Out a Order

by Evie Rhodes

  Shannon swept his arm across the wall unit, knocking all the contents to the floor. She jumped.

  “That’s your god, Tawney. Instead of saying please, Jesus, why don’t you just say please, Mr. Bank? That’s your god. So why don’t you call on them and see if they can serve you up some justice by bringing your daughter back? They’re powerful, right? So let them raise her from the dead. Damn you! Maybe they can write a check and negotiate to get her life back.”

  Tawney was so wounded and stunned she couldn’t utter a word in defense. Guilt raced through her veins at his words. He grabbed her by the shoulders. He shook her so hard her teeth clattered. “Go ahead. Call them, Tawney.”

  Automatic gunfire shattered the windows. Shannon threw her to the floor. For the second time that day he threw his body on top of hers.

  The room erupted in a blaze of gunfire. Holes quickly appeared in the walls, as glass rained down through the room. Then there was silence.

  Chapter 7

  Downtown Newark was a busy place, even at night. The peddlers, were roaming the streets hawking their wares. There were a lot of people on the streets.

  A group of young men were loitering outside the game room as the police cruiser glided leisurely by. Lombardo was at the wheel. Campbell was riding shotgun.

  They waved at their fellow officers who were manning the makeshift police station that had been set up at the corner of Broad and Market.

  The radio inside the cruiser crackled. “Campbell and Lombardo, you there?”

  Campbell reached for the instrument. “We’re here. What’ve you got?”

  “What’s your location?”

  “Broad and Market.”

  “Good. Get over to Muhammad Ali Boulevard. Reports of automatic gunfire have been reported. And Campbell brace yourself.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s the Davenport residence.”

  Campbell and Lombardo exchanged swift glances as Lombardo jerked the wheel, doing a U-turn in the middle of the street. “Thanks, David. I owe you.”

  “Not a thing, my man.” The dispatcher clicked off. Campbell replaced the instrument in its holder. He and the dispatcher had talked about this case earlier. He had had a feeling it wasn’t over. Somehow he’d known it was an open-ended chapter. The girl’s father was not going to take this lying down.

  He stared thoughtfully out the window.

  “What’s going on here, Lombardo? The girl gets shot and her distraught father is running behind the stretcher at the hospital. Conveniently a body is dropped into the grave that belongs to the little girl at the funeral. And now automatic gunfire is ripping through my man’s house. Is he really a victim? Or is there a bigger picture going on here?”

  Lombardo shrugged. “I ran a sheet on him out of curiosity. He hasn’t been involved in anything that I can see since the birth of his daughter. All activity on him stopped practically on the day she was born. Unless he’s gotten a lot more clever.”

  Campbell stroked his mustache while staring out of the window. “His daughter was eight, right?”

  “Bingo.”

  “I don’t know. If it’s just circumstances, then this brother is getting a bad break. If it’s more than that, then something is brewing right under our noses. Whatever answer happens to be the right one, one thing is for sure.”

  Lombardo hooked a corner on two wheels. When the car was back on four wheels it bucked forward.

  “What’s that?”

  “Our Mr. Davenport is one dangerous man. He’s not to be taken lightly.”

  “You ran a sheet on him?”

  Campbell laughed. “You might say that. I looked into a different type of law. I discovered an ocean of blood. None with his name attached, but there just the same.”

  Lombardo tossed Campbell a brief look.

  Campbell nodded.

  “Well, let’s see what my man has to say. But I guarantee you it probably won’t be much. We don’t have a lot to go on. We might walk out with a big zero, but we’re going to have to lean on him heavy tonight.”

  Lombardo smiled. His voice took on a deadly tone. “Let’s do it. If he spills any blood that I can prove in my territory, then I will become his looking glass. There’s only one law, and he’s not it.”

  Lombardo put the pedal to the metal, in pursuit of Shannon Davenport.

  The street in front of the Davenport residence was filled with people. Police cruisers were in the middle of the street with their flashing lights. Some of the residents were in their nightclothes. Police dogs were roaming the street sniffing for a scent.

  The car carrying Lombardo and Campbell squealed to a halt. They jumped out. Rushing through the crowd, they made their way up onto the porch.

  The living room was decorated in soft leathers with a touch of class. A scattering of sofas sat throughout the room. A beautiful large aquarium took up almost an entire wall in the room.

  Exotic fish in a beautiful array of colors swam nonchalantly through the water. There was also a gold birdcage hanging from the ceiling that was empty.

  Tawney was standing in a corner with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Her hands were wrapped around a mug of hot chocolate as though her life depended on it.

  Shannon was smoking and looking out of a side window with his back turned to the entire chaotic scene. A brightly colored parrot sat on his shoulder.

  The police were roaming around with gloves on and little plastic bags in their hands. Campbell and Lombardo strolled into the living room as though they owned the place. They immediately focused on Shannon.

  “Trouble again, Mr. Davenport?” Lombardo said.

  Shannon stubbed out the cigarette in a nearby ashtray. He never turned from the window. “Back off, cracker.”

  Lombardo’s face turned a bright shade of red. “We can do this nice, Davenport, or we can do this different. It’s your choice.”

  “We can do this any way you want, Mr. Police Officer. It don’t make a damn bit of difference to me.” He turned away from the window to face Lombardo.

  Campbell stepped forward quickly. “We’d like to do this orderly.”

  Shannon exploded. “Orderly. You want to do this orderly?”

  The parrot flew off his shoulder to the top of his cage.

  “You call this order? This is definitely out a’ order, my man. A bunch of street punks shoot my daughter. Then they arrive at her funeral and do another body drop, and tonight automatic gunfire rips through my bedroom where I sleep with my wife, and my daughter isn’t cold in her grave yet!”

  Shannon’s eyes shot flames of fire. “And you! You! Instead of being out on the streets you’re in my house, in my damn house wanting to question me again. Right? Well? Isn’t that right?”

  The police didn’t answer.

  “And you want to talk to me about order. I don’t think so. I’ll tell you what I think. This is out a’ order! This is out a’ line! This is all a lie!”

  Shannon pointed to his wife. “She’s living a lie.”

  Lombardo and Campbell looked at each other. Tawney never came out of her stupor. Shannon pointed at Lombardo and Campbell. “You’re living a lie.”

  He pointed to the rest of the police. “They’re living a lie. This whole damn world is living a lie. But you want to know something?”

  He walked directly up to Campbell eyeball to eyeball. “I’m a man who knows how to get to the bottom of lies. Believe that. Now, if you still want to talk to me you can do it downtown, because as you can see, my wife is in no condition to listen to this.”

  Campbell nodded. He turned to Lombardo. “We’ll wait for him outside.”

  Lombardo seethed. Smoke could’ve popped out of his ears. He clapped his hands. “Nice performance, Davenport. Certainly Oscar-worthy.”

  Shannon lunged for him. The cops positioned themselves.

  Campbell stepped firmly in front of him. “It’s not worth it. You’ll lose,” he whispered so only Shannon could hear. Shannon took a deep breath. Lomb
ardo put his hand on his nightstick.

  Campbell pointed to the street. “That’s us. You’ve got three minutes.”

  Shannon put his mouth close to Campbell’s ear in turn. “Yeah. Okay. But you’d better teach that dog some new tricks, because he’s out of bounds.”

  Campbell observed the pulse that was beating heartily in Shannon’s neck. He nodded to appease him and calm the waters.

  Shannon walked into the kitchen.

  The parrot flew off the top of his birdcage, landing on Shannon’s shoulder.

  Tawney’s mother was sitting at the kitchen table. She had a scared look on her face. The day had gone from black to blacker to midnight. And right now she felt like they were all treading fires in the midst of hell. She was casting nervous glances into the living room.

  And meanwhile all she could see in her mind’s eye was her granddaughter picking flowers from among the weeds to give to the old people, so as to brighten their day.

  Once she had asked her why she did it. Jasmine had treated her to a beautiful look of innocence. “Because it makes them smile, Grandme,” she said, using the nickname she had created especially for her grandmother.

  “Mama Sue, can you stay with Tawney?” Shannon said, breaking into her memories.

  He already knew Tawney’s mother would not be leaving his house unless it was under gunpoint. She wasn’t about to leave her daughter in the midst of this madness.

  It was a strictly mechanical question on his part. He needed something to say. He had always respected Tawney’s mother because she knew how to mind her own business. She also knew how to have a person’s back.

  She gave him a shrewd look. “Where are you going?”

  “Downtown with the police.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the police are fools who don’t know where to search for real clues. And because I have a criminal record.”

  “You haven’t been in any trouble since Jazz was born, Shannon. Surely they don’t think . . .”

  He touched her gently on the shoulder. “My own woman isn’t sure. How can I expect them to be?”

  Tears glistened in Mama Sue’s eyes. Shannon was like a son to her. She had always believed in him. Even when he was in the streets, there was a trait to him that was somehow different.

  She didn’t let him down now. “Well, I’m sure, Shannon! You wouldn’t have anything to do with this and I know it. Nobody’s going to tell me any different.”

  Tears glistened in her eyes at the losses and the heavy cost they were all paying.

  Shannon dropped a light kiss on her temple. “Thanks. I always said you were worth your weight in gold. I was right.”

  “Be careful, baby,” Mama Sue said, reaching for his hand.

  “Don’t worry. Just take care of Tawney for me. Okay? She isn’t taking this too well. Justice is right around the corner.”

  He strode out of the kitchen. Mama Sue watched him with a troubled expression on her face.

  As Shannon reentered the living room the parrot flew off his shoulder back to the top of its gilded cage. “Ark. The police are fools. The police are fools. Ark. The police are fools,” he mimicked Shannon.

  The cops turned to stare at the parrot. Shannon smiled. He had trained Pete well. He strode out the front door into the waiting cruiser. The sirens wailed as they sped away into the night. It was just another night in the Central Ward.

  Chapter 8

  At a deserted warehouse in the Ironbound section of Newark, four young men stood outside a steel door. All of them were underlings, reporting to Ballistic. Unlike so many of the other gangs in the area, they didn’t have a name or a moniker.

  The only thing close to a moniker that their activities resided under was Ballistic. It was enough to inspire fear, even in those who claimed otherwise.

  Ballistic was the grungiest of Newark’s crime lords. In the truest of traditions, he was a combination of street thug, old-school Mafia, and the new-millennium criminal enterprise entrepreneurs rising in Newark.

  He was one of the savviest, and hands down the most dangerous thug to ever grace Newark’s streets.

  Ballistic was the Central Ward. He was spawned from its loins although he’d come from Irvington. He was a product of what the Central Ward represented in every aspect of the word. The two couldn’t be separated. The Central Ward was targeted, spirited ground. And Ballistic was at the other end of its umbilical cord.

  Born in Newark, raised in Irvington, he had moved on to the Newark turf with a simple plan. One was to take over. Two was to turn anybody who got in his way into a corpse. Plain and simple.

  He wasn’t taking no shorts.

  Trey, a sullen-looking young man of seventeen, sauntered up to the small crowd. Neither one of these boys nor the ones in Rico’s group was older than nineteen.

  “What’s up?” Trey said.

  Bobby removed the hood of his sweatshirt. His eyes bored into Trey. They shook hands. “You black. You and my man Ballistic.” He nodded toward the warehouse.

  Warren P. stepped up to Trey. “What’s up, money grip? You be summoned by the man too, I see.”

  Trey nodded briefly. “What’s the level on this scene?”

  “Spence caught a bad hit. Got body-dropped into the Davenport girl’s spot in the ground. The heat is on.”

  “Where was his cover? I heard about the accident with the li’l girl. Not good.” Trey lit a blunt. He blew smoke rings in the air.

  Warren P. laughed sarcastically. “Wasn’t no cover, Trey. Nigga went buck wild crazy and decided to do a solo. Ballistic don’t accept no misses. My man Rico had his ground covered.”

  At that moment a discreet-sounding buzzer went off. The young men entered the warehouse. Trey put out the blunt with the toe of his boot.

  They all filed quietly down a long dark corridor until they reached an open space in the warehouse. There was one chair in the room with the back turned, among a scattering of crates.

  A huge muscle-bound German shepherd sat with danger generating from his eyes. He sat at attention watching the men enter.

  The room was dark and dank with a single bulb hanging from a suspended wire in the ceiling. They stood at attention until the figure in the chair turned to face them. When he did he stared coldly, while lovingly stroking the dog’s head.

  Ballistic had a hole in his throat with a breathing tube attached to it. His voice when he spoke was deep and raspy. His eyes sparkled like dark black diamond chips.

  He was holding a black cane with a wood handle. He surveyed each of the young men standing before him individually, coldly.

  “You niggas think that I am somebody to be toyed with?”

  There was a collective shaking of heads as they shifted uneasily in their spots. They knew better than to speak.

  “Someone is trying to make a fool of me?”

  Complete silence from the crew.

  He rose from his seat but not before kissing the top of the dog’s head. He rubbed the dog’s nose. He walked the room with a noticeable limp. He was dependent on the cane.

  The dog sat stock-still. Only his eyes moved while following Ballistic.

  “I am not happy with Rico DeLeon Hudson’s message to me. Understood? The income from that turf he cannot keep. Because I am king of this patch of land. No?”

  He walked up to where he could smell the breath of the first boy he approached. He looked so deeply into the boy’s eyes that he could see the blackness of his soul. He continued this ritual until he reached the fifth boy in line.

  As he stepped back without warning, his cane whipped through the air. The sharp point of it landed in the heart of the fifth boy. The boy dropped dead without so much as a sound to the concrete floor.

  Bobby, Warren P., and Trey stared straight ahead as well as the fourth man in line. Ballistic snorted. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket.

  He blew his nose, sticking the handkerchief back in his pocket. Then he limped his way down the line, back the way he had
come.

  He halted in front of Trey.

  “I want a fear deeper than the depths of hell to fall on Rico in under twenty-four hours.” He raised an eyebrow at Trey. Trey stared at him with deadpan eyes. He gave a slight nod.

  Ballistic twirled the cane. Trey didn’t flinch. He spat a wad of phlegm at Warren P.’s feet. A gurgling sound emitted from the tube in his throat. Warren P. didn’t appear to have noticed. Ballistic’s gaze found the fourth man. “Clean it up.”

  The fourth young man stepped past him to do so. Ballistic grunted in disgust. He shook his head before putting his Glock to the base of the young man’s head. Then he fired. The body dropped at Warren P.’s feet.

  “Five is too many. All I need is three. Trey, Warren, and Bobby. Understood?”

  He turned on his cane, limping from the room. The dog gave them a brief look, before trotting behind his master out of the room.

  You are listening, aren’t you? You should begin to listen with your inner audio as well as your outer audio. You will need more than just your ears to hear.

  We’re no longer in your world. We’re in the Central Ward. And the Central Ward is in and of itself Out A’ Order.

  Chapter 9

  Lombardo glared through the one-sided mirror, with a look of disgust on his face. He didn’t know why Campbell insisted on treating Shannon Davenport with kid gloves.

  He watched Shannon and Campbell spar off across the table from each other in the interrogation room.

  “I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me,” Campbell said.

  “You can’t help me if I do talk to you,” Shannon shot back.

  “Who shot your daughter, Shannon? May I call you Shannon?”

  “Whatever.”

  Campbell sighed. He rolled his eyes at the ceiling. “Shannon, who shot your daughter?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Who shot the boy at your daughter’s funeral?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Can you describe him?”

  “No.”

  Campbell stood up. He leaned across the table in Shannon’s face. “I have eyewitnesses who say he stood as close to you as I am right now. And you don’t know what he looks like?”