Wifey 4 Life (25 page)

Griff was in the bathroom stall almost one hundred and fifty
feet away from the van, while Jeff was in the store paying for the gas.
This is
the perfect opportunity.

I looked through the window of the service station and noticed
that there were two people ahead of Jeff. I figured I only had about a minute and
a half before the window of opportunity would be closed.

Walt’s focus was on everything around us. Every time someone
walked by the van, or a car pulled up to a gas pump, he made it his business to
turn around to see what they were doing.

I could tell that he felt uneasy and paranoid because of everything
going on around him. This was the perfect opportunity for me to execute my plan.

I still had the gun in my hand from when he gave it to me earlier.
I pulled back on the hammer very lightly, so he wouldn’t hear it, and then raised
it and pointed it at the side of Walt’s head. “Don’t say a word unless I tell you
to!”

Walt tried to turn his head around to look at me, but I pressed
the gun against his temple and told him not to move.

He chuckled like he found what I was doing very amusing. “What’s
going on, baby girl? You don’t like being on my team anymore?” He grinned.

“Just hand me your gun.”

As Walt handed me his gun, Lanier brought his arms from around
his back and pulled himself up into a sitting position. His eyes grew wide at seeing
Lanier free. Once I had Walt’s gun in my hand, I immediately stuck it down into
the waistband of my shorts.

“I can’t believe you helping this motherfucker after all that
shit he put you through earlier. You told me he tried to kill you, so what the fuck
is wrong with you?”

I was nervous, and Walt could sense it, because he made the comment
that if I gave him his gun back that very moment, he would act like what I did never
happened. As much as I wanted to do just that, I knew he wasn’t going to let me
off the hook that easy.

According to Lanier, he’d whipped my mother’s ass because she
tried to sabotage his plans for her, so why wouldn’t he do the same shit to me?
Not only that, but he hated when someone pointed a gun at him and didn’t pull the
trigger. Lanier had done it to him years ago, and now I was doing the exact same
thing, so I knew he wouldn’t have mercy on me.

“I want you to get out of the van very slowly,” I told Walt.

He leaned forward, grabbed the door handle, and slid the door
back slowly.

“Don’t open it up too wide.”

He pulled the door back halfway. “Is this good?”

“Yeah, that’s good. Now get out very slowly.” I continued to
point the gun directly at him.

While he was exiting the van, I looked over his shoulders to
see if Jeff had gotten to the register and paid for his gas yet, and sure enough,
he was at the register handing the cashier his money. In less than ten seconds Jeff
would be right back at the van.

“Hurry up! You’re moving too slowly.” I pushed Walt in the back.
I must have thrown him off balance, because he stumbled a bit when his feet hit
the ground.

By then my uncle had managed to break free of the duct tape around
his ankles, so he was ready to go. Without saying a word, he climbed into the driver’s
seat and started up the ignition.

I immediately looked at him and asked, “What the hell you doing?”

“I’m about to get us out of here! Now hurry up and slam the door
closed!”

Right when I grabbed on the door handle to slam the door shut,
Jeff reappeared and gave me a puzzled look. I was sure his little mind was wondering
why Walt was standing outside the van, not to mention, why his van’s ignition had
been started when he’d shut it off before he’d stepped out of the van to pay for
the gas.

Walt yelled, “They trying to get away!”

I assume Jeff had a delayed reaction. He started sprinting after
us only after Lanier yelled, “Close the door!” and sped out of the service station,
and into oncoming traffic on Chesapeake Boulevard.

From the back window I saw Jeff pull out his gun and aim it at
us as, but for some reason, he didn’t fire.

I screamed at the top of my voice when Lanier sped in front of
this eighteen-wheeler, almost causing us to get sideswiped.

The truck driver pressed his hand against his horn and held it
down for dear life. The shit scared the hell out of me. The sound of his horn echoed
in my ears, causing me to cringe, and I fell down to my knees, knocking the gun
out of my hand to the floor, and it slid underneath the front passenger seat.

I crawled toward the back of that seat and reached my hand
underneath it, trying to feel my way around until I located it. It was very difficult
to put my hands on it because of how fast my uncle was driving.

When he sped through the red light at the intersection of Five
Points, I honestly thought he had lost his motherfucking mind. I heard at least
four different car horns blowing. I yelled, “If you don’t slow down, you’re gonna
get us killed!”

“I’m just trying to get away from those niggas as quickly as
possible,” he yelled, panting.

I finally located the gun, grabbed it, and removed it from underneath
the chair. When I tried to stand, I felt the van jerk a couple of times. “What’s
wrong? Why is the van jerking?” I asked as I sat back on the chair.

Right when he was about to tell me what was wrong, I had already
figured it out, because the van’s ignition turned off completely. We were coasting
on fumes, and then after the van moved a few more feet, it stopped.

We were only one block away from where we’d left Walt and Jeff.
They both knew the van was on empty, so we couldn’t get very far. There was no doubt
in my mind that they were already en route to kill us both.

We had reached the ramp to jump on Highway 64. We knew we couldn’t
take the chance of running away from the highway to get into the nearby neighborhood
called Norview, because we could run right into Walt and Jeff. So we got out of
the van and fled on foot toward the traffic on the interstate, praying we wouldn’t
get hit.

My uncle didn’t look back once as he ran down the side ramp of
the highway. Cars blew their horns at us when they drove by. I tried my best to
keep up with my uncle, but I couldn’t.

“Get the hell out of the way!” one driver yelled.

When I heard gunfire, I looked back and noticed Walt and Jeff
were both on our tails. Jeff was the only one with a pistol, so he didn’t
hesitate to bust two shots at us. I was tired of running, but when I heard those
shots, I got a burst of energy from out of nowhere.

“Uncle Lanier, they’re behind us, and they’re shooting!” I yelled.

“Shoot back at them!”

Now I didn’t know how to aim a gun and fire a shot at someone
while they were in pursuit, and I wasn’t about to stop and try it, so I kept it
moving.

“Shit!” I said, realizing I had just lost the gun I had placed
in the waistband of my shorts. I started to stop to pick it up, but Walt and Jeff
were gaining yards on me. “They’re gaining on us!” I screamed. I was in bad
shape. My heart was beating uncontrollably, and I was running out of breath.

“You better come on,” Lanier yelled back. Saving me from them
was the last thing on his mind. He was more concerned about himself, and he didn’t
try to hide it.

I don’t know how, but we ran all the way down Highway 64 until
we got to the overpass. Then we ran down a small hill of grass to get to the street
underneath the highway, which was Virginia Beach Boulevard.

When I reached the bottom of the hill, I heard voices behind
me. I looked back and saw Walt and Jeff at the top of the fucking hill. At that
very moment, my life flashed in front of me, and this time around I saw my life
come to an end in that cloud. I seriously wanted to stop in my tracks and surrender.
At least then I could finally be put out of my misery.

But then something inside me lit up and told me to save myself,
and after this last time, I wouldn’t ever have to run for my life again. I guess
that was all I needed to know, because I put one foot in front of the other and
sprinted toward the underpass.

I turned the corner to travel under the underpass, and my uncle
had vanished. Fear engulfed my entire body. I didn’t know if I was coming or going,
but I kept on running.

It was extremely dark under the tunnel, but that really didn’t
matter to me, because my mission was to get as far away as I could from these
niggas. They were after my blood, and I wasn’t about to let that happen.

While I was running underneath this dark underpass, going in
the direction of Newtown Road, I heard a voice. It scared me to death. I thought
it was some homeless person trying to get my attention, but when I realized the
person knew my name, I stopped in my tracks.

“Kira, I’m up here,” my uncle said.

I was out of breath, yet I somehow mustered up the energy to
climb up the slanted, cement wall. When I got to the top, I saw my uncle hiding
inside a little box-shaped compartment right under the highway above us.

“Where is the other gun?”

“I dropped it when I was running down the fucking highway, but
I still got this one,” I replied in a low whisper. I showed him the gun with the
silencer.

He took the gun out of my hand and clutched it in his.

Not even a second passed before Walt and Jeff came running around
the wall of the underpass. Jeff still had his gun.

My uncle and I were sitting in a small crawl space at the top
of the underpass, and those two bastards had to run past us to get out. He leaned
into my ear and whispered, “You know that if we don’t get them now, they gon’ keep
coming after us?”

I nodded, not wanting to make any noise. I couldn’t afford to
draw any attention to us. Right now we had an advantage because we were the predator
stalking our prey.

“Stay right here. I’ll be right back.” Uncle Lanier stood and
snuck quietly down the wall, so he could catch Walt and Jeff before they were able
to pass us.

I watched him closely as he tiptoed toward them without being
heard. When he got close enough he aimed the gun at them and pulled the trigger.
I couldn’t hear the shots because of the silencer, but when Jeff collapsed on the
ground beside Walt and didn’t move again, I knew he had gotten hit and was probably
dead.

Walt must’ve seen Jeff fall to the ground, because he turned
around and looked back for a brief second, and then he started running faster.

I thought he might have stopped to pick up Jeff ’s gun, but he
must’ve figured out that would’ve made him an easy target.

My uncle hurried to catch Walt like he was in the fifty-yard
dash, but I couldn’t see which direction they ran because of where I was sitting.

It was pitch-dark under the underpass, but I noticed that cars
slowed down as they rode by Jeff ’s body. I saw one woman on her cell phone talking
to someone. I didn’t know who she was talking to, but it would just be my luck if
she was calling the police.

I knew it was time for me to get the hell out of Dodge. I got
up from where I was sitting and walked down the wall as quickly as possible. Cars
were still slowing down when they passed Jeff ’s body, so I covered my face to prevent
anyone from seeing me when I got close to his body.

I started walking in the opposite direction from where my uncle
and Walt had run, but then I heard a car squealing its tires, and a loud crash followed.

Without thinking about it twice, I turned around and ran toward
the scene. On my way to see what had happened, I had to step over Jeff ’s body.
As I did, I quickly snatched up his gun and then kept moving.

When I reached the corner of Kempsville Road and Virginia Beach
Boulevard, I noticed that the traffic was congested in front of the Chevrolet dealership
less than a half a block away. It became apparent that someone had gotten hit, because
a crowd of people had gathered around in a circle.

I wanted to know what really happened, so I decided to go over
and check it out myself. As I made my way down toward the scene, I noticed someone
running toward me. I shoved Jeff ’s gun into my pocket and tried to act normal.
I took a deep breath and looked straight ahead.

Then I realized that it was my uncle. I was so relieved.

He was panting very hard. “Come on and turn around,” he said.
“What happened down there? And where is Walt?”

He grabbed my arm and turned me around. “We can’t go back near
that other guy’s body, so let’s walk toward Sentara Leigh Hospital.”

As my uncle and I marched through the intersection of Kempsville
Road and Virginia Beach Boulevard, I noticed he was deep in thought. But that didn’t
deter me from asking him again what had happened, and where was Walt.

“He’s dead.”

“What? Did he get hit by a car?”

“I shot him in his leg first, and when I tried to hit him again,
he tried to get away from me by running across the street. He got hit head- on by
this white guy driving a Ford F-250 truck.”

“So what did you do with the gun?”

“I threw it down the sewer near the car dealership.”

“You didn’t let anybody see you doing it, did you?”

“No. I looked both ways before I dropped it.”

I wanted to fall down on my knees and thank God. My life had
been spared once again. No matter what situation I got into, God always had my back
and made a way for me to get out of it, and for that I was truly grateful.

As we walked down Kempsville Road, I wondered how this night
was going to end. Were my uncle and I going to remain distant and move on with our
lives as I had planned? Or were we going to bury the hatchet and try to forgive
one another? At this point in the game, it didn’t matter to me, because either way
I looked at it, I was going back out of the country, so he would never see me again.

“Ahh shit! I just thought about something,” he said and came
to a complete stop.