Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Yo, I’mma fuckin’ kill her!” The Dealer growled from the passenger’s seat of the car I was trapped in. I’d come to discover his name was Swiss. That’s what The Passenger kept calling him. Jerome was what they were calling The Passenger, who was now driving.
“Your ego ain’t worth two hundred Gs, my nigga,” Jerome argued. “Ain’t nobody killin’ her. We gon’ drop you off at the hospital, take her to Silas, and get this money.”
The third man in the trio sat beside me in the back. The other two men were calling him Grip, which I felt was a fitting name because he had an unbelievably tight grip on my upper arm.
“At least let me break this bitch’s arm and see how the fuck she likes it,” Swiss shouted, holding his hand tight against his bleeding gunshot wound.
Jerome turned a corner as he laughed. “If you ain’t want to get shot, you shouldn’t have let her have your gun.”
“What? You think I just handed it to her?”
“Fuck all that.” Jerome parked, nodding toward the entrance of the Jackson Memorial emergency room.
I thought about screaming for help. One step ahead of me, Jerome turned around met my eyes menacingly.
“If I hear a peep outta you when he opens that door, I’ll break your arm my damn self, y’hear me? ”
He waited for me to respond. I could feel tears burning hot against my cheeks as I offered him a short nod.
“Good girl.”
Swiss let himself out, stumbling into the hospital as we drove off.
“Ayo, Grip, you know where Silas stay at?” Jerome asked the man in the backseat with me.
Grip replied, “It’s near Pinecrest, but it’s closer to the beach. I’ll tell you when you need to turn.”
“Pinecrest,” Jerome echoed, then whistled, impressed by the address. “That nigga’s money too long.”
“We ‘bout to get money, too!” Grip hooted excitedly, shaking me as if I should be excited as well. “We really gon’ share it with Swiss?”
Jerome took his eyes off the road for a moment and shot Grip a look as if to say, Of course not.
He explained, “Swiss almost got popped by a little girl. That nigga don’t deserve to get paid. We split it 50-50. A hundred Gs for me, a hundred for you.”
I listened as the men plotted to double-cross their wounded partner, getting a feel for how insignificant they thought I was, in how openly they discussed it. Grip listed off directions for Jerome to take, all the while, his hands growing too familiar with my body.
“She kinda pretty, don’t you think?” Grip announced when we were almost there. Jerome glanced at my face from the rearview mirror and nodded in agreement. I felt the chill of fear settle in me then. Grip only made the chill stronger when he said, “Yo, pull over.”
“Why?” Jerome asked, an eyebrow climbing.
“She’s pretty,” Grip repeated as if this was all the reason he needed. “Pull over.”
His hand moved up my thigh, fingers creeping between them. Just before he could touch the button of my jeans, I swatted his hand away. Angered by my rejection, Grip’s fist went flying, colliding with the side of my face. I saw stars in my vision.
Jerome was alarmed, and he parked. “Yooo! Don’t hit her. Don’t put ya dick in her, neither. We don’t know what Silas wants her for, and you not about to fuck up my money over pussy.”
“Oh shut up, Rome. Silas only want her ‘cause her daddy’s the prosecutor on his trial. He might even throw us a bonus if we rough her up a little ‘fore we send her to him.”
“You don’t know that,” Jerome argued, his eyes hot with violence. “Don’t. Touch. Her.”
Grip’s eyebrows came together before he relented, letting me go. Relief washed over me. “A’ight, nigga. Can she touch me?”
I didn’t understand what he was getting at, but Jerome did. He rolled his eyes and shrugged. “Whatever, nigga.”
With that, Grip reached for the zipper of his jeans, pulling out a semi-erect penis, rubbing himself up and down. I tried to put some distance between him and I, as he started to bark orders. “Gimme some head, Rich Girl.”
Oddly, I wasn’t even scared.
After getting chased and captured, riding around in a car with kidnappers, getting punched in the face, and gradually accepting the fact that I was about to be handed off to Silas fucking Montgomery—I snapped.
What more could Grip do to me if I simply said, ‘Fuck you’?
So I said it.
And then he grabbed at my neck, roughly forcing my head down. I started screaming for him to let me go, scratching and punching whatever I could get my hands on. After a lengthy struggle, Grip eventually released my neck. Just before he could hit me again, I threatened him.
“I will bite your shit off if you touch me. And you wanna know what I just realized? Your friend won’t let you kill me after I do it.
He’s not playing about his money. He will sooner kill you to protect me—his money.
Then it’s just him and me. He hands me over to Silas—and boom.
Two hundred thousand dollars is a lot of money to not have to share. So test me.”
Jerome whistled at my valor.
“She ain’t lyin’,” he confirmed my observation, and started the car again. “So you might wanna put ya dick away, bruh.”
The remainder of the car ride was spent in silence. A part of me was a little dazed over my courage this evening. It almost felt like someone else was doing it all. But it was me.
I had it in me to face a gunman. I had it in me to fight him off and shoot him. I had it in me to take ownership of my body. I was strong. Maybe even a little brave.
I thought back to the mousey, crying Lauren from months ago, the one who begged Victor not to rape her. She was so weak. She was so na?ve.
That girl and I were so different. She wouldn’t even be able to imagine my life as it was now.
Kain wasn’t wrong when he called that girl a child.
When the car pulled up to the grand beachside estate from my memories, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel some fear.
However, what good were my tears? I was already here.
Better to face my doom with a clear head and bravery.
If tonight was the night I died, at least I could say they wouldn’t have the satisfaction of seeing me grovel at their feet.
I was not weak. Not anymore.
I wiped my face of the fallen tears, and told myself I wouldn’t be crying again.
Jerome held me at my upper arm, his untrimmed fingernails digging into my skin. His treatment was rough as he shoved me forward across the brick-paved driveway. When my eyes scanned the half dozen cars parked out front, I was not surprised that I was unable to find a black Camaro in the bunch.
The sadness that settled in my chest was not for me, but because this was only another sign that he was gone.
I stumbled over a step as Jerome pushed me up the walkway leading up to the mansion’s main entrance. Jerome swore under his breath and roughly brought me back up to my feet, his nails perforating my skin. I winced at the painful feeling, stopping my steps when met with a large brown door.
From behind me, Grip’s hand came up and pressed a single finger to the Montgomery’s doorbell.
There was no response. Grip rang the doorbell several more times.
“Maybe we shoulda called first,” he said to Jerome.
Jerome huffed, shaking his shoulders and reaching into the distance to bang the door with a closed fist. “All these cars in the driveway, and can’t nobody open a—”
The door clicked unlocked, and Jerome abruptly stopped talking, drawing in a calming breath. I kept my eyes down as the door slowly opened.
I was ready to meet my fate.
Reluctantly, I dragged my head up, my eyes trailing up a tall, masculine frame.
He was leaning nonchalantly against the doorway, as if visits like this in the dead of night were normal.
My eyes continued to rise, a slow breath coming out of me as my brain began to pick up on familiar characteristics.
I’ve met this person before.
Just before our eyes collided, something in my chest swelled with a mess of emotions.
Elation. Calm. Relief.
However, I knew not to wear my relief so plainly on my features.
You know what was strange? I wasn’t relieved for me.
Inside, it was solely the relief of discovery that consumed me. I was relieved to finally know the answer to the question that had been eating at me for the past six miserable days.
In that moment, I confirmed that he wasn’t one of the seventy-three people who died that night. Because here he stood, calm as always, leaning casually against the doorframe.
Kain.