Lickin' License (20 page)

Rich had seen so much in the streets, but he had never predicted the man who had saved him
in the streets would attempt to destroy him. The deceit and friends-turned-enemies were
parts of the game that Rich felt he and Chase were above. Rich had outlived enemies and survived street wars with rival crews only to be blindsided by his star teammate.

Rich stepped back into Candy's room and squeezed through the crowd of solemn faces. He stood beside Vanessa at the front of the group. He had nothing to say. No word would do anything to remove the pain he, Candy or Vanessa were experiencing. No language could
convey what he felt. So he watched, silently—accepting the punishment of seeing Candy
removed the furthest from herself that he could imagine.

Time drifted by and visiting hours ended. Rich and Vanessa were the last to leave the hospital. They walked through the parking lot toward a Range Rover. The atmosphere set in on Rich. He and Vanessa were no longer in Upstate, New York. They were in Manhattan—the
Rotten Apple that had spoiled everything for Candy. Rich kept his eyes open. “You got that gun
on you?” he asked Vanessa.

Vanessa held up a brown clutch.

“Where the hell you get a clutch from?” Rich asked.

“I bought it Upstate.”

Rich grinned because it took Vanessa needing to carry a gun in order for her to own a
purse. She had never used clutches or handbags. Rich's mind was so off-balance that he had not
noticed the small brown bag until Vanessa held it up.

Vanessa got in the Range Rover after Rich. “So we got two days left and we can take her home, right?”

“That's what the doctor said,” Rich pulled off in the Range Rover.

“Well, she could be a lot worse.”

“I'm sure you can think of something different to say to make me feel better.”

“I don't know what to say, Rich. In a split second, life has totally changed for us.”

“I been saying that to myself since all this shit happened.”

“I can't believe Chanel and Meisha showed up, not to mention Mimi,” said Vanessa.

“Yeah. Chanel gave me a speech about not risking everything trying to get revenge.”

“We've already lost one baby. You need to focus on the one we have left.”

Rich knew he was responsible for Vanessa's well-being as well as that of his future child. Losing

another child was not an option for him. But letting Candy suffer in vain was not an option either.

***

A day had passed since Rich and Vanessa made it back to the cabin. They spent
almost an entire day on the makeshift shooting range behind the cabin. In the middle of the night,
Rich shifted in his sleep until he awoke. Vanessa was gone. Rich grabbed his .40-caliber Taurus
from underneath his pillow and crept out of bed in his boxers. He tiptoed past two empty rooms,
and then saw Vanessa sitting in the front of the fireplace crying. He walked over and set the gun
down before hugging her in silence. They sat in each other's arms for almost an hour. The only
communicating done was with their hearts, confirming that their love would hold them together. Vanessa
had told Rich several times how she felt so safe in his strong arms, so Rich knew that she now
needed to be held more than ever.

“I couldn't sleep,” Vanessa said. “Couldn't get her off my mind. Then I dozed off and I
had a nightmare. Chase had killed you.”

Rich could feel her tears on his neck as Vanessa's sobbing increased. “I'm gonna be
all right. It was just a dream.”

“But it seemed so real.”

Rich and Vanessa sat in silence a little longer until she was ready to go back to sleep.
They lie on the huge rug in front of the fireplace, her head resting on Rich's bare chest until sunrise.

After showering and eating, Rich was back behind the cabin, shooting bottles. It had
become a stress release. It was also practice that would be useful for when he
crossed paths with Chase.

Rich turned to Vanessa as she walked over with her gun in hand. He watched her switch
from safety to fire. She cocked the gun back and took aim at her target twenty yards away. She
squeezed two shots that missed. The third reduced the 16-ounce Pepsi bottle to pieces of
glass. Vanessa turned to Rich with a sneaky grin.

“I would never believe it if I ain't see it,” he said.

“Do something enough, you get good at it.”

“Accuracy is one thing. I'm talking about something else.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Baby, you took to that gun like a duck take to water. Few days ago you almost passed
out after you pulled that trigger. Now you flickin' the safety and cocking it back like you grew
up on a Army base.”

“Things were a lot different a few days ago.”

“Baby, if it's one thing for sure and two things for certain, everything gon' be all right in a
minute. Trust me,” Rich said.

“But you can't erase memories. The pain of the past will always remain.”

Rich thought of the memories of him being abused. Not only were they permanent, but they
had affected how he viewed and related to women for years. He could not help but wonder how
Candy's experience would change how she viewed and related to him.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

C
andy had been recouping in Rich's cabin for weeks. The swelling of
her face was practically gone, but she still had trouble sitting down. The thirty staples in her butt
were a painful reminder of her assault, as was the pain she endured when defecating. But the
experience that hurt the most was losing her child. She felt she had neglected her motherly duties, that
she had failed as a mother before she even became a mother. Candy questioned whether she was
qualified to raise a child because she could not protect her unborn.

Vanessa and Rich reminded her that she could become pregnant again. But Candy didn't want to become pregnant. She wanted to give birth to the child that had been growing inside her womb.

She was not alone in her grief. The effect that her ordeal had on Vanessa and Rich scared Candy. For weeks, she
had watched the two of them firing guns daily, for hours. Vanessa walked around, protesting
that she would never allow Candy or Rich to be harmed again. She told Candy that if she had not
been scared of guns before, she would have fired enough bullets to kill Chase and he
would not have been alive to harm anyone.

While Vanessa was on defense, Rich was on offense. Candy pled with him day in and
day out not to seek revenge on Chase. She argued that Rich had everything to lose and nothing to
gain, because the damage she experienced could not be undone.

“I lost my son, Candy. Chase gotta die. His mother needs to lose her son.”

“What if we lose you in the process?” Candy asked.

“I’ve been planning Chase’s death for a while. Ain’t no failing.”

Candy stared at Rich in silence. His claims did little to stop the fear Candy had for his safety.

***

Days later, Candy was lying on her stomach on the living room couch. Vanessa walked into the room
after hours of shooting outside. She twirled her gold-plated gun with her index finger as if she was a cowboy in a western film. “Look at you!” Candy barked. “What if that goes off?”

“It's not loaded. See?” Vanessa cocked the gun back several times, then flashed the
bottom of the butt, showing there was no clip inside. She pulled a clip from her pocket and
quickly jammed it in and cocked the .380. “Now it's loaded.” She flicked on the safety. “But it's on safety.”

“This Rambo-Nino Brown shit gotta stop, Vanessa,” Candy demanded.

Vanessa was silent for a moment. She looked like she wanted to cry and kill. “What happened to you is not gonna happen again. Nobody is gonna destroy what we have.”

As Vanessa left the room, Candy gazed at Rich.

“Baby, not today. Please,” he uttered.

“Come here.”

Rich tucked his Desert Eagle into his waist and stepped over to Candy. He squatted beside the couch so he was face-to-face with her.

“I'm scared,” Candy whispered.

Rich put his hand over her cheek, pressing her face against his. “You don't have to be.”

“That's easier said than done.”

Rich leaned back, gazing into her eyes. “You know I love you, right?”

“Of course.”

“Do you know I'll die for you?”

Candy was silent, noticing Vanessa step back over.

Rich wrapped one of his arms around Vanessa's shoulders. “I'll give my life for either
one of y'all. And this ain't some shit you hear in a R
&
B song, watch in a romance movie or see a pimp tell his hos. I'm dead-ass serious.”

“Don't talk like that,” Candy said, coming to tears.

“Baby, I done lived my life two times over,” Rich said. “I traveled outside of the country
more than once and been to damn near every state in America. I slept in Trump Tower, I own a
penthouse, and I done drove any car you can name that cost upwards of fifty stacks. I done
literally slept with a different freak everyday of the week. And on top of all of this, I know what
it's like to love and to be loved. Not by one, but by two women at the same time. On some real shit,
what more can a man ask for? I lived my life. So when I say I'll give my life for the women I
love, I'm serious.”

Candy could see the passion in Rich's eyes and hear it in his low tone. She knew the chances of him not risking his life to kill Chase were almost none.

“We all would like to see Chase dead, Rich. But if you lose your life in the process, that's
something none of us would want to see. And it wouldn't be you giving your life to save us,
because we're safe right here. We're miles always from Chase,” Candy said.

“So we just sit here? Base our existence on not going where Chase is? Just forget about
the one-point-two million dollar penthouse where we fell in love? Where we planned our future
only to have Chase take it away from us?” Rich shook his head. “Not Rich. I been in the street damn near my whole life and nobody never took nothing from me. Then I leave the streets and
help create the one thing I never had, the most precious thing in life, just to have Chase snatch it
from us.” Rich shook his head, gazing at Candy. “Baby, I can swallow a lot of things, but that
ain't one. I couldn't live with myself and I wouldn't be no good to y'all if I let this shit slide.
That's why Chase and everybody else that had something to do with this shit is a done deal.”
Rich stood and walked away.

Vanessa trailed behind Rich into the bedroom. She understood his position, but it
troubled her. Not only because she feared for his well-being, but also because of the guilt she was feeling. The last thing she needed was for more guilt to kick in because of something happening to Rich—something rooted in the bullet she fired into Chase over a month ago. Since she could not stop Rich, there was only one alternative in her mind. “Rich,” she called. “I'm coming with you to get Chase.”

Rich turned to her. “Oh yeah?” he tossed his Desert Eagle on the bed.

“Yeah. You're not the only person who will die for the people you love.”

“You're much smarter than you're sounding right now.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“First and foremost, losing another child ain't a good look. Besides that, you're a twenty-
two-year-old woman working on a master's degree and your book is flying off the shelves like it got wings. And to seal the deal, everything you know about beef came from me talking to you
on a tour through Harlem and you listening to them freaks bumping they gums down in the
shop.”

Vanessa sighed and folded her hands. “Well, you been training me to shoot and how to clean guns for over a month, like we're starting a militia.”

“The word 'self-defense' mean anything to you?”

Vanessa sucked her teeth. “I've been shooting damn near every day.”

“Baby, Pepsi don't shoot back. There’s a big difference between them bottles and hearing bullets whiz by your head. Or when you're shooting at somebody who don't run, because they got a gun too. Better yet, when you can't tell which way the bullets are coming from, but you
know they got your name on 'em. These the type of details that mysteriously get left out of the
war stories dudes brag about in the 'hood.” Rich chuckled. “Everybody wanna be a gangster. Beef ain't just physical; it's a mental game. Some real psychological shit.”

Vanessa was silent.

“Come here, baby,” Rich said.

She took two steps. “I'm wallowing in my own guilt, devastated about Candy. I'm scared for you and frustrated about everything else.”

“It's okay, baby. Real situations cause real emotions to flare.”

“Tell me something I don't know,” Vanessa said.

Rich sat on the bed with Vanessa. “You gotta have faith in me, baby. You and Candy. If I tell y'all this gon' get done right, you can believe I ain't just talking 'cause I got lips.”

“I believe in you, Rich. I always have. That's why I fell in love with you.”

“That's the type of talk I need to hear, baby.”

Vanessa kissed Rich and smiled. She went back into the living room with Candy. She sat down, allowing Candy to rest her head on her lap. Vanessa told Candy what Rich had just explained to her.

“And you ate all that bullshit up, huh?” Candy shook her head.

“We both know his mind is made up.”

“Yeah, you right.”

“He's been through a lot in the streets,” Vanessa said. “Maybe this is light work for him.”

“I hope so.”

Rich stepped in the living room and kicked back on the recliner, facing the women as
they became silent. “You can't hide nothing from me.” He grinned. “Go 'head and tell me what y'all was saying 'bout me.”

“That we understand your stubborn ass,” Candy said.

Rich nodded. “I'm glad to see you smile again.”

Candy blushed.

“So what happens when this is all over?” Vanessa asked.

“We take a break for a minute. Then maybe it's time for us to spread out. Don't y'all
think so?” Rich said that the shop was falling apart and Candy would need time to manage her
new business. He also mentioned that Vanessa's career was soaring and each of them needed to
promote the book. “It would be good to start focusing on a fresh place outside of New York.”

“I don't know,” Vanessa said.

“You don't know what? Whether to fly the coop, or where we should land?” Rich asked.

“How 'bout the A?” Candy added.

“Atlanta.” Rich nodded. “I like that.”

“They have the Bronner Brothers hair show down there. That's perfect for my hair care products.”

“Maybe open a new Candy's Shop, too.” Vanessa smiled.

The more they talked, the more Vanessa felt things would turn out right. It was the first
time in a while that life seemed close to normal. Most of the time they had spent in the cabin had
been filled with debates, guilt trips and pessimism. But now, as they sat together in unity,
Vanessa felt like they were back in the penthouse.

Although she liked the idea of moving, Vanessa missed living in New York City already.
Seeing Mimi and the women from the shop at the hospital made her realize that in spite of
all the drama, they shared a concern for each other. It pained her not to call Mimi. But Rich had
insisted that Vanessa and Candy not contact anyone from the city. Leah had been leaving
messages on Candy's phone, informing her that she was running the shop while she was gone. Rich did not want to risk anyone finding out where they were located. He knew that in the midst of a
conversation, Vanessa or Candy could unintentionally mention something about where they
were. Vanessa argued that Rich had been to the city countless times since they left the hospital.
But she knew Rich had not been out socializing in Harlem. He was discreetly riding through the
neighborhood in an unfamiliar car, peeping through tinted windows for any sign of Chase.

“It's about that time,” said Rich, as he headed to take a nap.

“Who would've ever thought we would end up here?” Candy said. “I never thought I would deal with another man.”

“Falling in love with a man of the streets was definitely not on my agenda.”

“That's life. Unpredictable,” Candy said. “Even with all the bullshit we've been though, I wouldn't trade this relationship for anything.”

“This is real love.”

“Everybody is looking for it, but only a chosen few find it.”

Candy smiled. “I watched women come in and out of the shop for years, always complaining about men trouble.”

Vanessa thought of all the scorned women she had seen come in the shop in just months.
They had told story after story about sour relationships and hopeless futures with men. Even
Meisha and Chanel were crying out to be loved, though masking their craving by slandering
men. Their vocal demeanors were smoke screens and Vanessa knew it. Leah was the only person
in the shop who was in love and it showed through her levelheaded approach to life. Being in
love could humble a person. For Vanessa, love was life. She could not exist without either one. She knew that, thanks to Rich and Candy.

Rich was sunk low in the seat of a Toyota Corolla. It was an old model he had kept
parked outside his cabin for years. It was also the same vehicle he had used to creep in and
out of New York City on the prowl for Chase. For two months, he had been unsuccessfully
searching. He assumed Chase had vanished somewhere out of town like he had done after Pana had shot at him. It was a waiting game. But the game would be worth the wait.

Rich looked through the tinted windows of the Corolla, as he steered down Chase's
block. He slowed down and pulled over at the sight of Chase's Mercedes. It was parked directly in front of Chase's brownstone. Rich was parked five cars down and across the street.

It was the first time he had seen the Mercedes during his hunt for Chase.
This was the
opportunity Rich had carefully waited for while he watched Candy suffer. It had been two
months since she had been kidnapped and tortured. Although she had fully recovered physically,
there were psychological scars Rich, Candy and Vanessa had that would never heal. The images
of Candy lying helplessly in the hospital would be forever engrained in Rich's mind. For this, he
was determined to give Chase a slow death. The usual penalty of a few bullets to the head
was too kind for Chase.

Rich switched the safety off on his Desert Eagle. He pulled his hood over his
head. He stalked down the street and stabbed one of the back tires on Chase's Mercedes, then
doubled back to his Corolla. He pulled off and parked two cars down, across the street from the
Mercedes. Rich watched the back tire deflate. It was almost midnight and
no lights could be seen through Chase's windows. Rich knew it would be a long night.