Free Hard Candy by Amaleka McCall Page B

heels. He just didn’t know who he was messing with.

Chapter 4
    Rock was huffing and puffing by the time he made it up the stairs to his apartment door. His lungs were on fire as he coughed uncontrollably. He stood with his back against the hallway door, letting his bags fall to the floor. Rock was frustrated and exhausted. Droplets of blood oozed from his mouth and formed a teardrop pattern on his shirt.
    Rock’s hands shook as he fumbled with his keys. He was wishing he had fixed the old rusty lock on his door because, at times like this, he hated fighting with it. When the lock finally gave, he spilled into his apartment and lay in a heap on the floor for at least fifteen minutes. He was feeling worse with each passing day and had definitely overdone it this time. With each rise and fall of his chest, he thought for sure he saw flashes of the devil.
    Not the type to let illness defeat him, he bit down into his jaw and pulled himself up off the floor, determined to go through with his daily routine.
    He finally managed to get to his small Formica-top kitchen table. He’d had it for so long, the flowers embedded in the material appeared to be masked by a smoke screen. Rock dropped his bags onto the table and flopped down into one of the mismatched chairs. He popped the little plastic top on his cup of green tea and opened up his Daily News . No matter how much his chest and stomach burned, he needed his daily cup of green tea.
    Barely able to grasp the small paper cup, Rock held the small cup of tea to his mouth and took the first sip. He winced. He smoothed out the newspaper and read the first bold headline. Pain shot through his body like a bolt of lightning. A mouthful of tea and blood splattered all over the table.

    Candice’s phone ringing startled her out of her sleep. She bolted upright, thinking something must be wrong with uncle Rock. He was the only one who would call her this early in the morning.
    â€œHello,” she huffed into the phone, her voice sounding like a frog was lodged deep in her throat.
    â€œCandy! Wake up!” Shana screamed in Candice’s ear.
    Candice was surprised to hear her friend’s voice on the line. “I’m up. I’m up,” she reassured her friend, wishing she would just get to the point.
    â€œGirl! Razor been missing for three days!” Shana screeched, her voice shaking.
    Candice sat upright in her bed. “What? What do you mean, ‘missing’?”
    â€œCandy! Nobody ain’t seen Razor since he ran after you at the club! Oh my goodness! Broady is going crazy around here. I can’t even stay in the same room with this nigga right now, it’s so bad. Candy, they’re saying somebody might’ve kidnapped Razor ass.”
    â€œDamn! That’s fucked up. Who would want to do that?” Candice asked calmly. Her stomach cramped as soon as she asked the question. Suddenly, she was on her feet, feeling the need to pace, a coping mechanism she’d acquired over the years to deal with rushes of emotions.
    â€œThey found his truck on the side of a road out in New Jersey. Girl, niggas in the streets are saying that he might be dead. It’s not like Razor to even miss a day—much less three days—calling Broady or coming around to make money.”
    Candice didn’t really know what to say to comfort Shana. “Why would somebody want to kidnap him? Did he owe somebody money? Did Broady do something to somebody?” Candice asked, pacing the room. She closed her eyes and tried to picture Razor’s face the night he’d followed her out of the club.
    â€œGirl, they finally put a thing about it in the paper. Just because his baby mother is making such a big deal about it.”
    â€œDamn! It’s in the newspaper?” Candice immediately thought about Uncle Rock and his daily morning newspaper review. Her heart thumped a little bit. She wondered what he would be thinking if he read