The Cartel 3: The Last Chapter (3 page)

“Frankie Biggs sends his regards,” Robyn stated.

The judge couldn’t believe his ears. A man that he had sentenced to life in prison just weeks before had reached out from behind the wall and ordered his execution. For the right price, the Murder Mamas would hit anyone, including a state judge.

As soon as the judge’s head hit the wooden desk, Robyn stood up and walked out of his chambers. She bypassed the young girl, Melissa, whose head was face first on her typewriter. The cyanide-laced coffee had done its job to perfection.

Without looking back, Robyn exited the building unnoticed, with a satisfied smirk on her face. She waltzed down the stairs outside the front of the courthouse and slipped into the black Benz that was waiting for her curbside.

Aries pulled away discreetly, and without any words, they got ghost in the wind. Aries felt the engine purr beneath the hood of her Mercedes as she pushed the beautiful car along the California coastline. The wind whipped through Robyn’s hair as she pulled off the honey blonde wig that was her disguise.

The mystery that lay behind their designer shades was more deadly than any onlooker could ever imagine. Business was good, as usual. After the tyranny that had taken place in Miami, they had started anew in the City of Angels. There was more money to be made on the West Coast than they had ever encountered before. Leaving bodies in their path, their murder game had soared to new heights.

Still, they couldn’t help but feel like a fundamental piece to
their puzzle was missing. What had started out as band of five ladies with murder as an agenda had quickly become four, but then four had turned to three, and now after all the bullshit, the last two were standing. Too many mistakes had caused their numbers to dwindle, and not knowing where Miamor was weighed heavily on both of their minds.

The West Coast had been the plan all along. It had all been Miamor’s idea. They would take Miami by storm and stack their paper, until Murder was released from prison. That had all been tossed aside when Carter Jones entered the picture. Miamor had forgotten her own rules and gotten so caught up in her emotions that she had broken their cardinal rule: Money
over everything.

Now Murder was out of prison, Miamor was nowhere to be found, and it was up to them to fill him in on everything that had gone down since the last time he had seen her.

“What are we going to tell him when he asks about her?” Aries asked as they pulled up to the Union Station bus terminal.

“We’re going to tell him the truth: Miamor chose a nigga over him and over us,” Aries replied uncertainly, knowing that Murder would not receive the news well. When they had contacted him to let him know their whereabouts, they never mentioned that Miamor had not relocated to L.A. They hoped to get him there first and inform him later, because they knew he could help them bring Miamor home and talk some sense into her.

Aries pulled into the parking lot of the station and put the car in park as both she and Robyn peered anxiously toward the door.

“Didn’t his bus get here like an hour ago?” Robyn asked.

“He’s here. He’s watching us. Murder don’t move until he’s ready to. That’s where Miamor got it from,” Aries replied
confidently as she recalled the many stories that Miamor had shared with her about the man.

Finally, Murder came sauntering out of the station, his pants low, fitted hat worn over his eyes, while his head sat on a swivel neck as he surveyed his surroundings. Even though no pistol dwelled on his hip, his hand was instinctively planted there.

Robyn smirked as she popped the locks for Murder to enter the car. “You’re all the way in Cali. Who you looking for?”

Her tone was playful, but his was not when he replied, “I’ve popped niggas in Cali.” With that, he ducked low in his seat and pulled down his hat as Aries put the car in drive.

“Where’s Miamor?” he asked immediately. She was whom he had made the trip to see. After years of lockup, their reunion was inevitable.

“We have something to tell you.” Robyn turned around so that she was facing Murder. “In the letter we sent you, we didn’t tell you everything.”

“Where’s Miamor?” Murder asked again, almost impatiently.

Aries was silent as she drove. She didn’t want to be the bearer of bad news. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up as Robyn spoke up.

“She’s not here. She decided to stay in Miami. She’s fucking with the same niggas that murdered Anisa,” Robyn stated.

Murder’s temperature went through the roof as his jaw tightened and his brown eyes turned black. “My li’l mama wouldn’t do that,” Murder replied assuredly as he stretched out across the backseat of the car.

“It’s not exactly how Robyn is making it sound,” Aries cut in. “When we went to Miami, we accepted a contract to hit a group called The Cartel. Anisa was murdered, and after that, everything spun out of control. Miamor met this nigga named
Carter. She fell in love with him, but did not know that he was affiliated with The Cartel.”

“Affiliated how?” Murder asked. His words were calm, but the blaze behind his stare revealed his true emotions.

“He’s the brother of the nigga that killed Anisa,” Robyn finished. “When we left, she stayed behind. She’s not the same, Murder. That nigga Carter got her all fucked up in the head, and we need your help to get her back.”

Murder was livid as he processed everything the Murder Mamas had told him. He had been gone for too long. He was out of touch with the streets, and even worse, out of touch with Miamor. Although he had never expected her to wait for him, hearing that she was so loyal to another man sparked a flame inside of him that he tried to snuff out long ago. He was ready to go retrieve Miamor, and anybody who stood between them could get it.

They rode in silence, until they reached the condo that Robyn and Aries shared. As they walked up their walkway, they immediately noticed that things were not as they left them. The curtains in the living room window had been shifted slightly, and the piece of clear tape that they had put at the top of their front door had been ripped in half, indicating that someone had come in or out of the condo.

Aries put her finger to her lips and pulled out her 9 mm pistol as she stepped into the condo first. Their place was untouched; nothing was out of place, but they knew that someone had crossed their threshold. They filtered through the place, going in separate directions, until every room had been checked.

“There’s nobody here,” Murder stated.

“But somebody’s been here,” Robyn stated as she finally noticed the medium-sized packing box that sat in the middle of their kitchen island. She picked it up, and Aries gasped as she noticed the blood-stained bottom.

“Robyn,” she said as she pointed at the red color.

Murder walked over to her and removed the box from her hands.

He opened the box, and when he noticed what was inside, his stomach folded, causing him to bend over as if someone had punched him in the gut.

“What is it?” Aries asked in a panic as she watched Murder’s reaction.

Tears filled Robyn’s eyes as she shook her head back and forth in disbelief. She ran over to the kitchen sink as the contents of her stomach erupted from her mouth.

“What the fuck is it?” Aries asked again as she stormed over to the box, but Murder stopped her in her tracks as he wrapped one hand around her throat.

“Why did you leave her there?” he asked. “You should have never left her in Miami!” he stated, his eyes ablaze with anger.

The mixture of devastation and rage that twisted his features told Aries all that she needed to know. She violently slapped his hand away from her neck and rushed over to the box. Her heart felt as if it shattered into tiny pieces when she saw the severed hand that lay inside. The cursive
Murder Mama
on the wrist revealed her identity. It was Miamor. They knew that only one person could be this ruthless.

“She’s dead,” Aries whispered in disbelief.

Robyn stood from the sink and walked over to Aries as they wrapped their arms around each other. “We shouldn’t have left her,” Aries whispered regretfully.

There was an address written on the inside of Miamor’s hand. It was a sign of respect that only someone in their profession would understand. It was Mecca’s way of letting them know where they could find her body.

Without turning around, Murder stated, “I want to know everything you know about The Cartel.” No more words needed to be spoken. They all knew what had to be done. It was time to go back to Miami.

“Please, God, let somebody come for me.”

—Breeze

Every inch of Breeze’s body ached unbearably as the weight of Ma’tee’s home rested on top of her. “Help me!” she screamed, her voice raspy and sore from strain. For two days, she had been trapped beneath the rubble. She was trapped next to Ma’tee’s decaying body, and the smell was slowly driving her insane. His dead eyes haunted her as they stared in her direction. She could still hear his voice in her head, terrorizing her, telling her that she would never escape, and she felt nothing but utter hopelessness, because she knew that no one even knew where to begin looking for her.

Breeze’s body wanted to give out on her. Without food she was weak, but she knew that she could not give into death. She had to make it out of this alive. She had come too far to die now. Ma’tee could no longer hold her captive.

All I have to do is hold on. Someone will come,
she thought.
They have to.
She sucked on the wet dirt beneath her to provide herself with some type of water. It was all that her body was surviving on, but she knew that it would not be enough for her to make it much longer. Being trapped beneath the steel and concrete was like being buried alive.

Physically, she knew that she was injured, but she blocked out the pain as she tried to keep her mind strong. She knew
that once her will disappeared she would die, so she tried her best to remain calm. Her father had always told her that panic sent logic right out the window, and she would need to think clearly in order to survive.

The excruciating heat made her feel as if she were roasting in a cement oven. The blocks resting on top of her baked beneath the sun all day, burning her so badly that it felt as if a hot iron were being placed to her skin.

She was grateful when the sun began to set, but the night brought on a completely different set of problems for Breeze. The sounds of the jungle terrified her, as the wildlife was attracted to the scent of Ma’tee’s corpse. She wished that she could cover her ears, but her hands were smashed beneath the rock, and the only thing she could do was close her eyes.

Zyir’s face popped into her mind as she tuned out the sounds of the night. He had always been her voice of reason when she needed him, and as she visualized him in her mind, she realized that she couldn’t quite remember all of the details of his face. Too much time had passed, and she no longer held his exact features to memory. It was then that she grew more determined than ever to make it home.
Please, God, let somebody come for me,
she prayed.

She had very little faith that her prayers would be answered. Speaking to God had not saved her from Ma’tee’s torture, so she was skeptical that He would spare her from this. She was tired of the hardship that had become her life, and a part of her wished that she had been the one to die when the earthquake first hit. It seemed that Ma’tee had been granted the easy way out, while she was left to suffer.

She could feel herself dying slowly. With every minute that passed, her heartbeat slowed down. It was only a matter of time before it gave out. Breeze suffered through the sounds of the night with her eyes closed, but sleep never came. Her
nerves were too on edge for her to rest. The ground had not stopped shaking beneath her. Every few hours, another aftershock set off more destruction, shifting the house on top of her and causing her even more pain. The threat of it falling in on her completely was a constant threat. Any second she could be crushed to death, and the impending circumstance caused her body to tremble.

She began to talk to herself just to stay lucid, singing songs that she remembered to stop herself from giving in to the pain. Everything in her just wanted to let the earth swallow her. Exhaustion and fatigue caused her eyelids to become heavy.

Just as the daylight came creeping back across the horizon, she heard the sound of human voices. She strained to listen, thinking that her mind was playing an evil trick on her.

“Hello? Is anyone out there?” she called out at the top of her lungs. When she didn’t hear a response, her heart dropped in disappointment, but the footsteps around her grew increasingly more audible. Straining her ears, she finally confirmed the voices. She could not make out what they were saying, but it didn’t matter; she could not let them pass her by.

“Help! Help me!” she yelled desperately as she pushed against the rock, steel, and slate that imprisoned her. She screamed so loudly that her lungs hurt and she choked on the dust in the air, but she did not stop until she got the attention of the men. After locating her voice underneath the ominous pile, they rushed to her aid.

“Get me out! Get me out!” she cried frantically. “Please hurry!” She panicked as she felt the men lifting the concrete from her body. The closer they got to rescuing her, the more Breeze hyperventilated. Relief washed over her as she wept loudly. She had never been so glad to hear another human voice.

The men worked diligently to dig Breeze out as they spoke in a native Haitian dialect that she could not understand. They had no machines or forklifts, only their bare hands and the strength that God had given them, but that did not stop them from helping Breeze. Although a language barrier stopped them from communicating, they knew what the look in her eyes meant. They could see her pleading with them to get her out.

The more weight that was lifted off of Breeze, the more pain she felt. Her legs were completely useless. The blood flow had been cut off from them, and her light skin had turned a sickening blue.