The Golden Hustla Read online

  “Alexis, good for you to join us. We were just on our way into my office.” He pulled out his keys and opened the door. “Have a seat, everyone. I’ll be right back. I need to go check on the beginning salespeople.”

  “Beginning salespeople?” Nina said in disbelief, staring at Rinaldo. He looked as if he had been up all night.

  “Have a seat, Alexis!” Rinaldo turned around and left.

  “I know it’s not business as usual,” Nina stated in disbelief as she turned to face her co-workers. They were all seated around Rinaldo’s office, casually dressed in jeans and sneakers. Everybody looked as if they had a rough night.

  “That’s what it looks like,” Milt said.

  “You don’t know this cracker by now? I keep telling y’all he crazy.” Shawn sucked his teeth, laid his head back and closed his eyes.

  “Hey. You gotta do what you gotta do,” Pete said.

  Moments later Rinaldo burst back into the office. “When it rains it pours. But you know what? I ain’t gonna let these muthafuckas stop me! They obviously don’t have a fuckin’ clue of who I am.” He sat down and glared at every one of his Platinum sales staff.

  “I just want to congratulate everyone on how they handled the raid yesterday. Y’all did good. All we gotta do now is keep our mouths shut. I spoke to the attorneys and they said we could get back on the phones. They got our backs.”

  “Man, you crazy!” Shawn couldn’t hold back that outburst. “We sat there and heard them say it would be suicide for us to get back on the phones.”

  “Yeah, money,” Milt interjected. “Now you’re trying to tell us it’s cool to get back on the phones? I think we need to lay low until this shit blows over. I mean, we all got families to think about.”

  “I can’t believe you want us back on the phones,” Nina stated.

  Rinaldo stood up. He leaned over his desk, looked everyone over and sighed. “How y’all gonna punk out now? The judge didn’t say we couldn’t get on the phones. That’s who y’all need to be scared of. Not the fuckin’ attorneys! They work for us.”

  “Well, it was said, man,” Shawn snapped. “I sat there and heard them. What you think, we stupid?”

  Jeff raised his hand.

  “We ain’t in school, fool. Say what you gotta say.” Rinaldo was growing more agitated by the minute with his Platinum Sales Team. He expected more loyalty than this. “You down with me or what?” he snapped at Jeff, daring him to say no.

  “Get the lawyers on the speakerphone,” Jeff pleaded, “and if they say we straight, then I’m down. I’m with Milt, I got a family at home.”

  “Look. The lawyers already told me they would be in court all day. So talking to them right now would be out of the question. Now I told y’all these muthafuckas ain’t got nothing!” Rinaldo lied as he looked around at the faces of his Platinum Sales Team. “If they did, they wouldn’t have released everybody on their own recognizance.”

  “Rinaldo, Simeon just pulled up,” Deanna announced over the loudspeaker.

  Rinaldo looked at his watch. “Here it is eleven thirty and this muthafucka is just coming to work, knowing what we just been through.” Rinaldo hit his intercom button. “Tell him to come into my office.” He turned back to the sales team. “Any questions? Or are y’all still scared shitless?”

  “Scared? This is the feds, Rinaldo!” Shawn spat. “If a muthafucka ain’t scared he obviously high off something because he definitely ain’t in his right frame of mind. What muthafucka you know is trying to go to prison?”

  “Ump, ump, ump. Scary-ass Shawn. I expected that to come from Alexis. The girl of the crew. Not a big, bad-ass wannabe rapper.”

  Rinaldo yanked the plug out of the wall that was attached to his favorite wooden lamp. He took the lampshade off.

  “But Rinaldo, the attorneys specifically said do not work,” Nina reiterated.

  “If y’all say that shit one more time,” Rinaldo snapped. “Look, y’all muthafuckas are either with me or against me. And I hate to bust y’all’s bubble. Even if they did have something, it’s too late to back out now. And in case y’all already didn’t know, if I go down, y’all go down. I ain’t in this shit by my damn self.” Rinaldo looked around at everyone’s shocked expressions. “Yeah, I said it. Y’all got me fucked up. Y’all ain’t showing me any loyalty. How the fuck y’all expect me to show y’all some? We made money together, so we go down together.”

  That’s all I needed to hear, Nina said to herself.

  Simeon knocked on the door and then pulled it open. He stepped inside Rinaldo’s office with a big ole smile on his face as if he just came back from a long vacation. Rinaldo smashed the lamp across his head and began beating his twin brother with the lamp.

  Nina jumped out of her chair and moved across the room. Everyone else in the office had jumped out of their seats as well. They were all once again… shocked.

  Simeon was screaming at the top of his lungs, asking Rinaldo what was the matter with him and pleading with him to stop. Once again, the secretaries and the salespeople from the back had migrated to the always-action-centered front office.

  “Don’t… fuck with my… money! Don’t anybody fuck with my mu-tha-fuckin’… money! Your ass was supposed to be here before everyone else making sure I had bodies on every phone.” Rinaldo had sweat all over his face and was beet red as he beat his twin brother down.

  “This cracker is crazy,” Nina said out loud.

  “Hell, yeah,” agreed Pete.

  “Man, fuck this shit!” Shawn spat. “I wish he would come at me like that. I know y’all ain’t falling for this wack-ass scare tactic.”

  Jeff stood there scared shitless, unable to utter a sound.

  Milt finally went over to Rinaldo and snatched the lamp out of his hand. Rinaldo appeared to be just getting warmed up. Simeon was lying in a fetal position. Rinaldo began kicking him.

  “Get up!” he screamed, and kicked him again.

  Simeon forced himslef up on all fours and began crawling around in his Armani suit and custom-made shoes, scuffing them up.

  Rinaldo stood behind him, ran his hands across his head and yelled, “Everybody, get on those phones. I need some deals closed within the next sixty minutes. I’m doubling the commission for the first person to get a sale! Platinum Team, back into my office.” He then walked away and headed straight for the beginning sales team.

  When he came back, he closed his door and sat at his desk. He grabbed a cigar and lit it. “Okay. Where was I?” Acting as if he had not just completed an assault. “Oh yeah. I’m upping the commission another ten percent and will pay daily in cash. Pete and Nina, y’all got appointments to go see clients. I know y’all ain’t gonna let that money go. Y’all in or what?”

  “An extra ten percent and paid daily?” Nina needed to make sure she heard him right.

  “That’s what I said.”

  She thought about it. It was tempting but then decided it was not worth the risk. “I’m out. I’m chillin’ until further notice,” she said.

  “I’m in,” Pete said. “Fuck it!”

  “Okay, good. So let me get this straight. Pete is in. Alexis is out. Shawn, what’s up, man?”

  “I’m out.” Shawn stood up.

  “Why am I not surprised? What about you, Martin Luther? I guess you’re wimping out like Shawn?”

  “Count me out,” Milt said with finality.

  Rinaldo turned to Jeff, who was having a change of heart. “An extra ten percent? I’m in,” he stated before Rinaldo could say anything.

  Rinaldo stood there puffing on his cigar as he looked around at his staff that he had been getting rich off of for the past two and a half, going on three years. “I can’t believe y’all going out like this. After all I’ve done for y’all. When we come across a little speed bump y’all jump out the car!”

  Shawn, Milt and Nina started laughing.

  “Speed bump?” Milt repeated.

  “If looking at a conspiracy, money laundering and
a fraud case is a speed bump, then I hate to see what constitutes a hill,” Nina stated matter-of-factly.

  Rinaldo looked at Shawn. “What you got to say?”

  “Man, ain’t nothing to say but what I’ve always said, you crazy. I need my money so I can bounce.” Shawn pulled out his car keys.

  “What money?” Rinaldo looked at Shawn as if he was the crazy one.

  “For the sales I made that came in. That’s what money!” Shawn snapped.

  “Me too. I had two come in as well,” Nina added.

  “Well I don’t know how the fuck y’all expect to get paid when the accounts are frozen,” Rinaldo smugly stated.

  “Money, come on and don’t play games with your people. You got it,” Milt said.

  “Well, my people, I’ll tell y’all what. All of y’all got messages. Clients are begging to send in some money. Sell to these hungry-ass clients this one last time. Get them out to the banks today to pick up the checks and have them in here by the morning and I’ll pay y’all on them in cash, tomorrow afternoon with an extra ten percent. Is that a deal?” When nobody responded, he pleaded, “C’mon, can’t y’all do this one thing for me? If y’all don’t feel safe using these phones, then go to a pay phone or use your cell phones. Can y’all at least do that? If not, then I won’t be able to pay y’all. But, if you do, I’ll have cash for y’all tomorrow afternoon.”

  Pete ended up at a client’s home in Laguna Hills, California. It was his only black client, Marilyn Dobson. She had her luscious red painted lips wrapped around Pete’s dick when her husband, Jonathan, stepped into the den. He heard his wife talking in the kitchen and headed that way.

  “Oh, Peter. Mommy’s been a bad girl,” she paused to tell Pete in her British accent. Pete ignored her as he took a snort of heroin. He wished she would shut up and go ahead and get her nutt because he definitely wasn’t coming anytime soon. He actually was ready to bounce.

  Jonathan’s pale white face turned crimson red as he watched his wife of fourteen years do something to this man whom he had never seen before, and he couldn’t get her to do it to him. And on top of that, how she was talking to this… this negro stranger. He wondered who the stranger was, how long they’d been having this affair—and in their very kitchen—and if they met like this every Friday night. There must be an explanation. Obviously this strange negro is forcing her to do this, he told himself. He slowly backpedaled out of the den to their emergency spot in the living room. They kept a gun in a secret compartment over the fireplace.

  He retrieved the weapon and began to pace back and forth. He looked at Marilyn’s beautiful picture resting on the mantel. Oh, what beauty. It was rare and subtle and now it infuriated him. He marched back towards the kitchen, and what Jonathan Dobson, founder and owner of the largest PR firm in the state, saw at that moment was unforgivable and would forever be etched in stone on his mind. She assured me that my impotency was no problem. Now I see why. His lovely wife, Marilyn, was bent over their grandson’s high chair screaming out in obvious ecstasy as Pete watched and amused himself sliding in and out of her asshole.

  “Oh, Pete, you tiger you!” she screamed. “Oh yyyyessss,” she squealed out as her body shook and trembled in the quaking orgasm that she considered was long overdue.

  Click! Click!

  The unmistakable sound of a bullet entering its chamber caught Pete’s attention. He froze in midstroke.

  “Marilyn?” Jonathan questioned as if he wasn’t sure it was her.

  Marilyn’s face, clad in layers of makeup, turned an impossible shade of pale. “Jonathan, what are you doing home?” She tried to catch her breath as she stood upright, and eased the silk dress over her thighs. Pete slowly backed up.

  “How could you?”

  “Jon, I…”

  BOOM.

  “Whoa, man!” Pete held his hands up high in the air as his gaze shot from the gun to his dick, which was still sticking straight out. Marilyn’s body twitched in a pool of blood on the floor. The bullet had struck her neck. Blood was gushing out of her mouth and neck.

  “Nigger, put your pecker away. Now!” Jonathan yelled, since Pete was moving in slow motion.

  Nigger? What the fuck you think your wife was? That statement damn near fucked up his high. It should have been the gun and bullets but, no, it was the n word. Pete grabbed his now limp and shriveled-up member and shoved it inside his pants. Then, in a swift motion, he picked up and tossed the high chair at Jonathan Dobson and ran for the door.

  The Dobsons lived on top of a hill. Pete ran as fast as he could, before tripping and tumbling down the hill onto the road.

  “Come back here!” Jonathan ordered. Pop. Pop. He shot at him. He was skilled at running down this very hill. He had done so a million times as a young boy.

  Pete got up and began waving frantically at an oncoming Chevy dump truck. The trucker slowed down but then spotted the white man with a gun and he immediately sped up.

  Pete began running down the road. Mr. Dobson was not giving up. “Stop it now! I demand that you stop!” he yelled, out of breath. He knew that the curve at the bottom of the hill was a dangerous one.

  Pete, spotting the white dump truck coming towards him, ran out onto the road, waving.

  Screeeccchhhh. The driver slammed on the brakes, skidded sideways, knocking Pete almost three feet up into the air. His body came down with a spill and then a splat… onto the road.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  INTERTWINED

  Nina cut the ringer off on her phone, ignoring the constant calling from Rinaldo and Cream. She needed time to herself. She did something she did not have the luxury of doing in a while, and that was just drive. She found herself driving up and down the Georgia interstate, stopping at various shops, and even did a little grocery shopping at the farmers’ market, and it felt good. She wanted to cook Rick an intimate dinner.

  Cream.

  She never gave him the combination to her safe or her bank account passwords. He better have a damned good explanation. The only reason she hadn’t taken action was because she wasn’t sure of what action to take. Call the police? Confront Cream, who would only lie? To date the bank hadn’t contacted her at all. Shit, up until that point she didn’t know what to do. Well, now she did. Nina got off the first exit, jumped on Interstate 85 and made a U-turn. She was going to the bank.

  * * *

  Rochelle was working up a sweat as she pushed her son, Raymond, on the swing. She was jet-black, with skin as smooth as silk. Her five-foot-seven frame was well toned and the navy Tory Burch stretch pants she had on looked as if they were painted on. As she pushed Raymond her thoughts flashed to Rinaldo. She had been with Rinaldo three whole years before she got pregnant with their son. Even though Rinaldo was six years younger than her, she couldn’t help but acknowledge his relentless drive to acquire wealth. It didn’t matter to her that he was white. All she knew was he was always hungry and there was no doubt in her mind that he was going places. She too had been dreaming of going places, and he would be the vehicle to get her there, undoubtedly.

  She was the secretary at a telemarketing room in Vegas and he was a sales rep, selling home security systems attached to a sweepstakes. He immediately outsold all the other salespeople, and naturally, Charlie, the owner and man to know in Vegas, took an immediate liking to the young kid. Rinaldo went from team leader to supervisor to manager to business partner. He was young, poor, fat and white. Her family had no understanding of the fascination that she held for Rinaldo. She didn’t care. But she saw something in him. Every day that he came to work, she saw it. And she wanted to be there when it took him to the top.

  But now those same qualities she loved about him she despised. Of course, she was living like a queen. Five-figure shopping sprees, boob job, liposuction, house with a pool, travel anywhere she wanted to go at any time. She even survived his coke habit. But to end up lonely? What’s all of that money when you don’t have a loved one to share it with? What is the fun in boob jobs,
lipo and an ass lift when you don’t have a man to enjoy it and tell you how nice it looks?

  She was now feeling much happier that now she had someone who appreciated every inch of her body and he makes sure that he tells her that. Even though it wasn’t all of the time, it was more than what she was getting at home. When daddy is away, mommy will play. The S-man, she nicknamed him. Why? Because he is Superman between the sheets. The fact that he doesn’t like it when she calls him that made her smile. But that is exactly what he was in bed, super!

  Her heart skipped a beat as the forest green Mercedes S500 pulled up into the driveway.

  “Who is that, Mommy?” Raymond asked.

  “A friend of your father’s.” She lifted him off the swing. “Go play in your sandbox,” she instructed Raymond. When he took off running she sauntered over to the car.

  “Hey,” he said.

  She loved his gruff voice. It was so masculine to her. “Hey back.” She grinned sexily at him.

  “You have everything ready? We want to make our move right before the feds make theirs. Hopefully that will throw them off. My man Akil is about ready. How much is in Florida?”

  “At least sixty mil. Give or take five or ten.” Rochelle said it as if it wasn’t nothing.

  “You sure?” Shawn was trying to be cool and hide his excitement. This was unbelievable.

  “I’m sure. When are you going?” She didn’t want Charlie’s and Rinaldo’s people coming after her, that’s why she got Shawn to take the risk. She didn’t mind splitting it. That way if Rinaldo goes away, which she knows that he will, she can be with Shawn a little bit more and she damn sure won’t be broke. She’ll still be there for Rinaldo but Shawn’ll be able to freely do her.

  “We’ll be leaving within the next two weeks.”

  “Why so long? I thought the feds were getting ready to swing by?”

  “We thought so too. With Rinaldo opening back up, I think they are going to let him go ahead and dig his hole a little deeper. Plus, I gotta make sure everything is in place after we pick it up. Every move we make needs to be done at the same time.”