Chapter 13 #2
“Damn. I hate this. I remember her first day in the class. I could see it in her eyes that she was one of the ones that wanted to be saved. Then, I remember the day that he came up to the warehouse, forcing her to get in the car with him. I wanted to save her then, but I had to remember that she was a grown woman, and you can’t force grown women to leave a situation that they’re not ready to leave yet.
I’ll be back in a couple of days though, and when I touch down, I’m going to reach out to her best friend.
From the stuff that I saw on the news, she seems to be someone that Tamera was close with.
I want to take care of the funeral arrangements for her, and her babies,” I went on.
“That’s so nice of you to do, Uzi. We’ll talk when you get back. I don’t want to disturb you anymore. Enjoy your trip,” Lorraine said, and right after I thanked her, I hung the phone up.
“What happened?” Loco wanted to know.
“They found my student Tamera’s body, and her kids. Out in the fuckin woods. He buried them there,” I slipped up by saying “he”.
Technically, no one really knew who killed them and buried them there.
Everyone just had speculation that it was the husband, especially since he was missing in action.
I never told Loco what I did. Not because I wanted to keep secrets from him, but I was one of those killers that liked very few people to know what I did.
It was just the mindset that I’ve always had.
That way if I ever got jammed for something, and the feds went to my loved ones for questions, my loved ones wouldn’t have to lie because they genuinely wouldn’t know what the fuck was going on.
“Who’s he? Her husband?” Loco asked me.
“We don’t know if it was him for sure. We just feel like it was her husband that did it because he’s nowhere to be found,” I voiced, trying to raise up from his lap, but he wouldn’t let me.
I could lie to a lot of people, but I couldn’t lie to Loco.
He could read me in ways that no one else was able to do.
He was staring at me hard. Trying to read me.
I could tell his mind was spinning. Probably coming up with all kinds of shit, and knowing him, and the way his brain worked, the things that he was coming up with were probably spot on.
“You killed that nigga, didn’t you?” he asked me, and I looked at him dumbfounded.
I had to really get in my acting bag right now and pretend that I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.
“What? Loco, what?” was all I could really ask because I was more caught off guard than anything.
“I just watched your reaction to someone calling you and telling you that one of your former students and her babies being found in the woods, and you didn’t bat an eye towards that.
I know the life that me, and you come from.
I know after a while of seeing so many bodies drop, or hearing about people that we know and love dying makes you numb.
Makes you desensitized in a sense. But this shit right here?
You reacted as if you knew about it already.
Months ago, when Tamera stopped attending your class, you was on that shit hard.
You kept talking to me about her, telling me that you were thinking about her.
You wouldn’t let it go. I know you, Uzi.
Look me in my eyes, and lie to me again, and we going to have big problems, love. Did you kill that nigga?” he asked me.
His voice was firm. I bit down hard on my bottom lip, trying to see how I should respond.
“I did. It was nagging at me that she stopped coming to class, so I went looking for her. I had her address in her file. When I got there, I was able to force my way in through the back. It was blood on the walls, and the floor. He came in moments later. I was able to get a confession out of him. He told me that no one would find them, and that they were floating at the bottom of the ocean. I killed him after,” I told him the truth.
“Why the fuck wouldn’t you tell me that? Didn’t we used to beef about shit like this years ago when we were both in the game?” his voice got a little louder with me.
I didn’t say anything. I sat here, and let my husband chew my ass out, while I kept quiet.
He went on for about a minute, telling me that I should have told him what I did.
I don’t think he was that mad because he didn’t lift my ass up and make me get off his lap.
He did have that sexy mean mug on his face though.
“Boogie came and cleaned that shit up for you?” he asked me.
Boogie was our head man when it came to cleaning up mess. We went years back. He could clean the messiest scene and have it looking brand new.
“Yeah,” I said, and he sucked his teeth, while shaking his head.
“I’m about to call that nigga right now and curse his ass out.
I told him years ago that if you call him, for him to call me because that means that you trying to hide some shit from me, or you doing something that you don’t have any business doing.
Watch out,” he said, trying to move me this time, but I stayed put, not moving.
“I just didn’t want to talk about it, Marcelo. You know the code that I live by when it comes to catching a body—”
“Don’t live up to that code shit with me, Uzi!
The morning you did that shit, you were supposed to come home and tell me about it.
It’s been months, and you just now said something about it.
The only reason why you even said something about it is because I was right here when you got the phone call, and I was able to put the shit together on my own,” he snapped at me.
I nodded my head, letting him know that he was right.
I also apologized for keeping it a secret from him.
I told him everything. I didn’t want to leave room for him to get mad at me again, so I even told him about the detectives coming down to the warehouse, just to tell me that Tamera, and her children had been missing, and wanting to know if I knew anything. I spilled it all.
“I ain’t mad at you for doing what you did. I know you. I expected you to kill her husband. What I didn’t expect was for you not to tell me about the shit,” he went on.
“I know, and for that I’m sorry. You going to be mad at me for the rest of the trip?” I asked him, leaning my head in, and putting my face right in front of his.
I put my arms down, so that I could place them under his shirt, and I softly raked my nails up, and down his abs. I knew that I was breaking him down because a few seconds into it, his face didn’t look as hardcore anymore.
As I was doing that, I could hear movement. Someone was walking into the family room, and it was Aries coming in. She was holding her two-year-old daughter, Alai in her arms. You could tell that the two of them had just woken up from their nap.
“Where your phone? I texted you,” Aries said to me, walking into the family room, and she flopped down on the couch.
She sat her daughter in her lap, who laid her head on her mother’s chest, and she placed her little thumb in her mouth.
Alai was so pretty. She was a true diva.
She liked to be in all the hair, and make-up products like her mommy.
She was just a damn baby, but she was already into handbags.
Every time Cartier bought a pricey handbag for Aries, Alai felt like she needed one too.
“I was getting scolded,” I said to her, and she laughed at me, while rolling her eyes.
“Loco, gone on. For real,” Aries said, not even knowing what it was about, but she was ready to take my side.
“See the type of weird ass shit ya’ll do? Don’t even know what she did, but you ready to ride for her. Let me go outside, and smoke. Keep coming up with more shit to add to your apology. This shit not over with yet,” Loco said, lifting me, so that he could stand up.
He placed me back down on the couch, and then he left out. Once he was gone, I lay on my side, and Aries kept her eyes on Loco, waiting on him to leave out of the room, so that she could ask me what happened.
“What the hell did you do?” she asked me.
I had to vent, so I sat here, telling my best friend everything. She hung onto my every word, her eyes on me, paying close attention to what I was saying to her.
“Damn. Why didn’t you say anything to him from jump?” she asked, and I just groaned because she was making it worst. She fought back a smile, clearly entertained by this.
“I don’t know why you would ever keep a secret from Loco’s crazy ass to begin with.
Stay your ass in the house tonight with your husband, while we go out for part two.
I had a fuckin time last night. Girl, Cartier was so annoyed with me when we got in last night.
I’m sending him all these sexy videos last night while we were at the club.
The drinks kicked in, I’m telling him all the shit that I’m going to do to him, only for me to pass out as soon as I made it in the room.
My ass was exhausted,” she shared, and I laughed at that.
I sat here, staring at my best friend in awe.
Her beautiful chocolate skin has always been something that I would compliment her on.
Then, she had the nerve to be sitting there with her own mini me, that had the same chocolate skin and was just as beautiful as her mother.
Aries had that fine, straight hair. It was jet black, and she had it pulled up into a high ponytail.
Just chilling around the house in her lounge clothes but was still just as beautiful as ever.
A mother to two children, but she still looked so youthful.
Aries lifted a little bit, so that she could look out of the patio sliding door that was behind us. She squinted and then laughed.
“That’s Riot, and Dolo laying on that swing, under that tree in the middle of this heat? Oh baby, ain’t that much good dick in the world,” she cracked, putting her hands over Alai’s ears, so that she wouldn’t hear her.
I laughed because that was my immediate thought when I saw them doing that a while go.
“Loco came out here, and saw them, talking about I haven’t done any wild shit like that in a while to prove that I love him.
Mind you, they only went out there to chill.
They ended up falling asleep in the swing.
Aries, they been out there sleeping for over an hour.
I’ll do a lot of shit for Loco. I’m not laying in the middle of the sun, with a hoodie on for him though,” I cracked back, and Aries was cracking up.
In the middle of us laughing, and cracking, Beretta and Puma came walking in the room. Beretta was holding onto Mauricio. Everyone was slowly waking up and coming in here with us.
Mauricio saw that I was in here, and he reached for me. I took my baby from his auntie and rained kisses on him. Beretta sat next to me, pulling her legs up, so that she could sit Indian style. Puma came over, too sitting next to Beretta.
“We found this spot on TikTok. It’s called Aziza. It’s a restaurant, and lounge. It’s a nice vibe. Kind of like the vibe that we had going on last night. Ya’ll coming with us again, or ya’ll going to be on mommy duty?” Beretta wanted to know.
“I have a man upstairs, boo. It’s nothing to leave these kids with they daddy,” I let her know, and she giggled.
“See, this one of the benefits of not having kids. Me, and Puma can pick up, and do whatever the fuck we want to do,” she let me know.
“Yeah, and keep it that way,” I told her.
“Where’s Riot?” she wanted to know, and I reached my hand up, and pointed in the direction of the patio door.
Both her and Puma looked, and just like everyone else that saw, they laughed when they saw her, and Dolo out there, lying up under the tree.
The two of them were knocked out and probably didn’t have any plans of getting up anytime soon.
As someone that used to be in the streets, working crazy hours, barely getting any rest, I knew that their bodies needed the sleep that they were undergoing right now.
We were all leaving in two days, and once we were back home, it was back to that lifestyle for them, where they didn’t get a lot of rest, so it was cool that they were soaking it all up right now.
“I thought that I loved to be up under my man. I don’t hold a candle to Riot. We took each other’s numbers down. She said that she’s going to hang with me, and Puma back home,” Beretta let me know.
“That’s a friendship that I’ll approve of. We both know that outside of Puma, your ass don’t have the best track record in making new friends,” I let her know.
“I befriend one wrong person, and you still hanging that shit over my head,” she went on.
“Because that shit was one friend too many,” Aries jumped in, so I didn’t have to.
I still get chills when I think about the friend from college that Beretta made. Her name was Dakedra, and she ended up being a real nutcase. My sister dodged death with that girl, and since then, she never entertained any new friendships.
I didn’t mind her hanging with Riot. Riot was much different from her, and Puma, but I still felt like the three of them would get along.
Everybody started pouring into the family room, and once the kids came in, making all this damn noise, I skipped off for a little bit, so that I could go, and find my man.
I needed to make sure that we weren’t beefing.
I knew that this wasn’t something that he was going to drag out and hang it over my head for days though.
He was just going to be in his feelings about it for a little bit.
He was entitled to that though because I was supposed to tell him when it happened. I dropped the ball on that one.