Color of Justice

by Gary Hardwick

  Cameron smiled a little as he went into the big bedroom at the front of the house. This was his room, his sanctuary. He was going to close up for a while, take a break. Setting his own hours was one of the few things about being in this business he liked. He shoved his money into this pocket as he walked inside.

  “What the fuck—” said Cameron as he entered and saw the three young men in his room.

  Cameron reached for his gun, a 9 mm he kept in his waistband. But before he could get to it, Rimba Bady’s knife sailed into his shoulder.

  Akema then kicked Cameron in the face and he fell to the floor. Cameron felt hands over his body, searching, hitting. Finally, a foot crashed into the side of his face. He felt a rag being stuffed into his mouth as his hands were bound in front of him and he was sat upright on the floor.

  “Wha’sup?” said Muhammad. “We need to talk to you.”

  Muhammad motioned Akema to get a wastebasket that was across the room. Rimba turned on a boom box and blasted out a song by the Ruff Ry-ders. Muhammad got closer to Cameron so he could hear him.

  “Herman Bady is our father,” said Muhammad.

  Cameron’s face contorted at the sound of the name. Whatever memories he had of Herman were not good.

  “You was his cell mate in Texas,” said Muhammad. “You used to pull jobs together after you both got out, only he’d changed his name by then. You was his boy, probably had sex with him in the joint.”

  Cameron shook his head vigorously at this statement.

  “No?” said Muhammad. “Well, whatever. I know you keep in touch with him. Where is he?”

  Cameron shook his head again. Muhammad sighed, then took off Cameron’s belt and wrapped it around his left arm. He then placed Cameron’s belted arm over the wastebasket. Cameron began to struggle and shake, acknowledging that he knew what this meant.

  Muhammad took Rimba’s knife from Cameron’s shoulder and cut a deep gash in Cameron’s forearm. Cameron winced and grunted under his gag. Blood poured out of the cut, running and twisting in evil patterns through the hair on his arm. The coppery smell of it filled Muhammad’s nostrils. The blood stopped as Muhammad pulled on the belt tighter.

  “You remember this from the joint, don’t you?” said Muhammad. “The red dam? Tell me where he is or I’ll let you bleed.”

  Cameron’s eyes got bigger as he realized that they meant to kill him. He nodded his head vigorously as Muhammad took off the gag.

  “He’s here…in Detroit,” said Cameron.

  “We know that, nigga,” said Muhammad. “Where?” He loosened the belt and more blood flowed.

  “I don’t know!” yelled Cameron. His eyes rolled and Muhammad stopped the flow of blood. “Herman sent me a letter when I was locked up in Kentucky,” said Cameron. “Said he had a scam running here in the city or something like that. It came from some place in Detroit….” Cameron fell silent trying to remember.

  Muhammad pressed on Cameron’s wounded arm making it bleed faster and causing pain. Cameron yelled loudly and twisted his body.

  “What place?” asked Muhammad through gritted teeth.

  “Damn,” said Cameron. “It started with an O—Oasis! That’s it. It came from a place called Oasis.”

  “Where’s the letter?” asked Muhammad.

  “I didn’t keep the shit,” said Cameron. “It was just a letter from an ex-con.”

  “Oasis,” Muhammad said softly. “Is that all?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” said Cameron. “I swear, that’s all I know, man.”

  Muhammad pulled the belt tighter until all of the bleeding stopped. He then put the loose end into Cameron’s other hand. Cameron held it tightly and expelled a big breath.

  Muhammad stood and held out his hand. Cameron raised his bound hands, thinking Muhammad meant to help him up from the floor. Instead, Rimba handed him Cameron’s gun. Cameron’s eyes grew wider at the sight of the weapon. Rimba turned the music up full blast as Muhammad aimed the gun at Cameron’s forehead and fired.

  14

  MARSHALL

  When Danny and Erik got back to the SCU, things had become hot concerning the case. The Longs had called Jim Cole directly to complain. Oscar Stallworth had threatened legal action, while Virginia had phoned the mayor’s wife. Ever the politician, Hamilton Grace had contacted Tony Hill, the Deputy Chief, to “just say hello.” Reverend Bolt had not made a peep.

  Danny and Erik had a brief meeting with their boss, who was pleased with their work. When people complained, it meant buttons were being pushed. Still, they had very little to work with. The murders had been committed with a common weapon, and the killer’s efforts to ruin the crime scene had apparently succeeded.

  They were about to call it a night. Most of the other cops were already gone. Danny said good-bye to Erik and sat for a while looking at the case file. He listed all of the big losers in the Internet company, and even though none of them seemed like killers themselves, they all had ties to those who could have done the deed. He’d learned a long time ago that no matter how wealthy a person was, he was one cousin, one friend, one relationship away from the underbelly of life.

  “What are you doin’ up here, man?” asked a familiar voice.

  Danny looked up into the face of Marshall Jackson, his best friend. Marshall was a tall, good-looking man who had been Danny’s friend since they were kids. The two had been through hell and back investigating the assassination of Justice Farrel Douglas. Since Danny had been promoted to detective, they’d made a regular date to have a drink once a week, not wanting the demands of their jobs to become an excuse for losing contact with each other.

  “Hey, man,” said Danny. “I’m sorry. I forgot.”

  “Big-time detective ain’t got time for his boy, huh?” said Marshall.

  “Who the hell you callin’ boy,” said Danny laughing.

  Danny stood and Marshall slapped him on the back. They walked out of the SCU and outside into the evening.

  “How’s that damned new job of yours?” asked Danny.

  “Fine,” said Marshall. “And don’t say it like that. You know I couldn’t stay at the U.S. Attorney’s office, not after what happened. Private practice is more lucrative anyway. I’m making some serious money now. And I need it with the two kids.”

  “Defending criminals,” said Danny. “I still don’t believe it.”

  “The law doesn’t have good and bad guys, Danny. Get over that shit.”

  “Well, if you ever have to cross-examine me, be nice.” Danny laughed a little.

  They walked over to Fishbones, their favorite bar and eatery in Greektown. Danny barely listened as his friend talked about a recent case involving insurance fraud and a prosecutor named Jesse, who was all over him on the matter.

  “You okay, man?” asked Marshall, noticing Danny’s distracted look. “You still thinking about your mother?”

  “Yes, but it’s more than that.”

  “Look, man,” said Marshall. His voice was tense. “Your father didn’t cause her to die.”

  “I know,” said Danny. “I just have to get it out of my head. You know how I get.”

  “I know. You get stuck on something like this and you obsess. Let it go.” Marshall looked upset with himself, then added, “Look, I’m sorry, man.”

  “Don’t be. I’m working my way through it. Anyway, that’s not my only problem. I caught a bad case. The Baker murders. We’re interviewing suspects, wealthy black suspects.”

  “Uh-oh,” said Marshall. “Touching the untouchables.”

  “They all seem to be hiding something. The day ended with me getting my ass tossed out of a church.”

  “Holyland?” asked Marshall.

  “How did you know?” asked Danny.

  “The Reverend Bolt is the only minister I know who would do something like that.”

  “His helpers look like a goddamned drug crew,” said Danny.

  “They might have been,” said Marshall. “Reverend Bolt’s prison ministry is still
going strong. He gets them while they’re in the joint then gets them back on their feet when they get out. You know people suspect some of them in a killing.”

  Danny perked up at this statement. He’d been suspicious of Bolt’s assistants, but it was normal cop prejudice concerning the way they carried themselves.

  Danny and Marshall ordered a pitcher of beer and some of the restaurant’s famous alligator voodoo.

  “What’s the story?” asked Danny.

  “Well,” said Marshall, “when Reverend Bolt still had a storefront church, it got ripped off by some locals. The cops got a tip where to find the stuff, which they did, but they also found two dead bodies.”

  “And you think it was Bolt’s prison ministers?” asked Danny.

  “Nothing was ever proven. But have you ever read the stuff Bolt gives out to his people? It’s like a damned cult. He talks about being the hand of God, and the Old Testament being the way.”

  “An eye for an eye,” said Danny almost to himself.

  “Exactly,” said Marshall. “But don’t get me wrong. I think Reverend Bolt has a good heart, it’s just that he’s a hard man and the people who follow him are loyal and not too smart.”

  Marshall was always right about these things, Danny thought, so he would have to do some more checking on the reverend and his people. He was happy to know he might have been right about Bolt’s men. The real question was just how dangerous they were.

  “Thanks,” said Danny. “That was good shit. You need to get back with the good guys.”

  Marshall laughed off the joke. “So how’s Erik doing?”

  “Good. Still gettin’ used to me, though.”

  “You still seeing the shrink?”

  “Yeah, he’s into my head about the black thing.”

  “Oh, fuck that,” said Marshall. “You’re one of us, and it’s too late to change that.” Marshall took a moment then, “So how’s Vinny?”

  Danny sighed heavily. “She’s so into school that we’re starting to have problems about the shit.”

  “Dammit,” said Marshall. “I had a feeling this was coming.” Marshall looked guilty for a second then, “Vinny’s been calling me.”

  Danny was shocked, but didn’t say anything. His head filled with the usual stuff, like why didn’t Marshall tell him, and what the hell did they talk about. But Danny knew Marshall had more to say, so he didn’t want to jump all over him.

  The bartender, who was familiar with Danny and Marshall, brought the pitcher and the food. He smiled, said hello, then left.

  “At first, she had a lot of law questions,” said Marshall. “Nothing big, the normal stuff. But then she started asking about people I knew, lawyers, judges, and groups she should join. That’s when I got suspicious.”

  “Why would that make you suspicious?” asked Danny.

  “Because I know Vinny. She’s never been interested in social climbing, and all of a sudden, she’s into that legal world shit.” He sounded angry, as if he thought he could have stopped her.

  “Well, she’s all into it now,” said Danny. “And I got a feeling that I don’t fit into whatever she’s seeing for a lot of reasons.”

  Marshall took another drink of his beer. “Vinny’s long past caring that you’re white.”

  “But the world cares,” said Danny quickly, as if the response had been in his head all night. “It’s just another thing to keep us apart.”

  “Damn, I should have said something to her.” Marshall jerked his hand a little, as though he wanted to hit himself on the head.

  “Don’t blame yourself. You were just being a friend.”

  Marshall sighed, a frustrated sound that mirrored what Danny was feeling. “Well, as you know, I have experience with women trouble. I mean, I thought my loving wife had killed a girl over my little indiscretion.”

  “Man, you don’t even need to be thinking about that situation,” said Danny. “Let it die.”

  It was typical of the pair that they sacrificed for each other. Each not caring about his own pain, he tried to ease that of his friend. They’d been doing it since they were kids and neither man even noticed it anymore.

  “All I can say,” said Marshall, “is nobody understands women, especially black women. Vinny is strong like my wife, Chemin, and she’s got to work through this thing. You remember how it was when I went to law school? I was into the social step-up, the parties, the idea that I was lifting myself out of my situation.”

  “But you didn’t stop hanging out with me, did you?” asked Danny pointedly.

  “But I could have. See, it’s different for a man. I can have any kind of friend, but a woman likes to think that her man is going in the same direction as she is. She always wants him to be a little older, a little taller, a little more, you know what I’m saying?”

  “Fuck if I understand that,” said Danny with a tinge of frustration. “A person is what he is, you know. You can change the job, and the kind of clothes you wear to work, but that’s all.”

  Marshall looked at his friend, saw the face of the kid he used to be, and smiled. “You just don’t understand prejudice, do you, Danny? I guess you never did. Man, I wish you could teach that to a lot of other people I know.”

  “You remember my first day of school?” asked Danny. “Over at Davison, the old school?”

  “Never forget it. A playground full of black kids and there you were, sitting in a corner looking scared as hell.”

  “You were playing basketball with some other kids,” said Danny, taking up the tale. “I was sitting there about to shit in my pants and you came up to me and said, ‘So, you playin’ or what?’ I said yes.”

  “And I yelled out, ‘Yo, we got the white boy!’”

  The two men laughed at the memory. They eased a little now and each of them remembered why they made it a point to be together every week. A friend can get lost in the big bad world of working, striving, and living. You had to make sure you had your peace.

  “Anyway,” said Marshall, “Vinny has to work through this thing herself, and no one can do it for her. If you try to help her, she’ll accuse you of treating her like a kid. If you don’t help, she may think you don’t give a shit.”

  “I know exactly what you mean,” said Danny. “Women are a muthafucka. So I can’t win, can I?”

  “I like to think that you can’t lose. Either she wants you, or she doesn’t, and in the end, whatever she chooses will at least end the shit.”

  Danny sat there looking down at the wooden bar, knowing that this was the only person that he could be so open and vulnerable with. Everyone had to do it sometimes, and although he thought of it as a weakness, Danny knew it was also a necessity, and he felt better just being able to show how fucked up he was by all this.

  “Okay,” said Danny almost to myself. “I’ll back off of Vinny. I got my work, you know. That’ll keep my mind occupied.”

  “I’m not finished yet,” said Marshall with a sternness in his voice that reminded Danny of his father. “You’ve always loved Vinny because she was a lot like you, and it made your life easier.”

  “Oh, that’s bullshit, man,” said Danny, but even as the words came out, he knew what Marshall said was true.

  “You don’t like complicated relationships,” said Marshall. “Our relationship is about as complex as you’ve ever had. So, what I’m saying is don’t be afraid. I may not understand everything about women, but I do know that when a woman grows, things change, and you have to deal with it. They make you work at being better and sometimes you can’t see it. And us men, we don’t like being told how to act, because it makes us feel like less of a man. It’s the way it has to be. Men have been going through this shit since they were living in caves and eating wild animals for dinner. Let it be, man. And you’ll be better off for it.”

  Danny nodded, although he admitted to himself he didn’t understand all of it. Marshall was the kind of man who spoke in simple words, but they carried depth, nonetheless. No one knew Danny be
tter than this man, so he would heed his words because he knew they came from the heart.

  The two friends hoisted another round and told more stories about their coming of age together. Better days, thought Danny. The old days always seemed like better ones for some reason.

  Danny let go of his concerns about Vinny, but those thoughts were soon replaced by images of all the people who had good reason to kill the Bakers.

  15

  FLOATER

  The Sewer was loud with laughter as Danny walked in. He’d just come from Vice, where he’d been trying to get some info on John Baker’s hooker friend. The Vice cops helped narrow it down to a couple of dozen girls who frequented the part of town that Baker lived in. They promised to put the word out on the street. Danny had figured that it wouldn’t be easy to find the girl. The woman was probably smart enough to know that her man had been killed, and if that was the case, she might have gotten spooked and gone to another state by now.

  The laughter he heard came from some of the cops who were assembled and listening as Lisa Meadows told a story. Some clerical people were there as well as a couple of uniformed cops. Danny drifted over to see what was going on.

  “Wha’sup?” Danny asked Erik.

  “You missed it,” said Erik.

  “Tell it again, Lis,” said Joe Canelli, a husky Italian cop. He was still laughing when he asked her.

  “You do it this time, Gretch,” said Lisa to her partner, Gretchen Taylor. Lisa’s Brooklyn accent was still detectable even after years of living in the Midwest.

  “Okay,” said Gretchen. “Lisa and me got a call that someone had a tip on that serial rapist working the west side, right? So, we go to this house and we hear a man screaming and something hitting the walls like this—” Gretchen rocked a desk. “‘Go, go, go!’ he screamed.”

  The other officers who had heard the story laughed a little at this, knowing where it was going.

  “So we kick in the door, pull out our guns, and identify ourselves as cops,” said Gretchen. “Well, what should we see but a man bent over a chair with his wife…”