“Gus.”
“Aha, ha, ha,” laughed Newton, stamping one foot on the floor. “Ssh, ssh, ssh…”
“You gonna ask us in, Lonnie?” said Otis.
“Better not. I got company.”
“We won’t be but a minute.”
“Look here, man, I ain’t got what you’re lookin’ for. Not here.” “Go ahead and ask us in.”
Lonnie Newton shrugged and stepped aside. Otis went in, and Lavonicus followed, ducking his head to avoid the top of the door frame.
A small shapely woman in a short black skirt sat on the living-room couch, bobbing her head to the music coming from the stereo. The track featured a vocalist rapping languidly over an easy, scratchy wah-wah guitar with some popping bass behind it. The woman was hitting a blunt and did not look up as the men entered the room.
The living room fronted an open kitchen. A bedroom was set off to the right, and a stairway before it led down to a second bedroom. A bay window ran the length of the living room and offered a panoramic view of the city and mountains beyond.
“Turn that music down, will you, Lonnie?” asked Otis.
“What’samatter, man, ain’t you down with it? Or would you rather be listenin’ to the Commodores and shit?”
“Turn it down. Can’t hear myself think.”
“Thought you was Cali,” said Newton, counterclockwising the volume. He looked at the woman, smiled, then looked at Lavonicus. “How about you, Frankenstein? You into the West Coast sound?”
Lavonicus’s ears pinkened and his mouth dropped open as Newton laughed. Otis shook his head. The Newton boy was making a mistake. It was because the woman was in the room. Newton wouldn’t show fear in front of his woman; that was understandable. But he was pushing it too far the other way. Some men were stupid like that. Newton was one of those men.
Violence didn’t bother Otis, but it was usually messy and often costly, and he preferred to avoid it when he could. He thought he’d give the Newton boy a chance.
“Excuse me, young lady,” said Otis to the girl. “Give us a few minutes alone, will you?”
“Go on, girl,” said Newton.
She snatched the blunt up out of an ashtray and headed toward the stairs.
“Not there,” said Newton. “Get in the bedroom.”
She went into the bedroom, closing the door behind her.
“Nice-lookin’ lady,” said Otis, knowing then that the money was in the bedroom.
“Compton freak,” said Newton.
Otis went to the bay window and scanned the view. “Beautiful up here, man.”
“Yeah, the neighborhood’s red hot. Madonna just bought a house out this way. Maybe I’ll stop by and give her one of those personal housewarming presents you hear about.”
“Think she’d like that, huh?”
“Pretty as I am?”
Still acting cocky, thought Otis. And the woman wasn’t even in the room.
“You know, Lonnie, to live in a place like this you must be doin’ all right.”
“It’s a rental. But, yeah, I’m doin’ fine.” Newton picked a rolled number out of his bag of dope. He lit the fatty and drew on it deeply. “You want some of this?”
“Maybe later.”
“Your loss. ’Cause this here is some chronic motherfuckin’ shit.”
Otis turned from the window to face Newton. “Let’s talk business, Lonnie.”
“You mean that thousand dollars again? Told you I didn’t have it here.”
“Where you got it, man, a bank? You got no bank account, Lonnie, so don’t be frontin’ behind that shit.”
“Look here, man,” said Newton, gesturing with the joint in his hand. “Word is you’re out of the loan business, Roman. Most of your clients done, what’s that word, reneged on their contracts. It’s like any business, you know what I’m sayin’? You make the rules, you got to enforce them. Otherwise, people just won’t take you serious.”
“Now you’re gonna tell me how to run my business.”
“I’m a man. Maybe I’m the only man you been dealing with lately. And, man to man, I’m here to tell you that your business is through. My debt is erased, hear? Not that I plan to forget what you did for me. We’ll work out something away from the money side.”
“That a fact.”
“Look, man, you want my advice, you ought to just go ahead and concentrate on that singin’ career of yours. I hear from a couple boys I know down on Sunset that you’re not half bad. Your song selection’s about twenty years too late, but there’s money in that old-school bullshit now, you can believe it.”
Keep talking, young man. Just keep talking.
Newton gave Otis the once-over with pink, sleepy eyes.
Newton smiled and said, “I like you, Roman. Tell you what. I got an OZ of cola in the back room. How about I lay a gram on you and your personal tree here, you two can do a little clubbin’ tonight, have a good time.”
“I don’t want it.”
“How about this, then?” Newton placed the joint in the ashtray, picked up a watch off the table, and lobbed it to Otis. “Nice Hamilton I bought off the street. It’s yours if you want it.”
“I look like I need a Hamilton? I’m wearin’ a Rolex.”
“Take it as a backup. Go ahead.”
Otis studied the face of the watch and tossed the watch across the room.
“Silly-ass boy,” said Otis sadly. “That ain’t even a Hamilton. It’s a gotdamn Hormilton, man.”
“The money, Lonnie,” said Lavonicus.
“The money, Lonnie,” said Newton, mimicking the big man’s monotonous drawl. Newton clapped his hands together and laughed. “Aha, ha, ha…” He stamped one foot on the floor and went, “Ssh, ssh, ssh…”
Otis reached into his jacket, found the grip of the. 45.
“The money,” said Lavonicus.
“Damn, Gus,” said Newton, “why you so serious? Someone forget to put the bolts in your neck this morning?”
Newton was laughing as he went and stood before a framed mirror nailed to a wooden beam that ran from the floor to the ceiling. He looked in the mirror with admiration, patted his nearly shaved head, smoothed it where the barber had cut a faint part on the side.
“I look good, too,” said Newton. “Bitches be formin’ a line outside my door, know what I’m sayin’?”
Lavonicus grabbed Newton by the back of the neck and slammed his face into the mirror. The frame flew apart and the glass seemed to disintegrate. Lavonicus released his grip and Newton fell back in a heap on the floor.
Otis pulled his hand from his jacket and looked at the wooden beam where the mirror had hung. The beam was splintered and dented at the point of impact.
“I kill him?” asked Gus.
“I don’t think so. Go in the bedroom and find the money.”
Lavonicus went into the bedroom. The woman sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the floor, her fingers wound tightly together.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” said Lavonicus. She reminded him of a young Cissy.
He tossed the bedroom and found a rubber-banded roll of hundreds under a stack of sweaters on the closet shelf. Lavonicus took the money out to the living room, held it up for Otis to see.
Otis ran a glass of water in the kitchen, kneeled over Lonnie Newton, and poured the water over Newton’s face. His face was slick with blood, and beneath the blood was hamburger. For a moment, as the water washed the blood away, Otis and Lavonicus could make out a riot of small cuts and one deep gash running from Newton’s eye to the corner of his mouth. The cheek was filleted there, hanging away from the face.
Newton’s eyes opened. He moved his head, and pink saliva slid down from his mouth to the floor.
Otis took Newton’s chin and straightened his face so that he could see Lavonicus standing over him.
“Take a look, Lonnie. Just wanted you to remember it. That’s a face you’re gonna be seein’ in your sleep.”
“He’p me,” said Newton sloppily. “Pleee.”
“Gonna have to get your girl to help you, man. That is, if she still plans on hangin’ around.” Otis stood up. “By the way. You approve of how we, uh, enforce our rules?”