Trickery (19 page)

“I dropped six pies off at the house and gave them to one of his sisters, and she told me that something really crazy happened when they were carrying Reverend Flashlight’s body out of that funeral parlor.”

Trey shook his head. “Something crazy like what?”

“Well, she said them pallbearers threw the Reverend right out in the floor!”

“Threw him out on the floor?”

“That’s right,” she nodded vigorously. “He fell clean out. Right in the floor.”

“I don’t get it,” Trey said and glanced at Juicy hoping she could make some sense outta what the old lady was saying. “Did somebody drop him outta the casket, or did he fall out?”

“He
fell
out!” Mrs. Washington said. “Came busting clean out the bottom! They sure don’t build them things the way they used to. But the crazy thing was, Reverend Flashlight didn’t fall outta that pine box by himself.”

“Huh?” Trey said frowning. He was ready to get on the road and the old lady was fuckin’ with his head.

“What I’m trying to tell you is that Reverend Flashlight fell outta his box, but he wasn’t the only one layin’ up in there!”

Trey frowned. “Who was in there with him?”

“It was that
boy
,” Mrs. Washington said, lowering her voice as tears sprang to her eyes. “Maleek. Your friend Messiah’s brother. Maleek was running the streets with Gerard the night he got shot, you know, and I guess the Lord figured it was his turn to get shot too.”

Trey froze as a look of disbelief spread across his face. “What are you talking about Mrs. Washington?”

“I already told you I’m talking about that
boy
! Gerard’s friend,
Maleek
! They said that poor baby’s head was blown wide open when him and Reverend Flashlight hit the ground all tumbled up together. It’s just a shame before God how them greedy funeral folks be doing our people because both Maleek and the preacher was just as stiff and dead as dirt!”

CHAPTER 24

Chiney was in Trey’s bathroom getting her dick sucked. Her brother had left to take Juicy somewhere down south, and Chiney and Venus had the whole crib to themselves.

Chiney knew how her brother felt about her girlfriend, but she just didn’t give a fuck. She loved her some Venus and she was gonna be with her regardless. So the minute Trey and Juicy walked out the door Chiney had hit Venus on her cell and told her to rush over so she could give her a little birthday surprise. By the time her girl showed up Chiney had her brother’s bathroom lit up with scented candles, and had a tub full of hot bubbly water with rose petals floating on top, just waiting for her boo-thang.

“Yeah, baby,” Chiney panted, straddling Venus’s body with her right foot propped up on the edge of the tub. Using both hands, she spread her outer vaginal lips apart and thrust her hips forward. Her clitoris pointed straight out from her body. Its fleshy knob was erect and throbbing just like the head of a dick.

Venus took the succulent piece of meat between her lips and toyed with it. Sitting in the warm, bubbly water, she wiggled it back and forth and slithered her tongue around its swollen base.

Chiney palmed her woman’s head and pumped her hips back and forth. She was a straight up man, mouth-fucking the hell outta her bitch, at least that’s what she imagined in her own mind.

“Ah, shit! I’m about to cum again,” Chiney moaned as she felt a nut pressing against her asshole and trying to bust through her coochie. She had already licked Venus to three orgasms and had two herself. This is where Chiney had a big advantage over a real man. She could have back-to-back nuts and still be ready to wear Venus out again five minutes later.

“Here it comes!” she squealed, curling her toes and clenching her ass-cheeks tight as Venus’s head rapidly bobbed on her mini-dick.

“Ughh!” Chiney screamed as her muscles stiffened and she came hard and heavy. “Ugghhh!” Her titties jiggled as her body trembled and convulsed like a dog shaking off water.

Her knees were weak and shaky, and she was forced to lean against the wall in order to keep from sliding down into the tub.

“Whew!” she said after a few moments. She looked down at Venus, who was reclining in the warm water with a slight smile on her face.

“That was real good, baby,” Chiney praised her, even though Venus’s head game was nowhere near as good as her jump off Lincy’s neck action. Chiney stared down at her woman with mad admiration. She loved the way her girl’s light-brown coconut-shaped breasts looked as they floated in the soapy water. She hoped Venus was soaking the soreness outta her pussy because she was gonna want her another taste of it real soon. “Are you hungry?” Chiney asked.

Venus shook her head. “Nah, but I’m thirsty and I’m starting to come down though.”

Chiney bent down and pulled the stopper from the drain. The sucking sound of water rushing into the plumbing filled the air.

“What you doing?” Venus murmured.

“Letting the cold water out,” Chiney said. “Just relax. I’m gonna fill it up again and make it warmer.”

Venus lay back as the water swirled down the drain near her feet. The candles flickered and glowed around the room, and the rose petals that Chiney had sprinkled in the tub stuck gently to her beautiful brown skin.

Chiney waited until almost all the water was gone, and then she stopped the tub up and began filling it up again. She poured two capfuls of strawberry-scented bubble bath under the rushing tap, and then stepped out of the bathtub and onto the micro-fiber floor mat.

“I’ll be back,” she said. “I’m gonna go fix us a couple of drinks.” She grabbed a clean towel from the shelf and wrapped it around her body. “You good?”

Lounging sexily with the soapy water filling up the tub, Venus nodded yes.

“Wait!” she said as Chiney’s hand hit the doorknob. “Let me get another hit before you go,” she said.

Chiney reached for the vial they’d been smoking out of, but it was empty. She picked up the pants she’d been wearing and dug into her front pocket and pulled out the last of the dope that she had copped from Fitted that morning.

Chiney studied the small vial. It was stamped with a peculiar logo that said, “Strawberry Snake.” A pink snake was on the front, and it was shaped like the letter “S”. The snake’s tail was curled at the end, and two dice were gripped in the tip like they were about to be rolled. Both dice were showing just one dot, which Chiney knew stood for “snake eyes.” This wasn’t the same Divine Nine stuff she usually copped, but hell, half of it had been free so who was she to complain?

She set up the hit for Venus, placing the pipe on a dry washcloth and putting about a quarter of the glistening crystals in the stem. She handed the whole thing off to her girl, then gave her a lighter and told her to spark up whenever she was ready.

“Save me some,” Chiney said over her shoulder, knowing damn well Venus would prolly try to smoke the whole damn thing up in one blast.

Venus laughed. “Yeah, a’ight.”

“You good?” Chiney asked one more time before she walked out the door.

“Yeah, baby,” Venus said sweetly as she prepared to get her head sparked up. “I’m always good when I’m with you.”

$$$$$

Chiney moved around the kitchen still wrapped in her towel. Humming under her breath, she turned on the small flat-panel television that sat on the counter. A crooked Republican politician was on a talk show talking a bunch of yang, and Chiney shook her head as she listed to his twisted bullshit pitch.

She got two crystal wine glasses off the portable bar and set them near the sink. Then she took a fat lemon out of the refrigerator and rolled and kneaded it until it was soft. She washed it off and sliced the tip off one end and squeezed a little bit of juice into each wine glass.

Back at the bar, she chose a bottle of Puerto Rican rum and poured it until each glass was halfway full. She opened a can of Coca-Cola and poured again until the glasses were almost up to the rim. Then she added a few cubes of ice and sliced the lemon and stuck the pieces onto the edge of the glass.

She arranged the glasses on a sterling silver serving tray that one of Trey’s bitches had given him for his birthday, then rummaged through the fridge and found a hunk of cheddar cheese. She put it on a plate with a couple of grapes and then broke off a corner of the cheese and popped it in her mouth.

Giggling under her breath, Chiney let her towel fall and stood in the kitchen butt naked. Picking up the chocolate colored vibrating dildo she had retrieved from her closet after leaving the bathroom, she positioned it around her pelvis and strapped it on tight with the leather belts and buckles coming to a close on her right hip. Flexing her ass-cheeks in and out, she pretended she was stroking Venus down, getting deep up in that pussy. Nodding in satisfaction at the ten erect inches that stuck out at an angle from her body, Chiney felt more like a man than ever before. She had just picked up the sterling tray to take it to the sexy chick who was waiting for her in the bathroom, when she heard a voice on the television say:

“Breaking news coming to you live from Channel 7, Eyewitness News. Our top story this half hour…a two-year-old child has died after ingesting crystal meth left on a table by her mother. Eyewitness news reporter Martin Solter joins us live from Harlem, New York. Good afternoon, Martin.

“Good morning, Gloria. Yes, a twenty-year-old Harlem mother has just been taken into custody in connection with the suspected drug overdose death of her two-year-old daughter. Earlier today the emergency call center received a 911 call about a woman convulsing and a baby not breathing in an apartment on Eighth Avenue. Officers responded and found the mother overdosing on methamphetamines, and the child in full cardiac arrest. At this hour it’s being reported that the mother’s condition has been stabilized, however, the child was transported to Harlem Hospital where she was pronounced dead. An autopsy will be conducted, but according to authorities the mother admitted the baby may have ingested some crystal methamphetamine that was mistakenly left near her Sippy cup.

As you know, Gloria, the rise in meth usage in Harlem has become a concerning trend, and this is not the first case of an accidental overdose that has been reported after the use of the fashionable pink crystals that seem to be popping up all over the city. And sadly, this particular drug may have attracted the baby because it looks and smells like Strawberry Quik. However, I must add that the two-year-old was also reported to have several burns on her body and at least one broken bone, and child abuse charges may also be filed. We’re live at Harlem Hospital, Martin Solter, Channel 7, Eyewitness News…Back to you, Gloria.”

“Venus!” Chiney screamed as a picture of a meth vial with a Strawberry Snake logo flashed across the television screen. The sterling silver tray she was holding hit the floor and the wine glasses shattered in a thousand tiny pieces.

“
Don’t smoke that shit
!” Chiney screeched, jetting toward the bathroom with her stiff dildo waving from side to side in front of her. “Don’t smoke no more, Vee!
Don’t smoke it
!”

Chiney reached the bathroom and flung open the door. The running water had overflowed from the tub and thousands of frothy bubbles were spilling out on the floor. Venus was lounging with her eyes closed and her head propped against the wall. Chiney was already halfway to the tub when she noticed the meth pipe and the empty glass vial floating in the bath water.

“Venus?” Chiney blurted, panic in her voice.

Her feet splashed in warm water as she ran the rest of the way over and placed two fingers on Venus’s face. The girl’s head lolled to the side, and then her chin dropped to her chest like her neck was just a limp spaghetti noodle.

“Venus!!” Chiney screamed. “Venus, Venus,
Venus
!” Chiney cried as she jumped into the warm tub of overflowing water and cradled her lover in her arms. “Oh baby…baby…my
baby
…” Chiney wailed at the top of her lungs. Grief and desperation made Chiney’s cries grow even louder, but still Venus could not answer. Venus could not hear her. Because Venus was no more.

CHAPTER 25

Leaving Mrs. Washington standing in the street, Trey peeled outta his parking spot and left remnants of burnt rubber on the pavement. He ignored Juicy’s questions as he reached behind him and grabbed a bag from the backseat. He had just retrieved it from his safe at the Crossover Center, and there were three loaded gats inside. Two Glocks and a lightweight Ruger five-shooter revolver. Trey had a concealed handgun permit to carry them and his burners were all clean, but if he so much as smelled that little niggah Flex, that fool was gonna be a dead man.

Trey drove down the streets of Harlem passing by tons of corner boys working the drug sectors of Harlem. Some scrambled meth and yay for the G-Spot, others were small factions holding it down for low-level dealers, but the vast majority were young cats just like Maleek had been, out there on the street peddling product for Flex.

For the first time ever Harlem looked like a wasteland to Trey. It was a great big cemetery filled with walking skeletons. When you got right down to it, it was all about the drugs and guns in this town, and every young Black kid walking the streets could expect to die from one or even both of those things.

Ten minutes later Trey pulled into a parking spot down the block from the Three Brothers Funeral Home. He nosed up close behind a FedEx truck and killed his engine, leaving the keys in the ignition. His face was harder than stone as he reached into his gun bag and retrieved the three firearms. He set them on his lap and briefly examined them, then pushed the two semi-automatic pistols down into the waistband of his pants and slid the revolver beneath his seat. And then, for the first time since Mrs. Washington had dropped her bomb on his head, Trey turned and looked at Juicy.

“Stay right here,” he barked on her. “Lock the doors and don’t get out, you hear me?”