In a Cold Sweat (2 page)

The trouble began right then.

Travis had just closed the safe, when the lights in the room suddenly came on. “Hold it right there!” the security guard yelled with his weapon drawn. Parker turned quickly and immediately opened fire.

“No!” Travis yelled. Parker had hit the security guard with two shots to the chest.

They turned off the light and walked out into the hallway where they were confronted by two more armed guards. Suddenly lights came on and the whaling sound of the alarm rang throughout the halls. Travis fired a round of shots in the direction of security and he and Parker took off running in the opposite direction.

At the end of the hall, they were cut from exit by more security, which opened up on them on sight. Travis and Parker ran down the hall until it forked off in two directions. Parker stopped and turned. “This way!” he yelled, as he shot wildly at security and ran down the hallway.

“No!” Travis shouted to him. He had memorized the floor plan and knew if they went that way, they’d be trapped. “This way!”
 

Parker stopped in his tracks and ran back toward Travis, who was firing down the hall at security. “I’ll cover while you make it across.”

Parker nodded his head and Travis moved out into the open and fired. Parker ran out, but was hit almost immediately by a shot to his head. Travis watched Parker’s body fall to the ground. “Shit!”

He was dead.

As blood oozed across the floor, Travis made an attempt to grab the pack from Parker’s back. The gunfire was too intense and his body was too far away to reach it without getting shot himself.

Upset that he was leaving without the processors, but thinking only about escaping with his life, Travis ran as fast as he could toward what he knew to be an exit.

Once outside, Travis made his way around the building looking for more security. He broke radio silence and called for Jackie. “Mr. Blue to Mr. White. Extraction necessary; proceed to the rendezvous
poin
—Ahhh,” he screamed in pain.

“Travis!” Jackie yelled forgetting about their code names, but Travis didn’t respond. He had been shot in the leg and couldn’t make it back the way he came. Travis returned fire and as best he could, limped back inside the building.

As quickly as possible, Travis made his way to the front entrance of the building. He figured that with security looking for him outside, this would be the safest way to go. Travis felt himself getting weak. That’s when he felt the sharp pain and put his hand on the side of his stomach. He’d taken a bullet there as well and was losing blood.

Now at the front entrance, Travis stood in the shadows and peered out the door. He saw a security vehicle drive by and head toward the corner. Once the vehicle was out of sight, Travis opened the door and was startled by the alarm. He moved as quickly as he could down the street. Once he was far enough away from the building, Travis called Jackie. “Jackie!” Travis called out into his mike. “Can you hear me?”

“I hear you, Travis. Are you all right? I thought I heard shooting,” Jackie said, relieved to finally hear his voice.

“I’m hit, Jackie,” Travis managed to say. “One in the leg and the other in the gut.”

“How bad is it?” Jackie asked excitedly.

“It’s bad.”

“Where are you?”

“I don’t know exactly. I made it out of the warehouse, but I don’t know where I am,” Travis told her. He limped to the corner and looked up at the street sign. “I’m on the corner of 144
^th
and Wales by a transmission joint, hiding behind a blue Thunderbird.”

“Hold on, Travis, I’m coming for you.” It didn’t take long for Jackie to find Travis. She got out of the Hummer to help Travis get in. “Where’s Parker?”

“He took one to the head. He’s dead.”

“Damn,” Jackie said, and got back into the Hummer. “I gotta get you to a hospital.”

“No!” Travis shouted at her. “Call Freeze.”

Mylo sat in the corner of the room while the poker game went on; just as he did every night since Freeze put him in charge of the high stakes game that Mike Black himself used to run. Black controlled a profitable and expanding business that now included real estate, entertainment, finance and construction companies, in addition to burial services. But, over the years, Black made his real money in gambling, extortion, number running and prostitution. Black and his childhood friend Bobby Ray started out collecting for a local dealer named Andre' Harmon. Enforcing Andre's law earned Mike the nickname Vicious Black, but everybody called him Black.

Mylo had made
himself
useful and practically indispensable to Freeze. But, he earned his post after he snitched on Birdie and Albert. At that time, Freeze had convinced himself that they were responsible for the brutal murder of Mike Black’s wife, Cassandra. Everybody called her Shy, except Black, he preferred to call her by her government name.

Mylo told Freeze that Birdie and Albert were hiding out in Atlantic City, and he and Nick took care of everything from there. Mylo was able to get that useful bit of information because he was not only working for Freeze, but selling drugs for Birdie and Albert as well.

It began one night when Mylo told Albert that he couldn’t live off the scraps Freeze was throwin’ him. Without telling Birdie, Albert gave Mylo a package, which he flipped and his buys got bigger and bigger until Mylo had become one of their best earners.

“And you’re able to do this without Freeze knowing?” Albert had asked Mylo.

“They ain’t organized like they used to be. Black and Bobby
is
out. They don’t even fuck with the shit
no
more. I couldn’t tell you the last time I even saw Bobby. I’m tellin’ you, Freeze ain’t the nigga y’all think he is,” Mylo boasted.

Mylo knew that the time would come when he would have to get out, so before that
happened,
he wanted to have enough money to retire on. But there was another side of Mylo; one that Birdie and Albert, and especially Freeze, didn’t know about.
 
Mylo was, in reality, a rogue DEA agent.
 
His real name was Clint Harris and he’d been working deep cover assignments for the last five years. His job was to work his way into the target organization, gather information, and then bring the whole thing down. That had been his life, until his handler didn’t show up for their weekly conversation.
 
At that point, he was on his own. That is… until fellow DEA agent Kenneth DeFrancisco brought him in. “You work for me now,” DeFrancisco said when he first approached Mylo.

“What do I have to do?” Mylo asked.

“Exactly what you do. I put you in
position,
you make contact and work your way in, then report to me.”

“No problem,” Mylo responded, knowing that it couldn’t be that simple.

“There’s only one minor difference. You’re not there looking for evidence of a drug conspiracy; you’re there to create one.”

It was DeFrancisco that put Mylo in touch with Albert; but then DeFrancisco went to jail and left Mylo out here again making crazy money with no handler.

Birdie and Albert’s deaths were responsible for something other than Mylo getting a primo spot, running the game. Their demise also gave birth to The Commission.

After Birdie and Albert’s funeral, Mylo and several of the dealers that had bought from them got together to pour out a little liquor for their homies. It didn’t take long before Black was the topic of conversation.

“You know it was Freeze that killed Birdie and Albert’s boys,” Bruce Stark told the gathering after his fourth drink. “In broad daylight at a red light,” Stark testified.

“That nigga ain’t no joke,” Kevin Murdock, who liked to be called K Murder, confirmed.

Mylo laughed. “That nigga ain’t all
that,
trust me.”

“He bad enough to scare you out the game,” Stark said quickly.

“True that. But I consider that health insurance.”

“How you figure that, Mylo?” K Murder asked.

“These niggas claim to want to co-exist peacefully with drug dealers, but the proof says that these mutha fuckas delight in killin’ drug dealers,” Mylo said.

“You ain’t told
no
lie there. Since Black made peace with Chilly, that nigga ain’t done nothin’ but kill mutha fuckas,” Steven Cash Money Blake said. “He killed Chilly and Rocky.”

“I heard dude killed Chilly ’cause he was fuckin’ Chilly wife,” Billy Banner clarified.

“He still dead,” Stark said.

“Sure you right,” Cash Money agreed. “Then Black killed D-Train and now Birdie and Albert.”

Mylo looked around the room. But, being the calculating guy that he was, Mylo saw an opportunity to use their paranoia to his advantage.

“Which one of y'all dumb niggas gonna be the next fool to try?” he asked. No one said a word.

“What y’all mutha fuckas need to do is get together.” Mylo continued.

“What you talkin’ ’bout, Mylo?” Stark asked.

“I mean get together against Black,” Mylo said and got up to leave. “Y’all stand a better chance that way.”

A week later, Stark and Billy Banner, who everybody called BB, came to see Mylo at his apartment. At first Mylo was a little worried when he invited them in, but he figured if their visit was anything life threatening, Stark would have come with K Murder.

“Get y’all a drink?” Mylo offered.

“Whatever you got,” Stark said and took a seat on the couch.

“Mind if I smoke?” BB asked and pulled out a blunt. He smoked blunts like they were cigarettes.

Mylo laughed. “Knock
yourself
out,” he said before going to get the drinks. When he returned, Stark got to the reason for their visit.

“We decided to take your advice, Mylo,” Stark began.

“Shit, y’all done fucked up now, if you doin’ something I said.” Mylo chuckled.

“Nah, it was good advice,” Stark said. “I know you was drunk—”

“Shit, we all
was
,” BB said and hit the blunt before passing it to Mylo.

“Before you left you said we stand a better chance coming up against Black if we worked together,” Stark said.

“Organize,” BB added. “Instead of
competin
’ against each other, we work together; buy together. Get a better price. And if Black comes at us, we
be
together on that too.”

“Now
y’all talkin’
sense. Damn, it was a good idea,” Mylo said. “So who’s in this little boys club?”

“Me, BB, Cash Money and K Murder. We call ourselves The Commission,” Stark announced.

“The Commission, huh?” Mylo asked and laughed a little.

“We wanted to know if you wanted
in?
” BB asked.

“No thanks. I told you
before,
fuckin’ with them niggas is bad for your health.” Mylo paused and thought for a minute. “But you can consider me an adviser.”

After they left, Mylo began thinking of ways he could use The Commission to his advantage. The only thing on his mind was making the most of this golden opportunity he had staring him in the face.

When Freeze put Mylo in charge of the high stakes game, it surprised a lot of people, but Mylo had worked hard for it. Little by little, day by day, Mylo had done things to gain Freeze’s confidence.

When the door opened and Freeze walked in at around one in the morning, Mylo sprang to his feet. “What up, Freeze?”