Cold truth

Chapter 20

Mason sat for another moment after Nix left, ignoring the librarian's officious paper shuffling as she counted down the final minutes of the library's day. He wasn't surprised that Centurion sent Nix to retrieve the ledger, rather than put himself at risk. It didn't matter to Mason whether Nix recorded their meeting from the cover of his poncho since Mickey had been listening. Mason snapped the cell phone out of the cradle on his belt.

"Could you hear all that?" he asked.

"It was pin-drop quality," Mickey said. "Daphne had a tape recorder. I put the mike next to the phone. The recording has a hiss soundtrack, but it can probably be enhanced."

"Good job. Where's Jordan?"

"Upstairs. Daphne checks on her every fifteen minutes. She's driving Jordan crazy. You think Nix was bullshitting you about Emily and Jordan?" Mickey asked.

"Centurion, Nix, and Jordan tell pretty much the same story about Emily Davenport, except for the small detail about whether Emily jumped or Jordan pushed her. The part about Jordan having a baby should be easy enough to verify. On Monday, check the city's birth certificate records."

"Why not ask Jordan? Don't you think she'd remember?"

"I think she would have told me when I asked her about Emily, but she didn't. She's got a reason for not telling me, so I'd rather find out on my own until she's ready to talk about it. I'm beat. I'm going to get some dinner and go home. See you tomorrow."

The rain had stopped and the clouds had parted for the debut of a new moon when Mason walked out of the library, proving his aunt's adage that if you didn't like the weather in Kansas City, wait fifteen minutes and it would change. A warm breeze dried the air, carrying the smell of a barbecue joint a couple of blocks away that was renowned for its burnt ends, and answering Mason's question of what he would have for dinner.

Mason had parked his car on 12th Street in front of the library. He put the top down and circled back west to the barbecue restaurant on the corner of 13th and Grand, picked up an order of burnt ends, and headed south on Grand, already tasting the beer waiting in his refrigerator that would chase the barbecue. He popped a Coltrane CD into the player he'd had installed in the dash, letting the mellow sound take him home.

Traffic was light, in keeping with downtown's dead-on-Saturday-night reputation. Mason stopped for a red light at 17th Street, wishing he'd left the top up when a two-tone Chevy Caprice, one dent shy of the demolition derby hall of fame, stopped alongside him in the outside lane, bleeding bone-jarring rap from its open windows, overpowering Coltrane.

The driver looked to Mason to be no more than twenty, in spite of a patchy beard that failed to cover his patchy skin. His left arm hung over the open window, a tattoo of a snake wrapped around a naked woman writhing with the car's vibrations against his pale skin. The driver's passenger, a black man wearing a do-rag and a cold stare, drew hard on a joint, its sweet, pungent odor leaking out of the car. He burned the joint down to his knuckle and passed the butt to the driver.

The light changed, Mason popping the clutch, jumping out to put distance between him and the Caprice. The Caprice kept pace, escorting Mason to the next light at 18th Street, then roaring ahead, cutting in front of Mason just before they reached the intersection.

Mason slammed on his brakes, leaning on his horn, not stopping before the front bumper of the TR-6 kissed the rear of the Caprice. The passenger jumped out, sprinting to Mason's car. He leapt into the seat next to Mason, pointing a gun at Mason's belly.

It was a smoothly executed car-jacking, over in seconds and witnessed by no one. Mason was smart enough not to resist. "You want the car?" Mason asked, keeping his hands on the wheel. "You can have the car. Just leave me the burnt ends."

"Don't want this pussy piece of shit," the gunman said. "Want your sorry ass." He jabbed Mason in the ribs with the barrel of his gun. "Now shut the fuck up and follow my man."

The light turned green and the Caprice pulled away, its music suddenly muted, drawing no attention as they turned east on 18th. The gunman rode with his back against the passenger door, both hands gripping his pistol, staying out of Mason's reach. Mason doubted that he was the victim of a random street crime, certain now that Centurion Johnson had played him like a chump from the beginning.

Centurion had worked Mason with a velvet glove, stroking him and threatening him until Mason brought him the ledger, using Terry Nix as a cover. Mason imagined Centurion watching from a safe distance, laughing as Mason put his ragtop-and his guard-down. Mason would have to wait for a rematch with Centurion. In the meantime, he tried the gunman.

"You meet a lot of nice people in your line of work?" Mason asked.

The gunman motioned with his pistol to the road ahead, silently telling Mason to watch where he was going. Mason knew where they were going-into the East Side where Centurion and his Ebony and Ivory carjacking team would have the home-court advantage. Mason swerved to avoid a pothole that the Caprice rode over without fanfare. The gunman rolled with the car's pitch, casting an anxious look at the street, then pressing the barrel of his gun under Mason's armpit.

"Easy, slick," Mason said. "The car has a low ground clearance. I hit a pothole like that one and we'll have to tow the car out of it. I'm not going to turn stupid and give you an excuse to use that thing, so relax and tell me where we're meeting Centurion."

"I tole you before," the gunman said. "Shut the fuck up and drive. That's all you gotta do. You do that, and I won't shoot your ass."

The Caprice turned north a couple of miles east of downtown, following a maze of side streets and alleys until the only thing Mason was certain of was that he wasn't in Kansas anymore. The neighborhood had its own measure of darkness, devoid of streetlights and porch lights, illuminated only by passing headlights. The few houses Mason could make out had barred or boarded doors, overgrown yards, and no candles in the windows.

The Caprice pulled to a curb in the middle of a blacked-out street, Mason easing to a stop behind him, his passenger sitting up, tightening the grip on his gun. The driver of the Caprice walked toward Mason, a gun in one hand, his other hand behind his back, hiding something worse than the gun.

Mason tallied his odds. His passenger was too far away to jump without getting a bullet for his trouble. The driver was three steps away, close enough for a fatal shot. Mason squeezed the steering wheel, screaming inside at the futility of dying without trying, smelling his own sweat.

The passenger lunged at Mason as his partner reached the TR-6, jamming the barrel of his gun under Mason's chin. "Hold real still," he said, blowing dope breath in Mason's mouth. The driver stuck his gun in his belt, showing Mason the black bag he'd been hiding behind his back, shaking the bag open, pulling it over Mason's head, clotting his vision.

The bag reeked of a medicinal scent. Mason gasped and gagged, the rough fabric against his face. His sweat turned cold as a suffocating panic swept over him. He tore at the bag, trying to rip it from his face, the dark water taking him.

Consciousness came in painful pieces. Voices floated overhead, out of reach. Mason wanted to move, but couldn't, his head too heavy, his body too weak. Someone was playing a drum, he thought, until he recognized the internal percussion throbbing between his ears. Movement came to his arms and legs, whether by his own effort or others he couldn't tell, still struggling to open his eyes. Blinking at last in the dim light of a squalid room, knocked back by the stench of foul, dead air, he found the floor with his hands, then a wall behind him, then a hazy face in front of him.

"You not dead," the face said.

"Too early to tell," Mason said. "Where am I?"

The face came into focus. It belonged to a boy sitting cross-legged on the floor, his round black face faintly familiar. "My room," the boy said.

"Are you dead?" Mason asked.

"Not yet," the boy said.

"Then I guess I'm not dead yet either."

Mason looked around, getting his bearings. The room was small, barely big enough for the mattress on the floor, a dresser missing its top drawer in one corner, a pile of dirty clothes in another, a poster of Shaq and Kobe on one wall, crumbling Sheetrock and exposed wiring on another. Black plastic trash bags were tacked around a window, shutting out the light that crept around the edges, catching dust mites.

"You got a name?" Mason asked the boy.

"Donnell," the boy answered.

"You got a bathroom, Donnell?"

The boy smiled. "You're funny," he said, offering Mason his hand, helping Mason to his feet. "Come on."

The bathroom was in a hall outside Donnell's bedroom. There was a mirror above the sink with fluorescent lights on each side, the left side burnt out, the right side flickering like a gray candle. Donnell stood in the doorway, gazing up at Mason with unblinking eyes as if he'd made a grand discovery, finding a white man dead on the floor in his bedroom, miraculously resurrected.

"Give me a minute," Mason told the boy, closing the door. He wasn't surprised when the toilet didn't flush or when the water ran from the sink faucet with a rusty hue. It was enough to be alive, even if he didn't know why. It was enough to be in Donnell's house, even if he didn't know where it was. And it was oddly comforting that the boy was familiar to him, even if he couldn't place him. He opened the bathroom door, pleased that Donnell was waiting for him.

"Donnell, are there any other grown-ups here?" Donnell nodded. "Where are they?" Donnell pointed down the stairs at the end of the narrow hall. "How many?" Donnell shrugged. "You forget how to talk?" Donnell shook his head, giggling. The door to another bedroom opened and a stick-thin black woman called to the boy.

"Donnell, what you doin'? Get outta this hall!"

She grabbed the boy by the collar and dragged him back to his room, closing the door behind him. She leaned against the door, one hand on the knob, exhausted by the effort. A thin black dress, shapeless against her bony frame, hung on her like a sheet on a clothesline. Her eyes were dull, but Mason caught something in her look, the same familiarity he'd seen in the boy.

"Varonda? Is that you?" Mason asked.

"I didn't think you'd remember me," she said. "Be better if you forgot."

"It hasn't been that long," Mason said. "What, nine, ten months? You were charged with possession with the intent to sell. I got you into a diversion program. Donnell was in court with you. That's why I recognized him."

"He's a good boy, but he don't mind me like he should."

"It's hard for a kid to stay in a dark room. Why does he have to stay in there?"

"Only safe place in a crack house like this," she said, looking over Mason's shoulder.

Mason heard footsteps on the stairs as she spoke. He turned in time to see the passenger from the Caprice standing at the top of the stairs, his gun pointed at him again.

"Thought you was never wakin' up," the man said.

"Was I supposed to?" Mason asked.

"Don't matter to me," the man said. "Varonda, you know him?"

"He was my lawyer. Got me into that diversion program."

The man laughed. "You done got diverted all right, girl. Straight back to the fuckin' street sellin' your ass for a rock."

Mason remembered Varonda. She carried twenty more pounds and a glimmer of hope when he negotiated the diversion deal. She was on the edge then, having spent time on the street, but not too much time to get off. Since then, she'd gone back, hustling for crack, wasting her body until there was little left to hold or hustle.

"Fuck you, Tyrone," she said, joining Donnell in his room, shutting out the rest of the world as she slammed the door.

"So, Tyrone, what do you say you and me go out to the ballpark and catch the Royals," Mason said.

"Only thing you gonna catch is this," Tyrone said, waving his gun at Mason.

"If you were going to shoot me, you would have done that last night," Mason said. "Tell Centurion I want to talk to him. We'll work something out."

"Don't know no Centurion," Tyrone said.

"Fine. You don't know him. I do. Give me a phone and I'll call him."

"Don't got no phone and you ain't callin' nobody. Get your ass on downstairs," he said, motioning Mason to go first.

The driver of the Caprice waited at the bottom of the stairs, leading Mason like a slow-moving target with a shotgun wedged under his arm, aiming Mason toward a straight-backed chair in the middle of the front room. A couch littered with remnants of fast food was shoved against the wall opposite a wide picture window covered with a slender sheet of plywood. A whiskey-colored, shorthaired mutt, its ribs riding hard against its skin, burrowed its nose into the cushions, digging for a meal.

Tyrone grabbed a roll of duct tape and a length of rope from the couch, the dog snapping at him.

"Tyrone," the driver said, "quit playin' with that dog. We don't got all day."

"Easy, Richie," Tyrone said to the driver. "I ain't playin' with your dog. That bitch is a killer."

"Just smack that dog, it bites you. That's the way I trained it," Richie said, pointing the shotgun at the dog. Mason took advantage, wheeling, grabbing the shotgun. Richie rammed the barrel into Mason's gut, breaking Mason's hold. "Settle down, man!" Richie said. "You're gonna get all this you can handle soon enough," he added, prodding Mason with the shotgun, backing him into the chair. Tyrone clamped Mason by the shoulder, planting him on the seat. At least, Mason thought, he knew their names.

"Tyrone, Richie," Mason said as Tyrone looped the rope around his ankles and the legs of the chair, binding his upper arms at his sides with duct tape, his hands free but helpless. "Give me a clue here. You want something. You need something. Tell me what it is and we'll work it out."

They didn't answer. Tyrone disappeared while Richie kept the shotgun a dismembering distance from Mason's chest.

"Fellas, be reasonable," Mason said, fighting to keep his voice a notch below pleading. They had to want something, and he was ready to give it to them if they would only tell him what it was. It was hard to bargain with people who acted like they didn't hear you. "Tell Centurion that I don't care what he's doing at Sanctuary. It's none of my business."

Tyrone came back carrying a can of sterno, a bag of white powder, a syringe, and a lighter. He tapped out a measure of powder into a small cup made of tinfoil, added a liquid from a plastic tube in his shirt pocket, and stirred the mixture with his finger. Setting the tinfoil on a three-legged stand, he lit the sterno, slipping the flame beneath the tin foil.

"Hey, guys. Get real," Mason said, seeing his future in the barrel of the syringe, not the barrel of the shotgun.

Tyrone peeled off another strip of duct tape, grabbed Mason's left wrist, taping it to the side of the chair, flicking the large vein in the center of Mason's arm, rubbing the surrounding skin and raising the vein to the surface like a swollen blue ribbon. Tyrone dipped the syringe in the tinfoil, and drew the plunger back, filling the barrel, squirting a drop onto the floor to be certain the needle was ready.

Mason lunged, bucking the chair into Tyrone. "Goddammit! Give me a chance! It's the ledger! I made a copy. I'll get it for you."

It was all Mason could think of, but they ignored him, going about the business of killing him without threat or explanation. Tyrone tore off another piece of masking tape, trying to press it against Mason's mouth as Mason spat at him, whiplashing his head to avoid Tyrone's grasp.

The dog bounded off the sofa, nipping at Tyrone. Tyrone cursed and swiped at the dog as Mason bucked one more time, knocking the chair over. The dog was straddling Mason, Richie grabbing it by the scruff of the neck, escalating the game from dog play to dogfight as the mutt bit Richie's hand, drawing blood and fury. Tyrone was laughing, a giddy screech.

Richie clubbed the dog with the butt of the shotgun. The dog yelped, springing at Richie's trigger hand, the shotgun errupting, catching Tyrone in the gut, blowing him onto the couch, dropping the loaded syringe next to Mason. Richie howled as the dog kept ripping his hand. When he dropped the shotgun, Mason scooted to pick it up, cradling it in the crook of his arm, aiming at Richie.

"Get out or I'll kill you!" Mason shouted. Richie finally broke the dog's grip, clutching his ruined hand to his belly. "Run while you can!" Mason said.

"Varonda!" Mason yelled. "It's okay. It's over. Help me! Varonda!"

Varonda crept down the stairs, Donnell on her hip, hugging her waist. She tiptoed past the whimpering dog, spitting on Tyrone's body.

Donnell sat down next to Mason. "You not dead yet," he said.