said those kind of people don’t need a reason to kill; probably killed my baby for kicks or for some type of initiation.”
“But you don’t believe that, do you?”
“No. Zakiya would never be involved with drugs or drug dealers. I told you, she had her life planned out. Knew where she was going and was on the road to getting there.”
For the next hour, Mrs. Phillips and I sipped brandy and talked about Zakiya. Naturally, she mostly talked and I mostly listened. Mrs. Phillips raised her after shooting heroin consumed her mother’s life. Zakiya never knew her father.
Mrs. Phillips told me how Zakiya went out of her way to avoid drugs and not get in with
“No, it doesn’t.”
“You damned right it doesn’t.”
The longer I sat there, the more Mrs. Phillips reminded me of my grandmother. She raised me after my parents disappeared. One day when I was eleven they just didn’t come home. No one really knew what happened to them. My younger brother and sister went to live with my aunt and uncle in Mississippi.
They didn’t want me.
My uncle said they were just babies and they would raise them in the church. He said that I was into too much trouble and he was right. Those days I was into everything. After that, it was decided that I would go live with my grandmother, and I didn’t see my brother and sister again. After awhile, it didn’t matter as much. My grandmother was good to me. She showed me much love. She died five years later. But I had a new family by then.
About a year ago I went to Mississippi and tracked them down. My brother is a deacon in the church and my sister is married to the minister. I saw them, talked to them, but I didn’t tell them who I was. They had no idea that they even had an older brother. They were two- and three- years old when I last saw them. I guess my uncle never even told them about me. Look how I turned out as opposed to them. Their brother: the gangster, the killer.
“You tell Mr. Black that I appreciate him sending you over to give me that money. I can’t remember the last time I entertained a handsome young gentleman.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It was meant to be one.” Mrs. Phillips smiled. “I’m not accustomed to taking money from people.”
I stood up and put the envelope down next to Zakiya’s picture. “I understand that, but please take it to cover funeral expenses and that type of thing.”
“You tell Mr. Black if he really wants to do something for me, he will catch the people who took my baby from me. You promise me that, Mr. Simmons.”
“Please, call me Nick.”
“Promise me that you will find out who did this and see that they get what's coming to them.”
“I can’t promise you that, but I promise to do what I can.”
“That’s all I can ask for, Nick.” Mrs. Phillips laughed. “It’s more than the police offered me. To them it was case closed.”
“Do you have a picture of Zakiya that I could borrow?”
She gave me a picture and told me where Zakiya lived. I left that apartment thinking that I probably wouldn’t be able to find the bandits, but I would do what I could. One more thing to get me out of the house, and my mind off Freeze.
Chapter 7
I was up five o'clock that next morning, ready to go and out the house before Wanda opened her eyes. I wanted to be at the police station before the first shift came in. I needed to talk to Tamia Adams. She’s a New York City police sergeant who used to provide information for Freeze. I wanted to see if she had heard anything about the robbery. I had to catch her there because she’d moved and I had no other way to contact her.
Tamia took Freeze’s death very badly, much worse than his so-called woman, Tanya. So bad, that she cried through the whole funeral. After that, Tamia had to take some time off from work ’cause she was cryin’ all the time. That’s why she moved out of her apartment; said there were too many memories of Freeze there. Since then, any time she has something for us she’s been talkin’ to Black directly.
“Sergeant Adams,” I said when I saw her walking toward the building. I guess I startled her ’cause her head snapped around. She relaxed a little when she saw it was me. Tamia gave me a hug and a kiss on the cheek.
“How you doin’, Nick?”
“I’m good. The question is: how are you?”
“It gets a little better everyday.”
“Is there someplace we can talk?”
“Not around here.”
“I understand,” I said and we went back to my car to talk.
“What’s up?”
“There was a robbery at one of the businesses we own.”
“Which one?” Tamia asked.
“Paradise Fish and Chicken.”
“I know the place. Good take-out.”
“Two people were killed.”
“Your employees?”
“No, they were customers. They were standing in line. Apparently the robbers shot them for no reason.”
“I haven’t heard anything about that, but I’ll ask some questions and get back to you.” Tamia took out a business card and wrote her new address and phone number on the back of it. “Memorize that and get rid of it, please.”
I started to go home and get back in the bed. Wanda and I had been up late and I was tired. I started driving in that direction, but somewhere along the way I decided to ride by Zakiya Phillips’s apartment and have a look around. I didn’t know what I was looking for, but I went anyway.
Mrs. Phillips didn’t have a key to her granddaughter’s apartment, so I let myself in. It was a small apartment, but it was very well-furnished. Zakiya seemed to have good taste; a taste for very expensive stuff. Mrs. Phillips didn’t say anything about Zakiya having a job, just that she was a good girl, who had a bachelor’s degree in sociology and a minor in psychology and was about to attend law school. I looked around the apartment and wondered what type of work-study program she was on that would allow her to afford the kind of stuff she had.
I could think of one.
Drugs.
Maybe Mrs. Phillips didn’t know Zakiya like she thought she did. Wouldn’t be the first time the parents were surprised by what their child was really into. I continued to look around for anything that would support my conclusion. If she really was involved with somebody who was involved in the game, maybe there were some clues here that would lead me in the right direction. The only thing I found was a picture that she took at some club, and a business card for a beauty shop.
I took both and left her apartment, and once again decided against goin’ home and gettin’ in the bed. The beauty shop was to be my next stop. I went in the beauty shop to ask if anyone knew Zakiya and could tell me anything about her. While the beauticians told me their stories about what a nice girl Zakiya was, and how they couldn’t imagine why anybody would want to kill her, one of the customers, who was looking at me but not offering any comment, got up and left. “Where you goin’, Dee? You’re next,” one of the beauticians said as she headed for the door.
