Welfare Wifeys (10 page)

“You know Rico is one of my people,” Shai reminded him.

“That’s your bad, not mine, Shai. If you wanna lay your head on the chopping block for this nigga, I’m okay with that. Like they say, a bullet ain’t got no name on it. But if you were smart you’d fall back and let me do what I gotta do and get outta your hair.”

“And what if I say otherwise?” Shai asked, suspecting he already knew how Animal would respond.

Animal paused as if he was weighing it. “Then I’ll take my chances going through you to get to him.” Animal began backing away. When he was clear his three friends joined him. As an afterthought Animal called to Shai, “Get word to your people, Shai. The dog is back and he’s hungry.”

It wasn’t until the young hoods were gone that the realization of what had just happened set in. Honey began to sob uncontrollably drawing the attention of two police officers who had
been eating in the food court. As usual they were too late to catch the perpetrators. It didn’t matter though because neither Shai nor anyone with him would’ve talked to the police.

“I can’t believe that little punk did that,” Giselle said when they had made it back to the parking lot and the safety of Shai’s armor-plated Suburban.

“These jokers got some big balls, but don’t even trip. I’m gonna see Animal in the streets. Shai”—he turned to his best friend—“on everything I love I’m gonna gobble this nigga up.” Swan checked the clip of his gun.

“Let it be,” Shai said to the surprise of everyone in the truck, especially Swan’s.

Swan looked at Shai as if he’d lost it. “What the fuck do you mean, let it be? Shai, if we weren’t in that mall he probably would’ve tried to kill us.”

“Swan, we both know how Animal is built. If he wanted to kill us it wouldn’t have mattered if we were in a mall or a precinct, he would’ve let his hammer go. I can understand your anger, my nigga, but I can also understand that young man’s pain. I was harsh in the sentence I passed on Tech, but I had to make an example of him for the shit he was pulling. If I’d let him rock, every one of these young niggaz would’ve been trying to come for a piece of the commission. That was a judgment call and that’s what I tell myself so I can sleep with the decision, but if I had it to do all over again I would’ve let him live.”

“We’re gonna look like pussies if we let this go,” Swan said heatedly.

Shai looked at Swan. “Swan, we’re bosses, so I’m not concerned what it’ll look like for us not to punish Animal. What I am worried about is waking up one night to find that crazy little bastard standing over my son’s crib. Animal’s face is plastered in every rap magazine in the country yet he comes at us in a public place, knowing
that he was likely going to his death or a very long prison term. This tells us that he’s past the point of logic and ain’t gonna rest until this score is settled.”

“Shai, do you seriously think that Animal would throw his life away over his man getting whacked?”

Shai thought on it for a minute. “How would you react if it had been Tommy?” Shai’s older brother Tommy had been a mentor to all Poppa’s young guns, but Swan was his favorite.

“You’ve got a point,” Swan said, knowing full well he’d have charged into hell wearing gasoline underpants if it had been Tommy instead of Tech.

“Of course I do, which is why I say that as long as Animal doesn’t come this way with that shit we don’t have to erase him, at least not yet.”

“Animal is outta his freaking mind going at Rico with just him and the three stooges.”

“The fact that he has a death wish isn’t anything new, Swan. Heads feared Tech, but it was Animal who gave them cold sweats at night because he would go where no one else was willing to.” Shai weighed the situation. “Animal’s lil homeys are a tough lot, but I think he’ll save the prize for himself.”

“You mean go at Rico alone? Even if he can get past Rico’s soldiers, Changa is gonna do him filthy,” Swan said of Rico’s chief enforcer and bodyguard.

“Then Animal don’t fear nothing short of God, and that’s still up for debate. Changa is a monster, but Animal can be a very determined enemy. He’s crazy enough to try it.”

“Then I stand corrected. He doesn’t have a death wish, he’s trying to commit suicide.” Swan doubled over with laughter, but Shai’s face was serious. “Slim, you’re not actually thinking that Animal might pull this off?”

“I hope not, because if he can get to Rico you never know who
he might set his sights on next,” Shai said seriously. “Nah, we’re gonna fall back and make sure our asses are covered.”

Swan was less than pleased with Shai’s decision, but he was the boss. “So what about Rico?”

Shai looked at his friend and laughed. “Not much we can do besides hope his wife has taken out an insurance policy on his ass.”

Detective brown waited until Shai and his entourage had exited the mall before coming out from his hiding place. He had been behind a rack of clothing inside the lingerie store watching the exchange between Shai and Animal. He started to intervene when he saw Animal and his crew draw weapons, but decided that it would save him the trouble and the paperwork if he let him whack Shai. Unfortunately the confrontation ended without violence.

“Pussies,” Brown snickered and whipped out his cell phone. “Alvarez, bring the car around to the north entrance and pick me up.”

“If I scoop you we’re gonna lose Shai. I just saw them come out,” Detective Alvarez said on the other end. He was adjusting the lenses on his binoculars trying to figure out what Shai and Swan were arguing about.

“Don’t worry about the youngest Clark. I’ve got a feeling he’s gonna hightail it back to his estate and stay there for a while,” Brown said.

“And what makes you say that?” Alvarez asked disbelievingly. He knew better than most how Shai and his crew loved to be seen.

“Because the boogeyman just rolled back into town.” He ended the call.

Besides the staff and a few locals there weren’t many people inside the little Spanish restaurant on 167th and Amsterdam. The young girl who was working the grill and the register did the best she could not to keep people waiting while the rest of their short staff attended to the men eating in the back of the restaurant.

Rico sat as he always did, with his back to the wall and his eyes on the door. He had recently cut his thinning hair down to a buzz cut with a sharp line, making him look several years younger. The sleeves of his starched white shirt were rolled up, and his tie flipped over his shoulder so he wouldn’t stain it with the juicy steak he was devouring. The cook was so gifted that he had twice offered her a position on his staff, but she declined. Rico was thinking that the next time he approached he would make her an offer she couldn’t refuse.

Surrounding Rico were several of his lieutenants and his bodyguard, Changa. Changa wasn’t much to look at, standing a shade less than six feet tall and being of average build, but those who knew him knew that he was not a man to be taken lightly. Before coming to work for Rico in the States Changa had been a soldier of fortune working for a powerful drug cartel in Mexico City. He took great
pride in his work, executing men, women, and children at the behest of his employers until the government finally caught up with them and took the crew down. Changa would’ve faced the firing squad with the rest of his unit had it not been for Rico and a well-placed bribe that got him out of the country. He had since been in Rico’s debt and would do anything for him, which Rico made him prove time and again when he sent him to perform unspeakable acts on his enemies.

“So, how’re we looking, fellas?” Rico addressed his lieutenants with a mouthful of steak.

“As good as ever,” Lee said, sliding him a fat manila envelope. He was a light-skinned kid with a box-shaped head and hazy brown eyes.

Rico peeked inside the envelope and nodded in approval. “That’s what’s up.”

The second lieutenant, Willie, slid him a folded newspaper that was also full of cash. That just left Ras, who was twirling his fingers in his dreads and looking off into space like he had something better to do. “What about you?” Ras reached under the table and produced a greasy-looking paper bag that he set in front of Rico. “What the fuck is this?” Rico looked at the bag as if he didn’t even wanna touch it.

“It’s your cut,” Ras said as if it should’ve been obvious.

“I know
what
it is. I wanna know why the hell it looks like you took an order of ribs out before you put my money in?” Rico asked.

“Because I did.” Ras laughed but no one else did.

“You need to take your life more seriously,” Changa said, never turning away from the can of Pepsi he had been sipping. Though his eyes were covered with dark sunglasses everyone at the table knew they were locked on Ras.

“Chill out, Changa, I was just playing,” Ras explained. Ras was an animal on the streets so it wasn’t that he feared him, but he was smart enough to avoid a problem with him.

“That’s your problem, bro, you play too much sometimes,” Changa said.

Rico motioned with his hand for Changa to be cool. “Ras, how come every week we gotta have this conversation?”

“My bad Rico, man, I was just trying to make a joke and—” Ras began, but was silenced by a wave of Rico’s hand.

“Fuck your joke. I’m talking about the way you do things in general.” Rico hefted the greasy bag to make a point. “How many cats you know that will transport fifty thousand dollars like this?” Ras mumbled something, but Rico overtalked him. “None, that’s how many. Ras, not only is this shit unsanitary, but it just looks stupid. Think about how crazy I would look if I was walking down the block wearing a five-thousand-dollar suit carrying a greasy ass paper bag.”

“I didn’t think about it like that, Rico,” Ras reluctantly admitted.

“And that’s the issue here, Ras, you don’t think before you do shit. Besides Lee, my lil man Prince seems like the only one who can get it right,” Rico told him.

“I don’t see that nigga here with his bag,” Ras said as if he was putting Prince on blast.

“That’s because he dropped his bag and was gone twenty minutes before y’all got here.” Rico wiped his hands on a napkin and pushed back from the table to address his team. “Fellas, what I keep trying to instill in y’all is that this ain’t some nickel and dime operation we’re running here. We’ve got too much bread running in and out of this organization to treat it like we’re pitching
gee
packs on the block, and I suggest you all get it through your heads. Now that we’ve dealt with that let’s address some of these more pressing issues like these cats from the projects making y’all look like pussies.” He looked from Ras to Lee, who squirmed uncomfortably in his seat.

“Yeah, I heard ol’ boy and them made y’all look crazy the other night,” Ras teased him.

“I know you ain’t talking with how ya man Ron got his shit split two weeks ago?” Lee shot back. “I heard he stomped that nigga unconscious.”

“Why don’t both of y’all shut up because you sound like idiots? This nigga is disrespecting your hood and your soldiers and instead of figuring out which way you wanna kill him you’re in here arguing among each other about who he violated the most.” Rico shook his head in disappointment.

“Man, do you think we ain’t tried to whack this King James muthafucka a hundred times already? Little Snoopy from 115th shot this muthafucka and hit him with his car. The next day when he’s going to the store King rolls up on him and beats him to death with a baseball bat. No matter how many times you lay this bastard out he gets back up and kills somebody. It’s like he can’t be killed.”

Changa gave a throaty laugh. “Anybody can be killed, bro. It’s all about the methods you employ.”

“Then I welcome you to try it, because I’m tired of losing my boys,” Ras said.

“Then maybe you should take a more hands-on approach with the situation,” Rico suggested. Rico steeped his fingers and addressed his troops. “One way or another this King James muthafucka has gotta get dealt with because it looks bad when my guys get treated like third-rate hustlers when everybody knows we’re connected.”

Lee snorted. “Connected? Shit, I don’t see Prince Clark sending nobody down to the slums trying to help out. He’s tucked away in his castle counting money while we’re down here in the trenches dealing with this fucking nut job. As I think on it, I can’t remember Shai ever getting his hands dirty. The only reason he’s the boss is because his daddy’s in the ground and his brother is in the joint.”

“You watch your fucking mouth!” Rico slammed his fist against the table so hard that Changa’s Pepsi fell over and stained the white tablecloth. “Listen to me and listen good, young punk. Poppa Clark was a god to guys like me on the come up, when most of you were
still swimming in your daddy’s nut sack, so you get five more years of experience under your belt before you even fix your mouth to say his name. Furthermore, regardless of how you feel about Shai Clark, he’s the boss and you never disrespect the boss, you understand me?”

Lee lowered his eyes and checked his tone. “You’re right, Rico, and I didn’t mean any disrespect, but I was only trying to shed some light on what a lot of us are feeling.”

“And what are y’all feeling that I’m not already hearing regular complaints about?” Rico asked.

Lee looked at Ras who just shrugged. “Rico, we all know that Shai is the boss, nobody’s disputing that, but that don’t necessarily make it right. Dawg, it’s been our crew out here holding it down and kicking dough up to Shai and them, but we don’t get treated no different than anybody else when it comes to certain shit. When Danny Boy and his crew were waging war with the Bloods Shai stepped in and squashed that shit, so why do we gotta get our asses handed to us left and right with no support. All I’m asking is when Shai’s gonna even the playing field?”

Rico didn’t have an immediate response, because he knew that there was truth in his lieutenant’s words. This wasn’t the first time he had heard the grumbling of his troops over the uneven balance of power. Though he would never admit it publically it bothered him too. A lot of cats on the streets felt as Lee did, that Shai’s default inheritance of the throne was unfair and the power should have shifted to a more seasoned soldier when Poppa Clark died and Tommy got locked up. But unlike some of the soldiers who wore their emotions on their sleeves, Rico always kept his game face and showed the proper respect for Shai. But this didn’t change the fact that he was becoming more and more dissatisfied with the youngest Clark son and some of the decisions he was making, like the situation with Tech a while back. Little did Shai know Rico and some of his boys had planned on staging a revolt if he hadn’t handled Tech accordingly. Shai ordering the young bandit’s execution
settled some of the unrest, but it didn’t quiet the whispers about a more fitting boss running the organization, namely Rico.