In the Night of the Heat

by Blair Underwood

  My father flinched when I said that P-word in front of Chela, but it had the desired effect: Brandon laughed again. “Got that right, bruh.”

  Even Carlyle’s cheeks pooched a little. Just a little. Maybe enough.

  Chela brought Carlyle’s coffee first, walking with a self-confident sway across the room. I braced for Carlyle to throw the hot liquid in my face. Instead, he sipped.

  “Is it okay?” Chela hovered, the perfect hostess. She ventured a quick gaze at me, and I gave her a grateful smile. Good girl. Chela probably would have put Drano in their coffee if Lee hadn’t been watching her.

  Carlyle nodded, his eyes never blinking away from mine. “You believe that horseshit on TV?” he said. “T.D. Jackson’s a bitch who’s gonna shoot himself?”

  “Shit, hell no,” I said. “LAPD can go fuck themselves.” Another nod from the boyz. I was making up a little ground.

  Careful. Careful. Maybe everybody lives through this.

  While I spoke, Chela hurried away, bringing Brandon’s coffee next.

  I took a chance and went on: “That’s why I told Mel I’m not gonna rest until I find the asshole who did this. Just like with Afrodite. And when I do, I’ll call you guys first. No cops.”

  Brandon grunted. He liked that idea. A lot.

  But Carlyle didn’t look impressed. “Big talk after the man’s dead. He begged you. We were all sitting around talking about it—we’ve never seen T.D. beg nobody like that. And then Alma tells me you came to my house talking shit.” Brandon and Lee made disapproving sounds, remembering their anger. Carlyle wasn’t going to give me a way out.

  “It’s not like that, Carlyle,” I said, trying anyway. “Who am I to talk shit about T.D. Jackson? He was a legend. I know how hard T.D. worked his whole life to make his dad proud.”

  “Goddamned right about that,” Lee said.

  “And I get why you guys are pissed off,” I went on. “You and T.D. were more than friends. You were brothers, like you said. Heat.”

  Brandon held up two fingers. “Two generations. Heat looks out for Heat. Always.”

  The three of them stirred. I had touched a nerve; I just needed to work it in my favor. “We will find the motherfucker who did this,” I said, trying to rally them to my side.

  “You talk a whole lot of shit, Hardwick,” Carlyle said. “So what you got, then? You know so much. Who did it?”

  I hesitated, recognizing a trap. If I announced to T.D.’s killer—or killers—that I had found evidence, I might as well pull the trigger myself. The entire visit could have been designed to find out what I’d learned.

  I’ll never know what I would have said. There was no more polite conversation.

  As Chela walked past Lee back toward the kitchen, he reached over and gently slapped her on the ass, grinning at her as he made his play. It was more of a tap; the kind of casual contact countless barmaids and waitresses have endured through the ages. But this was Chela—and for all he knew, she was my daughter. That brother must have lost his damn mind. The sound of his palm snapping against her bare flesh rattled the room like an explosion. My eyes filmed over red. There was no real way out. Not now.

  I laughed, and I almost believed it myself.

  “Let me help you with that,” I said to Chela, stepping toward her, a smile on my face, hands open, my best gee-I’m-such-a-harmless-beta voice in play.

  I took one step, and then I crouched and shot a heel thrust kick into Lee’s knee. Muscle is one thing, tendons and ligaments are another. Force equals mass times acceleration. Pressure equals force divided by surface area. Dropping my 190 pounds as I slid toward him focused enough force into the ten square inches of the side of my right foot that I could have hurt someone twice his size.

  He buckled, losing balance, and I went in, spun him, and yanked the gun out of his waistband as I did. My left arm snaked around his throat, left fingers worming around the muscle to clamp onto his windpipe. If he twitched, I was going to dislocate it and let him strangle on his own blood, I swear to God. Brandon was on me in an instant, but I ducked his swing and smashed the butt into his nose. It burst like a tomato, splattering blood across his face and dropping him to his knees.

  I had the hammer back, the gun aimed squarely in the center of Carlyle’s face. Game, set, match. Damn, I’m good.

  Then I looked at Carlyle’s face. It bore a certain grudging respect, but no fear at all. That didn’t make sense, unless…

  Oh, shit. I shifted my gaze to the gun, a J-frame .38 Smith and Wesson revolver. I’ve held them before. A snag-proof titanium “pocket” revolver that only weighs 10.8. Unloaded. One of the lightest self-defense weapons with any stopping power, and I could feel that it didn’t weigh over eleven ounces. I glanced at the cylinder.

  “No bullets, asshole,” Carlyle hissed. “This was going to be a friendly little talk.”

  A bluff. The gun had been a bluff.

  Brandon rolled away from me. I still had Lee in a controlled choke, but that might not be enough leverage on his buddies. Dammit, I had just raised the stakes, and revealed my capabilities. They were going to regroup, and this time, they wouldn’t underestimate me.

  I heard a commotion from Dad’s wheelchair, and I prayed he had a plan. As fast as he could move in that thing, maybe he could make it to the door!

  “My turn,” Carlyle said.

  I was calculating moves and odds when a man’s voice roared: “Step back! DO IT!”

  Someone must have called the police, I thought. Damn, they were fast, too.

  No police. Dad sat in his wheelchair, leveling his massive .44 at Carlyle with two hands. Susie, he called his gun. I hadn’t seen Susie in a long time, and it had been longer since Dad had held her. Susie was shaking so badly in his hands, I wanted to duck, too.

  “Hey, hey…” Carlyle said, alarmed, arms raised. “Don’t hurt yourself, old man.”

  “This one…ain’t empty,” Dad said, breathing hard.

  Guns are the ultimate equalizer. Dad looked like a frail husk in that wheelchair, but the dynamic in the room had shifted. With the unsteady barrel staring them down, Carlyle, Brandon, and Lee were checkmated. I didn’t ask for Dad to give me his gun for my steadier hand, and I didn’t run upstairs for my Glock. Dad had it handled.

  “Thirty years on the force,” I said. “His hand’s shaking, and he’s been in a bad mood since his stroke—you do not want to piss him off. So here’s what’s gonna happen: Ya’ll are about to get the fuck out of my house. But first, we’re gonna finish the conversation you started.”

  “Fuckheads!” Chela chimed in, tugging her T-shirt down to hide her upper thighs. Her face was red with embarrassment and rage.

  I had an opportunity. After all, I had been looking for Carlyle Simms for days, and here he was. But I couldn’t have him arrested for murder. It was all hearsay, and I couldn’t betray Jeanine. Would the police even book him, given their humiliating inability to convict T.D? No. I couldn’t let him know what I knew. I was going to nail this bastard, but I had to find the right way to do it.

  “Chela?” I said gently. “Go upstairs, hon. Lock yourself up somewhere safe. Have a phone ready to call the cops if anything smells wrong.”

  Without a glance back, Chela scampered away, still pulling her shirt down.

  “I’m gonna remember this,” Carlyle Simms promised me.

  “You’d be a fool to forget it,” I said. I gave Lee’s throat a final tweak and push-kicked him sprawling onto his face. That felt good. I walked behind Dad’s wheelchair; I had sense enough not to interfere with his line of fire. “Now try to remember where you’ve been this week.”

  “None of your damn business,” Carlyle said.

  “Talk,” Dad said in his old voice, the one I remembered. His gun stayed on Carlyle.

  Carlyle held up his arm to shield his face. “Watch it, old-school. Shit. All right—we were over at the Bel-Air. That’s where we got a suite after T.D. won his Heisman. Memories, that’s all. Check the desk. I use
the name Dorsey Thomas. We needed some time.”

  Or they were hiding from someone, I thought. Dorsey Thomas was T.D.’s first and middle names, transposed. If any of them had killed T.D., booking their room under his name had been stupid, unless they were trying to get caught.

  “You asked me who killed T.D.? I don’t know yet,” I said. “But you can bet your ass it’s payback for Chantelle.”

  Carlyle blinked twice, which looked to me like Morse code for I helped T.D. kill her. And then I killed T.D. to cover my ass. Just maybe.

  “You know a Ronald or Roland who works for Donald Hankins?” I asked them. “Big guy? Name starts with an R?”

  It’s not often that a black man’s face goes chalky, but Carlyle’s did. Lee and Brandon only shrugged, but the name meant something to Carlyle.

  “Naw,” Carlyle said, although he wasn’t the liar T.D. Jackson had been. I didn’t know whether or not he’d killed T.D, but I had something on him.

  “Well, watch out for him, bruh,” I told Carlyle. “I hear he makes problems go away.”

  Brandon levered himself up from the floor, eyes blazing and blood drooling between the fingers he held to his face. But none of the men spoke again, transfixed by the wobbly gun in Dad’s hands. Lee raised a pillow from my sofa to his abdomen, his shield from an errant bullet.

  My father’s breathing had quickened, so I decided to relieve him. I nodded toward the door. “Go on,” I told T.D.’s friends. “Get out. One at a time. Slow. And call Mel to give her some support, you selfish bastards.”

  I pushed Dad’s wheelchair while Dad kept his gun trained on the retreating men. I noticed that the gun was shaking a lot less now that their backs were turned—Dad had been playing possum from start to finish.

  Once my intruders were outside, I triple-locked the front door. Through the peephole, I watched them climb into a black SUV. A Jeep Cherokee. Carlyle started the engine.

  I grinned back at Dad. “When did you get Susie?” I asked him.

  Dad flashed me a smile I hadn’t seen from him in too long to remember. He still had his own teeth; they looked just like mine, a mirror. “When Chela said…Carlyle’s name.”

  Damn, he was fast in that chair! Dad had made it to his room to fetch Susie as soon as they showed up at the door. “You had it the whole time? Why’d you wait so long?”

  “Wanted to see…what you were gon’ do.”

  I stared. Then I laughed ruefully. “And?”

  “Seen worse,” Dad laughed, and his laughs were even rarer. Then, Dad’s smile faded as concern shadowed his face. “Didn’t see…the other…gun, though.”

  “That’s why there’s two of us.”

  And we were both grinning again. Strange as it sounds, it felt like Dad and I had just met each other and thought maybe we wouldn’t mind hanging out. I heard the roar of Carlyle’s SUV outside. Through the peephole, I watched him drive away.

  I secured the other doors before I went upstairs to find Chela. She was in her room, and she had finally dressed, wearing baggy black jeans to match her T-shirt. I chafed at the memory of how Lee had touched her, but Chela wouldn’t let me fuss over her, brushing me away.

  “Ten, what the fuck? Tell me what the hell’s going on, so I won’t get you killed.”

  So, I told her. Some of it, anyway. Enough to keep us safe in case of unexpected visitors. Then I went to my bathroom and splashed my face with cold water. My hands shook so hard I had to grip the edge of the basin, staring into the mirror at eyes filled with uneasy knowledge. That had been close. Too damned close. If I was going to walk this road, I had to be more careful in the future.

  An hour after Carlyle left, I got a text message from Melanie: C CALLED. DON’T KNOW WHAT U DID, BUT THANKS. I was glad to have done something for her, and even happier that I could skip T.D. Jackson’s funeral. I wanted to spend the weekend with my own family.

  Breakfast hadn’t gone so well, so we made different plans for lunch. For the first time since Dad had moved in with us, we all ate out.

  EIGHTEEN

  MONDAY, OCTOBER 27

  Monday morning, Dad surprised me. After Chela left for school, he told me he’d asked Marcela not to come in until the afternoon. He sat with a small black satchel in his lap that he’d always used as a briefcase, his father’s medical bag from the 1930s. Dad was shaved and dressed in a formal light blue shirt, black sweater vest, and slacks, as if he were ready for church.

  “What’s the occasion?” I said.

  “You…working…today?”

  I was planning to drive to Pomona to talk to Miguel Salvador, T.D.’s brother-in-law, and then to Ojai to find Randolph Dwyer, the high school football coach who played with Donald Hankins and Judge Jackson in the 1960s. Both were more obscure leads, but I had already burned too much energy on Carlyle. I had to make sure I wasn’t overlooking anything.

  “Why?” I asked him.

  He shrugged. “Thought I’d…ride, too,” he said. “Fresh air.”

  Saturday had been a milestone for us, but I groaned inside. It was hard enough to drive to interviews between Los Angeles and Ventura Counties on a weekday, but Dad would need tending, and I wanted to be focused on T.D. Jackson. Even finding food suitable for Dad would be a hassle. No In-N-Out Burger for him. His heart couldn’t handle the grease.

  “Been a long time since I needed a babysitter, Dad.”

  “More like…a…partner,” he said, eyes gleaming. “Homicide cops…travel in pairs.”

  Call me dense, but that was the first time I got it: After our encounter with Carlyle Simms, Dad wanted to help with the case. Wheelchair or not, he was feeling more alive than he had in years.

  “You bringing Susie?” I said, smiling. He still had his concealed weapons permit.

  He patted his satchel. “Maybe.”

  Outside, I helped Dad into my car’s low bucket seats and folded his wheelchair into my trunk like it was an everyday thing, and Dad paid me no mind. We were finally both learning how to accept life for what it was, not what we wanted it to be.

  I started the car. “Driver is deejay,” I said. The rule April and I had lived by.

  “Just no…rap.”

  So much for Snoop’s Doggy Style, which had been in my CD player for a week; it never gets old, and I could hear it fine with one ear. But KJLH 102.3 worked for us, too, between Al Green, Alicia Keys, and Stevie Wonder. I wished it was a Thursday, when Stevie was in the studio for the morning show—I’ve met him, and he’s as gracious as they come.

  Driving with Dad was the best I’d felt since April had left, like taking an unexpected vacation. I wished we had thought of it sooner.

  The traffic gods were merciful, so it took us less than an hour to drive the forty-five miles to Pomona, almost a straight shot on the 210, with peaceful views of the San Gabriel Mountains. Southern California’s mountain ranges can’t touch the lush green of the Pacific Northwest and its constant infusion of rainfall, but I saw plenty of green peeking through. Much of Pomona itself is less scenic than the drive, but there is evidence of past splendor within the crush of strip malls. We found Salvador’s restaurant easily on the corner, with a giant revolving chicken on the roof to aid us. I had called Friday, and an unwitting teenager had told me that the best time to find Salvador was in the morning.

  I could smell a flock of chickens roasting even from the parking lot.

  “Coming in?” I asked Dad.

  “What you…think?” He picked up his black satchel.

  The handicapped ramp looked about ten years newer than the rest of the building—thank goodness for access laws—and I pushed Dad inside with ease. Los Angeles Country’s health department grades its restaurants, and the letter on the door was a “B,” not an “A.” Personally, I never eat anywhere that isn’t ranked at the top of the class. No takeout for me that day.

  Miguel Salvador was tending a dozen spits of roasting chickens near the register. He was wiry and about forty, with a shaved head to hide his balding scalp. He
looked tired and pissed off, but when I told him why we were there, he broke into a grin.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he said, shaking my hand as if I were personally responsible for T.D.’s death. He took off his gloves and walked around the counter to shake Dad’s hand, too, a rare gesture. Most people treat people in wheelchairs as if they’re invisible.

  “This is really something, right? The guy’s finally dead. Shot himself. Fucking puta. Sorry I’m cussing so bad, abuelo, forgive me, but I’ve prayed for this day.” As proof, he pointed out a large shrine behind his counter; a collage of photos of his brother, who looked nothing like him, and a colorful glass-encased novena candle honoring San Miguel. His brother looked boyish and vigorous, and Miguel looked careworn. His brother’s death was never far from Miguel Salvador’s thoughts. That’s the tyranny of murder; it deepens the loss.

  “Come on, have a seat. I served lunch free to everyone last Monday. If I didn’t need the money, I would have shut down this place all last week. I told my kids, ‘From now on, we will always honor this moment in time—the day T.D. Jackson finally did the right thing.’”

  I wasn’t sure a family ritual celebrating a man’s suicide was healthy for kids, but Salvador definitely hadn’t changed since his police interview. No wonder the detectives had noted how he was grinning from ear to ear. I didn’t have to ask Salvador any questions. After bringing us complimentary glasses of iced tea, he did most of the talking.

  “You know the truth, hombre? I wish I’d had the balls. When I wrote that letter to T.D., yeah, I was stupid to mail it, but I meant every word. You beat a man to death like a dog when his hands are tied behind his back?” He paused to thrust his hands behind him and crouch, imitating his brother’s death pose. “You shoot a woman in the head? Be a man, I said. Come see me and be a man. But I have a cousin doing fifteen in Chino, and it’s not for me. He kept telling me, ‘Don’t do it, man. Don’t end up like me.’