Guilt By Degrees

52

Bailey and I met Luis Revelo during our last case, when he was a rape suspect and was thought to be targeting yours truly. When I proved he wasn’t guilty of either crime, he became a helpful, if somewhat unorthodox, ally.

Toni looked from me to Bailey. “Uh, hello? Luis is Hispanic. Last time I checked, these skinhead guys don’t do swirl.”

Back in the day, before the Aryan Brotherhood-the granddaddy of white-supremacist prison gangs-got locked down on a 24-7 basis, Toni would’ve been right. No dealings, business or otherwise, were tolerated with anyone but whites. But the Feds had moved in with a vengeance to shut them down, bringing a series of criminal charges against dozens of the major players and instituting the most draconian lockdown conditions in prison history. As a result, the AB lost significant mobility, which should’ve meant operations-at least the ones guided from behind bars-were at an end. But being the resourceful, enterprising group they were, the AB followed the lead of many large corporations: they outsourced and recruited more junior groups whose movements in prison weren’t so restricted. Groups like Public Enemy Number One, whose younger members hadn’t had the chance to rack up lengthy rap sheets and still had the “yard privileges” that let them move freely about the cabin.

“Ever since the AB brought in the youngsters, there’s been a bit of an attitude shift about dealing with the mud people,” I said.

“When it comes to money, the new kids go a little color-blind,” Bailey said. “They’ll deal to blacks-”

“Or date Latina girls,” I added.

“Sex and money,” Toni concluded. “The great integrators. See? We can all just get along.”

The waiter took our orders.

“I’m going to call Luis,” I said, getting out of the booth. “Well, realistically, leave him a message and get the ball rolling.”

I had to move outside to find a space quiet enough to use the phone.

As predicted, I got his voice mail.

“’S Luis, leave a message, I’ll get ya back.”

I did. But as I hung up, I felt it again: a presence, hidden and menacing, watching me. I tried to look over my left shoulder without turning my head, hoping to catch someone off guard. Running valets and brisk walkers, a woman with bright-orange shoulder-length hair the consistency of steel wool deep in conversation with a young, sullen-looking-is there any other kind?-teenage girl. No one who gave a damn about me. Unsettled, I went back inside the restaurant, my appetite gone.

We were heading up Broadway when my cell played “FM” by Steely Dan.

I opened my phone. “Knight.”

“Nah, ’s daytime. You sittin’ in a box or something?” Luis said, then laughed, cracking himself up.

“Luis,” I replied, a smile in my voice. “How’ve you been?”

“I ain’t complainin’-I mean, I’m not complaining.” He corrected himself with a sigh. “Whassup with you?”

“Can you spare us a half hour or so?” I asked. “We need some information.”

“You still hangin’ with that hot blonde?”

“Detective Keller, yes. And I’ll tell her you-”

“Aw, come on,” he interrupted. “You know I was jes’ jokin’, Miz Knight. You ain’t-damn, aren’t-going to tell her I said that, are you? Jeez.”

Luis sounded truly aggrieved.

“No, I won’t,” I said. “What’s a good time?”

Luis gave a protracted yawn. I turned to look at the clock on the Times Building. Nearly three o’clock, and he was just now joining the world.

“How about five?” he eventually answered. I heard him whisper to someone nearby, “No. No más ahora.”

Not wanting to know what he didn’t want más of, I quickly agreed. “Five, it is-”

“You’re buyin’, right? ’Cuz I’m gonna need to eat about that time…”

Of course he would. Luis knew how to work it with the best of them.

“How about Les Sisters?” I suggested.

“Les Sisters, yeah,” Luis said with a satisfied sigh. “That’s what I’m talkin’ ’bout.”

I told Bailey the plan as she turned onto Temple Street and pulled to the curb to drop Toni off.

Luis got busy-with what, neither of us wanted to know-later in the evening. He was, as they say, a mixed bag. Well on his way to earning a GED and aiming for college and an MBA, he fully intended to leave the gang life behind. And, no question, he’d provided invaluable help on our last case. But there was no sense denying that he still had a foot planted on the less-than-savory side of the street.

“I sent in our latest video footage to get a still blowup of our stabber’s hand,” Bailey said to me now. “It’s supposed to be in. Why don’t you come back to the station with me and we can check it out?”

I was dying to see that photo. A blowup might show some identifying detail on the stabber’s hand. But that could also mean a possible run-in with Graden.

Bailey looked at me. “You can’t avoid it forever.”

Toni added, her voice warm, sympathetic, “And believe me, we’d both be feeling the same if we were in your shoes.”

She opened the door and stepped out onto the curb, then leaned down and pointedly looked at my feet as she spoke through my window. “Though I’d have better shoes.”

She would’ve too.