Roy Glenn - In A Cold Sweat

“Oh so now it’s your job to flirt with every woman in the club?”

“I’m not even going there with you. You know damn well what my job is,” Nick said and finished his drink.

“I just don’t understand why you can’t let Tara run the club. She does it anyway.”

“’Cause this is where Black and Bobby put me. So, what do you want me to do, ask them if they could give me something so that I could be off at night?”

“Yes.”

“And what do I say when Black asks me why?”

“You could tell him that-” Wanda said quickly and then she paused.

“Those are the same ones I came up with.”

“You could talk to Freeze.”

“Freeze asked the same question.”

“What’s that?”

“What you want me to tell Black?”

Wanda rolled her eyes and walked over to Nick’s desk. She leaned forward and put her hands on it. Nick stood back for a while and watched her bent over like that before he worked his way up behind her and lifted up her dress. “What are you doin’ back there?” Wanda asked, smiling as Nick eased her panties down.

“Nothing.”

Nick grabbed her hips and positioned her succulent ass exactly where he wanted it. He entered her slowly and Wanda began to squirm as he pushed himself inside her. She began winding her hips while Nick grabbed her shoulders and thrust his hips into her with so much intensity that Wanda had to steady herself. He plunged deep inside her before he exploded.

“I love you, Wanda,” Nick whispered in her ear. “There's no one else for me.”

Once they had fixed their clothes, Nick’s cell phone rang. “What's up, Freeze?”

“I need you to ride with me. See if we can find out who tried to kill Black.”

“Where you at?”

“In the club.”

“I’m in the office. Why didn’t you just come up?”

“I didn’t wanna interrupt nothin’.”

“What you mean?”

“Tara say y’all be up in there fuckin’ all night.”

Nick looked at Wanda. “I’ll be down in a minute,” he said and ended the call.

“What does he want?” Wanda asked.

“He wants me to ride with him.”

“Where?”

“See if we can find out who tried to kill Black.”

“Somebody tried to kill Mike?” Wanda asked excitedly. “When did this happen?”

“The night before he left for the Bahamas with Michelle.”

“What happened?”

“He was at a hotel and somebody broke in the room.”

“And?”

“Black strangled him with a towel.”

“The body?”

“The parlor,” Nick said and armed himself.

“Why didn’t you tell me this?”

“I thought you knew. I thought he would have told you since you saw him that morning before he left.”

“No, he didn’t say a thing,” Wanda said, and once again felt left out. Black had always been over protective of her through the years, but she thought that he would have at least mentioned that somebody tried to kill him.

“You want me to call you a cab?” Nick asked and picked up the phone on his desk.

Wanda started to ask why couldn’t he take her home, but she kept it to herself. Instead, she sucked her teeth. “Go ahead.”

As she rode home alone in the cab, Wanda thought about the way things were going. Black had always purposely kept her out of certain parts of their business; “ Do the words conspiracy to commit murder mean anything to you counselor?” Black would always tell her, but it was never like this. Now she felt isolated. She liked it better when she was the boss and Freeze had to answer to her.

When she got out of the cab, Wanda made her way to her door and fumbled for her keys as her cell began to ring. Sure that it was Nick, she dug the phone out of her purse. “Hi, Baby.”

But to her surprise, it was Glynnis Presley on the phone. She was an aid to a Senator. Mike had been a heavy contributor to a few local Congressional candidates over the years. Therefore, any time he needed something done, it was a simple matter to call Glynnis, she would call the appropriate Congressperson, who made the calls necessary for their problems to go away. “Wanda, it’s Glynnis.”

“What are doing up at this hour?”

“I need to talk to Mike,” Glynnis replied frantically.

“He’s out of the country, Glynnis. What's wrong? Are you all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine, Wanda. I just need to talk to Mike, that’s all.”

“What about?”

“It’s about his wife’s murder.”

Mike Black

It was a little before noon when the car pulled up in front of Black’s Paradise. I had arrived early for lunch with Jacara so I could check the place out. It felt a little weird being there. Cassandra and I had built that place and ran it together.

I hadn’t been here since the day Cassandra was kidnapped and taken to New York by Diego Estabon’s men. To me, it was the day that started this whole thing in motion. You see, I believe in cause and effect. The theory that for every action there is a reaction. If certain things happened, it would cause other shit to happen. The shit usually works to my advantage ’cause I’m usually the one pullin’ the string. But now, there was another puppet master pullin’ the strings.

When Cassandra was freed, she wanted to stay in New York instead of coming back to the island. “I feel isolated and trapped on this rock,” Cassandra told me on more than one occasion. Cut off from the rest of the world, she’d say. So I decided to stay in the city. If I had listened to my better judgement and dragged her back to the Bahamas, maybe she’d still be alive.

I got out of the car and walked inside with my three bodyguards close behind. There were a lot of new faces working there; new bartenders, new waitresses, but Esmond, the cook, was still there. As soon as he saw me come through the door, he dropped whatever it was he had been chopping up and came out to greet me. I would have preferred that he drop the knife too, and so would my new bodyguards. “Whoa, mon,” one said, and pointed his weapon. “Where ya tink you go with that knife?”

Esmond stopped in his tracks, put the knife down on the table closest to him and raised his hands.

“Its okay,” I told him, and pushed the barrel of his gun down. “He’s all right.”

As soon as he felt it was safe to do so, Esmond rushed up and threw his big arms around me. “It’s good to see you again, Black.”

“It’s good to see you too my friend.”

“The minute me hear you come, me fix conch chowder for you.”

“I haven’t had any conch since the last time you made some for me and Cassandra.”

“I want to say how sorry I was to hear ’bout the lady,” Esmond said, referring to Cassandra. “You know me love her like she me own flesh and blood.”

“She loved you too.”

“I miss her as I know you do,” Esmond said and hugged me again. “You let me know when you ready for some conch.” Esmond let me go and returned to his kitchen. “Maybe while you're here, we can get up a game. Since you been gone there’s no one to challenge me at chess.”

“Why don’t you bring me a big bowl and set up the board,” I said and he smiled. Esmond loved to play chess and we had played many games and I had lost plenty of them because of careless mistakes. If I could just live my life without making careless mistakes.

Once I had gone though the place and met all the new employees, I settled down with a big bowl of conch chowder and wondered just exactly what I was doin’ there. I mean, I did want to check out the place, but I wasn’t pressed about it. To be honest, I was there for no other reason than to see Jacara, and I wondered why.

Okay, Jacara did have the type of body that made me want to play with it, so naturally I wanted to fuck her. But I had much more important things that I needed to be doing. The people responsible for Cassandra's death were still alive and thinkin’ that they got away with it. And on top of that, somebody had tried to kill me and I have no clue what that’s about.