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"You know me, Nick. I’m a man of my word and I pay."
"Thanks for the drink." I got up and walked out, with the five grand in my pocket. I got in my car thinking how things had just taken a weird turn. At this point, I was sure that Jake had just taken off. So I drove by Cuisine to see if maybe Freeze had anything for me.
Cuisine was crowded and I couldn’t find a place to park. So I drove around finally finding a spot about two blocks away. I had walked about a half a block when I heard somebody say, "Got a light, man?"
I turned around and was met immediately by a fist in my face. There were three of them, one grabbed me from behind and held me while the other two hit me repeatedly. I recognized one of them from Rocky’s joint. I fell to the ground and they started kicking me. Once that was over he said, "Chilly sends his regards."
They left me lying there and walked away laughing. I struggled to my feet and breathed deeply. I would have to repay their kindness. I started walking the rest of the way to Cuisine. I made it as far as the lobby before I passed out.
When I came to, I was lying on a couch, a woman was tending my wounds, and Freeze was standing over me. "What happened to you?"
"Some of Rocky’s boyz tried to warn me off and blame it on Chilly," I said, and stood up slowly.
"How you know it wasn’t Chilly?"
"’Cause Chilly just —," I got up and reached in my pocket. I still had the money. "Chilly gave me five thousand dollars to find Jake."
"I thought you was workin’ for Gee?"
"I am. He still wants me to tell her where he is, as long as I tell him too." My head was still spinning, so I sat back down.
‘‘I told you not to fuck with this, now look at you." Freeze laughed. He walked over to the desk, put the phone on speaker and dialed a number. "Fucked around and got your ass kicked."
"I think my ass was the only thing they didn’t kick."
Freeze just shook his head. "This is Freeze, let me speak to Rock."
"This, Rock. What’s up, Freeze? I ain’t —"
"Shut the fuck up nigga and understand what I’m tellin’ you. You sent your boyz after Nick Simmons to
night."
"I didn’t have nothing to do with that, Freeze. I —"
"Shut the fuck up, bitch! Nick Simmons is family to me. You feel me, Rock? So I’m tellin’ you now, if that shit happens again, fuck peace. I’ll kill you and your whole set. Got that!" Freeze hung up the phone and started laughing. I laughed too, but it hurt.
Freeze took me out to Perry’s house so he could check me out and give me something for the pain. It was damn good seeing Perry again after all these years. Like everybody else, Perry treated me as if I never missed a day.
"I brought somebody by to see you, Perry." Freeze said.
"Yeah, who’s that?" Freeze stepped aside. "Nick! Damn its good to see you. Y’all come on in. Hold up, neither one of y’all shot or bleeding?"
"No, man. We just came to visit." Freeze said as we went inside Perry’s house.
"Okay, ’cause I still remember the last time you two came to my house this late."
"So do I. How could I forget," I said to Perry. I looked at the smile on Freeze’s face and I could tell he hadn’t forgotten either.
"Couldn’t forget what, Nick?" Wanda asked. "Y’all were just full of stuff I didn’t know about. I’m starting to feel like an outsider."
"Don’t feel like that, Wanda. We never even told Black. But you know Black, he found out anyway."
"Found out what, Nick?"
"Back in the day, me and Freeze did a little freelancing."
"What kind of freelancing, Nick?"