Only the Wicked (6 page)

“We've talked about the angles, Ivan. For the last two years you've made the most money you've ever made in your business. You're doing more research, and are getting more referrals from lawyers.”

“Get myself a couple of youngsters to do the leg work and an office a little closer to Santa Monica.” Monk switched on the light in the bathroom.

“Is that so bad?” She knew about his “crash,” his and Marasco Seguin's psychological after-shocks following the shootout the two were involved in at the Rancho Tajuata Housing Projects not too long ago. After the rush wore off, after the heady feeling of bullets whizzing by you and challenging death, and surviving, there's the inevitable toll on the psyche. The sudden anxiety attack walking to the 7-Eleven on the corner or the apprehension that dances with your nerves when you're taking out the trash. You can't predict when it will hit, just that it will.

Delayed stress, emotional come-down, or combat fatigue, as the head doctors called it in the old days; it was the mortal certainty the body's capabilities were finite. The concept wasn't new to Monk, but it took an incident like he and Seguin had gone through to reel in his ego, his feeling he could go forever. The cumulative effect of being hit, stabbed, shot at and kicked for twenty-something years exacted a heavy price on your mind and body.

“Maybe not so bad,” he said. Six years ago he wouldn't have entertained the idea of being desk-bound.

She undid her skirt and Monk leaned against the bathroom's doorjamb, watching her undress. Slowly, she wiggled the skirt down over her hips, and then kicked it away as it fell to the ground. She took off her blouse, and unhooked her bra, letting it slip down from her body as she turned in profile.

Then Kodama, clad solely in black sheer panties, walked over to him and unbuckled his pants, pushing his boxers down below his hips. He stepped out of them, and she elevated herself, wrapping her legs around his torso. Monk put his hands under her firm backside, easing her down. Kodama took his penis, positioning him around the material of her underwear. He gently shoved her against the bathroom wall. She arched her back upon contact with the cool plaster. Monk entered her. Kodama latched her arms tight around his flexed shoulders, the muscles in her legs bunching as he worked himself in her.

As they made love, somewhere above the house on the hill, he heard a coyote howling. The creature's yelping matched the rhythm of their hearts.

Chapter 4

The funeral for Marshall Adam Spears took place the following Saturday. Afterward, the wake was held at the Abyssinia Barber Shop and Shine Parlor. Food from Yank's Texas Bar-B-Que was laid out on two long tables set in the far end of the shop. The catering tins of beef hot links from San Antonio, fried turkey, greens with pebble-sized chunks of ham hock immersed in their mass, and other savory items of sialagogic value rested on pressed, brocaded linen. Juice, alcohol, ice and paper cups were laid out on a card table. Cold cans of beer were below the table in a metal washtub.

Little had KLON, the jazz and blues station, playing softly on his speakers. Several members of the Rakestraw Methodist Church were in attendance. Dellums had informed Pastor Breedlove, at the church, of Spears' passing, and he had been the one to do the eulogy. The story persisted of a daughter and an older sister, but neither the pastor, his congregation, nor Monk, had uncovered either as of yet.

Along with the church-going folk, the men who had been present at Spears' demise were also in attendance. Added to their number were some of the surviving teammates of the Towne Avenue All-Stars, along with members of their families. Monk had been able to contact a few through the community self-improvement organization—100 Black Men—and contacting the Negro Hall of Fame in Kansas City.

“This is nice,” Willie Brant enthused while chewing on a slice of hot link.

“That's the first time I ever heard you give a compliment, Willie,” Abe Carson said.

“Man can appreciate things, can't he?” Brant wandered off.

“I'm glad Spears had burial insurance.” Kelvon Little munched on a plate of red beans and rice. “Paying for the spread between all of us wasn't so bad though. Even Willie kicked in something. But I hope this doesn't start a trend.”

“Haircuts and send-offs,” Monk remarked, taking in the people milling about. “Might get you new business, Kelvon.”

“The octogenarian trade, and they don't tip so good,” the barber lamented, shoveling down more chow.

Monk had spent extra effort in trying to locate Kennesaw Riles. Had wound up talking with another relative, on whose side of the family, and specific extraction, he wasn't sure. This one, who lived out in the desert community of Parris, thought he had an old number for the former ballplayer, and had promised to look for it. He hadn't called back, and Monk was so busy getting things in order, he'd forgotten to get back in touch.

“Gathered,” Pastor Breedlove announced, wiping at his trim mustache with a paper napkin. He put his previously full paper plate on one of the barber chairs. The clergyman brushed at the front of his blue serge Zegna three-piece suit, the material beginning to tug across a stomach that had apparently grown since the suit was fitted.

“Gathered,” he repeated. “I didn't know brother Spears as well as I would have liked. But he came to our church off and on for some three years past. He may not have been a steady visitor to the house of the Lord, but how one comes to Jesus is not for us to say.”

Somebody said, “Amen,” and Monk and Carson turned to see Brant shaking his head in the affirmative. They exchanged incredulous glances.

“We don't know when our number will be called, when we'll round home plate for the last time,” Breedlove intoned. He pivoted about in semi-arcs and shifted on his feet as he talked. “We only know we must be prepared for the time our savior decides to bring us home.” He was a good-sized man, and he used his hands as if he were scooping out mounds of earth.

“Marshall Spears had a long and good life. He went past his three score and seven, and, really, can any of us ask any more? He was a professional athlete, a fighter for our people's rights in the deep south, but first and foremost he was a worker.”

A man in a vintage tan Vicuna sport coat and a ratty Sunny Boy cap sauntered into the shop. His pants were pressed corduroy, and his saddle-brown cap-toes were military shiny. He wore a pair of sturdy glasses and walked with the aid of a gnarled swagger stick with a gold orb for a top.

“The railroad, the playing field, the road to freedom and the rails on which the powerful locomotives carried many of our kin up north to a better life—these were the outward manifestations of Marshall Spears' life.”

The newcomer plopped into one of the empty barber chairs, wincing as he got his left leg onto the foot rest. This man and one of the old-time ballplayers exchanged nods as the minister continued his impromptu sermon.

Breedlove folded his arms, palms flat against his wide chest, a pharaoh in repose. “We can only ask to do what we know is right by our fellows. We can only do what we can do to ease suffering and injustice in this most imperfect of worlds. If we can do that, if we can keep our Father close to our hearts, then surely only God can call us to account. As the last book in the Old Testament promises, ‘Behold I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me.' We know the way has been prepared for brother Spears.”

There was a round of “Amens.” Breedlove was handed a small paper plate of the sliced beef links by a woman of ample hips in a hat of many angles. He kept his grin on her as he devoured his snack between his next plate of food.

“Man gets hungry working for the Lord,” Carson said sarcastically.

“You should watch that, Abe,” Brant cautioned.

“When you get so full of the Holy Ghost?” Monk asked.

“It ain't that,” Brant shot back. “But when someone you know goes, that's a sign, man. A sign the higher power is marking all our time.” Brant looked solemn, stuck his hands in his pockets and walked outside.

“Hey, Kennesaw, you looking pretty fit.” Lamarr Cedras, who'd played on the All-Stars and the Cuban X Giants, greeted the newcomer.

“Goddamn, ain't that you, Lamarr?” the other man chuckled.

The two hugged and laughed boisterously, and walked over to the beverage table. Cedras poured invigorating doses from the Gentleman Jack for both of them. Monk let the two reminisce and stamp their feet for several minutes before he introduced himself

“Kennesaw, I believe we're cousins,” he said, after the two older men sat down.

The old man gazed into the face beaming down at his. He had some more whiskey. Then he put the cup down on the black-and-white tiles Little had waxed that morning, all the time not taking his gaze off Monk. “You're Nona's boy. You kinda got your mama's face, but you're sturdy-like, like I remember your daddy the mechanic was.”

“Yes, sir.” They shook hands. “My name's Ivan.” The old man's hands were surprisingly smooth, the grip sure.

Kennesaw Riles got back up, listing slightly on his elegant walking stick. He put a hand on Monk's shoulder. “Did your mother come?”

Embarrassed, Monk add-libbed, “She didn't really know Mr. Spears, and wasn't sure you'd be coming today.”

Anticipation fled his face, and he removed his hand from Monk's shoulder. He looked down, his long fingers caressing the small gold orb topping his cane. Riles angled his head up again. “I ain't seen you since the time your father took you and your sister—what's her name again?”

“Odessa,” Monk said.

Riles peered at Cedras. “This boy's mother was always something. Always had her own mind on things. His daddy wanted to call him Earl, but she wasn't having that.” He sat down heavily, tilting his head back and exhaling softly.

“You know why she gave 'em those foreign-soundin' names, Ivan and Odessa?” He was looking at Cedras, but jerked his head at Monk.

“She's from Canada?” the old ballplayer asked blithely.

“Canada?” Riles chortled, tapping his cane on the floor as if invoking a familiar. “Negro, what's that got to do with—look, the reason she insisted on them names is kinda very fascinating.” He had another helping of the Jack as he settled in to regale his former teammate.

Monk noticed another newcomer just entering the shop. She was a young African-American woman in a black maxi-length skirt combined with a top of some clinging material that swept up and around one of her muscular shoulders. There was a silver lamé sash tied around her trim waist. She wore over-sized dark glasses, and her hair was done in an elaborate combination of plaits and braids.

He was aware he was staring too hard at her, but not, he justified, simply because she was fine. It did seem like he'd seen her before.

“Hi,” he said as she stood munching on a radish she'd plucked from the salad tin. “I gather you knew Marshall Spears?”

The face behind the big shades was impassive. Her jaw worked in efficient motions as she consumed her vegetable.

“I'm not trying to be funny,” Monk reacted. “I didn't know him well, but he was a regular here like I am.”

She swallowed. “Your name is Monk, isn't it?” Her voice was smoky, like aged bourbon on ice.

“Sikkuh,” he shook an index finger at her. “I tracked down the photographer who shot the poster you were on.”

She displayed her white teeth, slipping the glasses down on her nose. “I don't know what you thought when you saw me draped over a giant malt liquor can.”

“I thought Mr. Spears had, well you know, good taste.”

She scratched at a spot on her forehead. “He told me he was happy I was getting work. That sometimes you had a whole lot of ties to put down before the train could roll through.”

Spears' life was revealing itself to him as if it were a series of boxes, one inside the other. And the various people who knew him far better than Monk and the men from the barbershop were the locksmiths undoing the containers. “How were you two related?”

“He was my great-uncle. The brother to my father's mother.”

“Ah.”

“I do some modeling and like every other chick in this town, I'm trying to get my big acting break, too. I know how trite that sounds.”

“Some make it,” Monk conceded.

“I've been at it for about five years now.” She retrieved another radish. “After I got out of Spellman, my parents had a fit. Here I was with a degree in marketing, and I'd made up my mind to be the next Tyra Banks.”

“Are you from Atlanta originally?”

“No, Philadelphia. Although my folks and Uncle Marsh came from Arkansas back in the day. Before they moved to Chicago.”

“I'm sorry you had to hear about your great-uncle secondhand.”

“Yes,” she lamented, “but he had a long, full life.” She brightened. “Anyway, the photographer described you accurately.” She straddled the glasses on top of her head, cocking one of her expertly plucked brows.

“When was the last time you saw your great-uncle?”

Husky laughter turned the duo's heads toward Riles, Mr. Dellums, Cedras and two other old-timers who were now standing near the beverage table, the Jack and cans of beer held aloft.

“For Piper Davis, the best of the rest,” one of the older men said.

“He should have been in the majors, not that damn farm team of the Red Sox,” Riles commented.

“Yes,” another one nodded. “And so should have Nate Moreland, Jackie's teammate at Pasadena City College.”

“Yep,” mumbled another. “He pitched ten years for the El Centro Imperials, and should have been doing it for the Dodgers, too.”

The men all agreed and drank some more.

“About a month ago,” Sikkuh responded. “I came by to see him and saw that he'd put up that poster. I did the job last year, and had forgotten about the gig.” She looked off, then back at Monk. “He told me he'd spotted the poster in the liquor store he frequented, and convinced the owner to get another copy from his beer distributor.” She put a hand to part of her face. An ornate silver ring was on her thumb and a simple gold one around her forefinger. “Gawd,” she complained, peeking at Monk.