All Money Ain't Good Money by Tracey Lampley

Author:Tracey Lampley [Tracey Lampley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tracey Lampley
Published: 2024-07-21T00:00:00+00:00

***

After the hospital discharged me, Capricorn drove me home in his silver Italian sports sedan, the Giulia Quadrifoglio, also the most powerful sports sedan that Alpha Romeo had ever created. When I first laid eyes on this car, I could have sworn it stared me down. Now I luxuriated in its cooled seats supplied by refrigerated air on this scorching mid-July day. Usually, he jammed to the latest sounds of hip-hop but not today. Today, he probably wanted to spare me the cacophony of loud thumping music. So we listened to a sports talk show on Sirius radio. When he finally turned on to my street, I spotted my loaner car parked in the driveway instead of the garage. I turned to him. “Who brought the car home?”

“Cowboy did.”

I faced forward again and scoffed. “You gave him the case even though I asked you not to? Unfucking-believable, boss. Unfucking-believable.”

Capricorn sighed. “Relax.”

I turned to face him again. “How can you say that when you took away that case and possibly my career?”

“How is that, Jinx?”

I jabbed my hands in the air. “If I don’t solve this case, you and my colleagues will never take me seriously. It’ll always be matrimonial bullshit and surveillance. Nothing with teeth. Nothing like this. Nothing exciting.”

His hand shot out and grabbed then rubbed my wrist, but I jerked it away. “You can’t do this to me.” I drew in a sharp intake of breath and realized that I was losing an opportunity to get solvent. To be in the black instead of in the red. To pay off all my pressing bills and my loan shark.

“Like I said, Jinx. Relax. You’re back on the case. Didn’t I just say that in your hospital room?”

I was still holding my breath.

“We needed to make sure that Calloway believed we still had things under control. But Cowboy did find out some things from the detective that worked Elena’s initial missing persons case.”

Finally, I exhaled. “And?”

“And Cowboy found out that Elena Calloway may have been or is pregnant. The detectives went through her things—including her emails—and came up with something that they never revealed to the old man. There was an emailed pharmacy bill that included a pregnancy test.”

For a moment, I let that information sink in. Perhaps that was why Elena had taken off. She was pregnant. But completely dis her family? What would have made her do that? As if I had asked the question out loud, Capricorn said, “Someone could have raped her.”

A sour, bitter twang erupted in my mouth. Realization hit me, and I nodded. “Someone could have raped her. Deebo could’ve gotten her pregnant, and she decided to keep it. Of course, Elena’s grandfather would never permit her to have a baby by a Black man—especially a gang banging rapper, so she’s hiding out until well after the birth.” Realization hit me. “A Calloway male impregnated her. Shit, no wonder she left without a trace.” With disgust, I wrinkled my nose as I leaned into the headrest.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.