Author's Note: I don't think I have to place warnings on this chapter. Except for the language, nothing obscene happens here. None of the characters or places are mine, unfortunately.
With five more chapters until they leave San Fierro, should I go for the slash scene: Cesar/CJ or Cesar/Pitbull? I've been deliberating it for a few days now. Let me know what you think; please review or PM.
Chapter 13: Photo Opportunity
CJ's POV:
CJ reloaded his Desert Eagle and crouched behind one of the beams of the overpassing roadway. His target, a fresh-faced White teen in Suburban gear, audaciously stood in the middle of the dirt road below. Every bullet fired from the target's gun ricocheted off the steel supports of the bridge. The teen recklessly fired until the 9mm's hammer clicked against the empty chamber and echoed hollowly in the space beneath the bridge.
The Black gangsta turned, aimed, and fired two rounds into the teen's face and chest.
It was as though miniature bombs had detonated beneath the surface of the crack courier's face and chest. His lifeless corpse sagged to the ground minus his nose, right eye socket, and right cheekbone. The front of his shirt was stained with bone fragments and blood from his rib cage. CJ loomed over the body, kicked it to make sure the kid was dead, and scavenged the corpse.
Three days had passed since the incident at the garage, and CJ had not returned there. He disconnected every one of Cesar's desperate phone calls, and refused to return to the condo he shared with the Latino. In those three days, CJ had worked as a valet at the Vank-Hoff Downtown until he had enough cash to purchase the thriving business from its prior owner; and he helped Zero, the electronics whiz, defeat a horde of his arch nemesis Berkley's flying drone airplanes. Rather than returning to the apartment, CJ seized the opportunity to make more cash when a courier at the Hippy Shopper called in ill.
CJ had spent all morning in pursuit of the crack courier from San Fierro through the backwoods of Whetstone and Red County. After he stripped the teen's body of identification, the backpack full of cash, and the pistol, CJ pushed the teen's body into the raging Red River. His bloodied body turned the waters the color of its name as it tumbled down river and from CJ's sight.
'Fuckin' stupid kid, gettin' into the crack game and can't even shoot straight. Bet Smoke didn't tell him it was part of the job requirements. The kid didn't deserve to die. He was just a fuckin' idiot, about Brian's age when he got killed. I need a drink.'
He shoved his stolen Freeway into the river as well, in case Red County sheriffs had heard the gunshots, and mounted the kid's dirty Sanchez. CJ steered it into Blueberry Acres without an incident and parked it in front of a bar adjacent to the Ammu-Nation store. Just as he dismounted, six powerful gunshots sounded in quick succession.
The husky Black instinctively dropped to the sidewalk and scanned the street for the shooter. Years of living in Ganton around heavy gang activity had taught CJ two basic rules: Drop when the bullets start flying, and find the shooter before you start running. To his surprise, the street was nearly empty, except for an obese blonde and a hunchbacked old man calmly strolling up the street.
CJ pulled out his Desert Eagle. He anticipated that the shooter would reload and expose his or her location with the next round of bullets. His instincts proved correct, as the next round came from the roof of Ammu-Nation. The Black crept along the sidewalk and climbed the metal fire escape to the roof.
A White woman with pageboy-styled dark red hair stood in front of a target on the wall. She had the body of a magazine centerfold, from what CJ could see: voluptuous hips, slender waist, and a bust big enough in an olive green cut-off t-shirt to be seen from behind. With one hand placed on her camoflauge-clad hips, the woman fired into the target's head, chest, and groin. CJ's eyes roved over her shapely rear end.
"You've got thirty seconds to explain why you're watching me, asshole, before I shoot and kill you," the woman warned without turning around.
CJ cleared his name and rose to his full height. "The name's Carl Johnson and I ain't seen a woman who could handle a nine like that in a minute."
She faced him. Her sky blue eyes raked up and down CJ's body. 'Oh yeah, the pretty lady likes what she sees, I can tell by the look in her eyes. Good thing I got a fresh trim and tape on my fro, and my 'stache shaped up yesterday. Nobody does it like ol' Reece though. Plus, I still ain't gone soft, now that I got a membership at the dojo over in Garcia.'
"Thanks," the woman said and half-smiled shyly.
CJ recognized that smile. It was the infatuated expression of every woman who had seen something big and black that she liked and wanted. He flexed his chiseled pecs to make them jump. The woman rewarded him with a flushed grin.
"Um, it's a custom-designed Family Killer Jugar six-shooter, modeled on the ones they used for World War Two. It has a firing rate of one bullet every point-zero-six seconds when fully loaded and is accurate to a range of one hundred meters."
'So the bitch don't just shoot guns, she knows some shit about 'em too.' CJ ghosted his meaty hands over his white tank to reveal a magnanimous sliver of his magnificent six-pack. The woman's mouth lasciviously fell open before she composed herself, and CJ lowered the shirt's hem. "So why you up here shootin' guns with a one-hundred meter range, at a wall eight feet from you?"
"It is ten feet, and I needed to blow off a little steam."
"Oh, you need to blow off some steam? Let me help you out with that, Miss…?"
"Helena Wankstein, J.D. What do you have in mind?" Helena shifted her hips to one side and invitingly cocked one eyebrow.
"We goin' for a ride."
CJ offered his hand to her, but the redhead lawyer sauntered past it and down the stairs. "You can't afford to touch me, asshole." At the bottom of the stairs, she glanced around the parking lot beside Ammu-Nation. "Where's your car?"
'Shit I got my work cut out for me. Bet she's a bitch who likes the bad boy gentleman type.' CJ jogged down the fire escape just as a biker astride a red Freeway screeched to a stop in front of Helena.
"Move your ass!" the biker growled, even though Helena hadn't left the sidewalk.
Before she raised her gun, CJ backhanded the biker. "Fuck off!" To Helena, he gestured to the bike as if it were a golden carriage. "Let's go."
Helena straddled the bike's rear seat, and CJ kicked the biker in his mouth before driving the bike to Palomino Creek. While he drove, the lawyer rambled about her career as a successful divorce lawyer, her remarkably close relationship with her two older brothers, and her private school upbringing. Just outside the town, CJ steered the bike down an embankment and stopped at the edge of Fisher's Lagoon.
"Oh," she moaned sensually, "I just love it around here, don't you?" Helena dismounted from the bike before Carl and walked to the water's edge with her arms outstretched.
"Yeah, I kinda figured a bitch like you had to come out to the country for some reason." CJ approached her from behind, spun her around, and pulled her into an aggressive, lustful kiss.
Helena yielded instantly. With her slim arms flung around CJ's muscular neck, she hopped into his arms and steadied herself by encircling his waist with her powerful thighs. The husky Black cupped her rear end with both of his strong hands.
'Shit, she got a big ass for a White bitch!' CJ found her tongue and wound it boldly into her compliant mouth. She responded with yearning strokes of her own flexible tongue. Her wet, hot mouth and moist, tasty tongue knew exactly how to elicit the sexual beast in CJ to the surface. 'She got me harder than a brick! Tastes good too, like strawberries or some shit. Wonder what that pussy tastes like.'
"Just so you know, I don't normally do this when I just met a guy, Carl. I'm not a slut," Helena pouted against his lips.
"It's alright, baby. I knew you weren't a slut when we first met. You ain't no virgin, is you?"
"What kind of question is that? I just met you! That's a woman's personal, private business."
Helena was dangerously close to pulling away, so he renewed their kiss. To heighten her arousal, he built friction between them by grinding her hips against his bulging groin. Helena moaned wantonly, and bucked her hips against CJ's. 'I don't care if we just met or not, I bet this bitch is about to give it up right now.'
The husky Black laid Helena on the ground and covered her lithe body with his muscular weight. "I've never done it in public before," she gasped.
"No one can see us. This ain't public." CJ slipped one hand beneath the hem of her shirt and fondled her perky, braless breasts. They were definitely real. Helena opened her mouth as if to protest, but CJ's callused fingers worked her nipples like they were the combination lock to a treasure below. "Chill baby, Daddy's gonna play with you real good."
His cell phone chose that moment to ring. CJ wanted to snub the caller, but Helena heard the ringing tone and disdainfully shoved him off her body. "Answer your phone, asshole. I'll be over there." She walked toward the bridge over Palamino Creek.
'This bitch got more attitude than a hood chick. Bet that pussy is good and tasty though. If I don't get it today, whoever the fuck is callin' me is gonna fuckin' die.'
"Speak on it," CJ growled.
"CJ, it's Cesar, but don't hang up because it's really important, about Smoke and Ryder."
Only those two names spared Cesar the ignominy of another disconnected phone call. Sexual tension added to the Black's ongoing grudge with the Latino racer, but he had a bigger score to settle. "What about them?"
"I been following Ryder the last few days down in Los Santos, trying to figure out why Smoke and Ryder got yay moving between San Fierro and LS. I just spotted him heading to Angel Pine. You gotta come see it."
"Where you at?"
"Outside Blueberry, I'm at the beer factory. Ryder's car just left from here."
'Knockin' some boots or knockin' out that sherm head asshole, which one is more important? Hmm, I'll definitely go with killing Ryder.'
"Alright, I'ma be there in about an hour."
"Ok, but make sure you hurry."
CJ hung up the phone and approached the lawyer. Helena's arms were crossed, and her right foot tapped an impatient beat on the soft sand beneath them. The Black was skilled in diffusing the time bomb of an angry woman.
"Baby, that was one of my business associates," he sighed. CJ twisted his face into an expression of desperate, contrite need and forlornly held out his large hands. "I thought I was gonna be free all day to spend time with you, but we got an important meeting in Blueberry Acres. I gotta cut short our time together, baby."
As expected, Helena's arms unfolded, and her scowl softened into a sympathetic frown. "What kind of business is it?"
"I don't want to put you in any danger, so I can't tell you about it. I want to keep you safe from my lifestyle for as long as possible, baby."
Helena approached him and flung her arms around his neck. CJ wrapped his muscled arms around her small waist. "You better make this up to me, asshole."
"I will but this business might take a while to settle baby. You free Saturday night?"
"Yeah, gangsta, I'm free." CJ leaned forward to kiss her, but Helena deftly flipped a white business card into the space between their lips. "I want you to call me at this home number and pick me up from my home address at eight p.m." She appraised CJ's hulking body wrapped in a white tank, blue Zip khakis, and white Pro-Laps sneakers. "And dress better than this."
"Alright, baby," CJ chuckled deprecatingly. "Hop on the bike. I'll take you home."
"No, just take me to Ammu-Nation. It's in Blueberry, and you've got business to handle. I understand."
CJ compliantly drove her back to Ammu-Nation while she chattered incessantly about her childhood and the greatness of the countryside. At the gun store, he waited patiently until she climbed into a brown Bandito before he drove to the Fleishberg Brewery on the outskirts of Blueberry. Cesar's red Savanna stuck out like an eyesore under the beer factory's roadside billboard.
He parked the Freeway next to the billboard and dismounted. Cesar leaned against the passenger's side of the car, smoking. The buff Black detected a mixture of burning tobacco and marijuana, in addition to the overpowering beer in the air. "Hop in," said the lean Latino and tossed CJ the keys.
The Black piloted the Savanna through the hills between Los Santos and San Fierro rather than the Coastline Highway. It was barely past noon, but traffic on the highway was always erratic and inconsistent. As he drove by the San Fierro Tunnel, CJ decided to breach the thorny silence. "So where we goin', Cesar?"
"Let me make a phone call." CJ slowed to the speed limit while the Latino warrior jabbered in rapid Spanish on his cell. Cesar's normally cheerful brown face was somber when he ended the call. He inhaled deeply off the spliff and tossed the roach into the roadside grass. "Ryder's meeting them at the Cluckin' Bell in Angel Pine."
"They? I thought we was just followin' Ryder?"
"I did too. But my contact said Ryder just met up with some other putos."
"It sounds like a serious organization. We could be in way over our heads."
"Carnal, so we can't go in shooting. We gotta find out what they're up to."
"Those motherfuckers sell yay to the homies back in LS and get rich off it." CJ slammed the steering wheel in his rage. "What the fuck else do we need to know?"
"For one thing, we don't know how deep this organization goes. This ain't like takin' over neighborhoods in East LS, homes. This ain't gang versus gang we're talkin' about. We could be in some serious shit, international shit, homes. Trust me, we ain't ready to take on no motherfuckin' Russians or Colombians."
"Ryder killed my moms and lied to my face about it. Don't you understand that shit, Cesar?"
"More than you think, homes. How do you think I got shot in the shoulder, huh? Mi primo, my own cousin, turned on me and Los Aztecas!" Cesar punched the glove compartment. "I know you don't wanna listen to me, homes, but…."
"You don't know shit about me, punk. Just because you fucked one of my GSF homies don't mean you know me."
Cesar turned his face out the window and drummed his fingers against the passenger side door. The Black realized his temper had gone too far, but he was above retracting anything he said, regardless of how angry he felt. Kendl or his moms might elicit an apology from him, but CJ would not apologize to another man.
The two men did not speak the rest of the way to Angel Pine. Cesar's purring engine, the sounds of Radio Los Santos, and the sweet scent of abundant pine trees filled the hushed vehicle. When Ice Cube's "Check Yourself" began to spin, CJ rapped along to it. 'This shit is definitely Cesar right now.'
"Ay, CJ, stop here." The Black gangsta eased the classic car along the sidewalk in front of the Angel Pine Feed Store. Cesar pointed to the Cluckin' Bell parking lot across the street. "There's the puto's truck right there."
"Yeah, but whose Washington is that? That bitch looks sharp too." CJ pointed to a steel gray Washington parked strategically behind Ryder's brown Picador.
"I don't know, homes, but that Broadway? That's a fully tricked out Pimpmobile if I ever seen one, ese."
The door of the Cluckin' Bell swung open. "Shit!" Both gangstas slumped lower in the front seat, and watched over the curve of the dashboard as a heavyset brunette waddled out with a bucket of chicken cradled in her arms. "Those motherfuckers gotta leave at some point. Let's get off the street, Ceese."
CJ turned off the car and led the way up a fire escape to the roof the feed store. Shielded by the noisy rooftop air conditioner, the two men crouched and waited. A tedious two hours passed before Ryder exited the restaurant. "Ryder, you sherm-head asshole, I'ma fuckin' kill you!" CJ hissed under his breath.
A slim Black man exited shortly after Ryder. He wore a flashy purple suit accented with tacky leopard stripes on the collar and crushed velvet heels. His hair was slicked back and gleamed in the mid-afternoon sunlight. "I told you I saw a pimpmobile, homes!"
"Yeah, I know a pimp when I see one." A camera shutter clicked over CJ's shoulder. He turned to spot Cesar snapping photos of Ryder and the pimp entering their respective cars. "What do you think he's doing with the yay?"
"Don't know, probably tryin' to get into the slangin' game. What you got a camera for?"
"Homes, if these putos are from San Fierro, we gotta ask your boy Woozie if he can I.D. them." A middle-aged, immaculately dressed and groomed White man crossed the parking lot. Cesar snapped a photo of him entering the Washington. "Who do you think that is?"
"I don't know, Ceese, but he looks like a heap of trouble."
Last to exit the restaurant was a husky, middle-aged Latino. The tattoos entwined on his ripped forearms identified him as a gang member, a notorious murderer, and a mama's boy. He scoped the parking lot, unlike the three men before him, and climbed into a green-and-yellow Tampa. "That's T-Bone Mendez!"
"Who's that?"
"Ese, he's the leader of the San Fierro Rifa. I met him once or twice when he bought guns from the Aztecas."
"Where do you think he fit into all this?"
"No tengo ni idea, CJ. Let me ask Pitbull what he knows."
Until Cesar mentioned the half-Dominican, the Black felt reconciled with his best friend. It didn't matter to him if Cesar and Kendl were no longer dating. He needed to trust the Latino, but Pitbull's name reminded him of recent events. CJ stood up and glared coldly at the lean Latino. "Let's go."
They descended the fire escape. "Where you want me to take you, hermano?"
"Drop me off at the gas station." The two men rode the short distance in silence. When Cesar parked to let CJ out, the husky Black hesitated. "So what's goin' on with you and Pitbull?"
"What you mean, homes?"
"Never mind, Cesar, I'll catch you later." The lean Latino offered his fist to bump, but CJ tactlessly ignored it and stepped out the car. He shoved his hands in his pockets and walked down the street to the Angel Pine safehouse as Cesar headed out of sight.
'If he don't know how he's breakin' Kendl's heart, then I ain't gonna be the one to tell him.'