Tabu, page 9
“I am going to suck that,” she said while still kissing him and he just about came in his boxers.
CHAPTER 21
After Penny got her body satisfied, C-Mann suffered through another sleepless night. He could picture his own death and it wasn’t pretty. He could see Miami catching him slipping, walking up to him quietly and blowing a tunnel through his head.
Or maybe, like in the mobster movies, it might be one of his men. Burke? Fingers? Lanier? Shit, Lanier would sell out his momma for some head from an attractive woman, the unpretty motherfucker.
It could be anybody or nobody, C-Mann worried.
He moved his thoughts to his little Penny. She deserved better. She wants a family, a husband and children. She should go get it, he thought. And he should be a big part of it, he considered.
He watched her sleep.
The bright sunlight glazed over Penny’s golden brown skin. The urge to touch her was suffocating. He ran his rugged hand over her smooth ass and then down her short legs; so soft.
She cooed and turned into him. He cuddled her and allowed her to kiss him. Penny’s passionate tongue lit a fire inside of C-Mann.
“I want some,” she said, her petite hand grabbing hold of his cock the best it could.
He pinned her back to the bed and began by kissing her buds of breasts, they were all nipple and ultra sensitive. He kissed a trail to her belly and that anticipation that he was about to do the do goose bumped the skin of her legs.
She couldn’t recall the last time he had performed oral sex on her, especially right then because her mind was shattered.
“I love you,” he said coming up for air.
She hadn’t realized he’d stopped because her lower body was still tingling. His fingers were doing things now.
He plunged into her violently.
She liked that. No matter how wet she got he was still an invader. She enjoyed that overwhelmed feeling, the feeling of his girth invading her small space. He always loved that her small body could take so much damage. No matter how hard he rode, she asked for more.
Afterwards they both lay spent; Penny actually wanted more, but she understood the recuperating time men needed. She cuddled into her man, and he accepted her onto his chest.
“We don’t have to go shopping today if you are not up to it,” Penny said while running her tiny digits over his big hairy chest. “I understand.”
C-Mann didn’t remember setting this date to take her shopping. He didn’t remember it was now Saturday, but he didn’t want to spend the day in the house or without her.
“Naw, let’s go.”
She was pleased to hear that.
They dressed and C-Mann sped them from Brooklyn to a mall on Long Island. That was just the first stop. She worked her way from store to store then mall to mall, finishing the trip in downtown Brooklyn at fancy boutiques.
Penny got summer clothes, shoes and anything else that caught her eye. She was set to spend the money she made at her nine to five, and C-Mann appreciated that Penny was independent in that way. But he was not going to have his woman spending her own money when they were out.
All this running around and driving got his mind off of his problems and his death calling. Maybe shopping was therapeutic, he considered with a smirk. He didn’t want to admit that and have more days like this in his life. He was a little worried that he had left his gun in the car, not wanting to go in stores strapped. But what if something jumped off? He pushed that thought away. Today was for his woman, tomorrow back to the real.
Penny was oblivious to her man and his worries. She had walked ahead, on her cell phone giggling and bragging about her buys. She was waiting at the car, leaning on the trunk. When C-Mann got there, he opened the trunk and she dumped her bags.
“Thanks so much for today,” Penny said.
C-Mann nodded.
She slipped in closer; her hands sent her arms in his
jacket and around his ribs.
Penny said, “I don’t mean that you bought me anything. Thanks for that too, but I am just so appreciative for the time together.”
His eyes looked into hers. It was time to tell her.
She listened, wide‐eyed and mouth agape. Fear got the best of her and brought tears.
“We got to go,” she grabbed at his jacket. “We can get out of here.”
“No, I can’t run.”
“C-Mann, she is going to kill you,”panic was setting in. “That’s what she wants. We can go north, to Canada for awhile.”
“I can’t leave my dad.”
She dropped her head into his chest. She closed her eyes, allowing the circumstances to seep in.
“Maybe you should go,” C-Mann suggested.
“I am not leaving you.”
They hugged for a second and he let her cry.
For that moment he wished he had the balls to just drive his woman to the airport and be gone. He had more than enough money to take her to a Caribbean island hideaway for a year. Again he asked himself who would blame him for running off. And again the answer was clear, most people expected him to run.
He couldn’t do that. He wanted to stand and fight. C-Mann wanted to be able to kill the motherfuckers who killed his mother. And that’s all, he told himself, that mattered.
C-Mann and Penny turned from each other at the trunk and headed down the car for their doors.
They were silent through the drive back to Brooklyn, allowing the sounds of Lee Morgan’s horn to take them on daydreams. This was a burned copy of Bernie’s favorite CD, Morgan and his stellar band live in California, and Charles was seeing his father bobbing his head with the swing of the band.
Penny was considering calling an old boyfriend, a Brooklyn gangster who had stood up to the Jamaicans back in the ʹ80s when they were taking over most of the drug spots in Crown Heights. He was the killer that C-Mann wasn’t. He also wasn’t the love C-Mann was.
That nigga would kill whomever Penny said just for some head from her. That’s all he ever wanted and he paid well. He claimed he loved Penny, but she knew that couldn’t be true: the violent way he held the back of her head during oral sex or how he’d allow any bitch to suck him off wherever, including in Penny’s presence.
But this was the guy who could surely save C-Mann’s life. She sat there looking at the carefree people go about their lives in various automobiles and considering if deep-throating her ex and swallowing his foul come was worth seeing her man unharmed.
Yes, she decided, it was.
In the funny way the human mind works, C-Mann went from dealing with his dad’s shit to getting his big, thick fingers tightly on his woman’s petite ass when the thought of his cousin came into his head.
Fuck. Fingers? Why hadn’t he checked in? Maybe he got caught out there. Miami iced him and now he really is on the warpath for some Mann blood.
“Oh boy,” C-Mann groaned.
“What’s wrong?” Penny asked.
“I forgot to do something,” he said as he dug for his cell phone.
With a touch of fear, C-Mann opened his phone
and dialed Fingers’ cell number.
A female voice answered. And right away C-Mann was at ease because it did not have a Spanish accent. “Who this?”
“C-Mann? That’s what they call you?”
He worked his memory to pick up on the voice. He knew it, and was getting close to narrowing it down.
“What they call you?” he asked.
“The sweetest pain,” she laughed.
“Where’s Fingers?”
“Damn, what, you don’t watch the news, my
brother?”
My brother. Okay, she’s a sister, he considered while searching for an image of this chick.
“No. I’d rather hear bad news from a friend. Why don’t you tell me what I missed?”
“I killed him. And your uncle and your mother and your daddy’s play wife. And you know I have your father. You know you next.”
C-Mann’s face froze and his heart clenched. “Bitch,” he uttered.
She was laughing. “I killed the wrong girl, though.
She thought you loved her, that’s what she told me. You just like your daddy. How many kids you got?”
C-Mann tired to figure what chick she was talking about.
“You right to pick the one you with, though.”
C-Mann panicked. His looking around for a tail caused the car to swerve.
Penny came alive. “Charlie?”
He nodded to her as to say he got this. He got back to listening to this killer.
“She’s more the marrying type. But never forget that you got the other one killed.”
“Come fuck with me up close.” “I will.”
The phone went dead.
“Shit.” C-Mann looked to see the signal was fine and the seconds ticking on his end. The killer bitch had hung up on him again.
CHAPTER 22
C-Mann parallel-parked on Penny’s block with the ease of a native New Yorker: He didn’t touch the car in front or back, no bumps or dinks. But he failed to notice the two men watching him or his sister sitting in the Explorer double parked across the street.
After all, in his defense, this was Brooklyn on a Saturday afternoon and Black people were all around as if freed from their winter hideouts.
But he’d tell you that he should have at least detected the men approach the car once he turned off the engine.
Penny got out first. He stepped out of the car after popping the trunk and then BOOM.
C-Mann got hit in the side of the head harder than he had ever been. Ted had hit him once with the butt of his revolver.
C-Mann staggered until he could feel the car and tried to balance himself. Burly hands grabbed him and pushed him off his feet, and now two men were punching him about the head and chest.
The beating he was taking he deserved, he was thinking. Shit, he was slipping at wartime.
Penny was screaming and in her hysterics hadn’t noticed the female walk up on her. The woman pulled a gun and planted the barrel to Penny’s temple.
“Hello, bitch.”
Penny froze, damn near passed out from fright. Other screams came; the nice sunny day had turned into hell as people were scurrying for cover and distancing themselves from the street fight.
C-Mann fought his way to his feet and tried to open the car door. It was locked, and he couldn’t think fast enough. Where were his fucking keys? He had to get to the trunk. His fucking gun was in the damn trunk.
Oh, C-Mann was pretty mad with himself right about then.
The guys were on him. Not hitting him, but trying to subdue him. He was too big for that. He picked up one and slammed him on the hood of the El Dog. He popped the other with a swift right hand.
In the free second he scanned the ground for his keys. Fuck, where did they fall?
The chick with the gun had on all black and dark sunglasses to match.
“Tippy?” Penny said.
“Bitch you know my name?” She cocked the trigger on the oversized silver gun between her tiny hands. “Okay, answer this, bitch. Do you love Charles Mann?”
Penny couldn’t think let alone formulate a response.
“Bitch, do you love him?”
C-Mann flung open the trunk and moved shit until he could get his hands on steel; and it felt so good to have that cold power between his fingers.
The guy coming at him stopped, stumbled, fell and got up and ran. C-Mann wasn’t the kind of dude to shoot a nigga in retreat; seconds later he wished he was.
The running man yelled to his partner to do the same.
Tippy had moved closer to her and was ready to unload her weapon in Penny when, BAM, BAM, she got fired on. A bullet grazed her arm and she spun quickly to return fire.
Penny shook violently in fright. But the bullet wasn’t after her. Her man was busting caps at her attacker.
C-Mann was now exchanging fire from across his car with the lady in black. Both missing badly. Neither were real cold‐blooded killers.
The Explorer had u-turned and stopped behind C-Mann, and the men now had guns drawn on him.
C-Mann fired into the truck and got Ted in the passenger seat. He yelped and fell onto the dashboard, dropping his gun to his feet.
“Fuck,” Fred yelled. He got out of the truck and blasted shots at C-Mann, who did the dive over the hood of his ride and landed on the sidewalk.
“No! Don’t kill him,” Tippy ordered.
Fred was fuming but held back.
Tippy walked around with purpose. She was back in charge, but they now had a crowd at a distance watching them.
“Give him the note.”
Fred went back to the truck.
C-Mann moved quickly. He got to Penny. She was
a sniveling mess, her hands over her ears and mouth agape. He shoved her, her legs stiff as boards. “Go, move, get the fuck out of here.”
The sound of sirens put them all at alert.
Penny stopped,“No, come on, Charlie, come on.” Fred threw the note at him. It hit C-Mann in the chest then the ground.
Tippy said, “We taking your girl.”
“No, she ain’t got shit to do with this,” C-Mann pleaded. He stepped in front of Penny. She grabbed hold of his shoulder and stood behind him.
“You love her, huh? Good.”
Tippy grinned, striding slowly to the stiffened Penny. That was what she wanted to hear, that she had his heart now. She took a second to look him over. He was thick and strong, but she could not feel for him.
“You all alone in life,” she said. “You like how it feels?”
C-Mann raised his gun and pointed it at Tippy. Tippy stopped. “You out of bullets, stupid.”C-Mann fired. He couldn’t believe he missed. Tippy felt fright for the first time in her life filled with meanness.
“Keep coming. You think I’m out now?”
Tippy bit her lip. She had to go; she damn sure didn’t want to tussle with the cops. She felt her brother was a punk even though he had killed Ted. Ted. She looked down in the street at him on his back, his mouth and eyes open.
“That’s right,” C-Mann smiled,“You can easily be laid right next to him.”
Fred said, “We need to kill this motherfucker for this.”
C-Mann turned to Fred and blasted until his gun went click‐click. He missed badly.
Fred moved swiftly and pistol‐whipped C‐Mann to his knees. A solid blow to his skull gave C‐Mann a concussion that stopped time and sense.
Fred took Penny by her throat and dragged her to the truck. She couldn’t cry, she couldn’t breathe, and she couldn’t hold her pee.
The doors closed and then the Explorer screeched off.
Slowly C-Mann got to one knee.
He couldn’t hear anything but the ringing in his ears. He was dazed, things moved about him, over his head, white butterflies.
When C-Mann was able to focus he noticed that the sirens were closer and his attackers were gone with his woman.
He was mindful enough to push his ass up, scoop up his gun and then the note and get gone. Through the pain he pulled out just as a police car double parked at the address the concerned citizens had given.
People pointed to his car but the four cops in the two cars were out of their rides and concerned with the dead body.
It gave C-Mann enough time to make two swift rights and a left and he was on the highway. He was going away from his destination, Harlem, but it was the quickest way out of sight.
CHAPTER 23
C-Mann got it together enough to drive the speed limit into the city.
Once he was cruising on the highway, away from the killers, away from the cops...away from his love, C-Mann was overcome with an urge to cry. His nerves were spent, like the worn wires of an old radio. The pain in his arm was suppressed by the ache in his stomach from the fear.
The war was in full bloom.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” he groaned, head on the steering wheel while doing a steady 50 miles per hour in the middle lane. “I need some fucking help.”
He wasn’t thinking at first, just driving and trying to get somewhere. His heart was lumped in his throat and he could barely breathe.
He was getting overwhelmed by the emotions that had been blasting through him. Rage. Helplessness. Fear. All these days he had suppressed it. But now, with his tender lover caught up in this bullshit, fear made perfect sense and it had him in its tight grasp.
Penny was dead. Shit, everybody he loved was dead.
This drama got C‐Mann thinking on a similar night years ago. Three thugs tried to rob him at a red light in Harlem. He had eighteen thousand dollars in the car and his gun was under the passenger’s seat. They got him out of the car, beat the shit out of him and robbed him for his wallet; they got only two hundred and change.
He wondered how much of his memory bank was filled with horror stories where normal people stored things like Christmas traditions and family events.
He fought off those thoughts, considering his car might be hot, with the bullet holes and all. He was in between the two airports and could have gotten a rental car. But at this point he felt he needed to stick to the familiar.
He remembered the note.
It had felt heavy when it hit him and when he opened it he saw why. His dad’s ring finger was in it with the diamond‐encrusted wedding band still on it.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
His sister wanted ten million dollars.
Where the fuck was he going to get that much money?
Then it dawned on him that the money didn’t matter. She was going to kill him after having killed all the folks he loved.
Again he thought he needed help. He got moving and headed to the Bronx, back to the projects he grew up in. That was where the best niggas he knew of for this kind of shit reside.
Out of respect he brought with him a thick bag of about a thousand Ecstasy pills. Finding good X in the Boogie down Bronx was as rare as finding a pretty 16 year-old virgin girl.
He double parked on Third Avenue and stood out of the car in time to see Chuck and one of his right hand men walking his dog downhill into the projects. Just about everyday, except those when he was at full‐scale war, Chuck let his dog roam the gated grass on the side of 2615. He’d watched as the well fed, black pit chased foolish squirrels and dogs that fucked with him outside of the fence.
