What the fuck? They just let her go up. That’s not Malachi’s wife. Who is she?
3
Dining With the Devil
Atlanta, GA
MALACHI
“I checked up on that job you had Reggie do,” Ricky said as he sat in front of me. Ricky had been my right hand man for about ten years now. He’d been my most reliable soldier in the game.
“And?”
“Well, I found out that nigga Dre is up in Emory in a coma.”
“A coma?”
“Yep. Looks like Reggie didn’t quite get the job done like he thought,” Ricky quipped as he was checking his iPhone.
“Damn. I swear that nigga can’t piss straight without making a mess,” I grumbled as I looked out the window at Reggie sitting at a table, getting a dance from a girl.
As I was looking at my retarded little brother, I saw the most stunning woman I’d seen in a while walk in the club. I saw ass every day, and I could fuck any bitch in there I wanted, so I was not easily impressed with too many women I see. But this one got my attention immediately. She walked through the club with confidence, and she seemed to have a glow about her. She was flawless.
“Who is that?” I asked Ricky, and he stood up and looked at her through the window.
“That’s the chick I was following around in Dre’s car. I think that’s his girl. She’s heading straight up here. Do you want me to tell security to keep her there?”
“No. Let her come up.” Damn, this woman looked good. No wonder Dre decided to get out of the game. If she was brave enough to come here, then the least I could do was meet her.
Ricky made a call to security, and they let her up. Bump opened the door and let her in.
She was even more breathtaking up close. The look in her eyes was of disdain for me. For some reason, that aroused me even more. She cut her eyes to Ricky, as if telling him she knew he had been following her. Then she refocused her eyes on me. If security hadn’t patted her down, she maybe would have brought a gun up there to kill me. Most folks showed fear around me, but not her.
“You wanted to see me?” I asked as I leaned back in my chair and looked at her lovely body before me. Her thickness in them jeans was astonishing.
“Malachi Turner,” she said in a smooth, even tone. “I believe we have a mutual acquaintance in common.”
“That might be so, but who, may I ask, are you?”
“My name is Nikki Bell. You’ve done business with my baby’s father, Dre,” she said proudly.
Hmmm . . . not too many women would walk into the lion’s den for a nigga like this.
“What can I do for you, Ms. Bell?”
“I need for you to leave him alone. He’s no threat to you or your business.”
I smiled at the beautiful woman brave enough to speak to me so boldly, “Dre was never a threat to my business, but there was a matter of a debt he owed me.”
“A debt he had paid in full.”
“His debt isn’t paid until I say it is,” I coldly said to her.
She exhaled deeply and then glanced at Ricky, eyeing him like a shark. If looks could kill, Ricky would be done.
“Then I wanna know what I need to give you in order to settle it.”
No fear. I’d rarely come across a woman with this kind of determination since I left Kingston years ago. She intrigued me.
“Ricky, give us a moment alone.”
Ricky nodded at me and then gave Nikki another lustful glare before he left the room.
“Have a seat.”
“I’d rather stand,” she insisted, but there was only so much willfulness I would allow in my world. I was a god there.
“I said sit,” I said in a more powerful tone.
She reluctantly obeyed.
I got up and walked around my desk and stood in front of her. Her luscious breasts rose and fell with each deep breath she took. The look on her face was steady, still no fear.
“What can you give me that I don’t already have, Nikki?”
“What do you want? I can give you money, but you don’t look like a man who needs the few dollars I can give you. Dre is the father of my son, Malachi. I don’t want my son to grow up without his father in his life. As a man, you can understand what that can do to a boy,” she said sincerely. “That’s all he has. Don’t take that away from him. Please?”
No one had ever appealled to me like that. A woman like that was who I could see with a nigga like me. I could have fucked her, but she would never really give herself to me . . . not at first. No, a woman like that had to be broken before she would give in. Materialistic things didn’t seem to move her like most of the bitches in there. Most women would come in there with their pussy in my face, but not her.
“He’s in a coma. No telling if he will ever wake up—if he’s allowed to at all.”
“I know. Don’t take him away from us.”
“Perhaps we can come to some kind of agreement. Maybe we can discuss this further over a nice meal?”
She looked at me inquisitively, as if weighing her options. “A meal? With me?”
“Yes. Dinner. You do eat?”
She had expected me to ask her for something else.
“Yes, of course. When?”
“Tomorrow night. I’ll send a car for you, say around eight?”
“What about Dre?”
“He’ll be fine. We’ll discus his future as well,” I said and extended my hand to her. She looked at it then took it and stood up.
I kissed her hand, and a sweet smell of cherries filled my nostrils. My dick started to rise in my boxers. She gently pulled her hand away.
“That’s fine,” she said and turned and walked to the door. Her ample ass bounced with every step. My dick wanted her ass right then. She opened the door and turned and looked at me one last time before exiting my office.
A few seconds passed, and Ricky came back inside.
“Damn, Malachi, I know what you’re gonna do with all that ass right there.”
“I want you to keep tabs on her. I wanna know her every move. You can never be too sure what a woman can be up to.”
“Consider it done,” Ricky said and left.
I knew exactly what she had in mind. It had been a long time since I had a challenge walk through my doors.
NIKKI
That was the scariest Jamaican I’d ever seen in my life. I felt like my heart was about to jump out of my chest. I’d dealt with his type before, so I knew how to handle myself around him. I didn’t tell Janelle or Penny I was going to do this, because I knew they would try to stop me, but if I didn’t do this, I knew he’d kill Dre. His boy Ricky was the one following me around town. I knew he worked for Malachi.
Nothing much had changed since the last time I’d been up in The Pink Palace. Mostly new girls, but they all did the same old tricks on stage. Same horny-ass men up in there, a few of them I knew from my days there. They stared at me like I was brand new. Guess they were not used to seeing me with my clothes on.
As I walked through the club, I did spot this one girl staring at me from the bar. She must have thought I was there to audition for a job. Never again.
I was prepared to do anything to convince Malachi not to hurt Dre. I knew that sex would most likely be my only option, but he had surprised me. He wanted to take me out to dinner. He must have wanted to get a full stomach before we fucked. Whatever. As long as he left Dre alone, I was willing to do whatever he wanted.
I got to my car and took off. I turned down Spring Street and entered I-75/85 and headed to College Park.
* * *
Today I was at the shop with Penny. I was still replaying the last night’s events in my head, trying to figure if there was something else I could’ve done. Penny was putting some clothes back on the rack as I was sitting behind the counter in deep thought.
“What are you thinking about?” Penny asked me as she put the Averix hoodies on display.
“Nothing.”
“Nikki, you can’t keep worrying about Dre. I know it’s hard not to, but you can’t dwell on it every second of the day.”
“Penny, I need to tell you something, and it’s gotta stay between us,” I said to her. Penny had been my girl for years. We’d done all sorts of things together, from our time together dancing at The Pink Palace, doing private shows for niggas, and even a few threesomes. There wasn’t nothing that would shock her. In some ways, she knew me better than anybody else, so I knew she’d understand what I was going to tell her.
“You already know. What’s up?”
“I went to The Pink Palace to see Malachi,” I told her, and she stopped and looked at me disapprovingly.
“And why would you go and do something like that for, Nikki?” Penny said to me, upset.
“Because the other day when I was leaving the hospital, I saw a dude in a black Escalade watching me. Then yesterday the same Escalade was following me around town. Something told me it was Malachi trying to find out what condition Dre was in, and when I went to club, I saw the same nigga in Malachi’s office with him.”
“Oh my God. What happened?”
“Malachi’s a big, scary-ass Jamaican: powerful, arrogant, and a control freak. I just wanted to look him in the eye and see if I could reason with him. Say something, anything to convince him to leave Dre alone.”
“Nikki, we both know niggas like Malachi only want one thing from women like us.”
“I know. He had that look in his eye. I love Dre, but if it meant fucking that nigga to get him to back off, I was prepared to do that too,” I said to her, and Penny understood. We both knew that the power of pussy was the ultimate bargaining commodity that we had.
Penny walked up to the counter in front of me. “So what happens now?” she asked.
“He wants to take me out to dinner. Can you keep Tyler for me tonight?”
“Yeah, no problem. I know you have to do what you have to do, Nikki, but I don’t wanna see you get hurt either. I don’t think I could stand to see another man hurt you like that again,” Penny said and took my hand. Penny had stood by my side while I recovered from the abuse Damien put me through years ago.
“That’s not going to happen to me again. I’m not playing games like that anymore. I got too much to lose this time around.”
* * *
I started getting dressed about 7:15 for my dinner date with Malachi. I couldn’t believe I was about to break bread with the nigga responsible for putting Dre in a coma—not to mention what else he may have had in mind for me. But it didn’t matter. As long as Dre’s life was at stake, I was willing to do anything to protect him.
I decided to wear a simple black D & G cocktail dress that showed plenty of legs, matching Prada high heels, and a silver necklace with a heart-shaped pendant. My hair was in an updo, with two Chinese sticks in the back. My MAC makeup was flawless, as I gave myself a once over in the mirror.
Eight o’clock sharp, a black stretch limo pulled in front of my house. Funny how Malachi knew where I lived already.
I walked outside, and the driver got out and opened my door for me. Malachi was trying to impress me.
Pretty soon, we drove down Old National Highway and got on I-85 North to Midtown Atlanta. My only thoughts were what did I have to do to get Malachi to leave Dre alone.
The driver exited off 248B and then turned down Peachtree Street, and we soon pulled in front of The Melting Pot fondue restaurant. The driver let me out, and I walked to the door and went inside. It was a dimly lit restaurant that was sectioned off for a more intimate feel.
The hostess behind the podium smiled at me. “Hello. Welcome to The Melting Pot. Do you have a reservation?”
“Yes, I think it’s made out to Malachi Turner?”
She looked over her guest book. “Yes, please come with me.”
She escorted me through the restaurant, and we passed by the glass wall with what looked like a hundred bottles of wine on the wall, then around the corner down a passageway past the bar. Then she turned another corner and led me to a booth in the back, where I saw Malachi sitting at the table waiting for me.
He stood up and smiled as he looked me up and down. “Hello, Nikki,” he said in a deep Jamaican accent. He was dressed to the nines in a custom tailored tan suit and brown gators. He extruded the same confidence he had the other night.
“Hello, Malachi,” I said as I took a seat.
“Your server will be with you in a moment,” the hostess said and walked away. I tried to calm my nerves as I looked at the menu.
“You look exquisite tonight, Nikki,” Malachi said to me.
“Thank you.”
“I’m glad you decided to come dine with me tonight.”
“I didn’t have much of a choice,” I said as I tried to hold back my discontent with the thought of eating with him.
“Of course you had a choice, and you chose to be here with me tonight.”
“Nice restaurant,” I said, trying to change the subject.
“Yes, it’s one of my favorite places to eat. I know you’ll enjoy the cuisine.”
To my surprise, I did enjoy the fondue shrimp and steak. I was surprised at how fast and delicious the meat was cooked in the small fondue pot on the table in front of us.
For the most part, Malachi talked about himself. Like most egomaniacs, he enjoyed the sound of his own voice. He told me about leaving Jamaica when he was fifteen years old and his rise to power here in Atlanta. Surprisingly enough, he had bought The Pink Palace just a few months after I quit working there. I wondered if he knew that I did dance there.
Then he flipped the conversation to me.
“So how old is your son?”
I paused for a moment, unsure if I wanted to talk about Tyler with him. “He’ll be two in March.”
“What’s his name?” Malachi asked.
“Tyler.”
“Yes, his father gave him it,” I said, and Malachi smirked.
“I can see you’re a woman very loyal to your man.”
“That’s the only reason why I’m here.”
“No, it’s not. There is a number of ways you could’ve handled this situation.”
I put my fork down and glared at him. “You gave me no choice. You were going to kill Dre.”
“I never said that to you. I just merely asked you out to dinner.”
“Then why did you have your boy Ricky following me around at the hospital?”
“I wanted to have an update on Dre’s situation. If you thought I was going to harm him, you could’ve went to the police,” Malachi said then took another bite of his steak.
I wanted to grab a knife and stab him in the eyes for what he did to Dre.
“But you didn’t. You chose to come to me. You chose to come to dinner with me tonight because I’m the type of nigga a woman like you wants.”
Muthafucka. In some ways he was right. Back in the day, I would’ve been all up on him, doing whatever and taking his money. But I was not that woman anymore. Not after what I’d been through.
“The only thing I want is for you to leave Dre alone. I’m here willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. If sex is what you want, then let’s just get to that and stop all this wining and dining shit.”
“Finish your food,” Malachi said and just continued to eat his food as if he didn’t hear me. Arrogant son of a bitch.
4
Sexual Seduction
Buckhead, GA
JASMINE
“I’ll come pick you up from the club around ten,” I said to Kandi over the phone.
“That’ll be good. Thanks for hooking me up with this party, Jasmine!”
“Like I said, it’s no problem. Just be ready to make this money.”
“I’m ready for whatever! I’ll see you in a few,” Kandi replied, and I hung up.
Hmmm, ready for whatever, huh? We’ll see, young Kandi, we’ll see.
I looked myself over in the mi
rror. I was wearing a gray V-neck Elizabeth and James cardigan with a black lace bra underneath. The cardigan hung on my body like a mini-skirt, showing off my long, thick legs, and I had on gray python-printed Christian Louboutin pumps. I wore two silver Cuban link chains with a cross on one and a Hello Kitty charm on the other. My hair was down, parted in the middle, looking good after my trip to Alres Salon and Spa. My makeup was flawless as usual. I was the shit!
I jumped in my silver CLS550 Mercedes-Benz and headed to The Pink Palace. I decided to go through the city and down Peachtree Street. I was blasting Lil’ Wayne’s “Lollipop” as I cruised down the street. Sweet Kandi was definitely gonna be my lollipop tonight!
As I got closer to the club, I stopped at a red light and saw a limo outside of The Melting Pot restaurant, and then I saw Malachi and that chick I saw at the club the other night coming out. Who the hell was she? I had to admit that she looked cute in her black D & G cocktail dress. Bitch had style. But how did she get so close to Malachi so quickly? Something was going on.
The light changed green, and I pulled off and headed to The Pink Palace.
I got to the club and saw Kandi standing out front, waiting for me. She had on a white tube top and mini-skirt with black stilettos. Hmmm, I was going to have to step her fashion game up in the future.
I pulled up to the curb, and she opened the door and jumped in.
“Hey, Jasmine! Girl, I couldn’t wait for you to get here.”
“I see. Cute outfit you got on,” I lied.
“This ain’t nothing compared to what you got on. What did you do, raid Rihanna’s closet? That shit is hot!”
“I just threw this together. I’ll hook you up with some stuff later if you like.”
“Hell yeah! Jasmine, you my girl. So where is this party at?” Kandi asked as I turned on to I-20 West.