the table. Ray Ray picked it up.
“Ever handle one of these?”
Marcus shook his head. His own lie. Ray Ray laid the gun back down, butt facing toward Marcus.
“Pick it up, child. Get a feel.”
Marcus took up the gun. The weight of it caused his hand to drop. Cecil laughed.
“Sorry-ass nigger can’t hold a fucking gat.”
“He all right,” Ray Ray said. Then he leaned forward. The room leaned with him.
“You want to shoot that thing?”
Marcus nodded. He had the gun in both hands now.
“Sacred thing, Little Man. First time you pull that hammer back.”
Marcus looked down at the gun, now an extension of himself.
“You thinking you could shoot someone?”
Marcus nodded again.
“Who you like to pop, Little Man?”
Marcus turned a cool set of eyes on Cecil. Ray Ray smiled a second time.
“Little Man don’t like Cecil.”
“Gonna shoot him in the head.”
Snickers all around. Cecil reached for the piece in his belt. “Motherfucker.”
Ray Ray held up a hand. Jace and another stepped in.
“Take it.”
They took the gun off Cecil.
Ray Ray stood up. “How you been treating your people, Cecil?”
“I treat ’em right.”
Ray Ray grabbed Cecil by a handful of dreads. A couple of beads skittered across the floor and rolled into a shadow. “Not what I’m hearing, Cecil.”
“Ray.”
“Quiet now.” Ray Ray released his lieutenant, voice soft, two fingers flat on Cecil’s forehead. Like a blessing.
“Hear tell you like to slap people down.” Ray Ray searched Cecil’s face, finding all the familiar fears. “Quick with those fists when the boy’s twelve. That how old you are, Marcus? Twelve?”
“Thirteen.”
Ray Ray spread his hands, pleading for a little help. “How we gonna expect these young ’uns to be loyal to someone who whips ’em? They been whipped enough, I’m thinking.”
Ray Ray turned back to Marcus. “You want to shoot him in the head, Little Man?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Not so easy as you think.”
Marcus was used now to the gun’s heft and held it out at arm’s length.
“Gimme the gat, Marcus.”
Ray Ray took the gun and nodded to his men. They grabbed Cecil by the arms and dragged him into a corner. Ray Ray racked the slide and handed the piece back to Marcus.
“When you ready.”
Marcus gripped the gun in both hands. He didn’t feel his legs as they moved him across the room and wondered if that was part of it. Jace had Cecil on his knees, turned so he was facing the wall. Marcus smelled something sharp. A hand touched his shoulder.
“Hold on, Little Man.” Ray Ray stepped between him and Cecil. “You pissin’ yourself?”
They dragged Cecil to his feet. His jeans hung low and were dark with stain. They all laughed. All except Cecil, whose mouth was moving with no sound coming out. All except Marcus and James, who stared at Cecil and the gun in Marcus’s hands.
Ray Ray pushed Cecil back to the ground. “Shoot this nigger.”
Marcus stepped up. James floated at the edge of his vision. But Marcus was beyond that now, in his own world of space and light. No past, no future. Just him and the gun. He touched the barrel to the back of Cecil’s head. Cecil jumped. Ray Ray’s men regripped. Cecil’s silent muttering had become small, sniffling cries, and Marcus suddenly wanted it to be over. He steadied the gun, wrapped a finger from each hand around the trigger, and pulled for all he was worth. The hammer came down with a dry snap on an empty chamber. Cecil fell over on his side, sobbing. Ray Ray took the gun from Marcus and leaned close.
“Straight-up killer, my Little Man. That’s what you are. Now, what have you come to tell me?”
CHAPTER 12
Marcus Robinson sat on the green-and-white couch and told Ray Ray about the cop named Donnie Quin.
Three miles away, Donnie woke up in his own bed, a hundred heartbeats from full cardiac arrest.
Donnie tried to open his eyes, but they were swollen shut. He struggled to a mirror and pried them open with his fingers. The face that stared back at him was prickly with heat, lungs whistling with fluid every time he took a breath. Donnie didn’t know exactly what was wrong with him, but Nyquil wasn’t doing the fucking trick.
He felt his legs jelly and grabbed for a corner of the dresser. The soon-to-be-dead cop thought wildly about all the things he should have done in his life. Not for other people. For himself. Like take care of his heart. With fifty beats left, the thing began to jitter and skip. Donnie went to the whip, his reflection in the mirror pumping his chest to get everything back into rhythm.
Twenty-five beats left. Donnie lurched across the room and spent five of them dialing 911. He croaked out his name and crashed to the floor.
Ten left. Donnie could hear the operator by his ear, asking for more information. Donnie rolled onto his back and stared up at shapes moving across the ceiling. Was someone in his bedroom? Did it fucking matter? His heart was coughing now, pumping blood in fits and starts. Donnie counted down the last five beats himself. Then he ducked his head underwater and swam until his chest exploded.
Patient Zero, as Donnie Quin would later be dubbed, was dead before the EMTs wheeled him out of his apartment. Because he was a cop, however, they took him to Cook County Hospital, en route to joining his two homeless pals at the morgue. A sharp intern took one look at Donnie and ordered additional blood work. An hour later, the lab results came back. The intern didn’t know what he was looking at, but knew he didn’t like it. He sent the results to his boss, who ignored them when he got caught up in a conference call with Blue Cross about a new regimen of mammogram testing they were kicking back as unnecessary.
Meanwhile, a couple of doctors at Mount Sinai, one at Mercy, and two at Rush were seeing similar problems with patients. They passed their concerns along to their respective bosses, who also did nothing. At least not right that minute. And the predator that was feeding on Chicago was definitely a “right that minute” sort of thing.
BLACK BIOLOGY
CHAPTER 13
“What exactly is this?” I said.
We slid into a garage, underneath a concrete block of buildings on the edge of Hyde Park, maybe a half mile from the University of Chicago’s campus.
“I told you CDA was a private lab?” Ellen Brazile glanced back for confirmation.
“Yeah.”
“This is one of our facilities.”
