In the interview room, Swales admitted that he did not know Mario Durham personally or his whereabouts. But there was a guy folks called Donut, Durham’s “main boy,” who most likely could point the police in the right direction. Grady learned that Donut’s real name was Terrence Dodson. He asked Swales where he could find Dodson. Swales said that he didn’t know, but he knew the “general area he stayed at.”
“Can I get some love?” said Swales.
Grady said that if the information he’d given him was correct, and if it led to an arrest, yes, it could help Swales’s case.
That’s all Grady had been looking for. Someone less afraid of Dewayne Durham than he was of prison. A two-time loser about to strike out. It was how most cases were solved.
It took a hot minute to find Terrence Dodson’s address in Valley Green and get a record of his priors. Grady took his unmarked and, accompanied by a cruiser and a couple of uniformed officers, went to the address. One of the uniforms stayed out on the street with the cars. The other uniform went with Grady into the building, where they found Dodson’s apartment door. Grady knocked, the uniform behind him, and the door soon opened. As it did, Grady flashed his badge.
“Terrence Dodson?” said Grady, looking down on the small, ugly man who stood in the door frame, one eye twitching, trying to manage a smile.
“That’s my given name. Ain’t nobody ever call me that, though.”
Grady slipped his badge case back into his jacket. “Donut, then, right?”
“That’s right.”
“You know a Mario Durham?”
“Why?” said Donut, chuckling weakly. “He done somethin’? What, that fool spit on the sidewalk, sumshit like that?”
“Mind if I come in?”
“You got a warrant?” Donut barked out a laugh. “I’m just playing with you, officer, I got nothin’ to hide.”
Donut stepped aside to let the white man pass. Big motherfucker, too. Looked like that man played in the sequels to that movie with Felton Perry, about the redneck sheriff with the bat. The ones that weren’t no good.
HORACE McKinley sat in a vinyl nail-studded chair meant to look like leather in what used to be the living room of the house on Yuma. He talked on his cell as Mike Montgomery paced the room.
McKinley flipped the StarTAC closed. His forehead was beaded with sweat. There was sweat under his arms and it ran down his sides.
It had been a busy morning. He had learned from his own boys that Mario Durham was wanted in a murder. He had spoken to Ulysses Foreman, who had taken a call from Dewayne Durham, angry that the gun used by Mario had also been Jerome Long’s murder gun in the Coates killings. Foreman had called McKinley to give his condolences on the cousins, and also to assure him that he hadn’t known, of course, that one of his guns would be used against the Yuma Mob. McKinley saw an opportunity for an alliance with Foreman, and maybe to gain a favor or something free. He told Foreman that this was simply the cost of doing business for both of them and that no offense had been taken. And now that little old girl, ran his salon, had phoned with some disturbing news.
“That was Inez,” said McKinley. “The Stokes girl’s been talking to that Strange again.”
“What’re we gonna do?”
McKinley breathed in deeply and heard a wheeze in his chest. He was carrying too much weight. Now would be a good time to give up on those Cubans, too.
“Ice her down for a while, I guess.”
“Kill her?”
“No, I don’t want to kill the bitch ’less I have to. I was thinkin’ we’d hide her until she comes around. I figure, we separate her from her little boy for a few hours, she’ll change her mind about talking anymore.”
“We could use some help.”
“The troops been depleted, Mike. I got everyone on the street and I told them I needed a big cash night. It’s just you and me.”
“You want me to stay with the kid?”
“You’d do better with him than I will. Me, I’m better with the girls.” McKinley smiled at Montgomery, who was frowning. His long hands were jammed deep in the pockets of his jeans. “You gonna hold that boy tight? I don’t want you gettin’ soft on me now. This is business here; that’s all it is. We got to protect our own and what we got.”
Montgomery nodded. McKinley was only a couple of years his senior, but he was the closest thing to a father he’d ever had.
“I’m behind you, Hoss. You know this.”
“No doubt. You my right hand, Mike.”
“We gonna do this now?”
“No. We can get over to the salon later, take care of the girl. She ain’t goin’ nowhere else today.”
“What we gonna do now, then?”
“Let’s roll over to Foreman’s first and buy us another gun. I spoke to him, and he’s still got this Sig I had my eye on for a while. He’s expecting another piece later on today, too, case we need it. He’s got a boy he uses, gonna make a run.”
Montgomery pulled the keys to the Benz from his pocket and twirled them on his finger. “I’m ready.”
“We gonna have us our little war, I guess.”
“Might not happen too soon. Durham’s got his head turned around, lookin’ after that fool brother of his.”
“That might be the time to hit him,” said McKinley, rising laboriously from the chair. “While he’s weak.”
ULYSSES Foreman stood on the back deck of his house, smoking a cigar. Ashley was back in their room, packing for her trip down to her daddy’s in southern Maryland. She had the stereo on in there, Chaka Khan singin’ about “I’m every woman,” Ashley singing along. She loved Chaka. So did Ulysses, back when she was with Rufus. That was a fine motherfucker right there.
Foreman held one arm out and flexed as he drew on his cigar. He needed to get over to the gym, looked like he was starting to atrophy. Man had to pay attention to his body, especially in times like these.
It had been a morning. A call from Dewayne Durham about that brother of his and that goddamn gun. That was his own fault, renting the Taurus to Twigs. Once a fuck-up, et cetera. Foreman should have known. Apparently Mario had claimed that he knew about the gun being hot, too. Foreman had told Dewayne that this wasn’t so, but he wasn’t sure it had registered all the way. Now he’d have to do something for Dewayne just to keep his fire down. A gift, that would work; he could lay a gun on him, nothing too expensive, but no cheap-ass Lorcin, either, nothin’ like that. The kid from Alexandria was making a run for him today; he’d have him pick something up.
Then he’d talked to Horace McKinley, who had acted all unconcerned that he had sold that gun to Durham’s boy Jerome Long, who’d gone and used it on the cousins. The fat man acting unconcerned, but always strategizing. Foreman wondered what he’d want in the end.