Dirty Game

Chapter 1 As the ten-car, graffiti-covered, northbound Number Two train, commonly referred to as the iron horse, sped down the elevated train tracks toward the 176th Street subway station, it brought with it an unmistakable sound. A deafening, ear splitting, thunderous noise, it echoed off the various closed storefronts, car lots, parking garages, and buildings that lined Jerome Avenue. The train came to a sudden halt, making its designated stop at the station and depositing its minority residents back to their desolate urban neighborhood, back to their dismal reality. This section of New York City was known as the South Bronx. First it was hit hard by a rash of tenement building fires started by greedy, unscrupulous landlords seeking a big insurance settlement from properties they deemed worthless, rundown, or beyond repair. They figured that torching their buildings was more profitable than spending the money to rehabilitate them for low-income residents to reside in. They'd rather rid themselves of these undesirable properties and turn a profit in the process. Their decisions were strictly from a business standpoint, motivated by pure greed, nothing more and nothing less. What they never took into account was the effect that this crime would have on the buildings' residents or the Borough of the Bronx. Soon a rash of copycat criminals began repeating this crime, over and over again. Irreplaceable personal items went up in smoke along with these tenement buildings. Countless lives were ruined or altered. Many families were forced to relocate from their place of birth to even worse living conditions like the city shelters or the tough city housing projects. Like a bad case of the chicken pox, this insurance fraud scam quickly spread across the South Bronx, making it resemble a ghost town in some war-torn foreign country. Where buildings once stood and life once flourished, there were now vacant lots with mounds of rubble. The concrete structures were replaced by shattered dreams and lost souls. The abandoned and charred skeletal remains of these buildings were evident as far as the eye could see. Later, the crack-cocaine epidemic came along and finished off the job that the arsonists had started. It killed off any remaining hopes, dreams, or chances that the neighborhood had of recovery or revival, further crippling the Bronx for decades to come. This section of New York City was amongst the poorest in the nation. The boogie-down Bronx, the home of hip-hop, became known as the burnt-down Bronx. On a chilly fall evening in the South Bronx, a trap was being set that would bring about some deadly consequences. Parked in a car underneath the train station was Kenny Greene, also known as Ken-Ken. He was a tall, dark-skinned, well-built ladies' man whose specialty was strong-arm robbery. He was also one half of a duo, husband-and-wife con team. Ken-Ken's wife, Maria, was a gorgeous Puerto Rican woman with long straight red hair that flowed down to the small of her back. She had a light trace of hair just above her juicy lips and a beautiful black mole that sat atop them. It was the kind that women always artificially added with a black eyeliner pencil, in an effort to enhance their facial features. Maria was also naturally blessed with a body that could stop traffic. She had a pair of firm breasts that stood at attention, a butt big and wide enough to sit a drink on, a flawless caramel complexion, and long sexy legs. Dressed in a red-hot miniskirt with a matching leather jacket and six-inch stiletto pumps, she looked every bit like the hooker she was desperately trying to portray. Unbeknownst to everybody except family and friends, Maria was seven months pregnant with the couple's first child. But looking at her, one wouldn't be able to tell. HHolmes, Shannon is the author of 'Dirty Game ', published 2007 under ISBN 9780312359010 and ISBN 0312359012.