"Nooooo," Shaquille yelled, watching his girlfriend and child brutally murdered before his eyes.

Everyone in the room was silent save for sniffles from Cutty and James who cried and the constant growl coming from the hungry pit bull.

"Aight fellas, one more time and I've been very very nice. Santa would be proud. Now where the fuck is the drugs?"

Shaquille thought long and hard about what had transpired. He had lost his family right before his eyes. His world had been taken from him. Losing his life didn't matter, and neither did his friends at this point of the party. "Man, I ain't got no money or no drugs for y'all. Kill us and get the fuck outta my crib," Shaquille said with all eyes on him.

His two buddies were squirming with tears falling down their faces. Both of their heads shaking left to right.

Gun-man said, "I don't think his homies agree."

"Now, that's just too bad," Dog-man said.

"Sure is," Pizza-man said, taking a knee while rubbing his forehead with his gun. "And you know why?" he said, breathing in Shaquille's face. "'Cause this ain't about the money or the work, it's about revenge, pussy."

Pizza-man then nodded to the other men who took their positions and executed Cutty and James; both bullets to the back of their skulls. He then put his gun inside Shaquille's big mouth and pulled the trigger; what the coroner called, "a hole in one."

Murders three-five.

The gunshots were deafening.

Deafening.

Not a silencer like moments ago.

CHAPTER 17

Twelve days later.

It felt good for Trap to be back in business. He and Lamar had bagged up a nice percentage of the four kilos and expected a one hundred seventy-five thousand dollar profit. That was larger than usual, resulting from the deciding not to sell it wholesale.

Kick Rocks walked up to Trap, shaking uncontrollably, craving a hit. "What you got? Nicks or dimes?”

It was just after noon and Trap knew that she was short. She was always short. To top that off, her money always smelled like she hid it in the crack of her ass.

Trap replied, “I got these big ass boulders the size of dog’s head. We just bagged them up. It’s some straight oils.”

“Yeah, that’s it.” Kick Rocks drooled, wiping her running nose with her shirt sleeve. “Let me get a dime for eight, Trap.”

“Why not buy what you can afford? A nick. Come back with two more dollars and you’ll have two nicks. That equals a dime.”

“Boy, please, I want a dime so that I can go straight to the top of the rafters.” She smiled causing him to laugh.

Trap thought about all of the work they had bagged up and decided to take the short for a repeat customer, although his plan was not to take any losses. “Here,” he said, pulling a dime of coke from a sandwich bag held in his boxer briefs. “Stop coming short, too.”

“Or else, what?” She smirked, flashing rotten, browning teeth. “I spend money with y’all too much,” she shot back, passing him the money.

“You right, so don’t let me catch you with no straight money copping from someone else,” warned Trap.

“Whateva.” She sucked her teeth and started counting: T-minus ten...T-minus nine... Blast off.

J-Rock approached Trap, shook his hand and passed him a hundred-dollar-bill. Trapped looked down at it and shook his head.

“I don’t have weed, bro. Turk got it,” Trap said, trying to hand the money back.

“Naw, I want crack.”

“Huh? Come again? You a base head?”

“They ain’t for me, nigga. Got this bitch that goes to Penn that like to smoke the glass dick, to loosen her up to take the black dick.”

“Word? I know she got some friends, my nigga.”

“Probably, I’mma find out. But let me get ten of them dimes, so I can kill this pussy.”

“No doubt,” Trap said, passing off the ten rocks.

J-Rocks body camera captured the entire transaction.

When J-Rock hopped into his Mazda 626 and disappeared, Trap stood inches from the corner, leaned on the mailbox, and pulled out his earnings for the day to count. It was his tenth time counting his money. His pockets had never been so stuffed with money.

“Aye, Turk, this shit poppin’, dog,” Trap said joyfully.

After ten days in the hospital, and two days at a precinct, Turk was out on bail and in the thick of things. “Yeah, man,” Turk replied, “I think we got a better chance to get rich than to die trying.”

They cracked up with laughter.

Turk’s big body had gotten smaller since being shot. He wore a colostomy bag on his hip. A set back that he would have to endure for a long period of time. On the bright side, he was there to be apart of the Bartram Village legacy. His eyes were dull and weak from the everyday pain that he lived with after taking a shot to the stomach.

“Damn dog,” Lamar said solemnly, walking up to them. “I’m hungry as shit.”

“I’m out here eating,” Trap said, fanning his face with his money, and laughing.

“Walk me to the store, man. I ain’t tryna hear that gangsta shit.”

They laughed and made their way to the corner store when Lamar’s cell phone rang. It was Nikia.

“I really need to to see you,” she said as soon as she heard his voice.

“You good? Why you sound like that?” He was worried, a shocking trait that he was hard-pressed to activate.

“I was at the salon and this bitch...You know what, we gotta talk in person. What I have to say shouldn’t be said over the phone.”

“OK, I have a rental car. Where are you?”