Read The Family Business Online
Authors: Eric Pete,Carl Weber
The Family Business (12 page)
“That’ll be all, Paris. Go check on Orlando to see if he’s done back in my office,” I directed. She moved on, but not before eyeing Miguel a final time and flicking her hair. I could’ve sworn she had a little extra bounce in her step.
Once she disappeared around the corner, I leaned over and placed my arm across the roof of the Continental GT, peering inside.
“Miguel, that’s my daughter,” I offered, not sure if he was aware.
“Yes, sir,” Miguel responded, trying to be nonchalant about the obvious rise she’d gotten out of him a minute ago.
“This car, you can have one day. Matter of fact, once this deal goes through, maybe I’ll give it to you. We’ll call it a finder’s fee. But my daughter, you can’t have. Comprende?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good,” I said, looking him dead in the eye as I gave him a fatherly pat across his chest. “Because if you touch her, I’ll kill you.”
London
18
I walked out of Queens Village Montessori School, holding Mariah’s hand, styling and profiling like I owned the place. With the tuition I was paying them for Mariah to go to school there each week, I probably should have had Daddy buy the joint, because it would have been cheaper.
I’d picked her up a little early in hopes of using her as an excuse for stopping by the office and running into Harris. We’d been arguing nonstop since he found out that he wasn’t my first lover. I’d hurt his ego pretty bad. He hadn’t come home from the office before midnight for the past few nights, and he was out the door before seven every morning. I was hoping that bringing Mariah by the office to see him would be enough of an olive branch for us to at least talk. We had a fund-raising dinner with my parents in a few days, and I did not want my mother or father picking up on just how bad things were between us.
I knew that once we started talking civilly again, I’d ease my way back into his good graces. He was a sucker for a good blow job, so it might just take giving him some head from under his desk for him to forgive me. I was going to have to do something, because that man had a high sex drive, and I wasn’t about to let any other woman step into my shoes. I’d given up my professional life and had a baby years before I was ready, all in the name of making him happy, so you best believe I wasn’t about to let anyone step in my way.
“So how was school today?” I asked my daughter as she leaped into her seat in the back of my Mercedes SUV, her curls bouncing wildly.
“Good. Jermaine was bad again today. He couldn’t play at recess,” she rattled off without taking a breath. Kids. As I buckled her seat belt, she gave me a kiss on the cheek. “We goin’ to see Grandpa now?” she asked, almost pleading.
“Yeah, baby. Mommy’s gonna take you to see Grandpa. But I want you to find Daddy first and give him a big hug. He really misses you.”
“Okay, Mommy, but then I’m gonna find Grandpa and help him, because I run Duncan Motors.”
As much as Mariah enjoyed pretending she was an employee, barking out orders and charming the car shoppers, my father loved having her around the dealership even more. I kind of think his spoiling Mariah was an attempt to make up for how hard he was on us growing up—well, all of us except Paris. Perhaps he should’ve been harder on her. It might have saved us all some trouble.
On the way to bring Mariah for her visit, I stopped at the dry cleaners on Rockaway Boulevard to drop off Harris’s clothes. Mariah stood at my side, counting the articles of clothing as the woman behind the counter separated them. Everything was as usual, until I sifted through the crisp whites. As I grasped the third one from the pile, a red streak near the last button on the bottom of the shirt caught my eye. I studied it harder, realizing it was a woman’s lipstick smudge—and it wasn’t mine. It was far too bright.
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered.
“Oooh, Mommy, you said a bad word,” Mariah chastised.
“I know, baby. I’m sorry,” I apologized as tears welled up in my eyes.
“Mommy, you look like you’re crying. Is it because you said a bad word?”
“No, I’m not crying, baby. I just have something in my eyes. Mommy’s fine.” I wiped away the tears. The Asian woman behind the counter met my dazed stare, offering either solidarity or pity as she took the shirt away from me and squirreled it out of my view with the rest of the dry cleaning.
“Medium starch? We’ll clean it good,” was all she said as she handed me my ticket.
I sucked in some air, lifting my head as I walked out of the dry cleaners, wishing Harris’s clothes were in a burning heap.
As we walked through the parking lot, Mariah asked questions about every little thing she saw, as she was apt to do, but I didn’t respond. My fucking philandering husband was consuming my thoughts, along with ideas about just how I was going to pay his ass back.
I buckled Mariah into her car seat, then walked around to the driver’s side.
“No, no, no,” I said with a groan when I spotted the flat front tire. This could not be happening to me. Not today.
“Mommy, what’s wrong?” Mariah shouted from her seat. It was the first time I actually heard what she said since we’d left the dry cleaners.
“Hang on, baby. Mommy needs to make a call.” As much as I hated doing it, I needed to call my husband.
“Where are you?” I barked when Harris answered.
“In Manhattan. I have an important meeting.”
“You sure you’re not in some hotel with that bitch whose lipstick was left on your shirt? How the hell do you get lipstick down there, anyway? Wait. Don’t fucking answer that,” I said as my mind was filled with the image of some bitch giving him head.
I knew I probably should have stuck to the flat tire issue, but the minute I heard his voice, I couldn’t help myself. I wanted to jump through the phone and strangle him.
“London, I’m busy and don’t have time for your shit, okay?” he snapped.
Damn. He didn’t even deny it. “My shit! I’m the one out dropping off your laundry while you out getting your dick sucked by God knows who.”
“You know what ...?” He hung up, which pissed me off even more.
I called him right back. “Don’t be hanging up on me.”
“You keep talking to me about nonsense, and I’m gonna do a lot worse than hang up. Now, I told you I have a meeting.”
I’m not going to lie; his threat scared me, but I tried not to let it show. “Well, I got a flat tire by the dry cleaners, and your daughter’s in the car.”
“The one over by Farmers Boulevard?”
“Yep, and the only reason I’m here is because you said you don’t want anyone else doing your shirts but them.”
“You said Mariah’s with you?” The way he said it made me feel like he didn’t give a shit about me, just Mariah.
“Mm-hmm. You coming to get us or what?”
“I can’t right now, London. I’m just about to start this meeting. Just call Junior’s people. They’ll send somebody over to change it.”
I exhaled loudly into the phone. “I guess.”
“Listen, I love you, London. Now, get back inside with Mariah and lock the doors. That’s not the best of neighborhoods. I don’t want anything happening to you before we have a chance to talk.”
Don’t ask me why, but I hung up with a smile—before someone frightened the hell out of me.
“Miss—”
I screamed, turning around to find a man standing between me and the back of my car, where my daughter was sitting, watching this whole thing. He looked dirty and disheveled, but I told myself that didn’t automatically make him a bad person.
“Miss, everything okay?”
“No,” I said, embarrassed by being rattled. “My tire. I had a blowout.”
“That’s too bad,” he chirped.
At that point, I was about to show him where the spare tire was, because I assumed he was about to offer assistance. Well, you know what they say about assuming things.
“Guess I can’t drive it off, then,” he continued as he pulled a gun on me from under his hoodie. I gazed down its barrel.
“Please. My daughter—”
“Will be okay if you hurry up and hand over all yer shit!” he snarled, cutting me off.
“Mommy?” Mariah called out from inside. Thank God the man’s back was turned to her, so she couldn’t see the gun.
“Wait a minute, baby. The nice man is going to help us.” I looked at him and pleaded, “Please ... just leave us alone. You don’t want to do this.”
“Who the fuck are you to know what I want and don’t want? Lady, I’m losin’ my patience. Now, give up your shit!”
“Okay. Okay, here.” I was willing to give him everything, as long as Mariah and I could walk away from this alive. I let my purse slide off my shoulder into my hand, then tossed it to him.
“What else you got? What about that jewelry and that watch? Don’t even think about holdin’ out on me.”
I took off my wedding ring and watch and handed them to him. “That’s it.”
“What you got in the car? I said I want it all,” he shouted.
“Nothing. Just my daughter.”
“Check again, or I’ll make her check.” He glanced in Mariah’s direction. Just the thought of him going near her was enough to make me take action. I opened the car door. Behind me, I could hear him riffling through my purse with his free hand. I knew he was distracted, so I began fishing beneath the driver’s seat for something he hadn’t bargained for.
“Mmm ... you got a nice ass.”
I dreaded that his eyes were on me again rather than on my purse. I reached around a little more frantically for what should have been easy to find. Then it hit me—my gun wasn’t there. It was in the glove compartment, locked away so Mariah wouldn’t find it. Damn, motherhood had made me sloppy, but I had to think of something. This guy was starting to act creepier than before. “Um, my glove compartment is locked. I’m gonna need the keys out of my purse.”
“Nah, now that I think about it, that wheel and tire ain’t that bad. Why don’t you get in? We can drive around the corner ... talk. Maybe I’ll change it fer ya. Afterwards.” I jerked up when his hand touched my ass.
“Look,” I said, turning to face him. “You really don’t want to do this. Check my wallet. There’s—”
“I’m already gonna get the money, lady. What I want is between your legs. Now, get your ass in the car.”
He glanced over at Mariah, and I made a decision right then and there. I was not going to let that man rape me, especially not in front of my child, so we were about to see who was stronger. I was about to try to wrestle that gun away from him.
I took a deep breath, but before I could move, someone rushed up behind me and bowled the fiend over. He fell against the fender of my Mercedes, busting his mouth wide open and sending the snub-nosed revolver spilling onto the pavement, along with several rotted teeth.
My sudden rescuer, a very handsome, dark-haired white man, delivered a knee to my attacker’s ribs as he tried to scamper to his feet. Leaving his gun, my personal effects, and the teeth that no longer mattered, he fled up the avenue with his busted mouth.
“Get the fuck outta here!” my rescuer hollered, kicking at the open air in disgust.
“Mommy!” Mariah screamed as she tried to undo her seat belt. I rushed to the backseat, opening the door to check on her.
“Shhh, shhh. Hey, baby, it’s okay,” I said, delivering my best smile to calm her as I brushed her curls aside. “The man fell, and this gentleman tried to help him up.”
“I thought he was tryin’ to hurt you.”
“No, no, baby girl. Everything’s fine. This nice man is going to help us instead. That’s all.”
Mariah looked at the new arrival, waving at him with a warm smile. He returned her smile and waved back. I was still trying to remove my heart from my throat as the adrenaline wore off.
“Thank you,” I offered as he handed me back my purse.
“Glad to help. I was across the street. I didn’t think anything was wrong until I saw him going through your purse. Didn’t know about the gun until I hit him. Whoa,” he said, looking down at the ground as he suddenly realized his mortality in this situation.
“I didn’t know this city still had Good Samaritans. That was very brave of you.”
“My mom would be glad to hear that, but it wasn’t nothin’. I don’t like to see women in trouble,” he said with a smile. He had this rough charm about him, and he was easy on the eyes too. “You still need your tire changed, right?”
“I guess I do. London,” I offered, suddenly self-conscious about how this mom looked after a near-fatal encounter.
“Anthony. But my friends call me Tony,” he replied. “You think we should call the police?”
“For what? So we can be knee-deep in paperwork and waste the next five hours? I think he already got what he deserved.”
“Suit yourself. Where’s your jack?” he said, bending over to get a better look at the tire. I went to the trunk. “Beautiful daughter you have there.”
“Thank you.”
“She obviously gets it from her mom,” he added with a slight change in his voice. Was this white boy flirting with me?
As I smiled, I wondered whether I should even tell Harris or the rest of my family about this. For now, I would clear my head of such things and enjoy the view as Tony rendered assistance—while my husband was across town, once again too busy for me.
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