Lambchop,

What’s up with you, bull? Hopefully, by the time this kite lands, everything will be everything. As for me, though, I’m chill. They finally marked my case MUST BE TRIED. That’s next month, so hopefully, I touch down. Insha Allah. Your name poppin’ in here. Ya girl, Ms. K, still be giving me cigarettes and weed to sell. She ‘bout her bread. Wassup with the hoes out there? Oh, yeah, I heard about your man, Gunna, as well. If he lives keep an eye on that crafty ass nigga, dog. Aight, bull, I’m out for now. Good lookin’ on that $500, too. Shoot me some flicks.

Bulletproof Love,

Two Can Ham

Lamar smiled as the letter came to an end. This nigga, Hamma, shot out, he thought, walking down the front steps of the house. He saw a strange white man circling his car. The car hadn’t moved since the night he and Gunna caught their last body in Upper Darby.

“Hey, how you doing,” Lamar asked, hoping the man wasn’t a cop. “You like that there?”

“Yeah, bud, I actually love these bad boys,” the man replied excitedly.

“Right. Right.”

“These things are hard to come by. Most guys go and get a Grand Marquis, change the bumper, and throw on an extra exhaust pipe.”

“And, then, think that they have a Marauder,” Lamar said, laughing.

“This one is official.”

“Yup,” Lamar said, smiling. A friendly salesman. “It runs great and I only want eighty-five hundred for it.”

“No way, kid. This isn’t your little guy?”

“Actually, it’s my mother’s, and she’s off today. We can make a deal, ASAP.”

“Well, shit. Yeah, I’ll buy it. I only have about eighty-two on me, right now.”

“No problem, we can stop at a bank on the way to change the title. Let me get my mom,” Lamar said, shaking the man’s hand.

CHAPTER 23

Jackson Bobb was set to be sentenced in courtroom 9-A of the United States District Cort for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in downtown Philadelphia. This morning US marshals shackled Bobb’s wrists and ankles, brought him down to the basement of the Federal Detention Center, shuffled him through a tunnel leading to the courthouse to the smelly prisoners’ holding cell on the second floor to await his four p.m. sentencing hearing.

A new friend of SA Livingston’s, AUSA John McGraw, stepped outside of the courtroom to take a phone call. When he was complete the agent approached him with a handshake.

SA Livingston asked, “Is there a way for me to be certain a drug defendant always draws a life sentence?”

The prosecutor raised one bushy eyebrow and looked trapped in a puzzle.

“I’m new to the sentencing phase,” SA Livingston said. He told the agent that, Baker Bobb, a Jamaican immigrant, given the moniker “baker” for his marihuana laced baked treats, had distributed six-hundred kilos of marihuana which carried a base offense sentencing level of twenty-six. “Look it up in the guidelines,” AUSA McGraw said, “its sixty-three to seventy-eight months for the first offense. Because this is his third offense, he’s a career offender, demanding a base offense level of thirty-four and the highest range for priors, six. But he carried weapons and employed teenagers, so his offense level is raised two for the gun and four for exploiting children. That’s level forty, for a sentencing range of three hundred sixty months to life.”

SA Livingston admired the prosecutor’s use of the word exploited, the tone, the agent was sure, it wasn’t in the guidelines. It was!

They walked back into the courtroom as a court supporter ushered Baker Bobb into the courtroom and seating him next to his attorney at the defense table. Four US marshals were in the room, along with the rows of spectator seats, like church pews, filled to capacity with the defendant’s friends and unknown drug associates, like it was Easter Sunday.

SA Livingston sat and wondered if the courtroom deputy had a spare copy of the sentencing guideline as he took in the room and hoped the courtroom with its twenty-five-feet high ceiling, cheap chandeliers, wood panel on the walls, and no windows was as packed when he got Lamar Dunken in a trial. Her Honor slipped in and everyone rose, sat, and the courtroom deputy called case number 07-X-4381, the United States versus Jackson Bobb to order.

Poor fellow, the agent thought, this whole rich country, against this poor little guy. Wait, this rich son-of-a-bitch, he thought as his defense attorney argued against the forfeiture of his Bentley, Jaguar, his homes in South Beach Miami, and the Hamptons, his yacht, and thriving bakery.

The forfeiture discussion railed on for twenty minutes, the brazen assistant United States attorney out for blood, contending that Baker Bobb’s possessions were illegally obtained with laundered money as outlined in the pre sentence investigation report, and the judge ruled in favor of the government.

The arguing went on, the defense attorney requesting a downward departure in the sentence, asserting that a life sentence was inappropriate because of the defendant’s contributions to the community and his age. The AUSA wasn’t having it, requesting an upward departure. Which SA Livingston understood to mean, pick up the book and hurl it at him.

With force.

And clocking in at one hundred two MPH.

Long winded arguments raged on, spliced with legal jargon, but all SA Livingston thought about was Lamar Dunken. Finally, he heard the judge say, “After carefully hearing all arguments and taking into account all legal briefs, arguments, character letters and the PSI report, it is the judgment of the court the Jackson Bobb, is hereby committed to the custody of the Bureau of Prisons for a term of four hundred and twenty months as to the one count of the indictment.”

Music to the agent’s ears.

The judge’s ruling, not the mumbling behind him, words in thick Jamaican accents.

The judge took off her glasses, stared at the audience and pounded her gavel once. Before she continued, she could hear a pin drop.

CHAPTER 24

After selling the Marauder, Lamar was eight thousand dollars richer because he gave Nikia’s mother five hundred for her troubles. In the rented Impala, he headed straight to Bartram Village. There, he found Trap kicking it with some other up-and-coming goons and signaled for him to hop in the car.

Jogging from across the street, Trap jumped into the passenger seat, and said, “What’s up Lambchop?”

“Same shit, li’l nigga. I can’t call it,” Lamar answered, pulling into traffic. “You finish that work?”

“Yes, sir, I got your money at my mom’s crib.”

Lamar chuckled. “Good, good. You playin’ ya part, so I’m ‘bout to take you down South Street to get some clothes and shit.”

“Aight, bet.”

“We gon’ bag up when we get done,” Lamar said, handing Trap a burning Backwood.

“Cool,” the youngin’ said, “what’s up with Gunna?”

“He’s still on support. I wanted to see him today, but I got side tracked trying to get on the block to bag up and I sold the Marauder. Insha Allah, he makes it back out here with us to enjoy this ride to the top.”

“Damn, man, you sold the Marauder?”

“I had to, Trap. That jawn was used in too many getaways,” he said, texting Nikia at a red light. He asked her if she wanted anything from South Street.