Snapped (24 page)

He dialed her back and activated his Bluetooth. She didn’t take long to answer.

“Hey, Baron,” she said. “You’re coming to Thanksgiving at Daddy’s house next week, right?” His ongoing problems with Jojo made it necessary for Baron to stay close to home, where he was safe amid the calm and quiet of his Kearny, New Jersey, estate. But she hoped that he still intended to come to Thanksgiving dinner as he always had.

He sighed. “Nah, not this year. I’m going down to Charlotte to spend Thanksgiving with my moms.” The last thing
he wanted to do was to spend the holiday at the family home, where he would be the black sheep on display for everyone to judge. He was aware that the streets were abuzz with news of Trina’s disappearance. Her frantic 911 call had been played on nightly newscasts for weeks, with authorities unable to figure out who had brutally kidnapped Trina Samuels. Her family had plastered pictures of her throughout Brooklyn, and all the local newspapers covered the story as well. Sometimes, for kicks, Baron would read the nonstop coverage of the case. The whole situation was amusing to him. All that Trina had ever been good for was sex, and the media was acting as if one of the community’s stars had fallen. None of the news fazed him. They would never catch him. Baron was two steps ahead of all of them—at least in his own mind.

The problem was that his father didn’t see it that way. Nobles, Frankie, Gillian—everyone in their crew—believed that Baron was behind Trina’s disappearance. They knew that he suspected her of setting him up, and they all assumed that Baron had done it. Despite these suspicions, though, the goons who assisted him in the kidnapping and murder of the young lady knew better than to cross him. They kept their mouths shut and feigned ignorance of Baron’s deeds. He was bitter about everything. It seemed to Baron that all the years that he had spent keeping the businesses running, of making sure that nothing came back to incriminate them for any major crimes, meant nothing. Baron felt that his father had made up his mind that he was a failure.

Gillian frowned. “When did you decide to go down there?” The family tradition had always been for Baron and Gillian to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas at their father’s home. Baron’s mom usually came up for the holidays and stayed with her son at the house she had raised
him in. Celia would arrive right before Thanksgiving and stay until a few days after Christmas before returning to her home in North Carolina. It had been that way for many years, so Gillian knew that Baron was leaving town on purpose this year in order to avoid their father.

“I just decided it. I’m on my way to the airport now.” He pulled the sun visor down to block out the blinding rays. “I’m gonna stay down there until after Christmas.”

Gillian suddenly had a headache. “That’s gonna break Daddy’s heart, Baron.”

Baron sucked his teeth. “Please, Gillian. As long as you’re there and Frankie’s there, he’ll be all right.”

“That’s bullshit!”

“Listen, you’re the one who was agreeing with Pops that I should lay low. What’s lower than down South?” Baron wasn’t dealing well with the notion of Gillian being on top. He seldom visited his father at the Westchester estate anymore. A line had been drawn in the family and Baron felt like no one was on his side. Frankie and Gillian stopped by often in order to seek his advice on things. They wanted Baron to know that he was still included despite his absence from the family’s day-to-day dealings. Baron reluctantly cooperated, but Frankie and Gillian both suspected that he was feeling slighted after the way things were handled by his father.

Gillian was torn between being happy that her brother was keeping a low profile and being angry that he was ostracizing himself from the rest of the family. It seemed that since the fateful night in Brooklyn, Baron had kept himself isolated, opting to sit at home and wallow in self-pity most of the time. “Did you even tell Daddy that you’re leaving?” she asked.

“Nope,” Baron answered. “You can do the honors.”

“Wow.” Gillian shook her head in frustration, holding the phone but not knowing what to say.

Baron was done talking. “I’ll call you when I get back.” He hung up his phone and tossed it in the seat beside him. He felt a momentary twinge of guilt. This would be the first holiday season that he didn’t spend with Pops. He shrugged the feeling off and decided that it was time for a change. Time to do what he needed to do for himself, since as far as he was concerned, himself was all he had.

Frankie whipped his
Escalade through the streets of Jamaica, Queens, with Gillian riding shotgun. He was still getting used to the idea of her being his equal in the game. He wasn’t sure if he was feeling it, but he had to admit that it felt good to have her around so much. Even though they worked together a lot over the years, her new position increased their time together significantly.

They stopped at a red light and Frankie looked at Gillian. He thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever laid eyes on. He reached over and smoothed a stray piece of hair out of her face, tucking it behind her ear. Gillian looked at him and smiled shyly. She knew that he had overheard her conversation with her brother. He could tell that she was stressed out, and wished that he could take all her stress away. He hated seeing her like this.

“He’s not coming, huh?”

She shook her head. “He’s going to Charlotte to spend the holidays with his mother.”

Frankie nodded. “That might not be such a bad thing. It keeps him out of trouble, at least for a little while.”

She nodded. “I know. But this is just a bad situation all around, Frankie.”

“What you mean?” He glanced at her.

“If I would have known that me taking over would cost me my brother and cost my father his son, I wouldn’t have done it.”

“That’s not how it is, Gigi.”

“Sure it is. I know Baron.”

Frankie didn’t know how to respond to her. Truthfully, he knew that Baron was upset about the way things had changed. Frankie just didn’t want Gillian blaming herself for her brother’s selfishness.

After several silent moments, she reached forward and turned the volume up on the radio. She couldn’t help noticing the song that was playing: “teachme” by Musiq. She listened to the lyrics. “
Show me the way to surrender my heart.
” She couldn’t help feeling like that’s what Frankie was doing for her. Even though they weren’t more than friends, she felt things for Frankie that she had never felt for any man. With the few guys Gillian had gotten involved with, she had always kept things in perspective and had never been the kind of woman to sweat someone. Instead, she was the one who held all the cards, and she liked it that way.

Gillian had always been with a man who was legit—a fellow student at Columbia, a contractor who worked on her mother’s restaurant, and now a stockbroker. None of them had dabbled in the illegal activities that had made her family rich. They knew about the Nobles legacy, but never asked too many questions or in any way interfered in the politics of the business. With Frankie, she felt comfortable being her whole self. She didn’t have to watch what she said or keep any secrets. He made her feel protected, understood—and even
loved. Only a fool could miss the unmistakable chemistry between her and Frankie. Lately, she wondered where it was going. But deep down she knew that she had already fallen.

Frankie knew that he was playing himself. He was married, and Camille hadn’t done anything specific to turn him off. Still, he found himself making excuses for the time he spent with Gillian even though he knew that it was excessive.

They pulled up on a residential street lined with neat brick homes. Frankie expertly parallel parked and they headed toward a house surrounded by a small black wrought-iron fence. Together they climbed the stairs and rang the bell.

A young girl who appeared to be about nineteen or twenty years old came to the door. She had on a tiny T-shirt and sweatpants that hung tight on her wide hips, exposing a small portion of her midriff. She had an ass so big that Gillian noticed it from the front. She was short and stacked, with big brown eyes and a smile that lit up the foyer as she ushered them inside.

“Hello, Frankie,” she almost sang. “Come on in.”

Frankie and Gillian followed her inside.

“My name is Angelle,” she said, extending her hand to Gillian. “You must be Baron’s sister.”

Gillian nodded. “Yes. Nice to meet you. I’m Gillian.”

Angelle smiled. “Come on in,” she sang again. She offered to take their coats, but Frankie and Gillian declined. Neither of them expected this to take very long.

Gillian noticed that Angelle wore a chunky iced-out bracelet on her right arm, and it was gorgeous. Looking around, she also noted the huge flat-screen TV and the Bose stereo system. Seemed like her job as a medical receptionist had proven very lucrative. Gillian also observed the familiar way in which Angelle lightly touched Frankie as she laughed
at his jokes. She wondered what the story was behind the pretty young lady smiling so brightly across from her.

Angelle sat with one leg tucked beneath her on the sofa. She looked at Frankie and toyed with her bracelet. “So, Baron told me that things are changing,” she said. She turned her attention to Gillian. “You’re coming in the game on some Queen Pen–style shit, huh?”

Gillian simply smiled.

“Shit must be going real good in your life, girl,” Angelle pressed. “Hanging out with sexy Frankie all day
and
making money? That’s a win/win.”

Gillian’s jaw tensed and Frankie noticed. He decided to try and break the ice a little. “Seems like shit is good for you, too, ma. I saw you at the party last week looking like Beyoncé.” Angelle was a girl he and Baron had known for years. Just a typical round-the-way girl from the projects in Brooklyn where Frankie grew up, she had graduated high school, unlike the rest of them. Angelle went on to land one job after another, while managing to keep hustling the way she’d learned in the streets of Brooklyn. She always had a hookup or a get-money scheme, and she often shared these with Frankie and Baron. In return, they hit her off with money, and, as an added perk, Baron hit it every now and then. She wasn’t wifey material, but Frankie and Baron both still admired her go-getter mentality.

Angelle lit up at the compliment. “Well, I try to keep it sexy,” she purred. Angelle had always thought that Frankie was fine, but since she’d met and started screwing Baron first, she never had the chance to sample his friend. Turning her attention to Gillian, she said, “I’ve seen you before, with Frankie. But we were never introduced.”

Gillian nodded. Angelle didn’t look familiar, though.
She looked like just another one of the girls who hung on Frankie’s and Baron’s every word, trying to be the next wifey.

“So let’s go over what you wanted to talk to us about,” Gillian said, getting to the point of their visit. “Baron said that you wanted to make some changes of your own.”

Angelle nodded. “I’ve been working at Dr. Tatum’s office for close to two years now. I’m taking a risk forging so many prescriptions, ’cuz if I get caught I could get in mad trouble.”

Gillian stared at her blankly. “How would they find out? You’ve been doing this for a while now, and nothing has gone wrong. So what’s the problem?”

Angelle batted her long eyelashes. “My point is that I’m taking a big risk. And for what I’m getting out of it, it’s not worth that risk for me anymore.” She shrugged.

“So you want more money?” Gillian asked.

Angelle looked at Gillian questioningly. “Who
doesn’t
want more money?”

Angelle and Frankie laughed. Gillian didn’t.

“But besides that, there’s so many people popping pills these days that there’s no reason why we can’t keep getting money. Shit, everything from the foundation to the roof of this place was made possible by the business I do with your family.”

Frankie smiled. “That’s a two-way street. Having you work with us has made a lot of things possible. Word. We definitely wanna keep doing what we been doing. How much more money you need?”

Gillian noticed that Frankie seemed enamored of Angelle. He looked at her sidelong with a half smirk on his face. Gillian hated seeing him look at another woman that way. It
seemed too familiar, and she could tell purely from their body language that they were close. She couldn’t understand why Frankie was so quick to start talking money when this chick wasn’t even giving them any reason to entertain that request.

“I just want to be able to do what I can to help my family out. You know my brother is locked up and all that.” Angelle touched Frankie’s leg again.

Gillian cleared her throat. She tried not to show how uncomfortable and pissed off she was. She was supposed to be able to keep her emotions in check. “We all have problems.”

Frankie saw the look on Gillian’s face and could tell that she wasn’t feeling Angelle. But he didn’t want to get involved in the cattiness of females. What he was focused on was maintaining the lucrative connection he had without it cutting into his profit too greatly. He knew that everything came down to money with Angelle. The more she could get, the more cooperative she became. “Keep going,” he urged.

“I was telling Baron that I wanna step it up a notch.”

Frankie had to resist the urge to laugh, since he suspected that she hadn’t been explaining anything between thrusts and moans other than how good it felt. As “brothers,” they discussed their more memorable trysts, and Baron had told Frankie about how wild the sex was with this one.

Angelle continued. “The doctor’s brother-in-law owns the pharmaceutical-supply company that he does business with. The man is disgusting—pale, old, still trying to act young. But he likes me. Every time I see him, he says something fresh or asks me out. I can get shit straight from him, probably. But I’d have to fuck him. And that’s gonna cost you.”

Frankie laughed, but Gillian was disgusted by this slut
sitting next to him. She felt so uneasy. Gillian had no respect for women who loosely slept around with men just for money or personal gain. She had been raised to understand the meaning of being a woman, and the virtues of being a lady. So this part of the business was new to her—dealing with women like Angelle who didn’t care about selling their bodies or their souls for material things.