King Maker: The Knights of Breton Court, Volume 1 (20 page)

  
"Naw man, nothing like that. Let's roll," Baylon said.

  
"Naw, naw. We got a minute." Griff's eyes were without hope but swam with complete malignancy, shark's eyes. He walked around with so much pain, trying to figure out a way to make it all go away. His shirt loose to hide the gun in his waistband, he closed the door behind him.

  
"Come on man, let's go."

  
"Not till your big brother has a taste."

  
"It ain't like that. You can't…" Baylon put his hands on him to get him out the door. Griff laid a feral glare on him, promising that Baylon, Baylon's kids, and Baylon's kids' kids should line up and apologize for the effrontery. Baylon released him and raised his hands in a "my bad" gesture.

  
"You always did have trouble sharing."

  
The strange look on Griff's face, hungry and predatory, made Baylon anxious. Griff touched one of Michelle's tendrils of hair, a gentle caress flush with intent. Her braless breasts pert and at attention, he could trace the curve of her back through her thread bare outfit. Stifling a lascivious grin, he stepped to her, the heat of him wafting off in waves. He grazed her cheek with his finger, an intimate gesture, one too reminiscent, to Baylon's mind, of an owner with his dog. Griff all but let her take in his scent, but she slapped his hand away.

  
"Oh, it's like that is it?" Griff asked.

  
"It's like that," she said, too defiant. Unafraid of him.

  
Baylon winced. Griff had changed over the last few months. Became harder, an impressive feat as he was already one of the hardest men Baylon knew. However, not just harder, but colder. And he didn't brook women telling him "no".

  
Griff smiled seductively. An icy laugh. He grabbed her arm and jerked her to him. She raked her finger nails across his face and drew her knife. The thing about knives, to Baylon's mind, was they showed more heart than a gun. Any fool could squeeze a trigger and blast. There was a distance to the killing. The death. To use a knife required one to be up close and personal. Angry and intent. They couched together, crashing to the ground. Wrestling over the knife. "NO!" Baylon shouted and jumped in, hoping to leverage the blade. He tried to take it from her or keep it from him. If anyone was to have it, it should be Baylon. She clung to it, desperate that he might hurt her with it. Griff released his hold. The blade pierced her with a soft gasp, driven into her body. Her hand dug into his arm, a lover in the throes of passion, and then released. Warm in his arms. So peaceful. He wished he could hold her forever. Her lifeless gaze not too different from Griff's everyday expression. Her blood smeared his clothes. Stained his hands. Baylon's senses left him. The sorrow hit him like a blow to the chest, his heart heavy with shame and grief.

  
"Come on, man," Griff announced, a kid whose dinner had been spoiled. "We gotta get out of here."

  
Baylon took the knife, the proud owner of a matching set.

 

Laying naked next to Omarosa, Lee became suddenly self-conscious of how much his bed smelled like ball sweat and cheap aftershave. The sheets were rough and stiff, not fit for a woman like her. Omarosa slept barely making a sound, little more than an observed presence in his bed. That was the only way he could think to describe her. As if he took his eyes from her, she'd disappear, a wisp in the night. So he stayed up watching the gentle rise and fall of her chest. Taking in her scent. Listening for the sound of her slightest stirring.

  "I'm awake, you know. I'm not going to disappear on you."

  "I'm trained police. I specialize in finding folks intent on disappearing."

  "That what you were doing at the Phoenix?" Omarosa asked.

  "Nah, I was looking at you."

  "Ah, the fates conspiring for us to meet." She curled up, the sheet wrapped around her. A portrait of seduction, her every movement was choreographed to elicit an effect from him.

  "Something like that." Lee sat up. He never imagined himself bedding a black girl. His mind focusing on the black part of her description, he rolled the idea around in his head. Not that he bought into the stereotypes of black people's sexual prowess. He contented himself with knowing what to do with what he had. "What do you do?"

  "Do you care or is that some residual Protestant guilt rearing its head?"

  "Catholic. Very residual."

  "Do you even remember my name? No, never mind, don't strain yourself." Her voice little more than a low purr, she made him feel both inadequate and important at the same time. "What do you know about dogs?"

  "They bark, shit, eat, and sleep," Lee said.

  "They fight, too."

  "Not legally."

  "How often do you stake out for legal operations?"

  "What are you getting at?"

  "I just hear tell of a dog-fighting ring."

  "Not my beat."

  "So you'd think. You gang task force."

  "How'd you–"

  "I know things," Omarosa said. "Now, who do you think runs the dog fights?"

  "I'm listening."

  "Lots of rules go into these things so that shit don't accidentally jump off."

  "Even police."

  "Po-po go where they go. Can't be helped. Cost of doing business."

  "So you know where one of these fights is going to be held?"

  "Maybe. But I'll take some convincing to give it up."

  Suddenly uncomfortable, he didn't know if he was capable of anything approaching tender.

  But the thought of her riding him again rekindled an erection.

 

  
"Night!" one of them called out. "I got you. Get behind me."

  
The blood drained from his face. His sallow and wasted complexion reflected in the car window, full of hate and wariness. Oh shit. Did I just fire at Night? The full realization left his legs weakened. He forced himself to a steady gait. Duplicity he learned was in his own nature. With a level voice he called out, "Dred says hello, motherfucker."

  
He watched his head, making sure he wasn't seen. It wasn't much of a plan, but better the shit not fall back on him. His was already a life of a false resigna tion. A false life filled with scorn.

  
Junie knew when he first learned to carry the mix of rage and shame. In fourth grade, his teacher, Mrs Crider, a bunhaired brunette with a pinched face and aristocratic manner, made him a member of the safety patrol. This was back in the day when fellow students wore white sashes and were given badges and were charged with seeing their fellow students across the streets. This was a matter of high prestige, and short of student council or making the honor roll, only the most responsible or favored were chosen for the function. Junie was neither. Instead, as he could only surmise later, that Mrs Crider attempted to reach him. To give him a connection to the idea of school and his fellow students. It wasn't lost on him, even at the time, that his post was the most remote, where no student or quasiresponsible parent would allow their child to cross, especially escorted only by a three feet tall scrawny black kid with unkempt hair and questionable hygiene habits. Defying all odds, and despite Junie's reluctance, the blatant and transparent manipulation worked. He actually swelled with pride when the safety patrol was dismissed early and he rose as one of the chosen lot, eyes of his fellow classmates on him, to at tend to his duties. Nor did he feel ridiculous, lone black boy at the ass end of an isolated stretch of road, barely within eyesight of the nearest safety patrol member, as he waved and returned the allclear signal. It worked, that was, until like every else in Junie's life it turned to shit and was taken away from him.

  
As brilliant as Mrs Crider had been getting him to care about being responsible, she had a sizeable deficit when it came to sustaining that limited sense of self esteem she had successfully fanned to life. One day in class, she called upon Junie to answer a question. Flustered at the sudden attention, he stammered about. Mrs Crider stood there, silent and waiting. The eyes of his fellow classmates pressed in on him. He grew so desperately nervous, he knocked his books and papers to the ground. They scattered with a furious, though unintentional, shower. Springing out of his chair, he fell to his knees to gather up the papers. That was when he heard her, Mrs Crider, laughing at him. He was so perfectly pathetic: lone black boy, white teacher looming over him, white classmates a chorus of openmouthed laughter and fingerpointing. The words "fuck you" flew out of his mouth without thought, but they hung in the air like the empty echo of gunshot. The two little words stilled the laughter. Mrs Crider's eyes narrowed into an unforgiving glare and she sent him to the principal's office.

  
He never walked as a safety patrol member again.

  
Actually, he didn't walk as much of anything again. Whether he realized it or not, that was when the educational system lost him. He went through the motions of school for another four years or so, but he was already done. There was no reaching him after that. He had turned his back on the institution knowing that whatever path for his life he was to chart, it wouldn't be through any hallowed halls of higher learning.

  
And on quiet days in what passed for reflection for one Juneteenth Walker, he wondered how many Mrs Criders shut down countless Junies each day.

  
He retreated into the house.

  
"Any problems?" Parker asked.

  
"Just some nonsense," Junie said. "Nothing I couldn't handle."

 

Octavia Burke never lamented her quick rise in the ranks. She didn't have time for political games nor did she buy into either affirmative action or workplace racism. Either were self-defeating traps of a game she refused to play. Like her mother, she was nobody's victim. "You kiss butt, then you kick it." her mother always said, not one to pay attention to firsts either. First black nurse hired at Wishard Hospital. First black nurse promoted to department head. First black nurse elected to serve on the board. Strong and vital, nothing got in her way. Her fierce determination came at a cost. There was always a sadness about her, like she were missing out on something. She was always closed off, a cool aloofness she never intended with her children. Passed onto her children.

  So when Octavia's first husband told her that she had trouble letting folks in, it came as no surprise. Nor was she surprised when he left.

  She kicked her shoes off at the front door and hung her coat up. The house, silent and dark. A residual flow from upstairs, probably her second husband in bed watching television. Home was her oasis. Away from the madness of the office away from the detritus of the streets who took up so much of her time. She was happy to be home. It centered her and it saddened her that she spent so little time here. She continued her after-work ritual. Shoes, coat, then food. The microwave and oven were bereft of a plate of food. Whatever they had done for dinner didn't include her. The checkin calls of "when will you be home" were fewer and further between, tired of "I'll grab a bite on the way home" or "don't wait up, it's a long one".

  Then the boys. Long asleep, she made a point of peeking in on them if only to reassure herself that they were still alive and that she could pick them out of a line-up. To each boy, she'd sit on the edge of his bed and stroke their hair. To let them know she was present and loved them, even if they weren't awake to know. The simple gesture allowed the day to drain out of her, all of the misery and hopelessness and futility of her work. And it was the only time they'd let her love on them anyway. They were getting so damn big.

  Their marriage had hit a bad patch. Her long hours, the Job, were worse than having a man on the side. She suspected he filled the void of her absence with… someone. No, that wasn't fair. It wasn't in him. The only thing he filled himself with was quiet, festering resentment. Never going to bed at the same time. Letting the gulf between them fallow.

  The television played coolly in the background. He watched an episode of that new medical drama she liked so much where all the oversexed doctors looked barely old enough to drive. It was a show they decided to watch together. Or so she thought.

  Without betraying any hurt feelings, she walked into their bathroom to brush her teeth and closed the door. His passive-aggressive point having been made, he turned off the television. She came out wearing an old T-shirt. She slipped into her side of the bed. The same old night-time dance.

 

  
His heart soared.