1 Motor City Shakedown (6 page)

“So what?
We’re both on the case
together
. I’ve run capital trials before. There’s no reason to be scared.”

She made a face
she wished he was there to see.

“Issabella?
You there?”

“I’m not scared, you jack ass,” she said.
“I’m
pissed
. At you. I told you no. More than once. Maybe you think it’s cute to go and get me assigned to this anyway, but it’s not. And maybe you can get away with an awful lot with a lot of other women. I don’t doubt that. But not every one of us accepts a charming smile as a valid excuse for ignoring what we have to say.”

She took i
n a breath and waited.

“Darren?”

“You think I’m charming.”

Issabella put her forehea
d against the steering wheel and felt the rushing anger inside her turning over on itself, becoming embarrassment.

“I don’t think you’re charming,” she
groaned. “I think you’re presumptuous, and there’s no way this is going to work.”

“Of course it will.
This isn’t rocket science, it’s a murder case. Also, guns. I read the search warrant and the evidence logs. Vernon had an impressive amount of illegal firearms in his basement. Murder and guns. How can you want out of that sort of case?”

“I think I already explained how.”

Darren’s voice dropped an octave, becoming playful and intimate, like he was right there in the passenger seat, whispering in her ear.

“If it’s too distracting
for you, I can always dial down the charm while we’re working together, Izzy.”

She sat up straight again, hung up on him, and turned her phone to ‘OFF’.

“Sorry,” she said to invisible Passenger Darren. “But we’re not open for any more embarrassment today. We are full up.”

Outside her windshield, across the street, she spied a corner
convenience store. Painted across the brick front of the building in big green letters, it said “COME ON IN”.

“Yup,” she agreed, and put the Buick in drive.
“Absolutely, yes.”

FIVE

THUMPTHUMPTHUMP.

There was a Cheeto on the carpet, right next to her hand. Issabella let out a deep, shuddering yawn and blinked to get her vision foc
used. Next to the Cheeto was an empty bottle of pinot grigio.

THUMPTHUMPTHUMP

‘Ugh. Morning. Is it morning?’

It was.
Sunlight poured in through her living room window. She rolled over and shut her eyes, burrowing into the couch cushions.

THUMPTHUMPTHUMP

“Alright!” she shouted, and rolled onto the carpet. She straightened, and felt the ache in her legs and back. She stretched cat-like, her joints popping with little firecracker noises, and yawned deeply.

THUMP
--

“Alright! I‘m coming!”

Standing on her front step was a very big woman with round, blunt features, long brown hair, black jeans, a grey short-sleeved shirt, and an expression of dour boredom. A cigarette was dangling out of her mouth.

“What?” she growled at the woma
n, leaning against the door jam and feeling too lousy for any pretense at politeness or civility. She wanted to draw a bath and fall asleep in it.

“You Izzy?” t
he woman said around the cigarette. “Darren said I should come over and get you so you two can get working.”

Issabella knew she was just standing there, not responding, but her mind felt like it was on some sort of half-speed setting. She desperately needed water and whatever medicine might make the world around her stop swaying back and forth.

“You know…
the
case
,” the woman said. “The one with the guy and the cops and the whatever? The lawyer case? The--”

“Right… the case…”

Her head felt like it was stuffed full of wet cotton.

“Yep. So
let’s get going...”

“I’m not ready to go
anywhere
.”

“Okie-dokie. I’m in that van there. You
go put your face on and let’s go, okay?”

The van was a big, full-sized thing from the ‘70s or ‘80s, with a plastic bubble sky light and running boards between the tires. It was the color
s purple and rust. On the side was a rearing unicorn with a star-burst of airbrushed points blazing out from its horn.

“Okay,” Issabella heard herself saying, not
sure yet why she was saying it. “Okay. Just give me a minute.”

The woman shrugged.

“Whatever. You take as long as you want getting pretty.”

“Right.”

“You have any coffee?”

“What? Oh. Yes. Yeah, I have coffee.”

“Great. Bring that with you after you’re all dolled up. Bar’s all out and Fletcher probably will want a few cups.”

The big woman turned away and lumbered back to the unicorn
van. She stopped half way to the van and turned around again. A long limb of ash detached from her cigarette and fell onto her generous bosom.

“Theresa Winkle, by the way.”

“Issabella.”

“Yep. Okay, you
go get put together. And don’t forget the coffee, ok?”

*

The passenger-side window wouldn’t roll down. Issabella jounced along as the van trundled its way back toward Detroit. It shuddered and quaked over each pot hole and dimple in the road. That, coupled with the cigarette smoke Theresa was blowing around the interior of the van, was threatening to pitch Issabella’s already quivering stomach over the edge. She closed her eyes and started breathing through her mouth.

“You’re Darren’s new partner, huh?”

“Not exactly.”

Theresa glanced at the sea-sick lawyer next to her. She rolled her window down and Issabella felt a rus
h of refreshing outside air on over her face. She breathed deeply and her stomach settled.

“Not partners?”

“Not partners, no.”

“Huh.
He sure seemed to think you were partners.”

“Well, we’re not.”

The big woman shrugged and scratched her chin idly.

“Then why’re you riding back with me to meet him?”

Issabella blinked and stared at the big woman next to her. Who
was
this person? She certainly wasn’t any sort of legal receptionist or office manager. Had she mentioned a bar?

Was she being taken to a
bar
?

*

Malcolm Mohommad looked up from his sketchbook long enough to spot Darnell Gimson pulling up into the parking lot of the Coney Island on Whitacker and Abdell. He recognized Darnell’s car, an old black Monte Carlo boat that the drug dealer kept in mint condition.

While Darnell crept around for a spot to park, Malcolm’s attention returned to his little corner of the restaurant. His bulk shifted in the booth as he leaned over the little girl who was plopped down next to him, sorting through the treasure trove of art supplies Malcolm had spilled out on the table.

“Have you found what you want yet?” He said.

“Uh-huh,” She nodded her head and held up a little rubber stamp. It was heart-shaped.

“Alright,” he said, not betraying the disappointment he felt inside.

Hearts were a trite symbol. Like rainbows and plus-signs and peace signs and smiley faces. Malcolm included all of those tired, cliché images among his stamps, inter-mixed with a variety of stamps that produced more refined and abstract patterns-- things like interwoven leaves, Aztec bands and other imagery that could not be readily defined as a certain “thing”, but which nevertheless left interesting marks on a page.

“Can I?” the little girl said. She was maybe nine or so, with fat almond cheeks and hair that had been straightened, ironed and chemically-burned so that it approximated a white girl’s style. Her mother occasionally glanced up from across the restaurant, smiled vaguely at Malcolm, and kept talking to whoever it was she was eating with.

“You may,” Malcolm said. He reached over and flipped open the little tin ink pad and set it in front of the girl.

Malcolm sipped at his coffee and watched as the girl took Malcolm’s sketch pad and set it on her lap. With a destructive sort of enthusiasm, the girl began to plaster little black ink hearts all over the sketch Malcolm had just finished-- a thin old man in an old tweed suit who was at the counter. Malcolm had been taken with the man’s long, irregular nose and hunched posture.

He never drew beautiful people. Beautiful, healthy people were uninteresting to him. He liked women with gigantic backsides, old people, crooked people, and ugly people. He liked to see their poverty etched into the lines of their faces, to see their weaknesses on display in their obesity or their dull, cowish eyes.

Malcolm had been frequenting this Coney Island for two decades now, and had produced thousands of sketches of what he considered to be the wretched horde of humanity—the losers and the out-of-lucks. He had filled dozens of sketch books with wasting alcoholics, war veterans with amputated limbs, crack whores, crumbling, crooked and broken souls; page upon page of hopeless expressions, defeated postures and bleak, deadened stares.

“There,” The little girl exclaimed, and set the stamp down in the ink pad with an air of finality. She smiled broadly and held the heart-stamped image up to Malcolm. “Now he’s happy.”

“Why is he happy?”

“Because he has all them hearts to protect him.”

“I see.” Malcolm said, and he carefully tore the page out of the book and handed it to the girl, “You keep that, child.”

“You don’t want it?”

Darnell had appeared in the entrance, his tall and lanky frame draped in dark silk pants and shirt. Their eyes met for a moment and Malcolm looked back down at the girl.

“No. You keep that,” he said. “Now you go on.”

She scooted out, favored him with a final beaming smile and headed off toward her mother. Malcolm remembered his disappointment that the charming child had chosen the heart stamp. Over the years, he had become a known fixture in his corner of the restaurant. And over those years, more than a handful of children had ventured over to see what the big man was drawing with his multi-colored pencils and black brush pens.

Only a small percentage of those children, when invited to add their mark to his work, had ever chosen a stamp that Malcolm approved of. Those were the sketches he didn’t let the children keep, the ones he took back home with him and continued to refine.

“Child,” he said.

She turned around.

“Tell your mother I said you have excellent manners and that you will make a fine technician of some sort.”

Her nose wrinkled and her eyes glossed over. Then she brightened, shrugged and trundled away. Darnell’s slim shape folded itself into the spot she had vacated.

Darnell was one of those stylish men who wore silk well. A slim gold chain encircled his neck and his black leather boots had zippers on the side. His long face would have looked horse-like if not for the gleam of intelligence in his eyes.

As he sat, there was a
nervous tension that radiated off him as he found himself within arm’s reach of Malcolm Mohommad. Darnell settled his hands on his lap and stared at Malcolm him warily.

Malcolm let the man sit there for a long moment, aware that Darnell was one bad vibe away from bolting like a rabbit.

“I have questions, Darnell.”

Darnell cleared his throat, gave a shallow nod of his head.

“What questions?”

Malcolm reached down and lifted a leather briefcase up on to the table. He began to gather the scattered art supplies from the table top and set them neatly into the case.

“Why this man?” he said.

“Never asked why before.”

“Never is not an answer. I’m asking now.”

Darnell looked down at his hands, considering something.

“Snitch control,” he said and looked back up into the killer’s eyes. “That’s all. Can’t be running his mouth.”

“It says nothing of that in the papers.”

“The papers? Malcolm, what the fuck are you—“

“It says he was raided by the authorities for
illegal firearms. In the papers, he is a gun smuggler. Not a snitch.”

“
I don’t follow, man. Who cares what a newspaper says? That’s just stories for white folks.”

“
Is that so?”

“It make
s a difference?” Darnell said, and this time without the meek thread of fear in his voice. This was the only thing that mattered, and the only bit of information he had to be clear about.

Malcolm snapped the briefcase shut. He folded his arms in front of him and turned his head to look fully upon the slim, stylish man next to him.

“It doesn’t matter to you?” he said.

“Ain’t my business.
And, no disrespect, but it ain’t yours neither. There’s a clock running down on this.”

“I am aware of the urgency
.”

“Then why
’re we talking about newspapers?"

Malcolm stood and eased out the other side of the booth, briefcase in hand.

“A concern,” he said.

Darnell waited, finally said “Okay, what? What’s your little worry?”

“That there is a department that wants this thing done,” Malcolm said. “This man was nearly killed by the authorities. And now I am being asked to finish what they failed to accomplish. So a question occurs to me, Darnell. I wonder if you have been breathing a name out into the air, a name you know you should always fear to speak aloud to others. I wonder if I am doing a thing not for you, but for these little paper warriors who were incapable of silencing a man. This is my worry, Darnell. And now you tell me that it is not so.”

Darnell took a long, slow breath in through his nose and heard his heart thrumming in his ears. The deadliest man he had ever known was waiting for Darnell to
make assurances that he couldn’t honestly make.

“Malcolm, that’s crazy as hell.”

“Crazy. Is that so?”

“That
’s right. This is just me and my people, man.”

The big man in the construction worker’s clothing remained rooted over Darnell for another moment, as inscrutable as stone. Then he turned and walked out of the Coney Island. Darnell watched him disappear into the gray middle distance.

‘Shit!’
he thought, anxiously fishing for the cell phone in the pocket of his slacks.

Darnell glanced superstitiously out where Malcolm had disappeared back into the crumbling blocks of Detroit. His manicured fingers started pushing numbers on the cell phone.

*

Allen’s voice was an impatient growl.

“Wait, hold on. You mean he gives a shit?”