"We’re wasting time, Nick, get down from there. Jamaica, come here," Black said as he took one gun out of his pocket and took off his coat. "We’re gonna have to do this the hard way. I saw some hand jacks while I was looking for another forklift. We’ll each get one." Black looked at his watch, "It’s a little after one. I want to be out of here by three. We got about two hours to get as much as we can and get out of here."
We all got busy, we we’re done by two-thirty. Black and Bobby left in the truck while Jamaica and I followed in the car. We’d been driving for a half-hour maybe when we passed through a small town. Once we got a little ways out town Bobby began to slow down and came to a complete stop. "What wrong now?" Jamaica asked.
After a while Black came to the car, "What’s goin’ on, Black?" Jamaica asked.
"There’s a road block. We passed a bar a little while ago, there just out here harassing drunks. I don’t think they’ll bother us, but to be on the safe side, Nick, you wait ‘til I’m gone and make your way around through those trees just across from them. If Bobby opens his door, fire a couple of shots in the air over the truck. Then you get away from there in case they shot back. But I’m betting that these local will just take cover. That should give Bobby a chance to drive off."
"What if they come after you?" I asked.
"Then we’ll bail," Black said as he walked away.
Once Black was gone I got out and headed for the trees. I took up a position across from the road block and waited for Bobby to get there. The cop talked to Bobby for less than a minute before letting him drive on without incident. Jamaica and I weren’t that lucky. When it came our turn to go through the roadblock they made us get out. The cops searched us and looked in the car, but not closely enough to find the guns under the back seat. Then they made Jamaica take the breath test and walk a straight line, even though either of us had been drinking. After that twenty-minute ordeal, Jamaica took off and tried to catch up with Black and Bobby. What we found we’d never saw coming. About twenty miles up the road we saw Black and Bobby walking.
"What now?" Jamaica asked.
"Maybe the truck broke down," I replied as Jamaica slowed down.
"What happened to the truck?" Jamaica asked as they got in the car.
"We got jacked, that’s what the fuck happened," Bobby screamed. He told us that they had to stop because a car we blocking the road. Two men were standing in the middle of the road arguing. Once they stopped two more men, one on each side, opened the truck doors and ordered Black and Bobby out of the truck at gunpoint. They took their guns and jumped in the truck and drove off. The other two returned to their cars in the road and then they drove away, too. "They ran it like clock work, just like we would have." The whole thing was over in less than a minute.
Bobby cursed and complained the whole way back to New York. Black on the other hand, never said a word. But we knew, in his mind, he was goin’ over every minute of the robbery. And you knew he was pissed. He already had a buyer; they’d agreed on a price. Him and Bobby were supposed to meet with him in the morning and drop it off.
Once we got back to The Late Night, Black told me to drive him somewhere. I had a good idea where we were goin’, and sure as shit, I was right.
Black pounded on Ayana’s door and after a while she opened it. "Black?" a half sleep Ayana said. "What you doin’ here? Did something go wrong?"
Black didn’t say a word. He just kept walking toward her, and Ayana kept backin’ up, until she backed her way into the bedroom. Black closed the door behind him.
I propped up some pillows and made myself comfortable on the couch. Every once and a while I would hear Ayana yell, "I didn’t tell nobody! I swear, Black. I didn’t tell nobody!"
I awoke to what smelled like meatloaf cooking, "Good morning, Ayana," I said. "Where’s Black?"
"It’s afternoon and Black’s in the bedroom. If you want to take a shower or whatever, you can use the bathroom down the hall. Lunch should be ready in a soon," Ayana said.
I took a good look at her; she didn’t look like Black beat her down. Ayana was in her late thirties, early forties, maybe. But she was still an attractive woman. She was probably a very pretty women when she was younger.
I made my way to the bathroom and took a quick shower. When I got out, as promised, meatloaf, along with mashed potatoes, collard greens, fried okra and cornbread were on the table, but no sign of Ayana. Not wanting the food to get cold, I sat down to lunch. It wasn’t too long before Black and Ayana came out of the bedroom. She went in the kitchen and Black sat down and began eating. "Well?"
"I don’t think she crossed us," Black replied. "But we’ll talk about that later."
After we finished eating, I took Black home. On the way there, I asked my question again, "Well?"
"I been thinkin’ about this all night. I haven’t even been to sleep."
"Well?" I asked a third time.
"You heard what Bobby said. They ran it like clock work, just like we would have. The bandits were organized; other than ‘get out’; they never said a word. It happened so fast, I couldn’t really tell if they were black or white, but the one that took my guns sounded like he might be black, but I shouldn’t say for sure."
"You sure she didn’t tell anybody?"
"I just spent all night making sure she didn’t," Black said like I had asked a stupid question. "Now if she didn’t tell anybody, somebody had to figure it out. He’s the one we’re looking for." I drove a while longer; thinkin’ that Black had simply stated the obvious. But I should have known better.
"I want my truck back, Nick. And I’ll have it," Black said.
That night when I got to The Late Night, the kid was there talkin’ to Black. The kid, that’s what we used to call Freeze back in those days. Back then, all Freeze did was run little errands for Black and hang out at the club messing with the ladies. They were seated in the back of the club. Black was doing most if not all the talking. Freeze just did a lot of nodding. When I walked up they stopped talking and they both looked at me like I had no business there. I spoke and walked away and began doin’ my usual, which was hanging out, messing with the ladies. They sat there for most of the night, then suddenly Freeze jumped up and rushed for the door.
It was quiet for the next couple of days; nobody even mentioned the robbery, especially around Black. Then Black called me and told me to, meet him at The Late Night before it closes in the morning. We never closed before eight in the morning. I was with a girlfriend of mine and she wasn’t too happy when I rolled out of bed at, "It’s six-thirty, Nick. Where you goin’?"