Read Lifestyles of the Rich and Shameless Online

Authors: NOIRE,Kiki Swinson

Lifestyles of the Rich and Shameless (20 page)

T
he following morning Noble was discharged from the hospital on crutches. It was September fifteenth, his birthday, but Noble was feeling anything but happy.

“Yo,” his boy Pap said as he was driving Noble home. Department regulations required officers who received a gunshot to be admitted overnight, and Noble was ready to go hide out in his own crib now. “You was real lucky yesterday, dude. The department’s gonna get you another plastic leg, man. I saw what that hollow point did to your old one. You lucky them stupid security guards didn’t take out your real leg.”

Noble just nodded. He was grateful for everything that had happened to him yesterday. His prosthetic leg had been demolished, but at least his eyes had been opened. He smirked when he thought about how them scandalous chicks had tried to rush him at the hospital once the danger had passed and they found out he was okay. Well, it wasn’t never gonna be okay with him.

You don’t run the fuck off and leave somebody to die!

Kiki, Malisha, Zsa Zsa, and especially Sissy. Noble had put all those chickenheads up to roost. He didn’t want none of them jawns nowhere around him. They were all shameful and unworthy. Tryna run game on a brothah for his riches and his jewels. That was just like a damn woman, Noble thought, shaking his head. He was through fuckin’ with chicks for a good long while!

Noble’s street was lined with cars when they rolled up on his block. Pap double-parked outside the brownstone and helped Noble get out.

“You got the steps, man?” he asked. “I’ma go find a parking spot right quick, then meet you inside.”

Crutches were a minor thing to Noble. He’d mastered them during his rehab period while he was waiting to get fitted for his leg. He was just about to maneuver his way up when he spotted her sitting on the top stair.

“Happy birthday,” she said softly. She was wearing a mean khaki dress and she looked like a dream, but Noble knew she was truly a nightmare in disguise.

“What are you doing here, Zsa Zsa? You didn’t get the memo? Your application has been denied, so you might as well step off.”

She stood up. “I don’t know what’s going on, Noble, but I don’t like it. I mean, I see shit all over the news about a cop getting shot in midtown, then when I rush to the emergency room I find out my name is on some kinda access-denied list. I was worried about you, Noble! I was blowing up your phone! What the hell is going on?”

Noble smirked. “Save all that bullshit for your next mark, baby. I peeped your little conniving-ass shenanigans a long time ago.” He leaned on one crutch and counted off on his fingers. “All the time snooping in my shit. Going through my fuckin’ clothes, asking me all kinds of trick questions, tryna get up in my crib and crack my damn security code ... your sticky-ass fingers been on my black panther sculpture too.
Gold digger!
I don’t know why you over here today ’cause I wasn’t never planning to marry you. You ain’t the one. Your hood ass wasn’t even in the runnings.”

“Noble!”
Zsa Zsa pleaded, and despite his anger, the look of pain on her face poked him in the heart. “Think about what you’re saying, baby. I ain’t never worked against you in no kinda way. All I tried to do was make you happy. I would never hurt you.”

“Yeah. Cool. Then thank you. But you ain’t the type of woman I can be happy with. I gotta be with somebody I can trust. And that ain’t you.”

Noble was just waiting for Zsa Zsa to spark off on him like the bugged little project chick she was. But instead, she surprised him by walking calmly down the steps in her little khaki dress and safari hat and strolling right past him.

“Thank you too,” she turned and said, her slanted, pretty eyes shooting fire at him. “ ’Cause I can’t trust no dude who don’t trust me.”

Noble didn’t bother to answer. He was done. He never even looked back as he hopped up the steps on his crutches and stood on one leg outside his front door. He had just punched in his alarm code and stuck his key in the lock when the door swung open on its own, and he got the shit shocked straight outta him.

“SURPRISE!”

A whole crew of homeys from the police department and traffic control were standing in his living room. Noble leaned on his crutches, stunned.

“Yo,” he said, stepping inside slowly. Everybody was dressed crazy as hell. In safari clothes. He looked past a few people and saw his father sitting in the kitchen, and his tauntie smiling at him from her wheelchair. Bam was dressed like the Crocodile Hunter, and his aunt had on a cute little jungle hat.

“What’s going on?”

“Happy birthday!” everybody screamed out. His boy Yard came up and pressed a cold can of beer into his hand, as Noble made his way over to dap his father and kiss his aunt.

He stood on one leg as the dudes came over and shook his hand, and the girls all smiled and showed him some birthday love.

Noble let two ladies from his old precinct guide him over to the couch. A couple of young girls from traffic enforcement scooted over so he could sit down.

“Where all y’all come from?” Noble asked the girl on his left. “Who broke into my crib? How’d y’all get past my security system?”

His dining table had been dragged into the front room and it was laid out with all his favorite foods. There were gifts, wrapped in jungle paper, stacked up under the table on the floor. Noble just couldn’t believe it. He’d never had a surprise party in his life, and to have one on today of all days ...

He looked around. His whole shit was decorated! In a crazy safari theme! Monkeys was swinging from vines, and lions and zebras was hanging from the ceiling. How the fuck did they know?

“For real,” he nudged his girl Daydra, who sat beside him munching on a plate of hot wings and deviled eggs. “Who set all this shit up?”

Daydra laughed. “It was that crazy-ass Zsa Zsa! She’s been working on us for months. She told everybody exactly what you liked, and made sure we showed up to deliver.”

“Ooooh,
shit
!” Noble said as the full realization of what he’d done smacked him right upside the head.

“Did you see your cake?” Daydra asked, pointing toward the table.

Noble felt his heart drop when he saw the two-foot cake made in a replica of his favorite black panther. His long-lost sculpture was sitting on the table right beside the cake, and whoever had baked it had made it damn near identical.

Noble looked up. A handwritten banner hung above the table. It was shaped like an elephant and had a cloth draped over its back. The words on the cloth read,

NO MATTER WHO YOU CHOOSE
,
I HOPE ALL YOUR DREAMS COME TRUE
.

Beside him, Daydra laughed again. “Yo, Noble, I hope you got a real sweet tooth because that damn Zsa Zsa went through five bakers tryna make sure your cake came out just right. It had to be a perfect match to that ugly-ass panther thingie, and somehow it is.”

Noble just couldn’t believe it.

“You want something to eat?” Daydra asked, holding out her plate.

But Noble jumped up so fast her food hit the floor.

He reached for his crutch but it slipped from his hand. Cursing, he hopped in a half circle, then bounded toward the front window, bumping into his party guests as he jetted across the room.

He made it over to the window and quickly peered out. His boy Pap was down there. He was leaning on a whip comforting Zsa Zsa in his arms.

“Yo!”
Noble screamed. He flung the window up and pushed the screen straight out. “Zsa Zsa!” he yelled. “Wait, baby! I can explain!”

The look on her face hit him like a bullet, and before Noble could hobble halfway down his front steps, the woman he wanted to marry jumped in her ride, slammed the door, and sped off down the block.

I
t took mad weeks of begging before Noble finally eased up. No matter how much he called her or swung by her crib, or hit her on Facebook or went looking for her on the job, Zsa Zsa just wasn’t having it.

“Yo, man,” his dude Pap told him as they watched a basketball game at a wing and beer joint one night. A couple of hot-ties at the bar were trying to press up on Noble, but he couldn’t even see them chicks. Every girl he looked at turned into Zsa Zsa. She was the only girl he wanted. “I think you was trying to do too much, homey,” Pap said. “You know. Tryna figure out if you wanna be with one chick is hard enough. But having three and four on a string?” Pap shook his head and guzzled his beer. “Bad business.”

Noble sighed. Pap was right. His girls mighta been scheming and tryna fuck over him, but in a way he had been fuckin’ over them too. He had ’em reaching and stretching. Doing the Flava Flav thing. Competing for a relationship like a bunch of thoroughbred horses running behind a sticked-up carrot.

Noble knew how bad he had hurt Zsa Zsa, but he didn’t know how to make it better. He’d peeped her walking around writing tickets on the streets, and he could tell she wasn’t happy. Her body moved differently. That spark that used to glow in her eyes looked dim. It was like the light had gone out in both of their lives.

It was starting to get cold outside and Noble knew how much she hated her job in the winter. He’d sent a text message telling her he wanted to help her start her own business, and she’d sent one back that said
fuck you
.
He’d had roses and balloons delivered to her house every day for a week, and she had refused the delivery each time.

He’d run across Sissy and Malisha too. Sissy, when he went to his aunt’s crib and had her locks changed and switched her bills into his name to be paid from his account, and Malisha when he swung by Omega Bank and closed out all his accounts, to include his safety deposit box.

And Kiki?

Noble almost laughed. He’d seen her ass too.

All of it.

Kiki had gotten fired from her job and was stripping for a living now. Pap had dragged Noble to a titty bar in Harlem, and there Kiki was. Headlining that shit. Butt naked and swirling her hips for any man’s chips.

It was funny how hard it was to peep who people really were when you were looking too hard. Noble had been forced to hold a mirror up at his own ass too, and there were a few shitty things there that he had to admit needed some work.

Months had passed since his birthday, and Noble had almost given up hope for his happiness when he opened his front door to go to work one morning and saw somebody sitting on the hood of his whip.

“Thirsty?” she asked, holding out a carton of Tropicana. It was cold as hell outside, but her smile was bright, her eyes danced, and her shiny black hair flowed down her back. The juice looked damn good too. And even from where Noble stood he could tell it was the kind that had lots of pulp.

He didn’t wanna be away from her a second longer. He jammed both his crutches up under one arm, then hopped down two steps at a time tryna get to her.

“It was
you,
” Noble moaned, pulling Zsa Zsa into his arms. He nuzzled his nose deep into her warm, delicious neck.
It was always you... .
Leaning against the car, he inhaled everything about her that he loved and had missed so much. Wasn’t no more shame in his game. He thought about that ten-carat chuck of engagement ice he’d bought and had sized just for her, and decided it was now or never.

He took the carton of orange juice from her and set it up on the Corvette’s icy hood, and then answered her question.

“I’m real thirsty,” Noble said, getting down on his good knee so he could propose to his number-one honey.

“Will you marry me, Zsa baby? Please say yes, because I’m thirsty for you.”

Available now wherever books are sold!

Street Divas

by De’nesha Diamond

In this explosive series, the fiercest ride-or-die chicks in Memphis are battling alongside—and against—their ruthless men, to be the last diva standing ...

Still a Mistress
by Tiphani Montgomery

Nothing turns Chloe on more than the luxurious perks her slamming body earns her. And when her latest lover—a powerful politician with sins of his own—tempts her with a dangerous but high-paying proposition, Chloe sees more than diamonds and cash in her future. She sees sweet revenge ...

Turn the page for an excerpt from these thrilling novels ...

From
Street Divas

Melanie

I
’m seriously fucked. That shit hits home the second I see Python, my baby’s daddy and the leader of the Black Gangster Disciples, kick down my door to see his arch enemy, Fat Ace, head nigga of the Vice Lords, giving me a good dicking down.

I’m stunned and can’t move.

“WHAT THE FUCK?” Fat Ace jerks out of my pussy and makes a dive toward the nightstand for his piece.

“YOU’RE A DEAD MUTHAFUCKA!”
POW!
Python’s gun sounds like a cannon.

I blink out of my trance to dive in the opposite direction just as Fat Ace starts returning fire. Right now, I’m wishing that I didn’t keep my own weapon locked in a safety box at the top of my bedroom closet. Judging by the look on Python’s face, Fat Ace and I aren’t walking out of this muthafucka alive.

POW! POW! POW!

Python ducks and twists away from the door before Fat Ace’s bullets tear huge chunks out of the door frame. Unfortunately, that leaves me in Python’s direct line of vision. Time crawls the second our gazes connect, while death skips down my spine and wraps itself around my heart.

“No, Python. Wait,” I beg. I even foolishly lift my hands like a stop sign as if that’s really going to enforce a time-out. Python’s black, empty, soulless eyes narrow. At this fucking moment, I’m no different from any other nigga on the street: disposable. I’m already dead to him, and my tears are nothing but water.

Fat Ace squeezes off another round.

POW! POW! POW!

Wood splinters from the door frame inches above Python’s head, but that doesn’t stop him from lifting his Glock and aiming that muthafucka straight at me. I’m a cop and I’m used to plunging headlong into danger, but I don’t have a badge pinned to my titties right now, and my courage is pissing out in between my legs.

POW! POW!

Fat Ace misses again.

“Please. I’m carrying your baby.” As a desperate act, I clutch the small mound below my belly, and I succeed in getting his eyes to drop.

To my left, Fat Ace’s head whips in my direction. His voice booms like a clap of thunder.

“WHAT THE FUCK?”

I spin my head back toward Fat Ace. Why does it suddenly look like this muthafucka can pass for Python’s twin? Anger rises off of him like steam. I open my mouth but my brain shuts down. It doesn’t matter. There are no words that can save me.

“You fucking lying bitch!” Fat Ace’s gun swings away from Python and toward me, while Python’s gat turns toward Fat Ace. Both pull the trigger at the same time.

POW! POW!

The bullets feel like two heat-seeking missiles slamming into me. I propel backward, and my head hits the wall first.

Across the room, Python’s bullets slam into Fat Ace’s right side, but the nigga remains on his feet and squeezes out a few more rounds.

Shocked, it takes a full second before the pain in my chest and left side has a chance to register. When it does, it’s like nothing I’ve ever felt before. Blood gushes out of my body as I slowly slide down the wall and plop onto the floor.

POW! POW!

Python shoots the gun out of Fat Ace’s hand.

POW! POW! POW!

“What, nigga? What?” Python roars.

Fat Ace clutches his bleeding hand but then charges toward Python real low and manages to tackle him to the ground before Python is able to squeeze off another shot. They hit the hardwood with a loud
thump,
and Python’s gun is knocked out of his hand.

I need to get help. There’s way too much blood pooling around me.
I’m dying. Me and my baby.

“Is that all you got, nigga?” Fat Ace jams a fist into the center of Python’s face. Blood bursts from Python’s thick lips and big nose like a red geyser.

Tears rush down my face like a fucking waterfall.
I’m sorry, baby. I’m so sorry.
It’s all I can tell my unborn child.

“Your ass gonna die tonight, you punk-ass bitch,” Python growls, slamming his fist into Fat Ace’s jaw.

Christopher!

My head snaps up. My son, Christopher, is in the other room. How can he sleep through all this noise? An image of Christopher, curled up in the bottom of his closet, trembling and crying, springs to my mind.
I have to get to my baby.

I slump over from the wall but lack the strength to stop my upper body’s falling momentum. My face crashes into the hard floor, and I can feel a tooth floating in blood in my mouth.

Covered in sweat and blood, Python and Fat Ace continue wrestling on the floor. Fat Ace, still naked, gets the upper hand for a second and sends a crushing blow across Python’s jaw. A distinguishable
crack
reverberates in the room. To my ears, the muthafaucka should be broken, but Python ain’t no ordinary nigga. And sure enough, in the next second, Python retaliates, landing one vicious blow after another. A tight swing lands below Fat Ace’s rib cage. Its force not only causes another
crack,
but it also lifts Fat Ace up at least a half foot in the air and gives Python the edge in repositioning himself.

The punches flow harder and faster. The floor trembles as if we’re in the middle of an earthquake. Python is shoved against the side of the bed, and the damn thing flies toward my head. Lacking the energy to get out of the way, all I can do is close my eyes and prepare for the impact. The bed’s metal leg slams into the center of my forehead with a sickening
thud,
and a million stars explode behind my eyes.

The scuffling on the other side of the bed continues; more bone crushes bone. When I finally manage to open my eyes, Python is trying to stretch his hand far enough to reach for a gun, but it is a few inches too far. Fat Ace is doing all he can to make sure that shit doesn’t happen.

Watching all this go down, I realize that I don’t give a fuck if they kill each other. Why should I? I’m already sentenced to death. I can feel its cold fingers settling into my bones.

More tears flow as I have my last pity party. It’s true what they say—your life does flash before your eyes. But it’s not the good parts. It’s all the fucked-up shit that you’ve done. Now that judgment is seconds away, I don’t have a clue what I’m going to tell the man upstairs, that’s a good sign that my ass is going straight to hell.

I have to say good-bye to Christopher.

Sucking in a breath, I dig deep for some reserved strength. Determined, I drag my body across the floor, crawling with my forearms.

POW!

To my right, the bedroom window explodes, and shards of glass stab parts of my body.

Python and Fat Ace wrestle for control of the gun.

“Fuck you, muthafucka,” one of them growls.

Still, I’m not concerned about their dumb asses. I need to see my baby one more time. However, I only get about half a foot before sweat breaks out across my brow and then rolls down the side of my face. How in the hell can I be cold and sweating at the same time?

POW! POW! POW!

More glass shatters. I turn my head in time to see Fat Ace’s large, muscled ass dive out the window. Python runs up to the muthafucka and proceeds to empty his magazine out the broken window.

“CRABBY MUTHAFUCKA!” Python reaches into his back pocket and produces another clip. He peers out into the darkness for a minute. “I’ma get his punk ass,” he says, and then turns and races out of the bedroom in hot pursuit, nearly kicking me in the head as he passes.

Relieved that he’s gone, I drag myself another inch before my arms wobble and threaten to collapse. I need to catch my breath.

POW! POW! POW!

The shooting continues outside. In the distance, I hear police sirens. Then again, it could be wishful thinking. It’s not like the department would respond this fuckin’ fast.

Christopher. I gotta get to my baby.

Convinced that I’ve caught my second wind, I attempt to drag myself again. I try and try, but I can’t move another inch. A sob lodges in my throat as I hear the sound of footsteps.
Christopher!
He must’ve gotten the courage to come see if I’m all right. “Baby, is that you?” Damn. That one question leaves me breathless. I’m panting so hard I sound like I just ran a marathon.

The slow, steady footsteps draw closer.

“Baby?” I stretch out a blood-covered hand. When I see it, I’m suddenly worried about what Christopher will think seeing me like this. Shakily, I look around. I’m practically swimming in my own piss and blood. It could scare the shit out of him, scar him for life.

He’s almost at the door.

Tell him not to come in here!

“Baby, um—”

“Your fuckin’ baby is gone.”

Python’s rumbling baritone fills my bedroom and freezes what blood I have left in my veins. My head creeps back around, and I’m stuck looking at the bottom of a pair of black jeans and shit kickers. More tears rush to my eyes. This nigga is probably going to stomp my ass into the hardwood floors.

“You’re one slick, muthafuckin’ bitch, you know that?”

“Python—”

“How long you been fuckin’ that crab, huh?”

My brain scrambles, but I can’t think of a goddamn thing to say.

“What? Cat got your tongue?” The more he talks, the deeper his voice gets. The sob that’s been stuck in the middle of my throat now feels like a fucking boulder, blocking off my windpipe.

Python squats down. I avoid making eye contact because I’m more concerned about the Glock dangling in his hand. My heart should be hammering, but instead I don’t think the muthafucka is working.

The gun moves toward me until the barrel is shoved underneath my chin, forcing my head up. Now it doesn’t seem possible that I’ve spent so many years loving this nigga. How does a woman fall in love with death?

Python is not easy on the eyes, and his snake-forked tongue doesn’t help. Big and bulky, his body is covered with tats of pythons, teardrops, names of fallen street soldiers, but more important is the big six-pointed star that represents the Black Gangster Disciples. He’s not just a member. In this shitty town, he’s the head nigga in charge—and my dumb ass crossed him.

“Look at me,” he commands.

My gaze crashes into his inky black eyes, where I stare into a bottomless pit.

“You know you fucked up, right?”

I whimper and try to plea with my eyes. It’s all I can do.

Muscles twitch along Python’s jawline as he shakes his head. Then I see some shit that I ain’t never seen before from this nigga: tears. They gloss his eyes, but they don’t roll down his face. He ain’t that kind of nigga.

“You fuckin’ betrayed me. Out of all the niggas you could’ve fucked you pick that greasy muthafucka?”

“P-P-P—”

“Shut the fuck up! I don’t wanna hear your ass beggin’ for shit. Your life is a wrap. Believe that!” He stares into my eyes and shakes his head. “What? You thought your pussy was so damn good that I was going to let this shit slide? I got streetwalkers who can pop pussy better than you. You ain’t got a pot of gold buried up in that ass. I kept your triflin’ ass around because I thought ...” He shakes his head again and the tears dry up or had I imagined those muthafuckas?

Sirens.
I’m sure this time. The police are coming.

He chuckles. “What? You think the brothahs and sistahs in blue are about to save your monkey ass? Sheeiiit. That ain’t how this is going down.”

So many tears are rolling out my eyes I can barely see him now. I want to beg again, but I know it’s useless. Time to buck up. Face this shit head-on.

“I can’t believe that I
ever
thought you were my rib. You ain’t good enough to wipe the shit out the crack of my ass,” he sneers, releasing my chin and standing up.

The next thing I hear is the unzipping of his black jeans.

“You wanna live, bitch? Hmm?”

I nod but he still grabs a fistful of my hair and yanks me up. Next thing I know, his fat cock is slapping me in the face.

“Suck that shit. Show me how much you wanna fuckin’ live, bitch. You fuck this shit up, and I’ll blast your goddamn brains all over this fuckin’ floor. You got that?”

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