The Bad Seed Page 14

  Kevin eyed me up and down and then flitted by me and right out the door. I didn’t know what to say, but I wanted to beat the holy shit out of him. After Robert, he might be the next one to die.

  When the coast was clear, Nigel emerged from the stall. I was fuming.

  “Did you hear the way that bitch was talking to me? I ought to go out there and kick his ass!”

  “Don’t worry about him. He’s nothing to us. Now, back to where we were.” Nigel kissed me suddenly and pulled me into the stall, slamming the door behind him.

  CHAPTER 17

  When Nigel and I finished our dalliance, I went back into the party and decided to return to the VIP room to find Robert before he sent his henchmen to track me down and drag me kicking and screaming back into the room. His patience was often short.

  When I reached the top of the stairs near the VIP, I looked down to take in a full view of the crowd. The crowd bristled with energy and swayed with the beat of the music. It actually made me smile to see people having a good time and forgetting about the troubles of the world, if only for one moment.

  As a gazed into the crowd, I noticed an odd figure moving through the crowd. The figure’s face was hidden from my view by a purple hood, but he moved with ease and grace through the mass of people. Inexplicably, my eyes were fixated on his movements. He wasn’t dancing or attempting to get into a groove; he moved with what seemed to be a singular purpose: to get through the crowd to the staircase that led to the balcony where I stood. I noticed something odd about the figure. Something about the way he walked—no, glided—through the room filled my heart with dread. As crowded as the room was, he moved in an uninterrupted straight line and no one seemed to notice his presence.

  No one, except me.

  My eyes remained transfixed on the figure. He moved in a beeline toward the staircase. When I realized he was indeed moving in my direction, I gasped. Just below the balcony where I stood, he stopped. Slowly, he removed his hood. I still couldn’t see his face because he was almost directly below me.

  When he looked up at me, I was staring into the face of Jabari.

  I gasped out loud and quickly shook my head. How was this possible? Had someone slipped a hallucinogen into my drink? A horrific feeling seized me and I felt myself getting lightheaded. I grabbed the railing of the balcony to steady myself.

  The glare of Jabari’s eyes pierced my lungs. I couldn’t breathe and my skin felt hot. Surely, my eyes deceived me. Jabari was long dead, yet he stood below me, eyeing me with contempt. Had he really died? Had I really thrown him off the building?

  I looked around at the few people near me and they didn’t seem to notice anything odd. I closed my eyes and prayed that he’d be gone once I opened them, but I wasn’t that lucky.

  When I opened my eyes, he was standing on the staircase, as if he had been teleported from the spot below me to where he now stood. He was coming closer to me and I was sure he wasn’t coming to release me from my sins; in fact, I was certain that he demanded retribution. Quickly, I gathered myself and raced toward the VIP room. If I could make it there before he did, maybe I could save myself. I pushed and shoved my way past the few people, snatched open the door, and ran directly into Daryl’s chest.

  “Blues, are you okay?” he asked.

  “Huh?”

  “Are you okay?”

  I took a moment to collect my thoughts. I looked at him and suddenly felt very stupid. Here I was cowering from shadows like a frightened child when I should have been standing tall like a gladiator. This nagging guilt was getting on my nerves. Now, I was seeing things when I was awake. Maybe it was all the alcohol I had consumed. I needed to pull it together.

  “Uh, yeah. I’m okay. Just felt lightheaded.”

  His eyes remained curiously fixated on me. “Maybe you should take a moment and go and sit in VIP. Robert is in there. He was asking for you a minute ago.”

  “Uh, okay,” I said.

  “Tell Kevin to meet me out front. I’m getting the car from the valet. We’re already running late.”

  “Uh, sure.”

  I walked into the room and moved slowly to the back where Kevin and Robert were sitting. I turned around a couple of times to make sure I wasn’t being followed my some ghost.

  When they saw me coming, there was a noticeable shift in their mood and conversation. Kevin leaned over and whispered something to Robert and stood up.

  “Daryl and I have to pick up Danea from her hotel,” Kevin announced to Robert so that I could hear. “We’ll be back in about half an hour. If you need me, call me.” Kevin’s tone carried a bit of solace, as if he was trying to comfort Robert. He walked past me, shooting me a curt look and a sarcastic smile while shaking his rather large head.

  I stepped closer to Robert, who stood up, his face twisted as I moved in closer.

  “Where have you been?” he hissed.

  I felt really uncomfortable.

  “I was downstairs. At the party. Why?”

  “Where’s Nigel?”

  I swallowed hard. “I guess he’s downstairs somewhere. How would I know?”

  Robert’s eyes tightened. I could see the tension in his face by the protruding vein in the middle of his forehead, a sure sign that he was angry. He moved closer to me and pulled me into him forcefully. He kissed me hard, pressing his cold lips against mine. His kiss wasn’t intended to be sensual. It was an empty gesture to remind me that he still had power over me.

  Gently, I pulled away from him. “Robert, are you feeling okay? You seem…stressed, or something.”

  He curled his top lip. “I am…something.”

  “I don’t want you getting all worked up. You wanna tell me what’s up?”

  “How about you tell me?” His question was much more of a dictate than a question. I could feel the weight of his words pressing against my chest. I took a step backward. I wanted to be out of arm’s reach.

  “Robert, what’s going on?”

  He sucked in a deep breath and exhaled a puff of hot air. “You know, when I married you, everyone thought I had lost my mind. They could not understand the attraction we had.” He smiled as he reminisced. “We burned so brightly that we outshined everybody and everything. Never, not once, did I think you’d hurt me.” His smile quickly evaporated.

  “Robert, what are you talking about?”

  “You know damn well what the fuck I’m talking about!” He threw his glass against the wall and it exploded with a loud bang. The few other people in the room looked around suddenly at us. “All of you, get the fuck out of here!” They, mostly RDE employees, left the room quickly, leaving me alone with Robert.

  “How could you do this to me? I trusted you, even when I shouldn’t have.”

  I wanted to step closer to him, but fear held me in place. I wasn’t sure exactly what was going on, but from the pronounced scowl on his face and the anger in his voice, I gathered that one of my many affairs had come to his attention. I was not about to confess anything. At this point, I didn’t know who he was referring to. Surely, Ashleigh could not have been behind this. Last I heard, she was damn near close to overdosing.

  I took a cautious step closer to Robert. He was right in that he still had power over me—he still controlled the purse, but I had power, too. Seductively, I moved toward him and reached out for him. I thought if he could just touch me again, feel the warmth of my body, feel the movement of my hips or the smoothness of my skin, that it would settle his spirit, but the hurt in his voice was so deep that even my power was rendered ineffective. He moved away from me as one would if they stood too close to an open flame.

  “What have I done?” I asked gently. “Please tell me.”

  He did not utter a word. Instead, he stood without motion and glared at me. I could feel his stare cutting into me, clawing at me. It was difficult to maintain my cool disposition. I wanted to flee, to run for safety, but I had to know what he knew.

  “You’re gonna make me say it? You want to know h
ow you’ve embarrassed me in front of the whole fucking city by acting like a two-bit whore?”

  His words punched me in the chest.

  “Two-bit whore? Robert, I assure you—”

  “You shut the fuck up! Don’t you say another fuckin’ word or I swear I will cut out your heart!” He turned his back to me and then turned back in my direction so quickly that I jumped back. “Why, Blues, why? I gave you everything!” The alcohol in Robert’s system mixed with his rage and created a toxic mixture. He was ready to explode. I needed to coax my sin out of his mouth so that I would know exactly what I was accused of. Had he found out about Nigel and me? Marquis and me? The waiter from the restaurant and me?

  “Robert, baby. Would you please tell me what I’ve done?”

  “Don’t you mean who you’ve done? I feel so fuckin’ stupid for ever trusting your ass.”

  “What are you talking about? What did I do?”

  “Fuck you! I’ll tell you what you’re going to do. You’re going to get the fuck away from me before I stab you in the heart, like you’ve stabbed me. You were the only one that I trusted and you had to go and fuck somebody else!”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  He quickly sobered up and looked me directly in the eyes. He turned around and grabbed an envelope off the purple sofa. As soon as I saw the envelope, I knew the deal. It looked exactly like the one Ashleigh had tossed into my lap in the car. How in the hell had she gotten this to him? I thought back to our conversation in the car. She did say that she wanted to show me the photographs in a more dramatic way. I guess the bitch had this already set up and when I turned her into a crackhead, she of course, wouldn’t be worried about this. Fuck!

  Robert rushed over to me and stuffed the envelope into my hands. The heat from his breath singed the hair on my face.

  “Open it!” he commanded.

  “Robert—”

  “Open it!”

  With reticence, I slowly opened the unsealed envelope and pulled out a photograph of Nigel and me.

  That fucking bitch. I hope she gets raped by a dozen crackheads.

  “Robert—”

  As soon as I opened my mouth, he reared back and punched me so hard that I fell onto the sofa. He jumped down on me and started choking me with all the force he could muster.

  “You son-of-a-bitch!” he yelled repeatedly. I placed my hands on his forearms and tried to pry his hands from my neck, but it was like a vise grip around my neck. “I should kill you now!” The vein in his forehead pulsated so hard, I thought it was going to explode.

  Finally, he released his grip and rolled off me. He was breathing hard and he clutched his chest.

  “Don’t even think about coming home tonight, or any other night,” he said between deep breaths.

  I lay on the couch, trying to catch my breath. “Where am I supposed to go?”

  “You can go to hell.”

  “Robert, please; we can work this out,” I said as I rubbed my neck. “I am so sorry. Let me explain.” Just as the words left my mouth, a few loud popping sounds rang out like fire bells in the night. Then, we heard the screams.

  Pop.

  Pop.

  Pop. Pop.

  “What the fuck is that?” Robert, still clutching his chest, pushed past me in a flash and moved toward the door to the VIP room. Slowly, he opened the door and took a peek outside. I leapt up from the couch and ran to his side.

  “Robert, let me explain,” I said as I ignored the sounds.

  “Will you shut the fuck up,” he whispered in a forced voice. “Go and hide.”

  “What?”

  “I said, hide. Somebody is shooting!”

  Pop.

  Pop.

  Pop. Pop.

  It took a few seconds for his words to really register. When they did, foolhardily, I moved around him and looked out of the door. I saw a hooded figure in a purple velvet robe standing on the balcony, firing randomly into the crowd below. Even over the blare of the music, I could hear the sound of bullets tearing apart flesh. Terrified screams echoed throughout the great hall and ricocheted off the columns.

  I watched as the gunman turned the gun on a woman who raced for the staircase that led to the bottom level. Without so much as a pause, he turned in her direction and fired a single shot that tore through her midsection and sent her spiraling down the long staircase. Her screams chilled me to the core.

  “Oh my God! What are we going to do?” I asked Robert in a panic. Terror covered my entire body like a blanket. In order to get out of the VIP room, we’d have to run down the hallway to the staircase, in perfect view of the gunman.

  There were no exits from the VIP room. We were trapped. Sitting ducks.

  Pop.

  Pop.

  Pop. Pop.

  Robert closed the door. He looked around the room and I could see the wheels in his head spinning. He and I were the only ones in the room and it was completely sealed off. There was a bar in the back and some furniture, but beyond that there were no knives or guns in the room. We could hide behind the bar in the hopes that if the gunman did enter the VIP, he’d open the door, not see anyone, and move on. On the other hand, if he entered the room and saw us cowering behind the bar, we’d surely be dead.

  My mind raced. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to die. Not now. Not like this. I wondered if Jabari had had that same thought as he plummeted to his death.

  “Here, help me.” Robert raced as fast as he could to the back by the sofa. His stride was unsteady and his legs looked wobbly, but he pressed forward. “We need to barricade the door so that he can’t get in. Here, grab an end.”

  I raced over to the opposite end of the couch and lifted. Robert tried to lift, but the couch fell down to the ground with a thud and he looked as if he was about to pass out as he grabbed his chest again.

  Fine time for you to have a heart attack.

  “My medicine. Get it out of my jacket.” He pointed to his jacket that was strung across a chair at the bar. I raced over and tore into his pocket and pulled out his pills. With unsteady fingers, I removed the caps and poured the pills into my hand. I ran back over to him and watched him swallow the pills.

  “I need a minute,” he said.

  “We don’t have a minute, Robert!”

  “Just…just hide.” He looked at me. “Go!”

  Quickly, I raced over to the bar and balled up into a corner. I wished that I could fit into one of the compartments and disappear.

  Just as soon as I tucked in my legs tightly, I heard the door to the VIP open and I heard Robert’s voice. From my vantage point, I could see him struggling to stand.

  “You? What the fuck?” Robert said with some effort.

  The door to the VIP closed.

  “Aren’t I lucky? You’re the one I was looking for.”

  Instantly, I recognized the voice as that of Charles, the executive at RDE that Robert had recently fired. I realized the odd figure that I had seen moving through the crowd moments before wasn’t my guilty conscience manifesting itself in my reality. I had seen Charles and a prelude to murder.

  “So, is this how it ends? You just gonna gun me down like some kind of dog in the street?”

  “Yes.” Charles’s voice was plain, but firm.

  Robert’s breathing was heavy. I could hear it digging into his chest as he took a few steps forward.

  “I should have known you’d take the coward’s way out. Do you wanna know why I fired you? I fired you because you’re weak. You’ve always been weak. You couldn’t handle the pressure of being on top. You couldn’t make the big decisions.”

  I heard the gun cock. I held my breath. My heartbeat pummeled my chest. Robert’s machismo would get him killed.

  “Is this how you really wanna go out? What about your wife and your children? What are they going to think of you, Charles?”

  “Since I have no job now, thanks to you, I’m worth more to them dead than alive.”
/>   “You can get another job.”

  “Are you fucking crazy? Nobody is hiring!”

  “Do you want to come back to RDE?”

  “No, I want you dead, you son-of-a-bitch.”

  A gunshot rang out in the small space. The single shot sounded like cannon fire and the boom of the gun startled me. I tried to stifle my scream, but a squeak escaped from my mouth; that squeak was enough to betray my location.

  “Whoever is hiding behind the bar should come out now. I won’t ask again.” His voice was hard and stern. For a few elongated seconds, I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to pretend as if I hadn’t heard the words, as if he hadn’t heard my scream, but that was fantasy.

  Slowly, I stood up.

  I expected to see Robert lying on the ground with a bullet in his skull, but he was still standing, his eyes bulging in his head.

  “Blues. How nice to see you again. Go stand by your husband.”

  “Charles—” I said.

  “I didn’t say speak. I said move over to your husband.”

  I did as I was told. Robert pulled me close to him, as if he was trying to shield my body from the bullet that would fire from Charles’s gun at any second.

  When I looked into Charles’s eyes, I didn’t see the eyes of a madman. I saw the soul of a wounded man; a man who had lost his way in a cruel world. His eyes, wide and bright, reflected a sad sort of madness that, oddly enough, reminded me of myself. I, too, was a wounded man who had lost my way, but under different circumstances.

  I wanted to say something to Charles to let him know that he was not alone. He needed to know that we were kindred spirits and that his pain was my pain, too. We were united and inextricably bound by our wounds. But, words escaped me.