“I dragged my ass over here for fuckin’ forty bucks. I oughta beat your ass.”
I need to get a better view. Something seems familiar with this guy.She took a few steps, but because of the darkness, she didn’t see the raised tree root. She stumbled and fell. “Shit” escaped her instinctively.
“Who’s there?” She saw the man turn toward her; her stomach dropped.
“She’s with me. She wants a hit but she’s shy. First time, you know.” Nicholas shoved his hands in his pocket. “So what about that baggie? I need a hit, man.”
“Come out of the shadows. Don’t be shy.”
Breanna’s leg muscles tightened as if readying her body to run. Cold sweat broke out over her forehead and under her arms. Her heartbeat racing, she fought the urge to flee and stepped out from behind the tree. She swallowed hard and walked toward Nicholas and Candyman. She had a hundred dollars in her purse, so if she handed it to him for smack, it would look believable that she was there for a buy.
“How much you got?” he whispered.
She pulled out the hundred-dollar bill from her purse. From her side view, she saw Nicholas’s eyes bulge at the money. Candyman took out a cellophane bag and stepped toward her, out of the shadows. A flush of adrenaline tingled through her body as she gasped, “It’s you!”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” he growled. “You playing detective, bitch?”
“You know Candyman, Breanna?” Nicholas asked.
She started to back away from him, but he grabbed her like a vise.
“Nicholas, help me!”
The man covered her mouth as she tried to scream. Her watery eyes locked on to Nicholas. He bent down and picked up the hundred-dollar bill.
Candyman threw a baggie at him. “Get the fuck outta here!”
He picked up the packet from the pavement and looked at her. “I’m sorry,” he muttered, and then he ran away, disappearing into the darkness.
Her body went limp from the shock of his abandonment. Then something hard and heavy crashed down on her head and blackness engulfed her.
