Payback

'See for yourself,' Bobby said and pointed to the monitor. 'There they are.'

Nick and Wanda watched the recording of the robbery. Once it was done, Wanda asked, 'Where were the police? I don’t see the police anywhere.'

'They were drawn away from the door by a drunk couple arguing in the parking lot,' Bobby told them. 'The woman fired a couple of shots and the police came runnin’.'

'You think they were in on it?' Nick asked.

'I don’t know. The cops told Tara that they just took the gun from her and sent the two of them home.'

'You think there’s any connection with this robbery and everything else that’s goin’ on?' Nick asked.

'I don’t think so,' Bobby said. 'What would Curl have to gain by robbing the club?'

'You mean other than money,' Nick threw in.

'You’re kinda quiet about all this, Mike,' Wanda said noticing that he hadn’t said a word since she and Nick came into the office. 'What do you think?'

'I don’t know what to think about this, Wanda,' Mike said and walked over to the bar. 'But I will tell you this, the objective wasn’t money.'

'What makes you say that?' Wanda asked.

'If the objective was money they woulda waited until the club closed, waited until somebody came out the back door and got all the money from the bars and the door. So if it is Curl behind this it would make perfect sense.'

'I say again, what makes you say that?' Wanda asked.

'What is Curl trying to do? He is trying to expand his operation. How can he do that? He can only expand by killin’ us all and takin’ it or to get us to sit down with him and we give it to him. At every point the tactics have been correct, they just weren’t executed correctly. Which is why I don’t think that it’s Curl, or at least it’s not him callin’ the shots?'

'Then who?' Wanda asked as Freeze came thought the door.

'Where you been?' Mike asked.

'Yonkers PD.'

'Why didn’t you call me?' Wanda asked.

'‘Cause I wasn’t in jail.'

'Then what were you doin’ there,' Bobby asked.

'Somebody tried to kill me, but they got Paulleen instead. She’s dead.'

Meanwhile, another meeting was taking place at The Spot between D-Train and the four Impressions bandits. Melinda walked into the office. When she came into the office everybody stopped talking and looked at Melinda. She didn’t think anything of it; she was used to things like that happening when she came into a room. 'Hi, Dee. How did it go?'

'Y’all excuse me for a minute,' D-Train said to the bandits. They got up slowly and walked out of the office.

Once they were gone Melinda asked, 'How did it go?'

'Baby it went just like you said it would,' D-Train said and got up from his desk and put his arms around Melinda. 'And this time everybody did shit according to the plan.'

'That’s great, baby,’ Melinda said and kissed him on the cheek. 'What about the couple that caused the diversion? Did the cops take them to jail?'

'Nope,' he replied and kissed her. 'They just took the gun from her and told them both to go home.'

'How much did they get?'

'That was the only problem,' D-Train said and broke their embrace and started to walk away.

'Oh, Lord, what happened?'

D-Train turned back quickly and backhanded Melinda to the floor. 'TWO FUCKIN’ GRAND!' he screamed as he stood over her. 'My people went through all that shit for two fuckin’ grand.'

'That’s not possible,' Melinda said and tried to crawl away from D-Train, but he kept coming.

'Oh, but yes it is possible, Miss master plan.'

'I told you that the money wasn’t the point. The point was to get them to come to us!' Melinda yelled as she backed herself into a corner.

'Bitch, please. A nigga like Black spend that much on a suit. Them niggas ain’t gonna care about losin’ two fuckin’ grand.' D-Train looked at Melinda as tears rolled down her cheeks. 'Get up,' he said and held out his hand. 'Get up, I ain’t gonna hit you no more.'

'You promise?'

'Yeah, I promise. Besides, I got another problem that I need to deal with.' D-Train helped Melinda to her feet and practically dragged her into the stock room. Once they got in the stock room, there sat Clark Kent, surrounded by D-Train’s crew, gagged, beaten, and bloody, tied to a chair.

'What’s goin’ on here?' Melinda asked.

'This is what happens to a nigga that fucks up.'

'What did he do?'

'This dumb bitch decided on his own that he was gonna whack Freeze. But he missed. Killed his woman instead.'

'You killed Paulleen?'

'You know her?'

'Of course I know her. We were friends,' Melinda said knowing how fucked up this was. Now there would be no talk. She knew that Freeze would come after them with everything he had. 'What are you gonna do with him?'

D-Train took out his gun. 'I wanted you to see what happens to niggas that fuck up.' D-Train pointed his gun and pumped three shots into Clark Kent’s head. 'Guess he ain’t Superman,' D-Train said and his crew laughed. Then he grabbed Melinda by the throat. 'You ain’t got no more times to fuck up. Understand?'

Melinda said nothing, but understood perfectly, and it became very clear to her exactly what she had to do now.

Chapter Twenty-six

It was mid afternoon when Nick arrived at the Post office to met Freddie. He still hadn’t heard from Kirk. Since he had to catch Freddie, Nick allowed Kirk to rush out of his apartment without giving up any information, and now he regretted it. Nick tried to call Kirk again, and again caught Kirk’s voicemail. He wanted to call Black and tell him, tell him what? That Kirk knew something, but I have no idea what? That I think it has something to do with the DEA? I don’t think so. Not after Black just asked me if I was a DEA agent. But he needed to run this by somebody and thought that since he wasn’t ready to tell Black that Wanda was the next best choice.

The night before, Wanda and Nick talked about his situation for about an hour at her office. After he explained his concerns about what Sally Fitz had told him, Wanda had to agree with him, but she had to ask a question before she said anything else. 'Are you DEA, Nick?' Wanda asked with a smile

'No, Wanda, I am not DEA.'

'Good for you, Nick. It would break my heart if you were,' Wanda said in a somewhat flirtatious way, and then turned serious. 'But I agree, you were right to move Monika. How is she doing anyway?'

'She’s doin’ fine, she just needs to rest. She should be back on her feet in a day or two,' Nick told her.

'So do you think that telling Kirk about Shy was the best idea?'

Nick looked at Wanda.

'I’m just asking because I know that Mike will,' Wanda said, but she did question the logic behind it.

Nick smiled. 'You mean because he’s a cop?'

'Yes, Nick,' Wanda said and laughed a little.

'That’s exactly why I told him. Look, Kirk hears things we never will. I think he does know something, so I took a chance.'