Grind Mode Page 5

  He looked into her big brown eyes. Knowing it might be the last time he saw her, he took his time making love to her.

  *******

  Bee had returned from D.C. Teddy was waiting on him to fill him in on everything.

  “Bro,” Teddy said, hyped up, “we ’bout to get this money. I already got a team guarding the warehouse.”

  “That’s what’s up,” was Bee’s response. “Where Dink at?”

  Teddy hunched his shoulders in an “I don’t give a fuck” way. “That nigga think just because he big bro he can show face when he get ready.”

  “Yeah,” Bee said, “I know, fam. That’s Dink for a nigga.”

  “Yeah. Well he better get some act right ‘bout his self, ‘cause shit ‘bout to get real. And with the shit Will got riding on this, you know he ain’t going fo’ the fuck shit,” Teddy said with certainty.

  “Facts. Let’s just make sho’ shit stay straight,” Bee said. “You heard me, Teddy?”

  Teddy passed Bee the blunt and downed a shot of gin before he responded. “Yeah, bro. Just looking at this fuck nigga Dre coming up in here like he run shit.”

  Bee waved the thought off. “Man, fuck that fool. Soon he’ll be buying from us.” Dre walked up on the scene and said, “Bee, what’s up?”

  “Shit,” Bee said in a nonchalant way. “What’s good, Dre?”

  “Money,” Dre said before turning his attention to Teddy. “What’s up, Teddy?”

  “What you said, my nigga,” Teddy said quickly. “Money.”

  “That’s not what I’m hearing,” Dre said. “I hear the Slaughter Boyz on a takeover, and my block is on the list. I can’t have that.”

  “Nigga, fuck what you hearing,” Teddy said coldly.

  As they stood, Dre's crew drew down on them. They stared down the barrels of 40s and AKs without showing any signs of fear.

  “Look, nigga. Ain’t nobody scared,” Teddy said with a smile. “It ain’t about pulling out on real niggas. Is you niggas capable of pulling the trigga?”

  Dre laughed. “Oh believe me, they are. Sit down; let’s talk.”

  “Nigga, it ain’t shit to talk about,” Teddy said with a look of hatred on his face.

  Dre and his crew had slipped. While they were focused on Bee and Teddy, some S.M.F. niggas had crept up on them and drawn down. Dre felt the cold steel on the back of his head and said, “Damn. It’s like that, my nigga?”

  “Yeah, just like that,” Teddy replied. “Now get the fuck out.”

  “Fo’ sho’, Teddy,” Dre said while motioning for his crew to put their guns down. “We’ll be seeing each other real soon.”

  “No pressure,” said Teddy as the S.M.F. Boyz escorted Dre and his crew out. “Bee,” Teddy started to say, “bro, I’m going to kill that nigga.”

  “I’m with it, replied Bee, “but let’s talk about that shit tomorrow. I need to go handle something.”

  “Me too,” Teddy said, looking at the time.

  They went their separate ways. Teddy called Henry. “Henry, it’s Teddy.”

  “What up? What’s the move?” asked Henry.

  He told him about the shit that just went down. “That’s some crazy shit, my nigga,” Henry said.

  “Yeah,” Teddy said. “That’s why I need you to body this fool ASAP. You got it?”

  “Yeah, I got it,” answered Henry.

  Teddy thought about the incident with him and Mike and asked, “By the way. Have you and Mike kissed and made up?”

  “Hell no,” Henry said angrily. “That nigga knows what it is.”

  “I feel you, my nigga,” Teddy said, frustrated with the whole situation, “but you know that’s my brother’s mans an’ them. I need you to dead that shit, fam. Fo’ me.”

  “What about that nigga?” asked Henry. “What’s his thinking like?”

  “I’ll get Bee to have a sit down with Mike,” Teddy said, hoping shit would play out to everyone’s advantage.

  “Hmm… A'ight, fam. But if that nigga look at me sideways, I’m going to fuck his world up,” Henry said confidently.

  “Bet. One,” Teddy replied.

  They cut lines. Henry had to remember what he was headed to do. Looking at a bad redbone walking down the street triggered his memory. He called Sabrina. After three tries, she answered. “Hello?”

  “Damn, bitch, where you at?” he asked.

  “Henry, I’m at home,” she replied. “Why?”

  “I need to see you. I’ll be there in a minute,” he said.

  “Nigga, how you know I ain’t got company? A bitch is single,” Sabrina shot back.

  “They better be gone before I get there,” Henry said in a demanding voice.

  “Whatever,” replied Sabrina before she hung up.

  As he turned onto her street, he was thinking about her hard. She was fine and had business about herself, which was what he liked the most. Shit, every nigga appreciated that about a bitch.

  He pulled up and hopped out of the Benz. Whoever had tailed him thought he wasn’t on point, but just as soon as the two masked men got up on him, he pulled the Glock 40 and let loose, hitting one in the chest. The other one took off running and he ran after him, letting off rounds until the clip was empty.

  Sabrina ran outside to see what was going on. The first thing she noticed was the body lying in her front yard, and she started screaming. By the time the porch light came on, Henry had made it back.

  “Listen,” he said, breathing hard from running, “go in the house and get yo’ shit. You coming with me. Hurry up.”

  She did as she was told. As they turned off her street, the police were turning on. “What have you done?” she asked.

  “Shit. I pulled up and the niggas jumped down on me.” Henry’s mind went somewhere else as he thought about what just happened. Hold up. Bitch, you tried to set me up?”

  “What, nigga?” she said, surprised. “Really?”

  “You was the only one I told I was coming over here,” he snapped at her.

  Sabrina sucked her teeth. “First of all, nigga, you just called me a hot-ass minute ago. How would I have time to get niggas to tail you? And a bitch don’t get down like that.”

  Henry thought for a second, and she was right. “You dead ass right. My bad. So much shit going on, a nigga mind cloudy.”

  “Whatever,” Sabrina said with a wave of her hand. “Where we goin’?”

  “My spot. I got to call Teddy. It might be that fool Mike,” Henry said.

  He pulled out his phone and hit him on speed dial. Teddy answered, “What’s up, my nigga?”

  “I just bodied a nigga,” was Henry’s response

  “Come again,” replied Teddy, making sure he heard right.

  “You heard me,” Henry shot back. “I just bodied a nigga.”

  “Where? What happened?” Teddy asked with panic in his voice.

  “I pulled up at Sabrina’s house and two niggas who were masked up tried to get at me,” Henry replied.

  “What the fuck?” Teddy snapped out of frustration. “You good?”

  “Yeah. I’m headed to my spot now,” Henry said.

  “Okay. Okay. Lay low, my nigga. I’m going to see what’s going on and let you know. One,” Teddy said before hanging up the phone.

  Teddy’s mind went back to the confrontation he had just gotten into with Dre and his crew. He knew where they kicked it. He jumped in his ride and swerved over to the Eastside. He pulled up on the side of the corner store and parked out of sight.

  Teddy opened the glove compartment and pulled out the two automatic 9 mm. He checked to make sure both clips were full before getting out of the car and creeping up on the scene. Dre had his back turned, serving a fiend, and most of his crew were too damn drunk to pay attention to what was about to go down. On the side of the building, Teddy checked his guns over one last time before he rounded the corner and let loose.

  “This is what real niggas do! Fuck niggas, it’s on sight!”

  Teddy made sure h
e popped Dre. He emptied half of the clip in him as he tried to run. He caught a few of his homeboys. By the time both clips were empty, the set was a ghost town besides the dead bodies.

  Teddy ran back to his car, jumped in, and fled the scene before the police arrived.

  Chapter Seven

  Mark had decided it was best for him to stay with Lil Will, so he sent word for his right hand man to hold shit down in Boston.

  “Damn, fam! I didn’t know Albany was piped up like this,” Mark said, excited.

  “Bruh, you ain’t really seen shit yet,” Lil Will replied, laughing.

  They loaded up the car.

  “The whole southwest to Florida going to be in our pockets,” Lil Will said to Mark before yelling at his brother. “Yo, Teddy!”

  Teddy came trotting over to the car. “What’s good, big bro?”

  “Us,” Lil Will replied. “Get everybody together, and meet us at the spot ASAP.”

  “You back?” Teddy asked enthusiastically.

  “Yup, and it’s time,” was Lil Will’s response.

  “That’s what I’m talking about,” Teddy said happily and he jumped on the phone.

  Lil Will and Mark finished loading up and before they got in, Lil Will told Mark to tell the driver to stop by his mom’s house.

  “Got you,” was Mark’s reply.

  They pulled up in front of his mother’s crib. She was sitting on the front porch until he got out. Smiling, with tears in her eyes, she walked off the porch to meet him. “My baby home! Thank you God! Baby, look at you. Who these people? The feds or something?”

  “No ma’am. These are my people.” Lil Will introduced them. “Mama, this is Mark. And Mark, this is my mama, Ms. Ruby.”

  Lil Will’s mother, Ms. Ruby, was a fairly short brown-skinned woman who seemed to embody a great amount of strength. Although a woman of faith, she never looked down on her sons about anything they did in the streets.

  “Nice to meet you, Ms. Ruby,” Mark said, shaking her hand.

  “Nice to meet you too. Come on in. I just cooked some greens and fried chicken,” she replied.

  “That’s what I’m talking about,” Lil Will said and he walked in the house, followed by Mark and his mother.

  They sat at the dining table and enjoyed their meal. “Mama, where my sister at?” Lil Will asked his mother.

  She waved her hand in the air. “Please, baby, don’t talk them up. In my car somewhere. They running ya mama crazy is what they doing.”

  “You still going to the Mud Puddle?” he asked.

  “Every chance I get. We don’t stop having fun just because you all think we are getting too old,” she replied.

  “Now you know you getting too old for that,” he said jokingly.

  “Boy, ain’t nothing old about me. I still got it,” she said while doing a little grooving.

  They laughed. Mark, knocking off his plate, complimented her cooking, saying, “Ms. Rudy, you definitely can throw down in the kitchen.”

  “Thank you,” she replied, “but I want you to know it ain’t free. That plate gon’ cost you a hundred dollars.”

  “How ’bout I give you two?” Mark asked, reaching in his front pocket.

  “Okay,” Ms. Ruby said. She held her hand out to Lil Will. “That goes for you too, son. Pay up.”

  “You ain’t changed a bit, Mama,” Lil Will said.

  They laughed, ate, and talked for a while. Mark excused himself to give Lil Will some alone time with his mother.

  “Here you go, Mama,” Lil Will said as he handed her a black bag.

  She looked at her son. “What’s this, baby?”

  “Eighty thousand,” he said.

  Her eyes got big. “Damn. Y’all don’t want another plate? What about the guys in the car? For this, you can take it all with you.”

  “Nah, Mama,” he said, laughing. “We good. Just wanted to put something in your pockets.”

  She opened the bag and peeped inside of it. “Well, you did that.”

  They hugged. Lil Will checked the time. “Well, let me go. I got to meet Teddy and everybody else.”

  “Tell my boys hello for me,” she said.

  “I will. Have a blessed day, Mama,” he added.

  “You too. I love you,” Ms. Ruby said.

  “Love you too, Mama,” Lil Will said before getting into the car.

  *******

  Teddy, Bee, Dink, and the crew were at the warehouse waiting on Lil Will. Bee was a little wary of the fact Lil Will had left it on Dink to handle certain business matters.

  “Bruh, is everything in play?” Bee asked Dink.

  “Yeah,” answered Dink. “I got the North. Teddy get Southwest. Bee, you got East up.”

  Bee nodded his head, feeling his territory. “Good. I can visit Savannah, GA. I got people there already lined up with that check.”

  “It’s good to see everybody here,” Lil Will walked in and said.

  Lil Will had shown up. He pounded his brothers up. He looked at the boxes which the product was in. “I had three tons of work shipped here. Do the math. That’s forty million, three thousand bricks going at twenty five a pop, plus pills. We starting N.W.A. here all the way to Boston. It’s time to take out everyone that thinks they own the streets.

  “The street belongs to us. Slaughter Boyz. This our shit. Every corner.”

  “Shit sounds good, bruh,” Teddy cut in. “But what about the police?”

  “What about them?” Lil Will shot back? “They work fo’ us. I got them. Y’all just focus on getting this shit sold.”

  “Are we fucking with the heroin too?” asked Dink.

  “Fuck no,” snapped Lil Will. “That boy brings the feds. Nigga trying to eat. Not get ate, Dink. We got everything we need to get on top and stay on top. Clean cut coke. We utilize every ally we got. The Wolf Pack, S.M.F. We got it all. The future belongs to us.”

  “Nigga,” Dink stressed, “let’s get this shit over with. I got shit to do. Money to be made.”

  “Dink, chill, big bro,” Bee said.

  The shit was irking Dink. He was used to giving orders, not taking them.

  “Bee, you got your people on line and ready?” Lil Will asked his brother.

  “Yeah,” he answered quickly, “my zone on point. All I’m waiting for is the work.”

  Lil Will turned towards his other brother Teddy and looked him in the eyes. “What about you, Teddy?”

  “You know I got mines. Matter of fact, I’ve been thinking about expanding my territory farther south,” Teddy said eagerly.

  Lil Will looked at his oldest brother out of the corner of his right eye. “And Dink?”

  “Nigga, don’t ask me no dumb-ass shit like that. I been holding shit down,” Dink replied.

  Everybody looked at Dink. Lil Will stood and walked up on him. “Listen, bruh. This my show. You in or out? It’s your call. At the end of the day, you still my big brother, but don’t ever disrespect me again. We good?”

  Lil Will’s killers clutched with eyes up on Dink and his crew, ready to body them.

  “Nigga, fuck you,” Dink said coldly. “You need me, I don’t need you. I run my shit. Believe that, bruh.”

  Lil Will pointed towards the door. “Like I said. The door is open.”

  “Yeah, I see,” Dink replied sarcastically. “We’ll holla.”

  Dink and his crew dipped.

  A little heated, Lil Will asked, “Anybody else want to leave?” Nobody moved. “Good,” was his response to their silence. “Let’s get this money. Teddy, you and Bee, let me holla at you.”

  They strolled over to a corner away from everyone else.

  “Do y’all think y’all can push Dink’s load?” Lil Will asked his brothers.

  “No problem, bruh,” said Bee.

  “Man,” Teddy started saying, “we all know how Dink is. Nigga power struck. He’ll come ’round.”

  “You ain’t never lied,” Lil Will said, laughing.

  They all knew their oldest
brother. He’d been the same since they were young. He had the mind for running the show, but his ego always got in the way of his better judgement.

  “Whether he comes around or not,” Lil Will said, “we are going to stack this paperwork from the ground up.”

  *******

  Rimp had been trying to catch up with Fred, and when he finally did, they sat in the club blowing dro and drinking in VIP.

  “What you been up to, Fred?” asked Rimp. “You a hard nigga to catch up with these days.”

  Paranoid, Fred said, “A lot on my mind. Nigga, we got a major problem. I got word that Mark and Lil Will got a ticket on a nigga’s head.”

  “Yeah. A hundred thousand,” Rimp added.

  “Damn. Where you get that info?” Fred said, surprised.

  “Last night with Rick. We gave him all the money,” said Rimp. “I wonder what the shit is about.”

  “For real, my nigga,” Fred stated.

  Fred’s heart was pounding in his chest and he started to sweat. “We got to see what’s up and why they at a nigga.”

  “Yeah. Fo’ sho’, fam,” agreed Rimp.

  “Listen,” Fred said nervously, “my baby mama going through some shit. I got to check on her. You make some calls to see what you can find out on your end. We’ll get up later on.”

  “A’ight, my nigga,” said Rimp.

  Fred left out in a hurry.

  Damn, that nigga acting strange, Rimp thought to himself as he downed the shot of Remy. He exited the club, hopped in his Lexus, and drove off.

  Driving down 15th Street, he started making calls. He wasn’t paying attention to the black van coasting behind him. As he stopped at the four-way red light, three masked men jumped out of the van with guns pointing at him.

  “Get out the car, nigga!” yelled the masked gunman with the gun pointed at Rimp's head. “Don’t make me ask yo’ bitch ass twice!”

  He got out and two of them escorted him back to the van. Before he could ask what was going on, his whole world went black. The third man hopped in the Lexus and followed them.

  “Wake up, nigga!” one of the gunmen yelled as he kicked Rimp in the side. “Wake yo’ ass up!”

  Rimp came back to. He tried to move, but they had him hogtied. He was madder at himself for slipping when he knew a price tag was on his head. “A’ight, nigga. I’m awake,” said Rimp.