by Mike Lawson
Marcus directed DeMarco to a bar two blocks off King Street, a place more run-down than those on the main boulevard. It was only ten in the morning, but several black men sat at the bar drinking beer and bourbon, smoking, staring glassy-eyed at the television set above the bar. Playing on TV was a Martha Stewart rerun, Martha giving clever homemaker tips on Thanksgiving table settings. DeMarco didn’t know why the set was tuned to that particular channel but he suspected the television could have been showing Redskins cheerleaders, naked and mud wrestling, and the men at the bar would have had the same dull expressions on their faces.
Marcus and DeMarco took seats at a table as far away from the bar as they could get, and the bartender immediately walked over to take their order. The bartender was at least six-nine, and had the lanky, easy stride of an ex–basketball player.
“Sorry to hear about your brother, man,” he said to Marcus.
Marcus nodded and said, “Give me a black jack on the rocks, Tommy.”
The bartender arched an eyebrow in surprise. Apparently Marcus Perry wasn’t normally one of his booze-for-brunch clients.
“You got it,” he said. Looking down at DeMarco from his great height, the bartender said gruffly, “And what do you want?”
“Coffee, please,” DeMarco said.
“Don’t have no coffee.”
DeMarco looked pointedly over at the full pot in the Mr. Coffee behind the bar.
Marcus said, “It’s all right, Tommy. Bring him some coffee.”
Marcus pulled back the hood of his jacket and took off his sunglasses, giving DeMarco the first good look at his face. His hair was cut in a lopsided flattop, very close on the sides, and he had a small diamond stud in his left earlobe. His skin was a dark chocolate-brown, his nose broad with flaring nostrils, his jaw strong and jutting. Heavy eyebrows and deep-set eyes made him look menacing.
The bartender returned with Marcus’s whiskey and DeMarco’s coffee. He slammed the coffee cup down on the table in front of DeMarco, spilling half the liquid from the cup.
DeMarco waited until the bartender left, then said, “Mr. Perry, my name’s Joseph DeMarco. And I’m not a cop. I’m a lawyer.”
“You said you was a fed.”
“I am. I work for the government, for Congress, but I’m a lawyer.”
“Aw, now I get it, you piece o’ shit, you think you can sue somebody and make yourself some money.”
DeMarco shook his head. “I’m not suing anybody. I’m not that kind of lawyer.”
“Then why do you give a shit what happened to my brother? This some kinda political thing? You trying to cause that senator some kind of problem.”
DeMarco hesitated. He couldn’t tell Marcus he was investigating his brother’s death because Mahoney had told him to, so instead he gave the most honest answer that he could think of: “This isn’t about politics. It’s about finding out what really happened and why. I’ve talked to the police about what your brother supposedly did, and there’re just some things that don’t make sense.”
His voice heavy with sarcasm, Marcus said, “What! You don’t believe my brother, armed robber, biggest bad-ass in town, didn’t shoot that old lady? Hell, everybody knows that wild nigger did it.”
DeMarco didn’t say anything. Words wouldn’t penetrate the shield of Marcus’s distrust.
Marcus eventually broke the silence, saying, “I don’t know what you’re playin’ at, Jack, but m’little bro didn’t kill nobody. I don’t give a shit what that senator says.”
Marcus Perry was a very tough young man with a shell around him as hard as armored plate, but it suddenly dawned on DeMarco that he was grieving for his brother. He was ashamed to admit it, but he realized that if Marcus had been a white college kid instead of a black gangster, it would have occurred to him earlier that the man was feeling the same sorrow anyone would feel at the loss of a cherished younger brother. No wonder Marcus Perry and his friends didn’t trust people like him.
“Talk to me about your brother,” DeMarco said softly. “Please.”
Marcus just sat there giving DeMarco a flat, streetwise stare. He was convinced that there had to be some self-serving reason for DeMarco’s being there.
“You need to trust me,” DeMarco said. “I’m probably the only white man in Washington that doesn’t think your brother’s a cold-blooded killer. But if you don’t talk to me, no one’s ever going to know the truth.”
Marcus continued to stare at DeMarco for another minute, then said, “Okay. I think you’re bullshittin’ me, but I’ll tell you anyway.” He took a sip of his drink, then pulled a deep breath in through his nose and began to talk.
“Isaiah never did a damn thing wrong, his whole life. He worked at that dumb-ass janitor job, and he did it while he was still goin’ to school. He wasn’t no drop-out like me, and he was gettin’ goddamn straight A’s too. You think I’m lyin’, you ask the school. He was goin’ to college next year, said he was gonna be an engineer. And he woulda done it too.” Shaking his head, he added, “This thing’s killin’ my mother.”
Tears started to glaze Marcus’s angry dark eyes, but he quickly looked away and lit a cigarette to give himself time to regain his composure. DeMarco was thinking that Marcus Perry probably hadn’t cried since he wore diapers.
“What about the armed-robbery conviction?” DeMarco asked.
“Total bullshit. I’m the one who robbed that store. Isaiah and me comin’ home from school one day—he only fourteen, I’m sixteen, and I’m high—and we go in this damn bodega. Isaiah was just lookin’ at the comic books or some such shit, and I go up to the old spic behind the counter and flash my nine. On the way out I tell Isaiah, come on. He didn’t even know I’d ripped the place off. I told the cops that when they arrested us, but they didn’t believe me. They know you got two niggers in a store, they both robbers.”
DeMarco was surprised to hear that Marcus was only two years older than his brother. But he was old beyond his years, no more a kid than DeMarco.
“Did Isaiah have any other scrapes with the law?”
“Are you fuckin’ deaf? I just told you, he was a good kid. He never did nothin’.”
Trying to keep his tone neutral, DeMarco said, “Mr. Perry, according to the police your brother tried to steal a calculator from the senator’s office, and the senator caught him. The police think your brother tried to kill the senator to keep him from reporting the attempted theft.”
“That’s horseshit!”
The customers at the bar glanced over at Marcus when he shouted. The bartender said, “He givin’ you a problem, man?”
Marcus shook his head at the bartender, and said to DeMarco, “Isaiah wouldn’t steal shit, ’specially some fuckin’ calc-lator. Hell, he already had a calc-lator. Had one with a jillion damn buttons on it that did graphs and shit. So why would he steal one from that man’s office?”
It was the same question DeMarco had asked Drummond. “The police think that he planned to hock it,” DeMarco said.
Marcus started to spit, then realizing where he was, he said, “How much money you think you get hockin’ a fuckin’ calc-lator? I’m tellin’ you that story’s bullshit.”
“It may be, but can you explain what your brother was doing in the senator’s house that night?”
Marcus hesitated. Whatever he had to say next, DeMarco could sense he was reluctant to say it. DeMarco had to get him to talk.
“Mr. Perry, do you want your brother to go to his grave with people believing he was a thief and a killer? So please. Talk to me. Tell me why he was at the senator’s house?”
To give himself time to think, Marcus took another sip of his drink, wincing as the liquid seared his throat. Finally he looked directly into DeMarco’s eyes, and said very quietly, “He was sellin’ him a gun.”
“What!”
Marcus exploded. “Fuck you, you motherfucker! I knew you wouldn’t believe me.”
Marcus rose to his feet. “Wait a minute,” DeMarco said. “I’m
not saying I don’t believe you. I was just shocked, that’s all. Sit back down. Tell me what you’re talking about.”
Marcus sat down slowly, still bristling, but continued with his story.
“One night Isaiah’s cleanin’ up this office and this dude—not the senator—some other guy—starts talkin’ to him, askin’ Isaiah if he can get him a piece.”
DeMarco interrupted to ask when this had occurred. Marcus said it was three days before his brother died, while Lydia Morelli was at Father Martin’s. When DeMarco asked if he knew the name of the man who had talked to his brother, Marcus said he didn’t know, only that Isaiah had called him a “kinky-haired little white dude.”
Abe Burrows.
According to Marcus, Burrows had explained to Isaiah that because of the stance his boss had taken on gun control, he couldn’t just walk into a store and buy a gun. The media might find out. But he wanted one for home protection, and figured Isaiah could help him out.
“Isaiah said the dude was cool about it at first, shuckin’ and jivin’ with him, but when Isaiah says he can’t help him, he turns mean. Says just maybe somethin’ gets stolen from his office, people gonna think Isaiah the nigger janitor done it—him havin’ a record and everything.”
“He knew your brother had a record?”
“Yeah. Thought juvie records was sealed, but this guy works for a senator. Could probably find out anything. Anyway, the little prick squeezed Isaiah. Squeezed him hard. Lets him know that if he don’t get him a gun, he ain’t gonna have the privilege of moppin’ all those white men’s floors.”
Marcus glared at DeMarco as if he had invented bigotry.
“But my brother, he didn’t want to lose that job, so he came to me for help, asked me to get the gun for him. Isaiah said it had to be a .22 or .25, nothin’ bigger. The guy insisted on that. Gun I got for him was a piece of shit, but I figured anybody wanna pussy gun like that wouldn’t know the difference.”
“But why did he go to Senator Morelli’s house?”
“Didn’t know it was the senator’s house. It was where the dude told him to go. Gave him the address, said to bring the gun after midnight, and come alone. I didn’t think nothin’ about that. Just figured the guy didn’t want his neighbors to see Isaiah.”
Marcus started to say something else, but he didn’t. He shook his head sadly, lit another cigarette, and said, “And that’s it. Next mornin’ the police tell m’mom that Isaiah’d been killed—but I knew he’d been set up, somehow. He didn’t kill that white woman and shoot that senator.”
“Did you tell the police about your brother delivering a gun to the senator’s house?”
Marcus barked a harsh laugh. “Yeah, right. Fuckin’ cops ain’t gonna believe anything I say.”
DeMarco remained silent, trying to decide what to say next. He didn’t want to call Marcus a liar, but he had his own doubts about the gun story.
“You don’t believe me either,” Marcus said, as if reading DeMarco’s mind.
Before DeMarco could respond, Marcus said, “Fuck you, you dago piece of shit. Get outta here. Go on.”
“Look, Mr. Perry—”
“I said get the fuck on outta here!”
Chapter 32
Sharon was packing, humming to herself, happy as a damn lark. If she only knew, Garret Darcy thought.
Charlie Eklund had told Darcy that he wanted him to take a little vacation. A little bonus, the sly bastard had said. He’d even given him an extra five grand so Darcy and the missus would be able to do it up right.
It was all bullshit. Charlie boy was putting him on ice. He wanted him out of D.C. and not someplace where somebody could find him easily.
After Ladybird had entered that drunk tank in Maryland, Eklund had jerked Toby and Phil and him all over the place. One day he’d be following Big Bird and the next he’d be tailing DeMarco and sometimes that broad Emma. Now that was a joke. Whoever the hell this Emma gal was, she was good. She had to be a pro. Every time he’d been assigned to tail her, she lost him in about ten minutes. He would have been embarrassed except she lost Phil and Toby too, and Eklund, hell, he even laughed when he said he’d lost her.
But what he’d seen the other night—and what he’d heard—that was the kind of thing he hadn’t wanted to see and hear at all. Why did he have to be there that night? Why couldn’t it have been Toby or Phil? Eklund—that prissy little shit—he’d made people disappear before, and making a retired agent like Garret Darcy vanish, a guy with no official status . . . well, that wouldn’t be a chore for ol’ Charlie at all. And the funny part was, when the time came, it’d probably be Phil or Toby who would take him out.
Phil had put the bugs in place. With Ladybird at home, Eklund hadn’t wanted to take the chance of getting caught installing the bugs. But when she went into rehab, and with Big Bird always out of the house, he had Phil plant the bugs. Phil put them in Big Bird’s den, the living room, the kitchen, and the master bedroom, and then rigged them to a voice-activated tape recorder hidden behind the electric meter outside the house. It had been Darcy’s job to pick up the old tapes every night and put in new ones.
That night, he’d been sitting there in front of Big Bird’s house, waiting for all the lights to go off so he could get the tapes—and that’s when it all went down. He’d seen it all and the bugs had heard it all. He’d even managed to get a couple photos on his little piece-of-shit Kodak. The photos weren’t very clear, but they were apparently clear enough, because when Eklund saw them . . . Hell, Darcy bet the last time Charlie Eklund had been that happy was when Jack Kennedy died.
He’d been forced to wait a couple of days to pick up the last tapes, the important ones, and he was glad the forensic guys hadn’t found the recorder when they were gathering evidence at the house. The bugs they never would have found, not unless they started ripping walls apart, but they could have spotted the recorder if they’d looked hard enough. Fortunately—or maybe unfortunately—the forensic weenies spent all their time up in the master bedroom, not outside the house.
And then he’d been dumb enough to listen to the tapes after he picked them up.
When Eklund asked him if he’d listened to them he’d said no, but he could tell that the little shit knew he was lying. And that’s when he got his “bonus”: the keys to the place near Lauderdale, the envelope with the extra cash. Yeah, what a peach of a boss ol’ Charlie was.
He felt like telling Sharon to forget Florida, that they were going to Mexico. Or maybe Canada would be better, but it was so fuckin’ cold up there. He knew a guy that could get them clean IDs, and his brother could sell the house for him and get the money to him some way. The problem was how would he get his pension check? If he sent in some change-of-address form to get his pension mailed someplace else, Eklund would be able to follow it right back to him.
“Honey,” Sharon called out from the bedroom, “where’d you put your swimming trunks? The red ones, not the ones with the flowers on them.”
His swim trunks. Jesus. He wondered what she’d say if he said: Babe, we’re not gonna be doin’ a lot of swimmin’ because I saw something that I wish I hadn’t and now this sneaky old fuck at Langley is probably gonna kill me. So, doll, we’re gonna have to change our names and move to Nova Scotia and get jobs in a cannery so we don’t starve to death.
Yeah, he wondered what she’d say if he told her that.
“I think they’re in the bottom drawer,” he said, “where my long johns are. And maybe you oughta pack the long johns too.”
“What?” Sharon said.
Chapter 33
Emma parked in front of the school—an unappealing three-story lump of brown brick—and was immediately appalled by the institutional grimness of the place. There were security screens over the lower-floor windows, cameras on the corners of the building protected by wire mesh, and a uniformed guard standing by the main entrance in a parade-rest position, a radio and a nightstick visible on his belt. The place reminded her of a priso
n, minus the machine-gun towers. The guard was watching a group of teenage boys who probably should have been in class, but were just sitting and smoking, laughing and talking loudly. She suspected the guard preferred them outside the school rather than inside where he’d have to deal with whatever mayhem they might cause.
She was here because DeMarco had asked her to verify something, something that she could have done with a couple of phone calls, but that she’d eventually decided to do in person. She wouldn’t have normally helped DeMarco with a task as simple as this, but she knew that he was in way over his head, dealing as he was with Morelli and the CIA.
Emma nodded to the guard as she entered the school, and he nodded back, but kept his attention on the cluster of boys.
As Emma walked down a hallway past rows of dented lockers, she reflected back on how much she had hated high school. She had despised the cliques and the peer pressure to conform. She had been bewildered by the fads and disgusted by the simian antics of the boys—boys not much different from the ones in front of the school, only white and wealthy. And in those days, she had been confused by her sexuality and that may have been the most difficult part of all. But at the private school she had attended, the strongest drug she’d been exposed to was marijuana and if any of her classmates had been armed, she certainly never knew it. There’d been no guards, no metal detectors at the doors, no fear of a misfit with an automatic weapon massacring his tormentors. Compared to the school that Isaiah Perry had attended, her high school had been safer than a cloistered nunnery.
She found the vice principal in an office where one window was patched with plywood. The principal wasn’t available; he was testifying in court. The vice principal, a woman named Beatrice Thompson, was a heavyset African American with the eyes of a combat veteran, one who had been left on the front line for far too long.