite everything, he loved working for Brandon. Not only did he get his salary at the precinct, but any money they found in the drug houses was theirs to keep. He made more cash over the last few months than he did in his whole life so far. And he was going to make damn sure that Brandon was going to keep his job as long as possible.
~~~~
Finally back home, Malik was lying in bed, an open book by his side and a glass of Rémy on his nightstand. He was about to fall asleep when his phone rang. Recognizing the name of one of his men, he didn’t want to answer at first. But after seeing how it stopped ringing, it started up again, he finally picked up.
“Malik, man,” Meek spoke in a grave tone. “It’s bad. Really, really bad.”
He knew what he meant before he even told him.
“Where?”
“The Pit. Look, man, I’m at your place right now, parked. Come down and let’s go there together, a’ight?”
With a deep sigh, he got up and threw on a white tshirt and some jeans. He grabbed his piece out the drawer and tucked it beneath his belt at his back. What a fuckin’ mood killer. Sometimes he wished he could just give it all up and go live down south somewhere. No one would know him. Just him, his woman and his kid, all alone and free to live any way he wanted.
He looked through the window and saw the blue BMW parked in front of his house. He grabbed his hat and headed out the door, careful not to wake Terry. Down stairs, Meek’s grim face when he got in the car didn’t do him much good either.
“What happened?” Malik asked as they drove off.
“They raided The Pit,” he spat through his teeth. “Killed all the men there and took the cash again.”
“Impossible. I had a man in the precinct. He gave me info. He would’ve told me!”
“Ya talkin’ about Drake?” Meek asked, his eyes narrowing. “Ya actually thought that coke head nigga could be trusted?”
Malik sighed, rubbing his face. He was tired.
“I had my reasons. I know for sure he’d never betray me. Have you gone by The Pit?”
“Nah, man,” he shook his head. “Had no business there and it was way too far from my usual working spot. I just found out from Trev.”
“Trev, huh?” Malik snorted. “How do you know HE can be trusted?”
“Look, man, this ain’t a good time to start doubting each other. You trust your man and I trust mine, ya feel me?”
Malik shrugged. Meek was right. That shit didn’t really matter at the moment.
“There it is,” the man said, pulling over the car in The Pit’s driveway. It looked bad already. The door was wide open and his men’s cars were still parked around the house. When he walked into the main hall, he stared at the blood-soaked floor, a few of his men lying there with their eyes wide open.
He knelt next to a bigger-looking guy named Cash, a wave of anger washing over him as he gently closed the dead man’s eyes. He had been one of the good ones. He was only doing what he needed to make sure his wife and four sons had everything they needed. He remembered how he used to show everyone pictures of them in their school uniforms, telling them how they got the highest grades in the class, and how proud he was of them.
And now the poor kids lost their only support. He thought about how they would probably be forced to move into the projects once the last of their money was spent. Malik punched the floor, blinking away the painful thoughts.
“Man, you gotta see this,” Meek called to him from the living room.
As soon as he walked into the living, he froze. In the middle of the room, tied to a chair, was Drake Moore, his inside man. His face was bloody and bruised. You could tell someone worked him over with a knife all across his shoulders, arms and legs. He was completely naked, the word SNITCH carved into the flesh of his chest.
“Ya think our men did this?”
Malik shook his head.
“Nah. We don’t do this shit to our people,” he sighed, grabbing one of the curtains to cover Drakes’ body. “We just shoot and bury. This is the work of a fuckin’ psychopath.”
“What do we do with the bodies and the house? This spot is hot now,” said Meek.
Brandon turned away from the man tied to the chair and headed for the door.
“Burn it!”
~~~~
The second they left The Pit, Malik ordered for all his gang leaders to gather to The Unit. The Unit was a warehouse he owned and used to store his merchandise and money. He didn’t trust banks because they asked too many questions.
It took them all about an hour to arrive. Seeing them all around the big table, Malik couldn’t help but feel bad for them. He didn’t tell them why they were there and they looked worried.
“We secure down stairs?” he asked, causing everyone to quiet down.
He got nods of approval from several men.
Rock walked in and stood by Brandon, Rich and Meek. The four of them were the foundation of the business with Malik at the head.
“We good Malik,” Rich replied in a deadly tone. “I brought six of my beasts along and they at the doors.” Rich always looked mad at the world. His face was covered in tear drops and everyone knew what they meant. They knew to keep their distance from him.
“Why ya bring us here, anyway?” Rock asked. “I got better shit to do.” Rock had a scar that started from his forehead and ended right under his left eye. It was also the reason he was blind in that eye and it had turned gray. The men called him Rock because he’d lost the eye during a fight. His opponent had hit him with a sharp rock, yet he didn’t live to brag about it.
A few men muttered the same question under their breath, but not too loud to draw Malik’s attention.
He decided he should get straight to the point. There was no need to waste anyone’s time. “Cause in case ya haven’t heard our houses are being raided by the police. The most recent was The Pit. They hit that not too long ago and they killed all the men there. They also tortured and killed my snitch too, so he wasn’t involved.”
“Then we gotta do something,” another man shouted. He was young and thin, but that didn’t stop him from making a name for himself as the Cutter. One could understand why he was called that once they saw what he could do with a simple knife. “We can’t let them think they can fuck with us and get away with it!”
“I thought ya were paying the sheriff good money to keep his people away from us,” Rock spoke. “Does he wanna die?”
“I think they’re acting on their own. They work under the police, but they aren’t really controlled by them,” said Malik.
“Who are they?” Rich asked. He was ready to knock some heads.
Malik shook his head.
“I’ve no fuckin’ idea yet. That’s why I asked y’all to come. I want y’all to plant cameras all around your houses. We gotta find out who the fuck they are and deal with’em.”
“A’ight,” Cutter nodded. “But what’s gonna stop them from running down on us again?”
Malik thought for a minute. “Keep the houses guarded inside and out, but don’t make it too obvious. And for fuck’s sake, do your men really need to spread out the cash like that? Count it and store it. That’s it. I better not see another mother fucker posting shit on the Gram or the Book with my money around them or they're dead,” he said angrily.
There were no other protests from his men and the room was quiet.
“I’ll take your silence as you understanding me,” he said standing up. “Cameras, guards, count and then store. Get drunk and laid afterwards. We gon’ catch these motherfuckers if it’s the last thing we do.”