White sister

Chapter 42

I met Sally Quinn at a restaurant called The Turf House, in the Valley. She chose the place because it had a history of health department violations and the food was so lousy it was cresting on dangerous. Cops, who are notorious chow hounds, never ate there so we had a good chance of not being seen. We sat in a booth in the back, nursing lukewarm coffee in chipped mugs.

"This place is as bad as advertised," Sally frowned. "Can you believe it? There's a fly in this coffee." She showed me the insect. It was listlessly swimming in a circle in the lukewarm sludge, trying to find a way out. I waved at a waitress to try and get Sally a new cup, but the woman studiously ignored me.

"You're not gonna tell me what this is all about, right?" Sally said. She started fishing unsuccessfully for the fly with her butter knife.

"Hard to testify to things you don't know about."

She nodded, then dropped the knife and pushed a folder across the chipped wood table toward me. The smell of burning grease wafted in from the kitchen. Sally leaned forward and lowered her voice.

"It's all in that file, but to save you time, I'll hit the highlights. As you suggested, most of this background came from the gang book downtown and from a sergeant in street intel named Dona-van Knight who works the hip-hop gang scene."

She took a breath and launched in. "Lionel Wright was born in March of seventy-two. Only his name isn't Lionel Wright."

"Don't tell me, it's Bust A Cap."

"Orlee Lemon," she said. "Broken home. Mother was a crack whore. Father unknown."

"I've heard this story."

"Pretty typical, except Orlee was really smart. A's at Jefferson High. Did two years at City College, then transferred to Cal State. Graduated with a major in business and a minor in music."

"Where's the but}"

"Orlee Lemon was a smart kid but in his youth he was also very wild. Back when he was still in elementary school, he was doing street corners around Sixtieth for a shot caller named Mister Smith." She looked up at me and smiled. "No kidding. That was his given name, Mister."

I found his mug shot, a fat guy in his late twenties with two or three chins.

"Mister's gang handle was Crocodile Smith because even as a kid he always wore really colorful, expensive crocodile shoes. Nothing good in that folder about him. Lots of ag-assaults. One second-degree murder. Did a long bit in the SHU at Pelican Bay. Got paroled in ninety-seven."

"So how does Lionel Wright fit?"

"Turns out, while Croc Smith is away at the Bay pounding sand, Orlee Lemon went to college, then graduated and became Lionel Wright, started rapping. The Croc gets out of the joint, sees his baby G Buddy is now all grown up and cutting underground sides in a garage. Decides to go into business with him."

"This was a voluntary partnership?"

"Who knows? I did a little extra checking before I drove over here and there's a neat story that goes with Lionel's first recording contract."

"Let's hear."

"Croc had big bucks from drugs, guns, and street crime, but the gun-dealing beefs had the Feds sniffing him and they put the IRS on his tail. With Big Brother watching, Crocodile couldn't spend his money without risking a federal tax case, so he's cash rich and money poor. He needs to find a way put his dough to work where there's no IRS paper trail. He and Lionel get a CD ready, and they target a rap impresario named Ajax Matson. Ajax is what they call a "raptrepreneur." He owns a label called Walkie-Talkie Records, which has a big worldwide distribution deal with Atlantic. Guys like Ajax are inundated with CDs from wannabe artists, so getting a mega-producer like him to play your song is like next to impossible. But Smith and Lionel think up a way around this problem. They buttonhole Matson at this dance club in Hollywood and Croc hands Lionel's CD to the man, along with ten thousand dollars in crisp bills and tells him, 'You play this while we watch. Whether you like the CD or not, you keep the ten large.' "

"Not bad," I said. "So Ajax listened to it?"

Sally nodded. "And it's good."

"So then Lionel records for Ajax, right?"

"Right," Sally said. "Two albums. Ajax came up with his hip-hop name Bust A Cap. Both albums went gold. Then Lionel leaves Walkie-Talkie and starts WYD records and becomes a raptrepreneur himself. He's his label's first big star." She glanced across the restaurant. "Man, you think we could get some coffee that's at least hot enough so this fly can't do the backstroke in it?"

I waved at the waitress again, but she did an exemplary job of ignoring me.

"Anyway," Sally sighed, "our background on Lionel Wright says that from there on, it was a new life. Great big house in Bel Air, cars with lots of vowels in their names."

"But the problem was?"

"The problem was that Lionel Wright was about ten times smarter than Crocodile Smith, who looked fine in his gang drapes down on Sixtieth, but looked like terminal cancer in the offices of trendy Westside media companies. Lionel had started integrating with Hollywood movers and shakers. He was dealing with big media conglomerates and filmmakers, writing soundtracks for motion pictures. He turns out to be great at marketing and puts out Bust A Cap clothing, which is a smash in Wal-Mart, Target, and on the Internet. Then all the other stuff happens, the hair products, video games, the whole schmeer. But he's still got this three-hundred-and-fifty-pound slobbering street G standing behind him pissing people off. Two years ago Lionel made his break. It ended up being something called, the Shootout at the Barn."

"I remember that. In Compton. The Barn was some titty shake. A lot of guys left on stretchers."

"You got it. Lionel does the termination meeting there 'cause it's his homeboys' club. Croc Smith sees it coming and everybody comes strapped and with backup. Six guys end up dead. Among them was Smith's younger brother, Junior Smith gang handle, Roundwheel. Lotta anger still simmering over that. It became a straight-up revenge issue for The Croc. He started trying for some payback on Lionel. But Lionel has big money and he employs top-shelf security. Smith is a street villain whose idea of a smooth hit is to blow up your car. So to date there have been three attempts. All failures."

I picked up the folder and started to process this, thinking Lionel Wright had a lot of trouble heading his way. The old payback hit from his first partner on Sixtieth Street and now the Malugas. I was starting to see what Stacy Maluga might have in mind. All she had to do was set up Lionel Wright and Curtis Clark for Crocodile Smith and his posse and let the Sixtieth Street shot-caller do the wet work. Because of Smith's past history with Lionel, the Malugas would be way down on the suspect list.

I looked up at Sally and said, "Thanks."

"These are not nice people, Shane."

"Apparently."

"David Slade was still living up at Stacy Maluga's when he died," Sally said. "So this whole thing with Alexa has a gangsta-rap connection?"

"If you want, I'll spill the whole deal, but trust me you don't want to get mixed up in it."

"I didn't like you using me to get ESD to plant that bug, but you're a cop who gets results and I want a partner who's not afraid to kick a door, now and then. I've been working with a wuss for two years, so if you need some backup, I guess I'm volunteering."

"Even I wouldn't do that to you," I said. "But thanks for offering."

We reached out and slapped palms.

"Good hunting, partner," she said.