Ruthless (3 page)

“No doubt. You handled that shit like a real pro.”

I toss him a dismissive wave. “Please. I don't know about all that. I simply reacted. And gave that bitch what she had coming to her.”

“Yo, I hear you. Still, it was impressive.”

An awkward silence fills the space between us. He licks his dark-chocolate lips and, instantly, the memory of what they felt like on my nipples, on my clit, suckling and nibbling, taunting my pussy lips, causes heat to spread through my thighs. Flashes of his hard dick gliding in and out of my throat shoot through my head, triggering a pulsing in my tonsils. I swallow back the lusty thoughts, shifting the flames slowly flickering in my pelvis.

“But dig, Pasha. I wanted to talk you about something serious.”

I tilt my head, pressing my legs together. “Okay. I'm listening.”

He leans forward, rubbing his chin. “Yo, on some real shit. I think you got serious skills, ma. I dig how you move. You mad classy and real discreet. And you have a lil' street edge to you underneath all that sophistication. On some real shit, my peoples could
really use someone like you on his team.”

I raise a brow, narrowing my eyes, indignation written all over my face.
How dare this motherfucker!
There's no office decorum for how to address him for coming at me like this. Besides, professionalism went out the window the day I invited him to my home and sucked down his dick, then rode his tongue.

“Skills?
Your peoples'
team?
Nigga, I
know
you are
not
implying what the hell I think you are? And I don't appreciate you disrespecting me or discussing my…”

He raises his hands, palms out, in mock surrender. “Whoa…hol' up, hol' up, Pasha. Where you going with this?”

I narrow my eyes. “No. Where the hell are
you
going with it? You're sitting here referring to my skills, like I'm taking dick-sucking referrals or some shit. If your
peoples'
is looking to recruit a few good dick suckers for his squad, I am
not
interested. Sucking dick is something I do when I'm in the mood. And being somebody's damn on-call dick sucker will
never
be what the fuck I do.”

He grins, then cracks up laughing. “Oh, shit! Damn. You just went in.”

My nose flares. “I don't think the shit is funny, Lamar.”

He tries to regain his composure. “Yo, my bad, Pasha. But word? You really think I was talking about
those
skills? Nah, ma, I'd never play you like that. Damn. I mean, shit. Yeah, ya skills ain't no joke. Ya head game is serious. Hands down. You most def the truth in that department, but I'm not even talkin' 'bout no shit like that. I wouldn't do you like that, Pasha. C'mon, ma. That's not how I get down. I don't play them kinda games. I can't believe you'd actually think I'd handle you like that.”

I relax a bit, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “Oh, okay. But those are the only
skills
I know I've shared with you. It's not like I've done your hair. And I haven't cooked for you. So what
other
skills
could you possibly be talking about?”

He shakes his head. “I'm talkin' 'bout that work you put in on Sunday, yo. I dig how you handled that situation.”

My heart drops.
“You
assured me,” I hiss, leaning up in my seat, “the utmost discretion.
No
one can know about that, or anything else. There's a lot at stake here. Do you not understand that? I've put all of my trust in you, Lamar.
Please
don't make me regret it.”

He gives me a serious look. The muscles in his jaw tighten. “Yo, hol' up. My word is my bond, Pasha. On my life. Don't ever doubt that shit. I'ma man of my word. One thing I
don't
do is front on anything I say or do. I got
you
. I already know what it is. If you go down, ma—we all go down. And real shit, I ain't goin' down for
you
or anyone else. So, yeah, I know what's at stake. Real shit, e'erything me ‘n' my peeps handle is airtight. And what we discuss ‘n'
what
ever pops off between us,
stays
between us; period, point blank.”

I narrow my eyes at him, taking in his words, studying his posture, his facial expression. Once again, I do not see any signs to cause alarm. I sit back in my seat, breathing out a sigh of relief. “Thanks for those reassuring words. I'm glad we're on the same page.”

“We've always been on the same page; from the rip. Which is why I'ma put you onto some real shit. I know a lotta muhfuckas, Pasha. I stay connected to niggas who make shit happen; muhfuckas, like
me
, who know how to make shit disappear; feel me?”

I nod. “I'm listening.”

“Right now, my peoples only has one female on his team. And she's bad as fuck, and vicious as shit…”

“Okay, so what does all that have to do with me?”

“It could potentially have e'erything to do with you, if you consider what I'm about to spit at you. No bullshit. You're sexy as fuck, Pasha. And you have a fire inside of you that keeps burning
with more intensity. The more that nigga Jasper fucks with you, the hotter that shit seems to get. It's a turn-on. But there's something else about you, ma.…”

I fold my arms over my chest, pressing them into my swelling nipples, aching for his tongue, his warm mouth.
Oooh, God, I wanna fuck him.
I blink my gaze away from his lips. “Oh, yeah. What's that?”

“Underneath all that fire and passion and beauty makes you potentially dangerous, ma. Muhfuckas sleep on you. And that shit's what'll get them knocked. 'Cause on some real shit, ma. There's a real killer inside of you. And that, Pasha”—he scoots up in his seat, placing his forearms up on my desk, then licking his lips and clasping his hands together—“is sexy as fuck. The way you move, no one would ever suspect you'd be capable of slumpin' a muhfucka. But you proved you got it in you.”

I blink.
“Slumping
Felecia, as you put it, wasn't one of the things on my things-to-do list. Being a”—I lower my voice to a hushed whisper—
“killer
isn't what I've aspired to be.”

“Yeah, but you thought it. I saw the fire in ya eyes when you spoke on it. Bodyin' that broad gave you life, didn't it? It gave you an adrenaline rush like no other, didn't it? And”—he snaps his fingers—“just like that, it's what you've become.”

“Bitch, you sealed your fate!”

Thrrrssp!

Felecia's bloody mouth, her broken teeth, fragments of her skull and brain matter sweep through my head.

I swallow.

Shift in my seat.

“Felecia got what her hand called for.”

“And you can get paid out the ass to handle other muhfuckas who gotta get what their hands call for too.”

I furrow my brows. “What exactly are you saying to me?”

He tells me he's down with a “work-for-hire” operation that his peoples' runs. A multimillion-dollar business he operates that handles
waste management
—the elimination of unsuspecting marks through contract hits. That he currently has eighteen
contractors
on his squad. Fierce killers who move in silence, swift and unseen.

“I want you on our team, ma. If you'd like I can set up a meeting wit' you and my peoples. He'd wanna snatch you up wit' a quickness.”

“To do what?”

“Body muhfuckas…”

Be careful what you ask for. The truth is sometimes more than you can stand…

“P
asha,” Kendra says through the intercom, “there's an Andre on line two for you. He says it's urgent. And my nine o'clock is here, so the front desk will be unattended.”

I'm not surprised Felecia's long-term fiancé is calling me. I knew this day would come. Still, I haven't mentally prepared myself to deal with him—or Nana, for that matter, when she starts calling, inquiring about Felecia. Pretending won't be the problem. The anxious, relentless probing will be.

“Okay, thanks,” I say, relieved she's interrupted us. I look at Lamar. “We'll have to finish this conversation some other time. I need to take this call.”

He stands. “No doubt, baby. I have…”

I hold a finger up at him. “Rule number one.
Unless
I have your dick wrapped between my lips, or your tongue is wedged in between the ones between my legs,
don't
refer to me as
baby
.”

He holds his hands up. “My bad. It'll never happen again.”

I raise a brow. “Good.”

“No doubt.” He hands me his backpack. “I almost forgot. This is for you.” I give him a quizzical look. “Saturday night's catch.”

I nod. That quick, I'd almost forgotten myself. It's the money from Jasper's stash houses burned down over the weekend. They were able to collect from all three spots close to two-hundred-
and-eighty-seven thousand dollars. I lick my lips. “Thanks. I'll have to be sure to
really
thank you later.”

I make a mental note to have either him or Mel drive me to the Wells Fargo down the street later today, so I can rent another safe deposit box and stuff my new riches inside—compliments of Jasper.

He grins, heading for the door. “I look forward to it.”

Oh, I'm sure you do.
I take in the way his muscled-ass sits up on his lower back, the way it fits in his jeans, imagining my nails digging into his dark flesh, urging his big black dick deeper into my throat. Sucking Lamar off is so far proving to be one of my smartest investment moves.

My cell vibrates.

I wait for him to shut the door behind him, then glance at my cell.
I knew I'd hear from you, Stax.
A sly smile inches over my glossed lips. And sucking and fucking him will prove more beneficial than it already has soon enough as well.

I let his call roll over into voicemail, lifting the office phone from the receiver, taking a deep breath. I press line two, going into script. “Heeeeey, Andre. This is a nice surprise. How have you been?” My voice is cheery and light, dripping with sunshine and happiness.

“I'm good,” he says in his deep voice. “No complaints. And you?”

“You know how it is here. Busy as always. But I know you're not calling me out the blue for an update on my life. So tell me, Andre. To what do I owe the pleasure of this call?”

“Honestly, I was wondering if you've spoken to Felecia. I know the two of you were supposed to meet on Sunday night.”

“No. I haven't spoken to her; well, not since the day she called
and agreed to meet me. But she never showed up. I called her twice and didn't hear back from her, so I figured she either changed her mind or something else came up.” I feign concern. “Why? Is everything okay?”

He sighs. “Damn. I haven't seen or heard from her since she left the house Sunday night around eight to meet you at the salon.” The alarm in his voice causes my chest to tighten. He and Nana will both become sick with worry as the days turn to weeks and weeks become months with still no sign of her. The consequence of my dirty deed. “I don't know what to think, Pasha. I'm really starting to get worried.”

Poor thing. I wonder how worried you'd be if you knew the bitch you've been fucking the last five years was a lying, conniving-ass slut.

For some reason a conversation she and I had over dinner drinks at P.F. Chang's comes to mind. She had asked me, again, if I had ever cheated on Jasper while he was locked up. Of course I lied. Told her, “Nope. I have no reason to.”

The way the bitch stared at me, like she didn't believe me, like she was on a fishing expedition, should have given me pause to question her. But I'd let it go over my head. She sipped her third Margarita, eyeing me over the salted rim of her glass.

“Girl, good for you. I don't know how you do it. Personally, I'd be pulling my damn hair out if I had to go without sex. I'm sorry. I love Andre. But if his ass ever got locked up, I'd have to have me some dick on-call until he got out. Fuck that. I'm not about to deprive myself of some cock just because a muhfucka can't keep his ass out of the streets to handle his business in the sheets.”

I licked the salt from around the rim of my own glass, chuckling. “Well, I'm not saying it's been easy because it hasn't. But with the
help of a whole lot of batteries and a collection of toys, I get by.”

“Hmmph. Girl, if the shoe were on the other foot, do you actually think Jasper would be so quick to keep his dick in his pants…?”

I should have known then that that bitch was up to no good. I wonder if she had already been going down to South Woods sucking the nut out of Jasper's dick when she was sitting there saying this shit to me.

Here that bitch popped shit about me fucking over a good man when she had a good man of her own right in her own damn bed every night. For as long as I've known Andre, he's been a real easygoing, laid-back, and hard-working man who handled all the bills and made sure she had whatever extra money in her wallet. Not once have I ever known him to disrespect her, or even raise his voice to her. He wasn't a street nigga. But he'd grown up in the hood and survived letting its elements become a part of his life. The nigga had good credit, a job with benefits, and knew how to treat a woman. And that bitch thanks him by fucking Jasper—a nigga who was only using her ass to keep tabs on me.

Stupid bitch!

Andre doesn't drink, smoke, or use drugs. And he's never been arrested, or seen the inside of a jail cell, not even for a traffic violation. He's always been good to her. But that still didn't stop that bitch from cheating on him. Once—that I know of, in Jamaica, during one of our many weekend getaways that
I
fucking paid for. She met him on the beach earlier in the day. Then later that night fucked him. As a matter of fact, the bitch fucked him the whole three days we were there. Then boarded the plane back to the States and acted as if she'd never had her pussy stretched open by some long, thick Blue Mountain cock.