Authors: DC Noir
George Pelecanos (22 page)
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 each 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 fiancee, 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.
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."
Now,
with his tan canvas satchel slung over his right shoulder, Cort walked slowly,
absorbing the scene. The rain had quit, and the night was warm and humid.
To
Cort's left, two dozen spectators, mostly Latino adults, stood in front of the
faux-marble pillars at the top of the concrete steps of Sacred Heart Catholic
Church.
The
damage was concentrated in a three-block strip of 16th Street, dominated on
both sides by medium-and low-rise apartment buildings.
On
one corner, a lean, thirtyish, sandy-haired Franciscan priest in a thick brown
robe talked with a group of officers. Father Dave Lowell, a Sacred Heart
priest.
A
few months before, Cort had written a feature story on the church, focusing on
Father Dave, who'd worked at a parish in Guatemala. Cort shadowed Father Dave
as poor immigrants streamed into his office.
A
teenage girl who'd been raped by a family friend was distraught that she'd
sinned. Father Dave gently assured her she'd done nothing wrong, and convinced
her to call the police. Another woman brought in her toddler son for a special
blessing; the kid had an infected eye. Father Dave blessed the kid,
then
had a church worker drive the woman and her son to a
health clinic.
Father
Dave was the real deal. Cort had grown up in a church where the parish priest
dished out hellfire and brim-stone, when he wasn't
boozing
it up. Cort had lost touch with his faith a long time ago. But he believed in
Father Dave.
A
month after the piece ran, an old girlfriend was visiting from California when
she got word that her father had died in a car wreck. She cried all night. At
daybreak, Cort took her to see Father Dave. He spent an hour with her while
Cort waited outside the office. She emerged feeling better. Cort was grateful.
Cort
waved to Father Dave. The priest trotted over.
"Cortez,
I thought I might see you tonight. How are you?"
"Fine,
Father." He looked around. "How'd this happen?"