Читать книгу Gods & Gangsters - Соломон - Страница 10

“And that’s how it started.”

“I’m more concerned with how it ends.”

“Make up your mind. You said start from the beginning,” he reminded Detective Spagoli with a swarthy smirk. Spagoli sat back in his chair.

“Q.B.C. is responsible for several murders and the distribution of tons of cocaine up and down the east coast, correct?” Spagoli questioned.

“Indeed,” he confirmed.

“So what in the hell makes you think I give a fuck about when they started rapping?” Spagoli hissed like a boiled kettle. Leaning on the table he looked him deep in the eyes.

He took his last cigarette and crumbled up the pack. He held up the pack and looked at O’Brien.

“I’m out of cigarettes. Maybe you can get me a fresh pack? Or maybe she can go,” he remarked, then looked at the two-way mirror. “Baby, can you handle that for me?”

“You’re cute. I bet the booty bandits in Leavenworth will feel the same way,” O’Brien sniped.

“Well, that’s why I’m here, correct? So I don’t have to go to Leavenworth, right?”

“As long as you tell us what we want to know,” Spagoli reminded him.

“Then it’s time we talk about her…”

“Guitar Jimmy, stick wit’ us ‘cause you ‘bout to hear that murder shit,” Power bragged as he and Kane walked out of the engineering room and headed for the booth.

Once inside, Kane pulled out the bottle of Henny he had inside his bubble goose.

Jimmy gave them a disapproving look.

“Chill, Guitar Jimmy. This the magic potion right here! Start the track,” Power told him.

“Yo, I’m goin’ in there wit’ them!” Messiah announced, once he saw Kane turn up the Henny bottle.

The whole clique followed suit and Jimmy breathed a sigh of relief.

While in the booth, the buzz sounded like the block.

The beat kicked in, Power swigged from the bottle, gripping it by the neck like a broad he just bagged, bobbed to the beat and began:

As Power and Kane went back and forth over the track, Jimmy could only bop his head. He had never heard a sound so street get so melodic, almost hypnotic, at the same time. Just when Jimmy thought he had heard one of the realest rap records ever, Kane blurted out, “Yo, yo, turn that shit off! Turn it off!”

Power looked at Kane himself. “What up, thun?”

Kane shook his head. “Yo, who did that track?”

Jimmy answered, “DJ Diamond. Hottest producer on Duppy’s team.”

“Man, that shit is wack as fuck!” Kane blasted. The whole time, only Power and Kane could hear the track, so Messiah stepped forward and said, “Let me hear it.”

He took the headphones from Kane and Jimmy played the track. After only a few bars, Messiah took off the headphones and announced, “Yo, that shit is ass!”

Jimmy looked pissed as fuck. “You think you can do better?” Jimmy challenged Kane.

Kane hit the Henny and glared at Jimmy. “You God damn right.”

“Come show me.”

Kane didn’t hesitate to do just that. Power knew Kane had never made a beat in his life, so he wondered what made Kane so confident that he could. It didn’t take long for him to find out.

“Yo, the bass line is pussy. It need to be like the pulse of a killer at midnight,” Kane said.

“At midnight?” Jimmy echoed. “I have an idea what you’re talking about.”

“Like this,” Kane replied, then verbalized what he meant.

Jimmy used the keyboard to emulate it.

“Darker,” Kane said eyes closed. Feeling it deep.

Jimmy, understanding Kane’s visual better, dropped the key an octave. Kane smiled his sinister grin. “Yeaaaah,” he nodded.

Power watched as Jimmy and Kane went into a musical zone that had them both focused. Every suggestion Kane visualized, Jimmy was able to bring out. When they put it all together, it was a certified hood banger. “God damn, you did your thing, God,” Power exclaimed, giving Kane dap.

Kane smiled cockily. “Told y’all I could do better.”

Jimmy face was impressed. He hadn’t expected this and Power could see it in his eyes.

“Man, you’re a fuckin’ genius!” Jimmy said with feeling. He picked up the phone on the mixing desk and dialed a number, smiling and shaking his head at the same time.

“Yo, you need to get down here ASAP,” Jimmy said, then hung up.

“Who you just call?” Power questioned.

Jimmy looked at him. “Duppy”

Duppy hung up the phone and looked at the woman sitting in front of his desk. He had seen plenty of beautiful women before, exotic beauties of every ethnicity, but he had never seen one so mesmerizing. Her mother had definitely named her right…

Egypt.

She had the natural cat-eyed look that most women need eye-liner for. Her skin tone was the color of an Arabian sunset. She was slim, but statuesque and shapely. She could’ve been Greek, Latin, Italian or a mixture of it all.

But she was a black woman through and through, and she had the voice to prove it. Her voice was just as beautiful as she was. It was as soulful as Alicia’s and as strong as Whitney’s - she was the truth and Duppy knew it.

“So you want to be a star, huh?” he asked.

Egypt smirked, crossed her legs and the sun through the window lit up her hair like a spotlight, “I’m already a star, I just want the world to know it.”

Duppy chuckled. “Confidence. I like that in a woman.”

“Thank you. I come from a long line of confident women. My great grandmother punched Al Capone in the face.”

“Get the fuck outta here,” Duppy said, covering his incredulity with a snicker. This woman was a fine thing, but he didn’t want to give too much away about how much he wanted her as an act in his growing stable. Business first. Pleasure later.

“True story. She worked at the Cotton Club in Harlem, you know, back in the 20’s. She was a dancer and a singer. She could’ve been a headliner, but she was darker than a paper bag,” Egypt explained.

“Darker than a paper bag?” Duppy hated showing there was shit he didn’t know.

“It was a Cotton Club thing. If you were darker than a paper bag, you couldn’t perform. My grandmother was an exception, but they still wouldn’t let her headline. Anyway, Al Capone wanted her to come back to Chicago with him and work in his club. ‘To headline?’ she’d asked. He said, ‘No, but you’d make a good whore.’ So she punched him in his face,” Egypt shrugged.

Duppy laughed. “Word? Your grandma was ill. What did Capone do?”

“He bought her a drink, and when she died, he sent a hundred roses. You want to know what the card said?”

“What?”

“You’ll headline in heaven.”

Duppy nodded. “Classy move.”

“Classy lady.”

“I see the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree,” Duppy complimented.

Egypt smiled. Duppy had to forcibly lift his eyes from the stretch of blue jean material across her inner thigh. She was beguiling him with looks and personality, and Duppy was drifting. It would be easy to get lost in the notion of this woman. Very easy indeed.

“So does that mean I get to headline your label?”

They looked at each other across the desk. Duppy’s wolf-eyed look said everything his words didn’t - I’ve got a whole lot more in mind for you.

Egypt’s face said, reading him perfectly - whatever it takes.

“I need to run down to the studio. You wanna ride with me?” Duppy inquired, getting up from behind the desk, coming around and offering his hand like a Knight to a Queen.

“I’d love to,” she said, taking it.

“A’ight, let’s take it from the top,” Kane said into the mic as he adjusted his headphones. The booth was full of smoke and magic. He passed the blunt to Power, exhaling hard. The screw turned to the max inside him. This was living.

There was smoke everywhere by this time, because Jimmy was totally caught up in the vibe. All rules were out the window. It was hot and dark in the studio. Just a lamp over the mixing desk, the glow from the LEDs hitting Jimmy’s face and turning it into a Halloween mask. In the booth all lights but a tiny spot was off. The studio was as dark as the beat, and the beat was lower than Hell.

The beat cracked open and filled the room like poison gas. Niggas jerked and bopped uncontrollably. This wasn’t music, this was voodoo that the street melted down and poured into your ears.

Kane ripped through his verse while Power chugged Henny, bobbing his head like his neck was broken. He was just about to kick his verse, when light from the studio door spread across the room as it was opened. Power was about to throw down at whoever had spoiled the atmosphere, breaking the mood, when he saw who had come in. It wasn’t only Duppy who had invaded - if it had, Power would have torn the nigga a new asshole - but it was who was with him that drained the anger from his lips.

Power passed the Henny to Kane, and just stared through the glass. The woman with Duppy was like something from a fever dream. If you put all the best aspects of the opposite sex into one body, and then made her walk like she owns the whole damn joint, then she would look like this.

Her eyes caught Power across the studio and through the glass. This was the kind of woman who knew exactly the effect she had on niggas. And she was working it like there were no more Saturday nights left in the universe.

Power stepped out of the booth and giving Duppy a just above zero nod of respect for a welcome took the woman’s hand.

And that’s when time stopped.

The night was thick layered around the dirty streets.

Her way into the alley was lit from above only by the yellow windows of the tenements around her. Her every step was firm but cautious. She knew her life depended on each eye movement and swing of her gaze.

A lid from a trashcan clattered to the ground. She spun her head, just in time to see a scrawny cat slinking into the shadows with its fish-head prize. Sirens wailed in the distance and the city seemed to breathe darkness along the lonely streets.

A white man with a knife jumped out from an alley. His eyes were wild, his face set. The knife glinting as he scythed it down through the cold air.

Buc! Buc!

She put two in his face, and the knifeman spun away, crashing into the cat’s trashcans.

She kept it moving. This was the worst part of town for a woman to be out in at night. The walls of the alley seemed to move in. She went forward on hurrying feet, hearing the click of her heels. At the junction she paused, not sure which way to go and then she heard a squeal of brakes and the rumble of a powerful engine. The car skids up, the driver hangs out the window with a MAC-11.

Buc! Buc! Buc!

Her first shot cracks his skull, the last two explode his face all over the dashboard. The body falls back, spurting blood. Should she take the car or keep running?

She runs. Aware that the street, slick with rain, could hold anything ahead, or anyone. Her nerves sang, her heart beat.

A white light to the left. The dazzle of the pistol flashlight?

Buc!

Egypt’s heart sank. She’d just put a .45 caliber bullet into a six-year-old’s forehead.

“Fuck!” Egypt yelled as she snatched the virtual-reality headset off.

No longer alone in the dark virtual street. She was in the media room of the Chicago Police Department’s 14th District, Shakespeare station. The room was bright from strip lights and from the windows looking out on North California Avenue. Cars shooshed by, just another day in the city.

For Egypt it was anything but.

Egypt’s eyes took a second or two to adjust and she was feeling the first splinter of a headache coming on from her thirty minutes in the VR training simulator.

“Run it again! Give me one more chance,” Egypt requested, looking at Sergeant Malone.

Malone sighed. He was a twenty-year veteran of the force, built like a linebacker. He looked like Ray Lewis with less hair and a badge. A good cop, but his limp from a liquor store bust that went south fifteen years ago, would have made him a liability behind the scrimmage. He had seen it all and liked telling Egypt that he had, but she always assumed he thought she wasn’t cut out to be a police officer.

“Let’s take five, okay?” he suggested.

Reluctantly, Egypt answered, “Okay.”

They went to his office, along the long-carpeted halls. His office looked out over the parking lot, and she got the impression he’d rather it overlooked the trees running the length of the avenue. His office was full of potted plants to compensate for the lack of greenery in the view. It was like walking into a greenhouse.

Egypt took a seat while Malone poured them both a cup of coffee. He sat them on the desk, then pulled out a small bottle of brandy from his desk drawer. He held it up, raising his eyebrows in a questioning expression.

“Just a splash,” Egypt said. It might help the headache.

“A splash is all you were getting anyway,” Malone smiled. “This shits expensive.”

Malone handed her a cup, sat on the edge of his desk and sipped his brew.

“Good stuff,” he commented.

“You should be a bartender,” Egypt cracked.

Malone wasn’t in the mood for joking. He cut straight to the chase. “Moore, can I be straight with you?”

“Definitely.”

“You’re too dam pretty and too trigger happy to be a cop. What the hell are you doing here?” he asked. Egypt knew she was a conundrum no one had yet solved in the Chicago Police Department.

“I want to make a difference,” Egypt replied without hesitation. She knew it sounded lame, but it was the best she got.

“Join the Red Cross.” Her falling face made Malone soften some. “Look, Moore, I don’t know what’s driving you, I –,” he began to say.

Egypt sighed, holding up her hand. If she was to escape the lame ass reply of a typical Beauty Pageant air-head she’d just given, she might as well go the whole nine.

“My great grandmother.”

“Huh?”

“You said you didn’t know what was driving me. Well, it’s my great grandmother. She… she was a God-fearing woman. Never drank, never cursed, and never lied. All she did was go to church, until one night coming home from worship, she was gunned down in a drive-by. Senseless, random violence and she was the victim.”

The headache was replaced by the prickle of tears in the corner of her eyes. She wiped them with the heel of her hand. “It’s for her. If I can stop that happening to someone else, just one person, then it would be worthwhile.”

“I get it, but grief isn’t the reason to own a uniform, and neither is revenge. You’re wild, Moore. Too wild. Giving you a badge is like throwing gasoline on a fire. How do I trust you on the street, when you screw up so easily in the simulator?” Malone said. He wasn’t being an asshole for the sake of it, she could see in his eyes he believed what he was saying.

Egypt was furious, but she kept her composure. “Sarge, with all due respect, I think that’s bullshit. I graduated at the top of my class in the academy, my psych report gives no indication of this wildness you claim – “

Malone cut her off abruptly.

“Fuck the academy! I know a wild card when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now!” he bellowed. He took a breath and a slug of coffee. Egypt wondered how far he’d got counting to ten in his head before he spoke again. He sighed. “Look, I could easily stick you behind a desk and bury you, but you’d probably transfer to another precinct and get assigned a beat anyway. My point is, I’ve seen your kind before.”

“I’m going to be a cop, Sarge,” Egypt replied firmly. He shook his head, went around the desk and sat down. “Suppose there was a middle ground.”

“I’m listening.”

“How do you feel about undercover work?”

This she wasn’t expecting, this felt like a reprieve, a chance to prove herself to Malone and all the Chicago PD cops who thought she was all heat and no fire. “Whatever it takes,” she said finally.

Malone leaned forward. “What do you know about the music business?

“Ay yo, step up! That was your cue,” Kane said to Power, bringing him back to reality partially.

Power glanced at Kane, but he was still conscious of the beauty sitting in the corner of his eye. Damn, even this woman sat like a queen. If she’d of walked in with a leopard on a leash instead of Duppy, Power would not have been at all surprised. Power jumped tracks in his head and came back to the now.

“Yeah yeah, my bad. Go back and I’m on it.”

The beat broke in.

On her part, Egypt was just as struck by Power, but she was much subtler about it. She was aware that when she was looking anywhere other than at Power in the booth, that Power’s eyes were hot on her. Normally she’d feel sorry for the guys looking at her who were normally so far out of her league, but Power was anything but. It wasn’t just the way he looked, although he made pleasant tingles in all the right place, but the way he moved – liquid yet sharp, all attitude yes, but with a smile that could kill at a hundred yards. Even the way he walked, all lopsided shoulders and gangsta sway, made her heart skip a little.

Lust at first sight.

Duppy didn’t even notice her sudden infatuation with the green-eyed bandit in fatigues, rapping the sound that would soon rule the streets. Only when Power rhymed did he lock eyes on her, and she in return looked right on back.

His style sent chills through her. She licked her lips in anticipation of what the future might bring. Shifting position in her seat wasn’t helping cool the fire any. Power was burning her.

When Kane and Power entered the engineering room, Duppy gave them a pound and a gangsta hug. “Yo I can’t even front, that was the illest shit I heard in my life! Yo Jim, how come I never heard that beat before? When did Diamond do that?”

“He didn’t,” Jimmy replied. “Kane here did.”

Duppy looked at Kane wide-eyed. “That’s you?”

“You already know,” Kane’s arrogance made Egypt smile behind Duppy’s back. Kane wasn’t as much to Egypt’s taste as Power, but there was a dark intensity to him that she really appreciated.

“We definitely need to talk,” Duppy responded, he was about to say more, when he saw that Power was all but ignoring him, and only had eyes for Egypt. Duppy moved into both their eye lines, and trying to catch the situation early said, “Oh my bad, fam. I didn’t introduce. This beautiful woman is about to be the first lady of Notorious Records. That is, if she can handle the pressure and prove her position. Egypt, this is Power and Kane, also known as Q.B.C.”

Egypt looked at Power. “What does Q.B.C. stand for?” she questioned.

“Real niggas everywhere,” he replied.

She was about to get confused, then her expression showed she understood. “I mean the letters.”

“Queens Boro Crew. So what you do? Rap?” Power probed.

Egypt smirked mischievously. “You want to see what I do?”

“Seein’ is believin’, right?”

Oh I wanna show you her face said as she sashayed through the studio, and into the booth.

Egypt put on the headphones. The room smelled of blunt, Power and Kane. There was electricity in that smell. It was all potential. She looked through the glass as Kane and Power sat down, swapping the blunt. Power never took his eyes off her.

“Give me something clubby,” Egypt requested.

It took Jimmy a minute to find an appropriate track, but when he did, Egypt’s nod told him he found the right one. She dug into the track with a joint she knew they wouldn’t be up on - an old Chicago house classic.

From the moment she opened her mouth, she saw that first note grabbed every man in the room and wouldn’t let go. They swayed like a nest of cobras around a mongoose.

There was no denying her talent.

Power got up, and spoke in Duppy’s ear. Egypt could read his lips easily. He was saying, “I want to do a joint with her,” but all the while never taking his eyes off her.

Egypt could read Duppy’s face just as easily, he was hearing the words, but knew Power wanted to do a lot more…

“Yo, the world’s about to feel us, thun! They all gonna be tryin’ to speak the thun language. What the drilly wit’ that’!” Ty Five$ laughed as he washed his tongue with hundred dollar a pop Moet.

“Yo thun, that bitch had you fucked up,” Kane teased with a knowing laugh, as he passed the blunt to Power.

He, Power, Messiah, Ty Five$ and Lil’ Earl were on top of Kane’s building in QB, getting their drink and smoke on. The evening was falling towards night. Across the river the Boro was lighting up and the city beyond was shadowing against the orange sky. The sun looked like it was rolling down the cheese cut edge of the old Citicorp Center and the air around them was cool and comfortable. The whole city was making niggas feel like they were on top of the world, so they went to the top of the world to celebrate.

“Man, you buggin’ the fuck out, God. That bitch was checkin’ me out,” Power retorted cockily, as he took the blunt.

“Bullshit! I seen you, yo. I just ain’t say nothin’. She is a bad bitch though, yo. I ain’t gonna front,” Kane admitted, giving Power dap.

Power hit the blunt.

“Yo, I gotta hit that. Word,” he rolled.

“Fuckin’ the boss’ bitch? If we lose our deal over that hoe, I’ma fuck you up!” Kane laughed.

“Fuck Duppy, that nigga soft. Besides, we the best thing that ever happened to him. Without us, he’d still be scrapin’ Exclusive off that stage,” bragged Power.

“Word,” Kane cackled, giving Power a heartfelt dap.

Lil’ Earl looked like the only one who wasn’t feelin’ it tonight. He stood in the corner, leaning against the overhang of the building’s masonry, looking out over Queens Boro Park. He wasn’t smoking, he wasn’t drinking. Messiah peeled away from the others and went over.

“Ay yo Earl, fuck wrong wit’ you?” he asked, eyeing his cousin skeptically. Lil’ Earl was shaking. Ever since witnessing and being made to participate in Tyrone’s murder, he had been getting progressively worse. He’d told Messiah last night that at the beginning, he heard Tyrone calling him, then he thought he had begun to see shadows in the dark. “It got to the point where I couldn’t sleep with the lights off, but that made it even worse…” he’d said. Because he started seeing Tyrone, Messiah had thought. Fuckin’ pussy.

Lil’ Earl had described that he’d see Tyrone’s body decaying and all he could smell in the dream was the rotting stench of his flesh. “I-I-I’m sorry, Ty. I swear I didn’t mean to do it,” Lil’ Earl told Messiah he’d said in the dream. “Tyrone never opens his mouth, but I can hear his words… Tell the truth…. Tell the truth…. Set me free…. Tell the truth. Those words haunt me cuz…They were in my mind like a song stuck in the brain.”

Messiah had spanked Lil’ Earl’s face hard and told him to put that shit behind him. He didn’t want to hear none of that stuff no more, yet here was Lil’ Earl again taking the shine off the whole situation.

Messiah didn’t have to say anything, Lil’ Earl knew just by looking at him how angry he was “Man, I can’t take this anymore.”

“We dealt wit’ this nigga. You some noid ass crazy,” Messiah hissed, so the others, laughing and smoking still, didn’t hear. He didn’t want Lil’ Earl killing the buzz.

Messiah had kept an eye on Lil’ Earl since the murder but hadn’t realized how fucked up his cousin was until last night. Messiah was glad he had brought Lil’ Earl back to New York with him.

Lil’ Earl looked up at him, his expression on the verge of tears, his posture was bent and broken. “Tyrone…he…he still speakin’ to me,” Lil’ Earl admitted.

“No he isn’t cuz. That’s just shit in your head. Jus’ the chocolate you been smokin’.” Messiah said, staying firm.

The whole time they were talking, the rest of the crew were oblivious to their conversation.

Lil’ Earl shook his head.

Messiah gazed down at his little cousin, his mother’s sister’s son; his little nigga that peed the bed whenever he stayed with him. He loved him, but he loved himself and Knowledge more. There was no question Lil’ Earl would tell. The only question was when.

He reached his hand down to help Lil’ Earl up.

“Don’t worry about it, cuz. We’ll take care of it,” Messiah assured him.

Looking into his eyes, Lil’ Earl saw it, but at that point, he was too gone to care. “O-okay,” Lil’ Earl replied, as he reached up and took his cousin’s hand. Messiah pulled him to his feet and then without missing a beat, he shoved Lil’ Earl’s head and sent him toppling over the side of the roof.

Power caught the moment out of the corner of his eye. “What the fuck?!”

In that last instant before he fell, Messiah and Lil’ Earl’s eyes met.

On Lil’ Earl’s face was an expression of relief. He knew what his cousin was going to do, but deep down he thanked him because he knew he didn’t have the heart to do it himself. His arms flailed around as he felt the pull of gravity, making his heart pound - but then he looked down and saw Tyrone smiling up at him, no longer rotting, but whole and glowing.

Then his arms went from flailing to embracing as his body sped downward, faster and faster, until he hit the pavement. The crash taking out all the lights on the building, bridge, in the city from his head, and last of all the light in Lil’ Earl’s eyes went out.

Messiah looked over the edge at the broken bird of his cuz, spread on the ground, arms and legs doing impossible things. In seconds there was screaming and running footsteps. A woman fell to her knees by the body, her hands useless. There was nothing she could do. She looked up at Messiah.

Messiah shook his head moved back from the edge to face his crew.

All conversation on the roof had stopped. They all knew what happened, but none of them knew why. Messiah looked at them - at their questioning eyes and simply said, “He fell.”

And that became what happened.