RIPPED & READY (PART 71)

RIPPED & READY (PART LXXI) 

          If you gotta fuck someone up then you better have on the correct armor and be totting the sharpest sword.  Like I said, this mangy mutt was about to get an upper cut in the gut, and a right cross to the jaw.  Without a doubt I was dealing with a precarious piece of rat who was about to be straight road-kill.  If anything smelled as bad as this situation here did, it was time to fumigate. 

          I watched Joseph as he walked down the hallway with little man on his shoulder. After seeing how Joe-Joe Jr. sweetly waved at me I felt a surge of paternal strength  kick in. Yes, I was in the refueling process and I was rolling up my sleeves.  Once I heard the door close behind them I shifted my attention back to this troll who had removed his shoes and parked his two cotton cloaked Cadillac’s onto my glass coffee table.

          All the hairs on the back of my neck stood up just like they did at Big Bank Hanks’ place when that foul mouth parrot screeched out bitch for the first time.  I swiftly moved over towards where he was sitting on my long, leather sofa.  I stuck out my index finger and dug it into his chest. 

          “I’m going to say this one more time, Lance, keep your “got-dayum” pavement beaters off of my muthafucking glass table,” I said, digging into his chest for emphasis. 

          When he went to rise up, I used all the irritation inside of me and sent it into the tip of my finger.  “Sit your retarded ass down before I send your ass packing on that short yellow bus, bitch,” I said, gritting my teeth.

          He looked up at me with a cocked mouth grin.

          “Damn, I like you like this, Brotha Marco,” he said.

          A chill went down my back.

          Was this a coincidence or did this motherfucker just call me the same thing that Peewee kept calling me?

          “Play this mutherfuka until it ends, Brotha Marco,” he said, pursing his lips sending me an air-borne kiss.

          Darrius!

          Before I had a chance to respond to his comments, Joseph reappeared. 

          “There you two go again,” he said, carrying a pillow and a blanket for Lance.

          “Here you go, Lance, hopefully you’re going to be comfortable,” Joseph told him.

          I heard the two of them talking back and forth but the only thing that kept racing through my mind was his connection to Peewee and Darrius and what the fuck did that saying mean?

          Play that muthafucka to the end.

          Play that muthafucka to the end.

          I rewound back to that early morning when Darrius had appeared out of the blue, brandishing a gun and threatening to kill me.

          I realized I wasn’t fucking around with an amateur – he had ties to the Anthill Mob, but I couldn’t figure out what the big plan was?

          Did it have anything to do with Collin?

          Was Darrius and Peewee still out to get him?

          What was my role in their scheme?

          Over the last couple of years I had gotten some schooling about life in the streets, however, I was nowhere near the professional that these mutherfuckers were.  I didn’t know how, but I had to get Lance Livingston out of our lives.  It was one of those moments when you just knew that it would get worse before it got better.  I had a family to protect and I could not do it with witty words alone, I needed to bring out some steel (And I ain’t talkin’ about no steel magnolias either).

          I watched Joseph as he tucked Lance in on the couch.  I was so consumed in thought that my ears had stopped working. 

          “Baby,” he called once.

          “Baby,” he called me twice.

          “Marco, baby, what’s got your mind so consumed right now,” Joseph asked, grabbing me around the waist, pulling me into his body. 

          “Oh, just something at work,” I said, prevaricating my ass off.

          “What is it, Brotha Marco, perhaps you can run it by me.  I’m very good at taking care of business,” he said, smiling at me knowing that, for right now, things were just between us.

          “Aww, no, it’s cool.  There’s a rodent problem there and I was trying to come up with a plan to get rid of them, that’s all,” I said, leering at him.

          You could catch most rats with cheese, but to catch this one I needed more than a dairy product.

          “Well, just know that with most rats, you really need an “A” game strategy, Brotha Marco, and I’m good with strategy.  I’m second in command in that department he said,” in a sinister tone.

          Right, so now this motherfucker was letting me know his rank in the Anthill Mobb.  Well, he wasn’t the only one with a few tricks because I had a few of my own.  If I wasn’t so scared of getting put away for life, I would smoke this fool right here as he slept. 

          Tick motherfucking Tock!