D.C. Noir

by George Pelecanos

  By age fourteen, I’d developed a voluptuous, womanly body, and I had little trouble getting into any of the “adult only” places. Where Kim was considered by many to be dropdead gorgeous, I was the star of the show when it came to physical traits. And yes, I proudly flaunted my stuff. Yet I will also admit that the main reason I was always allowed inside of Evelyn’s was because I was the invited guest of “The Man,” as Zack was known in private circles.

  Kim and I were driven to Evelyn’s by Oje in his spanking-new, money-green Eldorado Caddy. Oje was a ranking member of Zack’s crew. He was deathly in love with Kim, and wished the feeling was mutual, but that’s another long story and no time for that. Briefly, though, he was not the pretty-boy type that Kim preferred, but she still kept him under lock and key, basically to provide protection. Anyway, Zack was waiting at Evelyn’s when we arrived, sitting at his reserved table in front of the stage.

  It was at Evelyn’s that night that I got my first real lesson on jazz. A local group calling themselves Miles’s Boys did several of Miles Davis’s magnetic tunes. Another local song-stress named Brenda Mcphey took my breath away with what Zack later told me was a splendid version of the great Nancy Wilson’s “Guess Who I Saw Today.” That was just the beginning of a lot of things that I would learn from Zack.

  I had a wonderful time and told Zack without hesitation that I would be more than happy to join him for a nightcap and whatever else at the Washington Hilton, where he’d reserved a beautiful and cozy room. The confidence and surity of that man was amazing.

  Zack’s lovemaking sealed it for me that night. Unspeakably perfect pleasure.

  I knew from the beginning that I wasn’t the only female in Zack’s life. His womanizing reputation in D.C. was as legendary as his suspected crime involvements. None of that particularly bothered me. I knew what I wanted, what I needed, and where I was going. We talked openly about his desires and his need for multiple partners in his life. Women played major roles in his criminal activities and he needed strong, faithful people to keep things working smoothly. He had a deep yearning to be financially successful, and I envisioned a lucrative future as Zack’s leading lady. I’d fallen madly in love with this fantastic man and nothing would tear us apart.

  Zack’s main woman when we first met was the beautiful Sarah Ward. Besides being gorgeous, she was a selfish, greedy, sneaky, no-good bitch. When I came aboard, friction instantly erupted between us. She had her sights on staying number one in Zack’s life and complained constantly to him about me. Always telling him that I couldn’t be trusted and that being involved with the sister of a competitor would eventually hurt him. Once she stole some product from one of Zack’s drug houses and tried to blame the shit on me. Zack investigated the matter and found that one of his workers had seen Sarah take the package. Zack showed her mercy, but she’d fallen way down on his list of people he could rust.

  I don’t know exactly when Sarah and Junior started sneaking around. By then my relationship with my brother had deteriorated to the point that we hardly saw each other, and the few times that we did cross paths, we rarely spoke. We had virtually become enemies, and rightly so, because I was now the woman of his hated rival—my Zack Amos!

  By the mid ’60s, Junior started to make a big name for himself. He’d formed a crew of stick-up boys who robbed banks, jewelry stores, and out-of-town drug dealers. Junior and his crew were nearly as feared as Zack and his organization.

  In the spring of 1969, one of Zack’s drug houses got knocked off by several masked men. Over $100,000 in cash and drugs were taken, and a few workers were badly pistol-whipped. There was no evidence of who the robbers were, but Zack kept saying that he had a gut feeling Junior was responsible. Zack kept his calm, though, and simply took it as a loss.

  When word got around that Junior and Sarah had been seen partying at the famous Cecilia’s Restaurant & Club at 7th and T Streets, N.W., adjacent to the Howard Theater where all of the major singers and comedians performed, Zack erupted with harsh words: “That bitch and brother of yours is crazy! Think that they can keep chumpin’ me and get away with it. Gonna fix their asses,” he told me.

  Zack and I had recently visited Cecilia’s for a night of fun. In popped Junior and Sarah, accompanied by several of my brother’s crew. Men like Zack and Junior hardly ever traveled outside of their safe zones without protection, and Zack had his guys positioned throughout the club.

  Neither man acknowledged the other at first, but as Junior, Sarah, and their entourage passed our table, the bitch looked down at me and had the nerve to say, “Whatcha lookin’ at, ho?”

  For some reason I had a flashback to that day Junior smacked me so hard I momentarily lost my taste. I jumped up before Zack could say or do anything to stop me, but instead of smacking this heifer with my palm, I balled up my fist and knocked the living shit out of her. I tell you, the bitch went straight out.

  That nearly led to a major confrontation right there between Zack and Junior, but the club’s security stepped in and defused the matter. Plus, Zack had high respect for Cecilia and didn’t want further mess to spread.

  Junior cut menacing eyes our way, but didn’t say a thing, he just helped bring Sarah back to consciousness. Zack decided it was best for us to leave, and as we made our exit, he hollered back at Junior: “You get a pass this time, nigga. Best you keep yourself and tramp in line!”

  Chemically, blood is thicker than water, but in the case of me and my brother, a series of painful experiences had transformed that chemistry. Our hearts became harder and the blood diluted behind our sufferings. In our respective pursuits of foolish material gain, we had lost the love and care.

  The year is now 1975, five years since the murder of Sarah Ward. Perhaps this is a shocking revelation to the reader, but I am writing this story from prison. A reporter named Frances Parker from the Washington Post contacted me and asked me to tell my story—she said she would cowrite it and turn it into a short story for her magazine. She also offered me a handsome fee. As I told Frances when I first met her, money is no longer important to me. At this stage of my life, I only want to clear my conscience and be granted God’s forgiveness for all of the evil that I’ve done. I’ve grown close to Frances Parker since our first meeting of a year ago when she came to this prison and asked me to do a story. Initially I said no, but she kept coming back. A story to generate income for herself had been her original reason for contacting me, but after a year of really getting to know each other, we have become good friends. She has encouraged me to lift my burden and let the folks in D.C. and the rest of the nation know exactly what happened that night inside the Fantasy Club.

  The night that Sarah was murdered, she had accompanied my brother to the Fantasy. Zack had invited them to this gathering under the pretense that a truce and the possible joining of crews would make all of our lives better. I was a willing accomplice to this deception.

  Unknown to anybody other than Zack and myself, an undercover D.C. police officer was planted in the club. He was a personal friend of Zack’s and one who was very well paid to be there that night. His name was Ted Jenkins.

  Zack and I were sitting at our reserved table at the Fantasy that night, sipping drinks and watching the dancers move creatively to the beat on the dance floor. The DJ was playing high-energy sounds to keep up with the lively and frantic mood.

  Junior and Sarah entered around midnight, extending greetings to those they knew as they made their way across the dance floor to our table. Zack rose and shook hands with Junior, and both he and Sarah gave me slight nods of greeting. A round of drinks was ordered as the two men began to make small talk over the booming rise of the music. Moments later, Zack and Junior told me and Sarah to split while they talked over some business.

  Immediately, I asked Sarah to join me inside the ladies’ room. “We girls need to do some talking and mending ourselves.”

  Two women were coming out as we approached the rest room. Drunkenly laughing and poking fun at ea
ch other, they purposely paused in front of the entrance so that we could hear them. This sort of plump-bodied but cute, short-afro-wearing woman said to her frail ugly-duckling-type girlfriend: “Girl, I just pulled this nigga tonight who is spendin’ money like crazy. He’s packin’ meat, if you know what I mean. Child, I’m gonna spend his money, then fuck his brains out.”

  As they passed, Sarah and me entered the bathroom and moved to the far end by the wash basins and toilets. Large mirrors were positioned on the walls above the sinks, which had stools under them. We sat next to each other and began to chat.

  I told her that I was sorry for all that had happened between us, that since she was my brother’s woman we were sisters in a way, that none of us should be at each others’ throats. It would take time for everything to mend properly between all of us, but me and Zack were willing to forgive and make a new start.

  Then I got up slowly, patted her on the shoulder, and told her that I’d be right back—I had to get my purse for a few items I needed to freshen up.

  As I dodged around the frantic dancers on my way back to our table, I turned to gaze back at the ladies’ room entrance. At that instant, undercover officer Ted Jenkins darted inside the rest room without anybody other than me noticing. I proceeded to our table.

  “Back in the nick of time, baby. Where’s Sarah?” Zack asked.

  “She’s still in the rest room waiting for me to come back,” I responded. “Came back to get my purse. Need to freshen up to keep looking good for you, Daddy. How’s it going with you and Junior?”

  “We’ve reached an agreement,” Zack said. “But Junior needs to tell you something, so hold tight for a second. Run it, Junior.”

  I could see the hatred for me in Junior’s eyes. But he spoke with remarkable calm. “Let’s get one thing straight, Fee-Fee. I’m only here to prevent a stupid war between Zack and me. Fighting will only cost the loss of lives on both ends, and the loss of a whole lot of money. None of us need this shit, so Zack and me have agreed to stop going at each other. Sarah won’t be going at you anymore and I expect you to stay clear of her. Another thing: I got what I want, you got what you want. We ain’t brother and sister no more, and it’s best that we keep it this way. Do I make myself clear?”

  As I listened to my brother, I saw Ted Jenkins exit the ladies’ room and lose himself in the crowd.

  Before I could get a word out in response to Junior, all hell suddenly broke out. Screams of terror could be heard coming from within the rest room. The music and dancing abruptly stopped and the crowd rushed to see what had happened. Junior sprang from the table and ran toward the rest room.

  Moments later, a squad of D.C. police were on the scene, directing the crowd away from the crime area. Three other officers led by Ted Jenkins hurried over to where Junior was trying to muscle himself through the crowd to the club’s entrance. With their guns drawn, two officers grabbed Junior, slung him to the floor, and quickly handcuffed him.

  The crowd went silent as Junior yelled out at his captors, “What the fuck is going on? Get the fuck off me, you pieces of shit. I ain’t did nothing!”

  “You are under arrest for the murder that just took place,” Jenkins announced. “You have the right to an attorney…” and so forth, his words drowning beneath the chatter of the confused crowd, watching as the cops swiftly moved Junior outside to the waiting police car.

  A year later, after a series of court hearings, Junior was tried and convicted of murdering his fiancée, Sarah Ward. Undercover officer Ted Jenkins told the court that he had been there at the club doing surveillance work and had witnessed a heated argument between the two in front of the rest room entrance before they both entered. That was right at the time of the murder. He hadn’t thought that the argument would carry over to something violent.

  “Couples are always arguing, then quickly making up,” Jenkins concluded. “I just feel so bad that I probably could have prevented that fool from killing her.”

  Zack and I were summoned to the grand jury to state what we knew or saw. We both emphatically claimed that we didn’t see, hear, or know anything.

  Junior was convicted and given a sentence of twenty years to life. Throughout the entire process he insisted that he was being framed. He’d figured out that Zack and I set him up, but he didn’t call names. Lacking evidence, it wouldn’t have helped him anyway.

  With Junior and Sarah out of the way, Zack was very much on cloud nine. He completely ran the city again, and we were loving the good life.

  Junior had my father visit him in prison. He told him that Zack and I had killed Sarah and set him up. Immediately, my father tried to get in contact with me. For months I avoided him, then finally agreed to sit down and talk. He told me what Junior had said. I denied everything and said that Junior had lost him mind.

  “Remember one thing, girl,” my father warned me, “God don’t like ugly. If you had anything to do with the murder of that woman and the jailing of your brother, you will pay a terrible price for your sins. And God be my judge, I’ll be the first to rejoice over your suffering if you did what your brother said you did.”

  My father’s words have stayed with me, surfacing frequently and torturing me badly. They were spoken nearly four years ago, shortly after Junior’s conviction. My father never found out what really happened, nor did he know that his words had weakened me and that he was one hundred percent right—that I would pay a terrible price for my sins. A month after talking with me, my father died in his sleep of heart failure. But I know that he really died of a broken heart.

  Zack noticed my change instantly when I returned from the visit with my father, as well as my deepening depression after my father died. He did what he could to try and cheer me up, but I was locked into despair. The tough, selfish girl that I had been was gone.

  Two weeks after my father’s death, Ted Jenkins was gunned down by two masked men as he left his house on Longfellow Street, N.W. He was about to get in his car when the men pulled up and unloaded twelve .38 Special bullets into his body at point-blank range, four head shots killing him instantly. The newspapers reported that the motive could be revenge from loyal members of Junior’s crew, but street rumor had it that Zack might be responsible.

  Even in my lethargic condition, I found strength to question Zack about the officer’s murder. He told me that he didn’t have anything to do with it—that Junior probably had it done and that we had to be careful because his crew might be plotting in on us as well.

  “You need to snap out of this shit you’re going through, woman! We need each other, and I need you at your best,” he’d tell me daily.

  Approximately a month after the Jenkins murder, Junior was found stabbed to death in the mop room of his jailhouse unit. No witnesses to the crime, no one picked up for the murder.

  I knew then that I was next.

  Two days after I received word about Junior’s death, I put six bullets inside of Zack Amos’s head. I used his own gun, which I’d taken from his shoulder holster in the closet. Just for that night I found the strength to be my old self again—cunning and manipulative.

  Zack had been in bed, waiting for me to come out of the bathroom and join him. He was so happy to have his baby back. I could tell that he was ready for a great night. I left the bathroom and entered the bedroom wearing the purple negligee that he liked best. He flung off the covers so that I could get a good look at his rock-hard, throbbing dick.

  “Come get it, baby—come to Daddy,” he said.

  With the gun behind my back, I moved seductively toward the bed. I shot him immediately.

  Then I called the police. Told them that I’d just killed my lover. Pleaded guilty in court and was sentenced to fifteen years to life.

  I’ve told my story. To some degree it’s been a cleansing process. I now feel straight with the street. Yet I may never be straight in the eyes of God.

  COYOTE HUNT

  BY RUBEN CASTANEDA

  Mount Pleasant, N.W.

/>   Cort DeLojero sauntered past the torched police cruisers, past wary cops in full riot gear gathered in groups of four and five.

  He picked his way through hundreds of broken beer bottles strewn about the street.

  A riot cop caught the forlorn look on Cort’s face and cracked, “You missed the party.”

  Cort grimaced. He walked past a burned-out cruiser that had been driven by a deputy chief and muttered, “Goddamnit.”

  Cort was the night cops reporter for the Washington Tribune He’d spent most of the night sitting in a company sedan in a parking lot at Bethesda Naval Hospital, working a deathwatch on President George H.W. Bush.

  President Poppy was laid up with an irregular heartbeat. Night editor Chuck Ross caught the disappointment on Cort’s face when he dispatched him. Chuck had said, “Think what a big story it’ll be if the president croaks.”

  Cort had given Chuck a thin smile. They both knew that if Poppy croaked, the big guns from National would elbow them out.

  Cort had been working on his fourth magazine when Chuck paged him at 1:30 a.m. They could slam stories into the paper as late as 2:00. Cort pulled the brick-sized company cell phone from his tan canvas satchel and punched in Chuck’s number.

  Chuck ordered Cort to ditch the deathwatch and get to Mount Pleasant. “There’s been a riot. A black cop shot a Latino man, and there’s rumors the man was handcuffed. They’ve torched about a half dozen cop cars on 16th Street, near Lamont. Didn’t you hear it on the scanner?”

  Cort’s eyes flickered down to the silent black police scanner mounted under the car radio. He groaned. The riot was a guaranteed front-page story.

  Chuck sighed. “I don’t blame you. I would’ve sent you, but we needed to keep someone at the hospital.”