All Hail the Queen (26 page)

Violated it with his presence.

Bzzzzz-zap.

Hurt Sarge.

Bzzzzz-zap.

Stole her weed.

Bzzzzz-zap.

Chased her down.

Bzzzzz-zap.

And her gut told her he shot Tank.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz-zap.

She removed the stun gun and looked at her handiwork. It took nine zaps, as she put the heat to his ass, to spell out FU in large letters with the two dots the prongs of the stun gun burnt into his flesh. He writhed in pain, his face twisted with it.

“It's never, ever fuck me. It's always fuck you and you'll
never
forget that,” she said, her eyes hot with anger and her power in the situation.

“You crazy,” he said between pants, his eyes glazed with agony.

“You don't
even
know,” Naeema said, by way of agreeing with him.

“Let's switch up some shit,” she said. “Different question and different weapon.”

It was clear to her that he worked for Murk and the drug lord wanted revenge for Tank testifying against him.

Ask your snitch of a man.

She turned off the stun gun and pressed it back under her thigh as she used her foot to slide his gun forward on the floor as she pressed her gun against his now-sweaty head. She picked up his small gun in her right hand and pointed it toward him.

“Should I let you live after you tried to take the life of my man?” Naeema asked.

“I didn't, I swear,” he said, stumbling over his words as the smell of his urine suddenly filled the air.

“I don't believe you,” she said. “You shot Tank and you
came for me earlier today and tonight you sat outside my house and were coming for me again, motherfucker. Wrong fucking move.”

“I didn't—”

POW!

His blood and brain matter splattered against the glass and the door as his body convulsed before his eyes went still with death.

Fuck it.

Naeema calmly used the shirt to clean her prints from his gun. She didn't want to risk walking home with it. At least with her 9mm she had a license. She looked up and down the length of the street as she worked. There was no traffic and the two apartment buildings flanking the lot had long since been abandoned. Across the street was West Side Park. It was the perfect spot for a crime.

Leaving his gun on his lap, she pushed her weapon down into the front of her strapless bra, held the stun gun in her hand, and climbed from the car. Quickly she bent and used the edge of her shirt to clean any fingerprints from the door handle.

Humph. Murk's ass is next.

Without a fuck to give for the death she left behind, Naeema made the short walk back home.

I should have asked him more questions before I killed him.

“Na.”

Murk wanted Tank killed because he testified against him. So why was he following me?
Why chase me? Why break in my house?

“Na.”

Murk knew who I was then, right? So why let me work undercover in his club?

“Naeema . . . Naeema!”

She blinked and turned her head to find Tank sitting on the side of the hospital bed with his eyes on her. The secrets she kept from him caused her to look away from him before he saw too much. She forced a stiff smile when she saw that Grip's eyes rested on her as well.

“Yo, what's on your mind, baby?” Tank asked.

Something ain't right.

“Nothing,” she lied.

Grip pushed up off the spot where he was leaning against the counter of the sink. “Well, I'm heading home,” he said, going over to Tank with his fist extended. “Good to look you in the eye again, yo.”

Tank dapped the top of his fist with his own. “Damn right,” he said.

Naeema looked away from them as she gently chewed on her bottom lip. “What am I missing?” she mouthed. “What
the fuck
am I missing?”

Barely an hour had passed since she branded, tortured, and killed a man. She walked away from the scene plotting on sitting outside Gentlemen Only and murking Murk before he had a chance to blink or think. A phone call from Tank summoning her back to his side was the only thing that kept Murk from joining his goon in the motherfucking hereafter.

She left Sarge behind at the house positive she had assured his safety—for at least the night—and made her way back to NYC. Time brought on deeper thinking and clarity that the heat of the moment had fucked all the way up.

Something ain't right worth a fuck.

“Did everything between us change while I was down, Na?”

Naeema stiffened as she looked back at him. “Never,” she said, her voice soft.

He said nothing. He was waiting on the truth.

“I think you were the real target of the shooting and not Fevah,” she admitted.

Tank scowled. His eyes shifted about the room. He was processing shit.

Just as surely as she knew her own name she knew Tank was recalling every step, every moment, and every little detail about the night of the shooting. She sat up a little straighter in her chair and didn't say a word as she watched him.

His lips moved with whatever words he mumbled to himself. His eyes were intense and focused as he stared at nothing. His face showed everything, including the moment everything clicked.

“They kept shooting even after the door Fevah was about to get out of closed. Three more shots,” he said.

She nodded. “Exactly.”

He locked those black eyes on her. “What you been up to, Na?” he asked, his voice hard.

Naeema opened her mouth but just released a heavy breath instead of the truth. Tank's anger at her for tracking down the killer of her son was hard to forget.

POW!

A vision of Kevin Greene's blood and brain matter hitting the glass flashed.

“What do you think about Yani, Willie, or Murk for the
shooting?” she asked instead, keeping the murder to herself for now.

He gave her a look that let her know she was pump-faking him on the truth and not fooling him. “Willie don't have the balls,” he said with a shake of his head. “He's all talk. Plus, he knows I floated him the loot to start that bail bond bullshit he done fucked up.”

Oh.

Naeema nodded. “And Yani? Not as the shooter but a part of the setup for the shooting.”

“Nothing to gain . . . that I know of,” he said.

“And Murk?”

Her heart was pounding so loudly she wondered if he could hear it. “Definite possibility.”

Naeema looked down at the floor and then back up at him. “Why'd you testify?” she asked. “You had to know he would come for you.”

He released a Sarge-like grunt and shook his head with regret. “I let the detective I know who worked the murder case blow it up in my head like they had him. He did so many favors for me in the past and he called me on it and asked me to testify. Everybody involved was shocked like a motherfucker when he got off on a fucking technicality. I coulda slapped the shit out of the judge as soon as he said the words that set Murk free.”

Naeema's eyes took in every aspect of his handsome face. “Were you afraid of him?” she asked in disbelief. In her eyes Tank had no fear. She didn't want that to change.

He looked at her like
Bitch, please
, even though she knew he would never say the words to her. “Did I go in hiding? Hell no, I ain't
afraid of that fool, yo. By going the straight route it put me in a jam where I couldn't move underground to off his ass without drawing attention to myself.”

She smiled and stood up to press a kiss to his temple.

He sat back to look up at her. “Is Murk still alive, Naeema?” he asked.

He might as well have asked had
she
killed him because that's what he meant and she knew it.

“For now,” she admitted, her eyes going ice cold with anger.

He reached up and cupped the back of her neck to pull her down closer to his. “I don't need you to fight my battles. I'm back. I got it,” he said, his words caressing her lips before he tasted them briefly.

Too late.

“Besides there's one more mo'fucker I gotta check out,” Tank said.

Say what now?

Naeema stepped back, her face filled with confusion. “Who?” she asked.

Tank wiped his mouth with his hand. “A greedy-ass, no-account, selfish damn politician,” he said.

Naeema arched a brow. “Hell, could you whittle the list down for me a little more?” she asked, her voice sarcastic.

Kickbacks were the name of the game and plenty of politicians on every level wanted to know what they could get out of any deal that came across their desk. Plenty of scratched backs and kissed asses.

“I got proof of some of his shady shit but I never thought he would try to kill me for it.”

Naeema crossed her arms over her ample chest. “How does he know what you have?”
she asked.

Tank looked at her and then shifted his eyes away.

She repeated the question.

“I used it against him,” he admitted, glancing over at her and then glancing away.

“For money?” she asked, her eyes now big as shit with surprise. “Motherfucking blackmail? Now you're caught up in all that back-scratching, ass-kissing bullshit that's had this city fucked up for decades?”

Tank was her moral compass. He was willing to put in the work to handle any situation by any means but his preference was the high road. The legal road. The right road.

The fuck?

“And to push him to do good for the city,” Tank said, his face tight with anger fed by her accusations. “Trust me, it's a lot of shit going down that I had a hand in, Naeema. A lot of good shit.”

Her body relaxed a little and she undid her arms.

“I could've turned his ass in and it would've led to him being forced out of office but I had a leash around that motherfucker's neck and I walked his ass where the fuck I wanted him to go, to do what the fuck I wanted him to do,” he said, his voice passionate and his eyes blazing. “Sometimes the devil you know—and got control of—is better than the devil they replace him with. You get me?”

She nodded and stepped forward to stand between his open thighs, rest her hands on his broad shoulders, and settle her chin softly atop his head. She closed her eyes at the feel of his hands settled on her hips and then wrapped around her.

In that moment each needed the feel of the other.

That's the man that broke in your house. That's him.

Her eyes opened as Mya's words came to her.

It made more sense for a man to have one of his goons break into a home to find evidence being used against him. Perhaps the politician thought Tank hid the shit at her house and wanted it back. Wanted to be free of Tank. And when that didn't work murder was next.

She licked her lips and stroked the back of his head. “Who is it?” she asked, forcing her voice to be soft and innocent.

“Huh?” he asked, his face snuggled against her cleavage.

“The politician? Who is it?” she asked, before pressing a kiss to his head.

His body went stiff. Naeema grimaced.
Shit.

“Hell no,” he said, now using his hands on her hips to push her back from him. “No.”

“What?” she asked innocently, pretending to look confused.

Shiiiit.

“Run that bullshit on somebody that don't know you,” he said, reaching behind him to push back the sheet on the bed before he lay down. He patted the small, empty space next to him.

Naeema wanted to finish what she started and that meant finding out the name and present location of the dirty politician, but in that moment—after all the days waiting and praying for Tank to be okay and present—that little piece of space on the bed beside him won over any other desires she had.

She kicked off her heels and lay down on her side with her face pressed into that intimate nook between his chin and his shoulder. With his arm settled over her and his hand
resting comfortably on her ass, she kissed the pulse of his neck. “Welcome home,” she whispered, promising herself that she would make the pitiful pawns on the chessboard of their life recognize that it's the job of the queen to always
protect her king.

15

“W
ell, damn.”

Naeema shook her head as she looked at the way Tank's living room was completely trashed. It took her right back to the night she came home to find her shit ransacked. Reaching under the sleeveless bulky sweatshirt she wore she pulled her gun from the leather holster she wore under it.

Stepping over shattered lamps and broken picture frames in her path she was all the more certain that she made the right choice to leave the hospital as soon as Tank hit a snore deep enough to shake the roof.