“What’re you talkin’ about, man?”
“Here it is,” said Strange, and he gave Blue the Warder Street address. “It’s a row house, got nothin’ on the porch. They ought to be there in about a half hour. Both Potter and his partner, the one with the cornrows. Potter’s driving a Ford Tempo, blue, late eighties. The third boy, I can’t tell you where he is. I believe he’s gone.”
“How you know all this, Derek?”
“I’ll explain it to you later.”
“Trust me. You will.”
“Get all your available units over there, Ly. Ain’t that how they say it on those police shows?”
“Derek—”
“How’d practice go?”
“Say what?”
“Practice. The kids all right?”
“Uh, yeah. The boys all got home safe. Don’t be trying to change the subject, man—”
“Good. That’s good.”
“I’m gonna call you later, Derek.”
“I’ll be waiting,” said Strange.
Strange hit “end,” made a one-finger one-moment gesture to Oliver, and punched in Quinn’s number. Quinn had turned his cell off. Strange left a message and stared at the dead phone for a moment before sliding it back in place.
“You done?” said Oliver.
“Yeah.”
“You know, what you did tonight ain’t gonna change a thing in the end. Those two are gonna die. I’ll make sure of that.”
“But not tonight. Not by my setup. Not in front of that little boy you got workin’ for you.”
“Yeah, okay. We been all over that already.”
“I just want that boy to have some kind of chance.”
“So you said. But what would you have done if I had said no?”
“I was counting on reaching your human side. You proved to me that you have one. Thank you for hearin’ me out.”
Oliver nodded. “Boy’s name is Robert Gray. You think I been ruinin’ him, huh?”
“Let’s just say that I don’t see him hookin’ up with your enterprise as an opportunity. You and me, we got a difference of opinion on that.”
“Strange, you ought to see what kind of conditions he was livin’ in when I pulled him out, down there in Stanton Terrace. Wasn’t nobody doin’ a
Strange leaned back and scratched his temple. “This Robert, he play football?”
“What’s that?”
“Can he
“Boy can jook. He can hit, too.” Oliver grinned, looking Strange over. “You’re somethin’, man. What, you tryin’ to save the whole world all at once?”
“Not the
“You know, wasn’t just my
“What was it, then?”
“I’m gonna need you someday, Strange. I had one of those, what do you call that, premonitions. Usually, when I get those kinds of feelings, I’m right.” Oliver pointed a finger at Strange. “You owe me for what I did for you tonight.”
I owe you for more than that, thought Strange.
But he just said, “I do.”
Strange drove back to the city in silence. Coming up Georgia Avenue, he tried to reach Quinn again on his cell but got a recording. He passed Buchanan Street and kept driving north, turning right on Quintana and parking the Cadillac in front of Janine’s. She let him into her house and told him to have a seat on the living room couch. She joined him a few minutes later with a cold Heineken and a couple of glasses. The two of them talked into the night.
chapter 30
QUINN had been parked along the curb for half an hour when Worldwide Wilson’s 400SE came rolling down the street. Quinn watched the Mercedes glide up in his rearview and he tucked his chin in and turned his head a little as it passed. The Mercedes double-parked, flashers on, as the driver’s-side window came down. A woman Quinn recognized, the black whore who’d asked him for a date the night of the snatch, leaned into the frame. A minute or so went by, and Wilson stepped out of the car.
He wore his full-length rust-colored leather over a suit. He wore his matching brimmed hat and his alligator shoes. He walked toward his row house, and the black whore got under the wheel of his Mercedes and drove off to find a legal parking spot for her man’s car. Worldwide Wilson moved like a big cat onto the sidewalk. He went up his
