by Layton Green
Bentley arched his eyebrows and took a sip of cognac. “Cobra?”
The square-jawed face of the assassin seemed to sink deeper into the shadows of his black hoodie. “I don’t have an opinion,” he said quietly. His eyes had never left Van, who didn’t seem to notice the attention.
“Stick with me and you will,” Bentley said, with a chuckle. “I’ll give you some books before you leave. Or maybe you think no one knows shit about shit, and that’s why everyone has a worldview or a philosophy, or for less visionary men a political view, which they cling to like a life raft in order to feel grounded in the world. Is that perhaps what you meant to say, Cobra? Because I can respect that sort of apathy.”
The assassin’s eyes gleamed within the hood. “Sure,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.
Bentley turned to his bodyguard, a behemoth of a man with a wispy goatee and three lines of cornrows caught in a man bun. “Solomon? Would you care to opine on the topic? Grace us with your biblical wisdom?”
The bodyguard’s arms bulged beneath his purple sweater like a line of baseballs. “I think niggers didn’t have no say in any of it, so it don’t concern me none.”
“Now see,” Van said, pinwheeling an arm, “how come y’all get to say nigger all the time, but if I say it, I’m racist as hell? I grew up in the same hood y’all did.”
The room grew quiet.
“Are you telling me,” Bentley said slowly, “that you’ve worked for me for over a year, and yet you somehow do not understand the basic difference between racism and prejudice ?”
Expecting a laugh, Van looked as if he wished he had never spoken. “Prejudice exists everywhere,” Bentley continued, “against all things and among all people. I have a prejudice against dark roast coffee. I have a prejudice against goods made in China. I have a prejudice against the French and Italians and Vietnamese, in general. Racism is not prejudice, Van. Racism is power”
Van’s hands fell to his side, and he looked down at the floor. “I’m just fooling around, man. I get it. I feel you.”
“What is it that you get, Van?”
He looked confused. “Like you said, boss. Racism is everywhere.” “Racism is nowhere. Racism is an illusion.”
“Huh?”
“Racism depends on a societal power structure. Look into the eyes of the most backward native in the Amazon and you still know he or she is a human being, capable of great feeling. Despite their petty prejudices, the vast majority of people would never even harm an animal. At least for no reason. So why did racism evolve? Choice, Van. Greed and choice. Human beings choosing to take advantage of one another for profit or sexual gratification or some other motive, then justifying it afterward with racism. It is not an innate behavior. It is learned. Purposeful. Taught by a few and embraced by many.”
“Yeah, sure boss,” Van mumbled.
“It is hard to swim against the tide, once the ocean is in place. Why disadvantage yourself and your children? But take away the power, and you take away the racism.”
Bentley’s eyes found Cobra’s, and something quick and final passed between them. “Speaking of power and the abuses thereof,” Bentley said, “my accountant seems to have found a discrepancy in your monthly report.”
It took Van a moment to realize Bentley was talking not just to him, but about him. The dealer’s eyes bugged, and his hands came up in a defensive posture. “Hey, boss, I would never—”
“Compounding theft with prevarication is never a wise idea” Bentley interrupted.
“Say what? Let me—” in the corner of his eye, he caught Cobra approaching, which caused the dealer to choke off his words and stumble away from the assassin.
A six-inch knife with a steel handle appeared in Cobra’s hand as if by magic. Van shrieked and started circling the room like a cornered animal, moving among the men with pleading hands, trying to find an absolution he knew in his heart was not coming. “Please,” he begged. “One more chance.”
Cobra glided forward, but Bentley held up a finger. “Not you,” he said, then pointed at Javier. “Him.”
Bentley stepped back, all the way to the side wall, followed by Solomon. The bodyguard flicked a switch and the red lights on the overhead cameras started blinking. With a shrug, Cobra tossed the knife to Javier, then stepped back to join the other two men along the wall.
Startled, the leader of Los Viburos managed to catch the handle of the knife. He looked up at one of the video cameras in sudden acknowledgment, then looked at the bodyguard, gauging the situation. Solomon had one of his hands tucked under his sweater. Cobra had his arms folded, expressionless.
Javier, alone with Van in the center of the room, watched as the white man faced Bentley, got down on his knees, and begged for his life.
“I’ll do anything, man. Anything. It’ll never happen again, I swear. Never ever ever. I’m loyal, man. I just had to pay for my cousin’s surgery. It was just one time. I’ll pay it back three times over.”
Javier glanced at Bentley, a silent inquiry as to whether this was a lesson or the real deal. Bentley gave a curt nod. Javier walked around and gripped Van by the back of his dreadlocks.
“Please,” Van whispered, right before the leader of Los Viburos jerked his head back and slid the knife across his throat. No one in the room—except Van—flinched at the brutality of the act.
After the drug dealer bled to death in front of the other men, Bentley turned off the cameras. He asked Solomon to dispose of the body and clean the floor, then addressed Javier and Cobra. “Would you care to join me for a drink?”
“Hell, yeah,” Javier muttered. “A double.”
Cobra declined the offer. As Solomon slipped on a pair of latex gloves and stuffed Van’s body into a thick plastic bag, Bentley handed cognacs to the other men and lit a cigar. He reclined on one of the couches and crossed his legs as he puffed. “Things are progressing at the park?” he asked Javier.
The leader of the street gang looked ready for a fight. Instead he pushed air between his teeth and gave a shake of his head. “Yeah, ese. You don’t have to worry about that. In a few weeks, they’ll be begging you to tear that shithole down.”
Bentley sipped his Remy Martin. “Excellent. Keep at it. How is our drug diva holding up ?”
Javier shrugged. “She seems fine.”
“Keep an eye on her. She’s more use to us alive, though if you think she’s having regrets, bring her here. I’ll provide a pep talk.”
Javier clicked out of the side of his mouth and took a long swallow of cognac.
“And the girl?” Bentley said to Cobra. “What was her name again? A color, I believe?”
“Blue.”
“Yes, thank you. Blue. You’re sure she’s the one ?”
“I’m sure, but she skipped town.”
“To where ?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“How far can someone like that get?” Bentley took another puff and leveled his gaze at Cobra, who stared back without blinking.
The crime lord could read the motives of most men before they ever spoke. Cobra was different. The man’s emotions disappeared into a black hole before they reached his face.
“Whatever piss-ant white trash town she ran to,” Bentley continued, “go find her and take care of the situation.”
Cobra acknowledged the command with a nod.
“Actually, don’t go anywhere yet. Javier, why don’t you put the word out with your gang? You have factions all over the Carolinas.”
“I don’t speak for the others. They might not like that I work for you.”
Bentley gave a thin smile. “Tell them it’s for you, then. Offer them a reward. Money speaks for everyone. Cobra, one more thing.”
“Yes?”
“Someone else may have seen something. I need you to send another message.”
18
On Thursday, after a coffee-fueled morning in the office filing paperwork and attending a monthly quality circle meeting, Preach c
alled the Courtyard and learned that Mackenzie Rathbun was working the lunch shift. Surprised that something concerning a witness had gone his way, he hurried to his car to catch her before she left. Tracking down a college kid with a vibrant social life could be more challenging than finding criminals.
Accessed by a long gravel drive, surrounded by a tract of deep Carolina woods, the Courtyard was a swanky steakhouse built in the style of a traditional log cabin. A pair of roaring fireplaces bookended the dining room, but the real draw was the elegant flagstone patio that, for nine months or so a year, provided an unmatched natural ambiance. The place had been around for decades, but it was expensive, and Preach had only eaten there once.
The lunch rush had ended by the time he arrived. He introduced himself to the manager, asked to speak to Mackenzie when she freed up, and waited at a table in the corner. Soon, a young woman with all- American good looks walked over, untying her apron and shaking out her hair as she crossed the dining room. Preach noticed a mole on the left side of her neck, long blond hair as fine and shiny as galvanized wire, good posture that made him recall her upper-class roots, and starshaped earrings with a blue stone in the center.
She sat across from him, looked him in the eye, and spoke in a selfassured voice. “You look familiar.”
“I don’t know that we’ve met.”
“Do you work for my father ?” The question was posed in a curious manner, rather than a rude one.
“I’m a Creekville police officer.”
“Oh.” She searched her memory for a moment, then said, “Were you at David’s funeral ?”
“Good memory.”
Her eyes slipped away. “I’m surprised I remember anything about that. A bunch of us got really hammered afterward.” She put a hand to her temple and took a deep breath. “God, how awful. He was such a sweet kid.”
“I’m very sorry. How well did you know him?”
She started to answer but choked on her words. A tear fell from the corner of her eye, and he waited in silence as she composed herself.
“He worked here last summer,” she said finally. “We talked a bit, mostly during the breaks and such.”
“I’ve heard from a few people that he was . . . quite taken with you.” She flashed a soft, sad smile. “Yeah. I guess he kind of was.”
“You didn’t return the interest ?”
“David? He was just a kid.”
Preach arched his eyebrows. “Was he that much younger?”
“He was in high school.” She laughed lightly and gave him a confident, knowing look that said, I’m in college and know everything there is to know about the world.
“I’m trying to piece together what happened the night he died. You didn’t see him, did you? October 2, a Thursday?”
After she thought for a moment, her eyes widened. “That was that night? Yeah, he stopped by the restaurant. He seemed pretty upset.” Preach realized the actual date of David’s death was not yet widely known. He leaned forward, intense. “Do you remember what time it was?”
“Around ten-thirty, I think. I was already rolling silverware. So yeah, had to be after ten, but probably not after eleven.” She waved a hand. “I’m gone by then.”
“How long did he stay?”
“Five minutes, maybe ? He said he really needed to talk. I told him I was busy but he insisted.”
“Had you seen him since the summer?” Preach asked.
“He stopped by now and then after a shift to say hi. To me and a few other people.”
Preach wrote down the names of David’s other friends at the restaurant, then said, “Please go on.”
“We stepped outside so I could smoke—I usually have one after my shift—and he unloaded a bit on me. Told me he hated his mom and was moving out.”
“Did he say why?”
“He despised her boyfriend, I forget his name, and thought they wanted him gone so they could be alone together. He said they couldn’t wait until he graduated.” Her eyes widened. “Wait—you don’t think they . . .”
“Don’t worry about that,” he said.
Mackenzie put a hand to her cheek. “Christ.”
“Did he say anything else ?”
“Hey—do you mind if I smoke? I could use one right now.”
Sure.
After Mackenzie grabbed a beige, knee-length suede jacket from a closet, he followed her to the patio and wondered if her parents, one of the wealthiest families in North Carolina, insisted she help pay her way through college.
“What are you studying?” he asked, after she shook out a Benson& Hedges from the pack and used a black lighter with a stylish purple swirl to light up. Could he see her carrying a silver cigarette lighter? It didn’t seem like her style. Mackenzie was less hipster and more international fashion model. Poised, intelligent, rich, the world waiting at her feet like an obedient lapdog. It was easy to understand why David had been smitten, and Preach couldn’t help but think of the parallels between himself and David at that age, and Claire and Mackenzie.
“Global finance,” she said.
“Big plans for the family company?”
“Something like that. I won’t deny I have some advantages in life, but the expectations that go with it?” She rolled her eyes. “Those are a killer.”
“I can imagine.”
She took another puff, holding the cigarette delicately in her fingers. “To answer your question, I can’t think of anything else we talked about. He did seem more distraught than normal. I didn’t think much about it because I’d heard it all before—except the leaving part, which I assumed was just talk.”
“You mean he’d talked about his mom and her boyfriend before, in the same vein?”
“A lot. It really brought him down.”
“What happened next that night?”
She shrugged. “He tried to get me to take a ride with him, but I had to study.”
“Where did he want you to go ?”
“He didn’t even say. I felt bad, because he seemed like he really needed someone. But I knew he had plenty of friends, and, well . . .” she trailed off and held a palm out.
He understood. She hadn’t wanted to lead him on.
“What about someone else? Did he mention seeing another girl that night?”
“Not to me.”
“Where did you end up studying?”
Her face clouded, and he regretted having to ask the question. “With a guy named Jared. Jared Wilson.”
She took out her cell and gave him the guy’s contact information. “Thank you,” he said, then pursed his lips as he thought. “I want you to think very carefully. David’s whereabouts that night are crucial to the case. You might have been one of the last people to see him alive.”
That knowledge caused her to pale, a crack in her flawless poise. She fought back the tears again, and he remembered the feeling of being immortal when he was young. How far away and unreal death had seemed.
“I know this is hard,” he said. “Did he mention where he was going next? Anything else that might be important?”
She pinched off her cigarette and dropped the butt in an ashtray she had carried out. “I asked him where he was going,” she said, in a heavy voice, “and he said he didn’t know. I told him to go home and talk things out with his mom, that I was sure she loved him.”
“What did he say?”
She hesitated and wrapped her coat tighter, as if something besides the weather had given her a shiver. “He said she didn’t love him anymore, and that maybe she never had. He said she was just like his dad.”
Preach felt a great weight on his shoulders as he returned to the station. Mackenzie’s words still haunted him. He could feel David’s pain as he struggled through adolescence, struggled to find a place in the world, struggled to be loved.
Where had the hurting teen gone after yet another rejection, this time by the girl of his dreams ? To whom had he turned?
Like most murders, Preach’s gut told him some
one David knew— and knew well—had stolen his young life.
The brainy deputy chief of forensics, Lela Jimenez, approached his cubicle. Short, athletic, and cherub-faced, her dark bangs brushed the top of her red-rimmed glasses as she tapped a manila folder in her hand.
Preach swiveled in his chair. “You found something?”
“It’s what we didn’t find. Hemp fibers in the woods. Not a trace outside a ten foot radius around the leaf pile.”
“You checked in all directions?”
“All reasonable directions. Off the path, it’s mostly just bramble.”
Preach nodded, thoughtful. “Is that it?”
“For now. I thought you should know.”
“You thought right. Thanks.”
After she left, he considered the new evidence. No hemp fibers on the path meant someone had carried David a few hundred yards out of the woods.
Not dragged. Carried.
No way Claire could have done that.
He expelled a breath and tipped back in his chair. It didn’t completely rule her out. She could have hired someone. But the evidence in this case was sounding more and more like the work of a man.
And, he thought grimly as he stroked his two-day stubble, there just so happened to be a male suspect sitting in a holding cell in the basement of the police station. Brett’s lawyer had stopped by that morning, but until the businessman agreed to discuss the damning texts on David’s cell phone, there was little his counsel could do.
Preach decided to eat lunch before he went downstairs. No need to go hungry while Brett sweated it out. After a Reuben sandwich from a deli near the station, he stuffed a pen and pad in the pocket of his overcoat and strode down the hallway of the holding chamber.
Brett was slumped on the cot with his back against the wall, shirt untucked, bleary-eyed, unshaven.
“How’s the Internet business?” Preach asked.