Jail's Bait: Time Served (Book 5)

Lamar stood at the balcony of the suite he shared with Malik, sipping on a fruit smoothie as he stared out at the beautiful Seattle mountain vista.  Living in a ski lodge-turned-mansion halfway up a mountain top in view of the Rockies Mountains surely brought in some spectacular viewpoints, but Lamar secretly felt that the view from his and Malik’s bed was the best view in the whole manor.  I wonder how much longer I’ve got to be able to see this, he thought to himself as he stood there, staring out at the western edge of the mountain ranges.

Lamar was no fool; he knew his noble gesture to refuse a heart transplant meant that he would grow slower and slower with each passing day, until that one day when he would just go to sleep and never wake up again.  He remembered when he was younger, before all the money and prestige, when he and Joop were two young punks trying to run the streets, pretending they were hard core thuggs…. Well, I played at it, Lamar admitted to himself; Joop, on the other hand, was well on the way to becoming the real thing… if my dad hadn’t stepped in and helped him.  That was back when he and Joop both believed that they would live to a ripe old age together.

And then came the truth about Joop’s family, and the money and prestige came rolling in.  And even more so did Lamar believe that with the added comfort of the super-rich, that he and Malik would live forever; they would sail off into the sunset in each other’s arms, and live happily ever after, and their love would never die…

But Lamar got shot by the EMT who was so obsessed over Rah-Rah, and the truth about his heart disease came out.  Funny thing was, if the EMT hadn’t shot him, they wouldn’t have known about his heart condition until almost too late… 

Lamar suddenly heard a knock on the doors to the suite.  Coming in from the balcony, he crossed over to the double doors and opened them.

Standing before him was Rah-Rah.  “Hey, Lamar,” Rah-Rah said, somewhat nervously.

Lamar stared at the man, uncomfortably aware that he and Rah-Rah were alone up here, alone together for the first time… since the night of the rape, over thirteen years before.

Rah-Rah looked around, and seemed to come to this same realization as well.  “Uhhhh, I can go see my son, until Joop comes- I mean, until Malik comes back,” he said, backing away.

“Did you want something...?” Lamar asked him.

Rah-Rah stopped then, with a look on his face that Lamar never saw there before; a look of fear. “I-I just wanted to… but it can wait until Malik gets back,” he said again, turning to walk away.

“No, Rah-Rah, wait,” Lamar said then; “you can come in.”

Rah-Rah stopped in his tracks, and turned slowly back around to face Lamar.  “I swear, I won’t come near-” Rah-Rah began.

Lamar held up a hand to silence his final words.  “I know,” he said comfortingly; “it’s okay.  Just come in.”  And he held open the double doors.

Rah-Rah hesitated, his eyes wide… and then he followed Lamar into the suite.

********

Two minutes later both men were sitting at the small table on the balcony, staring out at the view in opposite directions.  Neither man spoke for a while.   “Besides seeing Marquis, I assume you came all the way here from the asylum because you wanted to talk about something,” Lamar said, breaking the silence.

“You wouldn’t happen to have any beer around this place, huh?” Rah-Rah asked hopefully.

“Downstairs,” Lamar replied.  “Ring the kitchen and they’ll send up a 6-pack.”

“Uhh, okay,” Rah-Rah replied, going back to stare out at the vista.  Lamar rose one eyebrow to his nervous behavior, but sat patiently.

After another stretch of time Rah-Rah seemed to make up his mind.  He swallowed, and then turned to Lamar, who began to look away from him.  “I came here to set the record straight with you.”

Lamar froze in the act of turning around then.  “Set… the record straight...?”

Rah-Rah turned to look at Lamar.  “I have to say something.”

Lamar studied Rah-Rah in silence, his expression indecipherable.

Rah-Rah held his gaze for a few more minutes, then looked away, taking a deep sigh.  He stood then and faced Lamar once more, absently wondering why it was suddenly so warm yet felt so cold at the same time, as he started wiping away sweat from his forehead.

“Rah-Rah, just say whatever it is you have to say and then go see your son,” Lamar spoke up then.

“My son.”  Rah-Rah looked at Lamar and nodded grimly.  “I didn’t deserve you chipping in to take care of Marquis.  It wasn’t your responsibility, and yet you stepped in anyway.”

“I didn’t do it for you, Rah-Rah,” Lamar replied with a brutally direct look.  “I saw a child who needed help and I helped him.  He was kin to my lover’s family and Malik and I both wanted to help raise him.”

“I still see it like this; at the end of the day, you helped my son, even after… after everything I did… to you,” Rah-Rah managed to get out.

Lamar suddenly became rigid.  “You did a lot,” he said, the meaning behind his words implicit.

“And that’s why I’m here,” Rah-Rah said.  “I owe you the right to look you in the face and own up to it… to it all.”

Lamar looked at Rah-Rah, still in that rigid pose, that same unreadable look still etching his features.

Rah-Rah swallowed.  “Thirteen years ago, I drugged you.  I held you down.  I raped you.”  Rah-Rah took another deep breath, and went on, oblivious to the tears of decades-old guilt that now filled his dark eyes.  “For two hours, over and over, I did what I wanted to you because I felt I had a right to.  You see, in my world, you belonged to me and I was obsessed with you,” he continued, the tears of guilt finally spilling out and falling thick and fast.  “I didn’t care that I wasn’t the one you loved; I knew you loved Joop, and knew he loved you too.  But I didn’t care about that; all I saw was that if could only make you love me then everything would be all right.  So I drugged you and took what I believed was mine.”  He paused to sniff and wipe the tears from his cheeks.

Lamar held his gaze, yet tears of his own were now standing in his eyes, threatening to come forth.

Rah-Rah went on.  “For years I plotted to get Joop out of the way, and I spent a long time trying to kill him off and kidnap you for my own.  And even after all that, the two of you were the ones who raised-who raised…my son.” Rah-Rah fell to his knees then, the utter realization of it all hitting him hard as he began to sob.  “I-Im sorry, IM SORRY,” he yelled to the top of his lungs, and he beat the ground with his fists as he cried and cried.

Lamar sat in his chair, watching silently as Rah-Rah, crumpled on the balcony floor, cried.  The sobbing subsided, and Rah-Rah lay down on the floor still, hiccupping the residue from his weeping.  “I-I’ll do anything you want,” he whispered brokenly then, still scratching hopelessly at the floor.  “I’ll j-jump off this balcony, off the moutaintop.”

“You’ve already tried that one, and you took Jamara, Ray and Malik with you, remember,” Lamar said clinically, getting to his feet.  “Get up, Rah-Rah,” he said with a sigh, rubbing a tear out of his own eye.

Rah-Rah pulled himself to his feet, staring at Lamar.  His eyes were reddened and his nose ran, mixing with the unbidden tears.  He wiped his face on the back of his hand.

“Here,” Lamar said then, reaching over to pick up tissue from the table and handing it over.

“Thanks,” Rah-Rah said gruffly, blowing his nose and wiping his eyes.

“Did you get it all out...?” Lamar asked mildly.

Rah-Rah looked at him.  “I-I just wanted… well, I wanted to say I’m sorry for all the fucked up stuff I did to you and Joop.  And I wanted to thank you for being a surrogate father to my son.”  Rah-Rah hesitated.  “A-And that’s all,” he added, confused from Lamar’s quiet behavior.

Lamar stared at Rah-Rah once again, and sat down.  “Sit,” he indicated to the empty chair.

Rah-Rah did as he was bidden, still sniffling.

Lamar took a breath.  “It’s no secret that Joop and I worshiped you when we were kids,” he started off.

Rah-Rah leaned forward and started to put his head into his hands-

“LOOK AT ME,” Lamar said then.

His voice didn’t get any louder, but the force behind his command made the hairs on Rah-Rah’s neck rise.  He straightened up again, looking at the man resignedly, the sniffles stopping.

“Okay then,” Lamar continued calmly, staring Rah-Rah in the face.  “Like I said, it’s no secret that Joop and I worshipped you, and so it was the worst blow either one of us felt when you double crossed on our friendship. But I’ve had over thirteen years to come to terms with this, Rah-Rah… and I can tell you, I wouldn’t have been able to move on and have a full, happy life with Malik if I didn’t forgive you a long time ago.  Yes,” he added when Rah-Rah gave a start of surprise, “I not only forgive you, I already did… years ago.  The reward of forgiving you was having my family and friends around me, a great career which made me famous in my own right, and true love.  Malik and I are forever,” Lamar declared, the passion in his voice strong and unflinching, “and thanks in part to you, we have proof that nothing can ever come between us.” He reached out his hand to Rah-Rah.  “In my books, you’ve already paid, and paid, and paid some more for what happened to me.  Nothing you did to me could ever compare to the horror you have to relive over and over each day, knowing that you murdered your own father a split second before you found out who he was.”  His hand still extended to Rah-Rah, waiting for him to take it.

Rah-Rah hesitated, then reached up to shake Lamar’s hand.  You’re a good man,” he remarked simply.  “And you’re right, I’ll never get to know the man who I murdered, the man who never got to know me the way he wanted to; I’ll never have the father-son moments, the trips and the holidays and the baseball games and everything… which is why I wanted so bad for Marquis to have all that, to give him what I never had.”  He looked at Lamar then.  “You know, most people can’t say to me what you just said without worrying what I might do to them for bringing all that stuff up,” he said, frowning curiously.

“What can you do to me that you haven’t already done,” Lamar asked coldly, pulling his hand back and holding Rah-Rah’s gaze once again.

“I know, I know,” Rah-Rah said then; “should I ring for that beer now...?”

“Make it two,” Lamar said with a sigh, sitting back in his chair and scratching his head, staring out at the spreading vista as Rah-Rah spoke over the intercom, calling for a six-pack of malt liquor.

“I think you gave in too quickly,” Lamar said then as they waited for the kitchen staff to come up seven flights with their beers.

“How so,” Rah-Rah asked interestedly.

“When you offered to toss yourself off the side of the mountain again,” Lamar reminded him; “maybe I should’ve let you at least try.”  He paused, giving Rah-Rah an arch look.  “I’m sure we would’ve persuaded Marquis to deal with the grief and move on...!”

Rah-Rah peered at Lamar… and for the life of him he couldn’t tell whether the man was kidding… or not.

********

Melo sat alone, staring towards the school gates from behind the wheel of his silver-white, gold trimmed, late-model, voice-activated, fully equipped Lexus Elite SUV, an ‘encouragement’ from one of the members of the school board of Berkeley U.  It was an odd moment, his being alone in the truck.  Usually Melo would be surrounded by either his fellow Grizzles teammates, or a horde of underclassmen dazzled by his upscale ride, or else a bunch of giggling females, each one attempting to replace his girl with themselves.  Once or twice Melo even caught on that a dude or two was trying to send him a subtle hint that they wanted get down with him… but he never went for it, no matter how sexy the guy was.  Absolutely no one could find out he was into men and women… well, his taste for men was stronger, more intense.  But after the scandal that happened with his older brother, there was no way he was going down like that.  Which is why he came up with the great idea to have his cake and eat it too… use a souped-up date-rape drug to fuck anyone he wanted, men or women, without them ever remembering what happened; this kept his name in the clear, and his reputation as a ‘stand-up guy’ in the sports world intact.

He still remembered the day his celebrity brother, a high-profile sports figure, was publicly scandalized and robbed of his fame due to a secret coming out at the wrong time, from someone he’d trusted.  Still in high school at the time, Melo had bragged about his brother’s skills up until that point; afterwards he couldn’t even lift his head up at school for all the ridicule he got just for being related to the man.  When he graduated he legally changed his last name so that no one would associate him with all that mess, and decided that no one would be able to get close enough to play him for a sucker like how his brother had been played…

…but then he saw Kap, and his heart did a double-dip.  At last, he understood why some risks were worth the trouble.  And now, three years later they finally ‘had sex’.  After it happened he never meant to confess the truth to Kap; it was supposed to be like it had been with everyone else that asked him that same question the morning after he roofie’d them- well, those who were bold enough to ask him that, of course.  His ready-made answer was already primed on his lips- the ‘I-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about’ schpiel.  But Kap looked at him with his deep, sexy eyes, and Melo found himself telling him the truth- at least partially.    It was against everything he had ever vowed, to never let anyone have any power over him, and without blinking he gave power to Kap like it was free water.  As far as he could tell, Kap could now tell anyone that Carmelo Johnson and he had the best sex on earth, and the college football star’s career would be over, over… and yet, for the life of him, Melo didn’t understand why he wouldn’t have a problem with that… if he knew in the end, Kap would be his forever.

Melo sighed.  He believed in his heart that Kap and he were meant to be, and yet Kap was the only guy on campus who genuinely seemed unimpressed by him.  Even after they finally had sex and Kap learned about it… he didn’t understand why Kap didn’t suddenly fall at his feet like anyone else would have.  Kap was supposed to be so open from finding out that the most popular guy on campus chose HIM, that he would happily leave Marquis… but Melo just sat in his car, watching Kap and two girls leave the campus with overnight bags, five minutes ago.  They were going after Marquis, he just knew it...!  What WAS it about that guy that kept Kap from noticing him...?

His cell phone buzzed then.  He lifted it up, saw the name on the screen, put it to his ear and clicked it on.  “What...?”

“Now now, what’s the attitude for...?” the voice on the other end asked.  “I want an update.”

“Look, I got a problem,” Melo declared then.

“You’d better not,” the voice replied then with ire; “I’m paying you enough to make sure you DON’T have a problem.  You still like that car my grandfather gave you, right...?”

“Don’t threaten to take my car again, bitch,” Melo growled; “I’m doing what the fuck you asked me to do.  But there’s a small glitch.”

“What is it, then...?” the voice snapped.

“Kap just left campus… with the girlfriends,” Melo replied sullenly.  “I thought by telling him about what happened between us that he would get open for me and stay here… but Marquis has a stronger hold on him than I expected.”

“Yes, I know,” the voice replied wryly.  “So since you’re not good enough at keeping Kap from following Marquis out of school, I have to step up my game.”

“What are you gonna do...?”

“You don’t worry about that.  Just be ready to pick up the pieces when Kap gets back to Berkeley.”  The voice paused.  “He won’t be ready for what hit him, and he’ll need a shoulder to cry on,” it added with a smirking tone.

“Don’t you hurt him, you rat bastard,” Melo cried out, enraged.

“Well, well, well…” the voice replied with a hint of surprise.  “I guess I know now why you were so eager to go along with my little plan… you actually like that little pumped-up punk, don’t you...?”

“I’ll snap your fuckin neck if you EVER talk about him like that again,” Melo screamed into the phone.

“Then there will be no more wire transfers to your poor little bank account,” the voice countered smoothly.  “You do what I say, and keep your opinions to yourself.  Think about it… you actually want to be with someone who has grown up used to the good life because he dates a rich man.  You don’t hold a candle to the Hill family wealth, its power… what use would you be to Kap, coming from your piss-poor background...?  You need me and my MONEY, and you KNOW it.  So from now on, you step and fetch when I SAY!!!  Wait for my instructions...!” and with that, a sharp click was heard on the line.

Melo was shaking with anger…. How DARE that bitch talk to him like that…?  But he calmed himself down, shutting his cell phone closed.

He knew, unfortunately, that all that was just said was true.  Especially the part about his being dirt-broke- at least he was, until he agreed to help out with this plan to bust up Kap and Marquis.  And Kap really was used to having it all from his lover; he wouldn’t want to be with someone who didn’t have pockets deep enough to at least compete with Marquis, and as a sports star Melo knew all about competition.  You had to have a level playing field in order to have a fighting chance to win the game.  For the time being he’d have to keep his opinions to himself, and play the good-little-soldier role… but when it was all over and he got his fat pay-off, he would go after that little bitch.  Nobody talks about Kap like that…

Smiling darkly, Melo said aloud, “On.”  The Lexus Elite automatically switched on its engine, and he drove off.