Return of the Cartier Cartel (15 page)

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. First, you accuse me of murdering some wannabe wifey and filling my husband with holes. Now you’re coming to me for my help and asking me to elicit information from my husband and run and tell you? Get the fuck outta here!” Cartier was truly feeling herself, relieved that Jason hadn’t sold her out.

The lanky Detective Graves, nostrils flaring, stepped just a few inches from Cartier’s face. Cartier could smell her dragon breath.

“If you interfere with our investigation, I’ll have your ass thrown back in the slammer faster than your hoodlum husband will recuperate. You think you tough shit ’cause you did a murder bid? That shit don’t scare me!”

Just as Cartier thought. They did know about her past, which meant she was under investigation while Jason was in a coma.

“And your badge don’t scare me. If you didn’t have it on, I’d wear your ass out. Now get the fuck outta my face with your threats. I’m a grieving wife getting harassed by the police, and if you keep it up, I’ll have the news plastered in front of the police precinct with picket signs and the whole nine. You don’t know who I know. I’ll have Al Sharpton in my corner, so fuck around if you want to.”

For a few intense seconds the ladies participated in a stare-down, until Detective O’Leary pulled her partner away.

Cartier spun around on her heels, rolled her eyes at the two remaining police guards, and then walked in to see Jason.

I really fucked him up. Cartier looked at all the tubes hanging out. Two intravenous tubes dripped pain medication to help ease his suffering. The endotracheal tube that was helping him breathe was now removed for a tracheotomy, a voice box to help him speak, and there was a large metal wire cast with wire transplants to hold the position and set his left arm, which one of the bullets had lodged into and broken dozens of bones.

As Cartier approached the bed, Jason eyed her. He didn’t have to say a word. His silence spoke volumes. She returned his glare with the same contempt. She swallowed any empathy she had for him. Not only did she warn him that she wasn’t going to take any more of his disrespectful behavior, but there was still over a million dollars out of her reach—money he’d taken to set up him and his new bitch in their new life.

Thoughts of little Christian living in a roach motel while Jason prepared to have his little half-Puerto Rican love child made Cartier feel justified. Jason needed to charge it to the game. He’d gambled on Jalissa, and now he knew she was no match for Cartier.

“Was she worth it?” Cartier mocked. “As you lie here all fucked up, do you still think about her white skin and soft hair?”

Cartier still couldn’t contain her jealousy, even with Jalissa buried and gone. As images of them making love flashed before her eyes, she leaned over and whispered, “How does it feel to know that I took your seed from you? Your child gasping for air as the life drained from Jalissa? A child you’ll never be able to hold?” She stood up.

A single tear slid down Jason’s face. Finally he spoke. It sounded like auto-tune. “It . . . ain’t . . . over . . . until . . . I . . . say . . . it’s . . . over.”

Cartier plopped down on the side of his hospital bed, crossed her legs, and seductively hoisted up her skirt, slightly revealing her .25. “The day you walk out of here is the day I finish what I started. If I were you, I’d take my time recovering.”

Chapter 19

99 Problems

As spring arrived, Cartier started to relax again. She’d been on edge for months, always alert and looking over her shoulders. Jason must have heeded her warning because he was certainly taking his time recuperating. The hospital had moved him to a rehabilitation center in upstate New York, from where a nurse called weekly to update the family on his progress.

In the meantime, Ryan and Marisol had somewhat dropped from the face of the earth. Cartier’s Cartel couldn’t get an address, vehicle description, local hangout, nothing on the two. Cartier even kept on Wonderful and Blake, who thought Ryan was behind Jason’s attempted murder, which Cartier used to her advantage. She kept drilling into their heads, “Until Ryan is dead, the beef still lives on.”

Meanwhile, business was booming for The Cartel. Together they’d purchased a six-story tenement building on Parkside Avenue near Prospect Park with large rooms, 54 apartments (all occupied), and a superintendent already living onsite under a foreclosure. The original owner had bought the property back in 1972 for $190,000, which was top dollar back then. The property had appreciated at one time to close to $4.0 million. During the ’80s, at the height of the crack epidemic, the building had become dilapidated. The City of New York stepped in and began fining those slum lords, and by 1994 the landlord had made all the necessary repairs. Now he was tired and weary, and the real estate and stock market had sucked him dry for the fortune he’d amassed throughout the years. One by one, the bank began seizing his properties.

That’s where Cartier came in. There were several prospective buyers for the listing, priced at $575,000. Cartier’s Cartel offered him an all-cash deal of $450,000 and closed within ten days. She knew that in fifteen years or so the market would turn back around and their investment would be worth over ten million, with its close proximity to the park. In real estate it was all about location. The neighborhood was under major revitalization, and although she was black and proud, as an investor she was more than pleased that the building’s demographic consisted of mostly Caucasians, who were ultimately taking over the neighborhood.

Her mother had told her that, in the late ’80s, Flatbush consisted mostly of West Indians, thus the famous West Indian Day parade. Now, not only will you see mostly Orthodox Jewish families, but also white yuppies catching the D train on their way into the city to make a boatload of cash.

To keep things professional and also to have their taxes prepared properly, Cartier hired an outside building management company to collect the rent each month, handle evictions if need be, and send all the proper documents to their accountant. Cartier didn’t want to be just a drug dealer. She wanted to make smart investments with the illegal money and become a respected businesswoman; someone her kids could look up to. While she was incarcerated, she’d read stories about the John D. Rockefeller, Joseph Kennedy, and William R. Heart, where it was rumored that the foundation of their money came from prohibition, mob ties, prostitution, extortion, the whole gamut. And instead of ending up in jail, they all had their names cemented in our history books as moguls.

As the Mercedes’ Michelin tires glided down the Belt Parkway, Cartier kept hitting replay on Jay-Z’s and Alicia Keys’ New York anthem. The song made Cartier feel unstoppable. No matter how much she’d ever thought of leaving her hometown, she couldn’t help but feel grateful to be born and raised in New York. And it’s true what they say: “If you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere.”

Cartier arrived at Bam’s apartment, and instead of calling her to come down, she needed to go inside to pee. As soon as she got off the elevator, the aroma nearly sucked the clean air out of her lungs. She inched closer to Bam’s door and smelled the familiar odor.

“I don’t believe this shit,” Cartier said out loud. She banged aggressively on the front door.

“Hold the fuck up!” Bam returned, not knowing or caring who was at the front door. Seconds later, a lazy-eyed Bam opened the door with a huge Kool-Aid type grin plastered on her silly face.

Cartier pushed past her and went straight to the living room where there was an ashtray with something burning. “What’s that you smoking?”

“A blunt.”

“I know it’s a fucking blunt! What I look like? What the fuck is inside it?”

“Damn, Cartier. Could you stop yelling! I’m not your child. Go and chastise your kids because I’m really not in the mood for any bullshit today.”

Bam’s feistiness had somewhat annoyed Cartier, but deep down inside, she knew Bam was right. Most times Cartier did treat them like she was their mother, but in her eyes it came with the territory. She was the head of the crew, and she actually enjoyed controlling their every movement.

The other members should understand that she came off bossy because she was the boss. Single-handedly she had guided them up through the food chain to a place where they could afford their own whips, jewelry, clothes, and now real estate. She put each one of them in a position where they didn’t need no man for the “college plan.” The $54.11 Reebok was never an option.

Cartier could see Bam was toasted and decided to take it down a notch.

“I’m not trying to start nothing. I’m just asking what’s in the blunt, because it’s permeating the whole floor. You’re lucky that I’m knocking and not po-po.”

Bam exhaled and began combing her hair in the mirror. “It’s just a little Acapulco gold weed and a thin line of bomb.”

“Bomb?”

“Coke, Cartier, damn.”

“Since when you start smoking crack?”

“Crack?”

“This shit is crazy. What’s going on with you? We don’t use our product! That’s against the code of the streets.”

“So now I’m a crackhead?” Bam broke out into a maniacal laughter that only crazy people have mastered.

Cartier was taken aback by her strange behavior. Finally she replied, “You tell me.”

“Hell, muthafuckin’, no!” Bam was insulted once she realized Cartier was serious.

“Well, that’s what it could lead to.”

Bam tossed the comb on the sofa and faced Cartier. “Look, drop it. It’s just a recreational get-high to cope with the fact that I participated in getting the love of my life murdered, and it helps me to sleep at night without seeing his brains splattered all over his living room.”

“Bam, stop bringing up Big Mike! Especially now that you’re using. You say that shit in front of the wrong person, and we’re all going to jail.”

“Stop bringing it up? As if it’s that easy! This shit is fucking me up.”

“So get a religion, ask for forgiveness, something, but I don’t want to hear his name again. Nothing will bring him back. Nothing will make it better. Now, if it’s any consolation to you, you and I are in the same boat. Look what I had to do to Jason. He was the love of my life too. But before men we’re The Cartel, and they both were connected in some way to what happened to Shanine and Monya. And let’s not forget that when you found out Jason was fucking with Jalissa, you specifically told me that Jason couldn’t get a pass. And he didn’t. I did that for you. Because I love you, and we fam.”

“Cartier, don’t tell me that bullshit, you did it for me. You did it for YOU! Your jealousy tried to kill Jason. That shit ain’t have nothing to do with me, Shanine, and damn sure, not Monya, because what you really did was almost leave Monya’s child without a father. And, for the record, I’m not some dumb-ass, drugged-out junkie who can’t hold her tongue. Because of you, Donnie beat my brains out, and I never sold us out. It was your little girlfriend who cracked under the pressure, so spare me the I’m-the-weakest-link lecture. I got more heart than you give me credit for!”

Cartier no longer wanted to go back and forth. Bam was clearly high. “Bam, we could go tit for tat all morning. I didn’t come here for this. I thought we were going to buy you and Li’l Momma some whips.”

Bam stared at Cartier with contempt but quickly let it go.

****

Truth be told, Bam didn’t want anyone to know she’d started tapping her blunts with cocaine. It all happened accidentally. Lately she’d been hanging out a lot, trying to get her mind past what had happened with Big Mike. She went to a grimy basement party in Brooklyn and ended up having the time of her life. It was a BYOB type of atmosphere, so Bam brought a bottle of Henny and within two hours had downed almost a whole liter herself. The last thing she remembered was some cutie telling her she was acting sloppy drunk and needed to mellow out.

He passed her what she thought was only weed, and the first pull from the blunt had Bam flying high. The impact from the long drag off the blunt stopped her heart momentarily until she got used to the potent drug. The next morning, she woke up naked next to the stranger—obviously, they’d fucked—with a massive hangover. As she prepared to leave, she asked if he had a blunt for her to take for the road.

“Twenty-five dollars,” he said.

“What? For a blunt? Damn, nigga, if you wanna play it like that I should be charging you for last night, and I promise you it’ll be more than twenty-five dollars.”

“Ma, first off, I remember last night, and you weren’t that good. And this ain’t just a blunt. It’s Acapulco gold weed laced with pure white Colombian coke.”

Bam was shell-shocked. “Did you just say you gave me coke to smoke? Like I’m some fuckin’ trick!” Bam’s voice had risen to a high-pitched scream.

“Yo, calm down with all that bullshit and take the bass out of your voice before I have to handle your stupid ass in here. Matter fact”—The stranger jumped to his feet. He stood over six feet tall, and was posturing, to intimidate Bam—“it’s time for you to get the fuck out. Now I’m asking your dumb ass politely. The next time I have to ask, my fist won’t be so nice.”

“Bitch, if you so much as raise your hand to me, I’ll see you dead! You must not know who the fuck I am. My name is Bam. Head bitch of The Cartel. My crew and I rock niggas like you to sleep every day, so I suggest you check my resume, and you’ll find out that the last two niggas who went up against us are DEAD. So I suggest your bum ass—”

“I don’t give a fuck who you repping! I will—”

Bam was quick with her .45, which she steadied directly at his head.

His eyes flew open in horror. He couldn’t believe she’d actually pulled out on him. Perhaps there was some truth to what the Brooklynite was saying. “Chill, ma. That coke got you all jumpy and shit. It ain’t that serious. We had a good time last night. Let’s not ruin it with all these theatrics, ’cause a dude like me isn’t for all that drama. You feel me?”

Bam felt empowered as she stood there, cocky, pointing her pistol at the cowardly cokehead. Was this all it took? she thought. A gun and the heart to use it? Could that be the key from going from Indian to Chief?