“What about my money?” said Tyrell.
“Fuck your money, Cleveland. Ain’t got nothin’ to do with me.”
“Marcus,” said Adamson, trying to move Clay’s attention back to Monroe.
“What?” said Tyrell. “I’m just supposed to turn around and walk away?”
“You mean you ain’t gone yet?” said Clay.
“Marcus!” said Adamson. “Short Man’s goin’ for his—”
“I see him,” said Clay, calmly stepping in and back-fisting Monroe square in the middle of his face, aiming for two feet behind the mask, connecting deep, the nose giving like the shell of an egg.
Monroe screamed and fell to the floor.
Adamson stepped behind Rogers, twisted his arm up, used his other hand to pull the Ka-Bar knife from where it was sheathed. He put the serrated edge to Rogers’s throat, put pressure on the blade, moved it a hair so it drew a drop of blood.
Tyrell looked at Karras and Tate, who had moved in very close. Tyrell raised his hands.
The packing in Monroe’s nose turned black with blood. He whimpered, got up on one arm, began to reach behind him once again.
“Don’t do it, boy,” said Clay.
“Don’t do it, Short,” said Tyrell, slowly lowering his hands. “Mr. Marcus Clay is a quick one. There’ll be another time for all that.”
“Tyrell,” said Rogers, off balance, up on his toes, his eyes wide.
“Looks like they got you, Alan,” said Tyrell.
“Your boy goes for that gun again,” said Adamson, “I’m gonna cut this one’s throat. I’ll kill him, Cleveland, I swear to God.”
“Kill him, then,” said Tyrell.
“Tyrell!” said Rogers.
“You heard me.” Tyrell looked at Clay. “Think I give a fuck about that boy? Got young niggas all over this city give a nut to work for me. Lost two today, and it don’t mean a mothafuckin’ thing to me.” Tyrell looked at Adamson. “So go ahead, man, cut him open! Do it—”
“No!” shouted Tate. “Let him go, Al. Can’t stand to see another young man die.”
Rogers rubbed at his neck as Adamson set him free.
“What I thought,” said Tyrell. “Y’all ain’t hard. Not really.”
“Get out,” said Clay.
Tyrell smiled, reached down, and helped Monroe to his feet. Monroe spit blood on the black-and-white tiles, turned and followed Tyrell out the door. Rogers nodded at Tate and left the store.
Out in the street, Tyrell and Monroe stopped at Tyrell’s car, waited for Rogers to join them. But Rogers kept walking straight for the Z, put his key to the door.
“Alan!” said Tyrell.
“What?”
“Why you trippin’, man? You know I didn’t mean nothin’ in there. Just makin’ a point.”
“Get up with you later on,” said Rogers. “See you back at the house.” He got into the 300 and turned the ignition.
“Alan’s turned punk,” said Monroe, blood still streaming into his mouth, the wet gauze hanging from beneath the tattered mask.
“Boy’s too emotional,” said Tyrell, “that’s all. Not hard like you. You did good, Short. We get back, give you somethin’ to drink, swallow some pills I got, do a couple lines, you’ll feel a whole lot better.”
“Feel better when I fuck that nigga up,” said Monroe, looking with malignance toward Real Right.
“He can’t win. We gonna take over down here. Give it a little time, let him get comfortable, then catch him walkin’ out his shop one night. Gonna put him on his knees in the alley and let him look at you before you bust him in the head. You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Short?”
“Yeah,” said Monroe, smiling at the thought, his teeth pink in the light of the streetlamp. “Think Clay was lyin’ about the money?”
“I don’t know,” said Tyrell. “We get back, gonna take my cousin off his leash. Find out the truth once and for all.”
“My knees were knockin’ together,” said Karras. “Guess you could hear ’em, right, Clarence?”
“Thought that sound was comin’ from me,” said Tate.
Karras, Clay, Tate, and Adamson stood at the window, watching Tyrell and Monroe talking in the street.
“You told a lie, Marcus,” said Adamson.
“What lie?”
“You told that boy you were gonna open-hand him. Could be wrong, but it looked to me like you struck him with your fist.”
“Did I?”
“Uh-huh. And you hit him right where his nose was already broke, too. Couldn’t you see that was gonna hurt real bad?”
“Meant to just tap him a little.”
Adamson adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses. “Wonder who did the original damage to that boy’s face.”
“That was Marcus, too,” said Karras.
“See?” Adamson smiled. “Cleveland was wrong. You are hard, Marcus.”
“Nah,” said Clay, trying not to grin. “Not really.”
Twenty-Nine
Looking down from her bedroom window, Denice Tate watched Alan Rogers approach her house. With his head down and his shoulders kind of slouched, he looked different coming up the walk, not his usual confident self. She heard a knocking sound from one floor below.
Denice went down the stairs. She stopped in the foyer and leaned against the door.
“Alan?”
“Neecie, it’s me. Open up, girl.”
“Can’t. My father’s gonna be comin’ back any minute now, Alan. You got to go away.”
“Get on down by the mail slot, Neecie.”
Denice sat on the linoleum and lifted the rectangular copper flap. Alan had a seat on the cold concrete in front of the door. He unbuttoned his shirt cuff and put his hand through the slot. Neecie held his fingers. Through the space she saw Alan’s spent, bloodshot eyes.
“You okay?”
“Came to say good-bye, Neecie.”
“Alan—”
“Quiet, now, let me say it. Shouldn’t have been messin’ with you to begin with, young as you are.” Rogers blinked slowly. “You’re good. What you got to do is stay away from boys like me. Ain’t nothin’ up the road but trouble in that. You hear me, girl?”
“I hear you, Alan.” Denice swallowed. “But Alan, you got good in you, too.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do. You don’t belong with those boys you run with. You can change. Find yourself a real job.”
“You know I can’t hardly read.”
“Go back to school, then. Get that GED you been talkin’ about.”
“Too late for me.”
“It isn’t.”
“Go ahead, girl.” Rogers tightened his fingers in Denice’s hand. “You listen to your father, now, Denice; let him guide you. Never was lucky enough my own self to have someone like that.” He tried to smile. “Want you to know somethin’ else. I cared for you, for real. Wasn’t just that you were so fine.”
Denice’s eyes welled with tears. Rogers pulled his hand back through the slot.
“Alan, wait. Where you goin’?”
“Back out here, where I belong.”
“Don’t go.”
“Got to,” he said.
Denice pressed her ear against the door. She listened to the sound of his footsteps receding on the concrete.
Rogers walked to the Z, parked halfway down the block. His beeper sounded as he dropped into the driver’s seat. He switched on the interior light and read the numbers off the display.