“Don’t yell at me!” Wanda yelled.
“I’m not yelling!” I yelled. “This is yelling!” I yelled louder.
Then Wanda yelled as loud as she could. Then I yelled and then we looked at each other and then we yelled together.
Then we both laughed.
“That felt good,” she said as we got to Whitey’s.
“You feel better?”
“Not really,” Wanda said as she parked. “It felt good to let out some of that rage.” She turned off the car and looked at me. “But no, Mike, I don’t feel any better. I still miss the fuck outta her and I’m mad at her for dying on me. And I’m mad at you, and I’m mad at myself for not doing more to help her.”
“Good. Now you know how I feel,” I said, and we got out of the car. “I feel mad at everybody all the time.”
“I need a drink,” Wanda said, and I put my arm around her.
“You can have all you want. We own the joint,” I said as we walked in Whitey’s building.
Whitey Thompson used to be Montel Lamont’s muscle. Montel was a loan shark and a gambler that ran his game out of an apartment, until I killed him. Now Whitey runs the spot for me. Whitey was always quick to remind me; this me, Whitey T, the nigga that had your back on the Mitchell Wright thing.
And he did.
One of the things that I’ve learned is that loyalty is a priceless commodity and hard to come by. I consider Whitey to be a loyal soldier to me.
So, I’m loyal to him.
We took the elevator up and knocked on the door. King, Whitey’s right-hand man opened it.
“What’s up, Black?”
Me and Wanda started to walk in, but some nigga I ain’t never seen before stepped in front of me and put his hand on my chest.
“Back off, Carter,” King said quickly.
He moved his hand and backed up off me.
“Sorry, Black. He’s new.”
“No problem,” I said and looked him in the eyes as Wanda and I passed.
“That’s Mike Black. He’s the boss,” I heard King say to the new guy as I looked around for Whitey.
Since I killed Montel, Whitey had expanded his business. He was running a number bank and had opened another gambling joint and he had a couple of women working the room at both spots.
“All that needed to happen was for Montel’s old scary ass to get out of my way,” Whitey told me one night.
“Out with the old,” I said, and Whitey leaned close to me.
“Like one day, you gonna kill Andre,” Whitey said that night and walked away.
As I wandered around the joint, I kept an eye on Wanda as she made her way around the room. I wasn’t too worried about her being there. Just about everybody in the house knew who Wanda was and what she represented to me. I laughed as I spotted Whitey thinking, niggas know that I will kill a mutha fucka over Wanda. Especially now. But I still kept an eye on her.
“What’s up, Black?” Whitey said when I got to him.
“Money. That’s what’s up,” I said looking around the room.
“We making it up in here. Making it like a mutha fucka.”