Alex Ankrom - [Gabriel Carter 01] Read online

“What you find a pair of briefs and you’re a boxers man?”

  “No,” Carter said, “he puts his initials on the tag.”

  Dylan looked at the Detective, mouth slightly ajar, but all Carter could manage was a shake of his head in disbelief.

  Dylan popped a fry in his mouth. “That’s fucked up man.”

  “She and Kip are now married and—”

  “Wait, his name’s Kip?”

  Carter lit another cigarette. “Yeah.”

  “You got dumped for a guy named Kip?”

  “Yeah, laugh it up.”

  “Damn, that is really fucked up. That be like some ‘All My Children’ type shit.”

  “You watch ‘All My Children?’”

  “What? A nigga can’t get his soap on?”

  “I’ll chalk that one up to the gak.”

  “Shit man, I don’t know what it is? That Erica Kane is a fucking bitch, man. But I love her. That show’s better than fucking crack. I can kick the crystal, I know that, but not the ‘Children.’”

  “How long you and you’re uncle been homeless?”

  “What makes you say I’m on the street?”

  “Well, if you you’d been around a tv in the past two years you’d know that ‘All My Children’ was canceled.”

  Dylan’s eyes widened. “What? You fucking with me?”

  “Like two years ago.”

  “That’s fucking bullshit.”

  “Yeah they replaced that and ‘One Life to Live’ with a couple talk shows.”

  “Oh no, not Bobby Joe too.”

  “Hey at least ‘General Hospital’ is still on.”

  “Fuck ‘General Hospital.’ No one give a shit about Luke and Laura.”

  “You really like soap operas?”

  “Yeah, bitch! What you don’t?”

  “I don’t need to watch soaps. My life is one.”

  “Yeah man, that wifey shit is fucked up.”

  Carter shook his head and looked out the window. “Not just that. That’s just the tail end of the shit storm that is my life. My childhood, now that was a soap opera. I was born in the back of Greyhound Bus, just outside Morgantown, West-by-God-Virginia. You see my black mother met my white father in Leesville, Louisiana. This was back in ’71. Lincoln Kerr was in the Army. He was a ranger there at Tigerland waiting to be shipped over to the ‘Nam.”

  “Tigerland?”

  Carter glanced back at Dylan, and he couldn’t help himself but smile. “Yeah, it was Fort Polk’s nickname. The fort’s smack-dab in the middle of a swamp, which they thought was very similar to the jungles of Southeast Asia. So, anyway, my momma, Virginia Lee Carter, she’s a junior in high school. One day her and couple of friends skip school and cruise around town and sneak their way into a bar. That’s where she meets my dad. And I am the product of an afternoon quickie and a broken prophylactic. But the two did exchange names and mailing addresses, and they wrote to each other and shit, so I guess I can kinda be proud of that.”

  “Shit.” Dylan looked at the table and pushed around some of the sweetener packets.

  “That’s not all. My mom was good about hiding me. So, her parents didn’t find out until she was eight months along, when she told them about the pregnancy.”

  “Why’d she spill?”

  “‘Cause on March 17th, 1972 she received a letter from a guy named Frank Washburn, telling her that my dad was killed in action. With my dad being dead, she decided to tell her folks. My momma’s parents, being the strict Southern Baptist domestic terrorists that they were, beat her and kicked her out of their house. Now pregnant and on the street, she took the twenty-six dollars to her name and bought a bus ticket to Greene County, Pennsylvania, where my dad’s from. She made it to Morgantown, where she gave birth to me. She was strong enough afterwards to hold me for ten minutes. Then she died. Police found the letters on her and took me to my grandparents. My daddy’s parents raised me as if I was their own and turned me into the well adjusted human being I am today.”

  “Shit,” Dylan repeated. He turned, stared out the window, and watched the rain. “My dad, my real dad, was capped by some A-rab in Iraq. My mom remarried. He was a fucking asshole, dealt smack. Got her hooked on the shit and would pimp her ass off to his clients and shit. The Game fuckin’ swallowed her whole. She died when I was seven. I got a perfect on my spelling test, and I was so happy. I was so damn proud of myself. And I knew she would be too. I wanted to prove that I was smart. That if she’d let me, I’d take care of her. But I found her in the bathroom. Fucking needle was still in her arm, and she had this—this fuckin’ blank stare on her face.”

  Carter knew it was best to just let the kid get it all out.

  Dylan looked at the cop. His eyes glistened in the light. “Without my mamma around, my step put my ass to work. Turned me into his little hopper. ‘Better get the count right, boy, or I’ll beat your fucking ass.’ He couldn’t count for shit, but he was real fuckin’ good at that other part. Shit, he’d beat me to the point that I would pass the fuck out, and he’d wait for me to wake back up to continue. He got pinched when I was nine. Still got five years left on his dime in Graterford. Should be serving fuckin’ life man. He killed my moms. She may’ve been the one to put the needle in her arm, but he was the one that put the needle in her hand.”

  Carter nodded his head.

  Dylan cracked a small smile. “So, I got to go live with my uncle. My uncle, he was cool. Taught me how to pull a caper. He used to love stealing shit from construction workers and selling it back to them. Copper pipe can be a decent little score, you know?”

  “What happened to your uncle, Dylan?”

  But Dylan didn’t hear him, lost in his thoughts.

  “Fucking amazing how similar our lives are. Your dad dies in ‘Nam. Mine in Iraq. We both orphans. You think this is some kinda sign? You know like fate. Like God is bringing us together for some reason.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “So fuckin’ weird.”

  “What happened to your uncle, Dylan? What happened to your uncle?”

  Dylan’s eyes snapped back into focus, and he wiped the tears from his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talkin’ ‘bout.”

  “That dead guy on the car, that’s your uncle, isn’t it? Isn’t it?”

  “I ain’t seen nothing,” Dylan said like a true Philadelphian.

  “Come on, don’t give me that bullshit, Dylan. You saw it. You know what happened. I can see it. Come on, tell me what happened.”

  Dylan sat frozen, his eyes fixed on his half-eaten burger.

  Carter leaned in closer to Dylan. “Who’s gonna speak for your uncle? Huh? The dead can’t speak. We can. We gotta show the bastards that did this that our way still works.”

  Dylan leaned back and scrunched up his face as if he smelled shit. He said, “Your way still works? Your way still works. Man, fuck your way. Your way don’t do shit. And you know that! You can lock up all the damn niggas you want but there’s still a group of ‘em out on the corner the next damn day, sellin’ the same ass product. The Game is The Game and it ain’t never gonna change. No matter what kind of tricks you knockos pull, it’s still gonna be The Game in the end. The Game is eternal.”

  “Don’t try to feed me that bullshit. ‘The Game is eternal.’ You sound like an asshole. Makes me lose respect for your tired skinny ass. Makes me want to haul your ass down to the station. Now you don’t want that, do you? Man, you’re jonesin’ for a fix so bad that I don’t think you’ll make it in lockdown.”

  “Fuck you judging me. Like I don’t see that look in your eye, you on something too. We all are—”

  In his frustration, Carter slammed his fists down hard on the table, causing the forks and knives to chatter across their plates.

  In a low voice he said, “Dylan, do you think I’m playing with you? This is as serious as it fucking comes. Your uncle is dead. He ain’t coming back. And if you don’t start playing ball here, I’m going to assume that you h
ad something to do with it.”

  Dylan let a smart assed grin stretch across his face.

  Carter could feel he was losing him. “Don’t you think for a goddamn second that you’ll be in like Flint, because you’re just some kid. DA owes me a favor. A big one.”

  Dylan squirmed a bit and looked around for the exit.

  “I want you to know that. I want you to know, when I pin this one on you, I’m going to call in that favor, and he’s going to try your ass as an adult. A fourteen year old adult junkie, who murdered his uncle, to get his next fix.”

  Dylan’s lips quivered, as if he needed to say something but couldn’t find the words.

  “You know what they do to skinny ass kids like you in that supermax? Huh? The horror stories I could tell you. Tales from the Crypt, buddy. And I’ll make sure your step-dad’s the fuckin’ Crypt Keeper. You want that? All I have to do is make the recommendation.”

  Dylan’s eyes glazed over, and Carter knew he had his ass.

  “Your uncle needs someone to speak for him. He needs you to speak for him. He can’t say what he wants to, somebody stopped him for speaking. They beat the shit out of him, tortured him, and threw him out of a fucking fifth story window, like he was garbage. But if he could, he’d be saying, ‘I need your help. Help me, Dylan. Please Dylan, help me. Wasn’t I a good uncle? Didn’t I take care of you?’ Help him, Dylan.”

  Dylan shot up from his seat and tried to make a break for the door. Carter was faster than the kid. He grabbed Dylan and held him by the shoulders. Dylan looked up at him and sucked a glob of snot back up his nose. “I can’t tell you.”

  “We can protect you.”

  “No, you can’t. Not in this city.”

  “I will protect you. I promise.”

  Dylan shook his head.

  Carter picked up the playing cards that rested next to his plate. “Cut the deck for it.”

  He said the words softly to let the words sink in. “Cut the deck. I get high card, you tell me what I need to know to find your uncle’s killer. And I will personally protect you. You get high card, I let you walk and you will never see me again. But remember that also means that your uncle’s name stays in red forever, and his killer is free to do this again.”

  Dylan bit his lip and wiped at his eyes. “Okay, we cut the deck.”

  Carter set the cards down on the table, and Dylan picked up half the deck. He looked at it and weakly smiled. He showed Carter the king of hearts.

  “That’s a good card, but it don’t beat mine.”

  “How the fuck do you know? You ain’t even ganked up a card yet.”

  “Oh, sure I did. I picked this card ever since that first shuffle of the deck. I know where this card is at all times. I have the ace of spades.”

  Dylan gulped. “Is that so?’

  “Yeah. You don’t believe me? Well, pick up the top card and see for yourself.”

  Dylan’s fingers trembled as her reached for the waxed cardboard. He quickly flipped over the top card, revealing the ace of spades. “You—you tricked me! You had this planned!”

  “You’re right. I did. I had this planned from the moment I pulled out the deck. I saw the way you eyed them, and I found your weakness. You knew the rules and the consequences. Now man up. Rule number two. Never welch on a bet, Dylan. Spill.”

  Dylan shook his head in disbelief. “You motherfucker.”

  “I promise I will protect you.”

  “Dumb fucking luck.” He laughed. “You want to know why the motherfucker’s dead? Fifteen fucking blue tops. A hundred and fifty bucks worth of shit. They tortured him over fifteen fucking blue tops.”

  “You saw all this?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then why did they leave you alone?”

  “I was hiding. I’m skinny enough that I can actually go in between the wall of that shit hole we squat in. I watched it all through a busted electrical socket. And you want to know the worst part, he wouldn’t give in. The stubborn bastard wouldn’t tell. He figured that he deserved the shit after pulling that caper. Fucking ignorant—this city man. This city is just takes. And takes. It’s like a fucking vampire. It can get enough blood man. Just wants its fucking…”

  And with that, all of the emotions that Dylan had bottled up in his fourteen years of life, finally broke completely free. The tears flooded from his eyes, and his legs gave out.

  Carter caught the boy and held him tight. In his line of work, he comes in at the end of a life. He spoke for the dead. This was the first time in a long time as a murder police did he see a genuine opportunity to save a life. He had failed a witness once before, and though everyone told him that it wasn’t his fault. That it was the system that failed that kid, he still couldn’t help but see this as an opportunity to atone for past sins.

  Dylan was right. The city of brotherly love needed its pound of flesh. Like all cities, Philadelphia demanded a sacrifice. New York ran on money. Washington on power. Los Angeles on broken dreams. Philadelphia ran on blood. It took and took and took.

  But in a strange confluence of events, Carter saw this as an opportunity to give something back, to nurture instead of destroy. His training officer told him on his first shift in the rover, “You do the job and you go home. Never bring your work home with you or you’ll drink yourself to death long before your twenty.”

  For the last few months he saw his job as that of a glorified street sweeper. The city makes a mess, and he’s called in to clean it up. He didn’t make the city a better place, just one slightly less filthy.

  So even after all those thoughts ran through his head, it still surprised Carter when he said, “I got cable back at my place. The whole package. I’m pretty sure there’s a station in the 400s that plays reruns of soap operas. If you want, I’ve got the space and an extra bedroom.”

  Dylan looked up at Carter to see if he was fucking with him.

  Carter gave him the best smile he could muster. “Got a well stocked fridge. Hot shower. Got some old clothes that might not fit you in the slightest, but they’d be clean.”

  “Like for the night. So I can make like an official statement or something tomorrow at The Roundhouse.”

  “Yeah. Or maybe a bit longer. Until we got you settled.”

  Dylan dried his eyes, and Carter let go of him. “Cool. You gonna tuck me in, and read me a bedtime story?”

  “Fuck you then.”

  Dylan laughed and for a second he looked as if he were a normal kid, the kind he never got to be, but maybe, just maybe he’d finally get that chance. “No. No. I’m joking. Shower and some ‘All My Children” sounds great.”

  Carter paid the check, and they left. Dylan didn’t notice the guys standing across the street, until they got in Carter’s Audi. He stared at them, recognizing them from the neighborhood and from the spot that he had sat inside the wall, watching them through the busted light socket.

  Carter climbed in behind the wheel. “Don’t worry about them.”

  Carter touched his shoulder. Dylan looked at him and bounced his knee so hard that it shook the whole car. Carter said, “I won’t let anything happen to you. You just got to trust me.”

  Dylan took a deep breath and watched Carter pop a cigarette in his mouth. “Think I could have one of those now.”

  Carter lights up and thinks for a moment. He opens the center console, grabs a pack of gum, and hands it to the kid.

  Dylan looks at the pack. “What’s this?”

  “Nicotine.”

  Dylan pops out a piece from the plastic packaging and then another. He chewed the gum. It tasted horrible, but after a few chomps, he felt something soothing flow through his blood stream and soon his skin stopped crawling. “Thanks, I guess.”

  “I’ll get you more later. But you’re gonna have to stick to the gum. Because…”

  “Yeah. Your hypocrisy.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So why you giving me this?”

  Carter starts up the car and pulls away from
the curb. “Cause from what I’ve seen the agony’s gonna be a bitch.”

  Dylan gave Carter a weak smile, closed his eyes, and leaning back in his seat, fell asleep. He didn’t know why, but for the first time in a long time, it was all right to lower his guard. He felt safe. Carter glanced at the kid, and for the first time in a long time he felt as if the job mattered, his life mattered.