Payback Ain't Enough (6 page)

“Carter, get dressed. You’re going to court. I’ll be back in ten minutes,” Pittman, the guard, announced.

I pulled the blanket off my head and looked at the green fluorescent numbers on my clock. It said 2:07
A.M
. I stuck my head over the side of the bunk and looked down at my cellie, Esther.

“Esther,” I whispered.

“What, Janay?” she whispered back.

“Did she say for me to get up and get ready for court?” I asked as if it were a dream.

“Yes!” she snapped, which also meant, leave her the hell alone.

I sat up, snatched the blanket off me, swung my legs around and jumped off the top bunk. My feet hit the cold concrete, and I quickly stepped in my bunkie’s flip-flops and sat on the cold, steel toilet. I was warm and toasty under my blanket and didn’t want to get up and pee in the middle of the night. Now my bladder felt as if it was about to burst. After I relieved myself, I hit the silver flush button on the loud toilet and then went to my cell door. Something I did countless times here in the Fed’s holding facility in Detroit.

“Crystal!” I yelled for my sister. Her cell was on the same tier but all the way at the opposite end.

“Shut the fuck up!” some unknown voice yelled back.

“Disrespectful bitch! It’s two in the damn morning. Folks got to work in the morning.” I recognized Miss Anthony’s voice.

“Fuck y’all! Y’all do the same shit!” I yelled right back at them bitches. “Crystal! They woke me up for court!” I announced.

“Me too. Do you know what for?” she asked.

“Naw, man,” I told her, but as I started getting ready, I said to myself, “It’s probably to slap some new charges on us.” But I couldn’t tell her that because she was just adjusting to the fact that we were in here. She was such a wimp.

Later on, we rode about thirty minutes to the Jackson courthouse, hands and feet shackled. We both were on pins and needles from the moment we got dressed and stepped on the bus. “Nay, what do you think they are going to do to us?” my sister asked me.

“How would I know, Crystal? I know just as much as you.” And that was the truth. When the Feds ran down on us a little over two years back, we had a dead body lying on my living-room floor and were the daughters of Kingpin Big Choppa, who was on top of the FBI’s most wanted list but was nowhere to be found. And because of that, they held us as bait. They were still holding us, thinking it would bring him out of hiding, or we would give them all of the information they needed to put a tight seal on the case that they built around him. But we didn’t know shit. Hell, he hadn’t even sent us a letter. When my daddy up and disappeared, he did so without a trace. My
thoughts were that they were getting desperate and frustrated and now I was sure they were bringing us to court to slap more charges on us.

“I swear, Nay, I can’t take this. If they throw more charges on us, I don’t know what I’m gonna do. We already don’t know if we ever gettin’ out of this bitch.”

I understood where my sister was coming from.

When we arrived at the courthouse, they unchained every one of us that was on that prison transport bus. Men and women. My sister and I were put in a holding cell with six other ladies. We remained in the freezing cell until after lunch. By that time I was mentally drained and way beyond aggravated.

When they finally escorted us into the courtroom, it was as if I walked into a different world. It was soundproof, quiet and plush. I saw our attorney Jack Brunswick and then did a double take. I had to be hallucinating. My father stood there in a navy blue pin-striped suit, and a shiny bald head with a tan. When Crystal started screaming I knew that my daddy was real.

“Daddy!” we screamed as my sister and I started to dash toward him, but the marshals grabbed us both as if we were about to shoot the place up. “Please, let me speak to my father,” I begged. A marshal grabbed us by each arm, lifted us up and took us to the opposite side of the room.

“Nay and Crystal, it’s okay,” my daddy said. It sounded so good to hear my daddy say my name.

“Daddy?” was the only word that I could babble. I still couldn’t believe it was him. My dad looked as if he had lost a hundred pounds. I knew he had cancer, but would he be
dying within the next month or so? I thought as every scenario ran through my brain.

“Your Honor, I need to have a word with my clients. Please, consider that this was all done in haste and at the request of the government. They wanted to get this over with as soon as possible. Especially since, you, the presiding judge on this case will be going on vacation,” Jack, my daddy’s attorney and friend of over thirteen years, said.

“Five minutes, Mr. Brunswick,” Judge Silverstein said as she banged her gavel. Her bright red hair was piled high on top of her head and wrapped in a bun. She looked to be around fifty as she peered over the top of her wire-rimmed glasses at me and my sister. I had heard that for a white judge she tried not to be an asshole. “Your clients can have a reunion outside of this courtroom on your own time. Not the court’s time.”

The second she said that Crystal and I jumped up and made a mad dash over to our father. He grabbed us both and all three of us were crying. I missed my pops so much and always prayed that I would be able to see him again.

“Okay,” Jack said interrupting our family reunion, “let me bring the girls up to speed.”

As Jack ran down all that was going on, my mind began to run wild. I was right. The Feds didn’t want us; they wanted my dad. They had been watching his operation for years. So now here he was turning himself in, in exchange for freeing us. I wasn’t comfortable with that at all.

“Daddy, are you sure?” I asked him. “What if it’s a trick? And what about your health?”

“Yes, he’s sure, Janay,” my weak-ass sister snapped at me. No one paid her any mind though.

“I’ll be fine. Hell, I’m damn near sixty-eight. I ain’t got much time left. I lived my life, and for that I’m grateful. I can’t be selfish. Y’all are young and damn sure don’t need to be sitting in some damn jail cell for the next twenty years.” He moved in closer and put his lips to my ear. “I just want you to carry on the legacy. I owned the game, and I want my baby girl to remind them niggas out there of that. You hear me?” His words resonated in my head.

So that’s what this is all about. My daddy wants me to take over that which he built.
Damn.
I just can’t get out from under his wing. Ever since I was seventeen, I knew how to cut, cook and serve dope. Even though I was thrilled at the possibility of getting out of prison, I wasn’t saying to myself, “Hooray! I am so looking forward to getting back into the dope game.” I was tired of the shit. We had our run. So much for not being selfish. If at age sixty-eight he was on his way to prison, then what’s the point of me carrying on his legacy?

CHAPTER FOUR

“I know that this is a lot to have come down on you all at once, but Calvin, it is what it is,” Rudy, my attorney said, as he sat across from me. A week has passed since Forever’s funeral, and I had finally made it to his office.

“So, what are my options?” I asked, as if I had many to choose from.

“The indictment is definitely coming down. She’s a snitch for crying out loud,” he proclaimed as he took the stack of papers fanning them in my face.

“Then why haven’t the muthafuckas locked my ass up?” I challenged Rudy.

“Trust me, it’s coming. Plus, remember, you pay me to prolong some things as long as I can.”

“I understand that. However, can you assure me that I can get a bond? If not, I’m telling you, me and my family are out of here,” I promised him.

“I don’t see any reason why they shouldn’t grant you a bond,” he assured me. “Look, Calvin, you’re worried about the wrong thing. That’s my job. And after careful scrutiny of the indictment, I do think we can find some holes in it. But that’s my job. Let me do what you pay me to do.”

I got up and walked out of the office, mad as fuck. I worked at keeping myself out of all equations, then all of a sudden, I was at the top of the list on an indictment. I didn’t know how I was going to tell Shan, or if I should tell her at all.

I looked over at my son taking a nap on the couch. Anthony was only eighteen months, and here I was pregnant again. If Briggen didn’t get anyone to help me, I was going to have to walk away from overseeing our day-care center and the motel. Shit, he could sell them both for all I cared. Well, not the day care, because I did drop off Anthony sometimes. But having a child was like having three businesses. Add that to having a husband and taking care of the house, and that shit was overwhelming. I was tired simply at the thought of it all. I already didn’t have a life. Outside of Briggen, and with this new baby on the way, combined with him and his mood swings and Nick telling me that Briggen was out there hustling hard, I couldn’t see any relief.

“Shan, the boy is asleep. Go!” Keeta, Briggen’s cousin, hissed as she was pushing me out the door. Her daughter was babysitting while she and I went out. I was on my way home to get my shoes and matching bag.

“I’m going, damn,” I said as I got shoved. Who pushes a pregnant lady?

“Then hurry up. And don’t get all the way home only to call me up to say you aren’t going. I didn’t do all that work on you for my damn health,” Keeta warned.

I laughed. “You call this work? I look like a damn clown,” I teased her. My nose was starting to spread across my puffy, pregnant face.

“Bitch, please. You ready for a cover shoot. Just pick the magazine and I’ll make it happen,” she bragged.

Earlier we went to Neiman Marcus and I found this cute little short trench dress by Gaultier. I got it for $2,700. I had to have it because I had the perfect platform bootie sandals and Céline bag already at home to match. I brought the sandals, and Briggen had given me the bag last summer.

I already had the dress on, Keeta did my makeup, which I don’t even wear, and I put on these long-ass, thick, fake eye-lashes which had me looking like Betty Boop. I didn’t even recognize myself. Briggen talked me into cutting off my locks, so I was wearing my hair short and permed and Keeta had just styled the hell out of it.

“Shan, I’m not playing with you!” Keeta yelled out the door.

“Girl, just keep an eye on my son. I’ll be back,” I said, jumping into my whip.

Twenty minutes later I was in my house, had used the bathroom, slid on my bootie sandals and was ready to paint the town. When I got to the back door, Briggen was coming in. He had a bouquet of roses and from what I could see, about three gift-wrapped presents. He set them on the
kitchen counter, and I walked right past him and his phony-ass gifts as if they weren’t there.

“Hey, hey. Hold up. What’s up?” he asked, looking shocked and confused. I’m sure it was because I didn’t go anywhere and there I was all dressed up and on my way out. “Where’s my son?”

“
Our son
is at Keeta’s. I’m on my way over there now,” I answered flatly.

“To do what? Why are you all dressed up?”

“Why do you think I’m dressed up? I’m going out, that’s why,” I said and walked out the door.

“Shan, why are you trying to leave?” He came rushing after me.

“I told you, I’m going out, Briggen.” I continued my strut.

“So, you were just going to go out without letting me know?” he asked as if he couldn’t believe it.

“Briggen, please. You are not my father, plus, you haven’t been concerned about me or your son for the past few weeks.” I pushed past him.

“Shan, I’m not in the mood for your bullshit. You need to come sit down so we can talk.” He grabbed my hand as I kindly snatched it away.

“I have been trying to talk to you for weeks, and you ain’t have shit to say then, so act like you ain’t got shit to say now. Like I said, I’m on my way out,” I stated defiantly, hitting the alarm to my car. He snatched the keys out of my hand, taking me completely by surprise.

“Come back in the house so we can talk,” Briggen demanded.

“I’m not going in the house. Now give me my keys so that I can leave. Keeta is waiting for me,” I snapped, hoping that I could get out of there without having to talk to him.

“Fuck Keeta. Who’s more important? Me or her?” He came at me with that sorry and old-ass line.

“No, you didn’t just go there. You know what? Keep them. I’m not going back and forth with you. I got a set of spare keys in the house.” I started to walk past him but stopped. “I will tell you one thing. I ain’t got shit to say to you right now, Briggen, and I think it’s best that way because I may say something I just might regret.” I was fuming as I stormed up the backstairs and turned the knob, but unfortunately, the door was locked.

As Shan ran to try to get into the house, I sat down at our patio table and knew that she was pissed. I had her car keys, her house keys, and if she stepped off the back porch, she was going to get wet because it was beginning to drizzle.

My wife had on all this makeup, including them fake-ass lashes that all the chicks were wearing and a sexy little trench coat dress. Still with all that, she looked uptight as hell. It’s because I’ve been preoccupied with all of this other shit and haven’t been giving her any attention or dick. Hell, I hadn’t fucked her in weeks, and with her being pregnant, I knew that her emotions were all over the place. I was watching her as she stormed down the steps heading for her car, hoping that it was open.