All Hail the Queen (12 page)

Naeema pressed her hand against her flat belly, meaning to draw his eyes there. “You can't or you won't?” she asked.

“Both,” he said.

Naeema wondered if she wanted to speak to Fevah badly enough to take his big ass
down and drive the Tahoe into the Rover to clear the driveway or switch up the game plan. She went for the latter. “Listen, I'm just trying to figure out who is behind the shooting last night,” she said, her voice softening as she pretended to wipe sweat from the back of her neck and then the top of her cleavage.

The horny motherfucker didn't miss shit.

And neither did she.

Hook.

“Anything you can do to help me, I really would appreciate it,” she said, pulling the edge of the dress from her body as she fanned herself. “I want to find out who it is tried to kill Fevah and shot one of our guys. I want it real bad.”

Line.

“I know in this business you must know what it feels like to want something real bad. Like you don't even know how to think straight to get
it
,” she said with a hot little emphasis on the last word as she hitched her dress a little higher on her thighs.

She heard that motherfucker swallow.

Sinker.

“I'm on duty,” he said, stepping close to her.

Naeema forced herself not to step back.

“But give me your number and when I'm off duty I might be able to help you get some satisfaction,” he said, tilting his head to the side as he raised his hand to pull her dress away from her body with his finger and look down at her body.

Men are so fucking predictable
.

The shit really irked her nerves how tits and ass always fucked them up. She used it to her advantage but she still had no respect for their weakness.

Naeema gripped his big, rough hand and her dress snapped back to her body like a second skin. “What's your name and number?” she asked, pretending he had a chance in hell when he didn't. “We can meet up and then we'll both get satisfied.”

“Cecil. 212-555-3480.”

“Talk to you soon, Cecil,” she promised before turning to climb back into the Tahoe, which was still running. She gave him a smile before she closed the door and turned around at the end of the road to head back to Manhattan.

A number to a lowly bodyguard babysitting a driveway wasn't shit but right then it beat a fucking blank.

7

N
aeema was getting anxious as fuck.

“I need to smoke.”

Naeema could kick herself for not taking the weed she still had in her carry-on case with her during that long ride to Upstate New York. She could've blazed one and took her time. Now she was wondering if she smoked in the bathroom if she would set off smoke alarms or some shit.

Weed would mellow her the fuck out. Help her think.
Plit-plot.

She got up from the seat and opened the door to the small, narrow closet where she had stuffed their luggage.

Bzzzzzz. Bzzzzzz. Bzzzzzz.

Naeema frowned and turned to eye her cell phone sitting on the bedside table. It sat silent.
Tank's phone. How in the hell did I forget about that?

She removed the luggage but didn't see anything beneath them.

Bzzzzzz. Bzzzzzz. Bzzzzzz.

She looked up before stepping inside the base of the closet and reaching on the top shelf to pat it until she felt a plastic bag. Grabbing it, she shook her head at Tank's shoes, his wallet, and his cell phone. The clothes had been cut away from his body for better access to the gunshot wounds.
She took out the cell phone and wallet. The iPhone was locked and the wallet had almost a grand in hundred-dollar bills.

To be honest, she was camping out in his hospital room until the nurses caught on and sent her home because even the cheapest hotel in the area was a hundred dollars a night. She wouldn't spend Tank's money unless she absolutely had to but if the moment arose it was as good as gone.

She dug the Ziploc of weed and blunts out of her bag, rolling it up tight, and moved across the room to shove it and the wallet down into her pocketbook. After taking her seat she looked down at the phone and then over at Tank. Back at the phone. Over at Tank once again.

Sheee-it.

She swiped her thumb across the touchscreen and crossed her legs as she settled back against the chair to try every possible passcode she could think of. His birthday. Hers. Their anniversary. The date they met. The number he constantly played in the Pick 3. Hell, the tag numbers on all his vehicles and her motorcycle. House number. Last four of the house and cell number. Numbers pulled out her ass.

Shit.

She tapped the end of her thumbnail against the phone just as it vibrated.

Bzzzzzz . . .

The phone went dead mid-vibrate.

Fuuuuuuck.

Her fingers gripped the phone tight enough to dent it. She didn't have a charger. She slid the phone in the side pocket of her pocketbook and stood up to stroke Tank's cheek lightly with one hand and take his hand in the other.
She would give anything for him to open his eyes and look up at her. Smile at her. Hell, talk shit to her. Anything.

It had just been two days since Tank was shot. His condition was stable but he was still unconscious. The police had been back in touch with her but they couldn't provide any clues. She felt like there was something else she could be doing other than sitting there waiting on the fellas to bring her bits and pieces of whatever news or clues they swept up from the street. And even that was coming in whack-ass dribs and drabs.

She bent to lightly kiss his lips before turning to scoop up her pocketbook and leave the hospital room. She stopped at the nurses station. “I'm going to go out for a little while,” she said to the short, plump redhead looking at her with soft eyes filled with concern.

“Once you leave out you won't be able to get back in downstairs this time of night,” she said.

Naeema looked back at the door to Tank's room.

“I'm on duty 'til morning,” she said.

Naeema looked down when the woman lightly patted her hand. She eased her hand from under hers.

“I'll keep an eye on him and call you if anything changes,” the nurse said, looking apologetic for touching her. “You go get some good rest.”

“Thank you,” Naeema said. “Please call me. No matter what time.”

“I will.”

Naeema gave her a genuine smile before she turned and headed to the elevator at the end of the hall. When the doors opened she stepped in and turned as the doors closed behind her. She paced around the four walls like a caged
animal until the elevator slid to a stop. The doors opened and four uniformed NYPD officers stood there. Her body went tense as shit.

Naeema didn't fuck with the police. She'd seen too much and even dealt with some bullshit firsthand in the hood to be groomed with mistrust.

The officers cleared a path for her to exit and Naeema did that with a quickness, thinking of the weed she carried. As she left the hospital she took a deep inhale of the summer air as she made her way to the Tahoe in the parking lot.

She looked up at the sound of glass breaking. A tall, skinny dude with a hoodie on had a crowbar raised high in the air above the car he just fucked up.
Fucking stick-up kid.

Naeema kept it moving minding her own.

“Yo, shawty.”

Here the fuck we go.

She ducked to the left between two cars and stayed low as she moved forward toward the Tahoe.

“I just wanted to holla at you, beautiful. Dayum.”

Fuck you royally, bastard.

She waited until she was at the passenger door to deactivate the alarm and snatch the door open. She heard his sneakers beating down on the concrete and rushed up into the seat pulling the door closed.

“Unh-unh. Hold up, bitch.”

The door was snatched from her hand. Naeema looked into the face of a white boy. She hated that this surprised her.

“Let me get it,” he said, licking at his red lips with the tip of his tongue as his eyes shifted back and forth crazy as shit.

“I ain't got it,” she said, shaking her head.

He held up the crowbar.

Naeema pulled her right hand from inside the console and quickly whipped out Tank's gun to press against his forehead as she removed the safety and cocked it.

Click.

“Gun tops crowbar, motherfucker,” she told him, curling her upper lip as she nudged his head back with the barrel of the gun. “Get the fuck from 'round here.”

“Aight. Aight,” he said stepping back as he dropped the crowbar.

It clanged loudly against the ground.

“Matter of fact, let me run
your
motherfucking pockets, you thieving little bitch,” she said, flashing back on the fucker who broke into her house. “Let's see if you like the other side of a stickup.”

“I'm sorry,” he said, turning the pocket of his hoodie and jeans out.

All his shit fell to the ground. Crack pipe and all.

“Stomp that stem,” she said.

He looked at her and his eyes filled with pleading as he shook his head a little.

Naeema saw the desperation in the depths of his baby blues and his addiction in the yellowed whites. For a moment—not much of a moment—but a moment, she felt so sorry for whomever it was he used to be. Before the drugs. The addiction. “Stomp it,” she said.

Again he hesitated.

“Mother, do you understand how bad this shit got ahold of you?” she asked him, her voice incredulous as hell. “You rather risk gettin' shot in the fucking head than stomp that
bitch?”

Something in his eyes changed. She didn't know if it was the truth of her words or enough desperation to struggle with her for the gun. “Stomp it,” she said again, pushing the gun against his head until it tilted back and he could look straight up at the night sky.

He raised his foot and brought it down on the crack pipe.

She frowned in disgust when a tear raced from his eye. “If you give a fuck about yourself you'll walk in that ER right there and beg them to admit you to their inpatient rehab program, yo. Shit is crazy,” she said, keeping the gun to his head but switching her right for her left so that she could crank the SUV and throw it into drive. She took her foot off the brake and rolled forward until his body no longer blocked the door from closing and the gun was pulled away from his head.

As Naeema accelerated forward she watched in the rearview mirror as he squatted and picked up the broken pieces of his pipe. It was one of the saddest things she ever laid eyes on.
God bless his strung-out ass.

She sped away from the sight of what had to be the lowest point of his damn life. Nothing could go lower but him being straight and sucking dick for dope. Weed was her ultimate and she
knew
she loved that shit too much sometimes.

She didn't even fuck with a blunt after that whole scene and drove out of the parking lot after paying the fee. She put the gun back in the armrest and pulled over at the first dollar store she saw to buy a cheap prepaid phone, a card with minutes, and a phone charger. Back in the car she activated the phone and loaded the minutes.

She quickly dialed Cecil the bodyguard's number on the
prepaid as she picked up her touchscreen to open up Instagram. Earlier today she set up a fake account and followed Fevah's account. Not more than five minutes ago she posted a vid.

“Come out and salute your girl at Club Vixen. Nothing stoppin' my shine. Kno' what I mean. It's going down,” she'd said, her makeup, hair, and bodysuit as colorful as a box of Fruity Pebbles.

This bitch picking up the style Nicki Minaj drop-kicked.

“Whaddup?”

“Cecil? This Yummy. From yesterday. The lime green dress,” she said, needing to make sure that he wasn't on Fevah's security detail that night and curious if he had any new info to offer.

“Yeah, yeah. What's poppin' lovely?”

Naeema rolled her eyes and looked down as she swiped over to the club flyer Fevah posted earlier. “I was too busy to hit you up earlier but I wondered if you was working tonight?” she asked, looking at the rapper with nothing but her long weave to cover her breasts cut and pasted above a picture of the New York skyline and liquor bottles.

“Nah, I'm off tonight—”

“Hold on one second. I got another call,” she said, lowering the phone to put it on mute.

“Yo, I'm a put this call on speaker. Yo. Catch this thotology.”

Naeema leaned back a bit in surprise at Cecil talking to someone in the background. “Lame,” she muttered.

“I'm a slow walk this ho right over to give me brain, yo,” he said, sounding excited.

Naeema arched a brow when she heard them fools
dapping each other up. Her intention was just to make him think she got an emergency call and couldn't go through with meeting up.
This bullshit right here . . .