Pure Hate (19 page)

James shook his head in amazement and
chuckled, thinking about how he was turned down at Sears for six hundred
dollars of credit to buy a refrigerator.

“Cooper was a long way from a street prostitute.
Before he died, he was working for an escort company that specialized in
creative fantasy experiences. The place was perfectly legal. They even filed
taxes,” Vargas said.

“Let me guess. Cooper’s particular specialty
involved bullwhips and cattle prods? Creative fantasy experience,” James
laughed.

“Cooper was pulling down about five thousand a
night.”

“Five Thousand! Dollars? Some rich faggot pays
this guy what . . . a thousand dollars a pop just so he can beat the shit out of
him? What the fuck is wrong with this world?”

“The dude who ran the place said it was all
pretty mild, no real sadistic stuff, and there was absolutely no sex. All those
scars and bruises must have come from Cooper’s personal life.”

“Like he’s going to admit that he has guys coming
to him, paying for violent sex,” James barked.

“Okay, so what happened to the cards?” Captain
Kelly interrupted.

“You think Malcolm took them?” James
asked, hopeful but skeptical.

“This morning we ran his Visa and
American Express cards and they’ve been used twice since Cooper’s murder and
guess what the purchases were?” Vargas asked, drawing it out like a good joke,
building the suspense, waiting to spring the punch line.

“What?” the Captain asked.

“Someone spent close to five thousand dollars at
Kran Brothers on Seventh and South. You know that fancy menswear shop? I called
down there and they said a tall, bald, black guy came in and bought one black
Armani suit two days ago and then just this morning he came in and bought a
Hugo Boss suit, size fifty-two extra-long, and a pair of black, lizard skin
Stacy Adams, size fifteen.”

“Mu-tha-fucker. I just can’t believe the balls on
this sonuvabitch! He kills a cop one day and then goes shopping the next? We
just can’t be as stupid as this guy thinks we are!” James threw his hands up in
exasperation.

“You mean to tell me this bastard’s picture is
all over the news and nobody in the store recognized him?”

“I asked them that, too. The two old Italian guys
that work there, they own the place, they said they work all day and when they
get home they’re too tired to watch TV. Said they knew there was some guy out
there killing people, but they had no idea what he looked like.”

“Yeah, and they were probably in too much of a
hurry to sell one of their expensive-ass, over-priced suits to worry about
little things like getting an ID with that credit card. Do you really buy that
they didn’t know Malcolm’s description? A six-foot black vampire? His
description has been getting as much attention as the murders themselves!”

“Do you think he’ll use the cards again?” Captain
Kelly asked.

James bit his lip hard, trying not to
scream. He stalked back and forth like a panther in a cage. The captain was
staring at him. Detective Vargas was staring at him, too.

Fuck ‘em both
, James thought.

“Uh . . . I don’t know. I mean he’s a cocky
enough but he’s not stupid, either. I’m sure he knew he was taking a risk
buying that suit. I can’t see why he even did it. It would be crazy for him to
try it again.”

“Malcolm ain’t crazy. He wants us to think he is.
But he ain’t crazy. He’s just bad, just fuckin’ evil.” Spit flew from his lips
as James spoke. Suddenly self-conscious, he wiped his mouth with his sweaty
hand wrap and fell silent again.

Captain Kelly turned away from James and looked
at Detective Vargas.

“What the hell are you wearing? What do you think—you’re
back in Vice?”

Vargas was wearing an oversized Ben
Davis shirt, oversized FUBU jeans that hung low off his ass, revealing the tops
of his red and white checkered boxer shorts, a pair of black and white Air
Jordans, and black gangster loc sunglasses. With his hair slicked back, he
looked like a Mexican gang-banger.

“Sorry, Captain. The Lieutenant thought it would
be a good idea to go undercover and check out Malcolm’s old neighborhood. See
if any of his old homeboys know where he’s hiding out.”

“Yeah, but this is Philly, not LA in the
nineties. Nobody dresses like that out here! You’re Puerto Rican. Do any of
your friends dress like that? You go into G-town lookin’ like American Me and
they’ll have you made in a second. Go change your damn clothes will you and
take James to get a damn haircut. I’ve been trying not to say anything, but you
look like shit, James. Well, at least you shaved, but that haircut is way past
regulation.”

“Yeah, I’ll take care of it.”

“It’s almost time for the morning briefing.”

James rolled his eyes.

“And you
will
be there, James. By the
numbers. You hear me?”

“Yes, Sir!”

“Fuck you, James. Just be there.”

Captain Kelly walked into the locker room and James
followed. Vargas was still standing there, looking at himself in the mirror. James
shook his head. The guy watched too many hip-hop videos. Out of the corner of
his eye, James caught Captain Kelly staring at him again, visibly troubled.

“Are you sure you’re gonna be okay, James? I
mean, you just lost your partner. It might not be a bad idea to take a few days
off.”

“And how many people will die while I’m home
convalescing?”

“You are not the task force, James. You are part
of the task force. The investigation can and will go on if you need to take a
rest.”

“Yeah, I’ll think about it.”

“One more thing. We’re still focusing on Malcolm
here. We have an all points bulletin out on Reed Cozen, but forensics found skin
under Baltimore’s fingernails, black skin. He must’ve scratched Malcolm during
the attack. So that pretty much lets Cozen off the hook for the murder.”

“He might still have been an
accomplice. He and Malcolm could’ve set Baltimore up.”

“Do you honestly think Cozen might be
involved?”

“It doesn’t matter what I think. Until we know
for sure, we gotta consider him armed and dangerous.”

“Yeah, but you know what it’s like out there.
What if he’s innocent and he winds up getting gunned down by some overzealous
cop? A murderer that we failed to catch kills his family and then we murder the
guy. The press will crucify us.”

“Captain, there is no way we’re gonna come out of
this looking good. We’re already screwed so fuck the public relations.”

The captain held up a hand to silence him.

“We got the DNA tests back from the lab.”

“You can’t get DNA tests done in less
than a week.”

“No,
you
can’t get DNA tests done in less than
a week. I can hire another lab to do all our tests if those bastards don’t rush
a little when we need them. Anyway, the semen we found in Mrs. Cozen didn’t
match the DNA samples we took from Mr. Cozen. Now, I’m willing to go out on a
limb and say Mr. Cozen might want to kill his wife, but it’s hard to imagine
that he’d let a guy fuck her in front of him and his kids. I say bring Malcolm
in dead or alive, but handle Reed with kid gloves. The guy’s innocent, James.
We can’t afford more bad press on this. We’ve already made enough embarrassing
mistakes on this case to put all our pensions in jeopardy.”

“Yeah, like getting Titus killed.” James balled his
hands up into tight fists and stared at them.

“James, enough. I need you on this. All of you. If you
can’t put this behind you . . .”

“I’m not taking a vacation, Roy. Let’s just do
everything we can to catch this bastard. Once his ass is in jail, the press
will forget all about how badly we fucked up the investigation. Until then, I’m
the only one whose pension’s in jeopardy. You’ll be fine. You always are.”

“We’re in this together, Detective.”

“Okay, Captain. Whatever you say.”

“I keep thinking about the cop who
returned that little Asian boy to Jeffrey Dahlmer’s apartment.
After
Dahlmer
was caught is when all that information came out and the shit hit the fan. The
press crucified that guy. I wonder what mistakes they’ll dig up from this
investigation?”

“Sorry, Roy. But you’ll have to excuse me if I
don’t give a fuck. I just want to catch this asshole.”

James dropped his shorts and stalked off into the
shower. He turned back around and looked at Captain Kelly in amazement.

“Were any of Titus’s credit cards missing?”

“His what?”

“Credit cards! Did we check his wallet and make
sure everything was still there?”

“No.”

“Damn it! If that bastard buys a suit
on Titus’s credit he’ll never see the inside of a courtroom! I promise you
that. I’ll shoot him dead on sight!”

“You might have to wait in line.”

It was the first time since the ordeal began that the tears
came uncontrollably. Sobs racked his body as grief overwhelmed him. He felt
empty, like some vital part of him had been unceremoniously excised and lost
forever. His life was over. He had lived the last ten years for his wife and
family and they were dead. So were the next ten years of his life he and Linda
had planned out so meticulously.

The dream of Linda owning her own
vegetarian restaurant—dead. The dream of finally writing an award winning
novel—dead. Buying Linda a larger stone for her engagement ring—dead. Putting
Mark and Jennie in private school—dead. He and Linda joining a gym and working
out together—dead. Vacationing in Thailand—dead. Growing old and retiring in
Las Vegas—dead. All of his dreams died the night Linda, Jennie and Mark were
murdered, and he knew he would most likely be dead soon, too. Still, he had to
try, for his family. He had to try to stop Malcolm.

Reed cried so hard he had difficulty
steering the 2008 Ford Taurus through the cracked and potholed streets of
Germantown. He thought he saw Malcolm in every black face he passed. This was
Malcolm’s neighborhood and he was omnipresent, a dark shadow of menace that
seemed to fill every nook and crevice with the threat of violence. Reed started
questioning himself, doubting the sanity of going after Malcolm in his own neighborhood.

If I have to confront this monster,
shouldn’t I at least do it on my own terms, in a place where I would have the
advantage, where I might at least stand a chance?

This was suicide. But perhaps it
would give him the element of surprise. Reed laughed. The sound of his own
laughter frightened him. It had been so long since he’d heard it. It sounded
warped, insane. He was so scared, angry, emotionally exhausted, it felt like he
was losing his mind.

It had been fifteen years since Reed
last came to Germantown. He hadn’t been avoiding the place. He just never had a
reason to go there. He drove slowly up Germantown Avenue while memories of his
first few trips into G-town came back to him in a thrilling rush of
frightening, amusing, exhilarating emotions. Even knowing how it all ended, his
emotions were conflicted as he recalled his past with Malcolm. Much of who he
was, many of the things he liked most about himself, he owed to Malcolm. He was
a shy little nerd who everyone overlooked until Malcolm took an interest in
him. Malcolm taught him to believe in himself and his abilities because Malcolm
had believed in him. Malcolm showed him things about himself and the world he
might never have seen.

Reed crept his vehicle past the rows
of seedy bars. In front of these graffiti-covered, rundown establishments,
teenaged drug dealers “slang rocks” and crack-whores peddled their diseased
sex. He recalled when Malcolm smacked a young drug dealer outside the AMPM
mini-market, seventeen years ago, for offering him crack.

“Do I look like a fucking piper to
you fool? Huh? You think I use that shit? Don’t you ever insult me like that
again muthafucka! Ever!”

He grabbed the young dealer by his
leather jacket and cracked the back of his hand across the guy’s mouth with a
sound like a gunshot. The kid reached into his pocket and fumbled out a small,
silver, automatic pistol. Malcolm paid no attention to the gun. He slapped him
again and again. He didn’t even respect the guy enough to punch him. The drug
dealer dropped the gun and Malcolm slapped him again. The kid turned to run and
Malcolm kicked him, stomping down on his tailbone so hard the guy’s knees hit
the pavement. All the other dealers started laughing and cheering. Malcolm
reached down, picked up the kid’s gun, then turned to look at the other
“slangers” with an expression of utter disgust. They all stopped laughing.
Malcolm turned and threw the gun in the trash.

Reed was scared shitless, but Malcolm
seemed oblivious to the fact that he had almost gotten shot. Reed was
impressed. He wanted that kind of power.

The AMPM was still there and there
were still drug dealers all around it. Reed turned down Washington Lane and
headed for Burbridge Street, where Rick lived. Reed remembered the day he met
Rick. He and Malcolm were walking to the corner store. They passed dozens of
people in the street, on the corners, sitting on porches, and no one spoke to
him. No one said hi. Conversations seemed to halt when Malcolm walked by.

“Don’t you know any of these people?
Ain’t some of them your friends?” Reed had asked.

“Yeah, I know ’em and no, they ain’t
my friends. These are the same muthafuckas that used to tease me when I was
little. Made my life hell. Now that I’ve gotten big they ain’t got shit to
say!” He raised his voice and glared at a bunch of girls on a porch across the
street. There were two guys on the porch as well who were not all that small
themselves. They appeared ready to stand up and say something then seemed to
think better of it.

“Muthafucka’s all scared now. Fuck ’em!”

“Yeah, fuck you too!” a voice called
out from the porch that sounded almost identical to Malcolm’s, same
inflections, same rumbling bass. Reed turned to see who the dead man was and
was surprised when a short, skinny, light-skinned black kid came off the porch,
smiling. He was even more surprised when he saw Malcolm was smiling, too.

“Aw, this is my dog right here. This
little nigga’s crazy!” Malcolm was grinning from ear to ear when he slapped
hands with the skinny black kid. If Malcolm thought the kid was crazy then he
must be ready for a padded room, a daily cocktail of lithium and Prozac, and a
jacket with the sleeves in the back.

“Who’s the white boy?” Rick asked,
staring at Reed greedily like he was a toy that he wanted and he was just waiting
for Malcolm to say he could have him. Reed was pretty sure Rick was the type
who broke all his toys.

“He’s cool. Reed meet Rick.”

Rick just smiled at him with the tip
of his tongue sticking out between his teeth. He looked both goofy and
dangerous, like a hyena. Reed didn’t offer to shake his hand. He was afraid
he’d draw back a nub.

“Damn, and I was gonna suggest we go
over to Chestnut Hill and jack some of them rich ass white boys. I guess that’s
out now.” He scowled at Reed, looking both hurt and angry at him for spoiling
his plans. He didn’t look so goofy anymore.

“Well, let’s at least go find some
bitches.”

“Nah, nigga. Me and Reed gotta work
on some shit for school. I’ll check you later.”

Rick scowled at Reed, flaring his
nostrils, curling up his lip, and rolling his eyes.

“Punk ass white muthafucka.” He
hissed venomously. He spit through his teeth then walked back up to the porch.
Malcolm continued walking down the street, oblivious to Rick’s subtle tantrum.
Empathy was not a part of Malcolm’s make up.

“That nigga right there, you never
want to fuck with. He’ll kill your ass just ’cause he can’t think of nothin’
else better to do. He just don’t give a fuck. He ain’t headed nowhere but to
the pen. He’s one of them dumb muthafuckas that’ll still be standin’ over the
body kickin’ it and spittin’ on it when the cops pull up. If I ever kill a
muthafucka, I’ll get away with that shit ’cause my ass ain’t never goin’ to
jail. Rick expects to go to jail. He can’t see any way to avoid it. That’s what
makes that nigga dangerous. Jail don’t scare him.”

“Does it scare you?” As soon as Reed
asked it, he knew he shouldn’t have.

Malcolm stopped in mid-stride. His
head turned so slowly it was almost mechanical. Thick veins and cords bulged in
his neck as his head swiveled ninety degrees. Reed tensed for the blow he was
certain would come. Then a bone deep dread settled on him like a weight as he
realized that if Malcolm struck him he wouldn’t stop, not until someone stopped
him or Reed stopped breathing. Malcolm was staring down at Reed like he was
trying to hold back a storm. His face seemed ready to fly apart under the
strain of keeping the murderous emotions contained. Then it slowly began to
harden, to lose all animation, nothing on his face looked alive except his eyes,
and they were burning through Reed like lasers. When he spoke, his neighborhood
dialect was gone. His voice was a deep harsh bark. His nostrils flared and his
lips curled back. He sounded like he did at school, intelligent and deadly
serious.

“It’s a non-issue, because I’ll never
see the inside of a jail cell. Never. If it ever comes down to it, I’ll hold
court in the street.”

Reed nodded without comment. His eyes
were as wide as the barrels of a shotgun. He couldn’t break Malcolm’s gaze,
frozen like a deer in the oncoming lights of an eighteen-wheeler. He trembled
from head to toe as it slowly dawned on him exactly where he was, in the middle
of a black ghetto, the only white face for miles, standing in front of a very
large kid who was probably a psychopath, a very large psychopath. It was all he
could do to hold onto his bowels. Malcolm was still staring down at him and he
was not smiling.

Reed felt like a man who had been
read his last rites, strapped into the electric chair, and then suddenly
released and taken back to his cell, still tasting his own death. Malcolm had
issued no threat, verbal or physical. It had been a spiritual awareness that
had come from Malcolm’s murderous gaze, an awareness of just who and what the
man was. That was the first time he’d realized that, despite their friendship,
Malcolm was fully capable of killing him. It had been too late. By then, he’d
already started sleeping with Renee’.

That was seventeen years ago and now
Reed was back in the same place. He hadn’t learned his lesson. And this time,
Malcolm was not his friend.

The Ford Taurus wagon looked
completely out of place, like a poodle in a wolf’s den, as it rolled warily
down Duval Street amongst the old Cadillacs, Lincolns, Fords, and Chevys that
lined the block. He passed Ambrose Street and gripped the steering wheel
tighter, clenching his teeth. He peered cautiously down the narrow dead-end
street and spotted Malcolm’s old house. Of course, Malcolm wasn’t there, but
what was undoubtedly an unmarked police car was.

A white Crown Victoria with a
spotlight mounted beside one of its oversized side view mirrors sat midway down
the block with the silhouette of two bored and frustrated detectives in its
windshield. It was parked just a few houses down from the weathered three-story
row home where Malcolm had once vivisected a cat in front of him to see how
long it would live with its guts hanging out. Reed remembered watching it crawl
around the basement floor, howling in pain, dragging its entrails behind it.
His stepfather had stormed down into the basement, enraged by the noise and had
beaten Malcolm severely, the way you would beat a grown man, using his fists
instead of an open hand or a strap, then he threw Reed out of the house and
locked Malcolm down there with the dying cat all day.

Reed brought the car to a halt,
remembering how Malcolm’s eyes lost their feral intensity when he heard his
stepfather coming down the basement steps. He seemed lost and afraid, like the
teenager he was. Reed felt sorry for him then. Now he was ready to kill him.

Reed stared hard at the two
detectives in the unmarked cruiser. He could almost make out their faces. They
appeared to be taking a long look at his car as he passed. He hit the gas and
sped past before they could recognize him. He knew the cops were probably
looking for him almost as vigorously as they were hunting Malcolm. For all they
knew, he’d killed Detective Baltimore himself and he was running the streets
with the dead cop’s gun, irrational with grief. Reed chuckled nervously when he
realized that was exactly what he was doing.

The very next street after Ambrose
was Burbridge Street, where Rick lived. Burbridge was on a long hill paved with
red cobblestones and lined with lush trees. Three-story houses with stone facades
rose like monuments on either side of the street. Reed was amazed at how the
neighborhood changed so drastically from block to block. Compared to Ambrose
Street, Burbridge Street was middle-class splendor. But, compared to the cozy
little street that Mark and Jennie grew up on, the house where he and Linda
consummated their marriage, it was a slum. Reed’s bottom lip trembled and his
eyes welled up with tears but he fought them back. He picked up the Glock from
the passenger seat and chambered a round as he slid the Taurus into an empty
spot between a Mustang 5.0 and a Hyundai Excel in front of Rick’s house. His
eyes scanned the block. No sign of the Impala. No sign of Malcolm. He slid from
the car, took a deep breath, and walked up the front steps, the Glock held
behind his back, safety off, hammer cocked, forehead and hands sweating,
trembling.

You
are about to die. You’re going to join Linda and Jennie and little Mark. It’ll
all be over soon.

Reed could hear the voice as plain as day. It froze him right
in his tracks. The voice was coming from inside his head and it wasn’t his. It
was Malcolm. Quickly he looked around, pointing the Glock at the bushes on
either side of the steps, at the parked cars, up at the porch, the roof over
the porch. Malcolm wasn’t there. He was in his head. Only crazy people heard
voices. Reed knew that but he’d heard it.

You
are about to die!

The voice frightened him because he knew it shouldn’t be
there, because it meant that he was going insane, but the words didn’t frighten
him. They were simply points of fact. He was going to kill Malcolm so, in all
likelihood, he himself would die because Malcolm was the killer and he was not.
He was prepared for this. He had been living on borrowed time ever since he
fucked Renee’ and Natasha. He owed the devil his due. But Malcolm would die,
too. He was sure of that as well. And he didn’t need a voice in his head to
tell him.

“Can I help you, sir?”

The voice startled Reed, but at least it wasn’t coming from
his head this time. There was a rotund, elderly black woman standing on the
porch with her thick meaty hands on her rather substantial hips. She wore huge
Bermuda shorts that came to just above knees that were half swallowed in fat.
Her plump feet ballooned out of a pair of broken down sandals and her titanic
breasts swung like bulbous pendulums in an oversized T-shirt bearing the face
of Mickey Mouse. She wore her hair in curlers covered by a hair net. It was
Rick’s mom.