Tabu, page 1
Tabu Social Club
By
Thomas Green, Sr. & Jr.
Table of Contents
Title Page
South of Harlem Books | Atlanta, Ga.
For my dad, Thomas Green, Sr. | The best writer I ever knew ...and he didn’t have a book deal.
South of Harlem Books
Atlanta, Ga.
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
Copyright © 2003 by Thomas Green, Jr.
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any references to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. Other names, characters and incidents are product of the author’s imagination. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
ISBN: 978-0-9791404-1-9
Cover design by MarionDesigns.com
First Printing March 2005
Ninth Printing March 2016
10 9
Printed in the United States of America
For my dad, Thomas Green, Sr.
The best writer I ever knew ...and he didn’t have a book deal.
Books by Thomas Green, Jr.
Decatur Cab
Change For A Dyme
Larry’s Girls
Purple Lipstick
The Christmas Party
When it Hurts So Bad
Player No More
Courting Miss Thang
Love’s Home Run
Foreword
Thomas Green, Sr., lovingly known as Chip, was some kind of man, father and husband. He had one way to express himself, through writing vivid stories. You’d see him coming into Patterson Houses from the train station and the first thing you’d notice was his big shoulder tote bag, which he carried everyday, filled with his thoughts about his neighbors, his family and even the winos he passed. From the pimp tales to the love stories all of his work should be read with all the care and attention in which it was written.
Diane Slight (married to Chip for 18 years)
Author’s note:
Many people ask me how I got started writing. The truth is I don’t remember. I have always wanted to write, to tell stories.
Truth be told, I got it naturally from my dad.
My dad was always writing; he always had a clipboard with bright white Hammermill copy paper on it crafting a novel he’d only let a few of his best friends read... those that could understand his handwriting.
My dad, known as Chip, wrote about men who loved women and the women that loved those guys. In his stories he liked big cars, parties, good food and solid friendships. His male characters were tough and his females loving. The bad souls got dealt with, and the partying never stopped. Tabu is one of the many stories he wrote before he passed away in 2002.
Although he never wanted me to write for a living, he’d rather I have a steady government gig with benefits like him, but creative writing is everything for me. The only difference between us is I learned to enjoy having people read my stuff and now that self-publishing has become easier than finding a fish and chips joint in Harlem I just had to get one of his stories out there
Hope you enjoy...
PROLOGUE
Charles Mann was in Florida to discuss a misunderstanding of high proportions.
Those were not his words, not how he would describe the situation. No, he understood what the fuck was going on. Dominicans in uptown Manhattan wanted his dad’s club, Tabu in central Harlem. The problem was the club wasn’t for sale.
Charles’ father was making fat money by letting his club be a mule hut, a delivery and pickup spot for most of the drugs trafficked through Harlem. There was never any serious trouble; too much money was being made, until the Montenez brothers grew to dominance. They were greedy. They had their own club uptown, but they weren’t respected like Bernard Mann was. They wanted in on the deals with the people who dealt with Tabu.
The meeting was set up by Randy Quintana. Bernie Mann used to buy his drugs in high quantities from Randy and there was never a problem. In retirement, he has enjoyed considerable clout with the Spanish drug dealers up in New York because he was a neutral and wise man. Since he no longer had personal axes to grind and since his retainers were no longer out he was allowed to be privy to the inner workings of the New York drug game. He’d get inquiries about his views from active functioning bosses. Those views were not always necessarily accepted and implemented, but he was listened to. His son Miami was the Dominicans’ spokesman and he was no joke. That was a new role for the ruthless Cuban. His rep was one of being a fierce enforcer and hit man responsible for nearly a hundred kills from Connecticut to Florida; no one, not even Miami himself was sure of the exact count. He did not keep count or remember any murder. None of his murders, though, were civilians or innocents.
Having a man like Miami speak for you was overkill, kind of like slicing off your skin with a machete because it itched.
The Manns did not trust this meeting but they felt they had no choice. Some talking had to be done. And maybe, just maybe, since the negotiations were out of town things would be copasetic.
C-Mann entered the meeting, a hotel room in the busy Sun Grove Hotel on Miami Beach, and all the men in there came to alert.
C-Mann surveyed the faces. There were the two Montenez brothers, looking high and mighty. Dan-O, the tough one, was seated in a wicker chair. His brother Chico, the one with the brains and financial savvy, sat on the loveseat alone. Miami and Shout, the hard-nosed answers to any problems the brothers encountered, were sitting at the bar. Sitting off to the side, C-Mann saw the man who insured his safety, Miami’s father, Randy Quintana.
No one spoke.
Miami rose off a bar stool and came to C-Mann. He greeted him calmly then said, “Poppie. Up, arms up.”
Miami patted him down and revealed a .44 handgun. A mocking laugh came from the bar, where Miami had been sitting. It was from Miami’s partner, Shout. “Told you. He brings a tool to a sit-down.”
“Y’all lucky I am letting y’all take it.”
Shout laughed.
Miami sighed, “He’s clean...now.
Charles stood there like a kid impersonating an airplane, no burner and no thoughts on a way out alive. He had been left wondering instead of plotting.
Quintana stood from the wicker, Golden Girls‐ looking, easy chair and sighed softly. He was a plump, white‐haired man with glasses, who looked like a high school teacher within five years of retirement.
The room was extremely quiet, no sounds from life outside got in. The silence made C-Mann’s guts ache. He looked around and that was when he noticed the men, including that killer Miami, looking somber not menacing.
“Mr. Charles,” Quintana said in a thick Spanish accent. “Welcome.”
C-Mann nodded.
Quintana came closer. “Please. Sit. Something to drink?”
C-Mann followed to the sofa. “Yeah. Johnnie Walker. Black.”
Miami goes behind the bar and makes the drink. He brings it to the table with a napkin.
“Listen. This was a good faith reach out to you. Connie was good enough to sponsor this and I have guaranteed your safety. The Montenez brothers wanted to talk. They are about business, I believe, respectful and the whole nine.”
“Man, whatever,” C-Mann snickered at the man calling the Montenez brothers respectful.
“You have the right to your opinion.”
“Sure he does,” Dan‐O said angrily, “he can think whatever. But he should be thinking on how to leave the business with money in his pockets and not in a coffin.”
Quintana fell back in his chair, disgusted. “This was not how business disputes were handled in my day.”
“Oh yeah, old man, I remember all the ways you and them old cats made the streets bloody while getting things dealt with.”
Quintana shook his head.
Dan-O turned to C-Mann, “Look, fuck the bullshit, okay? There should be no hostilities between us. We do not want to take your family’s business from you. We just want to be in business with you.”
He paused, looking intently in C-Mann’s eyes. He placed a hand on his chest and said, “I love Tabu. It’s a grown folks establishment, for mature party people. No nonsense. All this is, this meeting, is to make you a sound business offer.”
“Yeah. And I ma here to let you know my father and me are fine. We do not need partners. Of any kind.”
Dan-O said, “Just listen then. The only vice your father controls in his own place, besides booze, is gambling. That’s not right. We can help with the drug game, make it more profitable business for the Mann family.”
C-Mann took a sip to suppress his anger. This motherfucker knows to much about our business. He had to think straight, not curse this motherfucker out. He came all the way down here to represent his father, and he so wanted to handle this meeting maturely.
“You and your father see what, no less than sixty stacks a month? That don’t make no fucking sense, poppa.
Connie and her people are ripping you off. Fucking Colombians. Tabu is the center of their operation and they pay you and your father nothing.”
“You see,” C-Mann pointed at Dan-O, “You already a little too deep in our business, and that’s not cool. Don’t worry about
“You know, and our choice was simple. To kill Connie’s sexy ass or we could go after you and your father. And you know what? Fucking with the Manns pose no threat of retaliation... and y’all easy to get at.”
“Do you, pimpin’. You think it will be easy, go for it.”
“Pimpin’?” Chico angered.
His brother calmed him. He said, “We talking. We just saying.”
C-Mann was animated. “Naw, fuck it. You saying threats, then be about them. Don’t fucking talk down to me like I’m little and shit.”
“Tough guy,” Chico smirked.
“Try me.”
Dan-O sobered.
After a second of silence, the sound of a Salsa tune caused Dan-O to blink.
Miami answered his phone, stepping outside of the room.
Dan-O exhaled, “You getting upset. Let’s calm it down and get back to business and not personal talk.”
C-Mann finished his drink, set down the tumbler and stood. “Ain’t shit else to talk about.”
“What, you going to run back and tell Connie and let her get rid of us?”
“You scared?”
Dan-O smiled without showing teeth.
Miami cuts in and bends to whispers in Dan‐O’s ear. Chico shook his head in disgust over the interruption. This entire meeting was getting on his nerves; kill the father and son and fine Colombian bitch and be done with it all.
Dan-O sobered. His posture changed.
“His phone must be off...” he said as if not wanted to speak.
C-Mann nodded. “Yeah, my shit is off. So?”
Miami came to C-Mann’s side. “Ah, my man...” Miami whined
C-Mann studied his stoic demeanor. “What’s happenin’?” What these niggas done did, was his real question.
Miami looked to his bosses.
“What the fuck is it?” Chico spat out.
“Suave, suave,”Dan-O said and then he pointed to Miami to continue.
C-Mann stood, worry wrinkled his brow.
Miami said,“C-Mann... my man, something has happened to your mother.”
“What?”
“She fell. On the subway. She died.”
“Fuck you saying?”
Seething, his eyes still on the three of them, C-Mann dug out his phone and cut it on. In the moment it took to power up, he contemplated trying to kill them all with his bare hands. He thought better of it.
He pressed his father’s number and looked dead at Chico while the call connected.
“You motherfuckers.”
“Shit. Fuck that,” Chico spat. “He think we that fucking low and shit.”
Dan-O shook his head. “You think that we had something to do with this? Come on?”
“That fucking temper. We will have to kill him anyhow like I first said when all we wanted to do was talk.”
Shout quietly got his gun out of its holster. He held it in his lap.
C-Mann got no response from his dad.
C-Mann’s mind zipped through scenarios. The Montenez brothers had secured his safety, but had they snatched his father? Did they take the club by force with him out of town?
“You motherfuckers think I am stupid or something? Y’all playing games? Got me down here fucking with me?”
Dan-O shook his head, “No, C-Mann, it’s not like that.”
C-Mann phone chimed a love song. Without looking his knew it was his girl. He answered, looking around the room. He heard sobbing in the phone.
“My God, no, my God, no Charles, no...”
C-Mann choked and swallowed back a sob. His breathing quickened.
“I’ll call you right back...”
C-Mann’s knees weakened; his heart clinched. He slowly shook his head and said, “Shit.” He was biting his lip, angry at himself for having allowed himself to be lured out of New York while his mother was whacked.
“You motherfuckers,” he said nastily. He took a fist to his face and gnawed a knuckle.
Dan-O rose and came to C-Mann. He softly said, “Why would we kill a civilian? A mother?”
C-Mann replied, “Y’all better get to killing me if you think I am just going to believe that shit.”
Chico rose. “Believe what you want to believe. But, my friend, your choice is now to go see your mother in a casket or see her with wings.”
C-Mann froze. He had never allowed a man to threatened him without a fight ensuing.
Quintana moved to stand next to C-Mann. He touched his arm and calmed him. Grave and regretful, he said, “Go home. Go be with you family.”
CHAPTER 1
Penny Layne stood by C-Mann while he solemnly grieved at his mother’s gravesite. While everyone else’s eyes were on the gold-lined casket and the rich array of flowers, she was looking up at her man. He was allowing her to hold his hand, and she took that as a sign of his love, needing and vulnerability.
Penny was a dainty 4-foot-9, slender, chocolate sister. She had just enough body to garner second looks, and was glad to have C-Mann as her man even though she was sure he was enjoying many of the fine women who entered his club.
C-Mann was an anomaly. He got pussy on the regular from the easy women at his club, yet still took the time to court Penny.
Penny loved big men and C-Mann was that. He was thick, 6-foot-3, with broad shoulders and heavy, gentle hands that could make her moist just stroking her legs. He kept a mini afro and those massive hands manicured. His pleasant looks were highlighted by an easygoing, radiant personality. He was a nice guy in a city full of men who were expert at faking being nice.
She saw that C-Mann was not playing games with her mind. He was putting money over pussy, and getting as much money and pussy as he could. She couldn’t fault a man under thirty for that.
She had a plan to be there when C-Mann matured and was ready to settle down. He was as good as a man could be to a woman. He was honest and let his actions speak louder than his words. Many men had come on to her in her life, and some got beyond first base, but not many scored because she hated bullshit.
From what she saw, so many people seemed to want C-Mann‐ to be more thuggish. His boys back in the ʹhood he grew up in thought he was soft because he didn’t do that gangster shit that they partook in, and his father wanted him to keep the club from being overrun by local hoodlums.
Penny liked that he was intelligent, polite and friendly. He could speak with thugs in Harlem about the Knicks and converse with her upper‐class friends in downtown Brooklyn about finances and make them all feel his coolness. She felt safe with him and that meant more than whether or not he was street. Penny very much understood how she had kept a busy man interested. She made herself an excellent kept woman. She was quiet, no nagging about time spent or phone calls, and she was low maintenance, pleased with however they spent their time together. When he was at her place, the phone rarely rang. If he came by and friends were there, they understood they had to break out.
And she lived in Brooklyn. When he visited, he would treat it as a vacation, being so far removed from the pressures of running the club for his dad and he didn’t run into anyone he knew.
Charles Mann stared at the flower‐covered coffin of his mother, mesmerized by the light rain tapping the colorful array of daisies and orchids.
C-Mann’s eyes took in the sight of the fresh, plump daisies and allowed them to unleash sweet memories. His mother loved daisies, something they would disagree on every Mother’s Day. C-Mann and his father would buy her the finest roses, many different colors, but she would be looking for daisies.
Mother’s Day had been her favorite holiday. Bernard and Shirley Mann had tried for years to have a baby then finally they had C-Mann, and then the next year a daughter.
Shirley had been killed on the morning of Mother’s Day.
For the third straight year her son had gotten daisies mixed in with his yellow roses for her. His dad defiantly got the same thing every year: two dozens of long-stemmed red roses.
C-Mann could hear the argument now: His father saying, “Daisies are not for Mother’s Day.” and she replying, “Mother’s Day is my day. I want what I want.”
The kitchen table in their Englewood home was covered with a daisy print. A fine linen cloth replaced it. The same bright yellow print was on the matching window curtains, potholders and hand towels. Those accessories had been in Shirley Mann’s kitchen for as long as C-Mann could remember. Visiting home, he still ate Frosted Flakes in a yellow bowl from a matching dining set. He thought back to all the spills that tablecloth had sustained. All the greasy or wet hand wipes the curtains had taken. He wondered if she ever knew how those stains got there.
