Prince of the City (4 page)

“You never left in the first place, Michael.” She held his hand to her heart. “You were always right here, always.”

“I love you, Connie.”

“I love you too, baby.”

On the drive back to their new home, Connie told him everything he had missed. She talked about Malik and how smart he was. She also mentioned Linda and Butter breaking up. The words that put a smile on his face was hearing Connie say that while he was paying the rent from prison, she saved and deposited all of her checks into Malik's savings account. Also, she told him about her job and how much she loved it.

As the car stopped at a red light, Connie looked over at Michael, whose eyes watered.

“What's wrong, Michael?” Connie asked.

He looked into her eyes and said, “Connie, you are truly a queen, and I will always treat you royally. I missed you so much.”

“I missed you too, baby.”

“Now, why isn't my son with you?” Michael asked.

“Well, since me and you have a little making up to do, I had Linda babysit for a while.”

With that, he smiled. Connie and Michael were married three years ago in prison, and although they had sex at the prison a few times, they had only made love once, and that was their first time together seven years ago. He knew he had to make passionate love to her, and she knew she had to give herself totally to him.

Once inside his home, Michael loved his surroundings. The condo was neatly furnished with thick black carpet and cream leather furniture. They had a forty-two-inch color TV, and Connie had even purchased Michael his own lounge chair, which she called the king's chair. He looked around at all the pictures of him, Connie, and Malik that she had blown up and framed.

“You want a drink, Michael?”

“Yeah, baby.”

While Connie fixed his drink, he walked out on the balcony to look at the scenery, which was breathtaking. From the tenth floor, he could see the whole Southeast side of D.C. For the first time in his life, Michael had reached the top of his throne.

Connie came out on the balcony and handed her man his drink.

“Come here.” He pulled her close and planted a kiss on her soft lips.

“Do you like it, baby?”

“I love it.”

“The view is nice too. Isn't it?”

He held her hand and looked out into the world. “Connie, this is ours.”

“What do you mean?”

He extended his hand out over the balcony and looked at her. “This. This is ours, baby. The entire southside of D.C. and everything in it.”

Connie smiled and grabbed her husband by the hand. “Come here. Let me show you something.” She led him into their bedroom, which looked like a master suite. Michael loved it. Their bed was enormous. Yet, it was being occupied by a pile of shoeboxes.

“Connie, why you got shoe boxes on the bed?”

“'Cause, baby, I wanted to show you something.”

“Show me what?” he asked.

“This.” Connie opened all the boxes. “These are all the letters you sent me. I kept every last one of them. They're in order by date. I read them from time to time just to get through the days. There are 956 letters here.” Connie then dumped all the letters on the bed. “Michael, make love to me on top of these letters.” She unsnapped her sundress, revealing her full nakedness. He kissed his wife passionately, removed his clothes, and made love to her for the second time in their lives.

They made love all day and night. In between taking a drink and smoking a joint out on the balcony, they would talk a little and then go back to making love. They fucked in the living room, kitchen, shower, balcony—everywhere. They felt the apartment needed to be broken in, and they did just that.

Some months later, once Michael was out and settled, he got with Sonny James, Slim's brother. Sonny was from Seventh and T Streets, NW. He was a mid-level hustler, moving ounces of heroin for Big Luke. Michael first approached Sonny after getting back with his best friend Black Sam, who had a strip on Sixth Street, SE that was moving approximately two thousand dollars worth of blow a day. To Michael, the strip had potential, but not a good quality of dope. The product that Black Sam was getting was only strong enough to take three times the amount of cut, and he'd be putting three and a half of cut on it. So actually, he was selling garbage. This was the reason Black Sam only had about thirty-five thousand dollars to his name when Michael came home.

“Damn, Sam. You mean to tell me in seven years, you only got thirty-five thou'?”

“Nah, Mike. You know I've been taking falls. Plus, the blow I be getting don't be nothing. I can't find a connect for shit. Them niggas uptown got all the plugs and ain't trying to share 'em.”

“Shit, Sam. I don't blame 'em. If you had the connect would you share 'im with a bunch of ruthless, disloyal niggas?” Michael asked. “The reason why they don't fuck with Southeast niggas like that is 'cause we always tryna take something from a nigga.”

“Yeah, out here it's like the fuckin' jungle. Ain't no order out here in these streets. Every man for himself and only the strong survive.”

“You got that right,” Michael agreed. “Look, Sam, I got a plan that's gonna get us rich. All you gotta do is follow my lead. It takes money to make money. Now, you got a few loyal customers over on Sixth Street. Where else do you be moving your shit?”

“Sometimes I go around the Lane or over to Fifteenth Place, and you know my cousin is over in Potomac Gardens,” Sam replied.

“There's four strips in Southeast that we gonna take over first.”

“What the fuck are you getting at, Mike?”

“Nigga, we 'bout to take over the whole Southside! After all, like you said, this is the jungle, right? And if we want to survive, we gotta think and act just like the lions do.”

As Michael and Sam rode down Alabama Avenue in Sam's 190E Mercedes Benz, they began to talk more about their future.

“Now, what's this you're talking about taking over the whole southeast? You know niggas ain't gonna just let you come here and take their spots like that,” Sam told Mike.

“Yeah, I know. But like I said—I got a plan. It's all about finesse. We gotta finesse our way in, just like a pussy, and once we get in, we gotta fuck the hell outta it and then pull out. You see, that's where other niggas go wrong. They don't know when to pull out.”

“So, you're telling me that we 'bout to make enough money to quit this shit for good?” Sam asked.

“Yeah, that's what I'm saying, Sammy.”

“I don't know 'bout that, Mike. I ain't ever heard of a nigga getting what he wants and getting out that easy. The only thing I know, which is reality so far, is that a nigga gets so big that he ends up in jail forever or six feet under.”

“Well, that's the difference. We ain't them other niggas. So the first thing we gonna do is take over Sixth Street since that's one of your major spots.”

“Yeah, but how we gonna do that? You know the nigga Kojack is the one who really got it locked down.”

“So we take it from him,” Michael said.

“Like I said, Mike. How?”

“You ever see the movie The Godfather?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you remember this part: ‘We'll make him an offer he can't refuse'?”

“I hear you, Mike, and you know I'm down till the end,” Sam told him.

“Good . . . Hey, Sam?” Michael asked, turning in his direction to face him.

“Yeah”

“Question. Why you ain't ever come see me?”

Sam looked Michael in his eyes and answered, “For what? To see you get hauled off like an animal in a cage?”

“So you saying I'm an animal now? What? I ain't human no more?”

“Shit, Mike. Hell yeah! From the stories I heard about you cutting niggas heads off and rolling it down the tier like a bowling ball, only an animal could do some shit like that.”

Sam and Michael laughed.

“I guess you're right then. But anyway, I do want to thank you for helping my family out when I called on you.”

“That's nothing. I'm supposed to do that. We've been friends since elementary school.” Silence filled the air.

Michael didn't respond, instead he looked out the passenger window and studied the Southeast jungle while also admiring his friend's loyalty.

“So where you wanna go now?” Sam asked, breaking his silence.

“Let's go to the Pancake House, get a bite to eat, and finish discussing how we gonna take over this muthafucka,” Mike answered.

“Cool,” Sam replied and then mashed the gas. Sam was eager to talk about taking over much more than Mike would realize.

 

Chapter 5

-THE TAKE OVER-

 

ithin three months, Michael had taken over two strips—Sixth Street and Talbert Street Southeast. He and Sam were going hand-to-hand with some of the best heroin in Southeast. Sixth Street wasn't that hard to take over. Kojack had heard about Michael at Lorton. So before Michael could make him an offer he couldn't refuse, Kojack surrendered on his own. Now he was buying from Michael, and he was the best customer Michael had.

After Sixth Street got moving, it was pulling in an easy twenty thousand dollars per day. The more the strip pumped, the less Sam and Michael had to be on the streets. Eventually, they hired Kojack as a lieutenant. They would drop off the dope early in the morning and collect money at nine o'clock at night.

Money was coming in from Talbert Street and Sixth Street so fast that Michael had to find another supplier, because Sonny James couldn't handle the rush. Whenever Sonny would get down, Michael was the first to buy all of it and then ask if there was more. Since Michael needed more than Sonny could supply, Sonny turned him on to Big Luke, who was D.C.'s first real millionaire in the drug game. Big Luke sold kilos of dope to all the major hustlers in the city. Luke began selling Michael kilos at a wholesale price, so Michael would buy one kilo and then get the other fronted. In the process of moving the product, Mike and Sam took shifts. Michael would buy it, and Sam would package it and dish it out to customers and lieutenants.

The next year was booming. Michael bought a brand-new, pearl white, convertible Jaguar and Sam purchased an all-black 300E Mercedes Benz. After laying the hit on the Wilson brothers who ran Fifteenth Place, Sam suggested they take out Skinny Pimp, who ran Wahler Place, the deadliest and most profitable strip in Southeast.

“Look, Mike, the nigga Skinny Pimp runs this shit. If we kill this nigga, we can get the spot. And from what I hear, this muthafucka is moving anywhere from fifty to seventy-five thousand a day.”

“Yeah, that shit sounds good, but like I said before, I ain't tryna deal with them niggas around there. They're snakes. Better yet, they're wolves. They run in packs. They kill each other. They ain't tryna get no money. They just got a pumpin' ass strip.”

“I'm telling you, Mike. We can get this joint.”

“A'ight. If you think so, we'll try it. But if anything goes wrong, I'm holding you responsible.”

“Good. We can meet up first thing tomorrow morning and take care of everything.”

The next morning, Sam and Michael dressed up as dope fiends. They drove Connie's Maxima and parked it around the corner on Ninth Street. While walking through the alley, they came across some other fiends.

“Hey, where that good shit at? Who got that bomb? We sick as hell,” Michael said. One fiend looked at them. Sensing something was up.

“Hey, where you from? We ain't never seen you coppin' 'round here.”

“We usually cop from Kojack on Sixth Street, but he got locked up last night,” Michael answered.

Then Sam interrupted. “Man, fuck where we from. We just tryna get our mix, man. We ill. Now is you gonna tell us where to get it?”

“Yeah. Go through the alley and look to your left. You'll see a line, but I don't think Skinny Pimp gonna serve no new faces. Y'all probably gotta pull up your sleeves and show 'im your tracks first.”

“Shit, ain't nothing wrong with that. We got enough tracks to make 'im give us some dope,” Michael said.

They walked through the alley and saw the longest dope line they had ever seen.

“See, Mike. Look. I told you this spot was pumpin'.”

As they approached the long line, scratching their arms like true dope fiends, Michael scoped out the scene. Skinny Pimp had two other dudes with him. One was short, and anyone could tell by the way he walked that he was strapped. The other looked like a fiend. He was serving the blow while Skinny Pimp collected the money. As the line got shorter, their plan started to unfold.

Michael whispered in Sam's ear, “Make sure you hit him right between the eyes.”

“I got you, Mike. Just watch my back.”

As Sam approached Skinny Pimp, Michael was in line right behind him. Skinny Pimp looked at Sam and said, “Who the fuck are you? You ain't never copped nothing around here before.”

“I'm Jimmy, man, and I'm ill. I need a fix bad.” He started scratching his arm. “Look, man, I know you don't know me, but I usually cop my shit from Black Sam and Mike Perry up on Fifteenth Place. Them niggas done got too big to come out and serve us early in the morning when we really need it.”

“Oh yeah? You cop your shit from them bitch-ass niggas, huh? You know what? I'm glad you came over here, 'cause them punks just lost a customer. Now what you want?” Skinny Pimp asked.

Sam looked Skinny Pimp deep in his eyes and gave him an answer he didn't want to know. Sam pulled out his .38 Special and placed it between Skinny Pimp's eyes.

“Nigga, I'm Black Sam, and I don't want no blow. I want your life.” With that, he pulled the trigger.
Boom!

When the shorter guy started to reach for his gun, Michael eased up right beside him, put a .38 to his temple, and pulled the trigger. The fiend who was serving the blow dropped the package and ran back through the alley while all the other fiends stood and watched Skinny Pimp's brain ooze from his head.