Hard Betrayal (Michelle Angelique Avenging Angel Series 2) Page 7

  “I don’t think so. This is not the sort of thing that happens when the shooting starts. When bullets start flying, people hit the floor, not each other.”

  “I heard someone was shot in the ER. That true?” the anesthesiologist asked.

  “Yeah, a cop shot two people. Both died,” one of the nurse said.

  “Well, let’s get scrubbed in. We have a young woman’s life to save.”

  .

  Twelve: ER Coma

  MICHELLE RAN UP to the receptionist at the information booth of Centinela Hospital. “I’m here to find Taye Harris,” she shouted. “She was brought into emergency.”

  “Are you a family member?”

  “No. I’m a longtime friend of the family.”

  “What was the name again?”

  “Taye Harris.”

  “You’re not family, right?”

  “I just said I’m a longtime friend.”

  “Yes, you did. I’m sorry, it’s been so crazy here I’m a little scattered. Can you spell the name?”

  “Taye Harris. Taye — T. A. Y. E. Harris — H. A. R. R. I. S. Taye Harris.”

  “And your name?

  “Michelle Angelique.”

  “Yes, Miss Angelique. Sorry, but I have to ask: can I see some ID, please?”

  “Oh good God! Yeah, here.” Michelle shoved her open wallet at the woman.

  “Thank you. The police asked me to check everyone’s ID today,” the receptionist said as she entered the information on her keyboard.

  “Where is my friend?” Michelle growled.

  “She’s on her way to surgery. I think her sister’s already up in the surgery waiting room. Go to the nurse’s station on the fourth floor; they can tell you where it is. Take those elevators across the way,” the woman told Michelle’s back.

  Michelle ran toward an already-open elevator. “Hold the door!” she yelled.

  On the fourth floor, Michelle followed the signs, running around the corner and down the hall to the waiting room. Before entering, she slowed herself down and more calmly than she felt, stepped through the door. She made eye contact with Nikky.

  Nikky’s eyes were red and tight. Michelle remembered that look; it was not a look you wanted focused in your direction. Nikky was scared and furious and now somebody would pay.

  “Is she . . . ?” Michelle asked.

  “She’s still in surgery. We don’t know anything yet.”

  Michelle let out her breath. “Oh God, I was so scared.”

  She wrapped Nikky in her arms, and held her friend long enough Nikky should have relaxed and leaned into the hug. Nikky never relaxed.

  Michelle sat down and pulled on Nikky’s hand until she sat on the couch beside her.

  “What can you tell me?”

  “Not much. She has some kind of a concussion so they put her in a coma. They’re operating on her now. I spoke to the surgeon about ten minutes ago. She said they’d be in surgery for at least three hours, possibly more. They can’t tell how serious it is until they’re inside her head. That’s all she could tell me.”

  “Three or more hours . . . What happens after that?” Michelle asked.

  “The doctor said it didn’t mean anything. Three hours was the minimum time. It’s normal to go four or even five hours.”

  “Good God, Nikky. Five hours in surgery is a long time.”

  “I know. I don’t know how I’m going to keep from going crazy.”

  “Did you talk to the ER doctor? Do you know what happened?”

  “Not really,” Nikky said. “I mean, no, I only talked to the surgeon, not the ER docs, or the cops, or anyone else. She said Taye was apparently beat up and that’s how she got the concussion. She didn’t know any of the details and was in a hurry to start. After we talked, I came in here. Then you showed up.”

  “Okay, let me go to the nurse’s station and see what I can find out,” Michelle said.

  “I’ll go with you.”

  Michelle and Nikky left the waiting room in search of someone to talk to. They found a middle-aged woman seated at the side desk, filling in forms. Nobody sat at the station’s front counter.

  “Excuse me, I’m Michelle, and this is Nikky Harris, Taye Harris’ sister,” Michelle said. “Taye’s inside and they’re operating on her head.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” the woman replied. “That kind of surgery is always a worry.”

  “Can you help us?” Nikky asked. “All we know is she has a concussion but not how it happened. How do we find out more about her?”

  The woman glanced around. “Well, I’m just an orderly, but I can sneak a peek at her chart.” She had the type of eyes that spoke of a lot of suffering and knew too well the worry and fear families in the hood lived with.

  “Oh, thank you, I really appreciate your help,” Nikky said, her own eyes filling with tears.

  “Her name’s Taye Harris, right?”

  Nikky nodded and the woman typed Taye’s name into the computer at the station.

  “No, it doesn’t say anything here.” She walked over to a cart with a half-dozen charts in a plastic bin and pulled one out. “So, let’s see if there’s anything here.” She flipped a couple of pages. “She came in an ambulance and . . . let’s see . . . she was with a woman named Joyce ‘JJ’ Johnson.”

  “I know JJ,” Nikky said. “Where can I find her?”

  “Sorry, this form doesn’t show where she is. I suggest you go check the ER first. If she’s not in there, then you can ask an orderly or go to the front desk.”

  “Thank you,” Michelle said. “We appreciate your help so much.”

  “You’re welcome. Good luck.”

  * * *

  In the open areas of the ER, Michelle and Nikky found JJ, eyes closed, lying on a gurney against the wall. Nikky touched her on the shoulder. “Hey, JJ, you awake?”

  “Oh, Nikky. I’m so glad you’re here,” JJ said. “They took Taye right into one of those closed-off areas, stuck me in here and won’t tell me anything. A short while later, they rolled her out and put her on the elevator, and still nobody won’t talk to me. I’m so scared. How is she?”

  “She’s in surgery.”

  “Oh, God. For her head, right?”

  “The doctors said her brain’s swelling so they need to let the pressure go.”

  “Will she be all right? Is your mom here?”

  “The docs won’t tell me anything real. They only said she needed surgery, and I signed the papers. No, Mom’s on her way.”

  “What now?” JJ asked.

  “Now, we wait. Tell me what happened,” Nikky said. “How did you and Taye get mixed up in this mess?” She swiveled her head and eyes, looking around the ER to indicate the surrounding bedlam.

  “We didn’t. We weren’t. We didn’t do a damned thing, I swear.” JJ told them what happened on the street.

  As JJ told her story, Michelle’s blood began to boil. She clamped her mouth shut stopping several explosions. Finally, when JJ appeared to have finished the story she asked, “Did you know these guys?”

  “I kinda recognized a couple of them, seen them around. But I know one guy for sure. He was that dude Deja used to be hooked up with.”

  “Tall, light-skinned guy?” Nikky asked.

  “Yeah. He’s the one who beat Taye.”

  “Muthafuckin rat bastard!” Nikky growled. “I’ll kill that sonuvabitch. When I get my hands on him, he’s dead.”

  Michelle held Nikky’s shoulder and the two women met eye to eye. “Whatever it takes,” Michelle said. “Anything you need. You have my deepest promise on that.”

  Nikky paused, closed her eyes, a tear ran down one cheek.

  Michelle hugged her and spoke softly into her ear. “We’ll get him. I swear to God, he’ll pay.”

  When Nikky pulled away, Michelle turned back to JJ. “What about the others?”

  They hit me, but they did a lot of dancing around like they didn’t want to hurt me bad. That guy, he was different, brutal.
I could see he meant to be serious, like he wanted to kill her with his bare hand. He’s also the asshole who broke my arm.”

  Tears in her eyes, JJ asked, “I don’t know why they did this. Why did they? What did we ever do to them?”

  “It’s not your fault,” Nikky said. “Not yours or Taye’s. The blame is mine. I should’ve offed that asshole a long time ago. Now I will.”

  “What about you?” Michelle asked. “Are you hurt bad?”

  “A couple cracked ribs and my arm’s broke. The doc said because my ribs are cracked, but not broken, I don’t have to worry as long as I’m careful and take it easy for a couple weeks. I’m scared my face will be scarred from these cuts. It’s bad enough, but nothing big like what happened to Taye.”

  Nikky’s phone chimed with a text. “Mom’s here.”

  “We’re heading back upstairs where they’re working on Taye,” Michelle said. “Before we go, do you need anything? How are you getting home?”

  “I’m good. My mom’s here. You barely missed her. She went to deal with some paperwork. She’ll take me home. Please tell me when you learn any more about Taye.”

  Michelle squeezed JJ’s hand. “We will.” She turned and trotted to catch up with Nikky at the elevator.

  The two friends looked at each other — neither said a word.

  * * *

  Michelle and Nikky walked back into the surgery waiting room to find Deja and Mrs. Harris standing, holding hands, looking out a window. Mrs. Harris turned and hugged Nikky. For several minutes, they held each other, rocking and crying,

  Michelle and Deja took seats in two upholstered chairs facing a matching couch with a low coffee table in the middle, where they waited in silence.

  A little while later, and still holding hands, Nikky and her mother sat side by side on the couch. They were both dry-eyed, but clearly on the edge of fresh tears.

  “Do we know how this happened?” Mrs. Harris asked.

  “Yes,” Nikky said, though she didn’t volunteer any more information.

  “Well, are you going to tell me?”

  “Oh Mom, you really don’t want to know.”

  “Yes, I do. I need to know.”

  Mrs. Harris looked at Michelle. “Do you know what happened?”

  Michelle nodded.

  “And you?” Mrs. Harris asked Deja.

  Deja shook her head.

  “Can we talk about it later?” Nikky asked.

  “Thank you for trying to protect me,” Mrs. Harris said, “and I love you for that. But we discuss this now. It may be wrong, and God may say this is a sin even to think about it, but I’m sorry, He’ll have to deal with it. You girls know I don’t know anybody to take care of this. And you do. My baby’s in surgery. She might be okay, or she could die. Or maybe she’ll live, but never be right again. One thing’s for sure, she didn’t do anything to earn this. Not this.”

  Mrs. Harris paused, anguish plain on her face, and she closed her eyes, covered her mouth with trembling fingers. A few moments later, she looked up. “Whoever did this needs to pay. I’m staying here with her, and I want you three to stay with me. We all stay until we know whatever they can tell us. Afterwards, I need you to go out and find the slimy pig who did this. When you find him, you . . .” She took a deep breath. “You make that bastard pay for what he did to my baby girl.”

  “Thank you, Momma,” Nikky said. “I’m gonna make him pay alright. I’ll take that sonuvabitch apart piece at a time and more. I’m grateful I don’t need to hide it from you.”

  Deja started to speak, but couldn’t, and where words failed, tears succeeded. They spilled over onto her cheeks as she nodded her agreement.

  Michelle took Mrs. Harris’ hands. “Mrs. H, right here and now, I promise you and Taye, and I promise every woman who’s ever been wronged this way, the three of us will get to the bottom of this mess. We’ll find them — all of them — and make them wish to God they’d never been born.”

  “We know who did it,” Nikky said.

  “Who?” Deja and Mrs. Harris asked at the same time.

  “Jerome, and he’s fucking dead meat.”

  .

  Thirteen: Moving Up

  “HELLO, TREVON.” Miss Betty stepped out onto her apartment porch and enveloped him a huge hug.

  “Hi, Miss Betty. Good to see you.” He returned the hug.

  “Come in out of that hot sun. Are you hungry, thirsty? Would you like something to drink?”

  “How about some of your famous picnic tea? Any of that around?”

  Everyone called it “picnic tea,” because it was so sweet, the ants tried to cart it off.

  “Course, I have some tea. There’s always a tall glass reserved for you.”

  While Miss Betty went to the kitchen for glasses, ice, and the tea. The two-story apartment was built like a townhouse with its own street-level front entry door, large living room, and dining area. The rooms were full of things he remembered from the house she’d lived in with Big John. A little tight, but her large, heavy-built furniture fit into the space. It felt comfortable.

  Betty’s late husband, Big John, had been like family to Trevon. His own father skipped out early and his mother spent most of her time at work. For years, she’d worked too hard for too little money and far too little respect.

  As soon as Trevon was old enough to understand, he believed she could have been a lot more. Her life made him think of the line in that song in the play Working: “If I coulda been, what I coulda been, I coulda been something.” Like so many hardworking mothers, she never had the chance to be what she really could have been.

  Even as a young teenager Trevon tried to hide that his help with the family finances came drug sales from his mother. But he was sure she knew about it. Now, by unspoken agreement, she didn’t ask about the drug side of his business and only focused on his being a lawyer. That she was very proud of.

  Big John was dead now, but Trevon remembered their important conversations clearly.

  One was on a rare cold, rainy Southern California morning. Trevon was nineteen and he needed to talk to the boss — alone. That wasn’t something he’d ever done before. After all, he was only a courier for Slim, bringing up product from San Pedro to Anglewatts. The job came with high risk, huge responsibility, and small reward, but it was a foot in the door to moving up in Slim’s organization.

  “Sup, Ralph? Big John around? I need to talk to him.”

  “Yeah, sure, kid, he’s around,” Ralph said. “But you aren’t talking to him. You talk to me. You know that.”

  Trevon shrugged and nodded. “Yeah, that’s how things normally go, and I don’t want to cause no problems, but what I gotta say can only be said to Big John.”

  “No can do. Doesn’t work that way. You tell me, and I decide if Big John needs to hear it.”

  “Here’s the deal,” Trevon said. “You know I respect you. You also know I don’t go making a mess when it isn’t necessary. But, like I already said, this can only be told to Big John, personal.”

  “You’re still not going inside,” Ralph said.

  “I understand you can’t let me in; I get that. How about I wait here until he comes out, catch him when he walks through?”

  Outside Big John’s office was a rather long and narrow, dark entry-way doubling as a storage area, which was crowded with cases of beer stacked against the walls. Three long industrial-style, double-tube florescent light fixtures ran down the center of the room, their bright white light hiding any natural light streaming in through the one small, dust-covered, high-set window protected by security bars. Ralph’s desk, a gray metal escapee from some government office, wasn’t the only incongruity in the room. It didn’t smell like it should have. Instead of dusty, cold cement and cardboard boxes, sandalwood incense permeated the area, and for reasons only known to Ralph, he burned three incense sticks in a small Buddha-style burner twice a day.

  “You could be sitting on those boxes a long time,” Ralph said. “Sometimes
he doesn’t come out for hours.”

  “I’ll wait for as long as it takes. No problem.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Like I say, no problem. I’ll sit over here.” Trevon plopped down onto a low stack of beer cases.

  “Shit, kid, you better not make me look bad. You do that to me, I’ll kick your ass into next week. Maybe make you see Jesus.”

  “I understand. I won’t make you look bad. Trust me, hanging out here in this cramped hall is not my idea of a good time. I wouldn’t stay if this wasn’t important.”

  “Hang on. I’ll see if he can talk to you.” Ralph slipped his feet off the desktop, swiveled around in his soft-leather executive chair, and took the twelve steps back to the closed door.

  A couple of minutes later, Big John stepped out. “Tell me.”

  Trevon met Big John’s eyes, then shifted his gaze over to Ralph, and back to Big John.

  “Yeah, all right,” Big John said. “Ralph, give us ninety seconds, no more. Come inside, Trevon.”

  Once inside, Trevon cut to the chase. “Butch, Alan, and Terry over in Compton are planning to make a run on you and your guys. When I made their delivery earlier today, I heard them talking.”

  Big John sat still for a moment, then yelled, “Ralph, you need to hear this.”

  Ralph walked in, but didn’t say a word.

  “Say it again,” Big John told Trevon, and Trevon repeated his story. “Anything else?” he asked.

  “They were setting a meet with several other lieutenants. Butch said Tony, Pike, and Bo, and their crews will be coming.”

  “When?”

  “I’m not sure. Tonight, maybe tomorrow.”

  “Why’re you telling us this?” Ralph asked. “You’re not in our organization; you don’t owe us nothing.”

  “That’s right; I don’t owe you,” Trevon said. “I work for Slim and do owe him loyalty. You’re his customer, so you get the benefit of that. Also, I thought you might feel a little appreciation for the heads-up.”

  Big John slapped Trevon on the back. “A little appreciation. That’s a good way of putting it. You’re smart enough to know if those guys take over my territory, they’d have enough juice to push your prices down. It’s in your best interest to keep me in business.”