In the middle of the night, all three of them climbed into a taxi and headed toward the Bronx to meet Chanel at the hospital.
Mecca was already there to greet everyone. She was in bad shape too after hearing the news about her friends. Mecca’s eyes were red from crying. She told the family what she knew. Chanel had been brutally raped and Mateo had been shot in the head by two masked intruders. At the moment, the medical staff was collecting a rape kit, clipping and swabbing her fingernails for DNA, and performing an exam on Chanel. Mateo was still in surgery. He was touch-and-go. Bacardi and everyone else was floored by the news.
“I need to call Charlie again,” Bacardi said.
She had been trying to reach Charlie since they’d left the apartment in Brooklyn, but she’d had no luck. Charlie’s phone was going straight to voicemail.
“Fuckin’ bitch, answer your fuckin’ phone! This is an emergency!”
Everyone was breaking down while sitting or standing around in the emergency room. How could this happen to such a sweet girl like Chanel?
***
They’d hit payday. God and Fingers had dumped the loot onto a motel bed somewhere in Brooklyn, and it was a goldmine. There were large amounts of cash, lots of jewelry, some clothing, and a few minks. But the mother lode was the kilo of weed they’d taken from the place.
Charlie was pleased with the lick. She noticed that there was some tension between God and Fingers, but she didn’t mention it. The only thing she said to God was, “Is my sister still alive?”
“What the fuck you think, bitch? Yeah, she’s fuckin’ still alive. She’s good—no fuckin’ harm to her,” he replied matter-of-factly. “Don’t ask me no shit like that!”
Fingers frowned at him.
Charlie couldn’t put her finger on what the sudden tension between them was about. What had happened?
“And what about Mateo?”
“What you think? I personally put a fuckin’ bullet in that nigga’s head,” said God.
She was pleased to hear the news. She believed God when he said that Chanel was still alive and that no harm came to her.
The trio started to go through their score, separating the cash, the goods, and the weed. They had the motel room all to themselves and weren’t worried about anyone intruding on them.
Charlie’s phone was constantly ringing on the dresser, but she chose to ignore it for the moment. She assumed that it was either her mother calling, or one of her sisters to inform her about the tragic news about Mateo and Chanel. She wasn’t in the mood to talk to them. What was important to her at the moment was counting money and getting what was hers—what was owed to her.
The guys needed to sell the weed and the jewelry to give Charlie her cut. In total, they felt that they
came off with at least fifty or sixty thousand in stuff, and split three ways, that would probably leave her with fifteen to twenty thousand dollars. It was a good day, Charlie felt.
Charlie’s cell phone rang for the umpteenth time that night, and once again, she continued to ignore it.
God looked at her and said, “You need to act surprised when you hear the news, Charlie. Ya feel me? Fuckin’ act concerned about ya sister an’ shit. Can you fuckin’ pull that shit off?”
“I got this, God. Don’t worry about me,” she assured him.
He sighed heavily. He didn’t want to worry about her, but he wondered how she would react when she heard the news about Chanel being brutally raped.
***
Charlie arrived at Jacobi hospital in the Bronx the following morning where she was met by everyone, even Mecca. Bacardi shot her a foul look and right away tore into her oldest daughter with, “I fuckin’ tried to call you and you don’t know how to fuckin’ answer your fuckin’ phone.”
“Chill, Ma. I was busy.”
“Busy…”
“What the fuck happened? What happened to Chanel?” Charlie asked with concern pouring from her tone, though it was fraudulent.
Butch, Claire, and Mecca simply looked at her with sadness. Did God lie to her? Did he kill her sister too? Now Charlie started to worry.
“Is Chanel okay?”