CHAPTER XXXII
12:20
Kingson came out of the Q train on Roosevelt Island and rode up two long flights in the near empty elevator to the ground floor. He saw the S90 immediately through the station's large and thick nearly floor to ceiling windows as he turned left coming out of the elevator. It was gleaming like a newly built NASA spaceship: pretty to the eyes but not all what or how the company said it could perform. All passersby looked at the car admiringly; without a doubt, it was of splendid aesthetic quality. He got into the car smiling and Yselle drove off before the lumbering RIOC bus could pass her and, of course, mission accomplished, it would inevitablyly slow down as soon as it got in front of her: That was the unspoken large vehicle conspiracy, and it appeared to happen worldwide. It also applied to SUV's.
"I heard it was a busy and violent morning in Harlem," Yselle commented, putting on some shades as the midday sunlight beamed into the car. Kingson flapped down both his and Yselle's visors.
"To say the least," he responded. "Almost lost my damn life." Then he proceeded to recount to her what had happened from when she had dropped them off at the Tram. She sat quietly throughout the entire recounting, absorbing the news of the morning's tumultuous and deadly events. Well, she felt sorry for this who had gotten shot, but at least they had succeeded in freeing Get Right.
Mission accomplished.
As with many other people, she too was a believer in the end justifying the means, so collateral damage aside, as long as the intended goal was reached, well done. To her, the end did justify the means, but with a caveat: the means could not be costlier than the end goal. Else, why bother?
They were passing RIOC's waste management headquarters when Kingson realized Yselle was a bit too reserved
"What's wrong, Yselle?" he asked. "Why are you so quiet?" She didn't speak at first, but then sighed.
"Ygritte wants to see her children but Chulo is refusing, calling her a bad example for them. So she's just been crying the whole time in the house." Kingson took a deep breath to calm himself down. What Ygritte had done was wrong, even egregiously so, but Chulo would have to stop hammering at her about it, at least so often.
"I'll take care of that... Who's in the crib?"
"The tattoo lady came a little while ago and she's been on her laptop looking at designs or whatever, since."
"Yeah, well, she's supposed to. She knows she got work to do."
"Okay... And she's really pretty. With a lot of hair." That caught Kingson's attention.
"You say she has a lot of hair?"
"Yeah, a lot of hair," Yselle repeated, laughing a bit. "And it looks all natural."
"Well, Branson always did like the beautiful ones." Yselle glanced at Kingson sideways and smiled, grateful for the compliment. "Apparently, he has a thing for big-haired women, who have... other big things." Yselle laughed aloud this time. She turned left and up, onto the small two-way leading along to the front of the house in whose name Chulo had put hers.
"Oh yeah, before I forget again: Ygritte's uncle, Victor, and two of his guidos, Chulo's cousins incidentally, came with her. Victor's checking the dogs - he the one that bought and brought the dogs here in the first place." Kingson nodded as she parked behind a hunter green Lexus Landcruiser. There was no reason for the dogs to be out, nor was the gate locked, nor shut. The only reason that could be, anywhere, was because of the assurance of firearms.
Or a God complex.
They went in the house and Yselle called out: "Estoy aqui." Star was in a large downstairs parlor, comfortably nestled inside a deep and cushiony armchair, her suitcase of tools and utilities on a nearby wide table. Her laptop lay open atop her lap but she put everything aside when she saw Kingson.
"What's up, twin?" she said, getting up and going over to to him.
"Star? What the-? How are you? You're a tattooist? Since when?"
"Since before Branson but it was just on hold. I'm okay, King; could be better, though. Kinda hoping you got some work for me."
"Hmmm. I never knew, shorty. Well, I'm glad you're here, and yes, it's quite an opportunity to make quite a bit of paper for yourself."
"I'm wit' it. Show me the money!" Star was just as short as Yselle but with a fatter ass, bigger titties and, incredibly, a slimmer waist. She liked to wear black all the time and today she was wearing black spandex leggings and a midriff Polo Sport t-shirt that exposed well toned abdominal muscles and the bottoms of her shapely and huge tits. Her lipstick was black; her nail polish was black, and her head of luxurious, all natural and thick hair was also black. She wore waist beads to always keep her weight in check and she had piercings of five pointed stars, one in each cheek. Plus a bottom lip ring. There was an intricate tattoo encircling and climbing up her right arm and ending in tendrils under her chin. Her black on black Nike Anthracite footwear completed her ensemble and she was doubtlessly splendid to the eye.
She was the epitome of exotic. But exotic never meant perfect. Yselle couldn't figure out why Branson had left her, though. Kingson and Yselle excused themselves and went upstairs, going into the previously visited large study. Chulo was talking to two other hefty men who were both of similar phenotype to him. They stopped talking and Chulo made as if to greet Kingson but the latter turned his head to a corner in which Ygritte sat, softly crying. Kingson went to her and bent down to shake her hand. She turned her head and continued her soft whimpering. She was already a beautiful woman but sorrow made women even more beautiful. Kingson turned back to Chulo and shook his head.
"I didn't sign up for this kind of slow torture, Mr. Rodriguez."
"And I never sign up for a cheating ass wife... but here we are."
"No, sir, you didn't, you're right, but what's done is done and now I have to be the best damage control engineer I can be. An eye for an eye leaves the world blind." Chulo looked at Ygritte and nodded to his cousins, who left the room. "We spoke about this earlier and you know what we have to do, but you're here antagonizing her for no reason. What's the issue with her not being able to see the children?" Chulo went to the small bar and poured himself a half glass of Amaretto. He took a sip before speaking.
"I see some of you not thinking." Yselle rolled her eyes and went to sit on the arm of the chair on which Ygritte was sitting. Ygritte calmed down some as Yselle put an arm over her shoulders. "I'm not keeping the girls away from spite. The police are surely watching them to see if me or... this one here try to contact them." He indicated Ygritte as "this one here," surely not Yselle. "We cannot go anywhere near the children now," Chulo said. Kingson reflected and realized that Chulo was absolutely correct and he had been thinking ahead. Kingson nodded in apology; Chulo nodded back, understanding and accepting the apology. He took another sip of the Amoretto. Kingson went and sat opposite Ygritte. He asked her if she understood why she could not see her children at this time. Ygritte nodded, showing that she understood English to some modicum. Kingson looked up at Chulo.
"But maybe we can do a video call, right?" Chulo was thoughtful. Sure, enough time had passed and, even if they traced Victor's phone, they'd come up with nothing trying to trace his. He had paid a good amount of money for his military grade cloaking technology. He nodded. Kingson turned back to Ygritte.
"Is that okay? Will you accept a video call?" Ygritte said yes and held onto his hands, thanking him repeatedly. Yselle saw her big brother roll his eyes behind Kingson. "Don't thank me yet, Ygritte - we need to talk, okay? Before you both video call the children, there are some things to be discussed." Ygritte's English was poor but she understood more than she could speak. And Yselle, who was perfectly bilingual, began explaining to her in rapid Spanish how and when Chulo and her would be able to make their appearance into society again, and in what fashion. He wouldn't tell her the entire plan, nor could she understand, but that was what they were paying him the big bucks for.
Kingson explained to her how the District Attorney might hold and/or arrest her and Chulo for questioning. She would have to act a certain way. Through Yselle, Kingson made Ygritte to understand that her entire life, even the lives of Desiree and Yvie, depended on how good an actress she became. Legally, they could not question her out of the presence of her legal representative, which was Kingson, but if they asked her any questions out of his presence, she should put the full weight of blame on him, telling them that he had said she should say nothing until he was with her. Lemony Snicket could not have narrated a series of more unfortunate events.
But deeds were done and now the focus was had to be on resolutions. He knew Chulo was listening and said some things geared at him although said to Ygritte. Chulo wasn't stupid; he would understand. If they arrested her, she must stick to the script or risk losing both her children and her freedom. Kingson dared not add that she would also lose Chulo, as that was already a foregone conclusion.
Or was it?
If Chulo could somehow, some way, find it in his heart to forgive this woman her morbid and foolish indiscretion, it was possible that they could continue on with a strained, but intact, marriage. She just had to remember that, no matter what the DA promised her, no matter what they said, she must stick to the script. Yselle was paying supreme attention to what he was telling Yselle to relay to her. In short order, Kingson then asked Yselle to call Star upstairs. Yselle went downstairs to call Star, and when coming back upstairs, they were both discussing which products to use in order to keep their hair curly and light, not frizzy.
"Star," Kingson called her somberly. She looked at him intently. "I'd like to ask you some questions in front of my client here." He nodded to Chulo, who briefly waved a beefy hand. Star waved back and refused to take a seat when offered one. "When you do tattoos," Kingson continued, "do you keep a record of whom you did those tattoos for and on what date and time, that kind of thing?"
"Of course," Star replied immediately. "You gotta keep track of the customers - what they asked for and what they received, how much it was, pictures of the tattoos, sometimes the process of tattooing, though they have to give you permission for that. There's something of a list of pre- and post-requisite... steps to be observed." Kingson paced a bit, his legal mind churning. He stopped pacing and looked directly at Star.
"Can you falsify the time and date of a tattoo you've done?" Star looked away, then at Ygritte, who was looking at Kingson in some confusion. She finally looked at Chulo for any clue to this mysterious question and saw that he was sitting behind his bureau, biting his fist and caught in some obviously strong emotion.
"I... guess so?" Star answered, a question in her tone, but what she was really asking was: why the fuck you asking me that strange ass question? Kingson started pacing again, looking everywhere except at Star. That made her really suspicious. Finally, after thinking of a dozen different ways to ask Star what he was reluctant to but had to, Kingson's shoulders slumped. If he hadn't known Star, he would not have had such a moral conundrum, nor would he have any problem asking her certain of these questions. He looked at her directly.
"Star, you know me, right?"
"Yeah, I think I know you well enough."
"And you know I would never ask you to do something that could harm or adversely affect you, right?"
"Nigga, what you tryna ask me? Just spit it out." Kingson took a deep breath.
"Would you swear, under oath, that you designed a tattoo on a date that you didn't, in order to get somebody off the hook for a serious crime? I'm making no bones about this. This is straight up perjury, and if you get caught slippin', you could get locked up." Star had the feeling that the room itself was listening for the answer to his question, it had become so still. Chulo was apparently enraptured by a rather plain looking pen on his bureau and Yselle suddenly found a terrific amount of lint she must have just noticed on her skirt.
Her leather skirt.
"Sure," Star answered simply. Kingson let out a deep breath, stepped close to Star and hugged her. She suddenly pulled away.
"I ain't finished, though." Some of the tension returned to the room. "First off, how much time can I get for perjury?"
"The maximum is seven years. Under federal law, the maximum is five years in prison and fines. The punishment for perjury varies from State to State, under State law, but it is a felony, although most perjury convictions result in only a year of prison, as well as probation and/or fines. A lot of the time,, the jail or prison term is suspended and fines are imposed instead." Star put her hands on her hips. He shrugged.
"'Only' a year, he says," Star complained. Her attitude was justified and couldn't nobody tell her different. She was the one putting her neck on the line. "This shit gotta be worth my while, yo. I mean, it really gotta be worth my while." Kingson nodded gravely and looked at Chulo, who also nodded in a most serious manner. The lawyer began explaining to Star what he would need from her specifically - eyes opened wide when just a few snippets of his plan to beat the case were revealed.
