The Mike Black Saga Book One (4 page)

Black pounded on
Ayana’s
door and after a while she opened it. “Black?” a half sleep Ayana said. “What you doin’ here? Did something go wrong?”

Black didn’t say a word. He just kept walking toward her, and Ayana kept backin’ up, until she backed her way into the bedroom. Black closed the door behind him.

I propped up some pillows and made myself comfortable on the couch. Every once and a while I would hear Ayana yell, “I didn’t tell nobody! I swear, Black. I didn’t tell
nobody
!”

I awoke to what smelled like meatloaf cooking, “Good morning, Ayana,” I said. “Where’s Black?”

“
It’s
afternoon and Black’s in the bedroom. If you want to take a shower or whatever, you can use the bathroom down the hall. Lunch should be ready in a soon,” Ayana said.

I took a good look at her; she didn’t look like Black beat her down. Ayana was in her late thirties, early forties, maybe. But she was still an attractive woman. She was probably a very pretty
women
when she was younger.

I made my way to the bathroom and took a quick shower. When I got out, as promised, meatloaf, along with mashed potatoes, collard greens, fried okra and cornbread were on the table, but no sign of Ayana. Not wanting the food to get cold, I sat down to lunch. It wasn’t too long before Black and Ayana came out of the bedroom. She went in the kitchen and Black sat down and began eating. “Well?”

“I don’t think she crossed us,” Black replied. “But we’ll talk about that later.”

After we finished eating, I took Black home. On the way there, I asked my question again, “Well?”

“
I been
thinkin’ about this all night. I haven’t even been to sleep.”

“Well?” I asked a third time.

“You heard what Bobby said. They ran it like
clock work
, just like we would have. The bandits were organized; other than ‘get out’; they never said a word. It happened so fast, I couldn’t really tell if they were black or white, but the one that took my guns sounded like he might be black, but I shouldn’t say for sure.”

“You sure she didn’t tell anybody?”

“I just spent all night making sure she didn’t,” Black said like I had asked a stupid question. “Now if she didn’t tell anybody, somebody had to figure it out. He’s the one we’re looking for.” I drove a while longer; thinkin’ that Black had simply stated the obvious. But I should have known better.

“I want my truck back, Nick. And I’ll have it.” Black said

That night when I got to The Late Night,
The
Kid was there talkin’ to Black. The Kid, that’s what we used to call Freeze back in those days. Back then, all Freeze did was run little errands for Black and hang out at the club messing with the ladies. They were seated in the back of the club; Black was doing most if not all the talking. Freeze just did a lot of nodding.

When I walked up they stopped talking and they both looked at me like I had no business there. I spoke and walked away and began doin’ my usual, which was hanging out, messing with the ladies. They sat there for most of the night,
then
suddenly Freeze jumped up and rushed for the door.

It was quiet for the next couple of days; nobody even mentioned the robbery, especially around Black. Then Black called me and told me to, meet him at The Late Night before it closes in the morning. We never closed before eight in the morning. I was with a girlfriend of mine and she wasn’t too happy when I rolled out of bed at, “It’s six-thirty, Nick. Where you goin’?”

“Out.”

“Out?” she pulled back the covers. “Only place you need to go is in, back in this bed. I want to feel you inside me.”

“I’ll be back,” I said and armed myself. “You’ll want to feel it even more when I get back.” I left there and was up in there about seven that morning, wondering what was goin’ on. I asked if Black was there and Sammy told me that he’d been there earlier and said that he’d be back.

Right after I got there, Bobby arrived, and Jamaica wasn’t far behind. They had got the same call from Black, and neither of them knew what was up.
Which shocked the hell out of me.
Bobby was in on everything.

We all took a seat, had a drink, and waited. When everyone was gone, Black came in. he went straight to the bar and poured himself a drink. He came over to where we were sitting and sat down. “So you gonna tell us what is so important to get me off some pussy at six in the morning?”

“Mine if I finish my drink first?”

“No, by all means, finish your drink,” Bobby said. “This better he good; that’s all I’m sayin’.”

We talked while Black finished his drink and let Sammy out. Then he led us in the back to the storage room. Black knocked on the door twice and opened the door. There was The Kid, sitting in a chair by the door. As we got in the clear, I saw four men kneeling down on a large piece of plastic. I recognized one of them right away. He dealt blackjack at Cynt’s.
Which is
Ayana’s
game and where she likes to play it.

Bobby started smiling, “What we got here, kid?”

“
These the
mutha fuckas that robbed us,” Black answered.

“You caught them,” Jamaica said and took out his gun. So did Bobby. Black already had both his guns out, so naturally I pulled mine.

“Freeze did,” Black said.

We all looked at Freeze. “By yourself? All at once?” Bobby asked sarcastically.

“By myself. One by one over the last couple of days,” Freeze said quietly but proudly.

After that there was no more talk. No questions of how he found them. Me, Black, Bobby, and Jamaica lined up across from them and opened fire.

I saw Freeze a few days later and I asked him how he found them. Freeze said, “Black figured it out. That night you walked up on us at The Late Night, he was lyin’ it all out for me. Keep your enemies close, but watch your homies. See Black knew if Ayana didn’t tell nobody, then it had to be somebody who knew she owed Black that money and knew the broke bitch had to have something else to deal with. That’s what led me to your boy at Cynt’s. He’s the one that gave Ayana the idea. They had them a little robbin’ crew, so once I had him,
catchin
’ the rest of them was easy. Black told me that there ain’t too many mutha fuckas that would want to touch a shipment of electronics like that. Black told me who the people were that should handle that type of merchandise. Then
Back
told me to start with the guy he had a deal with. He called me right after they called him. I got the last one when he rolled up in truck.”

After that, Freeze was part of the crew. He had proved himself and Black taught him the game.

On the train one day when
me
and Freeze were going to kill a Rasta named Desmond Kelly. Since I don’t like to drive and at the time, Freeze didn’t know how, we would take the train to get where we were going. Once we had taken care of our business, we
’d would
catch the train home.

On that particular day I saw a beautiful young lady. I tapped Freeze on the shoulder. “Be right back,” I said and moved toward her.
 
Freeze followed me anyway. When she
look
up, I was standing over her. At the next stop, the person sitting next to her got off the train, and I sat down. I had my gun in my coat pocket when sat down next to her. I’m sure she could tell that because she could feel it bump against her leg every time the train stopped. And it didn’t seem to bother her.

“Hello,” I said and smiled at her.

She looked at him and smiled. “Hi.”

“What’s your name?”

“Carmen.”

“So, Carmen, where are you goin’?” I asked.

“Jackson Ave.”

“I’m gettin’ off there too.”

“Do you live around there?”

“No. To be honest with you, I’m goin’ there to kill somebody.”

“Kill somebody! Why?”

“
‘Cause
they tried to kill me. But I don’t want to talk about that. I’d much rather talk about you. Is that a Georgia accent I’m hearin’?”

“Yes, I’m from Atlanta.”

“Atlanta is a nice city. What brings you to New York?”

“I came here ‘
cause
I needed a change. So I’ve been hangin’ out with my girl here. If I like it, I’ll stay. Get back into
school,
see if I can pick up some work as a model.”

“You’re a model?”

“I’ve done some modeling in Atlanta. Some print, some commercials,
shows, that
type of stuff.”

“Freeze,” I said glancing up at him. “
Nevermind
. Do you have a pen and a piece of paper, Carmen?”

“What do you want it for?”

“I want to give you the number of somebody who might be able to help you.”

“Okay,” Carmen said digging in her purse.

Carmen handed me the pen and paper and he wrote a name and number on it. “Here,” I said, handing the pen and paper back to Carmen. “This guy’s a modeling agent. Call him and tell him what you’ve done and what you’re interested in doing and he’ll take care of you,” I said as the train approached the station.

“Thank you. I’ll do that right away,” Carmen said as we got off the train and walked down the platform toward the steps.

When I got to the bottom of the steps I turned to Carmen. She was so beautiful. “It was nice talking to you, Carmen.”

“Hey!” Carmen yelled as he started to walk away. “What’s your name?”

“My name is Mike Black. Just tell Calvin that I’d consider it a personal favor if he found you something.”

After that brief meeting, Carmen called Calvin and once she told him that mike Black recommended her, she was able to
made
an appointment to go and see him. The second Calvin laid eyes on
Carmen,
he knew that she had the potential to be something special. He was able to get her some modeling work right away. Those led to more jobs led to more jobs and Carmen Taylor was on her way.

Carmen Taylor

I was so grateful to Black for the introduction. I always had thing for thugs and I thought that he was so fine. So I asked Calvin where I could find him. “No,” Calvin’s simple answer to my request.

“No? What you mean no? No you don’t know where to find him. Or no, you won’t tell me.”

“No I won’t tell you, Carmen.”

“Why not?”

“Because Mike Black is a very dangerous man and you don’t need to know how to find him.”

“What do you mean that he’s a dangerous man?” I asked even though I had a good idea. After all, he was carrying a gun and he did say he was on his way to kill somebody.

“You just need to take my word for it. That is not the type of man you need to be involved with, and leave it at that.”

I was a little insulted that this man that I barely knew was telling me what type of man that I needed to be involved with. I was about to cop an attitude and tell him, but I knew that would get me nowhere. “Please, Calvin, all I want to do is thank the guy. If it wasn’t for him, I would be where I am and doing the things that I’m doing. Just a phone number or something. What could that hurt?”

Calvin looked at me for what seemed like a long time. He took a deep breath. “Black doesn’t have a phone.”

“You’re kidding. If you’re not going to tell me just say so.”