me.”
Fearless glanced at me and smirked. There was too much blood and pain in the room for me to share his humor, but I knew what he meant. We had a path to follow now. And following was always better than being stalked.
“What about you?” Fearless asked Theodore Timmerman.
“Fuck you.”
“That’s all right, brother. Yeah. You just keep on sayin’ that. But I’m sure your mama don’t want them to be the last words on your lips before you die.”
“You’re not gonna kill me,” Teddy said, I thought rather hopefully.
“No,” Fearless agreed.
He crouched down next to the chair Teddy was tied to. Then he took a long finger and jabbed it lightly in the center of that dark cloud in Timmerman’s chest. The pain shuddered through Milo’s ex-agent like a quake through a dying engine. He tried to inhale but his lungs stalled and a dribble of blood appeared at the corner of his mouth.
“You taste that?” Fearless asked. “That’s the end comin’ up outta you. All I got to do is leave you here, man. That’s all, and you’ll be dead before sunrise.”
Timmerman was still trying to recover from the deep hurt that Fearless had pointed out. He took small breaths, jammed his eyes closed, and clenched his jaw tightly.
After a few moments of this agony he looked up and said, “Fuck you.”
My friend laughed and shook his head.
Ted Timmerman had won Fearless Jones’s respect.
32
FEARLESS REMOVED TIMMERMAN’S shoes and pants, gagged him, and bound his hands behind his back. I drove Ambrosia’s Chrysler up the driveway next to the big impersonal house and Fearless took our captive and pushed him on the floor of the backseat.
“You better not let nobody but Jesus know where you light next time, Barty,” Fearless suggested at the back door.
“What you gonna do wit’ him?” BB asked.
“Don’t worry ’bout him. Worry ’bout yo’self, man.”
I opened the door to the car but then I closed it again.
“BB.”
“Yeah, Paris?”
“Tell me about Rikki Faison’s house.”
“What?” he asked with a weak grin and slight shrug.
“Don’t fuck with us, BB. Tell me about that house and what you were doin’ there.”
“You got to go, Paris,” Bartholomew complained.
“Fearless,” I said.
“Uh-huh,” he replied. He got in behind the wheel and I ushered young Prince Perry back inside the church house.
“Tell me about Minna, man,” I said after the door was closed behind us.
“She was my girlfriend, that’s all. We been messin’ around for three, four months.”
“And?”
“And . . . well. One night she said that her brother heard that I was related to Aunt Winnie. She said that we could get a hold on her that we’d be able to make a big payday. Big.”
“So what you do?”
“I got together with Kit and we hatched up a plan.”
“What plan?”
Bartholomew stared into my eyes. His visage was a rueful one. I think he wanted to unburden his heart.
He shook his head instead.
“No, man. You might find out along the way, but if Aunt Winnie ask you you tell her you ain’t heard it from me.”
“I hope you know what you doin’, brother,” I said. “Call Milo’s number when you know where you gonna be. And don’t forget to use the name Honeyboy. Don’t use your own name.”
You could see that he didn’t want me to leave him alone there. Being tortured will bring out the communal spirit in most men. But he didn’t want to beg. At least he had that much pride.
***
WE DROVE TO GENERAL HOSPITAL and pulled into an alley across the street. It was closing in on seven-thirty by then and so the alley was empty. Fearless
