Page 46 of Kandie Shoppe

How people who were forbidden to even read were able to do this is a marvel to me. Stopping at the next ladder I do something I’ve never done before. I make a right instead of keep going to forward to the one that leads to freedom.

There’s no telling what Ulysses’ dirty ass will do when he finds out I’m gone. He may even try to arrest me again. Tummy tight, I follow the short path to the only ladder in this area. Praying like my life depends on it I ease the false floor away or at least I try to. I know he left. Garcia told me when he came to check on me or to let me know the coast was clear. Anytime he’s here I know I’m going to make it out with no problem. Hell, I bet he’d even leave the door open if I asked him but I never would. People forget Rory Garcia was one of the kids who I helped get free from Bishop Smith. As much as Ulysses and his ilk want to make me out to be bad, they just don’t know there are some people who think the world of me.

Then why did that look on his face of disappointment matter so much? I don’t know but I’m going to use the rest of my freedom rooting out all those feelings.

He likes to pretend he’s a saint when he’s meeting with a cartel boss behind the local flower shop. Let that weigh on his scale of righteousness. Oh, I forgot. It wouldn’t matter since I’m the only person who knows and I’m not credible.

I almost don’t care when I finally get the slab to move, opening up to his office. A rug was blocking the opening.

Pushing it to the side, I wince at the loud scrape. Waiting a tense second, I listen hard in case I need to jump back down into the tunnel. It would only be Garcia, but I’d never put him in that position and then he’d feel obligated to tell his boss the Sherriff which will blow a century’s old secret.

“Fuck,” I hiss, looking at the thick rug flopped over. It’s going to be a dead giveaway when he comes back and sees that the arrest report is gone and the rug is moved. It won’t take him long to figure out the false floor and the opening to the tunnel.

Looking around, I see a roll of duct tape on a nearby shelf. Creeping over, my body ready to spring at any moment, I grab the thick roll of tape. This is too risky by far, but at this point I don’t trust Ulysses not to take his teaching me a lesson all the way to Julia Tutwiler Prison. Rolling some over itself, I place it just so over the concrete slab. Smoothing it down the best I can, making sure there are no lumps or indentation that he’d notice, I look, assessing my work — not bad.

Making my way over to his desk, I take the report that he’s not filed along with the brand-new mugshot he took. Even in the picture, I look so forlorn. Not that his mean ass cared. He was licking his chops to teach me a lesson. Asshole.

I snatch up the paper and the picture he hopefully didn’t process yet because that would be another problem and I’d have to get one of my tech savvy younger cousins, Maxim or Thaddeus, to hack into the county system to remove it. Thad’s already in enough trouble and Maxim tends to be more of an upright citizen for the time being.

Stuffing the items into my pocket, I climb back into the escape hatch. “I promise I’ll be good.” I pray to Sky Daddy, hoping as I slide the concrete back in place the rug holds.

A few hours later,I’m turning the corner to my business in a bright sundress after a fresh shower. The tunnels beneath the jail diverge to several paths. A few go for miles in various directions leading out of town or deeper into Love land likeValentine’s veterinary clinic, and one leads straight to the back of my grandparents’ house to the tiny house they built for Kerania and me. To this day I have clothes and sundries stashed there for when I get in trouble.

Most days after I escape, I take breakfast with them, but I’m not trying to hear Pa-Pete fussing at me about his truck running out of gas or setting Ulysses’ truck on fire. Which in itself would be bad enough, but I can hear Mama-Pete getting on me for cutting up over a man which Love women never do. “We’ve fixed it so they lose their minds over us, not the other way around,” she would tell us when she gifted us our own scent of vanilla-rose.

I was mad is all and after the way he treated me after, I won’t be making that mistake again. My head is back on straight. It was real nice while it lasted, but it will be celibacy for me from now on. I obviously tend to care more about people than they do about me. He showed me just how fucking judgmental he is with the whole, “Let this be a wake -up call,” bullshit. He wasn’t saying that shit when he was knee deep in me. I can’t stand his ass.

Some of the pep has definitely left my step by the time I reach the landing of my loft. Pausing, I notice my door is ajar. Waiting, I listen for a few moments. Not hearing anything, I nudge the door with my toe. Slowly the door swings open with an eerie creek I never noticed before just now. I guess my senses are heightened under the circumstances of coming home to find my place has been broken into.

“What the fuck?” Looking around, I take in the destruction. My bed is ripped apart, my bookcase is empty. Every book has been thrown around the room. My special editionCruelPrinceis torn and ripped apart. A heavy ache settles in my heart. Everything I’ve worked for is destroyed.

They even cut into my bed. Walking over to get a better look, I stop cold. DIRTY WHORE is scrawled on the wall above my headboard in red paint that drips like blood on the wall.

With trembling fingers, I cover my mouth. This is pure hatred. This is not a prank. This is evil.

Who hates me this much? A pool of liquid is on my pillow. The moment I lean in, I get a whiff of the scent and immediately feel the need to retch. It’s semen.

Only when I rush back outside nothing comes up because I already threw up everything earlier in the jail.

Legs wobbly like Jell-O, I ease down on the top step, scared I’ll fall if I try to go down the other twelve. Casting my eyes around, I search the area behind the shop. Whatever evil bastard did this probably wants to see me break in real life.

Fishing my phone out, I press the icon of my cousin Oz.

“Hey, firebug,” he drawls in a mix of accents ranging from southern Bama to Western Cape, where he now lives.

“I need some help.” There is a deep pause. Not because he won’t help. I never ask for help.

“We’re on our way.” He’s bringing the rest of my badass male cousins.

Minutes later, they are silently assessing my loft, their faces murderous.

“Okay, baby girl, why don’t you go down to your shop while we clean this mess up,” Oz says as his brother, Nebraska, and four more of my male cousins spread out over my tiny loft. It suddenly seems like a CrackerJack box with all these over six-foot behemoths taking up this tiny space.

“I can help—” I begin frantically looking around, trying to see what I can salvage.

“Nah, Kandie girl,” Nebraska cuts me off smoothly. “Trust that the motherfuckers who did this are watching. They want to see you upset. We are not going to give them the satisfaction.Take your pretty self down to your shop and be unbothered. Ya hear me?”

Looking around, Nehemiah and his brothers, Benjamin, Nikodemus, and Malachi, all nod in agreement.

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