The Choir Director 2 (22 page)

I was just finishing up my evening prayers when Desiree entered my office carrying the mail and a cup of hot tea for me. I really appreciated her kindness; it was magnified by me receiving the opposite from my own wife. I was still living out of my office, although that little arrangement was about to change.

“Thank you, Desiree,” I said as she handed me the tea.

“Bishop, is there anything I can do? Maybe take your suits and shirts to the dry cleaner to have them cleaned and pressed on my way in this morning?” She glanced over at the abundance of clothes I'd shoved into my suitcase in haste. I hated that anyone knew about the problems between me and my wife, but seeing how I'd been living in my office, there was no way to avoid Desiree knowing.

“Sure. That would be really nice.” I got up to sort through my suitcase, but she beat me to it.

“Don't worry. I'll do it,” she said. I was glad I kept my undergarments in a separate laundry bag.

“Thank you, Desiree. You're a godsend.”

“Bishop, I know that I'm not an equal or anything, but you do know you can talk to me if you want. It's not like I know anybody here, so you don't have to worry about me gossiping. Pippie was my only friend here.” She glanced over at me with a forlorn look on her face. It hadn't even occurred to me how much Pippie's death affected her.

“I'm sorry, Desiree. How are you holding up? I know you and Pippie were close. I'm sorry that I've been so distracted that I hadn't thought to check on you.”

“I'm okay. You don't need to worry about me. You knew him so much longer.”

“A friend is a friend. Doesn't matter how long you know them, it still hurts the same.”

“Thank you. I'm only sorry you're going through so much, Bishop. You remind me of my dad.”

“Thank you. That's a great compliment.” I sensed that she wanted to talk about her father, but that conversation was not to be, because Monique barged into the room.

“Hello,” she called out as she flew in the door, looking way too sexy for church. She wasn't slick at all. She was wearing my favorite red dress with a plunging neckline, the same one she'd worn the night I decided to propose to her. Lord help me, but I was a breast man, and normally that vision would have been enough to sway. Except this wasn't close to normal. She took one look at Desiree with that armload of my shirts, and her mood visibly darkened.

“Sweetie, can you give us a moment?” Desiree, who was smart enough to sense the tension, smiled and left, closing the door.

“TK, when are you going to quit this foolishness and come home?” She leaned in toward me so that I could get a closer view of her mounds of pleasure, but I wasn't about to be manipulated or seduced. I backed away as if I'd been burned—and technically, I had been. It felt important to cut this short.

“Were you with Jackson the other day?” I asked her, wondering if she'd tell me the truth or if it would be one more in a series of lies and omissions. Monique's eyes met mine, accusing.

“What? Were you following me?”

“No, but I had someone following you,” I admitted, seeing that my words dropped like a bomb on her because her eyes grew to twice their normal size.

“What?” She actually had the nerve to look offended, as if she hadn't given me reasons, plural, to check and see what the hell was going on between her and Jackson.

Now that I was feeling more in control of my emotions, I walked around to the front of my desk. Leaning against it, I looked her right in the eye.

“You have broken every rule to a marriage,” I started with a heavy heart. This would be a very difficult conversation to have.

“You don't understand why I was with him,” she said, pleading. “It had everything to do with Tia.”

“Tia, huh? Tia doesn't even know Jackson. He didn't show up until after the wedding.”

“That's true, but—”

I cut her off, sick of this foolishness. I couldn't bear to hear one more lie. “You know what? I don't have anything more to say. I'll be filing for divorce by the end of the week.”

“TK!” she cried out, her voice breaking from the shock. “You can't do that!”

I steeled myself, took a deep breath, and continued because at this point, I didn't really have anything to lose by being honest. “Monique, I've been living in my office, functioning out of a suitcase, and instead of working to get me back, I find out you're out meeting with Jackson. I can't live like that anymore, not knowing if I can trust you. I love you with all my heart, but I almost killed a man over you. Me, a person who has dedicated my life to God. It's better to put an end to this now, before things get even more out of hand.”

“Are you serious?” Tears began rolling down her cheeks. I knew that she was broken up, but I couldn't make myself reach out and comfort her. I knew it was not the way a man of God should be acting, and I would certainly pray on it, but at the moment, I felt no sympathy for her. I believed in the sanctity of marriage, and she didn't. It was simple as that; and as much as I hated to see a woman cry, her tears were no longer my business.

“My mind is made up. You broke my trust and my heart, and there is no way in the world to unbreak it.”

She wiped her tears and straightened her shoulders, a determined look on her face. “We can get separated, but we're not getting divorced.”

“Yes, we're getting divorced.” I held my ground, reiterating my decision to move on without her.

“No! Separated, and that's that!” she announced, then got up and strode out of the room.

As I watched her walk away in that red dress, I felt genuine physical pain at the loss of our relationship. I had loved Monique fiercely and completely, even when members of my congregation were trying to convince me she wasn't worthy of the position of first lady. Her recent behavior had shown me that they were more right than I could have imagined. I would have to search my soul deeply before I could understand the lesson God meant for me to learn from this chapter of my life.

It took me a minute or two to get myself together once I reached my car, but I finally drove away with a sense of accomplishment. I had confronted my last demon and defeated my fears. The cloud was lifted. I felt like I was alive again. After all the fear, self-doubt, and sleeplessness, it was surreal to discover that the big, bad rapist in my nightmares had been reduced to a wheelchair-bound invalid, shitting in a bag and drinking through a tube. Never again would I be held hostage to my terror; I would never again worry that they were coming after me.

The freedom was exhilarating, but I was also physically exhausted. Truthfully, it had taken all of my energy to even walk into Mark's home, let alone to do what I had done, but it was well worth it. Now that I had finished what I started, I would be able to release the past.

And now I wanted to put as much distance as possible between me and this place.

From the safety of my car, I took one last look at the house of horrors, marveling at the woman I had met inside. If you had asked me before that day about the bond between a mother and her child, I would have sworn it was impenetrable. A mother's love means throwing herself on top of a grenade if it means saving her child. The woman in that house, though, didn't conform to any standard definition of the mother-child bond. If someone had come to harm us, my mother would have taken the bullet, no matter what we had done to deserve it. Mark's mother, on the other hand, basically told me her son was a monster and gave me permission to end his life. That was some cold-ass shit right there.

Ready to rid my mind of the dark thoughts that had consumed me for so long, I turned on the radio for the first time in weeks.

“Reunited, and it feels so good…” The old-school Peaches & Herb song was playing, like some sick cosmic joke. The reunion I'd just experienced felt anything but good. I quickly changed the station.

“Don't forget about us…” Mariah Carey's chart-topping vocals reached out to me like a message from the man upstairs. That tune was so spot-on that I couldn't help but giggle at the irony. Boy, did it feel strange to have a lighthearted moment, even by myself in my car. There really was no getting around the fact that Aaron still had my heart, and I deeply believed that one perpetrator at a time, I had finally placed myself in the position to win back my life. A slow smile spread across my lips at the thought of reuniting with Aaron. Would this mean that I could finally move on with my life? That I could allow the man I loved to make love to me?

I picked up my gun off of the front seat, feeling the cold steel in my palm. “Black Beauty, you're going into retirement,” I said gratefully.

As badly as I wanted to sleep, I knew that there was one more thing I had to do that night. I picked up my phone and dialed a familiar number.

“Hey, it's Tia. I know it's kind of late, but is it okay if I swing by so we can talk a bit?”

“Come on home, baby girl,” Bishop answered, and I felt one step closer to true freedom. I hung up the phone feeling ready to go forward and, most importantly, to tell the truth. It was time to go see my pastor, to cleanse my soul and to let go.

On my way to the church, I made a quick stop at my brother's house to change out of my soiled clothes and wash off the mascara that had run down my face. I wanted to start my life over, and the first step would be to wash away the vestiges of my last dramatic encounter.

By the time I jumped back into the car and pulled away from the curb, my heart was soaring. I exited the highway near the church, feeling lighter and freer than I had in weeks. I was so tired of running, and returning to First Jamaica Ministries felt like coming home.

I parked close to the entrance, since it was after hours and the lot was nearly empty. If this were Sunday, I'd be lucky to nab a space at the overflow lot a block away.

Shutting off the engine, I pulled down the visor for a final check in the mirror—just in case Aaron happened to be in the building. I almost jumped out of my skin when I saw the reflection of a woman rising up in the seat behind me. Before I could react, she slipped a belt around my neck, pulling it just taut enough to pin me to the headrest.

“You are one dumb bitch,” she hissed in my ear. “Don't you know you should never leave your car doors unlocked in the city? I knew you'd return to your brother's house sooner or later, but I had no idea you'd make it so damn easy for me to get at you.”

“Who are you?” I croaked through my constricted windpipe.

“Bitch, you're about to die.”

My survival instinct kicked in, and I began flailing my arms in an attempt to loosen the noose around my neck. I reached up my hand, trying to snatch it away, but the next thing I knew I was fighting for my life. The more I moved, the tighter she pulled the strap.

My mind went to the gun in my purse, but there was no way I could reach it. The situation was hopeless. I was about to die. After everything I had been through, all the demons I had confronted, why would God bring me this far only to let me die right in front of the church?

He wouldn't, I decided. I was not supposed to go out like this. I had to see Aaron again, to apologize and tell him how much I loved him. With my last bit of strength, I pressed on the horn and held it down, letting out a sustained blast. It startled her for a second, and she loosened her grip on the noose as she tried to pull my arm off the horn. It was just enough of a release to allow me to scream.

We struggled some more as she tried to maintain her grip on the belt and I squirmed in my seat, trying to break free. I reached for the horn again, and that's when I heard the rear door being snatched open. Just like that, the pressure on my neck was released, and my assailant flew out the opposite door.

I stumbled out of the car, coughing and gasping for air.

“Tia! Are you okay?” Bishop grabbed me and held me up.

“Who the hell was that?” I muttered in shock as we watched the woman booking her ass down the block.

“I don't know who she is, but I've definitely seen her before.” We stared at each other, the shock of what just happened striking us mute.

“Did you call the police?” I asked.

“Don't worry about it,” he said, with a deadly calm in his voice. “I'm going to take care of it myself.”

I walked up to my apartment and almost pissed myself when I saw Uncle Willie sitting in his car in front of my stoop. I searched the street to see if anyone I knew was around then quickly opened the door and slid into the passenger seat. That fool had the nerve to smirk as he pulled off.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” I yelled.

“I needed to talk to you.” He grinned, amused by my discomfort, like the asshole he was. Every time I saw him, he made me regret even more my choice to involve him in this whole thing.

“You ever heard of a phone? There are church members that live in my building. You could have blown everything.”

He shrugged, totally unconcerned with anything but his own agenda. “Your cell phone went straight to voice mail. We need to talk, so here I am.”

“My phone's dead. I left my charger at home.” I made a mental note to never do that again. The less I had to see of my uncle, the better. I sighed, buckling my seat belt. “So what do we need to talk about anyway? Please don't tell me this is about money again, because I don't wanna hear it until our plan is completed.”

“Well, to get right to the point, it is about money. A lot more moneeeeeyyyyy.” He dragged out the word like he was rapping. I sucked my teeth, wanting to punch his stupid ass.

“More money for what?” I snapped. “I've paid you everything I owe you so far. It's what we agreed on—and it was more than generous.”

He shook his head slowly, ignoring my rising anger. “Well, the situation has changed. The first lady called to tell me that the bishop asked for a divorce. It's only a matter of time until shit comes together.” He pulled into a grocery-store parking lot, looking self-satisfied. “So, I think I need a bonus.”

“Well, I think you're crazy.”

“It doesn't really matter what you think. I need more money. I've developed real feelings for the first lady, and I can't support her without money.” He popped the collar of the Hugo Boss blazer that I had purchased, along with numerous other designer pieces. Once I hired him, his broke ass insisted on a $20,000 wardrobe allowance. He told me if he was going to play the part of a successful agent, then he couldn't be dressed in Walmart T-shirts. I fell for it, blinded by my desire to succeed. If I had known it would cause his greed to balloon out of control like this, I never would have bought the stuff. I couldn't give in to his demands now, or he'd keep coming back until he took every last dime I had.

“I don't give a damn if you developed feelings for the Virgin Mary. We had a deal and you agreed, so we're done. I don't even know why we're talking about this anymore. Take me home,” I snapped.

“Well, I don't agree anymore.”

“A deal is a deal.” I said it slowly, as if he had a mental condition that kept him from grasping reality.

“Well, then let me put it in a context that you'll understand,” he said coldly. “Let's just imagine I went to the congregation and told them everything—I mean
everything
—about you and Lynn and our master plan. Those folks would run your ass out of town so fast…”

The last part sent a chill through me. I couldn't bear the thought of being chased out of the church before I had a chance to fulfill my goal.

“How much money would it be worth for you to stop me from having my little crisis of conscience?” he asked.

Part of me was so scared of failing that I wanted to write him a check immediately, but looking at his smug grin, I couldn't let him think he'd defeated me so easily. “Don't get it twisted,” I said, forcing myself to stay calm. “I'm not giving you a dime more than we agreed to. And if you do tell anyone about this, I'm not even gonna give you that. You need to just do what you're supposed to and stop this nonsense so you can get paid.”

He was unimpressed by my speech and pushed back even harder. “Sure you won't reconsider? Because I'd hate to have to visit you in jail.” He pierced me with a look that was meant to scare me.

I rolled my eyes. Now he was trying a little too hard, I thought, making up baseless threats. “Oh, please. I haven't done anything that's going to get me arrested. And even if I had, you're just as guilty as I am.”

“Not for the murder of Pippie Nixon I'm not. I had nothing to do with that, but you and your girl Lynn? How much time do you think you're gonna spend behind bars for that murder?”

“Oh, come on, Uncle Willie. Now you're just making shit up to try to scare me. I didn't murder Pippie, and neither did Lynn.” Just the thought that he would accuse me of doing something to Pippie had me pissed off. He was really barking up the wrong tree with that accusation.

“Oh my God,” he said. “Either you're just plain stupid or more naive than I ever imagined. Maybe you didn't have anything to do with it, but Lynn killed that boy.”

“Shut up, Willie! Shut the fuck up!” I jumped right up in his face, grabbing his lapels, ready to beat the black off of him. I didn't care that he weighed twice as much as I did, or that he could crush me. He was stepping way out of line by suggesting that Lynn would do something like that, knowing how I felt about Pippie. “She did not kill Pippie!”

“Yes, she did,” he said matter-of-factly. “According to Monique, the cops said Pippie had a bloody
R
on his forehead, just like the others. Do you think that was just coincidence? I sure as hell don't.”

The truth was, neither did I. Monique had told him a while back about the bloody
R
found on two other recent murder victims. Supposedly both guys were tied to Tia somehow, and the first lady actually thought Tia had committed the crimes. When Willie told me and Lynn about it, we actually had a good laugh. Lynn even said something like, “That's good to know. If I ever have someone to kill, I'll just put a letter of the alphabet on their head, and the cops will tie it back to Tia.”

“She didn't do it,” I whispered, not sure if I even believed my own words. I let go of his lapels, frozen in place, as the gravity of his words sank in. At first all I wanted to do was find Lynn and rip her head off, but then I wanted to know, “Why? Why would she do something like that? Pippie wasn't a threat. He was my friend.”

“That's why she did it,” he replied. “Because he was your friend.”

“What are you saying?” I asked, not wanting to believe what he was suggesting—that somehow I was responsible for Pippie's death.

“I'm saying she's in love with you. People do strange things when they're in love. You of all people should know that. Wouldn't you kill someone for somebody you love?”

He already knew the answer to that.

“What am I supposed to do now that I know this?” I asked sadly. When I left Virginia to execute my plan, I had no idea that it would lead to something like this.

“You stick to the plan, that's what you do. You can't bring that boy back, and Lynn is your biggest asset next to me.”

As far as I was now concerned, neither one of them was an asset.

“In another two weeks she'll be in Afghanistan, ducking bullets from the Taliban. If God is just, she'll catch one and your misery will be over.”

“What?” I shouted. “I'm mad at her, but I don't want her dead.” There'd already been too much loss in my lifetime.

“Then act like it. Get over this guy Pippie and move on with our plan…Speaking of which, there's still the issue of my money,” he said, bringing the conversation right back to his original purpose. “I need insurance just in case this blows up in our faces.”

“I'm not giving you more money.”

He sighed, tired of my defiance. “Maybe you're not exactly under­standing grown folks' talk. Either you give me the money first thing tomorrow morning, or your shit is on full disclosure, and I will make sure you don't have a chance to get Aaron Mackie. Is that clear enough for you?”

I felt every bone in my body shaking with rage. The fact that this mother­fucker was my only living family made his blackmail ten times worse.

“Fine. I will be at your office tomorrow to give you exactly what you deserve.”

“I knew you'd see this my way. Don't make no sense that you get to keep all that money to yourself. It's much better to share the wealth.” He had the audacity to try to give me a hug. I shoved him away.

“Don't touch me!”

“It's like that?” He laughed, pulling out of the parking lot to head back toward my house.

When Uncle Willie dropped me off, there was a light on in my apartment, which meant that Lynn was there. I bolted from the car, wanting to get away from my uncle and get inside to confront my so-called lover.

Lynn was sitting on the sofa with a freaked-out look on her face, as if she already knew I was on the warpath. I assumed Uncle Willie had called her, giving her a heads-up as soon as I got out of the car. It turned out I was wrong.

“We got a problem,” she said the second I walked through the door.

“Damn right we got a problem!” I marched right up to her and slapped her as hard as I could.

“What the—” Surprisingly, she didn't even flinch, just placed a hand on her cheek and looked up at me like she was perplexed as to why I would do that to her.

“Did you kill Pippie?” I shouted. “Did you kill him?”

She stared at me with no response.

“Goddammit, Lynn. Did you kill Pippie?” Inside, I was begging her to say no, though a part of me already knew she wouldn't say that.

Finally, she admitted in a blasé tone, “Yes, I killed Pippie.”

I'd never been in a fistfight, but suddenly I knew what it felt like to be punched in the stomach. Things were not supposed to turn out like this. “Why?” I croaked.

“Because I love you. That's why.”

“You don't love me. You killed my friend!” I leaped at her, swinging my fists like a maniac. She grabbed my wrists and we wrestled for a minute until she pinned me to the floor.

“Get out! Get the fuck out my house, you dike bitch!” I yelled as I struggled to free myself. It was useless. Lynn was a trained soldier, and I was no match for her strength. Before long I gave up and stopped fighting, lying limp on the floor.

She attempted to explain. “You asked me to come to New York to help you, Desiree. I did what I did because that man was the enemy and you couldn't even see it. He was Aaron's best friend, and nothing good could come out of your friendship with him. He was standing in the way of you achieving your goal. Don't you see? I was helping you.”

“I didn't ask you to kill him,” I sobbed.

She released my arms and moved away so I could sit up. Then she held my hands and looked into my eyes. “You're right. I fucked up. I was jealous of him, and maybe I overreacted. But I did it for you. I love you, Desiree. All I want is for you to get what you want.”

“But I didn't want him to die.”

“Of course you didn't,” she said. “Because you're a good person. But if you set aside your emotions and are honest with yourself, you know he would have gotten in the way. Ask yourself one question: In the end, what's most important to you, Pippie or Aaron Mackie?”

We both knew the answer to that one. Aaron was the whole reason I'd left Virginia and come to New York in the first place.

“Pippie was just collateral damage,” she said, wiping away my tears. “His death wasn't your fault.”

I collapsed against her and she held me tight, stroking my hair to soothe me. “I will always protect you, Desiree. I will always do what's best for you.”

I turned my face toward hers. “I love you,” I said, sealing the proclamation with a deep kiss. Lynn may have done the wrong thing when it came to Pippie, but she would always do the right thing by me. I trusted her. I had to. She was all I had.

“I don't ever want to lose you,” she said, stroking my face gently.

We held each other quietly for a while, too emotionally spent for anything else.

“Hey, Des, can I ask you a question?” she said after a few minutes.

“Sure.”

“How did you know it was me?”

I swallowed any lingering anger at her and said, “Well, I wasn't a hundred percent sure it was you until you admitted it, but when Uncle Willie told me about the red
R
on Pippie's forehead, I thought—”

“Fuckin' Willie,” she spat. “Why couldn't he have just kept his mouth shut?”

I agreed with her on that one. He already knew I was sad about Pippie's death, and then he had to make it worse by revealing that the woman I loved was responsible. If I didn't know better, I'd think he had his own little plan in the works—to destroy me.

“Yeah, fuckin' Willie,” I said. “You know he just came to me saying he needs more money? He says he'll reveal our whole plan to the church if I don't give him more.”

“What!” She jumped up and started pacing. “Des, that mother­fucker won't be happy until he's spent every last dime of your insurance money.”

“I know. But if I don't give him the money and he tells it all, I'll never get Aaron.”

She stopped pacing and looked down at me with a determined expression. “I will
not
let that happen. All I ever wanted was to make you happy, baby, and I will do whatever it takes.” She resumed her pacing. Under her breath, I heard her mumble something along the lines of “That's what I was trying to do tonight.”

The tension in her body gave me an uneasy feeling. “Lynn, what are you talking about?” I asked warily.

“The bishop saw me tonight.”

“So? He doesn't know who you are.”

She corrected me. “He does know me. Remember when he came to your uncle's office to fight over Monique? I was the one who tried to stop him. He knows me as Jackson Young's secretary.”

“Well, did he say anything to you tonight? I mean, it's ‘Jackson Young' he has a problem with, not his secretary.” I still wasn't understanding why she thought this problem was so serious—but that was only because she hadn't shared the worst details yet.