Hell To Pay

“Sure.”

“Y’all were tight?”

“I already told the police—”

“Tell us,” said Strange.

“Tell us again,” said Quinn, his tone softer than his partner’s.

Lee looked over Strange’s shoulder, then breathed out slow. “We hadn’t been tight for, like, ten, fifteen. We ran together in high school, that was about it.”

“Coolidge?”

“Yeah. I came out in eighty-six. Lorenze, I don’t think he finished up.”

“Lorenze have many enemies when you two were hangin’ together back then?”

“Back then? I guess he did. He had this way about him, right? But if you’re askin’ me, Did he have enemies lately, or, Do I know who killed him? The answer is, I don’t know.”

“Y’all didn’t swing in the same circles,” said Strange.

“Like I said: not for a long time.”

“You use drugs, Walter?”

Lee’s eyes, directly on Strange, narrowed, and he lowered his voice. “This ain’t right. You know this ain’t right. Comin’ up in here to a black man’s workplace and tryin’ to sweat him.”

“If you do drugs,” said Strange, plowing ahead, “and if you cop from the same people, then maybe you know who Lorenze owed. ’Cause it could’ve been a drug debt got him doomed.”

“Look. I haven’t been usin’ any kind of drugs for a long time. Back in the eighties, yeah, I had a little problem with powder. Lotta people did. But I found my way out of it, see—”

“Let’s get back to Lorenze.”

“No, you’re gonna let me finish. I found my way out of it. This isn’t the only job I have. I got a night job, too. I been holdin’ two jobs down now for the last ten years, and all the time doin’ it straight. Takin’ care of my little girl, raising her right.”

“All right,” said Strange. “You’re so far away from all that, why’d you go to Lorenze’s wake, then?”

“Because I’m a Christian. I went to say a prayer for my old friend. To pay my respects. Even you can understand that, right?”

“Did Lorenze still hang with some of the old crowd that you know?”

Lee relaxed his shoulders. It seemed he’d given up on reaching Strange’s human side and now he just wanted this done. “Most of them grew up and moved on. A couple of them passed.”

“Sequan Hawkins? Ed Diggs?”

“I haven’t seen Sequan, so I don’t know. Digger Dog? He’s still around.”

“That’s Diggs’s street name?”

Lee nodded. “I saw him at the funeral home. He’s still livin’ over there with his grandmother. He looks older, but the same, you know? He always was Lorenze’s main boy.”

“Thanks for your time,” said Quinn.

“That it?” said Lee, his eyes still locked on Strange.

“That’ll do it,” said Strange. “We need you, I expect we can find you here.”

Strange and Quinn walked toward the entrance to the store. They passed a white guy in a maroon shirt, small, with a belly and patches of hair framing a bald top, trying to calm an angry customer. The manager, thought Strange.

Out in the lot, Quinn glanced over at Strange on the way to the car. “You were kinda rough on him, weren’t you?”

Strange stared straight ahead. “We got no time to be nice.”

They drove out toward Potomac in Strange’s white Caprice. Strange made a cell call to see if Sequan Hawkins was at his job. Then he phoned the office and got Janine. Quinn sipped coffee from a go-cup and listened to their short, businesslike conversation. Strange made another call, left a message on the machine at Lamar Williams’s apartment, and left Lamar the number to his cell.

“What’s going on?” said Quinn.

“Lamar’s been trying to get up with me. Janine said he told her it was important.”

“Well?”

“He’s got his classes right now. I’ll get him later.”

“Any idea what he wants?”

“These boys rolled up on him a while back in Park Morton, lookin’ for Joe’s mother? Pretty sure it’s the same hard cases I saw up at Roosevelt one night at practice. They were huntin’ Lorenze, I’m certain of it now. Bet you they ain’t nothin’ but neighborhood boys, too. Maybe Lamar found out something more.”

“If they’re stupid enough to stay in the neighborhood, it won’t be long until someone turns them in.”