“Same for Jacobs, plus he’s into politics. He wants to runthings. Conflict of interest, there. You’ve never wanted to run things. FatherJoseph never wanted to be Pope or even a bishop, and Jews don’t have bishops. You three guys, you justwant to make the human race a little cleaner. Step by step, villain by villain.Every day. We need you. We can’t afford to lose you.”
Then she shivered. Still cold, still wet. “I’m starving. Let’sdump the evening sermon and grab a couple of burgers.”
The heater had finally cleared my windshield, and my headseemed straight enough for driving. I grabbed the chance — Cash’s “eveningsermon” had gotten embarrassing.
So we pulled into a burger joint and parked, not going through the drive-throughline, went inside and found a table right under one of the heater units. Iswear, Cash’s fingertips and lips were turning blue-white. Seen on a blackwoman, that’s alarming. I’m a hell of a poor host.
Or maybe it was reaction to the crime scene, delayed shock.That place sucked, to put it bluntly. And for all her case-hardened veneer,Cash didn’t insulate herself from the evil she hunted. And I still wonderedwhether the magic affected her. Serious bad vibes had echoed around thatupstairs room.
Anyway, I plunked her down under that heater and fetched food,calories, fuel. Opened with a couple of triple-deckers for me, one for her, twolarge fries, and scalding hot coffee to get some warmth going from the insideout. She wolfed her serving down and started looking at mine with a feral eye.I handed my second over and fetched two more, plus a couple of thick chocolateshakes for the instant sugar. That woman could put food away. Damned if I knewwhere she hid it on that skinny marathon body. But running for three hoursstraight with zero body fat must do strange things to your metabolism.
Then she slowed down enough to talk between bites, and hercolor improved. “Sorry about going to pieces on you. That scene . . .stirred up some serious memories. Family stuff, not just the sacrilege.”
If she called her performance “going to pieces,” I wonderedwhat she’d call one of Sandy’s tantrums. Psychotic rage? Cash was the mostcontrolled woman I ever knew. Even Maggie went wobbly every now and then.
“Anything you want to talk about?”
Cash shrugged. “No big secret. Just, a bunch of scum tied mygrandfather to a cross that looked pretty much like that one. Doused him withgasoline and set him on fire. Story inspired me to become a cop, protect mypeople. Then, when I got a badge I made the mistake of digging out the oldfiles and looking through them. Photos, before and after.”
Oh, hell. “What was it, Klan?”
That drew a twisted smile and a faraway look in her eyes. “Oh,no, nothing as romantic as the KKK riding through the night with blazingtorches. This was ‘Black on Black’ crime, and as slimy as they come. Happenedlong before I was born, and I should have just taken the fairy-tale my mother gaveme and let it lie.”
Cash shook her head and munched another bite of burger. Ifigured she was done with her story, and I started wondering if a chunk of hotapple “pie” would add to domestic bliss in the stomach world.
Then she sucked in some more of her chocolate shake,swallowed, and sighed and grimaced again. “See, Granddad was a two-bit preacherman, had a storefront church in a former drugstore down near Fourteenth andEuclid before urban renewal bulldozed the neighborhood. One of the worst blocksin the ghetto at that time. He’d salvaged a pair of rough-sawn eight-by-eightsfrom a collapsing building, heavy timber construction, formed his ‘Old RuggedCross’ up front where he preached, complete with spikes and everything, justlike Reverend Fred’s.” A shiver ran through her shoulders, not cold this time.
“Momma had said he got tangled up in a gang war, ratted somepimps and pushers to the cops, the gang-bangers broke in on Wednesday prayermeeting and shot the place up and then torched the building with him in it.Noble enough as it stands. But I hadto go and dig out cold files.” She paused and shook her head.
“Dumb. Turns out Granddad had fingered those guys because theybelonged to the wrong gang. Filesshowed, evidence and all, he was running numbers, a bookie joint, dope with aside order of girls and boys, you name it, back door of the church. Yeah, itwas a gang war, with him right in the middle of it. Fact was, he’d started it.”
Life on the mean streets. And that used to be the kind ofcrime white cops gave low priority, “just Negroes killing Negroes.” From what Irecalled, that Euclid neighborhood had become a no-go zone before thebulldozers moved in, Indian Territory. Cops would have needed armored cars topatrol the streets, and might have run up against tanks or at least bazookas ifthey tried. Serious gangs. Next thing to private armies, like Somali warlords.
And Cash’s family had come from that. Now I knew where she gother toughness, her aura of Masai warrior with spear and cowhide shield.
She drained the last of her shake, that rude gurgle from thestraw sucking air that your mother always told you to stop making, and pushedher chair back from the table. “So. Now you’ve learned more about the Nef Cashfamily tree than you ever wanted. And here I am carrying a gun and a badge,working for The Man.”
I shrugged. “Let me tell you about my father some day. Oldcliché — we can choose our friends, but we can’t choose our family.”
That drew another of her twisted half-smiles. “Hey, someclichés got that way by being true. Just to change topics and ruin yourdigestion, do you think Kratz is done now? That trail you laid out, John Doe toWolfgang to the late lamented Reverend, sounds like a full sweep.”
I grabbed the wreckage from our table,
