Chapter 4: Anthony Martinez

Anthony's PoV:

"It's the deals. The deals."My mother kept repeating in her thick African accent.

"I know mama."I said quietly, caressing her hair.

She was schizophrenic and had dementia.

"Who ah* you."she looked up at me with her almost black eyes.

"Mama it's me. Anthony." I smiled softly.

"Oh Tony, my sweet boy. Can you find Charles." those words wrenched my heart.

"Mama. Dad died 4 years ago." I tried to out it softly. no matter how many times I'd told her. It seemed to become more painful every time.

"Tony let's go. Ya had your time. It's time to go work."my boss Marcus told me gruffly. He was also my best friend. More like a brother. My mama practically raised him sense he was 6 years old. He lived with us and everything. He spoke roughly, but you could see it in his eyes that her words wounded him too.

"We gotta go to work okay Mama."I kissed her cheek.

"Bye Mama."Marcus said, his voice cracked.

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2 hours later.

"Yes to the crack."I said seeing the numbers all around me.

"But a million dollars bro,"Marcus lightly smacked my arm. "C'mon."

"We can make 5 mill off of it. If we play our cards right. Which we will."I smiled at the thought of all that cash. "We could pay for more treatment."

"Yeah but Tony, you've seen the odds. You said it's only a 2% chance."Marcus said solemnly.

But that's a 2% chance you and I are willing to take."

"How do you know what I am willing it bet."

"I see it 100% right now."I said.

He just looked at me with the really face.

"You've never led us wrong before. DJ call 'em up."Marcus said.

DJ took out his iPhone and dialed up the crack dealers. "We'll take it."

"What about the 2 mill in weed, we just bought."Marcus inquired. "What do we do wid* dat*"

"The numbers changed."I sighed. "We'll have to run it up to get more than 2 mill back."I continued jotting notes in my drug note book.

"Run the numbers again on the ecstasy."

"I did, twice now. And the money back ratio is lower than what we pay for."

"Are you sure. Ecstasy is hot in the streets right now." Malcolm piped in.

"Mal, call em and tell em no."Marcus ordered

"Sure thing.."Malcolm said grudgingly.

Work went on, just like that.

I heard 2 gunshots. Just like that Malcolm and DJ dead, shot clean in the head. Then another shot. Marcus was shot in his calf.

I dodged a bullet meant for me. I reflexively reached for my pistols and everything went black.

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