Read Out a Order Online

Authors: Evie Rhodes

Tags: #Fiction, #Thrillers, #Suspense

Out a Order (14 page)

BOOK: Out a Order
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Chapter 31
T
rey and Warren P. watched as Ballistic paced back and forth. The chips were falling in place to his liking.
Trey spoke on Ballistic's cue that he was able to do so. “Rasheem and Mitchell have Davenport's wife. It's a personal favor in honor of Spence's death.”
Ballistic nodded. “It is an ambitious move.”
He was already aware of the circumstances and had been waiting to see how long it would take before the 411 was relayed to him. He knew they were pretty much on schedule as it should be.
“She's in a safe spot. We grabbed her off the street earlier. She should keep for a while.”
Ballistic stroked his face. “I am rather pleased at the turn of events. It could work to our favor.”
“How so?” Warren P. chimed in. Trey shot him a warning glance. Ballistic didn't miss it.
They were to speak only when spoken to. It was Ballistic's unwritten rule. Ballistic was thinking to himself that Trey had better school Warren. If he violated one more time he would swim with the fishes as the Italians used to like to say.
“You've done well.” Ballistic went on as though Warren P. had never spoken. “There is one more piece left.”
They both stood at attention. This time Warren P. had the good sense to keep his mouth shut. He had detected imminent danger on his last question, and Trey's warning glance had reminded him of Ballistic's “speak only when you're spoken to,” rule. He knew it wouldn't pay to be so zealous again.
“Take the woman to the old storefront on Clinton Avenue. Send Rasheem to Rico with the message about the woman and her whereabouts. Have him charge Rico for the information.”
Trey smiled at the simple brilliance of Ballistic's plan. With a lift of his head, Ballistic indicated Trey could speak. He could feel him brimming to put the pieces together.
He rather liked Trey and considered him the wisest of the crew. He was seriously considering giving him a coveted position one day. His throat gurgled as he waited for Trey's response.
“Yeah, Rico knows Davenport will look for his wife and he won't make Rasheem's connection to us.”
“Exactly.”
Ballistic limped over to the chair with his cane to sit down. Immediately his German shepherd was at his side.
“Make sure that Shannon Davenport without a lot of effort knows where to find his wife. We'll be waiting for Rico when he shows up. Leave a trail on the kidnapping of Shannon's wife that leads straight to Rico. That'll clear the guilty party.”
Ballistic waved his cane in the air. “I'm going to call in my markers with Rico's crew. What's left of them, that is. People owe me. It's time. Rico DeLeon Hudson will soon learn that I have purchased all that is his. It's time to take baby boy out for the count. I don't wish to waste any more time toying with him.”
Ballistic agitatedly waved his cane in the air once again. “Leave me!”
There were times when he had enough of people. He was very much a loner. And this was one of those times.
Besides, he was being called on for a higher duty by that to which he paid his allegiance. He needed time to prepare for that ritual. He needed a council with the Darkling.
Chapter 32
T
awney was huddled on the floor in a tight ball in a corner of the garage when Trey and Warren P. returned. Trey glanced at her, assessing the damage. She was still breathing, so these two young bucks were still within their parameters. Although by the look of things they were skirting it pretty close.
They had made a mess of the pretty lady.
Trey brought them up to date. “I had a talk with Ballistic. He wants you to go see Rico Hudson.”
“Why?” Rasheem asked, puzzled.
Their piece hadn't been connected to Rico at all even though word was all over the street that he and Shannon Davenport were beefing.
“He wants you to sell Rico information.”
Rasheem raised an eyebrow. He glanced sideways at Mitchell. Mitchell lit a cigarette, listening intently. There might be a promotion or something in it for them. He couldn't wait to start getting some real cream. 'Cause cash ruled everything around him, and that was word.
“What kind of information?” Rasheem said.
“The final destination of Tawney Davenport. The old Clinton Avenue storefront.”
“Yeah, we can do that. Rico will buy a little freelancing on our part. He knows we're about the cream.” Rasheem grinned in Mitchell's direction, ecstatic at the opportunity to impress the all-important Ballistic.
Trey purposely hadn't told them about Ballistic's thinking the kidnapping played right into his plans, because he didn't want them getting bigheaded.
“Tell him you found a way to smoke Shannon Davenport out for him but it is going to cost him. It ain't no freebie. He'll jump at it because he's bugging about his girl's death and he can't get his hands on Ballistic. He's doing petty stuff for revenge.”
“That's word,” Warren P. said.
“We're getting the word on his actions, but he ain't even in the ballpark, so we know he's frustrated,” Trey said, calling out Rico's situation.
“He's gonna be looking to waste some blood just to quench his thirst.”
“Also you need to float the word over the wire, with the trail leading to Rico for the kidnapping of Tawney Davenport. We're going to reinforce Shannon's thought that Rico grabbed her. Also the wind doesn't need to blow in the direction from which it's really coming. You feeling me?”
“We're feeling you.” Rasheem spoke for both of them.
“Got it?”
“Got it!” Mitchell and Rasheem replied in unison.
Trey handed them a huge knot of fresh one-hundred-dollar bills, then left the garage again on foot.
When Trey was gone Rasheem snatched Tawney to her feet. “It's time to roll on to your final destination, Ms. Thang.”
Looking at him, Tawney saw nothing but death in his eyes.
Chapter 33
I
n one of the safe houses Rico, Temaine, and a few of the crew members were sitting around. There was a lot of nervous energy in the room. Sean, a short skinny dude who talked too much, stood watching Temaine.
He couldn't stand the sight of Temaine, never could. To him Temaine was arrogant and sly. He reminded him of a damned weasel. Slippery when it's wet. Sean never did trust him. Also he was sick of Temaine and that damned piece of licorice.
He always had that mess stuck in his mouth no matter what the situation was. He looked like an overgrown kid from day care. It was grating on Sean's nerves just looking at him. “Why you always sucking on that licorice, man?”
Temaine jumped up from his seat. He didn't say a word. He shoved Sean clean off his feet. Sean fell backward over some chairs, looking up at Temaine in surprise.
Temaine pulled his gun from his waistband, putting it to Sean's temple. “Shut up, nigga! I don't want to hear your stupid mouth no more.”
It was kind of comical in a way because the piece of licorice was hanging from Temaine's mouth, yet the gun coupled with the frown on his face meant serious trouble.
Angrily Temaine clicked off the safety and twirled the barrel. The other crew members rushed over yelling for Temaine to knock it off and take the gun away from Sean's head.
Rico's voice reigned supreme in the room, although he wasn't the least bit excited. In fact Rico was like the ultimate calm before a storm. He didn't even raise his voice. It was just the deadly serious tone of authority that laced it, which caught a person's attention. “Take the gun away from his head, Temaine.”
Temaine's finger itched on the trigger. Rico stepped closer. He snapped his fingers. “Now, Temaine.”
Temaine looked down into the sweat-drenched face of Sean. Slowly he removed the gun from his temple. He put the gun back into his waistband, climbing off him.
“I got a plan. Don't get antsy on me now,” Rico said to him.
Temaine's breathing slowed down a bit. He took a blue scarf from his jacket pocket. He tied it around his head. “I want Shannon Davenport dead now. The police are all over him. Not tomorrow. Not the day after. I want him now.”
Temaine turned to him. “And Ballistic too,” he bluffed. “Their time is running out. There is no more time. The time is now.”
Rico let him run his course. “I'll be calling the shots around here, li'l brother,” he said.
“Then start calling them now, blood,” Temaine retorted.
Rico made eye contact around the room. Guns clicked quickly into place, all trained on Temaine.
Temaine looked wildly around the room realizing too late that he had overstayed his welcome. “Oh? So it's like that, Rico? I been kicking it on the block with you nigga since we was knee-high. And you wanna take a nigga out like that, huh?”
Rico snapped his fingers. The guns disappeared. He took Temaine's head in both of his hands. He kissed him on the forehead and then took a step back. “In God we Trust.”
A shot rang out from behind Temaine, hitting him in the back of the head. It dropped him to his knees. He looked up at Rico with shock in his eyes. He had played his last hand. “Why?” was the last word he uttered.
“Because you flipped sides, li'l brother,” were the last words he heard.
Grief briefly flickered in Rico's eyes.
 
 
The words “rockabye, baby” instead of being screeched were being whispered in the winds of destruction. The bodies of the black-targeted babies were piling up. And the children of the damned unknowingly were preparing to fight back.
Marcus Simms got up from his spot outside the window where he had witnessed Temaine's demise.
Aisha, the poor child, was drenched in sweat. Great rolls of it cascaded down from her hairline into her face. Her vocal cords were still locked in silence. Yet though she couldn't speak on her sketchpad she continued to write in red marker.
Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!
Unknowingly she was unlocking a floodgate in the spirit. She couldn't talk but she could write.
Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,
she scribbled in a frenzy.
Chapter 34
The Past
 
S
atan is a liar. There is no truth in him. Although this has been mentioned throughout scriptural history time and time again, it is still the greatest form of deception known to man. As well as the most unaccepted one.
Neither the elders of the past nor the generations that would come forth into the present, or their offspring, which wound up being the children in Newark, were any different.
None of them believed any more than the rest of the world, and in keeping with that was the foundation of their disbelief in which most of their terror was laid as they lacked the power of bellief. The tracks of blood that were currently lining the streets of Newark, New Jersey, poured from their bodies.
The spirit demon rose up like a mist, shaking the trees just like it did when Jazz died in the gutter of their streets. Marcus Simms saw it. But still none of them would grasp the true source.
So when one woman's child was wrenched from her grasp, and sacrificed before her very eyes not moments before her own gruesome death, and when she vowed with her last breath of life to swap her soul in exchange for a haunting revenge, the people in attendance thought it was folly.
They thought it was a desperate woman's last cry for vengeance. Well, they were wrong. Satan, who is known by more names than can be listed here, but suffice it to say he is the same, was present as he always has been in the world's darkest hours.
He is of the principalities of darkness. He is the author of spiritual wickedness in high places. Ephesians chapter 6. It's all there. We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers of darkness, against the rulers of darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
But they just didn't believe.
So when Ms. Dorothy, as she was known, pierced the realms with her exchange request to become a spirit demon in exchange for her soul, her request was both heard and granted. It was that simple.
The rest, as you've been following—is history.
The night Ms. Dorothy and her baby were slaughtered is written in the spirit of black magic. There was a storm the likes of cats and dogs that night as water poured, not fell, from the skies. The night was as dark as a black ink spot, the kind of black where nothing moved, an inky, sticky black.
Streaks of lightning danced through the dark, like lit batons that had been strewn through the sky. The thunder rolled and cracked, like a sonic boom not from the heavens but from right there on earth, right next to your ear.
Everybody heard it. Including Mama, Papa, and Nana Mama, who were barely past the thumb-sucking, bed-wetting age at that time, and were the best of friends along with some of their other friends from the neighborhood who were now long since dead.
They should never have witnessed it, but being the hardheaded curious little kids they were, they had seen it all. They decided they wanted to see what was going on with Ms. Dorothy, because she was the talk of the Louisiana swamps and they were fascinated both by her and by the stories of her.
From their hiding place the three of them trembled together like little matchsticks as they witnessed the hideous display of a trial by judge and jury, and the occurring tragedy.
The woman's imminent demise was predicated on lies, on deception, on pure evil. None of the rumors, stories, or old wives' tales were true. It was the game of the beast exerting his power over man. Luring him into sinful territory, into damnation where he would have total control.
True to the game the lies were going to cost them their most prized possession, their souls. Though the body were dead the spirit had yet to live again, though not for the damned.
Ms. Dorothy was on her knees in the dirt-floor shack, in front of a flaming fire. Encircling her were a number of men and women all dressed from head to toe in black. Even their faces were covered; the only opening in the garment was the eyeholes.
This was so that in the small town no one would truly know who had really been responsible for what. Unless you recognized the soul of someone through the eyes. Because after all, the eyes are the windows of the soul.
It was their way of meting out justice, and covering the crimes of the guilty. Ms. Dorothy would forever remember the clothing they wore, as well as the eeriness of the black-clad figures, even after she left that body and became spirit.
At times in her darkest moments she would come to emulate it, black veil over the face and all. Only she didn't use eyeholes. With the strength of her sight in spirit form she could see through concrete, nevertheless through a veil.
This was what Shannon Davenport saw that day outside Je's Restaurant. Her black caricature so to speak. When she appeared in this form there was imminent danger as there had been on the night Shannon first witnessed her.
But what she would remember about that night more than anything was the wrenching away of her baby, the sacrificing of the bouncing brown-eyed baby boy who looked into her eyes, smiling and grabbing her finger to his mouth. A love supreme.
She would never forget his sweet baby smell, the instant gurgling, the joy, and the happiness that emanated from one small baby boy. Nor could she stop hearing the sound of his chuckle.
As all the forces, both those seen and not seen, looked on, one of the figures stepped forward, wrenching the baby from Ms. Dorothy as she clutched him tightly to her bosom cooing the lullaby “Rockabye, Baby” in his ear as she rocked him softly.
“Please,” she begged. “You've made a mistake. It's not what you think. Take me but spare his life. I beg of you, spare his life.”
Tears streamed down her cheeks as a look of pure terror flashed from behind eyes that were once woebegone, but now were filled with absolute disbelief and terror. The child had been the one real bright spot in her life.
The black-clad figure yanked the child from her grasp, causing the child to burst out screaming. She looked up with her tear-filled eyes. “For which crime do you charge me?”
“You have born a sacrifice birthed on that day in that hour. His blood is the blood of many,” the black-clad figure replied.
“His blood is innocent,” she retorted.
“His blood is spilled,” responded the figure as he slashed the child's throat in one smooth motion, silencing the baby's cry at the same time. The baby's blood gurgled from the wound, dripping onto his mother's head and splattering across her clothing.
“His blood is a sacrifice. With his blood we pay so many others will not. The spilling of his blood will wash away the evil he has brought with his birth.”
Ms. Dorothy hiccupped. “Rockabye, baby, rockabye, baby,” she sang until she began to screech the words from the top of her lungs. “
Rockabye, baby, rockabye, baby
.”
She held out her arms for the dead child, but even in death he was not to fill them. Her outstretched arms were ignored.
Suddenly her chant of “Rockabye, baby” changed to a request. “Oh, Prince of Darkness, I commend you my soul,” she prayed to the dark forces.
For an instant in time she was transported away from her enemies, where she bargained and sealed her own fate for revenge. She shook hands with the devil gladly. She traded all she had for the forces of darkness, and with her trade she would exact revenge.
Upon her being returned to her reality, the last words she spoke were “The blood of your offspring will be spilled in the streets. Damnation is written in their future.”
She reached once again for the infant. “Rockabye, baby.”
With those words she was pushed face-first into the flaming, searing fire. The sight of this woman burning alive was so horrid that the children who were watching vomited in unison, their stomachs heaving.
And they never forgot the words that rose up out of the fiery fire, out of the black-burned charcoal body that shouldn't have been able to speak but it did. “
I am the Darkling and I will remember you all!
”
“Rockabye, baby! Rockabye, baby!” Ms. Dorothy screeched even after death.
BOOK: Out a Order
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