CHAPTER FIFTEEN

 

For The Love Of The Lie

 

 

Lauren pulled up to the block where the church use to sit and couldn’t believe the scene. Engulfed in fire, smoke oozed from the top of the steeple and there were mounds of fire trucks and firemen in front trying to extinguish the blaze.

Lauren parked sideways, hopped out of the car and moved toward the entrance. “Mario! Devonte!” she screamed trying to make it to the doors. “Please don’t be in there! Please don’t!”

A burly fireman stepped to her to prevent her entrance as she tried desperately to wiggle from his embrace. “Ma’am, you can’t go inside. You’ll be killed.”

“Get off of me,” she screamed trying to fight him off. “My family is in there! My family is in there!”

“I hope that isn’t true, young lady. Everyone in there is dead.”

Her anger turned to emotional pain as she realized everyone she loved was gone.

Again.

 

 

Lauren rushed into her bedroom, her heart pounding wildly. “Mario! Mario! Are you in here?” She looked around although she knew he wasn’t anywhere to be found. Besides, whenever he was home she could smell the scent of expensive cologne mixed with alcohol oozing from his pores.

Worried about what was happening she sat on the bed, grabbed her purse and dialed the first number she memorized…Devonte’s. When Tykisha answered she was shocked. “Where is D?”

“You haven’t heard?” Tykisha asked suspiciously.

“If I heard I wouldn’t be asking.”

Tykisha laughed, “I just got out of jail but God is still inside.” she paused. “You should really move on with your life, Lauren. Devonte has already chosen me. He was going to make me his wife but the cops pulled us over before he asked.”

“Tykisha, the last thing I’m thinking about is being with Devonte. I just want to make sure he’s okay,” she said.

“Well that’s not the worst of your concerns…”

“Is it about Mario?” she asked with raised brows.

“Mario?” she repeated. “I don’t know anything about him.”

“Then what is it?” she asked irritated.

“It’s about, Rebecca and Eddie. They were undercover cops.”

“I knew it,” she yelled. Lauren fell back in the bed, as her tears ran toward the back of her head.

“They were trying to get information on the drug operation so they went undercover.”

“I’m so disgusted,” Lauren said. “I had them bitches around me and everything. Where is Devonte now? I mean, which prison?”

“Get a pen,” she said. “I’ll give you all the info.”

 

 

From behind the Plexiglas Lauren sat in her seat and watched the door, waiting impatiently for Devonte. When it finally swung open she was surprised at how handsome he looked in his orange jumpsuit. She was also surprised that they allowed him to maintain his dark shades.

The security guard walked Devonte up to the glass and helped him down. After raising his hands as if he were blindfolded, Devonte eventually found the handset and picked it up. “Hey, beautiful.”

She smiled and wiped her grin away when she remembered she was mad with him for a multitude of reasons. “I’m worried.”

“About?”

She shuffled in her seat. “Everything.”

He sighed. “You know that’s always been your thing. You worry even when you have someone taking care of things for you. Why put yourself through stuff like that?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know.” She looked down at her hand that was face down on the table. “I wish I did.”

He nodded. “Why are you here?” he paused. “I thought you hated me.”

“I want to know something and I need to know the truth.” Her lips pressed tightly together before reopening. “Where is Mario?”

He exhaled. “I don’t know, Lauren. But you should get use to not seeing him around anymore. The last I heard he moved on with his life.”

Her stomach felt as if it buckled. “What…what do you mean?”

When he remained silent she realized that even if he wanted to give her the bloody details he couldn’t. With the murders and bombing at the church, they were unable to pin anything on him due to his condition and a lack of evidence pointing at him. Besides, everything had been burned. And most of his conversations happened on the roof or balcony, and could not be recorded. But instead of releasing him they kept him behind bars to make sure nothing else surfaced.

The back of her throat tingled upon hearing what he said about Mario. “I loved him,” she said softly. “Not as much as he wanted me to. But as hard as I could.”

“I know.” He paused. “And he loved you too,” he cleared his throat after remembering that he had to be careful to keep things in the present not past. “I mean…he loves you.”

“He would’ve never hurt me,” she whispered. “I’m sure it wasn’t him the other night.”

Devonte, still unaware of Samantha’s antics said, “Then who else?” he paused. “Even if he didn’t, he crossed me.”

For a second she stared over at him, remaining quiet. “Why didn’t you want me? Why didn’t you choose me when I did everything but drop to my knees?”

“Because I wanted you to have a man who could appreciate your beauty,” he paused. “Even in your older years when you would need to hear it the most.”

She tilted her head to the right. “I don’t understand.”

“I knew if you got with Mario, the only man who loved you half as much as me, that he would appreciate what it meant to be with you. And that he would tell you that everyday, since I couldn’t. But he was weaker than I thought and couldn’t do the job.”

“But why couldn’t you?” she frowned. She asked the same question before and never got an answer, so she didn’t expect this time to be any different.

“Because I’m blind, Lauren.”

She looked at him, preparing to laugh but his stiff stance told her he was serious. Was this some scheme in an effort to beat the charges? And did she need to play along?

“But how?” she paused. “I’ve seen you walk around without canes. You move around your apartment like it’s nothing.”

“When I’m familiar with a place I count the spaces, sometimes not even needing to do that if I memorize it. If I’m not familiar with the place I click my tongue and the echo back lets me know where something is. It’s called human echolocation. If I don’t do the noises The Triad helps me around. If you think back, they are always with me or near.”

“So they know?”

“Yes,” he nodded. “They’re the only ones who do. And they’ve kept my secret.”

“But why hide it? I don’t understand.”

“Because of my profession, Lauren. Blindness may be seen as a weakness.”

“So…so you’ve never seen me?” She placed her hand over her heart.

“No,” he whispered. “Although I wish I had, baby,” he exhaled. “So much.”

“So how do you know I’m beautiful?”

“I had Greco describe you to me in great detail.” He said passionately. “He has been a fan of yours from the beginning so nobody does it better.”

Her body collapsed forward and she placed her elbows on the desk. “I’m so confused.”

“Don’t be. When you’re blind your other senses are heightened. The sense of touch, smell, taste, hearing…but I can also feel your energy. I felt you cared about me even before you said it, and it made me want to do more for you.”

She sat up straight. “But I don’t believe you,” she said harshly. “You don’t hesitate when you move. You just go. You can’t be blind.”

“I’m one hundred percent blind, Lauren.” He paused. “I would never lie about something like that. And I would never do that to you.”

Silence.

“What about when you were younger?”

He sighed. “My eyesight started leaving me as a kid. I would knock into things because I didn’t understand what was happening. I didn’t want to tell my aunt because she was going through too much already. With my mother and trying to pay the bills and all.” He paused. “The only person I told back then was Wanda.”

“Wanda?”

“The first woman I ever fucked,” he shook his head. “I was a child at the time but she forced me to grow up quickly.”

Lauren was flabbergasted and her tongue flopped around in her mouth. Such a large weakness on a powerful man made her even more attracted to him. Perhaps she sensed that when she first met him.

“Don’t feel sorry for me,” he said seriously. “That would hurt more than you realize.” He leaned back in his seat. “Just because I can’t use my eyes doesn’t mean I’m not a man.” He paused. “Anyway when I was in Dove’s Home For Boys, I was locked up by myself for awhile. Even though I had a little sight at the time, it was leaving and I would close my eyes and really practice echolocation. I would walk around the room, click my tongue and I would faintly hear the echoes bouncing off of objects and would know how close they were. I can’t explain it.”

“Do you even know why you’re blind?” she asked.

“I got my eyes checked once in Dove’s Home and they said I had glaucoma. It wasn’t bad at first. Things seemed cloudy and if I tried hard I could do all right but through the years it worsened. Maybe I didn’t want to see life in the same way anymore so I lost my vision.” He paused. “Before I didn’t care much but that was before you.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve done a lot of terrible shit in my life and this is my punishment. Never being able to see the woman I love, and the only woman who sincerely loved me back.”

Lauren placed her hand over her mouth and suffocated a sob.

“Why you crying?” he asked.

Shocked she moved her hand slowly and asked, “How did you know?”

“I told you I can feel you.”

She observed him quietly, hating herself for loving him despite being aware that he killed Mario. She exhaled and asked, “When are you leaving?”

“Any day now,” he paused. “They have nothing on me. They have to let me go. I’m just waiting on my lawyer to give the word.”

She nodded. “When you get out of here I will tell you how I feel about you treating me so shallowly.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I would not have cared if you were blind, Devonte. And I deserved that chance before you wrote me off. I hate you for denying me the love that was rightly mine and for Mario.” She hung up, placed her hand on the glass and walked away.

 

 

Devonte sat in his bunk with Wakeem, one of his former soldiers who moved dope for him inside the prison. Since June and Heidi put the word out that Devonte was blind, he knew he needed to get out of prison before someone tried to get famous on his name.

“I spoke to Chicago’s girlfriend on a face to face visit earlier today,” he said. “They told me to tell you it was taken care of.”

Devonte walked away from him, counting fifteen steps out, he leaned against the wall. “Did she say how…did she say how it was done?” he stuttered.

“No. Just that it was quick.”

 

 

THE MORNING AFTER MARIO LAST SAW LAUREN

 

Sitting in one of the pews in Devonte’s church, Mario looked up at Jesus who was nailed to the cross. With a bottle of vodka in his hand and a gun on his hip, he wept harder than he ever had in his life. He wept for loving a woman who would never love him back. He wept for Varro who he killed to prove he was not afraid to be tough like he thought Lauren wanted. And finally he wept for killing his cousin.

A funny thing happened after he finished crying. Staring up at the cross, his heart open wide, his emotions on a roller coaster, for the first time in a long time he felt relief. It was time to put his life back together and move on.

First he was going to tell Lauren that he loved her and that he was wrong for trying to control her. Afterwards the plan was to let her go, holding on to a woman who didn’t want him was futile and a waste of time.

He also made up in his mind that he was out of the Harrington family and would leave his beef with Devonte behind. He didn’t know what life had for him in terms of a career, but with a little money saved up he hoped it would come to him real soon.

Pulling himself together, he stumbled out of the church. But the moment he hit the sidewalk he was surprised when Chicago pulled up in an all black van. “You gotta come with us, it’s Lauren!” he said holding the door open. “I think she’s hurt.”

Inebriated and not thinking straight, Mario hopped in the van. Once inside, when he saw Shaw and Greco his heart started rocking. He was within the jaws of death. “Where is she?” he asked.

“Don’t worry,” Greco said handing him a bottle of vodka. “Get this up in you so you can relax.” He paused. “We’ll take you to see her later.”

Mario twisted the top off, downed as much as he could swallow before doing it again. When he was done he handed the bottle back to Greco. Although he was drunk his senses were in tact and he knew the inevitable was about to happen. “I’m not going to see her am I?” he asked.

“No, man,” Greco said softly.

“Is she hurt?”

“No,” he said confidently. “She’s fine.”

Mario shook his head and laughed. “After all this time he’s finally going to do it. He’s finally going to kill me.”

“We’re sorry, man,” Shaw said. “But we think you snitched and told the cops that we moved dope out of the church.”

They were unaware that Devonte’s father had been involved. His father learned that a dope boy with the same last name set up shop in a little church and to avoid scandal he sold him out.

“You never wanted no parts of the church anyway,” Shaw added. “Telling the boys in blue was just your way of seeing that it was over.”

“I’m not gonna lie, I’m not with moving drugs out of a church. But I swear on what’s left of my life, that I didn’t tell the cops. I’m a lot of things…a snitch ain’t one of them.”

“Sorry, brother, wish I could believe you.” Greco raised his arm, tugged the trigger and killed Mario on the spot.

When he was slumped over, he fired multiple bullets into his chest cavity for good measure.

 

 

Devonte was over his grandmother’s apartment after being released from prison two weeks earlier. With all of the witnesses being eliminated the state didn’t have a case so they had to let him go.

He wasn’t foolish though. A lot of blue blood bled in that church and he knew the cops were watching his every move. He was done with the dope game…for the moment anyway. He saved up enough money to buy Lauren a ranch in Texas, complete with horses and everything she needed to take care of them.

Cleaning up loose ends, last night he told Tykisha that he couldn’t be with her. She took it so hard he sent Chicago over his apartment, where they lived, to make sure she wouldn’t kill herself. And the last time he called, Chicago said she was sleeping.

Mentally drained and ready to get away, Devonte grabbed a bottle of beer out of the refrigerator and sat at the table to drink it. When he was done the door opened and Lauren came inside, “You ready?”

He grinned. “I am if you are.”

 

 

Nestled in the sunlight, Lauren rode down the street in her red drop top Mercedes Benz, as Devonte leaned back in the passenger seat, his right foot hiked on the dashboard. Every so often a twinkle of the sunlight would flirt with his GOD medallion, causing the diamonds to sparkle.

Devonte exhaled and said, “I want to ask you to be my wife, but I’m not going to do it right now.”

She laughed and placed her hair behind her ear. “Good, because I don’t know if I would say yes anyway.”

He grinned. “You would.” He said confidently. “I’ve been the nigga for you from the gate.” He paused. “I’m just glad you finally realized it.”

She couldn’t get over his cockiness but it was one of the reasons she loved him so much. Part of her soul felt guilty for feeling free to love him, considering what was done to Mario. But she was a dope man’s wife, with or without a ring. And death was always on the addendum in the drug game.

Devonte turned his head to the right so that the sun could wash his troubles away. And yet, deep down he felt like this was not his life. Was he the type of nigga who got to run away in the sunset with the bitch of his dreams? Or was he the kind who fell victim to the streets, flesh open, face down in his own blood?

“If we were to be married, tell me how our life would be,” he said.

She grinned. “So now you want me to tell you a bedtime story?” she joked.

“Humor me,” he laughed.

“Okay, well I imagine we would live on a big ranch. And before you get all crazy understand that ranches are beautiful.”

“What if I told you I bought you one already?” he asked.

Her eyes expanded.

“Where do you think we’re going?” he continued.

“You said on a road trip to Texas.”

“I don’t do road trips,” he said confidently. “I make moves.” He paused. “The ranch is yours and that’s where we’re going now.” He winked. “Now finish telling me.”

She tried to calm down but the excitement he caused made her feel bubbly. It was hard to concentrate let alone talk. It wasn’t the materialistic things that made her so grateful even though she appreciated nice things. It was because he was putting a real effort to sharing a life with her. The life of her dreams.

“Well, we’d have plenty of horses and I’ll even teach you how to ride one.” As she spoke, she really pictured their lives together and Devonte did too. “We would have two kids, a maid once a week, and we would be helplessly and happily in love.”

He nodded. “You could be with a nigga like me?” he asked. “A man who can’t see?”

“For life,” she said confidently, staring contently at him even though he couldn’t see her.

“I didn’t tell my aunt I forgive her,” he said softly. “If something were to ever happen to me, can you tell her that?”

Her stomach flipped. “Don’t talk like that, Devonte. You make it sound like you expect something to happen.”

“No,” he said. “We are going to have the life we planned. Its just that she is on her dying bed and I finally understand how it feels to have forgiveness.” He paused. “You taught me.” He continued. “And for the first time in my life I have the kind of peace that I would want everybody to have.”

“Okay, baby,” she smiled although not wanting too. “I will.”

She stopped at a stoplight. Suddenly a beautiful silver Chrysler pulled up on the right side of the car and a pretty girl with the blondest hair she’d ever seen smiled at her. She realized in that moment she had albinism but it didn’t take away from her beauty.

“I love you, Lauren,” Devonte said as if sensing that something was off.

“I love you too,” she said. “Always have and always will.”

Lauren waved at the girl who waved back with a hail of bullets aimed at Devonte’s upper and lower torso. She screamed in horror, as she witnessed the man she was in love with exploding into a pile of guts and blood before her eyes.

With Stanford’s last wish being carried out, Ninny drove away from the scene, leaving Lauren alone and broken hearted.