Mr. Mysterious In Black (26 page)

Oh shoot.
I’d promised her I’d help her out tonight. Kelsy had taken interest in something—for once—and was working on opening her own fashion store. Perfect for her, since shopping was her hobby—um, since shopping was
all
she did. My excitement for her was hard to contain and I could hardly wait for the ostentatious opening. With her parents, ‘doing it big’ was compulsory.

Tevin hit the brakes with the aim of preventing collision with a car in front, and I was glad I’d buckled up. He was driving like a maniac.

“East?”

“Yeah,” he replied, distracted. “When last have you been?”

“A while.” My tone was forbidden.
No thoughts about the past, please.

As Tevin forced out of the traffic and onto a short-cut street which was traffic-free, he floored the gas. Boy, he must be
really
late. Most people didn’t drive these streets, for they feared the ‘bad areas’ that these streets led to. Residents of this county preferred to believe that ‘bad areas’ didn’t exist. So though I was now living among the uppity people, I knew that the ‘bad areas’ existed. Because the bad area was what I grew up in. And I knew the ‘bad area’ was exactly where Tevin was going to make his delivery.

“Shit!!!” Tevin exclaimed when a police siren went off behind us, but he didn’t stop. Instead, he sped up.

“Tev, what are you doing?” I asked slowly, as if speaking to a child. “Just pull over. You’ll get yourself in jail.” But as I said it, I knew that with Tevin no one was safe. And the fact that he was driving a fully tinted, pitch-black Escalade would make the cops even more suspicious.

“I can’t,” he uttered, turning the jeep with screeching tires onto another street. The cops didn’t ease up.

Realizing the danger in his idiotic attempt to outdrive the cops, I shouted, “Why the hell not? You’ll get us killed!”

Tevin glanced at me, and for the first time since I’ve known him, he looked scared. “Because I’ve got fifteen kilos of cocaine in the back. Twenty pounds of marijuana, two muzzleloaders, two shotguns, a pistol, a nine millimeter and a case of copper bullets. Like I told you, I was making a
delivery
.”

My eyes tore so wide, it was a miracle my eyeballs didn’t roll out of socket. “What the hell, Tev!!” I screamed. “Shit, shit, shit!!”

Soon, there were two police cars chasing us. My heart flopped in my throat. This was my third time being wrangled in a police chase. The first two were with
him,
Cali D
.
But we never got caught. Even so, I was never this worried because he didn’t have every possible illegal thing in his jeep!

My God.
Tevin has really outdone himself this time. He’d better be a damn good driver and get us out of this mess.

Tevin screeched onto another street and the jeep’s ass slammed into the side of a car that was parked on the curb. Still, he didn’t stop. I glanced at the meter and noted that he was clocking eighty miles per hour. The cops were there, sticking on tails. Red and blue lights flashing in the setting evening.

This is it.
I was either going to die in a car crash or go to jail. And I’ll never see Natalio again. I should’ve made use of the word ‘forgiveness’. Because now I may never get the chance to kiss him, touch him, make love to him again.

“I dunno where the shit I am!” Tevin panicked. “You know around here, Sadie. Where the hell is this?”

“I have no idea. But you better find a goddamn way out, asshole!!” It had been ages since I’d been to ELA, everything looked different and was a lot more structured than in my days. So I was just as lost as Tevin.

“Oh no, baby girl. I need ya strength. You can’t be mad at me,” he said through a half-sob. Tevin was afraid. More frightened than I was, it seemed. And it couldn’t just be of being caught and jailed. He feared something else. The men who are awaiting this delivery, maybe?

The loud sirens behind us and honking of car horns accompanied by vitriolic shouts as we brushed or bumped nearby vehicles would send anyone in a panic attack. And that wouldn’t be good; he’d crash and kill us both.

Taking a deep breath, I spoke in a much calmer tone, someone needed to have their wits about them. “You’ve never been in a car chase before?”

He wagged his head wildly.

In spite of the situation, I laughed. “Some gangster you are, huh?”

“Sadie, this shit is serious. A bloody life-and-death situation we’re in. Aren’t ya scared?”

“Was,” I giggled. And when I looked ahead, I laughed even harder, as loud and crazy as a hyena. The laughing, I couldn’t help it, for I only laughed this hysterically when I’m frightened out of my boots.

“What?!” Tevin snapped.

Obviously, he hadn’t been paying attention to where he was going so I nodded for him to look ahead.

Tevin slammed the breaks, jerking us forward. “Dios Mio!!”

Wrapping my arms around my stomach, I laughed my frightened face off. And soon my laughter morphed into tears as I stared at the towering red-bricked wall before us and the flashing lights of the police cars behind us.

Dead end.

Our ass was grass.

The grotesque giantess flicked out a slimy tongue and winked at me.
Yuck!
That has got to be the longest tongue I’ve ever seen. I gave a meek smile, walked over to the bars and stuck my face there. It reeked in here. A mixture of urine, feces, and possible dead corpses, who knows?

For over twenty-four hours, I’d been locked in this cell with a flirty giantess and a petrified wafer-thin brunette. What kind of crime had she committed? She looked as frightened as a rabbit. I dared not probe questions about the giantess. Her crime was probably slaughtering a stable of horses or molesting an entire brothel.

Oh God, I need to get out of here.

I wasn’t even allowed the chance to explain that I was oblivious to the illegalities on board because ‘anything I do or say could be used against me in the court of law’.
Ugh.

I was hoping Tevin would word me some justice. If he cared about me at all, he would. Because I had all the time in the world to wonder, I wondered how he was holding up. Probably scared out of his wits since he’s never been in jail before. Some men can be tough, yes, until they get caught. That’s when you’ll hear them cry like a female cat getting shagged.

What was going to be done to me? How long would I be kept in here? The fashion bidding’s on Monday, for Christ’s sake. I had to prepare. Would I be out by then? Would I end up missing that opportunity? Geo Lee would be so disappointed. As I would be in myself. Why does everything always go wrong for me? Hell, I’ve been born an execrable birth.

Let me out! Let me out! Let me out!
I screamed in my head, my knuckles pale as I gripped the bars of the grill. It was a miracle I wasn’t crying and shivering like a frightened adolescent. I’d been through so much crap in my years of being with
him
. Cali D exemplified the citizen one should
never
be. But then, with all of his illegalities, we had never been to jail.

Guess it was just bad luck with Tevin.

“Sadie Francé,” a crusty female voice called.

Dragged from my reveries, I raised my eyes and saw a plump, dark-haired officer keying the grill. “You’re good to go,” she winked at me.

My shoulders slumped as I released a noisy exhale. Relieved, weak, sleepy and worried, I was all of the above. Tevin had done me well. Stepping out of the hell-hole, I followed the officer as she led the way.

“High friends in high places, eh girlie?” the officer whispered over her shoulder.

My countenance frowned into bewilderment.

“Your feet have been washed. Steer clear of the mire from now on,” she added, patting my shoulder.

What in the world was she talking about?

The bald-headed man behind the counter glared at me with a grim expression as he pushed my belongings to me. Sheepishly, I grabbed them, slipped into the filthy bathroom to change from my hideous overalls and was then buzzed out.

In the waiting area, Kelsy was pacing back and forth. “Sadie! Oh my god.” She rushed towards me and locked me in a tight embrace. “Oh god, I was so worried.”

“I’m fine. Now.”

“I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t know what to do. They’re keeping Tev. You think he—”

“I doubt it,” I shook my head. “Not with all that was on board. Come on, let’s get outta here.”

As we exited the building, passing police cars and lazy cops giving us the judgmental eye, I wondered, “How did you know to come?”

Kelsy frowned. “I got a call from some guy. Said I was to come pick you up. You were bailed.”

Confusion clouded my already weary brain. I hadn’t called anyone. Maybe Tevin did? “Huh? Some guy?”

“Yeah. I thought it was strange, too, because it wasn’t a police officer, but I was so glad you were getting out I didn’t care to ask questions.”

This was making no sense. “Bail isn’t possible so soon. Not unless Tev told them I was oblivious.” And as I said it, I remembered the officer’s rambling about ‘high friends in high places’ and something about my feet being washed. Hmm…Natalio. But how would he know?

Because he’s omniscient, duh.

At the moment, I didn’t care how I got out. Grateful I was to whoever had lent aid. That, I could think about that when I’ve showered, had me a meal and some well-deserved sleep.

Kelsy was drowning with tears as I regaled the inauspicious car chase yesterday while she drove us home. She wailed about us chasing death, how stupid Tevin was, and most of all lamented on the possibility that she may never see Tevin for a very, very long time. Whenever my discombobulated mind was back in array, maybe I could telephone my ‘high friend in high places’ and see what favors I can get done?
Ha!
Would be interesting to see how that turns out.

Kelsy wiped her nose in the most unladylike manner and sniffed, “I’m just gonna make a quick stop by Tev’s to pick up my stuff. There’s no way I’ll be able to stay there by myself tonight. This is just horrible.”

“Okay. You can stay with me until tomorrow,” I offered, knowing that she wouldn’t be contented on her own whether it was Tev’s home or hers. Kelsy liked company and preferred being anywhere else but her own home. She nodded.

Vestigial of the sun, the dim orange glow slowly faded as darkness ate into the daylight. Kelsy steered the vehicle into Tevin’s sprawling complex, muttered something about giving her a minute and hopped out of the car. My stomach churned as I waited and I realized then that I haven’t slept in over twenty-four hours. This was not how I envisioned my weekend after receiving that heart-swelling news from Geo Lee.

Geo Lee!
Shoot, I’d missed a day of work and I hadn’t even called in to say why. Would he be pissed? I’ve never seen him pissed off before. I fished for my blackberry. It would be too late to call him now, but that’s better than not calling at all.
Darn it
. My cell phone battery’s completely dried out. God, I needed to get home. Now.

My mouth grew arid as the wait extended, and I feared I might die of hunger or faint of dehydration, so I slotted out of the car and dragged my lethargic body off into the house.

An eerie feeling brushed me as I stepped across the threshold, but I dismissed it. I was tired and I needed food and rest. Kelsy was supposedly packing but I heard no noise coming from the bedroom. The house was strangely quiet.

In desperation of slaking the aridness of my tongue, I journeyed into the enormous kitchen and opened the fridge door to grab a drink. “Hurry up, Kels. I’m in desperate need of a shower and sleep,” I shouted, as I scanned the contents of the refrigerator.

Opting for a
V8 Splash
, I popped the cork from the bottle and brought it to my mouth, depleting half its fluids in one drink.
Quenching,
I thought with gratitude as I wiped my lips with the back of my hand. I kneed the fridge door shut and found myself staring into the nozzle of gun.

Shhhhhhhit!

The bottle fell from my hand and went smashing to the ground. Now what?

“Shhh,” hissed the bulky intruder who was clad in black from head to toe, wearing a mask that showed only his eyes and lips.

That must have been the last bit of fright and fear that was left in my body because suddenly I cared not what the hell this man would do to me—unbelievably so. I was, most irritatedly, tired of it all. Tired of my cursed life and everyone in it. Things couldn’t get any worse than this.

Nonchalance remarkably surfaced. “Kelsy?”

The intruder blinked at me, and I assumed he was stunned by my indifference. If he was expecting me to beg and plead, then he had another thing coming because I hadn’t the strength to do so, even if I wanted to. My last twenty-four hours constituted of a long day’s work punctuated with merry news, which later evolved into a heart-palpitating car chase and a sleepless, nail-biting night in a stinking hell-hole.
So do with me as you wish. Please
. Death would be an infinite respite. Ending all my bloody miseries for sure.

“I’m right here,” Kelsy’s voice was small and shaky behind me. When I turned, my heart constricted at the ashen-faced Kelsy who was wrist-bound by another husky intruder, also clad and masked in black.