Love and Death in Brooklyn

by Glenville Lovell

  The show left many people smiling and nodding their heads. They may’ve witnessed the first blush of a new reggae star.

  I watched the performance alone from my table. Intermittently, I got up to scout the room to make sure Lizard-Face had not sneaked back in. Negus was nowhere in sight. I presumed he watched the show from the sound booth. After the show I went backstage to congratulate Smooth, and Negus if I saw him.

  Negus was already in the dressing room along with several young girls in stretch-to-fit pants that couldn’t possibly stretch another inch without bursting a seam. Some of them wore weaves of colors to match the rainbow. Negus was dressed as only he could, his freshly shaved dome shimmering in the harsh dressing room light.

  Papa Smooth sat in a chair as if poised on a throne, his awkward skeleton of a body still dripping sweat. Negus had told me he ate only vegan. He looked like he could use a little meat. In front of him was a glass filled with a green pulpy-looking liquid, perhaps some kind of fruit mixture or vitamin drink.

  “Commanding show, Papa,” I said.

  He looked at me with a smile, his eyes wide and tired looking. Then he stood up. I shook his hand and he smiled again. His face was too broad and too long for his extremely slender body and his teeth were craggy. He had narrow dreamy eyes, the eyes of a child, quiet, as if they were still tangled in the bliss of sleep. The matching gold satin shirt and pants almost made him look like a circus performer. But his smile had the infectiousness of sunlight, with his upper lip curling back like a lily unfolding.

  He was exhausted, seemingly too tired to speak. He sat down again and the sight he presented was amazing. For as tired as he appeared to be, he still sat as rigid and upright as a monument. Must be that West Indian upbringing, I thought to myself.

  “The crowd loved you,” I said.

  He offered another tired smile. “Yeah, man.” His Jamaican accent rippled like a warm wind.

  “We should all have a drink together to celebrate,” Negus said, his eyes planted on my face.

  One of our waitresses sashayed by and I tapped her shoulder, stopping her. “Bring me a bottle of Courvoisier, Adriana, and some glasses.”

  “Sure thing,” she said, and sailed off with a sassy swirl of her hip.

  I chuckled. These Caribbean women always throwing their hips around like old news.

  “My . . . River told me that a friend of yours was killed the other night.” Smooth sipped from his glass, gulping to swallow chunks of pineapple.

  “He could’ve been a great one,” I said.

  “Yeah, I know that story.”

  He sipped from his concoction and looked into my eyes. I saw a pain there that startled me. I averted my gaze.

  “Were you two close?” Smooth said.

  I turned to face him. “Not really. I’m closer to his father.”

  “Oh, yeah, the newspaper say his father used to be a cop.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Like you, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You ever killed anyone?”

  I don’t normally find that question unsettling, but at that moment it was. I decided to ignore it. I turned to Negus, leaning against a pillar in the middle of the room with a satisfied smirk on his face. “Did River call you?” I said to him.

  He nodded.

  Someone touched my shoulder. I looked around.

  “Your brandy, big boss,” Adriana said, letting her insouciant smile uncurl like an earthworm.

  I took the tray; Adriana sashayed away. Setting the tray down on a table in the corner of the room I poured brandy into three of the glasses. Negus accepted the glass I offered with a smile and nod.

  Smooth shook his head at the drink I held out to him. “Me don’t drink strong, cuz.”

  I looked at Negus, who shrugged as if to say: You shoulda known that.

  “Well, a toast to you, Smooth,” I said. “You lived up to your name. You’re as smooth as lightning.”

  Our glasses clinked together.

  I CHECKED the street carefully to make sure Lizard-Face wasn’t laying in wait when I left the club shortly after four. The street was quiet. The train of noise, which distinguished this city even in its deadest hour of the day from any other, came rumbling through the sky: a wailing police siren; the hoarse underground cough of subway cars; the screech of wheels scorching the track. A block away, garbage men ganged up on refuse cans to stuff them into the back of trucks. This was my city.

  Vibrant.

  Ugly.

  Musical.

  As I grasped the Volvo’s steering wheel I wondered if I might get away with waking Anais.

  EARLY NEXT AFTERNOON Anais, Chesney, and I walked along the lake in Prospect Park. We’d taken Chez to the rink, where she skated for over two hours. It was impossible to get her away, and we only accomplished this by promising to take her for cou-cou and flying fish at Culpepper’s. Understandably Chesney was still attached to Bajan cuisine.

  The rain had fallen earlier and misty air came sweet in its trail. A muffled echo rose up from the trees behind us followed by loud snorts. Mounted horses slowly emerged from the mist, one skittish roan jerking at his bridle, but the young rider kept her composure and soon calmed the lively horse down. As the group passed us Chesney grew excited, tugging at my arm.

  “Can I learn to ride, Daddy?”

  I looked down at her bundled together like a Christmas present in red corduroy coat and green pants, her hands as small as a doll’s, her eyes as bright as a comet, and felt my heart jerk against my rib cage. Emotions still new to me currented through my body. But I have to admit that as strange as these emotions felt, there was something inspiring about witnessing the expression of innocent exuberance, not just in any child’s eyes but in the face of my own child, a face that spoke to me in an emotional language more poetic than any I’ve ever heard.

  I laughed. “First we master the ice then we’ll try a horse.”

  “But I’m a good skater,” she protested.

  “Let’s ask Auntie Anais what she thinks of your skating.”

  “Oh, you’re not going to trap me,” Anais said.

  “Don’t you think I’m a good skater, Mom?”

  Anais, who’d been walking ahead of us, stopped and turned. In the amber afterglow of the setting sun her face flushed with primal emotion. It was shock and bewilderment competing with the desire not to make a big deal out of one little word, which at this time had driving implications to us all.

  “I think you’re a great skater, honey,” Anais said.

  “See, I told you,” Chesney exclaimed, wrapping her arms around Anais’s leg.

  And then I understood what a real Hallmark moment was. It was when two females ganged up on you.

  “Okay,” I said. “You can learn to ride.”

  Past Anais down the path she skipped. I caught up to Anais and we hugged, smiling into each other’s eyes. On the lake gray swans searching for food raked the water with their sword beaks. A quick wind got under the treacherous ripples producing a current that corrupted the calm of the dark silvery surface. The swans took flight, lifting toward the sun, then plunging back to the lake with an airrattling explosion.

  After our late lunch at Culpepper’s I tried to take a nap. I was close to drifting off to sleep when I got a call that would take me back to Prospect Park.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  a fter leaving the club I met a girlfriend at Wharf Rat on Pier 23 where Negus met me around three. We left there two hours later. Negus had rented a room for me at a hotel in Paramus.

  “We made love that morning. I was really hungry afterward so I ordered room service. Five minutes later there was a knock at the door and Negus went to answer it.

  “I was thinking room service was kinda quick when I heard phatt, then a cry. I knew it was a silencer. I didn’t wait. I jumped from the bed straight through the window. I don’t know how I did it. Fear, I guess. I landed in a garden and started running to the Bronco.

  “We’d
come up with an escape plan for something like this. We had a tire stashed under the truck and a spare ignition key under the mat on the driver’s side. I broke the glass and jumped in. Started up that shit and was banging. When I hit the highway I checked to see if he was following me. There was nobody behind me. I got to the first rest stop and called the police and told them to get an ambulance to the hotel.”

  It was late evening. We were sitting on a bench in Prospect Park near Grand Army Plaza. There was little foot traffic in the park as the sun had already hung its head in the forest of sleeping oaks for the night. The golden lights of the park lamps left shimmering halos above the stripped tree limbs. I didn’t even want to look at her. The muscles in my jaw tightened. I tried rubbing them vigorously, but that only served to make my shoulders tense. I was a horse tethered too tightly and strained for release. But I couldn’t lose it now. She had an agenda and I was curious to know what it was.

  “So you don’t know if Negus is dead?” I said stonily.

  She squeezed her forehead as if trying to scare away a headache. “He’s alive. I called Paramus police when I got across the bridge. They wouldn’t tell me how bad his condition was but they said he’s alive.”

  “What were you wearing when you got away?”

  “A sweatshirt.”

  “That’s all?”

  “I’d just put on one of Negus’s sweatshirts before the shit happened.”

  “Where’d you get those clothes?”

  She was now wearing a leather bomber and thick corduroy pants.

  “A friend.”

  “What friend?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  I leaned forward to peer deep into her eyes, hoping to catch a glimpse of what was really going on in her thoughts. It was like trying to see the bottom of the sea. “Just tell me one thing.”

  “What?”

  “Who the hell are you, really?”

  “What do you mean?”

  I leaned back, anger beginning to overwhelm me. “You’re a killer, a liar, and maybe a thief. What I don’t understand is why you chose to lay your skunk on me?”

  She laughed and I heard a dark hysteria behind it. On the other side of her voice was the absence of feeling, of emotion.

  “You’re the only person I know smart enough to keep me in one piece until this thing blows off. If I knew this city I wouldn’t need your help.”

  “Why should I help you?”

  She squared her eyes, staring directly at me. “Because you don’t abandon your friends.”

  “Who was your boyfriend working for?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I stood straight up and started to walk away.

  She broke after me. “I’m telling you the truth.”

  I turned around. “I’m so over your freaking games.”

  “Listen, I didn’t get into his business. I didn’t need to have that information. I knew he was a transporter. That’s all I know. And I didn’t even need to know that.”

  I grabbed her jacket. “I don’t believe you.”

  “Then fuck you! What the hell do you want me to do? Genuflect to your royal badass before you take pity on me? Well, I’m not going to do that for you or anybody. You either want to help me or you don’t.”

  I released her. “I suggest you talk to the FBI.”

  “Forget them. All I need is a place to stay. Preferably outside the city.”

  “Your Russian suitor is known for some grisly stuff. He threw a man out of a building in Arizona to shut him up. Left a stain on the sidewalk they’re still trying to wash out.”

  “I’m not running because I’m afraid of him.”

  “Is there anything you’re afraid of?”

  “We all got our weak spots.”

  “This life of secrets. Doesn’t it get boring sometimes?”

  She scratched at her face. “No more boring than yours.”

  “It’s funny, I thought we hit it off so well when we met. Hiring you was easy. Gettting rid of you is like trying to get rid of the devil.”

  “A man like you, the devil is in good company.”

  “Why don’t you go back to Miami? Don’t you have family down there?”

  “What if I told you no?”

  “You’ve got to have family somewhere.”

  Her eyes met mine and there was no give. “What if I said no to that too?”

  “I’d say that’s impossible.”

  “Why? The slaves who were brought over here from Africa had to start a life without families.”

  “We’re not talking about slaves. We’re talking about you.”

  She took a step back and hung her head. When she looked at me again there was pain in her eyes. “We’re talking about separation. Life is a series of separations. My mother is dead. My father is dead. I’m separated from everyone else. I’m alone and that’s the way I like it.”

  I stared at her for a second not knowing what to say. To say that she was a very complicated woman would’ve been an understatement, but she was also as compelling a personality as anyone I’d ever met. Behind her a woman in a gray leather coat meandered into view, shaking her head as if she was talking to herself. Then she disappeared.

  “I might know somebody with a place,” I said.

  “Thank you.”

  I unclipped my phone to call Toni Monday.

  SEMIN GUPTA called me later that night as I was checking my e-mail.

  “Did I catch you at a bad time?” Her voice was playful as always.

  “No, Semin. Just cleaning out junk e-mail.”

  “This shouldn’t take long. Your good doctor comes from a very stoosh New England family. Went to Harvard. Practiced in Boston before relocating here. About five years ago, two years before she moved to New York, she was investigated by the police for stalking one of her patients. Apparently they’d been having an affair and the man tried to break it off. Her family managed to get it hushed up but she had to leave Massachusetts.”

  “Don’t you get your license shredded for stuff like that?”

  “Not if your family’s got money and connections.”

  “You just get run out of town to start somewhere else.”

  “Dr. Heat isn’t a total deadbeat, though. She’s done a lot of community work since moving to New York. She volunteers once a week at Rikers where she counsels violent inmates. And before that she worked once a week for the Children’s Family Health Center. Gratis. Perhaps this man she stalked in Massachusetts deserved it.”

  I laughed. “Don’t we all, Semin?”

  “Some more than others,” Semin said. “Is there a story here for me, Blades? Does this have anything to do with Ronan Peltier?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Politicians can’t keep secrets. He was nailing her, wasn’t he?”

  “This is New York. Somebody’s always whipping it out in the dark.”

  “I’m hearing some rumblings that his death might’ve been a hit by the Russian mob.”

  “Really? Where’d you hear that?”

  “The police say they’ve bagged the killer. As in body bag. Some dude whose girlfriend seemed to prefer blood sausage to franks. His body was found on a Coney Island beach. According to police they found the gun that killed Ronan Peltier in this guy’s apartment. They’re saying this guy was used by the Russians to take care of any trouble they had in black neighborhoods.”

  “They’re certain of this?”

  “Hey, you used to work for the NYPD, do they make mistakes? You don’t know anything about this, do you?”

  “Thanks for the info, Semin.”

  “Anytime, babe.”

  I hung up from Semin and dialed Noah’s number.

  He answered the phone after the second ring, his large voice moldy with sleep, his growl a true minimalist delight. “Huh.”

  “You sleeping already, big man?” I said.

  “What you want, Blades?”

  “You didn’t tell me the police solved
Ronan’s murder.”

  “Huh?”

  “I just spoke to a reporter. She said the police think a gangbanger they found sleeping with the crabs on a Coney Island beach killed Ronan.”

  “Oh that. It’s crap.”

  “Oh that. Is that your response?”

  “Look, Blades, Detective Riley called me and told me they found the gun that killed Ronan. And the shooter was dead.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “ ’Cause I want you to keep digging. Riley gets a tip from somebody who says the gun used to kill Ronan is at this apartment. They don’t have a motive. Nothing.”

  “That doesn’t explain why you didn’t tell me.”

  “I forgot. I got a lotta shit on my mind, Blades.”

  “What if it’s true?”

  “What?”

  “That this guy did body work in black neighborhoods for the Russians.”

  “Why would the Russians want to kill Ronan?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then find out.”

  After I hung up I sat staring at the computer screen for a long time deep in thought. Was there a connection between Ronan and the Russians? And who killed Marjorie, and why? Was I wrong in thinking their deaths were related?

  I fished through my wallet for Detective Riley’s card. It was after eleven in the evening. I didn’t think I’d find him at the precinct but I called anyway. He wasn’t there.

  I called Noah back. “Do you have the detective’s home number?”

  Noah groaned. “Hold on.”

  I powered off my Mac as I waited. Noah returned shortly with the number.

  “Thanks,” I said, and hung up.

  I dialed the detective’s home. A woman answered the phone with a plush intelligent-sounding voice. In the background I could hear the scattershot drone of rain falling.

  “May I speak to Detective Riley?” I said.

  “May I ask who’s calling?”

  “Blades Overstreet.”

  “Hold a minute, please.”

  Riley came to the phone with a bounce in his voice, sounding the way I think I’d sound after a good bout of sex with Anais.

  “Detective Riley, this is Blades Overstreet.”