Obsession 3 (17 page)

“Daddy's home,” shouted a naked thick half black, a quarter Asian and a quarter of some other nationality girl. She was as short as Lil' Kim with breasts a stripper would pay for. They jiggled up and down as she bounced over to Lucky and kissed him on the cheek.

“What's up, mommy?” Lucky asked her, a smile spreading on his lips.

“Mmmm, let me guess.” She looked down at his private area and licked her lips.

“Sorry, Quasi, I can't play house with you today,” Lucky told her. He eyeballed Secret.

“Oh, I see you brought another foster kid home to add to the family,” Quasi said after she turned quickly and looked at Secret. She then looked back to Lucky, her two pigtails swinging and swishing.

It didn't go unnoticed by Secret that this Quasi chick hadn't even given Secret the once-over. No side eye and no up and down look with her nose twisted up in the air. This was an indication that she felt Secret was absolutely no threat to her at all. A jealous woman would have looked the other woman up and down to see what she was working with, to see what kind of competition she was up against; kind of like how Secret was giving Quasi the once-over on the low low.

“You know how I am about familia.” Lucky grinned.

“Well, good. We can use her, considering Shawn has graduated.” Now Quasi showed a hint of jealousy in the way she was looking at Lucky after mentioning Shawn, which more than likely she was referring to Shawndiece.

“We've already talked about this a million times,” Lucky said in a playful, scolding tone.

“I know, I know,” Quasi whined. “You need mommy to take care of the house and makes sure the kids are well behaved doing what they are supposed to do.”

Lucky kissed Quasi on the lips. “Can't nobody run this shit like you.”

“You better fuckin' believe that shit,” Quasi said with confidence. “It's just that I wouldn't mind being on the outside ridin' with choo. You know I can handle that type of shit.”

“Yeah, but if it ain't broke, I ain't gon' fix it.”

“I hear you, I hear you.” She waved Lucky off and rolled her eyes. She then walked off, summoning Secret to follow her. “Come on, young'un,” Quasi said to Secret. “It's training day.”

Secret looked at Lucky. He shrugged at the use of Quasi's words that mirrored Secret's earlier that day.

“And take good care of her,” Lucky called out to Quasi. He then looked to Secret and winked. “She's special.”

“Aren't they all just special?” Quasi threw over her shoulder sarcastically.

Secret didn't budge. She just looked at Lucky with questioning eyes.

“Go on.” He nodded toward Quasi who'd stopped and put her hands on her hips after realizing Secret wasn't behind her. “I'll be back to get you later.”

Quasi walked back over and stood between Lucky and Secret. “What?”

“Nothing, she's good,” Lucky answered. “Like I said, just take good care of her.”

“I got choo, Daddy,” Quasi said to Lucky.

“I know you do.” Lucky play spanked her on the ass and then exited back up the stairs.

Just two seconds ago the girl had been smiling huge at Lucky, but now her face was all twisted up at Secret. “Come on. Let's do this.”

“Lucky?” Secret called out with a trembling voice.

He stopped on the staircase and looked back at her.

Secret looked at Lucky. She wondered if he could see her heart beating out of her chest. She wanted so badly to just tell him never mind; that she didn't want to do this anymore, that she'd made a mistake. But she had no idea how he would react. Right now he wasn't treating her like a princess. He was treating her like a worker. Clearly he had no problem at all separating business from pleasure. On another note, if Secret pulled out, would it ruin her chances of fulfilling her obligation to Detective Davis? But she'd had enough information, didn't she? She knew where his main crew hung out. She knew where his drug supply was at. Wouldn't her word be good enough for them to bust into the place and raid it?

But what if Lucky wasn't there when they raided it? What if they couldn't connect him to the home? After all, she had no idea whose house that was or whose name it was in.

Secret's head began throbbing at all the thoughts going through her head. Thank God Lucky couldn't read her mind; otherwise, if he was a killer, he would have probably put a bullet right through her head.

“What is it, Secret?” Lucky spoke to Secret as if she was a child getting on his nerves.

“See you later.” She waved innocently.

He turned and walked up the steps; no smile, no return wave, no nothing.

“You can work next to Nikita,” Quasi told Secret as she went and stood next to a naked girl at one of the pool tables. Quasi said to Nikita, “Show her the basics and then I'll come over and school her in a minute.”

Nikita nodded and Quasi walked away.

Secret looked the dang near six foot tall, paper-thin woman up and down. The girl gave her a stare right back. Secret tried her best to keep on a poker face, but she was scared. One could see it. One could smell it.

As Secret gave her new coworker the once-over, she almost gagged when she noticed the tampon string hanging from between Nikita's legs.

The girl noticed Secret looking between her legs. “What? I'm not supposed to work when it's that time of the month? Do you think a stripper lets her menstrual cycle stop her from making money? I sure the fuck ain't about to. Now bring your scary ass on so I can show you how this shit is done.”

For the next two hours, Secret had no sense of time. It felt like she'd been in that dungeon like atmosphere for days. After all, there were no clocks hanging up anywhere so she had no sense of time. It was dim, just a sixty-watt bulb hanging over each pool table.

Nikita had run down to Secret the different types of drugs and pills, how to count, scoop, and measure them. “The cooks work third shift, so we ain't got to worry about that,” Nikita had told Secret.

Secret wasn't 100 percent certain, but she was sure the cooks Nikita was referring to weren't chefs, and they weren't showing up to cook a dinner so that everyone could sit down at the dinner table like one big happy family. She reckoned it was coke they were going to cook.

Quasi eventually pulled Secret into her office, which was nothing but a little table with a monitor that surveyed each pool table. From the angle of the camera, it looked as though it was probably planted somewhere in the lighting base of the single bulb over each pool table.

Quasi never left that room. If she had to go to the bathroom, or even if one of the girls had to, they did it right there in one of the four red chitterling buckets that were lined up against the wall.

Secret stood at Quasi's desk, as the queen bee herself sat at the only chair in the room. She listened to Quasi tell her all the rules she had to abide by.

“No stealing, no poppin' pills, no . . .”

Quasi's words faded out. Secret knew that no matter what, she was never coming back to this place again.

Fuck the rules. Secret kept a straight face as Quasi went on for about twenty minutes straight. It sounded as though she might have been reading a script, but everything she was rambling off had been memorized.

“How'd she do?”

Lucky's booming voice over Secret's shoulder brought her out of her daze. Secret turned around to see Lucky walking toward her. He was like the messiah himself, there to save her from hell.

Secret felt as though she could breathe for the first time in hours.

“She did good,” Quasi replied to Lucky. “What can I say? You know how to pick 'em.”

“And you know how to raise 'em.”

“Touché,” Quasi said with a smile.

Lucky looked to Secret. “You ready?”

Was he being funny by asking her that? Didn't she look ready enough?

Secret wanted to jump up and down and shout, “Yes, yes, I'm ready. Daddy, please get me out of here,” like the child he was treating her as. But instead she just nodded.

Quasi rose up out of her seat. There was a box sitting on the floor behind her little desk, that didn't have any drawers. She reached into it, pulled something out, and started walking toward the steps. “All right, let's go,” she said as she began to place rubber gloves on her hands.

Lucky walked Secret over to the steps and then stopped. Quasi was standing there with her fingers gloved and spread out like she was about to perform surgery in the ER. Secret looked to Lucky, then looked to Quasi, then back to Lucky again. Somebody needed to tell her what the hell was going on.

Before Secret could even ask, Quasi spoke.

“Open your mouth.”

Still looking at Lucky with questioning eyes, Secret slowly opened her mouth. Lucky pulled out his cell phone and started texting while Quasi looked around and fingered the inside of Secret's mouth.

Once Quasi was finished searching Secret's mouth, she lifted each breast and ran her finger underneath them. Next she ran her fingers through Secret's hair. “Don't waste your money on a fancy hairdo if you coming here to work,” Quasi told Secret. “Notice all the other girls have their hair pulled back in ponytails.”

Secret looked over her shoulder at the women. She hadn't paid much attention before to the fact that each one of them actually did have their hair in a ponytail.

“And don't do pigtails,” she warned Secret with a glare. “That's momma's style.” Quasi used her palms to bounce the bottom of her pigtails. She looked in and behind Secret's ears and up her nose. She then stood there looking at Secret with her hands still raised.

“What the fuck you just standing there for?” Quasi asked Secret. “Bend it over.”

“Huh? What?” Secret asked.

Quasi sucked her teeth and then walked behind Secret. She placed her hand in the middle of Secret's back and pushed her over.

She placed her hand between Secret's legs on her inner thighs, then pushed them apart. Secret's hands hit the ground so that she could balance and catch herself from falling.

“Ummm, you know I like this part,” Quasi said as she inserted a finger into Secret's vagina.

Secret squeezed her eyes tightly and folded her lips in. Lucky just stood there half reading a text, looking up every few words to watch Quasi finger Secret.

Quasi licked her lips and winked at Lucky as she crooned her body to the movement of her finger inside of Secret.

Lucky smiled and shook his head. “Girl, you ain't right.”

Quasi pulled her finger out of Secret, but before Secret could rise up, Quasi was already fingering her anal area.

All of Secret's blood had drained to her head. She felt as if her dome was going to explode. Violated wasn't the word to describe how Secret felt at that moment. She was in rage that Lucky was standing there texting, allowing this to happen to her. Was this all part of some sick test he was putting her through? Was he trying to see how strong she was? If she would break?

“All done,” Quasi said. She spanked Secret on the ass while saying, “You can get up now,
mami.
”

Secret stood up erect. She allowed her blood to circulate through her body for a moment. She didn't want to rush, taking a step and get lightheaded. Just as she was about to move, the door at the top of the steps opened.

“Coming through. Delivery!” a male voice shouted as he carried a box. “The ice cream man has arrived.”

Behind him was another gentleman carrying a box. One of the guys who had been suited up at the front door followed them, gun drawn.

Lucky pulled Secret out of their way. Lucky nodded at each guy. Once they were at the bottom of the steps, Lucky put his phone in his pocket and escorted Secret up the steps. Secret followed in silence. Lucky didn't say a word either. He led her to the back porch where Secret retrieved her things and then got dressed.

There was still silence as Lucky walked Secret back to his Escalade truck. Once they were comfortably seated in the vehicle, Lucky started it up. He then looked over to Secret who was sitting stone-faced staring straight ahead. Lucky grabbed her by her chin and turned her face toward him. He looked into her eyes and smiled.

Now that was the Lucky Secret knew. She no longer saw that heartless man she'd been accompanied by just a few minutes ago.

Lucky leaned in and kissed Secret on the lips. “Let's go get something to eat.” He then pulled off.

Secret was stunned at how easily Lucky had been able to separate personal from business. It really was as if he'd had an on and off switch. It was almost inhuman. Well, Secret wasn't programmed like that. She didn't come with an on and off switch. She couldn't control her emotions so calculating. But for now she would have to do her best at pretending she could. Hopefully long enough as to where soon it would be lights out for Lucky and his entire drug trade forever.

The next day Secret was glad she was on the schedule to work at the grocery store. That was her excuse for getting out of day two of her training with Lucky.

“Why don't you just go ahead and put your two-week notice in now?” Lucky told her. “You about to be making money hand over fist here in a minute.”

“Well at this second I'm not and I have a baby to take care of,” Secret had told Lucky as they spoke over the phone.

“You know I got li'l mamma,” Lucky told her, “and whatever you need.” Lucky had given Secret a wad of cash the day he'd dropped her off after her ride along with him. She figured that was for a day's work of pay though. So she'd more so earned it rather than him giving her something for nothing, which was what he was insinuating.

“If I wanted to depend on you my entire life, then why would I even bother with all this in the first place?” Secret had told Lucky. “Duhhh.”

He chuckled into the phone receiver. “You independent women crack me up. But I ain't mad at ya. Do ya thang, ma.”

“I am, and that's exactly what I'm about to do now. So I need to let you go so I can get to work.”

“Cool. I'll talk to you later.”

Secret ended the call and let out a huge sigh of relief. She'd managed to get out of hanging with Lucky today, but Lord only knew what tomorrow would bring.

“It's been two days; when we hooking up again to . . . you know?” Lucky asked Secret as she washed dishes and he held Dina.

Watching Dina smile and coo at Lucky stung Secret's heart. She did not want her poor child to think for one minute this man was her father. And to just think that once upon a time that was exactly who Secret wanted Lucky to be. But now, now that she was able to see who Lucky really was, the mere sight of him repulsed her, let alone when he touched her. When she had to let him touch her. Slowly but surely though, Secret was able to psych herself out. She was able to tell herself that this was all just business. She was doing a job for the state. It was nothing personal. Funny how just a couple days ago she couldn't understand how Lucky had so easily been able to turn his emotions on and off, yet here she was in the midst of mastering the same skill.

Secret finished up the dishes. Lucky watched television while Secret bathed and put Dina to bed. She eventually joined Lucky on the living room couch.

“A woman's work is never done,” Secret said, flopping on the couch and exhaling.

“You the one hell bent on being superwoman,” Lucky told her.

“Not because I want to, but because I have to,” Secret offered.

“I hear you.” Lucky grabbed the remote and flicked the channel. “So, what's up with tomorrow? Or have you had a change of heart?”

“I'm good. I have to work though.”

Lucky sucked his teeth. “There you go.”

“No, for real, I do,” Secret said. “But I'm on the early shift. I'll be off by three, and then I'm all yours.”

“Cool. Quasi misses you,” Lucky joked.

“Ugghh, Quasi,” Secret said with disdain and then moved away from Lucky.

Lucky laughed. “Oh, you don't like Quasi?”

“Can't you show me some other tricks of the trade besides that? I don't want to be condemned to the basement of some house.” Secret crossed her arms in a pout. “Plus, I know that Quasi chick is feeling you,” Secret said, playing the jealous role. “I can hardly focus on what I'm supposed to be doing for side eyeing her. Something tells me it's only a matter of time before she and I clash.”

“Aww,” Lucky said teasingly, “A couple hours in the dungeon got you all bent out of shape and feeling bold.” Lucky went to kiss Secret on the cheek.

Secret pulled away.

“Oh, it's like that?”

“Just show me some other stuff,” Secret said.

“Shawndiece started in the dungeon.”

“I'm not Shawndiece.” Secret turned to face Lucky. “You said I was special. Special chicks don't get treated like the next trick.” She squinted her eyes at him. “Are you trying to treat me like the next chick?”

“Never that.” Lucky shook his head. “But when it comes to business—”

“When it comes to business I still expect to be treated special. 'Spite popular opinion, I'm ultimately going to be the queen bitch around here, so you might want to give your girl Quasi the memo.” Secret rolled her eyes.

“Damn that hard side of you turns me on,” Lucky said, grabbing his manhood.

“Then is it settled? I mean, I know eventually I'm going to have to do what I have to do, but I don't want to be a one-trick pony like Quasi. I want to know everything there is to know.”

“Everything?” Lucky questioned.

Secret turned her body toward Lucky and seductively said, “Everything.”

After about another ten minutes of persuasion and a nice, long blow job, Lucky gave in. After Secret got off work at three o'clock tomorrow, he agreed to show her something new. The dungeon was permanently off the list of things to do.

At three-thirty on the nose Secret heard Lucky blowing for her outside of her apartment. She said a silent prayer that God would watch over her, grabbed her purse, then bounced outside to Lucky's truck.

“Hey, beautiful,” Lucky said as he stood waiting for her with the passenger side door open.

“Hi,” Secret said, getting in the car.

“Damn,” Lucky said as Secret bounced right up into the passenger seat then looked at him to close the door. “A nigga don't even get a kiss? You don't want me to treat you like a regular chick, but yet you just played me like a regular nigga.”

Secret laughed. “My bad. Let me try this again.” Secret got out of the truck, ran back up her walkway then came back down. This time when she got to the truck, she grabbed Lucky behind his neck, pulled him down to her face, and stuck her tongue down his throat. After a wild, passionate kiss she pulled away, looking him in his eyes and said, “Hi.”

Lucky laughed and shook his head at her. “Girl, get your crazy ass in that car.”

Secret smiled and hopped back into the car.

Lucky closed the door and then climbed into the driver seat. He took her to a couple of the trap houses where he checked in on things and even collected money.

“I don't usually do this type of thing,” Lucky had told Secret after they exited the house. “I got other soldiers who handle this type of thing. I just wanted to show you everything per your request.”

They got back into the vehicle and went to another spot. This one being one that Secret was very familiar with. It was the one she'd taken Lucky to that day to get the duffle bag full of drugs out of. The duffle bag full of drugs that would ultimately land her in jail.

They walked up to the house and Lucky knocked. “Yo, it's Lucky,” he called through the door. A few seconds later a young guy with a mouth full of bling answered the door.

“Wasup, my main man Lucky?” the young guy greeted him.

“I can't call it, young blood,” Lucky replied, giving the boy some dap. Lucky entered the house.

Secret noticed that this was the first time Lucky had actually grabbed her hand and led her inside. With her hand resting in his, she stayed by his side.

Secret looked around the living room with an opening to the dining room and kitchen. It was full of guys. Some were sitting on the couch and chairs playing video games. Some were at the table playing a game of cards. All were either drinking or smoking. As a matter of fact, there was so much smoke that Secret could barely see two feet in front of her.

There was a second television other than the one the guys were playing video games on. A porno was showing on that one. So there was a sound mixture of shooting from the video games, moaning and groaning with an acoustic guitar string from the porno along with cussing and fussing from the heated card game.

“I see you brought us a new toy to play with.” A guy walked up to Lucky, rubbing his hands together. He looked Secret up and down like she was his next meal. Or more like his last supper.

“Oh, no, no, no,” Lucky said, pushing the guy back. “This one is mine.”

“Aw, come on, man. Since when don't you share? You know the saying: it ain't no fun if my homies can't have none.”

“Down, boy,” the young guy with a mouth full of bling told his friend. “You heard what my man said.”

The friend put his hands up in defense. “All right, my bad. My bad. It's all good.” He held up his hand to high-five Lucky.

“Fo' sho.” Lucky gave him a hand slap. “But I got you. I'll bring a little somethin' around your way. Got this nice Dominican chick I know you'll have fun with.”

The guy's eyes lit up. “Now that's what I'm talking about.” He gave Lucky another high five and then walked away, but not before eyeballing Secret with silent thoughts of wishing he could have her right now.

Lucky looked to Secret. He was about to say something to her but his phone began to ring. Lucky pulled his phone out and looked at it. His eyes lit up like Times Square at night. “Yes!” he said quietly and did a little fist pump in the air. He then quickly looked to Secret. “Hey, I gotta take this call. I'll be right back.” He started to walk away as he hit the talk button to answer the phone. “This is Lucky.” He spoke in a professional business manner. There was none of that “wasup” and “yo, my man” he greeted all his other workers with. This time Lucky spoke as if he was speaking to his boss instead of worker bees.

Secret was only two steps behind Lucky as he walked down a small hallway, heading toward the bathroom at the end of the hall. It wasn't until he got to the bathroom and went to close the door that he realized Secret was behind him. He briefly took the phone away from his ear and whispered. “Hey, I said I have to take this call.”

“Then I'm taking it with you,” Secret whispered right back with attitude. She then pointed to the living room. “If you think you're leaving me out there in the lion's den, you have really lost your mind.” The look in Secret's eyes let Lucky know she was not about to back down on this one. He had a very important call on the line and didn't have time to argue with her.

Agitated, Lucky mumbled. “All right. Just wait right here then.” He pointed to the spot right outside the door and then closed it.

Secret stood right outside the door with her arms folded. At first she wasn't paying any attention to what Lucky was saying, but then with nothing else to focus on, his words began to penetrate her ears. And what he had to say made Secret's ears perk up. Although she could only hear one side of the conversation, she could hear enough to know that this coming Friday, something big was going down. A shipment of “ice cream.” Secret recalled the day back at the dungeon with Quasi. The men carrying boxes said they were bringing a delivery, that the ice cream man or something like that had arrived. Secret put two and two together. The boxes had the drugs in it that the girls at the pool tables had to do their thing with. That was the ice cream.

Secret pressed her ear to the door and this time she clearly heard Lucky set up a meeting time for this Friday, three days from now, at six p.m. The meeting spot was Lucky's garage.

Now it was Secret pumping her fist in the air. She had what she needed. No mistake, she was sure once she relayed this information to Detective Davis that would be all he needed to take Lucky down. Game over.