This could only mean one thing. “Tony?”
My best friend Tony Martin, a Ph.D. psychologist who does police ride-alongs in the city, had been my mentor when I began my career in the state mental health system ten years ago. Back then he had his own thriving private practice and a reputation as one of the best marital therapists in the Midwest. In our professional circle he was known simply as The Voice. His silky smooth elocution always reminded me of a white James Earl Jones. Women routinely turned their heads at the sound of his mellifluous voice, but it was a woman—a client—and Tony’s colossal lapse in judgment that led to a few frenzied minutes of taboo behavior that cost him his practice and nearly his wife and daughters. He aches to end his three-year exile with the police “knuckle-draggers,” as he calls them, and return to private practice.
“The Voice wants to be back in business,” Baker said.
“Which is precisely why he won’t jeopardize his job.”
“I know people on licensing and insurance boards.…”
The web he was spinning perplexed me. “All this for a classmate you knew a long time ago? I don’t buy it.”
“Don’t make me get on my knees.”
“What crime are you trying to prevent?”
Baker rolled that damn toothpick around in his mouth and stared at me.
“Do not follow me again. Do not call,” I said, walking away.
“I think Maynard intends to kill the little brother, but I can’t prove it—yet. I need someone I can trust, talkin’ with him on the inside.”
“Why would Maynard risk killing someone you say is suicidal?”
Baker turned pensive. “Maybe we find out together.”
“What else aren’t you telling me?” I realized how stupid the question was once it left my lips.
Baker rolled the toothpick to the other side of his mouth. “If the Man throws the book at Lonnie, the brothers in the ’hood ain’t gonna like it one bit. Could be riotin,’ lootin,’ random mayhem, and shit. Lonnie goes down, it gonna go bad for the city.”
“Why? What makes him different from every other poor black criminal in prison?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I could tell you. You gotta learn that on your own; you take the case, and you’ll find out.”
“You’re being too enigmatic, Detective.”
“Best I can do. You a smart guy,” he said, glancing back at the bench, the stream, then up through the branches at the cloudy sky. “Sometimes too smart for your own good.”
I thought of the secure confines of my couch, the varied names of my burgeoning fears, and of Lonnie's shell-shocked mug shot. The sadness in his eyes said it all. I feel your pain, brother.
“Baker, you’re a big black bastard.”
“It won’t take up much of your time,” he insisted.
The referral kiss of death. “I’ve heard that before.”
I remembered the 2006 baseball Cardinals and the USA Today headline the day before the World Series that read, “DETROIT IN THREE.”
And when Buster Douglas knocked Iron Mike Tyson on his ass.
I thought of a hundred-to-one longshot winning by a nose at Fairmount Park.
What are the odds of a regular Joe beating City Hall?
I thought of Maynard’s cryptic words to his co-conspirator.
My id said: Don't do it; he offers nothing but trouble and pain. My ego said: Maybe you can help this man, and maybe you need a jolt from a lightning rod about now.
Baker waited patiently while my internal battle raged.
“I’ll see him today, but I make no promise to stay on the case when it all goes to hell, and it will. I walk away any time I feel like it. No questions asked.”
“Hot damn! I knew you’d do it. You won’t regret it, my man.”
“I already do.”
“I know you the man for this, Cool Breeze.”
“That makes one of us.”
I left the soothing English Garden ready to be fitted for my lightning rod.
Next stop, Gateway City Jail.
chapter four
the end of the line
Rain dripped from the concrete fangs of two massive lions standing guard at the Gateway City Jail. I hurried up the steps between the imposing Doric columns. What a dinosaur. The new county jail is a spa compared to this.
After getting through the metal detector screening line, I walked down a cold, shadowy hallway that smelled of old building, institutional cleaning fluids, and stale city air. Dust motes shone and drifted like dying fireflies in the slivers of light slanting through the high, narrow windows. The closer I came to the visitation area for the special lock-down unit, the smell changed to fear and the windows disappeared.
This is the end of the line.
Last year I was nearly an inmate here.
I checked in at the guard station, received a guest badge and a litany of guidelines from a beefy guard who rattled off a long list of visitation no-nos in rapid fire monotone. Heightened security and greater restrictions applied in lock-down, the area reserved for the most dangerous or self-destructive prisoners. No Plexiglas partition separated prisoners here during visits with their attorneys, counselors, or priests, and the guards confiscated my keys and wallet and change, even pen and paper, until my time ended. Then they ushered me into a cramped room with lime green cinder block walls, a water-damaged drop ceiling, and harsh fluorescent lighting. A scarred and battered gunmetal gray steel table stood bolted to a steel plate in the middle of the floor. The smell of mold and sweat filled the room.
“You have thirty minutes,” the guard said before the door slammed shut with a heavy metallic thud.
The end of the line.
It wasn’t until I turned to sit at the table to wait that I noticed him. Lonnie Washington seemed fragile and small, as if he had folded into himself like an origami bird. He said nothing. Didn’t even look up, but instead stared with blank eyes into the middle distance. Two of him could have fit in his orange prison jumpsuit. His wrist chains were hooked to a thick bolt in the tabletop while leg irons secured him to another steel plate welded to the floor.
I took the chair across the table from him, closer to the door.
His eyes remained vacant, fixed on some point in the corner of the floor. His straight, slender fingers and hands appeared tattooed on both sides, and the artistry looked jailhouse or amateurish at best.
He had whipping boy written all over him.
“I’m Dr. Mitchell Adams, a social worker in private practice. It’s good to meet you, Lonnie. Detective JoJo Baker thought it might help if you had someone to talk to on a regular basis. What do you think?”
No response.
He didn’t acknowledge my presence or move a muscle. His listless, dark eyes never wavered. I couldn’t tell if he’d heard me.
“Detective Baker is concerned you might have a hard time adjusting and thinks I can help you deal with this place.”
Nothing.
“He also told me you're having thoughts of killing yourself. Is that true?”
Still no response.
I tried five minutes of silence and we sat like two strangers waiting on the same bench for a bus a la Waiting for Godot. Waiting for something.
But there was nothing. More quiet time passed until suddenly his right hand shot up and the ghost-like rattle of his chains filled the tiny room. Startled, I recoiled, feeling foolish once I realized the shackles permitted him to raise his hand mere inches above the table. Oblivious to my reaction, his hand quickly moved back and forth in the air, his eyes still fixed on the corner. At times his hand returned to the tabletop, seemed to grab some imaginary object, and continue its movements in the air. After five minutes of this, all movements ceased as quickly as they’d begun and gloomy silence returned.
“What did you just do, Lonnie?”
Nothing.
“I know you can hear me. Talking helps pass the time.”
Zippo.
Silence ruled ag
ain until the hand made similar motions in the air, eventually returning to rest on the scarred table. Those slender fingers trembled at times.
“JoJo said you attended school together.”
Nothing.
“When I first met him, JoJo scared the hell out of me, but after I came to know him I consider him a friend, of sorts.” The things I’ll say to start a conversation.
When our time ended, I said, “It’s been nice seeing you, Lonnie. I’ll come back tomorrow to see how you’re doing. Is there anything you want or anyone you’d like me to call?”
More nothing.
The guard unlocked the door and escorted me out.
My next five visits passed in much the same way. The vacant staring persisted. The hand movements increased in frequency, and for some reason I attributed a sense of urgency to them, but not one sound or word passed his lips.
While I struggled for days to find an inroad to Lonnie's trust, the case against him was proceeding full steam ahead. Evidence had been impounded and was being analyzed; motions were being filed; neighbors were interviewed, Maynard made more tough, reassuring statements to the press as his team continued to build the case against Lonnie; the media took hold of each new development and ran with it like a dog that had finally caught up to a car. People on the street were interviewed, claiming to have seen the three fugitives in various parts of the city and county, asking about a reward; while a few brave or foolhardy souls questioned Maynard's facts. Baker hounded me daily for reports on my “progress” with Lonnie.
$ $ $
On day seven Lonnie showed a fresh sign of life—a slow trickle of blood weaved its way toward his brow from his closely cropped Afro.
“Lonnie, you’re bleeding,” I said, removing a handkerchief from my back pocket. “Let me get that for you—”
His body went rigid as his torpid eyes turned fearful. They instantly tracked to the door and a guard the size and demeanor of a defensive lineman rushed into the room.
“Sir, you were instructed never to pass the prisoner contraband of any kind,” the muscular guard warned. The badge on his massive chest read Sergeant Donnell Collins.
I held the white cloth up for him. “This man is bleeding and can’t raise a hand to his face. Get him a bandage or let me wipe the blood before it reaches his eye.”
Sgt. Collins wore latex gloves and inspected the handkerchief closely. “You’d be amazed at the resourcefulness of prisoners, especially this one. He could use this to hang himself, choke a guard, conceal a weapon, or jamb a door. I have to account for your safety too; he could be HIV positive. You get this back when you leave.”
Collins stared down at me, most likely taking me for a weak, bleeding-heart softie from the suburbs in a swell gray sports coat and matching twill pants.
I am, however, more than the sum of my parts. Or at least I used to be.
I returned his glare. “I know you have rules. We all do. One of mine is to help people when I can. He’s helpless and scared. Attend to his wound or I will.”
Collins inspected Lonnie’s head. “He’s got a small gash in his scalp. Superficial. Head wounds tend to bleed a lot.” He used my handkerchief to swab the trail of blood and apply pressure.
“We’ll take him to the infirmary and give him a lollipop when you’re done.” He raised the bloody rag and said, “This will be disposed of. You have fifteen minutes left. I’m watching.”
As Sgt. Collins left and silence returned to the cold Spartan room, I heard the white fluorescent tubes above us buzz steadily like a concealed nest of provoked hornets.
I sat back across from Lonnie. “You certainly reacted quickly to my breach of prison etiquette, didn’t you?”
Another silence lasted so long I heard each second tick away on my watch. The room was warm today, and I felt myself start to nod off.
“What’s Detective Baker look like?” Lonnie asked in a soft voice, looking at me for the first time.
Finally.
“Good. There is someone inside. He’s six foot four, more muscular than Sgt. Collins, has a nasty scar around his left eye socket and loves to chew toothpicks like they were the fingertips of bad men. He often wears a parrot green sports coat and his bald head has a waxy shine to it. What broke your silence?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. You were kind. You stood up for me, and yourself. Does he have a lady friend and, if so, what’s her name?”
“Simone. She was an exotic dancer when they met. Give me a tough one.”
He raised an eyebrow. “How’d he get that scar?”
“Fighting off a gang of drug dealers who’d attacked her in the middle of the night. They chained him to a tree on the East Side. I can recite the gory details, but I’d rather not.”
“Impressive, but that doesn’t mean I should talk to you.”
“I’ve been known to help the occasional person in trouble.”
“You feel guilty. You’re repaying some kind of civic debt to JoJo. You have my permission to walk away right now with a clear conscience.”
I sensed no emotion behind his statement, just opinion.
“Look, you’re in about the last place a man would want to be—”
“You don’t know me,” Lonnie interrupted. “You come here asking personal questions like I’m some sort of pet sociology or abnormal psych project.” He assessed me from head to toe. “What’s the worst thing that ever happened to you, your Beemer break down in the ’hood at night?”
I looked him in the eyes. “I’d been a ladies’ man most of my adult life. Never even wanted to get serious. But then I let someone get close and fell in love. A deranged client of mine murdered her and then tried to kill me. I should be dead.”
Some days I think he succeeded.
“Detective Baker almost pinned the murder on me.”
Awkward silence and then recognition spread across his face. “I remember that. The police arrested the killer about the time the Gateway University scandal broke. You passed up movie and book offers?”
I nodded. “I want my private life to remain that way.”
He sat for some time in silent contemplation. “Your last new client was the delusional killer?”
“Very perceptive,” I said. “And I’m only sitting here today, on this side of the table, because Detective Baker figured out the truth. I also think he figured out that we need each other.”
He smiled wanly. “You know what they say I did, right?”
Was he saying this for shock value?
“Yes.”
He didn’t proclaim his innocence; rather, he stared at me, seemingly lost in thought. “I like your substance. I apologize for the Beemer comment. I was out of line.”
Lonnie’s eyes tracked to the door again. Without moving a muscle, he said, “Guard at the door.” Then, in a whisper: “My work is over. No one can save me. I’m good as dead.”
I asked him what he meant but all he said was, “Would you check on my momma? LaKeesha Washington, she lives off Grand, on Hebert.” He rattled off the street number as the door swung open.
“I’ll see her today—” I answered as two heavy-set armed guards surrounded him. They unshackled him as Sgt. Collins escorted me from the room. “—and I’ll see you same time tomorrow.”
For a fleeting instant a vestige of life fluttered in his eyes. “You mean it.”
As I left the room, a guard barked at Lonnie to drag his bony ass to the infirmary for his Band-Aid and lollipop. After the other visits, I’d been escorted out first. Lonnie rose awkwardly and nearly fell twice as he hobbled toward the door. Then I noticed the disability Baker spoke of.
Walking in shackles can’t be easy, but doing it while walking on your ankle and being dragged along by a couple of larger guards at their unshackled pace is damn near impossible. The sight of his deformed club foot made me wince.
chapter five
a dark netherworld
I drove north on Grand Avenue past the lush Gateway University campus a
nd its many contemporary buildings of higher learning, beyond the fabulous Fox Theatre and Powell Symphony Hall. It was late afternoon on a fine spring day made for soaking up the sunshine; I had the top down and an old Jimmie Spheeris CD playing. A couple eye blinks later, I crossed over to the dark side of the moon. Manicured landscapes disappeared and in their place, empty weed-filled lots vied for prominence with abandoned and boarded-up buildings spray painted with gang tags. Inhabited homes, some tidy with yards fenced off as if the owners were trying to hold back the steady march of decay, barely outnumbered the decrepit remains people once called home. I passed a chop suey joint, tavern, church, and two quick loan stores. A vendor sold jewelry and trinkets from the hood of his old beater parked on an empty lot. The number of cars on the road decreased; small clusters of people loitered or milled about outside what appeared to be one of the area’s only open businesses, a yellow mini-mart/liquor store, while some pedaled bikes or waited for buses. An old Bondo-primed Riveria with tinted windows sped past me and cruised with abandon through a series of red lights.
I passed Grand and Dodier, where Stan the Man Musial patrolled the outfield in old Sportsman’s Park fifty years ago, which later was renamed the first Busch Stadium. No building remained, though there was a baseball field. Too many vacant buildings and businesses from a bygone era now reduced to empty shells with broken windows and buckled parking lots overrun by weeds and glass. Before Natural Bridge Avenue and Fairground Park, I made a left off Grand onto Hebert Street, where some of the mostly brick bungalows sat vacant and dilapidated, one next to another, block after block. Every so often the burned-out shell of a house stood in an empty lot like a desiccated skeleton. Postage stamp yards revealed bare spots interrupted by crabgrass, broken glass, and discarded fast food wrappers. Hebert Street looked to be one of the worst maintained streets in a badly blighted neighborhood.
If Lonnie Washington was printing money like there was no tomorrow, he certainly didn’t seem to be spending it on his mother.
LaKeesha’s small brick and wood A-frame appeared almost as bleak and Godforsaken as the jail. Shortly after I’d parked my Solstice at the curb, two young boys nearby began fighting and throwing chunks of broken bricks at each other from the scattered rubble of what I assumed used to be a house next door. In the interests of peace (and my cherry red Solstice), I called the boys over and gave them each five dollars to watch my car while I spoke with Mrs. Washington. The smaller one named Ty had a wry smile while DeAndre was taller, darker, and carried more meat on his frame. They grabbed the bills and took their positions.
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