There Can Only Be One Read online

  TRAPHOUSE KING 3

  Lock Down Publications and Ca$h

  Presents

  TRAPHOUSE KING 3

  A Novel by Hood Rich

  Lock Down Publications

  P.O. Box 870494

  Mesquite, Tx 75187

  Visit our website @

  www.lockdownpublications.com

  Copyright 2018 by Traphouse King 3

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in review.

  First Edition October 2018

  Printed in the United States of America

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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  Cover design and layout by: Dynasty Cover Me

  Book interior design by: Shawn Walker

  Edited by: Sunny Giovanni

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  Submission Guideline.

  Submit the first three chapters of your completed manuscript to [email protected], subject line: Your book’s title. The manuscript must be in a .doc file and sent as an attachment. Document should be in Times New Roman, double spaced and in size 12 font. Also, provide your synopsis and full contact information. If sending multiple submissions, they must each be in a separate email.

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  Acknowledgements

  I’d like to take the time to thank my homie, Cash. Thank you for providing me a platform to showcase my talents and skills. It means a lot. I’d also want to give a shout out to our C.O.O Shawn Walker. You are amazing, Queen. Thank you for always going so hard for Lock Down. We appreciate you, Queen.

  Dedications

  This book is dedicated to my lil’ one. Everything Daddy do, he does it with you in mind. I love you with all that I am. Never forget that.

  Table of Content

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 1

  ~Rich~

  I read over the message on my phone again and again in disbelief. It said, they’d just found my baby sister in the alley, deceased. I felt like I couldn’t breathe as I leaned against the whip, my heart was beating so fast it caused my vision to become blurry. I squeezed my eyelids shut tightly and took a deep breath. My eyes were misty, and I kept imagining my little sister’s beautiful face.

  How could she be dead? Who could have done this? She was just a teenager. All those thoughts roamed through my mind. Macho stopped in his tracks and jogged back to the whip I was leaned up against.

  He placed his hand on my shoulder, as I stood hunched over out of breath. “What’s good, big homie?” He looked me up and down, with concerned eyes.

  I tried my best to control my breathing. I needed my heart to stop beating so fast. It felt like it was being squeezed inside my chest. I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. I handed him my phone, so he could read the same message, I’d read. Porky and Paper made their way back over to us.

  “Aww, hell naw. When you find this out?” Macho handed the phone to, Paper.

  Paper looked it over. His eyes got buck, then he shook his head. “Damn, Bruh, I’m sorry to hear that.” He grabbed me into his embrace and wrapped his arms around me. “Nigga, I’m down to do whatever you wanna do after we hit this lick. I can only imagine what’s going through your brain, right now.” He looked both ways into the dark night and handed the phone to Porky.

  Porky read over the message and lowered his head shaking it. “That’s your sister, right?”

  I crouched down on one knee, looking up at him, nodding my head. “Yeah, that’s my first sister. The first female outside of my mother, I’d learned to love. This shit hurt, bruh.” My heart felt like it was getting worst. I could not believe my little sister was dead.

  I couldn’t even imagine who’d done it to her, or why. I kept on seeing what had taken place between us the last night we were physically together. We argued over her disrespect and drug usage. I wounded up spanking her. She left the house directly after, before leaving she vowed to never come back and hadn’t.

  Paper grabbed my hand and helped me to my feet. “Look, bruh, we gon’ handle that bitness wit’ her, but first we gotta take care of what we came here for tonight. It’s too much at stake. Now, I’m sorry to hear about what happened to lil’ sis, but we gotta focus on the task at hand. Ain’t no way around it.”

  I looked him over for a long time in silence. His eyes lowered into slits and peered into mine. Images of my sister Keyonna continued to play over and over in my mind. I imagined her lying in an alley, twisted, left there in the cold. I felt responsible. I felt like I should have done so many things different. But the most important thing was that I should have never allowed her to leave the house the night that she did. I should have tried harder to keep her there. I should have tried to talk some sense into her. Now, because I hadn’t, she was dead. It was all my fault.

  “Yeah, a’ight, Paper. Let’s just handle this bitness, then we can jump on this other situation with, Keyonna. That sounds good to you?”

  Paper nodded. “Hell, yeah, let’s get it.” He patted me on the back before jogging toward our destination.

  Macho tapped me on the shoulder, and looked into my eyes, before following behind Paper.

  Porky handed me back my phone, “Bruh, you already know, we gon’ knock some heads off over this. The Misfits got you, big homie. Let’s just handle this lil’ bitness. You know how the game go.”

  I agreed, and a few minutes later, with a heavy heart. I stood behind, Paper as he opened the big cellars wooden door after Porky had clipped the Master Lock with bolt cutters. As soon as the cellar was opened, Macho disappeared inside, with Porky following close behind him, then Paper and then me. I closed the wooden doors back and made my way down the stairs that led into the basement of the house, holding my .40 Glock in hand. The staircase smelled like a bunch of wet mop heads. It felt cool, yet damp. The stairs were concrete, along with the walls on each side of us. I stayed cl
ose behind, Paper. I had tough time not allowing thoughts of Keyonna invade my mind. I wanted to throw up. My sister was too young for me to bury. Fuck.

  Macho and Porky were about ten feet in front of me. As we approached the bottom of the stairs, Macho ran ahead into the basement. There were two quick flashes from his silenced Glock. He turned around and waved for me and Paper to follow him. When I got inside the basement, I saw the two big bodyguards lying on the floor in a puddle of blood that pooled around their heads. I stepped over them and made my way to the front of the pack. I tried to remember how my father had explained the breakdown of the house. He’d said that after we killed the two bodyguards, there was going to be another one at the top of the stairwell.

  As we traveled through the basement, I got to the door that led upstairs and into the house. I slowly turned the knob and pulled it open just enough for me to fit my body into the opening. Once in, I made my way up the dark stairs with my gun held tightly in my hands, aiming upward. I stepped onto the first step and tried my best to see if I heard anything unusual, but I did not. I took the second step, and then the third. I didn’t realize I was holding my breath until my vision grew hazy. I exhaled with my chest heaving up and down.

  Suddenly, the door opened at the very top of the stairs. I could hear classical music coming from inside of the house. The door closed again, and the music disappeared. There was a cough, then I could hear footsteps traveling down the dark hallway of the staircase.

  I backed off the three steps and into the basement. Slowly closing the door back and stepping on the side of it. Paper, Porky, and Macho stood frozen. Each armed and standing with their backs along the wall beside the door that led upstairs.

  Paper leaned into where he thought my ear was located inside the mask. “What happened, bruh? Why the fuck you back down here?”

  I put my finger to my mask, and nudged him away, before pointing at the door. He nodded and placed his back against the wall. His gun aimed at the door. Porky and Macho did the same thing. I waited in anticipation for the door to open. I took three steps back and aimed my gun where I figured the bodyguard’s head would be.

  “Hey, Tony—Neil? You guys alright down there?” Asked the guard as he made his way down into the basement.

  I could hear his steps making their way in our direction. They sounded heavy. I imagined him to be a big man. I bit into my lower lip and aimed my gun as the knob on the door jiggled, and then it swung inward. The bodyguard stuck his head out of the door. As soon as he did, I slammed my .40 Glock to his forehead and grabbed him by the throat.

  “Don’t move muthafucka.” I yanked him off the last stair, wrapped my arm around his thick neck and placed my barrel to his temple.

  He dropped his gun on the floor and threw his hands in the air. “Hey, buddy, I’m unarmed. There’s no reason to kill me. I’ll do whatever you want.”

  Paper stepped in front of him and put the barrel of his pistol on his lips. “How many people upstairs?”

  The guard, a tall, slim, Sicilian, shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know, maybe four or five.”

  “How many armed guards?” I asked tightening my hold on his neck.

  He gagged and arched his back. “Two, they’re in the living room behind Don Bertolli. The other man is Paulie. They’re all connected. I don’t think you wanna rob this house. You’ll pay for it later. Trust me.”

  Paper shook his head. “Oh, yeah, well, we’ll see about that.” Paper waved me away. I took a step back. He pulled the trigger and blew the guard’s brains out of the back of his head. The guard fell to the ground face first. Paper looked down on him with his gun smoking. He stepped over the man’s dead body and pulled open the door. “Let’s go, y’all. Time is money.”

  I rushed into the stairwell and took the steps two at a time until I got to the top of the stairs in the dark hallway. Once there I twisted the knob and pushed the door inward just enough to stick my head inside so, I could peek around. The door led into a hallway. I looked to my right and could see two lamps one sitting on each small table. There was a white leather couch that had a suit coat draped over the arm of it. To my left, there were two opened doors down the hallway in that direction. I didn’t know what they went too, but they made me nervous.

  I turned around and told my crew what I saw. I ordered the Misfits to go to my left, while me and Paper went right. I figured the Don, his bodyguards, and my father would be in that direction and I’d been given strict orders to follow so that the mission was a success.

  Porky and Macho tightened the silencers on their guns and got ready to run into the house, while Paper perched beside me, and stuck his head into the doorway, looking both ways as I had. The classical music appeared louder.

  He stood up and patted Macho on the back. “Y’all go make sure everything good. We coming in right after y’all.”

  “Say no more.” Macho opened the door, and ran into the house, going left with Porky on his heels.

  As soon as they ran inside, I ran into the hallway and kneeled, with my shoulder sliding along the wall, the closer I got to the living room, the louder the music got. When the hallway ended I saw that Don Bertolli, an older man that looked to be in his late sixties, sat at the head of the long table with two beefy, armed bodyguards standing behind him. Across the table was my father. He sat with an opened briefcase filled with money. I aimed and fired my pistol twice.

  Boom! Boom!

  My bullets slammed into the chest of each guard. They flew backward into the wall and crumbled to their knees.

  Don Bertolli stood up and put his hands in the air. “Hey, what’s going on here?”

  Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

  Paper popped him once in each shoulder, and in each thigh. The Don crumbled to the floor beside his bodyguards. I aimed at my father’s chest and popped him twice. Knowing that he was wearing a Kevlar vest, hoping that no harm would come to him.

  “This is a stick-up! Tear this muthafucka up. We aren’t leaving until we got everything. That’s an order!” I hollered.

  We spent the next thirty minutes tearing the house apart, while my father curled into a ball in pain. I noted that I didn’t see any blood leaking out of him which was a good sign. It let me know none of the bullets had penetrated him. We made a complete mess of the house, snatched the suitcase that was filled with five hundred thousand in cash, and fled the scene.

  I had told Paper to drop me off at Aaliyah’s crib, but when I got to her place, there were two squad cars in front of it. I told Paper to keep on rolling while I sent, Aaliyah a text telling her to meet me at the corner.

  I grabbed the suitcase full of cash from Macho and jumped out of the whip. “Say, bruh, I gotta see what’s good wit’ my people. I’ll get at y’all in a minute.”

  Paper gave me a weird look, before nodding his head. “Yeah, a’ight bruh. But, after you get all this shit situated you and I gotta have a long talk, so we can get an understanding. I ain’t gon’ get into it now, but I’m feeling some type of way.”

  I didn’t have time to dwell on what my nigga was feeling. I needed to see what was good wit’ my sister. “Bet, I’ll hit you up as soon as I know what it is.” I slammed the door and jogged away from the whip as they pulled off.

  I had so many things going through my mind, that I couldn’t even think straight. Aaliyah met me on the corner about ten minutes later. When she saw me, she turned her jog into a full-on sprint, running and jumping into my arms. “Baby, somebody killed your sister. They killed her and left her in the alley on twenty-sixth and Center Street. I’m so, sorry.” She buried her face into my chest and broke into tears.

  “Aaliyah, where is Kesha, right now?”

  She took a step back and looked up to me. “She’s with the police. They’ve been questioning her and asking if she knows why anyone would do this to you guys’ sister. She’s having a hard time. I think you should go to her. She could use your comfort.” She wrapped her arms around me and laid her head on my chest. “I
was so worried about you, Rich.”

  I kissed her on the forehead and rubbed her back. Two police cars turned onto her street. One of the cruisers stopped and shined its big light on us. I held up my hand to shield my eyes from it.

  “Hey, you guys alright over there?” Asked the white officer that drove the car. He shined the light from me, down to, Aaliyah.

  I had two .40 Glock pistols on me. A suitcase with five hundred thousand dollars in it, and a bulletproof vest across my chest. I started to get nervous right away. Especially since I hadn’t changed clothes after we hit the lick with my father.

  Aaliyah nodded. “Yes, we’re good officer. Thank you for asking.”

  He shined the light into my face against. It was so bright that it gave me an instant migraine. I could feel the pain throbbing behind my eyes. “Well, you kids get off the street. It ain’t safe out here tonight. Been a lot of shootings. The city’s going to hell.” He clicked the light off, rolled up his window, and pulled down the street.

  I noted he parked across the street from Aaliyah’s house, before he and his partner got out, walked up her steps and knocked on the door.

  I grabbed her hand, led her around the corner and into the alley behind her block. We stopped on the side of a garage. “Look, Aaliyah, I think Andrea might have something to do with my lil’ sister being killed. I just found out she was fucking wit’ that nigga, Fax all along. She might be harboring some ill feelings because of what happened with her boyfriend, Maxwell. I don’t know for sure, but I’ma get to the bottom of it. However, I can’t go and comfort my sister, right now, while all of them police are around. I need you to tell her that I love her and that as soon as they get out of her hair, I’ll be there for her. Tell her that I’m sorry, and we’re going to get through this. I’ll hit her phone later to check in on her. Okay?”