Chapter 8
“Well, ain’t you just the smoothest nigga I done ever laid eyes on!”
Caesar found himself grinning when his cousin Niles got into the BMW. Niles was only two years older than him and was known for talking mess. A brown corduroy cabbie hat rested on top of his short ’fro, and he wore the matching brown bell bottoms. Niles was what men would call a high yella Negro and what the girls would call “dreamy.” He had a muscular build and was a damned good shot. The two of them tried to keep each other out of trouble as much as possible.
“Seat belt,” Caesar said before he pulled away from in front of Niles’s home.
“Oh, yeah, I heard about ya run-in with the law. You on the straight and narrow now, is that it?” Niles poked fun at him.
“You won’t be talking all that shit if I get into an accident and you fly through this window, will you?”
“Hell no, nigga! I’d be dead!” Niles said seriously, and Caesar laughed again. “But no, seriously, cousin, what the fuck?”
“Man, I got caught slipping.”
“Kings don’t get caught slipping. What happened?”
“It was that motherfucka Gerald. He set me up. That bastard was working with the Feds.”
“See! See! What the hell did I tell you?”
“You know what you told me.”
“Nah, nah. I wanna hear you say it. What the fuck did I tell you?”
“You told me Gerald wasn’t no good.”
“Exactly. I know a dirty-ass motherfucka when I see one. But the good thing is you’re out.”
“You know my pops came to the rescue.”
“I know that’s right. Learn from that lesson, Caes man. I know you wanna see everybody eat and all, but some motherfuckas you gotta just give scraps to.”
“I hear you.”
“But do you really?”
“I hear you!”
“A’ight, man. I don’t got time for ya daddy to be comin’ and tryin’a ram his size eleven up my ass because of some shit you did.”
“Man, shut up. Did he tell you all the details about what we’re doing today?”
“Yup. I know exactly where we’re goin’, too. I’m the one who dropped the coke off to Raymond.”
“And who the fuck is Raymond anyway?” Caesar asked, scrunching his face up. “And why haven’t I ever heard of him?”
“You have. You just don’t know him as Raymond. You know him as Money Man.”
“Shut the fuck up. Money Man owes us fifty?”
“Fifty,” Niles confirmed, shaking his head. “He was supposed to run that shit to the buyer and bring back the money. But somehow the money and the drugs are MIA.”
Money Man had been doing business with the Kings for some years. He had even brought them a few of their best customers. He was a corporate man, but Caesar had only gotten to know him by his alias in their dealings together. He worked for some pharmaceutical company, which was how he was able to connect them with clients.
“Let’s hope he has a real good explanation behind all of this.”
“Fuck an explanation. He better have the money or the drugs when we get there, or it’s lights out for Money Man.”
Caesar nodded his head in agreement. Niles directed him the rest of the way until they reached a high-rise condo. They parked on the street outside of it, and Caesar looked up.
“What floor?” he asked.
“Tenth.”
“You sure he’s in there? If I owed somebody fifty thousand and they knew where I lived, I for damn sure wouldn’t come home.”
“That slimy bastard has been doing his best to duck us, but one of my guys said they saw him come home last night.”
“Okay then, let’s boogie.” Caesar reached across to the glove compartment and pulled out a revolver pistol. He checked to make sure it was loaded before tucking it under his jacket and into his pants.
When they got out of the car, the two men got a lot of stares from the women walking up and down the sidewalk. There was one in particular who was eyeing Niles down. She was cute and wore a straight wig that was flipped at the ends. In her hands were bags, indicating that she was out on a shopping spree. But the way she was looking at Niles, she was out looking for more than just clothes and shoes. She licked her lips at him and made a “come here” motion with her finger.
“Look at that fine thang right there. I would let her eat this dick all up,” Niles said, winking at her.
“That’s not what we’re here for.”
“I know, nigga. I can look though, can’t I?”
They got to the revolving doors of the condo and stepped inside. The doorman was busy giving a tenant a package and didn’t even notice them slide by to the elevators. Niles pressed the button for the tenth floor, and up they went.
“Did your people say if Money Man was by himself?”
“No, why?”
“Because if you owed the most dangerous man in New York fifty thousand dollars, would you be alone?”
“I didn’t think of that.”
“Of course you didn’t. Be ready for anything.”
When the elevator let them off, Caesar followed Niles to a door in the middle of the wide hallway. Niles motioned silently at the door, and Caesar nodded. He looked over his shoulder before drawing his gun and waited for Niles’s knuckles to hit the door.
Knock! Knock!
When they heard footsteps approach, they both stepped out of the way of the peephole.
“Who’s there?” The voice was gruff, and Caesar didn’t recognize it.
“Is Raymond here?” Niles asked.
“Whose askin’?”
“I’m Bill, his neighbor from down the hall,” Niles said in his best Caucasian hippie imitation. “I heard he was who to come to for pills and shit, man. But if he doesn’t want my money—”
The door unlocked before Niles even finished speaking, and a big white man revealed himself. Once the entrance was big enough to go through, Caesar shoved his gun in the man’s face and ran inside the condo. Niles moved quickly behind him, aiming his pistol at the rest of the house.
“Hands where I can see them, motherfuckas, or I’ma turn you all into spaghetti!” Niles shouted.
The three men sitting in the all-white living room stopped and put their hands in the air. The blunt that was in rotation fell to the floor. Caesar pushed his man against the wall and snatched the firearm from his hip, tucking it into his own pants. Feeling that he might prove to be a problem, Caesar took the liberty of hitting him hard in the temple with the revolver, knocking him out cold.
“He’s in here,” Niles called over his shoulder to Caesar.
After Caesar made sure the front door was locked, he stepped over the unconscious man and went to the living room. Sure enough, there was Money Man looking like a million bucks. His hair was combed back, and he was dressed in a Versace suit and had two gold rings on his right hand. The sight of Caesar brought the most uneasy look to Money Man’s face.
“Money Man, just the person I came to see. Niles, check them all for guns,” Caesar instructed.
Caesar aimed his weapon at them and watched like a hawk for even a twitch while Niles disarmed them. When all their weapons were placed on the kitchen table a ways away, Niles came back and stood next to him. It was then that Caesar took notice of the stacks of money on the glass coffee table in front of the men, along with lines of cocaine and weed.
“Caesar, man. I was coming to see Cassius today to drop off his money.”
“Is that right? Because it looks like you were smoking and having a good time to me. What you think, Niles?”
“I’m thinking that better either be our money or coke on this here table,” Niles answered.
“What happened Money Man? You were supposed to drop that off for us, but we haven’t heard from you. Did you even take it to Rochester like you were supposed to?”
“Of course I did,” Money Man answered.
“Okay, that’s one mystery solved. Now on to the next. Where’s our fucking money?”
“Caesar, listen, I was going to bring you your money. I swear,” Money Man said, putting his palms up.
“Then explain why you have all this muscle around you. You’ve never had security before. Why now?”
“Because he knew we were gonna come for his ass, that’s why,” Niles said.
“What happened, Money Man?” Caesar inquired again.
Money Man looked from one gun to the other before he groaned loudly. “All right, all right. I fucked up, okay? I fucked up.”
“So you didn’t drop the drugs off?”
“No, I did. But when I got all that money in my hands, I went a little wild. That’s all.”
“You spent it?”
“A little of it.”
“Okay, so how much is left?”
“That.” Money Man slowly looked at the money on the coffee table.
“You gotta be fuckin’ kiddin’ me!” Niles exclaimed. “Motherfucka, that don’t look to be more than ten thousand dollars.”
“It’s almost twenty. I’ll get the thirty for you.”
Caesar took a deep breath and blew the air out through his mouth. His head fell back for a second, and he tried to calm the sea of anger about to surface. He wished Money Man had told him something other than what he just had.
“You’ve been doing business with us all this time. Why would you fuck up now?”
“Cassius never gave me a job this big before.”
“He thought you had proved yourself trustworthy. That word, trust. He’s very big on that. Especially since he doesn’t give his away easily.”
“I might have gone a little overboard, but—”
“A little? You spent thirty thousand fucking dollars! And cut the bullshit. You weren’t planning on paying us back. If you were, you would have done it by now.”
“What you wanna do with this sorry-ass piece of shit, Caes?” Niles asked.
“The same thing we do to any other snake that slithers its way into our garden. Cut its head off.”
Caesar had every intention of putting a bullet in Money Man’s skull right then and there, but he noticed one of the other men make a move for his ankle. He pulled out a small handgun and was fixing to aim it at an unsuspecting Niles. Caesar had to react fast. He averted his aim from Money Man and shot his accomplice in his temple. The man’s head snapped to the side, but it was just the diversion the other accomplice needed to tackle Caesar to the ground. Niles tried to shoot him, but Money Man punched him in the face.
The man on top of Caesar knocked the revolver away and wrapped his hands around Caesar’s neck. Gasping for air, Caesar reached for his pocket and withdrew a small switchblade from it. His strength was leaving him, but he used the last of it to shove the knife into the man’s red neck. He collapsed, choking on his own blood, and Caesar stood rockily to his feet, trying to catch his breath. When he did, he saw Niles and Money Man in the middle of a full-on fist fight. Caesar spotted his revolver and picked it up. The moment he got a clear shot, he took it. The bullet lodged itself in Money Man’s skull and made him drop instantly.
“Man! What you do that for? I was whoopin’ his ass!” Niles exclaimed.
“No, you were wasting time. Grab that money. We gotta go. I’m sure one of the neighbors heard the gunshots!”
* * *
Niles came back to the King mansion with Caesar. Caesar didn’t know if his father had returned home yet, but just in case he had, he didn’t want to be alone in telling him the news about Money Man. Cassius was never happy about losing money. But at least that time it hadn’t been a mistake made on Caesar’s part. He also knew Cassius would be happy to learn that Money Man was dead. He wasn’t the type of man who would let someone redeem themselves after wronging him. Once you proved yourself disloyal, that was all she wrote.
“You boys want some lunch?” Martina asked when they came into the kitchen.
“Yes, please. I’m starvin’!” Niles told her, leaning on the island. He turned to Caesar, who had taken a seat on a barstool next to him. “And you think you’re slick comin’ here instead of takin’ me home.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Caesar feigned innocence.
“Nigga, please. Didn’t I just tell you earlier that I don’t want ya daddy’s foot up my ass? He’s gon’ be pissed off when we tell him this shit!”
“Y’all know I don’t like all that cursing in my kitchen, now!” Martina chastised, pointing a spatula their way.
“I’m sorry, Miss Martina,” Niles said, trying to offer her a smile, but she squinted her eyes at him. He turned back to Caesar with wide eyes and whispered, “She used to be nice.”
“She still is. I just don’t think she likes you.”
“Whatever, man. Where is Cassius anyways?”
“I don’t know. He said he had some business to handle. I’m sure he’ll be back soon enough.”
The phone on the kitchen wall rang, and Martina stopped cooking to answer it. Niles was cracking another joke about what Cassius was going to do to them when Martina waved the phone at Caesar.
“It’s for you, Caesar honey,” she said, stretching the cord over the island to hand it to him.
“Hello?”
“Caesar King?”
“Nasir?” Caesar asked, recognizing the deep voice. “My dad is out right now.”
“I’m not calling for him. I’m calling about him.” There was something about the way he said it that made Caesar’s stomach turn.
“What is it. Does he need me?”
“No. I don’t know how to tell you this, kid, but Cassius is dead.”