Return of the Cartier Cartel (4 page)

Christian’s eyes went toward the top of the refrigerator. “My stomach is rumbling for that white cake.”

Cartier looked at the vanilla cake Trina had baked over the weekend. “Go and take your ass in the bathroom and get ready for school!”

The loud outburst from Christian’s wails had woken up all the kids. She’d screamed as if she was getting her ass torn to pieces, though Cartier hadn’t even touched her. Cartier knew she and Jason were raising a cry baby, using a different approach to parenting, talking things out with the kids and not hitting as a form of discipline.

Trina wasn’t as patient. “Shut up!” she roared, startling the four-year-old. “I’m telling you, Christian, you are begging for an ass-whipping, hollering like you stupid, so damn early in the morning. Now take your tail in that bathroom and get ready for school, and if I have to tell you twice, I’ma get the belt.”

Reluctantly, Christian marched off, to Cartier’s relief. She had told Trina on numerous occasions to not hit her daughter, but Cartier knew her mother was only two seconds from putting the smack down.

After the children were off to school, Cartier wanted to resume what she’d started the night before. She fixed Jason breakfast and called him in. Once seated, he began to tear into his plate of food, never lifting his head up, although he knew Cartier wanted to talk.

“What are we doing here?”

Jason held some of the scrambled eggs on the fork and stared at his wife. He had no idea where she was going with the conversation. “What do you mean?”

“I asked, what are we doing here? Why are we here?”

“Like, why are we living with your moms?”

“You know what? Yes. Answer that question. Why are we living with Trina?”

“We’re here because we got shit to do, and once it’s done, then we’re out.”

“That’s my point, Jason. We’re only here because we got shit to do, but each day we’re here, it’s not getting done. We’re squeezed in here like sardines in a can, and I feel like you’re losing sight of what brought us back to Brooklyn. Why are we not getting any closer to Ryan? You got my mother sleeping on the sofa, all the kids piled up on top of each other. I can’t live like this anymore. It’s been two months to do something that I thought would take a week.”

Jason dropped his fork and pushed his plate away. He lost his appetite. He didn’t want to hear about murking Ryan. Truthfully, Jason had once again lost his passion to avenge anyone’s murder. He was back in the streets getting money, and that was where his heart was. But he couldn’t tell that to Cartier, nor was he saying that he wouldn’t get at them niggas, but it just wasn’t a priority.

“Cartier, why are you putting all this pressure on me? Don’t you think I wanna handle my business? I’m out here getting money to take care of my family. I’m out on these streets day and night with my ears peeled to the curb, trying to get the right information to get at these niggas. I know I don’t discuss it with you, but believe me, I got this.”

“I just think you need to let me in on your plans. I’m not some green chick who grew up sheltered. I get down for mine, and I think I could help bring this situation to a head.”

“OK, ma, let’s talk. I’m all ears. Tell me what I gotta do, and it’s done. Tell me how you want shit to go down, and I’ll make it happen.”

Jason could see Cartier’s mood shift. He held up his index finger. “Hold that thought for one second.” He ran into their bedroom and returned with a crumpled paper bag he’d brought home last night, pulled out the kitchen chair, and began to count out the stacks of money he’d just picked up. Why not kill two birds with one stone? he thought.

Instinctively, Cartier sat down beside him and helped him count it out, not bothered that he’d interrupted what was supposed to be an important conversation.

After a solid thirty minutes of business at hand, Jason said, “How much you got there?”

“Thirty-five large,” Cartier replied. “How much you got?”

“Seventy.”

“Is the count correct?”

“Hell, yeah. Those niggas know not to fuck with my bread. Now, what’s on your mind? Let’s square all of this away for good.”

The pangs of jealousy hadn’t actually subsided from Cartier’s run-in with Jason’s L.A. mistress, and when Jason spent long hours away from home, those negative feelings resurfaced.

“Things are going well with your business, and now you gotta take care of your family. I don’t want to live like this, shacked up with Trina in this roach motel. I deserve better than that.”

“I hear you, ma. And that’s what I was gonna do anyway, but I got so much shit on my mind right now. I’m out here in these streets for us, not me. You think I’m out here up in the clubs partying, but most of the time, I’m in there making connections. In the clubs is where you see niggas who need product. A lot of deals go on in the sanctity of a nightclub.”

Cartier looked at Jason like he had two heads. “Don’t tell me that dumb shit like my name is Moron. It’s insulting. You ain’t up in the clubs solely for business. You’re up in the club for the bitches!”

“See, I can’t tell you shit, so I’ma prove it to you.” Jason began to grab up the stacks of money. “I put a bounty on Big Mike and Ryan’s head, and my man came through for me.”

“Big Mike? Why Big Mike? And what type of bounty?”

Jason didn’t have any bounty on anyone. He wondered if he should feel guilty about the small lie he was telling to keep peace in his household.

“Hell, yeah, Big Mike. He gotta get it too, and that’s final. No more speculating on whether or not he was down. I’ve been thinking about this shit real hard. Last week after Janet came back from taking Jason Jr. to see Monya, she and I began to kick it, and we decided that we won’t ever know for sure who pulled the trigger, so they both gotta get it.”

Cartier took in his words. “OK, I feel you, but from here on out, you and I will decide things together. We’re a team. Don’t ever forget that. I should have been a part of officially adding Big Mike to the list.”

Jason nodded.

“So tell me about this bounty.”

“I put the word out to a few select, thorough niggas that I trust that I needed to get close enough to touch those lame-ass dudes. Anyone who could get me information, I got fifty large.”

“Just for information?”

“True that.”

“That seems like an awful lot of money. Don’t forget you got a family to feed.”

“Damn, Cartier, can’t shit ever make you happy nowadays? All you do is complain. I thought I was doing exactly what you wanted. You been riding my back since we were in Cali. You just said shit is taking too long.”

Cartier realized she did sound like a whiny, ungrateful child. “Babe, you’re right. I’m sorry.” She leaned in and gave him a quick kiss on the lips. “I’m just concerned, that’s all. And I just want this shit to be over. I want both of those bastards dead, and I’ll happily do the whop”—Cartier began doing the old-school dance—“over their graves.”

Jason couldn’t help but laugh at his wife’s antics, but then he got serious again. “Well, that’s why I need information on where these niggas rest at. Ever since they got word that I was back on the scene, those niggas don’t even party no more. I heard Big Mike went back underground like a li’l bitch living with some trick in South Carolina. And Ryan, that nigga name should be Casper ’cause he stay ghost. I can’t get no info on that muthafucka. No bitch name, no address. I can’t even get what type of ride he driving. That’s a clever dude. I heard he switch his shit up constantly from his cellie, to his whip, to his chick. He don’t got no loyalty for nothing, but the bread.”

“Fuck Ryan. He ain’t God. He can get got just like anybody else, and he definitely ain’t smarter than me or you. You giving him too much credit. Those moves he’s doing is Hustling 101, and I’m not impressed.” Cartier sucked her teeth and threw in an eye-roll.

“You better not be impressed, if you know what’s good for you,” Jason teased, looking at Cartier sideways.

Cartier exhaled and tried to gather her thoughts. She needed to focus and get a clear vision of what their future was going to look like. She didn’t want to mention anything to Jason, but she kept getting a strange feeling that shit was going to go wrong. She was never one to worry in the past, but her gut kept giving off warning signs. She felt strongly that if they didn’t find and kill not only Ryan but now Big Mike as well, then their lives were in imminent danger. If either one of those guys felt threatened enough to stay on the low, then Cartier and Jason needed to move in silence and lullaby them both before it was too late.

“Jay, there’s so much I worry about, mainly our kids. You’ve had a long run out here in these streets, and we both know that that fast money don’t last forever. I want our family to be straight. You can’t keep spending money like it’s water. We gotta keep stashing for that rainy day. If anything happens to either one of us, we both need to rest assured that Christian and Jason Jr. are going to be straight.”

“Now why you gotta go and jinx a nigga?”

“I ain’t jinxing you. This is what smart people do. They plan shit out to the very last detail, and that’s how we gonna stay a step ahead of the game. Take the bounty off their heads and keep that money in our stash. I’ma get back out there and keep my ears open. You know chicks can’t keep any secrets. Before we know it, we’ll find out where Big Mike and Ryan are creeping.”

“So that’s how we should do it?”

“Most definitely.”

“A’ight, but just watch who you asking about Big Mike and Ryan. Those niggas ain’t stupid. If they hear from the wrong person that we been asking about them, shit could get ugly. And I want you to start carrying that chrome .25 I have stashed up in the closet. Wherever you go, you need to be strapped.”

****

Cartier missed connecting with Monya more than she could ever express. Admittedly, she didn’t think about her each day because the pain was so powerful, but whenever she allowed her mind to travel back to the past, a steady stream of tears would inch out, and before she knew it, she was a hot mess.

All she thought about was, What if? What if they had been born into a better environment? What if their mothers had chosen better baby daddies? What if they weren’t forced to hug the block because they were virtually starving from lack of food money? What if whoever decided to rob Monya and Shanine didn’t feel as if they had to kill them?

The short ride to the hospital was consistent for Cartier twice a month. She’d bring a portable radio with numerous CDs of their favorite music, perfume, a comb and brush to style her hair, fingernail polish and remover to paint her nails and feet, and loads of gossip. Today she brought a mixed tape with a new female rapper named Nicki Minaj from Jamaica, Queens.

“What you think about this chick?” Cartier asked Monya as she began to remove the old nail polish to apply a new coat. “I’m trying to figure out what’s all the hoopla over her. If you ask me, she’s a Lil’ Kim knockoff, minus the hard lyrics.”

Cartier looked at the neon pink OPI color she’d just applied and loved it. “Listen to how she manipulates her voice. That’s all Kim,” she exclaimed, getting hyped for no reason. “Damn, Kim fell off. How you gonna let someone come and steal your style? A style that B.I.G. created and Kim pulled off. If you ask me, after B.I.G. got murdered and Kim dropped La Bella Mafia, she didn’t put the sexy swag in her voice. She was just rapping regular, almost trying to sound hard like Foxy, but not realizing why we liked her from jump.” Cartier held up Monya’s hand to her face. “How that look? I’m hooking your ass up.”

Cartier then got up and walked to sit on the other side of the small hospital bed, so she could paint Monya’s other hand.

“Yeah, back to this Minaj chick. I’m not trying to make it a Queens versus Brooklyn thing, but you know those bitches always wanted to be us. And when I say us, you know I mean Brooklyn. Queens girls are some lame, wannabe bitches, and I’m fucking pissed that Kim ain’t riding for us no more. She’s moved from Brooklyn and went all Hollywood . . . talking about Hollyhood.” Cartier rolled her eyes. “I should slap her face!”

Cartier knew if Monya was awake she’d agree with every word she was saying. “Anyway, Monya, as soon as you wake the fuck up and stop trying to hog all the attention”—Cartier laughed and playfully tapped Monya on her shoulder—“we could get back out there and do us and have these bitches worshipping us. We could even do something legal. You know”—Cartier looked off into space—“I was thinking we could get paid just for being who we are. This whole reality TV seems to be here to stay, and if we could get us a show, I think we could really blow up, you know, get our fifteen minutes of fame. And we wouldn’t have to sell out either, like these fake-ass people manufacturing drama. Shit, we bring real drama every day, the real drama that people wanna see. And here’s my thoughts. The show would be called Cartier’s Cartel.” Cartier paused. “Oh, I know you just didn’t flinch, bitch. I see you’re still a hater. OK, how ’bout The Cartel? How that sound?”

Cartier looked at Monya and actually waited for a response. Then she continued, “Yeah, the camera would follow us as we roll through Brooklyn with real fights, checking bitches and niggas, and hugging the block. Imagine the camera rolling, back in the day when we fucked up Shorty Dip with our moms! The ratings would have hit the roof. Or how ’bout the time when we got busted for Donnie’s murder? I can still remember the look on Trina’s face when the police came kicking in the door.”

Cartier laughed so hard, she almost couldn’t stop.

“Wait. Imagine the camera catching the day you came to visit me in jail to tell me that you and Jason were fucking around and you were pregnant. I know the look on my face had to be priceless.” She doubled over in laughter. “Wasn’t that some shit? I know I must have looked like Boo Boo the Fool.”

After about five minutes of silence with Cartier just staring at her friend with anticipation and a longing in her eyes, she got serious. “Monya, I know you’re going to wake up soon. I know that in my heart, but I think Janet is losing her faith. You gotta do something to help her, Monya . . . open your eyes, squeeze her hand, do something ’cause she’s starting to talk like you’re already gone, and if something doesn’t happen to change her outlook, then I’m afraid that she’s gonna take matters into her own hands and try to kill Ryan herself. You know she has it in her, Monya—as do I, but I would prefer if she just let me and Jason handle this. I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to Janet, or my moms, ’cause we both know where there’s one there’s the other.”