Angel's Revenge (3 page)

The rest is up to you.

Dutch’s final words to him replayed in his head and made Young World put his gangsta down in a way that would make Dutch smile
in his grave and make the streets bow down. While he relaxed with the love of his life in Cancún, Mexico, the streets of Newark
were on fire.

“Young World, muthafucka!” the masked gunman yelled from the chrome black Ducati. His fully automatic Israeli Uzi spat round
after round into both the driver of a droptop Lexus coupe and the girl sitting in the passenger seat. They slumped like Kennedy,
and the Ducati gunner sped off, leaving the bodies nodded at the light.

Lana’s deep-throat game had Young World feeling like he was about to bust all over her tonsils, but he wasn’t ready to nut.
He wanted to feel that bomb shot of hers that had him so in love. He lifted her chin and pulled her up until she straddled
his hips and slid down on him, riding him like the stallion he was.

The young hustler wasn’t a stranger to the county jail, but with the paper he was making in the McCarter Highway Projects,
bail was like candy money. His mama posted his bail. He knew it would be just a few hours more before his paperwork was processed
and he was released. He stretched out on his bunk without a care in the world, knowing his name would soon be called. He didn’t
know his number would come up before his name did.

Youngen closed his eyes to catch a quick nap. He never saw Duke slip into his cell like the Phantom of the Opera, gripping
a homemade shank tight in his palm. Duke quickly snatched the pillow from behind the man’s head and put it over his face.
The short struggle ended quickly when Duke plunged the shank into his victim’s heart, giving it a deadly twist to seal the
deal.

“Tell ’em Young World sent you,” Duke whispered menacingly.

“Ooh, World, don’t stop, daddy. Ooh, I love you, World, I…” Lana groaned as she rode World like she was raised riding broncos.
Her ass slapped against his thighs.

“Say my name, ma!”

“World, Young World, nigga!”

The black-clad Charlie bellowed before she let off a rain of black talons into a crowd of Irvington Bloods on the corner of
Groove Street. They never knew what hit them. Their bodies jerked and twisted like a crew of break-dancers before they dropped
to the ground, dead and smoking.

Just like that, Jazz’s murder was avenged and the Charlie disappeared into the shadows.

Lana gripped the dragon chain like the reins of a horse bridle and rode her stallion wildly. Young World grabbed her ass,
spread her swollen lips, and plowed into her, matching her, thrust for forceful thrust. Lana screamed out in a mixture of
pleasure and pain while Young World long-dicked her into a sensual explosion that drenched her thighs and the satin sheets
beneath them. She collapsed on top of her man, covering his face with gentle kisses.

“I love you, World.”

“I love you, too.”

Young World lay back and relaxed. While he was getting his dick sucked and fucked on all night, he felt secure knowing that
back in Jersey he had a team of hungry wolves working to ensure that he had an empire to go home to.

Their murder game was not to be fucked with, but World made the mistake of thinking murder was enough to hold an empire together.

THREE YEARS LATER

O
ne-eyed Roc stood in his prison cell at his sink, brushing his full beard in the mirror. It glistened with the Muslim hair
oil he used on it almost as brightly as his freshly shaven head. Roc stepped back and admired himself. His gentle expression
reflected a magnetic edge. They say prison preserves your youth, and at thirty-three, Roc still looked like he was in his
mid-twenties. The only difference was his slightly protruding belly and the extra bulk prison food had put on him.

He was six foot three and a solid 235 pounds. His celly nicknamed him Suge Knight because of his resemblance to the music
mogul, along with his deep booming voice that commanded attention whenever he spoke. Roc was, however, far from a Suge Knight.
Islam and his sincere adherence to its beliefs had mellowed him, perhaps not all the way, but enough for him to be recognized
by the prison administrators and his fellow convicts, who were well aware of his past street reputation. In fact, no one called
him Roc anymore. They called him by his Islamic name, Rahman, which meant merciful in Arabic.

Rahman felt in his heart that he was no longer the murdering gangsta that he was when he had first arrived to prison. He now
possessed a sincere passion for Islam and for the plight of the inner city that he had spent so much of his life terrorizing
and dehumanizing.

When Rahman had gone to prison, he had saved a hefty stash, a little over five million dollars. But in the three years he
had been locked up, he had given away over a million dollars to needy families, single-parent homes, battered women, and orphaned
children.

His wife, Ayesha, who was faithfully sticking by her husband, managed the money, doling out cash as Rahman instructed. Things
had been rough for Rahman and Ayesha with Rahman away and Ayesha raising their three children alone.

Despite the distance and the apparent hopelessness of his life sentence, she would often tell him, “You’re with me even when
you’re away. Allah will bring you home to me.”

And it seemed that Allah would do just that.

“
As-Salaamu Alaikum
, Ock.”

Rahman turned around to find Akbar standing in the doorway of his cell.

“
Alaikum As-Salaam
,” Rahman replied, returning the greeting. “I ain’t even hear you standing there.”

“Then you slippin’,” Akbar chuckled. “You hear a ninja walkin’,” he joked.

Akbar was Rahman’s mentor. They had similar backgrounds. Akbar was older than Rahman and also from Newark. Both had been heavily
into the game, but now both were dedicated to Islam.

Akbar walked into Rahman’s cell and held out a magazine.

“What’s that?” Rahman asked, looking at the rolled-up magazine.

Akbar showed him the cover. It was a copy of the new
Don Diva
magazine with a picture of Dutch, Craze, Angel, Zoom, and Rahman himself on the cover. It was a photograph Rahman recognized,
but he turned away from its nostalgia.

“Come on, Ock. You know I don’t keep up wit’ that anymore,” he told his friend and grabbed his prayer rug and kufi.

“Naw, nephew, I think you’ll want to see this one,” Akbar said as if it was absolutely necessary Rahman read the article.

“Page fifty-six, Rah. I’ll get it from you after Jum’ah,” Akbar said as he walked out of the cell.

Rahman sat down on his bunk and flipped to page fifty-six. The article was entitled “Angel Alvarez.” And he read:

What’s really good, yo? You know Don Diva always comes with the exclusive exclusive! “You heard it here and nowhere else”-type
shit, ya heard? Our topic today? That mysterious street legend, Dutch. It’s been three years since his alleged (and we do
mean alleged) death. Now we have a one-on-one interview with Angel Alverez, the only female to run with the notorious Dutch.
The following came from a taped phone convo from West Virginia, where Angel is currently housed.

DD: What’s up, mami? What’s your life like?

Angel: You know how it goes wit’ a bid. You put it on your back and troop it like a boss bitch. Ju don’t know?

DD: Aiight, if only these snitch muthafuckas understood the principles of this shit. But yo, I hear congratulations are in
order! You won your appeal.

Angel (laughs): I can’t believe that shit either. Fuck man, my lawyer ain’t even expect it! You know how the Feds get down.
They some dirty muthafuckers. No matter how fucked up the case is, they make that shit stick. Even if you innocent, you goin’
to jail fo’ fuckin’ with them, man.

DD: Well, I guess it’s true. You can’t hold a good bitch down!

Angel: What, ju don’t know?

DD: So, how does this affect Rahman’s case, or should we not discuss that? (Rahman Muhammad was Angel’s codefendant, now also
serving multiple life sentences.)

Angel: Naw, yo. Me and my nigga ain’t got nothin’ to hide. We held it down like family supposed to and now just like cream—we
’bout to rise to the top. Me and you, Roc. We all we got!

Rahman lowered the magazine and couldn’t help but smile. Angel was still Angel. They wrote each other from time to time, which
was why Rahman already knew about her case. After finding out about her appeal, he had jumped on his. He was just waiting
on a decision. He turned his attention back to the article.

DD: So when do you touch down officially?

Angel: You know the courts. It’s a whole bunch of legal bullshit, but it’s comin’. And like Dutch used to tell me, they can’t
stop what they can’t see, so it’s best nobody know, feel me?

DD: Felt. But speakin’ of Dutch, what was son really like?

Angel (pauses, then laughs quietly): How many real gangstas you know?

DD: Including myself? One.

Angel (laughs at my quip): Well, dig yo, gangsta ain’t enough to make you Dutch ’cause papi is so much more. He had strings
attached to the game like a puppet, and he controlled every move. Even now, three years later, niggas still makin’ records
about this nigga, namin’ clothes after him…

DD: Not to mention books.

Angel: Oh, yeah, that Teri Woods chick? I respect her pen game. She’s real gangsta for puttin’ my man’s story out there. I
read it. It was official.

DD: But yo, one last question. If anybody knows, it’s you. We asked Rahman two years ago (see
Don Diva
July 2003 edition), but he evaded us. Do you think…?

Angel (shouting): Fuck that bullshit! Fuck what you heard! My man ain’t dead! Them fake-ass, wannabe gangstas might want him
to be, but he AIN’T! And until he come through, just know Angel gonna hold it down and rep my man and the streets!

DD: You keep saying your man. Thought you were… you know?

Angel: What? I eat fish? (chuckles) I’ve had my share of snapper, but let’s just say Dutch is my sweetest taboo.

DD: Juicy, Juicy tell me…

(The one-minute warning cut me off just when we were getting to the good shit.)

DD: Well, one minute left, any last words?

Angel: No doubt. To Roc, hold your head ’cause it’s me and you. To Goldilocks and Angela Hearn, one love. And to the streets,
pick a side and ride or die ’cause the ride is ’bout to get rough. And let all them bitch-ass niggas know who’s runnin’ them
streets for real. Angel’s baaaack, muthafuckas! Siempre.

Rahman laid the magazine aside and rubbed his face. Angel definitely hadn’t changed and apparently thought he hadn’t either.
But he had, and it made him wonder where that left the two of them. He knew what she was going to do if released from prison.
Take back what they had lost. But he had a different mission—to clean up the streets.

What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object? Well, the streets would soon find out.

Rahman walked into FCI-Lewisburg’s chapel just as the Islamic call to prayer was being chanted.

Hayya alas-Salah. Hayya-alal-Falah.
Come to prayer, come to success. In Arabic, heard throughout speakers in the chapel, it represented the masjid for the Muslim
inmates.

Rahman was the prayer leader, better known as imam in Arabic. He led all the Muslim inmates in prayer and advised them on
their personal issues from time to time. He prayed his two ra’kahs and then made his way to the podium.

“
As-Salaamu Alaikum
,” he said in greeting to the forty-something Muslims sitting on the floor in lines of straight rows behind one another.

“
Alaikum As-Salaam
,” the brothers replied in unison.

Rahman surveyed the gathering of men before him. He knew many of the brothers had been stone-cold murderers, kingpins, pimps,
and boss players. Now they all bowed to one God in perfect unity and harmony. Allah was truly the greatest.

“All praises are due to Allah. We praise him, seek his help, and ask his forgiveness. I bear witness that there is no God
but Allah, and that Muhammad is his servant and messenger,” Rahman began, then flipped open his Qur’an.

“I want to read from Surah four, Ayat seventy-five. It says…” he began to recite the Qur’an in Arabic, his deep baritone caressing
each syllable and his articulation punctuating the guttural sentences.

“
Wa Maa la-kum la tuqaatiluna sabili-llahi. Wal-Mustadina min ar-rijali Wan Nisaai Wal Wildan. Al-Latheena yaqulu-na Rabba-na
Akhrij-na Min Hadihil. Paryati Zalimu Ahlu-ha Wa Hab la-na Min Ladun-ka Nasiraa
.”

Then he repeated the prayer in English.

“And what is wrong with you that you fight not in the cause of Allah and for those who are weak, ill-treated, and oppressed
amongst themselves, both men, women, and children, whose cry is: Lord rescue us from this town whose people are oppressors
and raise for us, from you, one who will protect and raise for us, one who will help.”

He closed the Qur’an and paused to let the words sink in.

“This was a cry for liberation. Is this cry still not heard today? All around us, in every ghetto in America, brothers and
sisters are crying, and yet the call continues to go unanswered. We in this room come from every part of the U.S. The North,
West, South, and East, the inner cities, boondocks, and backcountry roads. We know that the ghetto is everywhere. People in
society use this prayer every day, with or without understanding. But instead of calling on God, they call on the numbers
man, the dope man, the liquor store, the strip club, or the corner bar. They call on anyone, anywhere, and anyway they can
to escape the oppression being inflicted upon them.”

Many of the brothers nodded in agreement.

“But what is oppression? Is it just racist cops, politicians, and judges? Isn’t debt oppression? The type of debt that keeps
us tied to two and three jobs tryin’ to come out of it? Isn’t the game oppression? It leaves a brother with only two options—jail
or death. It’s a vicious cycle and where does it get us? Where are we now?” Rahman’s voice boomed.