by Anton Marks
Shaft gulped his frothy cocktail and licked his lips.
“Ah!” he sighed, stifling a belch. “I needed that.”
Y looked at him slyly as she too took a swig from her own drink.
“If I had to make a guess on what line of work you were into, I’d say you were a Financial Advisor or something. You’re so unlike any policeman I know,” Y said after watching him lean back into his seat. “Come to think of it you’re the only policeman I know.”
“Policeman?” He jibed with a fake middle England accent.
”Detective Sergeant.”
“Don’t you dare start that again.” She pointed her finger at him with unconvincing threat.
“I’ve laughed enough today as it is.”
“Do you think I’m doing this for you?” He looked at her with a confused expression, “I need to see that beautiful smile of yours. Let’s just say it makes a difference to me.”
“You’re full of it, Winston. D’you know that?”
“But you still love me, don’t you?”
Y shook her head and blew him a kiss across the table.
“Seriously though, why did you, with your personality, want to become a policeman in the first place?”
“Would you believe me if I said Starsky and Hutch, Steve McGarret and Quincy ME? I even wanted to have a snitch like Huggy Bear, when I grew up.”
“That’s it? Television?” Y said with mock disappointment. “I was expecting some profound and honorable tale of making a difference in society or being a role model to the kids.”
“Sorry but Blaxploitation cinema informed my career.” He cleared his throat with fake embarrassment. “John Shaft, Superfly and Truck Turner.”
“Your parents must have been the open minded sort?” Y asked.
Shaft nodded.
“I guess my old man’s hero’s became mine.”
“And school? Did you find the time for it?”
“You kidding, me right? I was a geek. All glasses big feet, big ears and buck teeth. Cute though.”
“I can just picture it,” Y said, grinning.
“My favorite biographies were of Mathew Henson, Bas Reeves and Washington Carver. Growing up I never saw myself as being anything else but an adventurer, when I grew up. I obtained a Masters in Anthropology and Criminal Psychology. I did two years research in Africa for my doctorate, which I didn’t complete and returned to London. I joined the Force soon after that. Training was an eye opener though.”
Y shook her head, understanding exactly what he meant.
“The type of person I am, they’d kick me out for insubordination in no time. I have a thing against authority and Police training camp seems a bit too much authority for one person to handle.”
He nodded.
“You don’t know the half of it.” He spun his glass in a pool of condensation recalling the past. “I’ve had to deal with the fucked up perceptions of ‘every black man looks alike’, our inferior intelligence, our laziness, indiscipline and lack of commitment. And I took every one of those bullshit preconceived ideas and turned them on their heads. Sometimes my back was against the wall, pressure from all sides and still as a grown man I’d be asking myself how would Superfly handle a situation like this? Kick some honky butt and ask questions later, or use my determination like the explorer Mathew Henson to out-maneuver them and then kick some honky ass?” He laughed heartily, “Stupid I know but it got me through. I guess if you want to blame anybody for me being here, blame the director Melvyn Van Peebles.”
“He has a lot to answer for,” Y said under her breath.
He nodded his head then lowered it for a contemplative moment, emerging with a wide toothy grin.
“Enough of me, how are you managing? How is the world of celebrity handling you?”
Y paused and thought of where to begin or if she could even explain it at all.
“Holding on, I suppose. I think we’ve finally decided that this is something we can do and do well, getting the business side arranged through Mr. Patel and also preparing to get licensed.”
Shaft moved his chair closer to her.
“Busy bees. One thing missing, though.”
“And what’s that?”
“You’ve forgotten to ask me how I can help.”
“Just being here is help enough for me, truly.” Y said
“But if you need anything, anything at all you will let me know, right?”
“You will be my first advisor.”
“You make it sound like you convened a war council in the time of King Shaka.”
“It feels like we did.”
“Come on then, don’t keep me in suspense. What is the rest of the posse doing for the war effort?”
“Well, about now they should be with our client, making him feel all loved and protected. We got offered jobs!”
“In personal protection?” Shaft asked surprised.
“Yep.”
“A paying client?” Shaft asked again, incredulous.
“What other kinds are there? Of course, paying.”
The detective should be amazed but he knew that when it came to the girls if it was right for them all the elements would fall into place. Seeing how they maneuvered the pitfalls with a kind of effortless ease was a truly uncanny thing to witness. He reached over from his seat, nodding his head as he hugged her.
Shaft wasn’t sure why he did it but he kissed her on the lips and held her close.
There was no resistance.
“You’re a bitch,” he said breathlessly to her.
“Is that anyway to talk to a lady,” she said with her cheeky smile. “I’m a queen bitch.”
“Touché!”
After the celebration he asked.
“So what is this gig? Can you talk about it?”
“If I tell you, I’m going to have to kill you,” she laughed but she was wrestling with the idea of telling him everything but how did you explain the dark fantasy she was experiencing with her sisters? This was the realm of insanity that involving Shaft in may not be a good idea.
And this was going so well.
“Not much to say, really. Our client is a music promoter with powerful enemies and wants our protection up to and including the night he holds a big dance.”
“It seems basic but I could check him out for you.”
“We did our due diligence but if you could check him out too then that would help.”
“I’ll get onto it for you.”
“Be careful. The Met won’t appreciate your extra-curricular activities if you get caught.”
Trying to make light of her comments, he peered at her keenly as if he was examining her for fleas.
“What is really on your mind? There is something more I’m missing or you’re not telling me.”
Am I that easy to read? Y thought.
Y’s response was swift and laced with misdirection.
“I’m just uncertain if we can do this. Have we met our match with this celebrity thing? I’m proud of whatever we do but I want this to work. I’m not sure I could suffer more disappointment.”
What was meant to be deadly serious made Shaft laugh.
“Welcome to the human race, Y. You can be fazed by life like the rest of us mortals but hush.” He took her hand and stroked it gently, “You’re too hard on yourself. If there’s one lesson I’ve learned it’s that a bit of uncertainty in life is healthy. Nobody likes a smartass who unfailingly knows where they’re going from one moment to the next. It makes them a boring liar and a potential candidate for a good kicking. Delving deeper, and quoting my brotha Confucius, ‘only from uncertainty you will find certainty’”. He gave his best voice of wizened authority. ”It’s going to work out, just be cool.”
“Did Confucius actually say that?” Y asked.
“Not exactly,” he said flatly. “But if he was here, he would.”
“So, I’ll just take your word for it then,” Y said.
Shaft threw his hands in the
air.
“Now you’re getting the hang of this.” He grinned then genuflected, kissing her hand on his way down.
“Fool!” she said and started laughing again.
16.
Red Ground Estates, Surrey
Friday July 19th
22.20
The men who had been stationed outside of Spokes’ country residence were getting used to the cold hard facts of slipping personal hygiene, twelve hour shifts, unpalatable coffee and indigestible food, but that was what was required of them. The money was good and no one in their right mind would question Deacon’s orders without having a well armed regiment in reserve for the backlash.
In the meantime they prepared for a possible opening in Spokes’ battlements on the off chance. Deacon was adamant and obviously a firm believer in providence awaiting any possibility, whether mundane or supernatural to breach Spokes’ defenses.
Team Bravo were six hours into a shift, a five man crew in a BMW SUV hidden in the leafy copse out of sight readying themselves to send out a two man scouting unit to see what they could see. Robert and Stevo were dressed in dark overcoats packing enough heat to engage an equally armed crew not a millionaire promoter who had no experience in the world of violence they occupied.
Deacon’s desperation was showing.
Stevo reached for the door release to let himself out when someone rapped on the tinted glass.
“Shit!” he said, hearing weapons cocking in the background with the swiftness of seasoned assassins. Stevo calmed their nervousness with a gentle to and fro of his hand, knowing that suburbia threw up these situations from time to time. He switched his facial muscles to neutral and placed the pistol behind his back as he slid the door open.
A tall dark skinned man, dressed in light khaki slacks, Clarkes shoes with white shirt and Panama hat of which he tipped in his direction while smiling grotesquely.
“What?” The man in the van asked gruffly.
“I need your van, pardy.” Darkman said evenly. “And your talents.”
Stevo glared at him and then laughed.
“Are you fucking retarded or something? Walk away before I hurt you.” He spat. “Talents?” He said to himself and tried to slide the door shut but it wouldn’t budge.
“Don’t be like that, star. What if I promise not to kill yuh.”
Darkman placed the cricket bag he was carrying on the ground beside his leg and with one hand on his waist, a smile creeping slowly across his lips. Stevo was yanking on the door perplexed as to why it still would not close when it dawned on him that this strange Jamaican was threatening to kill him.
“You what?” Stevo asked incredulous and slightly amused then it was gone. He glared angrily at the man who had not moved and was watching his ineffective efforts with amusement. “Kill me? Are you listening to this lad’s?” His head snaked inside. “This wanker want’s us dead.”
Laughter erupted in the vans interior.
Enoch shook his head in a gesture that almost looked like remorse for what he was about to do. He reached into his pocket, popping a small bundled up parcel of vegetation in his mouth like gum. He chewed heartily on the unprocessed leaves of the demon weed, his salivary glands pumping mouth water into the cavern of his mouth. Careful not to swallow any of the masticated contents, Enoch maintained chewing his cud. He puckered his lips and prepared to squeeze the liquid through his tongue and upper palette. The incantation unraveled in his mind rearranging the form and function of the liquid in his mouth as he forced it out. His spit vaporized explosively from his lips filling the interior of the van with a powder cloud of tornado force that obscured them into silence. Moments later the hoarse wheezing of five men overcome and bent to his will whispered out to the cool air like the slow leak of a bike tire.
Slowly Darkman entered the SUV, it rocked slightly with his added weight. Casually he checks over his shoulders to see if he had been seen and slid the door closed behind him.
Surrey Heath, Victoria Park Nature Reserve
Saturday July 20th
22.15
A dark uneasiness crept in time with the girls as soon as they wandered through the gates and into Victoria Park and only Suzy Wong felt it.
It had been a spur of the moment decision which they had discussed and decided Spokes could be on his own while they got some air and down time. The house as large as it was and sporting every amenity a reclusive millionaire could ever want still was unbearable after forty-eight hour stretches. Y had come up with the idea of a walk in the park. At the time it felt like a good idea. The boss was asleep and the floor surrounding his bed was marked with Mayan sigils of protection for his peace of mind. If it was triggered he had an hour worth of mystical defense. The grounds were covered as usual with his personal security detail, the park-cum-nature reserve was twenty minutes walk away and his ring should afford him enough time to contact them if he was being threatened. So here they were walking arm in arm, shooting the breeze with at least two out of the trio enjoying the vast greenery even in the darkness.
Suzy subtly excused herself from Y and Patra’s discussion and fell back. The deeper they got into the reserve’s winding pathways and open expanses the more her disquiet increased. She watched her sisters proceed in the distance oblivious to the waves of menace that had her emotions in a tangle. She stopped feigning interest in a blooming bougainvillea and tried to settle herself.
Moments later Y sensed Suzy’s absence and stopped to look back only to be reassured by her easy wave in the distance. They stood their ground and continued on with the conversation waiting for Suzy to catch up.
Suzy concentrated but her five senses detected nothing. It was her intuition that was expecting the rows of foliage to transmute into a monstrous plant with a taste for human flesh. But a warm breeze ruffled their leaves and nothing more sinister than tree sparrows emerged from the branches. Suzy could not shake the feeling though so on a whim she left the safety of the foot path and moved silently into the shrubbery. She inhaled a heady mixture of humus, sap and chlorophyll as she nestled into the dense branches and crouched to wait.
After five minutes she was beginning to feel silly then that feeling of foreboding returned with more intensity.
Something appeared.
It came as an almost imperceptible grating murmur that she couldn’t distinguish if she had heard it or if it was extrasensory in nature. Her temple prickled immediately and her ears tingled as minute forces of some kind ran up and down her earlobe stretching it as if they were becoming elfin. Suzy shifted in her crouched position wanting to sprint away from there but fear and curiosity held her fast. That God awful murmur was behind her, so she spun to face it and saw nothing. Then at the periphery of her vision something swooped out of eyeshot, through the leaves, silent and ethereal, large enough to be human but with no definition to speak of but ink black with many tattered and flapping edges. The figure moved through the air like a demented vulture trailing its substance behind it as if this world had some effect on how it moved, dulling its power but not its inquisitiveness.
It was looking for something, looking for Suzy.
She crouched; transfixed then with the cold hand of dread gripping her spine she stood up and walked out of the shrubs.
“You wanted me?” Suzy growled up into the night sky.
The spectral bird of prey swooped again at the edges of her perception responding to her voice. It twirled with satisfaction when it realised she was still in the park, almost whooping with delight from its aerobatics, it shot upwards merging into the trees, leaving behind a sense of foreboding that Suzy now knew had to be acted on.
Enoch’s essence returned to his body seated in the Command SUV he had forcefully appropriated, sans its original five passengers with such displeasure, his corporeal self spasmed and gasped for breath as he became one with himself again. He slammed the door to the astral world like a teenager slamming his room door shut with vexation and kept swearing. He uncrossed his legs and leane
d back into the passenger seat, his five senses re-aligning themselves to the here and now. The euphoria of being unfettered from his body disappeared and what returned were the emotions of flesh and blood.
Deh Chiny gal can see mi to rass. He thought.
He had been right to not take them for granted and from what he had read , their talents could manifest in different forms but a warrior sensitive, now that was different. The plan to track them to where Spokes was holed up was an inspired one but what was genius was the vévé, he had planted at the entrance to the mansion. It was a work of voodoo art if he said so himself using the skin of a deer as the canvass and his paints were black sand, cornmeal and human blood to mark out the delicate patterns that would subtly nudge his targets to a particular way of thinking. He was not used to the delicate strokes, and the spider web energies it would influence, his diagrams were more heavy handed in their construction and effect but this was almost beautiful in its function. The spell was so unencumbered with the usual trappings of bending the will of its subjects that the three bitches thought the idea of walking to the park was their own. That’s why this trap he was about to spring would prove pivotal.
He had read accounts of the Guardians interfering with the scheming of his great, great grandfather on one of his frequent jaunts around the world. They were immune to overt magic and reveled in conflict so to distract or destroy them required subterfuge and cunning. Grandfather Pierre was in Costa Rica when it happened and he circumnavigated the issue without shedding any blood and still getting the Tabernacle Moth that he seeked. Enoch thought it was a good strategy but bad for his ego. And when he sat to write his memoirs, he would recount how he trapped and slaughtered the blessed Guardians with his ego intact.
No back dung, an no compromise.
They would die, Spokes would be alone and although he couldn’t face him directly he would instruct the demons from hell’s Seven Circle to rip off his ring finger and gut him open from ass to gullet. Another chunk of Enoch’s soul forfeit to the darkness but it was worth it.