by Leila Lacey
Marcus wrapped his arms around her, pulling her into a hug as he leaned down and whispered, “You, my lady, are going to have to trust me. I promise I will take care of it.”
Peering up into his eyes, Alena knew from that day on, Marcus would always keep his promises to her.
Two days later, Marcus, his mother and father knocked on her parent’s front door and asked to talk with Alena and her parents.
They’d all adjourned into the family room where Marcus formally asked her mother and father to date her, one year early. He’d promised to never be a distraction to her studies but to be a help if he could, to treat her with nothing but love, respect and kindness. To take her on real dates where he came to the door to pick her up with flowers and take her to a meal and maybe a movie if she would like.
After about an hour of discussion, where Alena’s mother and father grilled him like he was a member of Al- Qaeda, they agreed to let them date on a probationary basis for the rest of the school year. But if there were any issues at all, they would be forced to break up and Alena would be placed in an all-girls school.
That’d been the start of the most magical love affair any two people could have.
* * * *
A month before their wedding…
“Ugh! I can’t take this wedding stuff anymore Marcus!” Alena said slamming the sharpie she’d been using down on the table. She’d been working for the last two hours on their seating chart for the wedding planner. She needed to have it ready for her by tomorrow. This would be the simplest of tasks, if not for both of their families.
Both of their mothers wanted to take control and neither of them knew what the word compromise meant.
She’d been trying her hardest to make both of them happy, wanting to make their wedding a blessed event, merging their two families.
Instead, it’d been fight after fight over everything, the location, the flowers and the bridesmaid’s dresses…all of it.
“What seems to be the problem baby?” Marcus asked walking up behind and Alena putting his arms around her.
“I can’t deal with all of this who is more important nonsense our parents are pulling. This wedding is supposed to be about us and our love. Instead, they have managed to make it about them. I just wish we could go to the court house, get married and move on.”
Turning Alena around in his arms, so he could look into her eyes, he asked, “Why don’t we?”
“Why don’t we what?” She peered up at him like he’d lost his mind.
“Why don’t we go to the courthouse tomorrow and get married?”
“What? Have you lost your mind?” she asked him while feeling shocked. “First of all, BOTH our mothers will kill us. Next, our families won’t get to share in our joy! I don’t want to sneak off like I’m ashamed of us Marcus.”
“No baby, that’s not what it means.” He took her hand leading her to the couch. “Listen, I’m with you, this has all become about them and not us. This isn’t the memory I want us to have of the day we become a family. So, why don’t we go to the courthouse and get married, just you and me? Then we can still let our family have their wedding but we will have the memory of the day we actually got married. So, no matter how truly ignorant our families act, it won’t faze us at all”
“Really? You would do that for me?” she said surprised. She knew he wanted to please his family just as much as she wanted to please hers, only she’d finally gotten to the point she didn’t care what made her family happy, mostly because it was next to impossible. She needed to do what gave her a peace of mind. Marcus however, was a pleaser to his core.
Unfortunately, with trying to please everyone, most times, someone always got the short end of the stick. In his case, it was always him. Just like with his brother, he was always setting aside his life to go and help Jeffery with his problems.
As if Marcus knew her thoughts, he shook his head. “Baby, I know it frustrates you how my mom is always calling on me to fix Jeff’s problems. He is my brother and I don’t know how to just abandon him. But YOU, you are going to be my wife. The mother of my children and there is no one in this world more important to me than you are. I absolutely would do anything to make you happy!”
Jumping out of his lap while clapping a squealing Alena shouted, “Yes, Yes!” to his proposal of getting married at the courthouse.
After spending the next three hours making love in front of the fireplace cementing their love for one another. Alena and Marcus started making calls to set up their wedding day.
Four days later, Alena, Marcus, Jeffrey and Vanessa stood in the Lesko County courthouse and said their vows. Marcus wore a Steel Gray oxford suit with a satin yellow tie and his grandfather’s cufflinks.
Vanessa got Alena a bouquet of yellow and white roses, then a yellow rose boutonniere for Marcus. Jeffrey showed up high and tried to get Marcus to smoke some marijuana with him before the ceremony.
Alena expected it to be a cold and impersonal experience, but it’d been anything but. Her father played golf with the mayor, so Vanessa called him and told him what they wanted to do and he agreed to marry them in his office, rather than them waiting in a long line of people who would be trying to get married by the judge
Mayor Ted Bennett office was warm and inviting. His executive assistant got several bouquets of sunflowers and strategically placed them around the room.
Alena and Marcus stood facing each other, holding hands as they recited their vows. Promising to love, honor and protect each other until death did them part.
After the ceremony Alena was so happy, she started to cry.
“Baby what’s wrong?” Marcus asked her. He wanted this day to be one she cherished for the rest of her life. Now, they’d said there vows and she was crying. He hoped they were tears of happiness.
“Nothing, Nothing,” she said shaking her head and swiping at tears.
“Well, I may be high, but I’m pretty sure tears are bad!” Jeffrey said.
“Come on Cheech, let’s give them a minute in private,” Vanessa said grabbing Jeffrey’s arm and pulling him into the hall.
“What’s wrong?” Marcus asked her again.
“Nothing! I’m so happy I’m your wife. Today, I married the man of my dreams. I am so happy I could burst!” She smiled as she jumped into his arms. “Thank you so much for doing this for me,” she whispered as she kissed him.
“Anything for my…wife,” he said kissing her back. “Come on Mrs. Banner, let’s go eat.”
CHAPTER THREE
A month after the shooting…
Deputy Sheriff Seth Hale is the oldest son of Captain Steven Hale. He came from a long line of police officers. His younger brother, father, grandfathers and father’s brothers were all cops on one force or another.
He joined the force to protect and serve in his community. He wanted to make his family proud. Seth got the opportunity very quickly to join the drug unit of the sheriff’s department. Being the new guy on the squad, he was hazed like anyone else and wanted to prove himself, he believed these men were also his brothers and had his back.
Anyone who saw Seth in uniform said he was born to be a cop. At six foot four inches with dark brown hair, he kept in a close neat cut. With blue eyes, and a muscular physic, Seth could bench press two hundred and fifty pounds without breaking a sweat. He practiced martial arts so he wouldn’t need his gun to deal with every situation. In his youth, he volunteered at the neighborhood YMCA teaching young boys the fundamentals of football and soccer. He always enjoyed soccer, basketball and football. He liked working with the kids. They are our future and the most honest human beings you could ever meet.
Seth always thought if you wanted to know how you look in an outfit you’re wearing…ask a kid. Good, bad or ugly, they will tell you the truth.
Seth was born and raised in Southdale Texas on the north side of town and didn’t know much about black people. He hadn’t gone to school with more than two or three which made it as if they weren�
�t even there. Which meant he’d never taken the time to get to know any of them.
From what he’d heard from his father and uncle’s arrest stories, most blacks had broken the law or knew someone who had. So, he’d always relied on his P&Q’s on his beat, right out of the academy and when he patrolled in the black community.
He didn’t think of himself as a racist. He felt he was realistic. Seth firmly believed not everything was racial in this world and some blacks looked to lean on the racial profiling excuse too often to cover up their crimes, mistakes and failures—until eight weeks ago, when he shot and killed a man for the first time.
Seth was sitting in the locker room at the station house waiting to talk to his boss and the Internal Affairs officer who’d investigated the shooting.
He’d finally gotten a friend of his in the IA division to give him a copy of the file about the shooting, and felt sick to his stomach while reading it.
The more he read, the more he realized he’d killed a man in cold blood. He and his partner were on a late night stake out of a known drug house in the south part of Southdale.
They’d seen a BMW X6 xDrive50i pull up to the house. A young black male got out and went inside. He stayed inside for ten minutes before leaving the house supporting another man who was obviously impaired.
As the men climbed in the car and drove off, Seth’s partner Master Trooper, Jon Maddox decided, they needed to follow them for a little while to see where they were going, and then do a routine traffic stop.
Maddox was Seth’s boss and partner in the drug unit. He came from a long line of cops too, who are definitely racist. Since the rising of the KKK, the Maddox family had always had more than one man on the police force. And boy, did they have some tales of killing niggers in the line of duty.
Today, Maddox locked up and or killed as many niggers as he put it, as he could and being in charge of the drug unit, he knew he would get a lot of them. Dead or deader was his motto.
When they’d pulled the car over, Jon sent Seth ahead while he stayed back from the vehicle.
Calling out to the men in the vehicle, “Driver turn off the engine!”
Both driver and passenger reached both hands out the window.
Next, he called out, “Open your door and step out with both hands above your head!”
Seth knew things were bad when Maddox didn’t want to get his license and registration to run a check. But Seth figured he knew more than he did.
As the driver stepped out but the passenger didn’t, he repeated the instructions to the passenger who still did not respond.
When the driver looked over his shoulder, something he saw made him turn back toward the car.
Maddox yelled stop and before getting those words out completely, he followed with, “Gun! Shoot!”
Seth drew his gun and he, Maddox, one of the officers from the backup car fired fifteen shots into the driver. He’d immediately run to try and help the driver but Jon had pulled him away telling him it was a good shoot and to not touch the driver.
Seth knew it was his conscience which immediately, told him to do so. Now looking through the file, he knew for sure it was.
IA had discovered the driver turned back to the vehicle because he realized the passenger was seizing from an OD and he needed help. The driver and the passenger were siblings. IA had also discovered there was no weapon in the car or on either of its passengers. However, the shooting was justified because it was a ‘reasonable assumption’ on the part of the officers that the driver could be going for a weapon.
Seth stood up and punched the locker in front of him over and over, until he heard Maddox call is name.
“What the hell are you doing man?” he said as he rounded the corner and saw Seth with his fists red and swollen with his head leaned against the locker.
“Nothing,” Seth said breathlessly. Looking away, he asked, “Is it time for the meeting?”
“Nah, I can give you the good news here. You are back on full duty!” Maddox said smiling.
Seth looked at the ceiling to prevent him from seeing the tears of shame in his eyes.
“What’s up man? I thought you would be happier?” Maddox asked while hitting his arm.
“What is there to be happy about? I killed a man for no reason,” Seth replied.
“Aww, come on man! You put a dog out of his misery, you prevented him from becoming the father to six or seven other nigger babies,” his partner sneered while pushing him against the locker.
Seth put his forearm in Jon’s throat. “What the hell is wrong with you? We killed a man out there!” Seth shouted as they stood nose to nose with each other.
Pushing him back, Maddox charged Seth.
A couple of other officers came in a pulled them apart.
Pushing away from the black cop holding him, Maddox seethed, “Don’t you ever put your hands on me boy!” Then he turned to Seth. “You just remember who pumped ten of the fifteen shots into that niggra. I didn’t kill anyone Seth, You did!” he yelled on his way out the door.
Seth grabbed his jacket, gun, badge along with the file and went into his Captains office without knocking.
“Well, I see you’re so happy about going back to work that you forgot your manners boy,” his captain said while sitting back in his chair.
Seth took his gun out of the holster, took the magazine out of it and placed them on his desk along with his badge. “I quit.”
“Ohhh...Come on son, put your badge away. Don’t be so dramatic.”
“I killed a man, I killed him and I took him from his family because we overreacted because of the color of his skin. That is not the kind of cop I want to be!” he yelled.
“You’re gonna throw away a career and all you’ve worked hard for over some dumb black guy who should have followed orders!” his captain yelled. “You didn’t know if he had a gun. He could have killed you and your partner!”
Seth shook his head, hanging it low. Then he raised his gaze to stare at his Captain. “I didn’t bother to find out if he even had a weapon either.” He turned and walked—he never looked back.
* * * *
Two Years Before The shooting….
“Maddox, I’m pretty sure that family is not running drugs in the court house in a wedding dress,” Seth said to his partner.
Seth and Maddox had been following Jeffrey Banner around for six months now. Maddox claiming he felt sure he was a drug kingpin. Instead of an addict with a very influential and wealthy family. Seth had serious doubts, as a matter of fact, after looking into some of Maddox’s arrests of ‘high ranking’ drug dealers, eighteen out of twenty of them were addicts Maddox caught with drugs on them and he’d built a case of lies, based on following them around to know their habits.
Seth had put in to be transferred the day after he realized his partner was a dirty cop, rather than report what he found. Something told him there would be no changes on Maddox and he would be known as a snitch. Transferring was his only option, if he didn’t want to ruin his career…If the department would even give him one.
Maddox glanced at Seth out of the corner of his eye. “Yeah, and I bet you think those two fat, black bitches look nice right?” he said nastily.
“All I am saying is I don’t think the guy is anything but an addict. I bet if we stopped him now, we would find some smack on him. Just arrest him for what he actually has done and get him behind bars. So, we can take on some real cases,” Seth said in anger. He was tired of all of his racist talk and bullshit.
“You look here, boy. Do you think those niggers would give one moment consideration to putting a bullet in your head? Or, your precious little brother? Those niggers are animals and if they are breathing, they are breaking the law. Now, I don’t know what kind of liberal house you grew up in, but I come from a family of red blooded Americans who will not abide by those people ruining our country!”
“And I come from a family of cops and Christians, people who have served this country honorabl
y. I AM an American and I don’t need to try and frame some junkie to get him behind bars for shit he didn’t do, to better my career. I’m not going to hell for anyone!” Seth yelled back.
“Yeah, I will remember to tell your family that when they are standing at your graveside, you little pussy!” Maddox sneered in disgust. “Now, being I am YOUR superior officer, you will do what I say or resign!” Maddox waited until their car pulled out into the street and flipped his light on to pull them over. After driving a block, both Seth and Maddox got out of the car and approached the vehicle.
Only the Jeffrey guy wasn’t driving, the other gentleman he’d come out of the mayor’s office with was behind the wheel. “What seems to be the problem officer?” he asked Maddox.
“License and registration sir,” Maddox said to him
The driver started to pull his wallet out saying, “I know I signaled and I didn’t get a chance for my speed to get up to more than twenty. What is it that I did wrong?”
“You don’t ask the questions boy, I do. License and registration,” Maddox replied.
The driver stopped trying to pull his license out and looked at Maddox. “First of all, my name is Marcus, not boy. And I hate to be a problem, but I happen to be a citizen who knows his rights. Therefore, I know you can’t pull me over without cause. I also know you must tell me what that cause is. If you feel like you don’t have to tell me why you pulled me over, I can refer you to my attorney who would be glad to hear your explanation as an officer of the court. So, I ask again, before I dial my attorney on speed dial…What seems to be the problem, officer?
“Now, you have pissed me off boy. Get out of the car!” Maddox yelled trying to open Marcus’ door, but it was locked.
Marcus looked over to the woman passenger and handed her the phone. “Alena, call the lawyer and put him on speaker phone. Vanessa?” he spoke to the other woman sitting in the back, “Pull out your cell and start recording”
