What's Really Hood!: A Collection of Tales From the Streets (30 page)

He hit the intercom button on his phone. “Doris, tell Parker and Radcliff to bring the WMM file.”

“WMM? What is this about? You fucker! You tricked
me to come to your office under false pretenses. I should sue your ass!” She stood and grabbed her purse. “My name is Erica
McCoy, not WMM.” She turned to leave the office.

That’s when Houser hit the play button on his recorder. Booming through its speakers was the conversation between her and
Bob Tokowski. Erica abruptly turned around at the sound of her sales voice and stood frozen in place.

Agents Parker and Radcliff entered the office. They both slid several folders in front of Houser and took their seats. Agent
Parker looked as if he had a blond toupee sitting on top of his head. His wrinkled plaid suit drooped over his scrawny frame.
He reminded Erica of an anorexic Bart Simpson. Radcliff was grossly overweight and sloppy looking. His oily black hair was
slicked back into a ponytail. He looked like a goldfish.

After they listened to Alexis yell “Bob!? Bob!?” Houser turned off the tape recorder.

The room grew silent, except for Radcliff’s heavy breathing.

“Please have a seat, Ms. McCoy.”

Erica clutched her Gucci bag tighter.

“Fuck you! I am going to sue your ass for deceit and for wasting my time. Kiss my ass!” With that said, she stormed out of
the office.

Houser jumped from his chair and headed for his office door. He stood in the hallway in front of his office and said, “Murder,
Ms. McCoy! If you don’t get your ass back in here, you’re going down for murder.”

Erica spun around and practically ran to get in Houser’s face.

“Murder!? You wannabe FBI agent! I ain’t got nothing to do with no murder. You people have really lost your minds. Find someone
else to hassle,” she said through clenched teeth.

“Ms. McCoy, your client Bob Tokowski, he died. Dropped dead of a heart attack, right while you were trying to scam him with
your ‘millions’ in gold coins.”

Houser motioned with two fingers from each hand to emphasize quote unquote “millions.”

“That’s right, we know all about the scamming and scheming of WMM. We know your boss, Rinaldo Haywood, aka Brian Stout, aka
Tommy Green, aka John Bennett. We know about his office in the Florida Keys run by his cohorts Brandon Ingram and Charlie
Adams. We know your phone name Alexis Greenspan. Very catchy. We—”

“Hold up, you asshole. I don’t give a fuck what you know. I’m a sales associate. A damned good one at that. I sell to business
owners. If the client decides to patronize our firm and at the same time gamble at a chance of getting a bunch of gold coins,
so the fuck what? That’s not illegal!” Alexis ranted as she turned to walk out.

“Alexis or Erica, whichever character you’re in right now,” fat boy chuckled as Houser began his negotiations, “this is your
only chance to help yourself. You know what’s going on over there is against the law. All I have to do is say the word and
the feds’ll be all over that place. And not only will you go down for money
laundering, conspiracy and fraud, you also have a murder hanging over your head.”

Parker finally decided to put his two cents in.

“Look, Alexis. The company is going down whether you help yourself or not. If I was—”

“Look,” Alexis sighed as she stepped back into the office and shut the door. “If y’all had something then you wouldn’t need
me.”

Alexis snatched open the door and then slammed it shut behind her.

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