“I’m a physical science major.”
We looked at each other for a long moment. I finally pulled the card out of my pocket again. “Can I give you this? You can pass it on to Deacon and tell him I’m looking for him.”
“I ain’t opening the screen,” she said, her words firm. “I don’t know you. Leave it outside and I’ll get it after you go.”
I stuck the card between the screen and the doorframe. “Fair enough.”
“Don’t count on him calling you,” she said.
“He’s not in trouble, Malia. At least not with me.”
She smirked, looking at me like I’d just made some outrageous claim. “So you come into my neighborhood, this neighborhood, and expect me to believe Deacon ain’t done nothin’ wrong to get you here?” She laughed softly. “Nice try, mister.”
“I just need to talk to him,” I said.
“Noah,” Carter called from behind me.
I turned around. He was focused on the end of the street. Three teenage boys were making their way toward us.
“You better go,” Malia said, seeing them as well. She stepped back and shut the front door.
I walked down to the sidewalk to Carter. The boys were slowly ambling up the street, all of them dressed in baggy jeans and polo shirts, trying to look casual. They stopped when I joined Carter.
“Get anything?” he asked, not moving his eyes from our friends.
“Nothing.”
“Man, you are so good at your job.”
“Thanks.”
The boys were now pretending to check out an old Cadillac parked on the street, engaged in an animated conversation. Their words didn’t make it to us.
“The smart thing to do would be to get in your car and go,” Carter said.
“Yes, it would.”
“But you got nothing from the house.”
“No, I didn’t.”
The vein in his neck pulsed. “So we gotta go talk to these guys, don’t we?”
“Afraid so.”
The conversation among the three stopped. They were about seventy-five yards away. They returned our stares.
Carter looked at me. “There may be more. In the houses. These guys may be decoys. I’ll go behind you a little bit, so I can watch.”
I nodded, the muscles in my back and stomach tightening. I flexed my trigger finger, knowing that it might get put to use.
“You ready?” Carter asked.
I wasn’t, but it didn’t matter.
We started walking.
Twenty-six
The mild afternoon sun felt like a heat lamp on my neck as Carter and I walked down the street toward the boys. All three were about six feet tall, lanky, and athletic. Two had their heads shaved completely, the other an Afro that was teased nearly two feet off his head. The two shaved heads wore similar navy polos, the Afro a bright green one. The only difference I could see between the two shaved heads was that one of them had a gold hoop in each ear. The baggy jeans that they all sported looked designer. Their faces belied their tough-guy poses, though, and I put each of them at about fifteen years old.
“What’s going on?” I asked, stopping a few feet short of them and trying to sound relaxed.
The kid with the Afro stepped forward and shrugged his shoulders. “Nothin’, man. What’s up with you?”
I couldn’t think of anything better than the truth. “I’m trying to find Deacon.”
The kid laughed, exposing a mouthful of white teeth. “Like you and he all tight and shit, right?”
The two boys behind him snickered.
“No,” I said. “I just need to ask him some questions.”
“You ain’t no five-O,” the one with the earrings said. “’Cause you can’t wear no shorts if you wearin’ a badge.”
“I’m an investigator.”
The Afro lifted his chin and looked past me. “That your partner?”
“Something like that,” I said, glad to know Carter was still behind me. “Any idea where I can find Deacon?”
The kid put a finger to his chin and pretended to think. “Hmmm.”
“Hey, Carlos,” the one without the earrings said. “I know where he might be.”
Carlos smiled at me. “Where’s that, Reg?”
Reg looked at me. “Mission Beach, man. He love it down there.”
They all laughed. I did not.
Reg hit his twin in the shoulder. “Rudy, man. What’s the name of that place he digs so much?”
Rudy grinned, a silver tooth in the middle of the grin. “Think it’s called the SandDune or somethin’ dumbass like that. Someplace you only find dumbass white dudes.”
The anger percolated inside my body. They were sending a message. They wanted me to know that they had either been a part of or knew about the drive-by. The adrenaline spiked in my veins.
“Takes a lot of balls to shoot at somebody out of a car after asking for directions,” I said. “You guys are real big-time. Deacon let you wipe his ass, too?”
The smiles disappeared. Carlos took a step toward me. “What you say, motherfucker?”
Carter, who was standing next to me, grunted. “What he said was, you guys are giant, and when I say giant, I mean
Fury raged in Carlos’s eyes. “Hey, fuck you, Hulk Hogan.”
“I’m not into guys, Carlos,” Carter said. “Particularly ugly ones.”
Carlos took another step forward and his hand went to his waistband. I lunged at him, grabbed him by the throat, swept his legs with one of mine, and dropped him onto his back.
“Anybody reaches any further and they get an extra hole to stick their finger in,” Carter said, coming up next to me, his gun aimed at the two standing boys.
Reg moved his hand away from his body, but Rudy hesitated.
“You pull that thing out, bud, you better hope it’s bigger than mine,” Carter said to Rudy. “I’m fast and I don’t miss.”
Rudy stared at him for a moment, then eased his empty hand around to where it could be seen.
I looked down at Carlos, dug my knee into his chest, and pressed my right hand down on his throat. “You owe me.”
Carlos’s cool quickly evaporated. His eyes bulged and sweat formed on his forehead. “Bullshit.”
“Bullshit? You come down to my neighborhood and shoot the place up? Try to kill me? Which part is bullshit?” I pressed harder on his chest.
“Man, you’re chokin’ him,” Rudy said.
“Yeah, I am. And I’m gonna kill him if someone doesn’t start talking.” I smiled down at Carlos, squeezing his throat a little harder, his larynx feeling like a rock under my palm. “Right here in the street. In front of all your friends.”
Carlos kicked his legs and slapped his arms wildly at my sides, all to no avail. He tried to speak, but I was cutting off the air and he gagged. His eyes darted from side to side, tears spilling out of the corners.
I looked up at his friends. “Somebody better start fucking talking.”
