Takedown (2 page)

The only thing the girls admired more than the clothes was my new street cred. Days after leaving juvie, I was back on the streets as a full-fledged dealer. They probably thought that took balls.

They had no clue.

T
hat afternoon I sat with Detective Prescott at a café on Bay Street. We were in the Financial District, where white-collared rich guys traded stocks. The place was usually packed with businesspeople lined up for the overpriced salad bar, but now it was mostly empty. If you saw us, you'd think we were father and son. Maybe teacher and student.

Not cop and informant.

As a rule, I didn't like cops. I'd seen too many people roughed up, harassed, and humiliated. Instead of the motto “To serve and protect” it should be “Because I can.” But Prescott was all right. He treated me with respect and even talked about personal stuff, like
how his five-month-old twins were up all night fussing. I knew it could be a strategy—make a personal connection to keep your informant loyal—but I didn't care.

Prescott guzzled a coffee, stuffed in a brownie, and talked all at the same time. He was in his late thirties, five ten, and built like a weight lifter who'd gone soft. Something about him being black made me like him more . . . and less. Black cops acted like they were on your side, like they
knew
how it was. Most white cops didn't even pretend. But black cops were also criticized for arresting their brothers to get ahead.

I guess that was something Prescott and I had in common. A black cop was a traitor, and so was I.

“This morning I was so tired, I literally fell asleep while I was shaving,” he said, pointing to a cut on his chin.

“Jeez.”

“Did you see the press conference the other day?”

“No.”

“Sorry, I should've phoned you. We called it to show off all the goodies we got from Pup's arrest. Crack, guns, the whole deal. You should've seen me, spiffy in my blues.”

I didn't like the sound of it. “Seriously? You went bragging on TV?”

“It's good PR. We do it whenever we have a major bust, to show we're not screwing around all day. I told the reporters it took
countless hours of painstaking police work to make it happen.” He winked. “ 'Course, I couldn't mention my secret weapon.”

Thank God for that.
If Prescott had let it slip that he had someone on the inside, Tony would go head-hunting. And he wouldn't stop until he found the snitch. “You and the chief can go ahead and soak up the glory. I sure as hell don't want it.”

“I hear you. Now, back to business. Tony's gotta be bringing in a shitload of cocaine to make the Diamond Dust. How do you think he's shipping it?”

“I can only guess. Lots of delivery trucks around.”

He tugged his earlobe and stared off into space. Prescott always did that when he was thinking. “How about you find out for me?”

“I'll do what I can, but I can't promise anything. I have to be careful not to blow my cover.”

“Fair enough. You're a clever kid, Darren. That was some nice work you did the other night. Because of you, we got all we need on Owen Bradford.”

He must have been talking about Pup.

“We hope to have Bradford off the streets for ten years. He's got a long rap sheet, so that should push the judge to give him the max. We think he's responsible for three murders carried out by Tony Walker's gang. Can't prove it, though.”

The murders weren't news to me. Word on the street was that
Pup had taken out Pistol, the leader of the South Side Bloods, a few months back. And that he'd really messed up a couple of guys from Hamilton who tried to cut a deal with Tony's suppliers.

“I dropped something,” Prescott said, a gleam in his eye.

I ducked to find the paper bag under the table. Without looking inside, I shoved it in my knapsack.

“There's a bonus fifty in there from me. You're putting yourself at risk for a good cause, Darren. And if I make another bust like that one, I may be in line for a promotion.” He grinned. “Don't spend it all in one place, now.”

I glanced at my watch. “I gotta be somewhere. Are we done?”

Prescott nodded. “Catch ya later.”

Grabbing my knapsack, I left the café and ran to the subway station. When I got to the platform, there was a train waiting, and I slipped in right before the doors shut. Even better, I snagged the last seat.

I thought about the cash in my knapsack, probably one fifty, including Prescott's bonus. I'd give some of it to Mom to help with the bills, and the rest would go straight into the bank to save for college.

The train stopped and a flood of people came on. A thirty-something lady glared at me like I should give up my seat, but unless she was going to tell me she was pregnant, I wasn't moving. Not my fault her feet hurt from those heels.

I checked my watch: 3:36. Usually I picked up my brother by 3:30. He'd be wondering where I was. Not that he can tell time, but he knows I always pick him up after nap.

By 3:50, I was there. Home care was supposed to be homey, but this one wasn't. Noreen took care of six kids, sometimes more if a neighbor needed a last-minute babysitter. I could tell that Kiki wasn't getting much attention. Whenever I got there, he was snotty nosed with a wet diaper.

I went in, and there he was, building a perfect tower of blocks. Kiki was only two, but you could already tell he was smart. He was good at putting things together, figuring out how they worked. He ran up to me and hurled himself into my arms. I hoisted him up and spun him around like a superhero. His arms circled my neck, and he gave me a look that said, “Where the hell you been?”

“Sorry I'm late, Kiki.”

His answer was a wet slobber on my cheek.

I got his gear on. “Thanks, Noreen,” I said, and Kiki waved bye-bye.

Noreen was trying to pull apart two screaming toddlers. “Bye, Kiki!”

In the hallway, I was about to put him down, but he clung to my neck and tightened his legs around me, so I kept holding him. “All right. I was late, so you call the shots today. What's my name, again?”

“Da-win.”

“What's your name?”

“HeeHee.” He hadn't mastered the K sound yet.

The projects were pretty quiet because it had started to rain. I pulled Kiki's hat down over his ears. “I know what you're thinking, little bro. You're wondering why you gotta grow up in such an ugly-ass place. Gimme eight years. By the time you're ten, I'll have you set up someplace nice. I promise.”

We reached our building, and I climbed the stairs, which was faster than waiting for an elevator. I held him with one arm while keying the lock, then washed his hands, changed his diaper, and put on some cartoons. There was a box of Goldfish crackers in the cupboard, but it was empty. I never understood why Mom put empty stuff back in the cupboards—maybe because the cupboard was closer than the garbage can.

I checked for Cheerios, but there were only Bran Flakes, and I knew Kiki wouldn't go for them. I found a protein bar in my knapsack and cut it into little pieces, then gave it to him in his favorite Spider-Man bowl. At the first bite of chocolate, he was happy. I figured the protein would be good for him, especially since we were also out of milk.

I wrote a note for Mom with a list of things we needed and left it on the table with some money. It amazed me that my family had
survived while I was in juvie, but I guess Tasha had picked up the slack. It wasn't that Mom didn't make money—she did okay as a dental receptionist—but she spent it all wrong. Too much takeout, too many beauty products.

At least Kiki had Tasha and me. We'd just had Mom. I couldn't even remember my dad. He died when I was eight months old on a peacekeeping mission to Bosnia. I only had one picture of him. He was wearing his military fatigues and a blue peacekeeper's cap. He looked strong and intelligent. A modern-day hero, the way I saw it. Sometimes I wondered how my life would've been different if he were alive. Maybe I wouldn't have ended up in juvie. But then, if Dad had been around, there wouldn't be a Kiki.

“Hey,” Tasha said when she walked in the door a while later. She slung her wet jacket over a chair and went right over to Kiki. “Where's my hug, sweetie?”

He complied without taking his eyes off the TV.

“You gave him a chocolate bar for snack? Seriously?”

I didn't look up from my magazine. “It's a protein bar.”

“There's probably way too much protein in it for him. What if it makes him sick?”

“I've never heard of protein making you sick. There's nothing else to eat anyway.”

“You could've taken him to the store.”

“It's raining. Maybe you didn't notice.”

She sighed loudly. I could never do anything right.

Tasha always gave me a hard time. When we were kids, she'd teased me and grabbed my toys and pushed me in the dirt. But she'd also stood up for me when bigger kids wanted to knock me around.

If she'd had a soft spot for me back then, she didn't anymore. When I got charged with dealing, she called me every nasty name in the book. She told me it was my fault Mom went into labor early with Kiki, not pregnancy diabetes like Mom said. And she visited me every month to tell me how hard it was at home with the baby and with Mom struggling to pay the bills.

Tasha sat down across from me, opened her knapsack, and pulled out a textbook. That was my cue. “Time to go to work,” I said.

“Whatever.”

I stood up. “Is there something you want to say?”

She knew I was dealing. So did Mom. It was another reason for Tasha to look down on me, but she never said anything. And I knew why.

She glanced at the money on the table.

“Later,” I said.

S
ome people say that no one is born evil—that life makes you that way.

But I knew that wasn't true. Plenty of people got fucked over by life, beaten into the ground, and spit on. But they didn't end up like Diamond Tony.

All I wanted this morning was my choco-latte and a quick bus to school. Instead I got a crime scene right in the middle of the projects.

Somebody shoved past me to get closer. I stepped back, away from the crowd, away from the stench. I'd caught a glimpse of the body and the bloodstained ground and didn't want to see more.
Everybody was saying that it was Rico, Pup's brother. And that Tony had done the job himself.

A light-skinned girl was screaming. Must be Rico's girlfriend. She ran toward the body, but her friends tried to pull her back. Finally the crowd parted to let her get closer, and she collapsed, shrieking. Her friends picked her up and dragged her away. Smart friends. If she stuck around the crime scene too long, she might say or do something that would put her on Tony's hit list.

People in the crowd kept asking why. Had Rico been planning to rat on Tony to get Pup a lighter sentence? Or was it Tony's way of telling Pup to keep quiet or the rest of his family would die? I wanted to shout at them that it didn't even matter. Tony was sending a message to the whole neighborhood.
Don't talk. Be afraid. Don't think I won't.

The crowd suddenly hushed. A group of guys were crossing the projects ten yards away. It was Diamond Tony and his entourage.

They say killers like to hang out by their crime scenes. I guess it's true. From a distance, Tony could be any random guy in a black bomber jacket and Jays cap, but the sunglasses gave him away. He wore them whenever he was outside, whether it was sunny or gray, morning or night. Tony waved at the crowd like a celebrity greeting his fans.

Evil.

W
hen I was fifteen, I got recruited as a lookout. That's how it started.

I felt honored and bragged about it to my friends. I got paid, sure, but I'd have done it for free, just for the status of being a part of Diamond Tony's operation.

I didn't know back then what Diamond Tony was made of. All I knew was that he was the most notorious kingpin Toronto had ever seen.

It was all good for a few weeks. I had as much MPR—money, power, and respect—as a kid could hope for. Then one day, while a deal was going down, the cops descended on us from every
direction. One of Tony's guys shoved a package into my hand. “You know the code.” We ran off in different directions, but I didn't get far before the police tackled me.

In the cruiser, I had this jittery feeling. I knew the code: Don't snitch. If I named names, I'd pay the price. My family would too.

They put me in a white room that was as small as a prison cell. There was a table attached to the floor and three chairs. Two detectives, a skinny white guy and a short, Jennifer-Lopez-plus-thirty-pounds, came in to interrogate me.

Skinny paced around the table. “Why don't you make this easy on yourself and tell us who those drugs belong to?”

“I'm waiting for my lawyer.” Everybody knew that Diamond Tony had a fancy-ass lawyer who represented his people. I hoped he'd send him soon.

Skinny flattened his palms on the table and leaned toward me. “Why would you need a lawyer?” I jerked my head back at his coffee breath. “The crack isn't yours, is it?”

I didn't answer.

That's when J.Lo started in on me. “All you need to do is tell us who gave you the drugs and what they asked you to do.”

“No one and nothing, ma'am.”

Skinny raked a hand across his bad comb-over. “How would a kid
like you get half a kilo of crack in the middle of Walker territory?”

Half a kilo? Shit.
I glanced at the door, wishing Diamond Tony's lawyer would hurry the hell up.

J.Lo pulled a chair up next to me and gave me a motherly look. “You can tell us the truth, Darren. That's what'll get you out of this.”

I forced a laugh. It wasn't a mother I needed—it was Witness Protection.