The Car Bomb (The detroit im dying Trilogy, Book 1)

by T. V. LoCicero

  Frank’s delivery upped its intensity. “We at Channel 5 have offered to help Mr. Peoples safely reach the law enforcement agency of his choice and to tell his side of the story. Again, Mr. Peoples, if you’re watching...”

  In the hot, grubby little room the mattress was now empty. Frank was still speaking from the screen in fluttery black and white.

  “...please give me a call here at the station, and I will personally meet with you at the time and place of your choosing.”

  Chapter 32

  On opposite corners of this bombed-out city intersection were a dirty, littered, sad excuse for a park and a crumbling, abandoned apartment building with the glass smashed in nearly every window of its four floors.

  Two groups of black males occupied the corners: one in their 40s and 50s in the park, lounging on broken benches or perched on crates, passing something in small paper bags; the other in their mid-teens in front of the apartment hulk, serving the drive-up trade at curbside.

  On a third corner the man who had been watching Frank so closely, now in wrap-around sunglasses, jeans and a Hank Aaron “755” t-shirt, walked to a phone booth, reached in and lifted the receiver.

  Chapter 33

  In the WTEM control room, the newscast continued. On the line monitor Mary Scott was saying, “...and in just a moment Don Allard talks to the mother of that 14-month-old girl who was killed by a stray bullet that crashed through her living room window last month.”

  With a small flourish of his left hand the director said, “And black.”

  At a console next to the director, Dennis Clark pushed a button and leaned toward a mike. “Good work guys, right on the money.” In front of Dennis a phone buzzed, and he picked it up. “Control Room.” Dennis paused and shook his head. “Ah, sir, he’s on the air right now in the middle of a newscast.”

  In the studio during the break Frank and Mary were shuffling through their scripts. Frank said, “Hey, Mare, you ever tried this Ice stuff, smokeable speed? I hear it’s great for PMS.”

  “Shove it, Frank.”

  Dennis’s amplified voice filled the studio. “Frank, a guy on the phone says he’s Anthony Peoples.”

  Dropping his script, Frank said, “Put him through.”

  Dennis: “You’ve got less than forty seconds.”

  The phone buzzed under the desk, and Frank picked it up. “Hi, this is Frank DeFauw.” He paused, pulled a pen from his suit coat, turned his script over and wrote on the back. “Okay, I’ll be there by 7:30.”

  Chapter 34

  On the street corner the man in the sunglasses still held the receiver.

  “One other thing, man. I’ll know if you’re bein’ followed. So make sure you’re not. Or the trip’ll be for nothin’.”

  When he hung up, his eye caught something scribbled with a black marker on the plastic window of the booth next to the phone.

  detroit im dyin

  only come here on a dare

  detroit im dyin

  dont you even fuckin care

  He had seen this someplace else. Spray-painted on the wall of a school off Cass Avenue. So some wanna-be poet was loose on these desperate streets, or maybe others were copying it here and there.

  Whatever, the words were lodged with an ache at the base of his stomach.

  Moving out of the booth, he swept his gaze from the enterprising youngsters on one corner to the broken down bench brigade on the other.

  Then he walked away, wondering how long he could keep hiding in plain site in this god-forsaken city.

  Chapter 35

  With maybe two hours of daylight left, the sun low and in his eyes, he slipped on his shades and drove the Viper quickly through light traffic. Checking the rear-view mirror he noted a black Taurus a block and a half back. He made two right turns. The Taurus was still back there.

  Thirteen minutes later the Viper pulled up at the covered side entrance to the Westin Hotel in the huge multi-building Renaissance Center complex on the river. As he slid out of the car, a valet guy was on him quickly.

  “Frank, how are you this evening?”

  “Hey, good. I’ll be awhile.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  Heading for the entrance, he glanced about 40 yards up the street and found the Taurus stopped at the curb.

  Once inside he kept the shades in place and walked with pace through the lobby past a huge floral arrangement on a marble-topped table. As ususal it was quiet in this cavernous place, and drawing none of the usual greetings and stares, he turned down a circular corridor lined with a few shops and eating places and, moving quickly now, headed for another, larger lobby off an entrance on another side of the complex.

  When he emerged from the riverside entrance, he promptly flagged a passing cab. Sitting low in the backseat, he slipped a furtive look at the empty entrance as the taxi pulled away, and the cabbie asked where to.

  Chapter 36

  The sun was still up in the west over the city. From this roof-top corner of a three-story building, there was a clear view of both streets converging to form an intersection below. Little or no traffic moved in this mostly abandoned industrial area. Finally a taxi was headed this way, moving up one of the streets that fronted this building. A car followed the cab but then turned off on a cross street.

  From inside the cab Frank took a close look at what used to be a small factory. From the rotting plywood covering the windows and the crumbling masonry, it appeared nothing had been produced here in many years. The cabbie stopped in front and said, “You sure you got the right address?”

  Frank got out. “Just keep it running, buddy, and wait here.”

  From the rooftop corner, the black man in the wrap-arounds watched Frank stand next to the cab, glance up and down the empty street and move to the entrance.

  To Frank’s surprise the battered old door opened easily. The hallway inside was dark and decrepit and filled with a stench so bad he could hardly breathe. Maybe dead animals, he thought. Moving cautiously through, he found a stairwell and headed up. A grimy window on a landing above provided just enough light for him to see the dirty, littered steps. As he climbed he began to feel it in his knees and resolved to get back to the Stairmaster.

  At the top of the last flight, he pushed on a door, and it creaked open only with considerable effort. Stepping out into the light on a flat, tarred roof full of cracks and holes, he found no one in sight.

  Then from behind the door, a black man appeared and removed his wrap-arounds.

  “Didn’t think you’d come.”

  Frank turned to face him, and the two stared at each other.

  “You don’t look much like your mug shot, but Mr. Peoples, I presume.”

  “I’m not lookin’ like my driver’s license neither.” He held his license next to his face. “But yeah, that’s me.”

  Frank looked closely first at the license and then at the face, now covered with a heavy beard and framed with budding dreadlocks. “Okay, yeah, so you’re Anthony.”

  “Were you followed?”

  “Yeah, but I lost ‘em. Why would I be followed?”

  “You don’t know these people.”

  “What people?”

  “People blew up my family.”

  Frank shook his head. “I can’t imagine how you’re dealing with that, Anthony. So who did it and why?”

  Anthony Peoples gazed hard at Frank before answering. “Look, you gotta understand some things first.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  “The first thing is I had nothin’ to do with that robbery at the party store and shootin’ that security guard.”

  “Right.”

  “No, this is for real, man. I’m in there that night to buy some beer, and this guy that did the deal walks in. There’s just this one Arab girl behind the counter, and she knew me from the neighborhood. The guy pulls a gun, she gets all scared and confused. And when the shootin’ started with the guard, I hit the floor, then split and just run home. She tells the c
ops I was with the guy. And the guy, tryin’ to get hisself a plea deal, says, yeah, I was the look out.”

  “But you’re saying you had nothing to do with it at all.”

  “Swear to God, man.”

  “Okay. So what’s this about your cousin being ‘Pretty Rick’?"

  "Rick was my cousin. I grew up with him. But the last five, six years I had nothin’ to do with him. Still, when I got charged, he went the bail and hired me his attorney. Big time guy named Dworkin.”

  “Sam.”

  “Yeah, so he says he can get my case to this judge, and he’ll toss it if I give him fifty grand.”

  “Judge Billy O’Bryan?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “I looked it up. But, hold on, you had fifty grand?”

  “No, man, not even close.”

  “So why the hell would they think you could come up with it?”

  The black man shrugged. “Probably figured I could get it easy from Rick.”

  Frank shook his head. “I have to tell you, Anthony, this is not making a hell of lot of sense.”

  “It’s the truth, man.”

  “Okay, so what happened next?”

  “So next I went to Gant.”

  Frank was incredulous. “Prentis Gant, the prosecutor?”

  “Yeah, my wife Nita said, ‘You are nothin’ but innocent. You go to the prosecutor and tell him about this. And so I did.”

  “And Gant said what?”

  “And Gant says he’s been tryin’ to get something on these guys for a long time. So we end up gettin’ it all on video tape with Dworkin and the judge.”

  “Wait, wait, so you got a pay-off with these guys on tape?”

  “Yeah, but before Gant could do anything, they found out about it. Must be somebody in his office. And they squeezed Gant to drop it.”

  “Squeezed how?”

  “I don’t know, but Gant’s wife is Mexican. Half her family’s here, maybe illegally.”

  Frank nodded and stared off for a few seconds before saying, “Okay, so what about the bomb?”

  “So Gant called me before it happened. He said it’d be good to get my family out of town. Said I had to meet with him that night and to bring the tape.”

  “You had the tape?”

  “Copy of it, yeah. That was the deal I had with Gant. I thought havin’ a copy of the tape would be protection. But I was gettin’ that tape when the car blew up. Nita, she didn’t know nothin’ about this. Gant said I couldn’t tell nobody about it, even my wife, so I didn’t want her seein’ me get the tape. So I said take the kids out and start the car.”

  “So then you were at the house when it happened. The police have been saying you weren’t.”

  “No, they don’t know. I was there, in the basement. I didn’t see it happen, but I heard it.” He paused for a moment. “And by the time I go upstairs and look, it was so far bad, I knew they were all of them gone.” He stopped and stared at the sun heading down.

  Frank said nothing.

  “Jesus, I didn’t know what to do, so I just split, down the alley and out of the hood, and nobody even seen me with all the cops and ambulances coming and the sirens goin’.”

  He looked back at Frank. “But I mean, Nita and the babies, they wasn’t even supposed to be in town. Supposed to be in Chicago, but our van had to go in the shop.”

  Frank shook his head again and finally asked, “So you still have the tape?”

  “Not with me, no, but, yeah, I got it.”

  “Why did you call me, Anthony?”

  “‘Cause I don’t trust any cops, even the feds, ‘til this whole thing is public.”

  “So why trust me?”

  “I don’t really know, man. I really don’t. Specially when I read about you and the judge being’ pals in the newspaper.”

  “You’re reading a guy that hates me. And besides, if the judge is dirty, no friendship’s gonna save him.”

  “Yeah, well, anyway, there’s no one else left for me. And I’m not figurin’ to just disappear. They’re gonna pay for what they done.”

  Frank looked at him for a long time, studying the saddest eyes he’d ever seen. Finally, he put out his hand, and Anthony shook it. And then Frank surprised himself, grabbing the man and giving him a hug.

  When he looked into those eyes again, he said, “I’ll have to do some checking, Anthony. But the next time I see you, I’ll need that tape.”

  Peoples nodded. “My life, man, what’s left of it, it’s in your hands.”

  Chapter 37

  At 9:30 it was quiet in the night-side newsroom. Francine was working at one computer and reporter Don Allard at another. Frank walked in with energy and purpose.

  “Francine, can you get me Prentis Gant’s home address.”

  “Right away, Frank.”

  Frank moved past Allard. “How you doing, Don?”

  “Good, Frank. You see Barnes’ column?”

  “Tonight?”

  “Yeah, another blind item. I don’t know how he gets away with that shit. If we did anything like that, they’d run us out of town.”

  Frank scooped up a copy of the Freep as he walked past a desk. “You got that right.”

  Francine remembered something and turned away from her computer. “Frank, Alice left word. She wants to see you. I think Jack’s with her.”

  He stopped abruptly. “At this hour?”

  “Yes, she said as soon as you came in.”

  Chapter 38

  Reading the paper folded over, Frank was walking down a long hallway. He stopped, finished what he was reading, then shook his head in disgust and walked again.

  In the VP-GM’s suite the secretary’s desk was buttoned up. Frank entered and moved through to stand in the doorway to Alice Whitney’s office. Alice was at her desk, and with his pipe clamped in his mouth, Jack Johanson occupied a chair. Between them on the desk was the same paper Frank had been reading.

  He walked in. “So, burning the midnight oil.”

  Alice looked up. “How are you, Frank?”

  ”I’m fine, Alice, and you?” He moved to another chair in front of the desk, ignoring Johanson. “Why so late?”

  “I was catching up. These quarterly reports always put me behind. And Jack and I were talking about Barnes.”

  Frank nodded. “Ah, Jack’s favorite journalist.”

  The news director looked at the ceiling and said, “You’re my favorite journalist, Frank.”

  Frank promptly dropped his cool. “Oh, horseshit, Jack. I can’t remember the last time you gave a newspaper guy an interview. You must think Barnes is something so special that you...”

  Alice intervened. “Frank, I asked Jack to see Barnes.”

  Frank’s head shook with disgust. “When are you guys ever gonna learn he’s a snake? He’ll take all your schmoozing and then turn around and bite you in the ass. Or rather, bite me in the ass. He’s a fuckin’ snake.”

  Alice stared him firmly in the eye. “He may be a snake, Frank, but he writes this town’s most widely read column every other day. He can bite you in the ass whenever he feels like it. What’s the old line, ‘Never get, into a pissing match with an elephant?’"

  “With a skunk” laughed Frank. “‘Never get into a pissing match with a skunk.’ I love it when you gals try to be one of the boys.”

  Alice bowed her head briefly with annoyance. “Look, Frank, Jack and I’ve been talking, and we think it might be a good idea if you took some time off.”

  “What?” For the second time this night Frank was shocked.

  Alice knew she’d finally got his attention. “You seem to be under a lot of pressure lately, Frank. And the fact is you’ve been through a lot in the past year. Take some time off. Get things patched up at home. Stay out of the spotlight for a while and get your life together.”

  He stared at her dumbfounded as Alice sailed on. “The fact is you seem to be drinking more than you should again. And lately it seems to be affecting your work. You�
�re not as sharp. And frankly, your judgment seems to be lacking, especially in public situations that are bound to find their way into print with Wil Barnes in this town.”

  He felt himself getting mobilized. “I can’t believe this. Is this all because of a stupid little three-line item in Barnes’ column tonight?” Picking up the folded-over newspaper he’d been holding, he read:

  “‘Which local media prince is battling booze and the blues with both his wife and his long-time mistress? Friends say both women have had it with him and want a divorce.’”

  He looked up at Alice. “Christ, most people won’t even know who he’s talking about.”

  She shook her head. “Give your audience more credit than that, Frank.”

  Johanson said, “Look, Frank, Barnes says there’s a lot more where that came from. He says he has a date with Sherie to spill her guts about you and booze and drugs and other women.”

  For the first time Frank felt a stab of something close to fear. “Barnes is a fucking liar!”

  “I’m sure he is,” said Johanson. “But apparently he’s working on a major spread that names names and could appear as early as Sunday. That’s what I was doing with him today, Frank—damage control, giving him quote after quote about what a remarkable journalist you are. All of which I believe, by the way.”

  Alice tried a woman’s touch. “Look, Frank, we’re on your side. All we’re concerned about is you and your family. And we really think you should take some time off.”

  Staring down at the paper in his lap, Frank seemed beaten. But when he looked up, there was a powerful appeal in his eyes. “Alice, I’m working on what could be the biggest expose we’ve ever done here. Bigger than that thing with the mayor’s family a few years ago. And the one thing I need right now is air time. Don’t take me off.”

  She glanced at Johanson, who looked more than a little dubious. “What’s the story, Frank?”