Mann desperately tried to move his body into an upright position and start the car to drive himself to the hospital. He could do neither. The pain was too intense. Every second he fought to stay conscious only prolonged his misery. Finally, Mann succumbed to his internal injuries, passing out and dying right in the driver’s seat before any medical attention could arrive.
At nine o’clock at night, coming down from a high, nothing looked more inviting to Mimi than another bag of dope. Black showed her no mercy, he kindly obliged her with the drug.
“Here, yo,” he said, passing her the beige like substance. “This some new batch I want you to try out and tell me how it is.”
Up to this point Black was a trustworthy, reassuring presence around her. He wasn’t like the other guys who wanted sex in exchange for some dope. He looked out for Mimi whenever she was dope sick and wanted to get the monkey off her back. Black supplied her with an endless amount of dope. That good dope that he gave her would chase away the black clouds that seemed to hover over Mimi, and make her feel good again.
“Okay,” Mimi replied, her voice still slurred and her hair was a tangled mess.
Eagerly, Mimi reached up, taking possession of the dope and began snorting. Black grinned in anticipation of the drug’s affect. The more Mimi snorted, the wider his smile became. A few minutes later, when every morsel of the drug was gone, Mimi began to feel funny. She fell back on the couch in an attempt to feel better. However, a feeling inside her told her something wasn’t right.
Not a minute later, Mimi began sweating profusely as the battery acid mixed with heroin raced through her veins. Everything all at once seemed to cross her mind … her mother, her father, her son, even Netta. Her concern for life and the living were too little, too late.
“Help me,” she cried. “Please…..”
Black glanced down at her and smiled. He gave her hand a firm squeeze. “See you in hell, bitch!”
In a few moments it was over, Mimi died as a result of respiratory failure. She stopped breathing and proceeded to turn blue. Without even thinking about what he was doing, Black wrapped Mimi’s body up in an area rug, placed it in the trunk of his car and drove to West Baltimore and dumped it in Druid Hill Park.
Now there were two down, with two more to go.
Late that night, Netta found herself pacing around her bedroom in nothing more than a white bathrobe. She hadn’t heard from Tone all day, although he told her earlier that he had a lot of running around to do. Still, with every passing moment, doubt was seeping into her mind. She was beginning to worry, big time.
Netta paged him, and then she paged him again. She waited and waited for a phone call on the landline, but none came. She glanced outside her bedroom window to see if she saw any sign of Tone pulling up. She saw none. She began to get fidgety and overanxious as she awaited his arrival home for the night. She glanced over reassuringly at the moving truck they had parked in the parking lot. Netta told herself her escape from this personal hell was only a couple of hours away. She had never wanted anything more in her life.
It seemed too good to be true. However, it was just that simple. They would leave Baltimore in the morning after Tone had gotten a few hours of sleep. Or maybe she could convince him to sleep in the truck while she drove the first leg of the trip.
Now Netta was thinking too much. Tripping. Second guessing herself. She decided to lay her ass down. Worrying about Tone’s whereabouts was about to give her an ulcer.
Netta went to the closet and grabbed the gun out the box, placing it under her pillow. She forced herself to try and get some sleep, just in case Tone agreed to her crazy plan of leaving as soon as he returned home, in the darkness of the night.
Netta hadn’t been asleep all that long, two hours at best, when she was awaken by a disturbance at her front door. Her mind was still cloudy when she heard the rattling of the doorknob. The noise shattered the peace and tranquility of the night. She heard the squeaking sound of the front door that alerted her to the fact whomever it was had just entered the house.
“Tone?” she called out. However, no reply came.
Netta sensed danger. In her mind if it wasn’t Tone, then who could it be? There was only one logical explanation in her mind. There wasn’t anyone behind that door that was coming to make sure she was safe and secure. If they had gained entrance to her apartment, then they were coming to kill her. She was scared and her fear blocked her ability to think clearly, it blocked her ability to reason, her ability to do anything but protect herself.
To be on the safe side, Netta grabbed her gun from underneath her pillow. She wasn’t going out like she had before. She wasn’t going to be victimized again. This time she would be ready for whoever or whatever happened next.
Quietly, Netta got up out the bed, moving a few feet away from the door, assuming a firing stance. She bent her knees slightly, extending her arms, holding her weapon tightly with both hands. There would be no surrender or no retreat for
