Page 22 of Fraudulent Beauty

“What’s your name?” the officer that was taking the lead asked.

“Tahli Ross.” I answered in a flat tone. I was pissed and not trying to hide it.

“Do you have identification on you?”

“Didn’t I just tell you my name?” I snapped.

For a few seconds, he glared at me like he wanted to slap the taste out of my mouth. With an evil ass smirk on his face, he reached for my purse. My heart drummed in my chest because my dumb ass still hadn’t gotten rid of the ID that I used when I got that fake ass check deposited. Stupid, stupid me.

The officer looked through my card holder and when he came across both driver’s license his eyes lit up like the sky on the fourth of July. “Well, what do we have here? Is your name Tahli Ross or Tameka Johnson? I had about five fake ID’s total. Thank God, they weren’t all on me.

I refused to say anything else. They could take me to jail because I was done talking. A sour taste infiltrated my mouth when I realized I was going to lose my job at the bank. Mack was lame as hell and in that moment, I hated him. I couldn’t be angry with him without being upset with myself, but this particular incident wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t damn near forced his bags in my hands and dipped. He was a piece of shit for that.

Inside the police car, I was so pissed and zoned out that I wasn’t paying attention to any of the little slick comments the officer was saying. I was so infuriated that tears filled my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. When it dawned on me that I might actually see Khalif at the station, I felt nauseous. At least he already knew what I was about, and he wouldn’t be shocked to see me walking in with cuffs on.

I wasn’t sure what kind of charge I was going to get for having the fake ID. My head was throbbing, and the day had quickly become one of my worst days ever. The mall cop saw Mack give me the bags. I wasn’t with him when he purchased the items with the stolen card, and I would be damned if I ate any of those charges. I would use every dime I had for a lawyer. Just because I was in possession of a fake driver’s license didn’t mean that I had ever even used it. Hell nah, I wasn’t eating this charge. I would give them Mack’s first and last name along with the bastard’s phone number if they wanted it.

When the officer arrived at the station, my gut made this embarrassing ass noise. I wasn’t hungry, so my stomach damn sure wasn’t growling. I just wanted to close my eyes, open them, and be anywhere else but where I was. I simply had to learn to make better choices. This reality check had slapped the taste from my mouth, and all I could do was learn from it. I had a sold a CPN number earlier, and I was done with that too. The cocky officer walked around and opened my door. He still had that same creepy, shit eating grin on his face.

“Let’s go.”

The way his eyes roamed over my frame made me want to vomit. He didn’t appear to be too much older than thirty-five, but his pink ass skin was making mine crawl. He looked like one of those people that had weird ass fetishes like sticking beer bottles up his ass or something. I got out of the car, and he roughly yanked my arm.

“Never seen a thief act so uppity. You could have made all of this go away by giving up some of that sweet black pussy. That’s about all y’all are good for anyway. I might even have thrown in some money, so you can stop stealing shit. But your kind is good for that too, right?”

“Fuck did you just say to her?”

Heat radiated through my body from anger and relief. At least someone else heard what the officer said to me because no one would have believed me if I reported him. I was also a little embarrassed because the one person that I didn’t want to run into was right where I didn’t want him to be.

“This doesn’t really concern you now does it?” the officer snapped.

“Ma’am, would you like to file a complaint against this officer? If so, I’ll be a witness of everything he just said to you.”

“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” the officer growled. “You are a grade A fucking ass kisser and dick sucker.”

I gasped when Khalif punched the officer in the face so hard that he let my arm go and fell back onto the police car. It felt as if I was in a dream as other officers ran out to see what the commotion was about. It was about to be a long ass day.

I sat in the police chief’s office with a scowl on my face. I knew my ass was in trouble, but I almost didn’t care. I had made it known a while ago that Davis was a racist asshole that abused his power. I was probably the only officer that complained, but others that he arrested had complained about his derogatory comments and use of excessive force. Nobody did anything however, and it pissed me the fuck off. The police chief was black, and I expected more from him. I didn’t give one fuck about being shunned by some of the other officers for ratting him out. It wasn’t going to be on my conscious if the day came when his stupid ass killed an unarmed black person or did some other fuck shit. I didn’t join the force to make friends.

“Moses,” the chief sighed and sat back in his chair. “I understand your frustrations, but you know what you did wasn’t acceptable, right? After all the training you’ve had, all the things you’ve accomplished, how do you let an asshole like Davis set you off?”

“How did I let him set me off?” I asked with a frown. “That man walks around all day every day with his chest poked out spewing bullshit. Everyone with vision and ears knows he’s as crooked as the day is long yet nothing is done. If I lost my job for hitting him that’s what it is. I don’t want to work in a place that lets people like him win.”

“Khalif, you work at a place that gathers evidence before it makes a final decision. It might seem unfair, but there is protocol. Davis was being investigated before you ever reported him. It may have taken some time, but today’s incident was the straw that broke the camel’s back. We have enough complaints from various people and enough proof to let Davis go.”

At least if I had lost my job that bastard lost his too, so I couldn’t even be too upset. I simply bobbed my head at the chief’s words.

“I want you to go home and cool off for the day. Come back tomorrow refreshed.”

The fact that I hadn’t lost my job either calmed my attitude all the way down. Standing up, I extended my hand toward the police chief for a shake. “I appreciate you.” I didn’t want favoritism from him because he was a black man. I wanted him to be fair and understand that a racist police officer was a dangerous thing. He had done what needed to be done, and I was satisfied.

The police chief shook my hand, and I made my way out of the office. I wasn’t sure if Tahli had been processed. I wasn’t even sure what her charges were, but I kept walking straight toward the door. I didn’t need anyone thinking that I only defended her because I was checking for her or knew her on a personal level. I would have intervened if I heard him say what he said to her to anybody.

I just had to trust that Tahli would be able to get herself out of this jam. I wanted to call Sheniah, but I felt that might be overstepping. I was just going to mind my business. I had calmed down since finding the fake ID in Tahli’s car. The situation that I’d just witnessed was one I wanted her to avoid. That was the reason I was so pissed. It was less about judging her and more about not wanting her to mess up her future. I knew she’d been waiting for a full-time position at the bank. Now, more than likely, she was going to lose the part-time one too. Social media loved cancelling people, so I could only hope her fanbase wouldn’t turn on her.

Tahli had been on my mind every day since our disagreement. Having full custody of Sierra had been consuming a lot of my time outside of work, but I still had enough energy left to think of Tahli a few times a day. I had even thought about reaching out to her but decided against it. Sierra had two more hours in school, so I headed home to get out of my uniform and take a shower. When I was done with my shower, I saw that I had a missed call from Nook. He’d called me twice since Sheniah’s birthday dinner, and I hadn’t answered for him. I didn’t have the brain capacity to entertain Nook’s foolishness. Walking into the kitchen to look for something to eat, I called him back.

“Got damn, I did something to you?” Nook answered the phone dramatic as hell. “You just said fuck me, huh? Tahli must have some good pussy.”