Trust No Man 2 Read online

  I had sold my Lexus truck and copped a brand new Cadillac Escalade, pearl white exterior, 26-inch rims, pearl white and black swirl leather interior, suede visors, door panels, and headrests with Panasonic flatscreens and DVD player. I also expanded my wardrobe, but it was all urban gear. I had hooked up with Tabitha a coupla more times, but that shit fizzled quickly ’cause I wasn’t feelin’ no chick but Inez.

  Murder Mike was now pushin’ a black Ferrari. His wardrobe was versatile and ran extensive from faded baggy jeans to custom tailored Armani, depending on the occasion.

  For the past five or six years mad mafuckaz in the rap and music industry at-large had been migrating to the Dirty South. Now Atlanta was home to mad superstars in that industry. Plus the ATL had its home-bred superstars, like Jermaine Dupri, Outkast, Goodie Mob, T.I., Toni Braxton, Monica and a slew of others. We’d bump into them all at certain clubs or restaurants. Mad video hos would be at the hot spots, all on major players’ dicks.

  I wasn’t sitting on a mil’, but my shine was still bright. My rep attracted those types of hos too. Most bitches are mad attracted to a nigga with enough power to rule the streets, because they know he has to be way above the average dude. They’re curious to share that thug passion with a nigga who’s rumored to rule over other thug niggaz and murk his enemies.

  Although we occasionally partied and enjoyed our spot on top of the game, neither myself nor Murder Mike made club-going a habit or routine. We understood how disastrous that could be. Besides, Rich Kid was still alive, with no telling when he’d resurface and strike back.

  CHAPTER 13

  Summer came around, after months of no major drama in the game, or in a nigga’s life. I’d been in St. Louis for the past week, where I met with all four Dreads and discussed business. Murder Mike was on vacation in N’awlins.

  The Midwest was cool, but I was glad to get back home. With Murder on vacation, it fell to me to handle his duties while he was away. I hated fuckin’ with dope, even when I was giving it to the niggaz who dispersed it out to our traps and our other workers. It was just too easy to get setup.

  Kyree was home from prison. We had hooked up a few times and I broke him off some cheddar so he wouldn’t be forced to try a stunt on nobody. We were still a’ight even though I hadn’t remained in touch with him, and his sister, Brenda, had told him an exaggerated version of what went down between us. My nigga wasn’t beefin’ about that, it had been too long ago. Plus he respected a nigga’s realness. Kyree knew that I was gangsta and couldn’t be “checked” without bloodshed.

  “Nigga you look like Shaft!” Murder Mike cracked on my super-fro as I got out of my whip, having just pulled up in the shoe in Englewood to meet him.

  Keisha put in her two-cents: “You do look like you out of the nineteen-seventies. I ain’t never seen you with your hair picked out.”

  “I ain’t never seen you with yo’ mouth closed,” I shot back, snidely. “Y’all just don’t know style,” I said. Me and Murder dapped hands.

  “Whud up, fool?” he greeted me.

  “Same story, different day. Whud up?”

  Wasn’t any business on his mind. He’d just wanted to meet in Englewood and show our presence, a reminder to our soldiers down in the trenches that we weren’t too good to visit the hood. Also, our visit reminded them and the braveheart, who was the Englewood crew chief that we’d check on them unannounced to make sure they were on the grind and not bullshittin’.

  The hood remained the same no matter the season. No new faces, just a year older. Blue and a handful of other faces were absent from the horseshoe, having blew trial and gotten trapped in the unforgiving jaws of southern justice with its equally unforgiving penal system.

  Keisha was now pushin’ some work, coming up a little nicely. I guess she had a front row seat for so long she had watched and learned how to roll. Whenever I came across some weight I would hit her with it. Shawdy was proving to be about her business.

  Angel came over to where we stood, looking straight dyke with a short caesar haircut, baggy jeans and Falcons jersey. She resembled nothing of the cutie I’d freaked at the hotel with Keisha a year and some months ago. I was almost regretting that I had introduced her and Keisha to that girl-girl sex, ‘cause now Angel looked like a handsome nigga, instead of the cute shawdy she’d been before that night.

  “Hey, y’all,” she spoke to me and Murder.

  My main man nodded.

  I said, “Whud up, Ma? Or is it Papi now?” Smirking as I waited for Angel’s response.

  “It’s still Ma, nigga!” she responded defensively. “You ought to know that. Or have you forgotten what’s under these clothes?”

  “I know what was under ‘em last year, but shit obviously done changed,” I said. “Whatever you do though is a’ight with me.” ‘Cause it really was. I live and let live. But I couldn’t help thinking about how turned on Angel had been that night at the hotel when I coerced her and Keisha into a ménage trios with me. Obviously Angel’s first taste of pussy had turned her the fuck out.

  “Anyway,” Angel said. “Y’all heard about Miss Pearl?” She asked, quickly changing the conversation.

  “Naw. What about her?” I queried.

  “Oh,” said Keisha, “she died from a stroke, a few days ago.”

  Murder lost interest in the conversation; death not connected to the game and not earning him another platinum nail was not worthy of his time. But Miss Pearl’s death was of great interest to me because I knew Juanita would be affected and may need a shoulder to cry on. I was thugged-out, but I always had concern for those who had genuine concern for me.

  I asked Keisha and her “boyfriend,” Angel, if they had seen Juanita. Angel told me that Juanita had been in Englewood the other day, cleaning out her mother’s apartment and collecting Miss Pearl’s personal things. I told her to find out when and where Miss Pearl’s funeral would be and to call my cell and let me know.

  “Don’t forget,” I reminded them. “And I’ma have some more work for you soon, Keisha.”

  A nigga like me don’t do funerals unless it’s fam’, or me in that box. If I go inside a church, you can bet it’s a safe up in there I’m after, or a mafucka I gotta murk but couldn’t corner anyplace else.

  So I waited outside of the church until the service was over, and the mourners drove in a slow caravan to the cemetery where Miss Pearl would be laid to rest. I followed at the rear of the procession then waited in my drop while the mourners went to the grave site saying their final goodbyes before the casket was lowered into the ground.

  Juanita was dressed solemnly in a simple black dress and looked as distraught as someone who’d just lost her Ma Dukes would be expected to look. She returned to the funeral home’s limo, walking wearily at the elbow of a dude dressed in an army uniform.

  Her brother , I figured.

  Although I hadn’t seen him in years and wasn’t positive it was him. I was glad she spotted me as I walked up to intercept her because I really didn’t know what I would say to get Juanita’s attention. “Sup, shawdy?” would’ve been out of place.

  “Hi,” I managed to say. “I’m real sorry to hear about your mother.”

  Later that evening we sat inside my living room. Juanita was understandably solemn and quiet. I had no words to lessen her loss, so I just held her in my arms in a consoling embrace, not at all sexual. She fell asleep in my arms, bone weary from grief and travel. I just sat there and held her until she woke up after an hour of rest. Juanita was staying at my house that night; I’d take her to the airport to catch her flight back home in the morning. She’d transferred from the University in Texas after being awarded a full scholarship to a school in Nevada. The coming semester would be her first at the West Coast University.

  “I just moved out there two weeks ago,” she said, her grief-stricken voice almost a whisper. “I had sent Mama my new address and told her to give it to you if she saw you.” Her eyes teared at the mention of her Ma Duke. “Oh,” she
continued after regaining her composure, “thanks for the postcard. How was New Orleans?”

  “It’s decent down there,” I said, recalling my visit to N’awlins over a year ago.

  I convinced Juanita to let me take her to Justin’s to put a meal in her stomach and take her mind off grieving for at least a short time. She dressed simple for dinner but still was every inch as beautiful as I recalled her being the day she’d driven away. She had a combination of strength and determination mixed with a fragility that made her more appealing than any female I knew.

  Despite the sudden death of her mother, Juanita was at peace with her new life. She hadn’t been in Nevada long enough to tell me much about it, other than that it was hot and had a lot of flat land, and few trees. I admired the courage it must have taken to move so far away from everyone she knew, so she could pursue her academic dreams.

  “I see the streets are being good to you.” she said, then added, “For now.” Obviously referring to the crib.

  “I’m only leasing the house. I don’t own it.”

  “I hope you get out of the game before it turns on you, whether you ever come back to me or not,” she said.

  That night we slept together in my bed together but didn’t do anything more than sleep. At the airport, I gave Juanita a gift bag from Chanel.

  “You’ll come to me one day, I honestly believe that,” Juanita said as she wiped at her tears.

  I didn’t comment. What could I say? I just kissed her tears and told her not to let any of those college boys steal her heart. When she left to board the flight back to Nevada and a life so much different from mine, I felt an emotion I thought no longer existed in me.

  Whenever Juanita looked inside the Chanel bag, she would find five thousand, repayment of the loot she’d given me, and she would find a diamond-encrusted breast pin of two inter-locking hearts. Along with a note that read: I don’t know how to say it, so I gave you this gift to speak for me, signed, Youngblood.

  Also inside the bag was a CD by the artist Musiq Soulchild, the single “Love.”

  I walked out of the airport terminal, hopped in my Escalade, put in a rap CD and hit flip-mode, pushing the vibe I’d just felt for Juanita into the cellar of my mind. Last night had reminded me how much I dug Juanita. We’d slept peacefully, hugged up, despite the tragedy she was grieving and the fast pace of my life. Even without having sex, I’d enjoyed being with her, and waking up with her in my arms. Besides Inez, who was damn near like a nigga’s comfort and convenience, I had never slept in bed with a woman with no plans of dicking ‘em that night. Juanita held that distinction alone.

  Snoop Dogg bumped out the system as I whipped the Escalade; his lyrics helped remind me that no female was special.

  CHAPTER 14

  Another year passed so fast it seemed like somebody had hit the fast-forward button on a nigga’s life. No one had challenged our stronghold on the dope game in Atlanta, but we hadn’t gained control of any politicians or police officials like Crazy Nine said we’d need in order to have a long reign on the throne. We hadn’t accomplished our objectives in the other states yet either. We’d made significant progress, but it was proving much harder to gain control of St. Louis, D.C., and especially southern Cali, than we’d anticipated. I’d bodied another nigga in D.C. and Murder Mike had flown out to Cali and returned with two more platinum fingernails on his hand. He’d have to use toenails if he stayed in the game and continued murking niggaz, which was real likely. As for me, I still wasn’t rich, but I was living good and stackin’ paper.

  These days, Lonnie remained my tightman, the one nigga I would trust over all others in my life, including fam’. It’ll no doubt surprise you that me and Pete had squashed our beef and, though we didn’t hangout together, we sometimes wound up at Lonnie’s crib at the same time.

  Kyree had tried the nine-to-five thing, punching a time clock, but it was too slow delivering the type of things he wanted. Now he sold weed and went on licks with Lonnie and Pete.

  Toi was still with Glen, and still lovesick. I wasn’t trippin’. He knew not to ever hurt my peeps again. I’d talked to him on the phone several months ago, and we had made peace. But in my mind, we could never be friends. I had busted caps in him. Even if he claimed to forgive it, I would never trust him.

  Speaking of forgiveness, I still had none for Ann, the woman who birthed me, in case you forgot. Toi was constantly trying to get me to call Mama or to go by there with her. She’d given Mama my new pager number, and Mama had paged me twice. I called her back. I didn’t hate her, but our conversations never lasted longer than a few minutes, as she and I still blamed the other one for our not speaking.

  I let Toi take Little Terrence and Tamia by to see Mama. Inez had gone with her so that she could meet Mama too. Afterwards she remained in touch with my mother and would take Tamia to see her sometimes, but she knew better not to try to play peacemaker.

  Lil’ Terrence was every bit of me, just not as adverse to school as I’d been at his age, but physically he was all me. Tamia, who on the other hand, looked more like her mother Inez. Though she also resembled baby pictures I remember seeing of Toi. My lil’ girl was already walking and getting into everything. She reminded me of Eryka so much.

  I still hadn’t found a trace of Cheryl or my daughters. Though I continued to make periodic searches of her mother’s home, I hadn’t found one slip of paper that indicated Cheryl had contacted her mother.

  Some college graduate, a highly intelligent fool, had hired Inez to work at a bank. She’d been employed there for eight months now, enjoying honest work more than she’d expected to. I told her if she ever saw a foolproof way I could come in and cleanout the vault, to let me know.

  “They have security out the ass,” she said. But I had no doubt that Inez would do some Bonnie and Clyde shit with me if times ever got that drastic. I guess whoever hired her didn’t know that.

  In a way, I was getting bored with Inez. She was still mad crazy ‘bout a nigga, and she was even finer since having my daughter, but our relationship was growing stale. I hadn’t started neglecting her yet, but I was definitely looking for another shawdy. Not that I would’ve replaced Inez with her. I’d never dis shawdy like that. She’d shown mad loyalty and I’d do the same. But I’d spend a lot of nights with a new shawdy if I could find one real enough to warrant it.

  I knew where one well worth my time resided, but I wasn’t trying to pack up and jet to Nevada.

  Occasionally, I’d get with Keisha and blow her back out. She was still bumpin’ pussies with Angel, but she was too sprung on this thug passion to go strictly veggie. Plus I was frontin’ her four bricks at a time. Shawdy was coming up good in the hood.

  One day, I was in the projects freestyle battle-rapping against a cat from up North named Swag who had moved to the Dirty with his cousins in Englewood. We were going back and forth, cuttin’ each other down with lyrical venom. A huge crowd had gathered around. Not too many niggaz knew that I rapped, so I surprised them with my flow. But dude was nice with his shit, so I couldn’t just chew him up.

  A dude named Sheep was supplying the beats by drumming on the hood of an abandoned car. Wanting to end the battle once and for all, I spat:

  I was raised on collard greens and cornbread/I’m that Dirty South nigga/You keep talkin’ out ya head/I’ll be that go in ya mouth nigga/Throw that ‘bo in ya mouth nigga/That fo-fo in ya mouth nigga/When my chrome split ya dome/No more runnin’ ya mouth nigga/When that Brougham takes you home/I’m still runnin’ the South nigga/The streets respect my name/’Cause murda murda is my game/Yo, why waste my time with this lame?/I clap niggaz fo’ the dough, shawdy/You rap niggaz just want the fame/Y’all tell this up-North pussy what’s my name.

  “Youngblood!” Keisha shouted on cue, and I rapped on.

  Yeah, that’s who the fuck I be/A trill nigga who gets paid for that murda shit/But up-North niggaz I clap ’em for free/Take that to ya head like stale cornbread/Keep slippin’ on Dirty South
niggaz/We gon’ send you home dead!

  The crowd went ape! Swag, the up-North cat, couldn’t do shit but bow down.

  “Sun, you wicked,” he paid props and gave me dap.

  “You real nice yourself,” I acknowledged. “But this my hood. You can’t win down here.”

  “Sho’ can’t!” Keisha chimed in.

  “Bitch, shut da fuck up!” yelled a nigga named Zay, who used to slang for Rich Kid.

  “Yo, nigga, who you callin’ a bitch?” I asked, steppin’ up in his grill. My hand was at my waist, grippin’ heat.

  “Naw, Youngblood, I was talking to Keisha, not you,” he explained, about to piss on himself.

  “Nigga, I know damn well you wasn’t talkin’ to me. But Keisha is my bitch, so apologize to her.”

  I pulled out my heat. I could tell Zay didn’t wanna be punked in front of the whole hood, but the nigga knew that I was trained to go, so he didn’t test my G.

  “I’m sorry, Keisha, my bad,” he uttered.

  “A’ight, kick rocks, nigga!” I barked. “You ain’t from Englewood no way.”

  Zay, who was really from Scotsdale, walked off like the lame he was.

  CHAPTER 15

  One day my pager started beeping, back to back to back. I was at Lonnie’s crib getting blazed with him, Delina, Pete, and Kyree. I saw that it was my mother’s phone number flashing across the screen. No need to go to a pay phone to call her back, she wouldn’t want to discuss anything illegal, so it was cool to dial her from Lonnie’s home phone.

  “Yeah?”

  “Have you heard from Toi lately?” my mother asked.

  “Not since early last week.”

  “Well, I’m worried about her,” said Ann, her voice reflecting her words. “I’ve been trying to reach her all week. I even went by her house yesterday and no one answered the door.”

  I told her Toi had probably gone out of town with Glen.