A few moments later, they were running around after one another in the vast backyard. Zachary was having a heck of a time kicking a ball in a straight line. It was one of the few things he wasn’t advanced at.
“Okay, now wait.” Xzion raced to his side and held the ball out. “You must’ve gotten this poor coordination from your mother’s side,” he teased.
Zachary grunted and kicked as hard as his little body would allow. The orange kickball went airborne, flying wild like birds in the skies. Zachary went after the thing, but it was too late. As it descended from the air, a man in an unzipped black leather coat, white shirt, slouchy jeans and white sneakers caught the ball. The man’s skin glistened under the sunlight, and his dark sunglasses picked up the reflection of the trees. Feeling a surge of anxiety, Xzion shot a look towards Zachary. Before he could boot up his eye, the man dropped the ball, brandished a gun and pulled the child towards him.
“Hello, Mr. Khrome. This has been a long time comin’. All of my patience has finally paid off.”
“Who are you and what the hell do you want?”
“Yeah, let’s discuss that. I think we need to have a talk. Get the fuck in this goddamn house.” The man waved the gun towards the unlocked side door. “This is a visit that is long overdue…”
****
All Xzion could think about was that if he made the wrong damn move, his son could get killed. His whole world was cradled in a stranger’s arms who was now marching him into his house at gunpoint, his child a hostage, as they were escorted into his own living room. He didn’t care about getting shot, but the gun could be turned on Zachary, and that would have an entirely different outcome. Zachary wasn’t protected from bullets. It would be the end of his little boy…
All of the things he could’ve done to turn this situation in his favor were no longer a viable option and he’d never felt so paralyzed in all of his life. Not even an attempted mind control would work, for as the man slipped into a trance, the gun could go off. It was entirely too risky.
“Sit down,” the man commanded, still cradling the child to his chest with one hand and brandishing the gun with the other. He pointed in the direction of a Lazy Boy chair near an end table with two family photos atop it. Xzion did as told and, in the quiet of his internal confines, scanned the man from head to toe:
Lorenzo Carter, thirty-two, 6’2, 205 lbs., currently carrying two weapons: Beretta 92 and .45 ACP semi-automatic pistol.
“Now, I’m not one to waste a lot of time paddy cakin’.” The man’s dull, dark brown eyes scanned the room, then landed on the family photos. “Oh, so you uh family man?” He laughed, squeezing Zachary a bit tighter. The toddler wiggled in the monster’s grip, forcing the man to tug at him and push his body tighter and higher to his own. Zachary emitted a soft uncomfortable moan.
“Yeah…this your boy, huh? You gotta family, yeah…” The guy smirked. “That’s real interesting, because you been tearin’ up peoples’ families for a long ass time. I know all about you, ‘XXX Killer’…”
Xzion felt his insides warming. He wracked his mind thinking of things he could do…options. He panicked a bit more at the thought of Jayme coming through that door, her arms full of groceries and a man taken off guard, blasting her away.
“You like to cut people up, then brand ’em. You are a real sick fucker, you know that?” The man moved about the room, looking at the artwork then back at Xzion. “Before I kill you, I want to get some things straight and don’t get any ideas or a bullet will go in this little son of a bitch’s head first. Don’t believe me? Just try it.”
Xzion looked into the demon’s eyes and could plainly see he wasn’t calling any bluff. He’d done this shit before, and the fact that a child was involved proved to be no motivation for a meeting of the minds.
“Almost three years ago, you took someone important away from me. His name was Lewis Carter.”
Oh my God. Preacher…the club where I first saw Jayme…
“All over the news, for years, reports rolled out about some mad man killin’ drug dealers and anyone in his way! These were people!” Spit sprayed out of the man’s mouth as his anger reached new heights. “And here you are, no doubt in police and government protection; you were probably hired by them! Makes sense to me. I’ve been watching you, tailing you for the past few days and I finally got my chance. You get to be out in your damned yard, playin’ ball ’nd shit with your son but Preacher’s kids’ Daddy dead, man! All because of you!”
Xzion remained motionless and clasped his hands. He kept his eye on the man, waiting for a moment — any moment would do — when he could get his son away from him and put an end to this once and for all.
Just then, the faint sound of the front door opening was caught by Xzion’s acute hearing. He leaned over, ever so slightly, his heart beating a bit faster as each half second passed.
“I know you two better not be still playing that Halo mess!” Jayme called out. A crinkling noise followed from the bags more than likely hanging over her wrists. “I’m cooking tonight, Xzion. We can watch a good movie, too. Damn it feels good to be off today. The lady in the deli told me to tell you, ‘hello.’ You have quite a fan base in the butcher area, too.” She chuckled.
Lorenzo stood there with a smirk on his face and his hand wrapped tightly around the little boy’s mouth. He backed away until he was hidden by a partition. “Say one goddamn word, and I promise you, I’ll put a bullet so deep in his skull it will take a shovel to dig it out,” he whispered.
Xzion swallowed and waited for what felt like an eternity as Jayme made her way down the long hallway. As she took step after step, Lorenzo got into position then leapt out, causing her to shriek and scream as he held her tight around her waist. Jayme fought, trying her damndest to knee him. She twisted in his grip, smacked and pulled.
In the commotion, Zachary managed to slide out of his grip and run straight towards his father after the man pushed him harshly in the back. Xzion shot up from his seat and took the boy in his embrace, but then looked at Lorenzo who now held his wife…Jayme. Her eyes glared at the man but then, she seemed to relax a little. Her chest heaved up and down, but her eyes…yes, they were all knowing, as if she knew this son of a bitch.
Lorenzo waved the gun at him, tipping the nose diagonally as he sneered, his hatred for him so clear in his eyes. “Sit the fuck back down! Nobody told your raggedy ass to stand the fuck up! Now, I got your woman! Look at this shit!” His voice had a rasp to it, a note of exasperation. Jayme seemed to be struggling to breathe as his grip tightened around her throat. She started to reach for her back pocket but Xzion gave a subtle shake of the head in a silent, ‘No.’ He couldn’t let her take that chance. Zachary sobbed on his father’s lap, cradled close like the fearful child that he was.
The intruder trailed eyes to another photo in the room. “Your woman is a goddamn cop! You out here fuckin’ people up on a daily basis, and you’re married to Baltimore’s finest! I should kill this bitch just for that alone!” He twisted his arm around Jayme’s head, putting her in a death grip.
“Lo---renzo!” she gurgled, barely able to talk. He whipped around, his eyes wild and crazed.
“How tha fuck do you know my damn name, goddamn it?!” He loosened his grip so she could speak, and pointed the gun at her head.
Jayme briefly closed her eyes, exhaled loudly and took a deep breath.
“I grew up, with your brothers, Lorenzo…and I remember you. You were young, but I remember you.” She coughed. It was evident by the way the man’s body tensed, he wasn’t prepared for this turn of events. Xzion remained quiet, waiting for his chance to destroy this fucker who was terrifying his family…but Jayme was still in his grip. He had to wait it out…
“I went to school with Preacher and Justice… My name is Jayme, my last name was Knight. I remember when you left, too and…” She shot Xzion a glance. “I remember when Preacher died.”
“And here you are, fuckin’ the man that killed my b
rother! You ’sposed to be a damn police officer. You’re supposed to protect the public ’nd shit, and you here wettin’ this killer’s dick and wearin’ his ring and havin’ his damn babies! Ain’t that some shit?!”
“No…no…You don’t understand.”
“No, I understand quite damn well, bitch! I see the pictures. I can see that this little bastard looks just like you and that mothafucka sittin’ right over there! But most importantly, I understand I’ve been chasing this fool for a damn eternity, and that I had to leave my family, the family I never got to see, because I had caught a damn case. And then, when I finally get a chance to spend some time with my brother, this man took him away!” He turned the gun back in Xzion’s direction, but this time, his hand trembled.
“So…you are here to try to avenge Preacher’s death? This won’t bring him back, Lorenzo!”
“What are you? A grief counselor?” He yanked her neck hard, making her grunt. “You can save all that shit. Not the point. This is a little street justice. You of all people should know that, Officer Khrome.” He scoffed as he glanced at a plaque she’d received with her name on it. “I was in New York, being treated like shit, away from the only two mothafuckas that gave a damn about me, Preacher and Justice.” He twisted her body as he turned back to glare at Xzion. He clicked his gun. “Enough of this shit!”
“No!” Jayme shouted. “Wait, please! You think…you think Preacher cared about you. He didn’t!”
“What the fuck are you talking about? You don’t even know me to say some shit like that! Quit stallin’.”
“No! I’m serious.” She gulped as he squeezed her tighter. “You didn’t kill that boy, Lorenzo! Preacher did, and he let you take the rap!”
“What the hell are you talking about? I was right there! Some shit had went down; we were all standing around and I shot the gun and the boy ended up dead. The police were after me and everything! You gotta come betta than that, bitch!”
“No, I’m telling the truth, I swear. But you didn’t stay long enough to find out what the police found out, Lorenzo! I have the case, and I remember because everyone wanted to know where you went and after Preacher was killed, all of his charges, including that one, came up! You were ruled out, and for the longest, the police didn’t know who did it. It was a cold case but then…then after Preacher died, new evidence was submitted. People were afraid to tell the truth while he was alive, but they did after his death. He bragged about it, Lorenzo! Bragged, while you stayed hidden and on the run.”
The man’s mellow yellow complexion turned ashen as Jayme continued to beg for her life, not in a literal sense, but with compelling, true information…
“The bullet wasn’t from your gun…you didn’t hit that thirteen year old! The bullet was from Preacher’s gun — the department did ballistics and everything on the bullet lodged in the kid. If you don’t believe me, I can show you the damn report right now!” Her voice shook. “Preacher didn’t give a damn about you, Lorenzo! He let you stay up in New York, ’cause he wanted you to feel bad, and he hated you. I don’t know why he hated you, but he did. He was happy you were gone!”
Xzion couldn’t read minds, but if he were a betting man, he’d put everything on Lorenzo’s suddenly turning green about the face and his silence as a sign that his world had just been shattered.
“And he stopped Justice from telling you the truth. I know, because I had just become a cop when Justice was brought in for selling dope. I pulled up his records and asked him about that case. Rumors swirled, but we never had any concrete evidence. I told him we could close that case against his brother, that being you, if we could find you. He wouldn’t admit to anything at first, but then he told me that your mother and Preacher didn’t want you coming home, and you were better off where you were. He tried to send for you, and Preacher had stopped him. Look, Lorenzo, I don’t know what type of family stuff you had going on, but you were the fall guy…that’s not love! The man you revered set…you…up!”
“Nah!” Lorenzo seemed to come to life again. “I don’t believe that shit! You just makin’ this shit up!”
“I can verify it. Just let me prove it to you!” Jayme implored, her voice cracking as she glanced at her son balled up in Xzion’s lap.
Lorenzo was breathing heavy now, sweat dripping off of his face. He teetered from foot to foot, the gun still pointed at her head as he nervously rocked back and forth with the woman.
“Lorenzo, you gotta believe me. Preacher wasn’t who you thought he was. I can go right to my computer and have one of my men send me the file electronically. I can have it in less than five minutes! Please! Let me show you, Lorenzo. I’m not lying!”
****
Ten minutes later Lorenzo realized his entire life had been a lie.
He scratched his nose with his thumb, leaned back on the couch and kept that gun pointed at Jayme’s head. He knew now, he couldn’t kill her — she didn’t have shit to do with this — but his struggle continued. His third eye had failed him. The realization hit him like a sledgehammer. He felt he could read people, understand them at their basic level, yet somehow or another, he knew nothing at all. He looked at that man sitting across from him with that little boy and wondered… What if he had been loved like that? Could his life have been different? What if he had a father who protected him, and a mother who loved her child as much as Jayme seemed to love her son.
He was clueless as to why this man had killed drug dealers all around the country — shit, the world — and he may never know or understand it, but it didn’t even matter anymore. Preacher had been his entire life. When their mama showed she didn’t give a shit about him, Preacher stepped up and showed him love. He had no idea that Preacher hated him even more than Mama did…
His entire life, he revered the man, loved him. Preacher had been his teacher, surrogate father and big brother all rolled into one. Now, some of the odd phone calls with Justice made sense. Justice would say things like, “Keep yo’ head up, man. You ain’t what you think you are…” Real cryptic shit. There was even a rumor that Preacher had killed Justice over some bullshit. He had never given it any real thought or validation…until now. Had Preacher been that bad seed monster he was portrayed as? Apparently so…even his whores told him stories of the man beating, raping, then beating them again, sometimes simultaneously. That was the thing he couldn’t get down with –— that sort of abuse of one’s power. Nevertheless, Lorenzo had risen above the odds, he’d made something of himself, or had he?
Sometimes, in a drunken stupor, he’d think about how his mama hated him, and how he enjoyed seeing those women out in the cold, selling pussy and not giving a shit about themselves. It felt good to play ‘God’, to twist a person’s world up so tight, they delighted in selling their damned bodies on a mothafucka’s behalf. None of it meant shit. It never gave him the full satisfaction he craved. He wanted it to be her… He wished he could have pimped his own mama, put her out on the stroll and made her bring him trap money as a final act of sweet revenge. It wasn’t his fault he’d been conceived. It wasn’t his fault he looked the way he did. It wasn’t his fault that none of this shit happened, but he still felt responsible. Somewhere deep inside, he believed he was the root of why everyone’s life had spiraled out of control. He also realized he’d been pimping himself this entire time. He sold himself a heavy bag of lies, and when he opened that shit up expecting to see bright, sparkling things, all he found inside were rocks, hard knocks and a mirror for him to look into and see the fuck-up he truly was.
If he’d just been Mink’s son, none of this would’ve happened. Mama would’ve loved him; he would have finally gotten that kiss of approval that he raced around chasing for so damn long.
He didn’t care that he had the finest prostitutes in all of Baltimore. He didn’t concern himself with any of it — the money, the respect he got on the street, all of his nice cribs, the way young boys looked up to him and women wanted to choose him. The only woman he cared about wanting
him was his mama, and now she was dead — it was too late. She went to her grave hating his yellow guts.
He smiled, glanced at Jayme and Xzion, then placed the gun inside of his mouth.
“Here I come, Mama. Maybe you will choose me now…”
“Lorenzo! Noooooooooo!” was all he heard the pretty cop say. Then, he felt immense pressure and pain in his skull as he pulled the trigger, but soon…he felt nothing more at all.
All the pain was gone. No more need to hustle. No more need to struggle. No more need to prove one’s worth. It was finally over, FOREVER…
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“Well it’s about time!” Mrs. Knight moved about her dining room, until she’d placed the crystal punch bowl filled with a sweet, red liquid exactly where she wanted. Xzion had only been to his in-laws’ house a few times, and each time was an adventure.
“Mama, these things take time though. Nevertheless, I appreciate your support.” Jayme hugged her mother and kissed her on the cheek.
“They should have promoted you a long time ago. Better late than never, I suppose. We’ve been planning this party for you for months. But you’ve been so hard to get a hold of as of late. Glad you could finally stop by and give your mama a little time.” Her mother set a coffee cup at the head chair of the table. The woman proudly clasped her hands together, reviewing her handiwork. “Okay, your father should be down soon.” She started to head into the kitchen.
Jayme stopped her. “Mom, before you go, I want to thank you again for this. It is really sweet.” The muted chatter of people in the adjoining rooms grew a bit louder.
Her mother winked and blew her a kiss before walking away, an empty tray in her hands. Jayme stood there alone for a while, holding herself. It was good to be out of house. It had taken a while for her to get over that young man blowing his brains out in their living room. It took even longer for her to not believe that Zachary wasn’t suffering. She was a mother and all she wanted, more than anything, was to help her son somehow ‘unsee’ what he’d witnessed…
The Tale of the Blood Diamond Page 33
