Hell's Diva by Anna J. Read Free Book Online Page B

Brownsville. Each spot was making over $20,000 a day, and she paid the workers $2,000 a week. She put Stone in a rehab program with a promise to put him back on his feet if he completed it. When he completed the program, Stone made sure each spot ran smoothly. He was security, and Ruby paid him the same she paid Mecca and Dawn.
    The spot in the Brownsville Houses was having problems with a local stick up crew headed by a guy named Tah. When Mecca was told about it from the workers, she remembered the name from somewhere but couldn’t put a face to it. When she informed Ruby, Ruby barked, “What the fuck do I pay Stone for? And what’s up with those punk-ass workers? None of them got crons?”
    Mecca told Stone about the stick up crew and all he said was “I’ll handle it.” He never did. Word on the street was that Stone got soft and the young cats lost respect for him. Tah and the stick up crew took advantage of the word about Stone going soft and stuck him up at a block party in Brownsville houses.
    “If I gotta go to them projects myself and handle these clowns, I’ll fuck around and kill them niggas, then I’ll kill Stone’s punk ass!” Ruby growled.
    Ruby stayed away from Brownsville as much as possible. The gritty section of Brooklyn was too unpredictable for her. Stick up kids and killers were born and raised on the Brownsville streets every day, and she didn’t want to be some young hot head’s first of many bodies. When she did show up in Brownsville in her ocean green Sterling with BBS rims, it was usually in the early morning hours to see Stone and to remind the residents of Brownsville that she was still around, and she wasn’t hiding in the villa she bought in the Hamptons where she and Monique now stayed.
    Ruby and Monique had become full-fledged lesbian lovers. Monique treated Mecca like a daughter. She loved Mecca as if she were her daughter, and she became concerned with Mecca being on the street. After a lovemaking session with Ruby, Monique expressed her concern as they lay naked on their king-sized, heart shaped waterbed with red satin sheets and pillows.
    “Ruby, them streets are dangerous. You shouldn’t have Mecca out there. She needs to get herself a job or something or finish school. Niggas don’t care if she a girl or not, they’ll treat her just like a nigga when it comes to that money. She still damn near a baby.”
    Ruby folded her arms under her head and sighed. “She’s young, but she got a old soul. Mecca knows how to handle herself.” Ruby looked over at Monique and continued. “Monique, you know that girl ain’t gonna listen. Her and Dawn are hardheaded.”
    “Don’t let them work for you no more. They won’t have a choice but to get a job. Them girls are materialistic like hell. They ain’t trying to be broke,” Monique said with concern filling her voice. She knew firsthand how the streets would eat you alive and spit you out. She barely made it out of the very same streets Mecca and Dawn were now on, and she wanted better for them.
    “All they’ll do is go to work for someone else, and they won’t treat them like I do. Or they’ll become strippers or hookers or something, and I’m not trying to hear that, Mo,” Ruby said in a matter-of-fact tone. Monique knew when to back off. The last thing a person wanted to do was piss Ruby off. She was liable to do anything with no remorse.
    Ruby rented Mecca and Dawn an apartment in Sutter Gardens, an apartment complex in the East New York section of Brooklyn. The neighborhood was just as dangerous as Mecca’s Brownsville environment, but she would have it no other way. Her reason for staying in the slums was simple.
    “If niggas think you hiding, they’ll come looking. If you in their face, they know you ready for whatever.”
    Ruby also bought Mecca and Dawn Volkswagen Jettas. Mecca’s was china blue, Dawns was silver.
    Mecca and Dawn pulled up in their Jettas at a basketball tournament in Miller Park in East New