Capone

3. Capone Delgato

3

capone delgato

Naheim came bopping back into the store with a smile on his face. His ass better had wiped that look off his face because he was married.

To my little sister.

He was out here picking and swinging around brown skin like he didn’t have a commitment around his fucking finger. I had told that nigga the moment he broke my sister’s heart, I would put his ass in the grave.

My first question when he finally bopped his ass in here and leaned against the freezer chest was about brown skin, and why the hell he was swinging her around like he didn’t have a wife at home?

“Who that?” I nodded toward the entrance of the store.

He scoffed. “Timmy’s stupid ass…. Big booty Tasha’s son. He swears if he hang around long enough that I’m gonna put him on,” he explained.

“Fuck him… I’m talking about shorty you were hugging and tossing around.”

Naheim laughed. “Chill. I haven’t seen her in years.”

“Who is she?”

“Oh, E?”

“Yeah, E,” I mocked, fed up with how he was withholding the information to my future wife. I had only seen her for a quick second, and I was already conjuring up how I could run into her for a second time.

When the altercation between shorty and Timmy broke out, I was about to head out there and knock some sense into that little nigga’s head, but Naheim beat me to the punch.

He was taking forever to get to the damn point and my patience was running thin. “Me and Erin grew up together. The last time I saw her was when I was about to be sent upstate.”

“You know her, or you know her?”

As he was about to reply, my phone started ringing. I grabbed it from my pocket, holding my finger up to screen the call. When I noticed the number, I slid my finger across the screen and held it up to my ear. “Yo.”

The same bitch that always told me to press one to accept the call spoke her usual shit. A few seconds after I accepted the call my brother’s voice came through the line. “Yo, Capo… what up?” My brother Cappadonna’s voice commanded the line.

“Ain’t shit but the sky… how you?”

“Could be better. Just getting over a fucking cold… nasty ass niggas don’t know how to cover they mouth,” he complained.

“Other than that… you straight?”

“Yeah. I need you to go and check on Kendra. I’ve been hitting her phone the last few days and she hasn’t hit me back.”

“You beefing with her this week?”

“Nigga, I ain’t never beefing with her. Kendra always got a problem… and I don’t be wanting to hear that shit.”

Kendra and Cappadonna were always on and off. One minute they were together, then the next she was broadcasting to the world that she was single. When he got locked up, she swore she was going to hold him down. If he only knew the shit she was out here doing while she was supposed to be his girl, he would catch another case on top of the one he was already serving.

Capp never wanted nobody to tell him what was going on with his girl. I guess it was better off with him not knowing what was going on. Maybe it helped him from going upside somebody’s head while on the inside. I peeped how she moved, and I kept note on how she was doing my brother.

“You pay for her entire life… fuck she got a problem with?” Capp paid for everything that Kendra wanted.

I avoided getting into my brother’s business because he was a grown ass man and I trusted he knew what he was doing. He already paid for her nice ass condo in Brooklyn, upgraded her whip every time she complained, and kept her pockets laced with money.

I was the nigga that was dropping money off to her every month, and making sure the rent was paid in that expensive ass condo. It was Capp’s money, but it was me physically going to make sure the shit was paid, and she had money. Kendra was an entitled ass bitch, and I couldn’t wait until my brother came home so he could see the shit for himself.

She was careful, too.

I was never able to catch her fucking with any other niggas. That didn’t mean she wasn’t fucking around on Capp behind his back. I had my own shit going on, so I wasn’t so invested in what the fuck Kendra had going on.

“Chill on her,” he warned.

“What’s gonna happen when you come home? You gonna move into the condo and things are gonna be happily ever after? Nigga, she eats bacon.”

Cappadonna laughed. “Fuck up. She gonna give that swine the fuck up. I’m not the same person I was before I went in. It ain’t easy holding it down for as long as she’s been holding me down. I’ll let her have her freedom because when I come home shit is gonna change.”

Capp might have been in his cell thinking that shit was going to change when he got home, but I knew better. Kendra had gotten used to having her freedom, so it was going to be hard for her to submit and be the woman that Capp wanted when he finally touched down.

“Yeah, ight.” I laughed.

“Other than my shit, you good?”

I smirked because Capp would forever worry about everyone. He was the one that was in prison, yet he was worried about us. “I’m straight. Just because you’re older by a few minutes don’t mean shit.”

Capp let out his infamous hearty laugh. “It’s always gonna mean shit. Look, don’t come up and see me this weekend… I’m going into the hole.”

“The fuck? For what?”

Capp ran that prison, and the warden hated that shit. He was able to do shit that the regular inmate wasn’t. Like now, he was calling me before being put in the hole, which was unheard of when you were in prison. This nigga had them scheduling the shit like it was a routine doctor’s appointment.

I already knew not to talk too much over the phone. Whenever Capp needed me to know something he either told me on a visit, or he used the phone that he paid to have smuggled into the prison.

“All is good.”

“Nigga, you already know it is. Damn warden be trying to make an example and show he got pull… hurt his feelings so now he wants me put up until his ego is healed.” Capp laughed, not giving a fuck that he would have to sit up for the next week or so.

“Hit me when you get your privileges back.”

“You already know.”

“Love you, nigga.”

“Love you too, Punk ass,” I replied, and we ended the call.

As I wrapped up the call, I put my attention back to Naheim. “You ready?”

As he nodded, we headed out the store to continue the real reason I was even out here today. I never frequented these parts, but since I saw Ms. Erin, I knew I would be over here more so I could run into her again.

Naheim tapped on the wooden door with the back of his hand a few times before the door opened. Sarge, one of my dealers, opened the door. He was about to bullshit with Naheim until he saw I was behind him.

“Fuck… what’s good, Capo?”

I ignored him, shoving my way inside the house. From the way Sarge opened the door, I knew shit had to change. Naheim had been having problems with this trap for a minute. Money was always short, or product was coming up short. When I was younger, I lived to bust a nigga’s head open over missing product and money.

Now that I was older, the thrill wasn’t the same anymore. I was tired of having to tell grown ass men what needed to be done. Niggas loved to cry when they needed money, but they never wanted to do the fucking work to get the money.

As I walked into the living room, I slapped the shit out of one of the niggas that was supposed to be working. Instead, he had his feet propped up on the coffee table playing a fucking game system.

Who raised these niggas?

“Nigga, you lost your min…” his words were caught in his throat when he realized it was me. “Oh shit, Cap…Capone.” He jumped up from the couch.

“O…Oh shit, C…Capone,” I mocked and punched him in the chest, sending him barreling through the coffee table.

“What the fuck is going….” Tasha stopped short when she realized what had unfolded. “Capone, what you doing here?” she crossed her arms, looking down at homeboy who was holding his chest while groaning.

I ignored her and watched as the rest of them fell in line. It wasn’t that Naheim was weak and couldn’t hold it down, he was holding too many down. The man worked hard, and I would never take that from him. However, he had let shit slip through the cracks. Tasha should have been doing her job, not fucking asking me questions about what the fuck I’m doing.

“I pay you bitches to play games? This house exists so you can play games and chill with your friends?” I slapped the shit out of one of the younger ones.

If you came to me and wanted to work, I put your ass to work. I wasn’t a fucking social worker and having feelings didn’t exist in this world. When me and Capp got in the streets nobody asked us to sign a damn permission slip. You got in, put in work, and prayed you got out without losing your life or doing time.

Sarge was supposed to be in charge whenever Naheim wasn’t here, and he was like one of the young ones. It was the blind leading the blind in this bitch.

Kincaid, the second in charge came out the back room where Tasha had been fixing his pants. “Oh, we fucking on the clock, too?”

Tasha turned away, avoiding eye contact with me. I could tell when a nigga had been inside a bitch, and being that Kincaid was probably a few years older than her son, he couldn’t hide that shit.

“Nah, n—” He didn’t get to finish his sentence because I punched him in the mouth.

“Capon—”

I grabbed her ponytail up and pulled her close to my face. “You were back there sucking this young nigga’s dick?”

“We…W…Naheim,” she called out like he was going to help her out, and he stood by the counter with his arms crossed.

“The fuck you want him to do? I can smell the dick all on your fucking breath. I pay you to cook crack, bitch, not fuck my workers. If you want to use that pussy, I can sure open another house and let you use it.” I released her, and she fell to the ground next to Kincaid.

I had to give Kincaid credit. He was made differently. While the bitch I had punched in the chest was still on the floor moaning in pain, he had picked himself up from the floor and was standing in front of me waiting to see what came next.

“If any of you touch this pussy, it better be on your own fucking time.” Tasha was still on the floor acting like I had punched her in the face, too.

If she didn’t cook crack so good I would have been let her hoe ass go. I wish I could say this was the first time she had pulled some shit like this. While niggas my age wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole, these little niggas didn’t know any better. They were so hyped to bust a nut that she was the best option.

“Matter fact, I’m Ms. Flanigan and you bitches are Annie. Get the fucking mop and clean this shit up. I better be able to see my fucking face in these floors the next time I come through.”

They all flinched when I walked past them and out the door. I hopped in the passenger side of Naheim’s truck and waited for him to finish up talking to them. I was pissed that they made me come out here to scold them like they weren’t grown. Tasha was older than all of them and here she was in the back room sucking dick instead of cooking up my product.

I couldn’t stand that bitch and hated that she used to be one of my sister’s best friends. I never understood why Capri ever kept her ass around. Naheim jogged down the steps and hopped in the driver seat, pulling off right away.

The one rule me and Capp had was that we never sat around. Once our ass hit the seat, we pulled the fuck away.

“Tasha in there talking big shit about not working for us anymore,” Naheim mentioned.

“Fuck her.”

“Yeah.” He zoned out as he drove through the blocks. “Pop out tonight.”

Naheim wasn’t my best friend; he was my brother-in-law. Other than work, we didn’t kick it much. It wasn’t because I disliked him, I just stayed to myself. My best friend was locked up, so I preferred to stay to myself.

“For what?”

“Capri out of town with her girls from law school, so I’m gonna kick it with my cousin. I gotta drop him some money anyway. They having a barbecue and all that shit.”

“Nah, I’m straight.”

“Nigga, come out and chill. You always up in the fucking house. I know you want some food.”

I laughed because I could taste the grilled chicken with barbeque sauce. “I’ll think about it.”

I leaned back and enjoyed the ride. My hand was stinging from having to slap and punch people that already knew what was expected of them.

I couldn’t wait until Capp was out so he could handle this shit. Capp lived for this side of the job, while I just wanted to make money and chill the fuck out. The minute he came home the streets was going to be a fucking zoo, I could already tell. The shit sent a good chill up my spine in anticipation.