Player & the Game (19 page)

K
eith sat upright in his seat when he saw the bathroom door open and Stephanie step out of the doorway. She raised her head and strode toward him.

Since hanging up the phone with Mike, he had given a lot of thought to what his mentor said. Maybe Mike had a point. Maybe he had been too harsh with Stephanie. His wariness of entering a relationship with a woman like her—who he knew had the ability to wrap him around her finger, if she tried hard enough—had made him act colder to her than he intended. No woman deserved this type of treatment—even an opportunistic gold digger like Stephanie Gibbons. She was still a human being. He had to make amends.

He watched as Stephanie opened the car door. She looked a lot better now than she had when she walked into the bathroom fifteen minutes ago. She had touched up her makeup. Her sunglasses were now pushed to the crown of her head and he could see that her eyes were bright and cheerful. She was even smiling.

That's quite a transformation,
he thought, a little bewildered. When he saw the state that she had been in when she left, he hadn't expected her to come back this way.

She sat in the leather seat beside him and he loudly cleared his throat.

“Uh, look, Stephanie . . . before . . . before we get back on the road, I think we need to talk.”

She buckled her seatbelt. “Talk about what, Keith?”

What did she mean, ‘Talk about what?'?
It was pretty damn obvious what they needed to talk about!

“Stephanie, we need to discuss what happened back there at the motel.” He closed his eyes. “Look, I think I came off harsher than I meant to. I shouldn't have said what I said. I didn't mean to hur—”

She shook her head. “Keith, it's all right. We don't need to talk about it.”

“We
don't?
”

“No, we don't have to rehash what happened last night and this morning.” She shrugged her shoulders. “We just had sex! No big deal. We're both adults. We had fun. We'll leave it at that.”

He now gazed at her in amazement as if her body had been taken over by an alien life form. Was this the same woman who had screamed and cried and thrown things at him in the motel room? Was this the same woman who had refused to look at him for the past three hours?

“But . . . but I thought you—”

He stopped mid-sentence when she raised a hand to his lips, silencing him. She shook her head again.

“Keith, it's all right. Really. I'm OK. I've gotten over it.”

“
In fifteen minutes?
” a voice in his head shouted. “Talk about a rebound!”

“Besides, I think we need to focus on the issue at hand here,” she said.

He cocked an eyebrow. “Which is?”

“Finding Isaac.” Her dark eyes narrowed. “What's gone on between us is irrelevant. I'm only here for one thing and that's to find that scheming son of a bitch. I don't want to be lovers. Hell, we don't even have to be friends! I just want you to do your job, which is to find him. Understood?”

He stared at her. Maybe this was how women like her operated. Maybe they could click some internal switch to turn off their emotions like some gold-digging Terminator. Either way, it left him totally befuddled.

“Understood,” he mumbled behind her hand.

She dropped her hand from his mouth. “Good. So . . . where to next?”

“Well . . . Mike sent a list of towns we should go to. He said any one of them could be where Big Red is based.”

“Great!” she exclaimed, dropping her sunglasses back to her nose. She rubbed her hands together eagerly. “Then let's get this show on the road!”

“Yeah . . . sure, Steph,” Keith said, shifting the car into drive. He gave one last cagey glance at Stephanie before finally pulling off.

 

After about a week of searching for Big Red, each backwater town started to look like the next. They all had the same rundown look. All the neighborhoods were filled with old, beat-up looking houses with weed-infested front yards and chain-link fences. All of the towns had the tired-looking strip malls on the outskirts with the no-name restaurants and stores. Crime was rampant. Drug dealers were on every other street corner. Cars that had been stripped of everything but their steering wheels were on cinderblocks in empty alleyways. A few women stood on street corners in tight-fitting tops and ill-fitting skirts, ready to sell themselves to the next man who pulled up and offered them twenty dollars.

The towns reminded Keith of a slower, more country version of his old neighborhood in East Baltimore. In some ways, they were a lot like home.

Keith could see how an industrious and wayward man like Big Red could quickly take over towns like these, but unfortunately he had yet to find the particular town where Big Red reigned from his drug-dealing throne. They had been looking for days and at each place they went no one knew where they could find a guy named “Big Red,” though a few had tried to point Keith in the right direction.

Keith now pulled to a stop in front of a small convenience store. He turned off the engine. “I'm going to go inside to grab something to drink. Do you want anything?”

Stephanie shook her head. She barely looked up from the magazine that was in her lap. He watched as she flipped to another glossy page.

She had been acting like this all week, not really giving him the outright cold shoulder, but she was aloof to the point that it was almost unnerving. They didn't argue anymore. They barely said anything to one another, actually. She would sit quietly in the car while he staked out neighborhoods or hopped out of the SUV to go somewhere and ask questions. He would give her an update and she would nod her head and return her attention to her magazine or cell phone.

Her sudden behavior shift was throwing him off. He felt like some undercurrent of anger and hurt still lurked beneath the surface, but Stephanie refused to talk about it and he wasn't going to press the issue anymore.

He shut the car door behind him and walked inside the convenience store, leaving her behind.

It was a small store with only a few shelves of goods and one freezer in the back filled with beer, soda, and ice-cream cones.

Keith noticed a group of black men standing near the counter. They laughed and joked, slapping each other's backs while they talked. But when he entered, their conversation came to a sudden halt. Keith noticed a distinct chill enter the room.

He nodded to the four men and only the one in the center of their throng nodded in return. The rest gazed at him suspiciously. He wasn't surprised. Again, this reminded him a lot of home. If a stranger had walked into a store in his old neighborhood, all the dudes standing around would stare at him cautiously too. Strangers couldn't always be trusted.

Keith slowly walked to the back of the store, slid back the freezer door, and pulled out a bottle of Coke. As he did, he glanced out the store window and saw that Stephanie had gotten out of the SUV. She must have gotten bored with reading her magazine. She was now slumped against the hood, adjusting her bra straps and the front of her tank top, gazing at nothing in particular. Her brown legs glistened in the bright sun.

Keith walked back toward the front of the store and placed his soda on the counter. He noticed that all of the men were still silent, but now they were staring out the doorway at the parking lot. Stephanie seemed to be the object of their avid interest.

“What's up, man?” the one in the center called out to Keith.

He was rail thin and wearing a stained tank top and drooping jeans around his hips. The top of his boxer shorts was on full display. He also sported several gold chains and a Rolex watch. The young man nodded and raised his lips, revealing a mouth full of gold teeth.

Keith nodded. “What's up?”

“That your girl out there?” the young man asked, pointing out the door.

Keith raised his eyebrows in amusement. He followed the path of the guy's finger and watched as Stephanie grimaced and lazily fanned herself in the scorching sun and sweltering Florida heat. She raised her hair from her shoulders and twisted it into a knot at the crown of her head.

He had to admit, she did look pretty damn good standing out there. He understood why the men couldn't take their eyes off her.

“Yeah, I guess you can say that,” he finally answered.

“Well, you one lucky nigga! She a dime, man!” the young man exclaimed with a smile. He turned to one of the men beside him. “Ain't she? She even better lookin' than Renee!”

One of his companions slowly shook his head. “Oh, nigga, don't let Big Red hear you say that . . . talkin' about his chick that way.”

Keith was handing his money to the cashier, but paused at the mention of Big Red's name.

“Why?” the skinny one argued. “It's the truth! Tell me she ain't finer than Renee . . . and Renee's one bad bitch!”

“I don't know, man!” one of them protested, glancing at Stephanie again. “I'd have to see those bitches side by side to really say. You can't really judge this way.”

“Man, you full of shit! You know damn well—”

“Who's Big Red?” Keith asked, feigning ignorance.

The group of men abruptly stopped arguing. They turned around to face Keith again. The skinny one narrowed his eyes with distrust. “Why you wanna know?”

Keith shrugged casually. “Just because. You said he has a chick that's finer than mine. I want to know who the dude is.”

The skinny one sucked his teeth. “Man, Big Red's chick ain't finer than yours! This nigga just talking shit! You can see her yourself at the Hangar Club on Fridays. She works the center stage. Sometimes, she's with Big Red down at the bar on 15th too. He's there all the time.”

Keith nodded, paid the cashier, and grabbed his soda. He then walked back toward the convenience store entrance.

“Hey!” the skinny one shouted. “Yo! Your lady got a sister, man?”

“Several of them!” Keith assured.

“Well, tell them to roll up down here and pay me a visit. Monty knows how to take care of a bitch,” he said, holding up his gold chain as evidence.

Keith nodded. “I'll do that.”

He walked out of the convenience store and made a beeline to where Stephanie was standing. She was still slumped against the car, fanning herself. She frowned despite the fact that he was now smiling ear to ear.

“Well, that was a long errand,” she muttered testily, crossing her arms over her chest. “You took the car keys with you! I was frying in there. What the hell took you so long?”

He didn't respond. Instead, he cupped her face, leaned down and gave her the hottest, wettest kiss he could muster. Her eyes widened in surprise, but quickly drifted closed. She wrapped her arms around his neck and he wrapped his around her waist, lifting her off the ground as they kissed hungrily. It was a heady reminder of the passion they had shared a week ago, a passion that he desperately wished he could sample again. When he finally lowered her back to the asphalt and she gazed up at him, her eyes were dazed and her lips were swollen.

“What . . . What was that about?” she whispered, staring up at him dully.

“That's me thanking you for sticking around,” he said, licking his lips.

He grinned again then walked around the SUV's hood and opened the driver's-side door. She climbed in after him.

“What?” she asked.

“Thanks to you, we now know where we can find Big Red.”

“
What?
Really? You better not be joking, Keith!”

“I'm not joking. He's at a bar on 15th Street and we're headed there tonight!”

S
tephanie and Keith watched as three men slowly strolled across the parking lot toward the bar. She leaned forward and was practically sitting in Keith's lap to get a better view.

A morbidly obese one was in the middle. He wore a black tracksuit with white piping and a black visor with the bill turned toward the back of his head. His curly red hair was in cornrows that hung down his back. He waddled and wheezed as the group made their way toward the doors.

He was flanked on both sides by two hulking dark-skinned dudes covered in tattoos. One had cornrows, the other had dreads. They looked like club bouncers or college linebackers who had missed the NFL draft.

As the three walked toward the entrance, the crowd lingering near the doors separated, giving them ample room. Stephanie noticed how one guy practically ran to get out of the way. A few seconds later the three men disappeared behind the barroom doors.

“Do you think that was Big Red?” she whispered.

“How many fat black guys with red hair could there be around here?” Keith muttered. “Of course, it was him.”

“Well . . . Are we going in then? Why are we just sitting here? Aren't you going to go in there to talk to him?”

“Steph, a guy like that isn't someone who you just roll up on, asking questions. He's a drug dealer and a crime kingpin around here. He's probably had several bad run-ins with the local cops. I doubt he's likely to start rambling to me just because I buy him a beer and tell him I'm a private investigator.”

“But I thought that's why we came tonight! I thought we came here so that you could talk to him! We certainly didn't come here to take his picture!”

Keith turned to her. “No,” he said tensely, “but I can't go charging in there without a plan. Just give me a damn second to think about how I should approach this. You only get one chance with a thing like this. I don't want to mess it up.”

“And while you're thinking about it, Isaac could be getting away!”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “Fine, if you're in such a damn hurry, then what's your bright idea on how to handle this?”

She glared back at him, knowing that he was trying to cow her, but she wouldn't be cowed by him this time. “Yes, actually I do have an idea on how to handle this,” she lied.

“Oh, and what would that be?”

He leaned back in his seat and tilted his head, gazing at her expectantly.

Actually, she had no idea on how to handle this, but she had had just about enough of Keith and his condescension. His smugness was really starting to irritate her. Suddenly, an idea popped into her head. Even she knew it was crazy, but still, she had to take a chance.

“I'll go talk to him myself,” she said firmly, raising her nose into the air.

He laughed, making her scowl.

“What's so goddamn funny? You don't think I can do it?”

“Oh, I
know
you'll do it. You'll do it just to prove me wrong and in the process, royally screw up whatever chance we have of finding Isaac again.” He closed his eyes. “Stephanie, look, I know you're still angry at me because of what happened between us back in South Carolina.”

She gazed at him, completely stunned. He was actually making this about him . . . about their having sex? What an ego this guy had!

“This has nothing to do with that, Keith!”

“Yes, it does. And I want you to know that you don't have to try to get back at me for what I did. I know I was wrong for the way I handled it.”

“You really think that I'm going in there to get back at you?”

“Yes, I do, and you're only putting yourself at risk by doing it. Look, I've tried repeatedly to make amends and start all over again with you, but—”

“Keith, this isn't about us, damn it!” she snarled. “I'm not going in there to get back at you. I'm going in there to talk to the one man who might know where we can find Isaac! We've been to every shitty town within fifty miles trying to find this guy, and I'm not going to let him get away because you want to sit here twiddling your thumbs or talking about where we went wrong!” She flipped down the visor in front of her and opened her purse. She then pulled out her lipstick and a compact and gazed into the visor mirror. “You may have years of experience as a police officer and the ATF . . . You may even have experience being a detective, but
I
have experience at being a woman.” She pointed at her chest. “You say that you can't just ‘roll up in there' asking him questions, and you're probably right.
You
can't do it. But
I
can.”

“You really think that Big Red is going to be swayed by a pretty face and nice legs?”

She applied her lipstick and puckered her lips. She then opened her blush compact. She began to apply some to her cheeks. “Maybe. It wouldn't hurt to try.”

“Stephanie, no woman is that gorgeous that a hardened criminal is going to just start spilling his guts because she winked at him. It doesn't work that way. This isn't the goddamn movies!”

She ran her fingers through her hair, admiring her reflection. “I know that, Keith, but what else have I got to lose?”

“Your life,” he said steadfastly, grabbing her wrist, catching her by surprise. His dark eyes gazed intensely into hers. “You could lose
your life
if you keep messing around, Steph. Or if not that, something else could happen to you in there. Don't do this. It's not worth it!”

She pulled her wrist out of his grasp and stared at him. “You're just . . . just trying to scare me,” she said shakily. “I can take care of myself. I'll be fine.”

“If I say I'm sorry, will that get you to stay? Will you give up this crazy idea of going in there alone, and let me handle this instead?”

She lowered her eyes. Her heart ached a little at his words.

But even if Keith said he was sorry, she knew he didn't mean it. She could tell. He still thought she was some small-town floozy, a gold digger who had tried to use her body to win him over. He didn't care about her welfare. He only cared that she was an unnecessary burden, some frustration that he had been lugging around with him since Virginia that he hadn't been able to offload. He didn't want her to go into the bar because he was worried about the drama she would unleash, but he didn't have to be concerned. Like she told him, she was fully capable of taking care of herself. She could do this.

Stephanie gave her reflection one final glance before she flipped up the visor. She then dropped her lipstick and compact back into her purse and closed the zipper. She opened the car door.

“Steph!” Keith yelled. “Damn it, Stephanie!”

She stepped onto the wet asphalt and shut the door behind her, ignoring Keith's calls. She then adjusted her denim skirt and jacket, pushed back her shoulders, and walked across the parking lot.

“Are you sure you know what you're doing?” a small voice in her head asked as she walked toward the bar.

Not really, but I'm not going back there now,
she replied. She wouldn't give Keith the satisfaction.

With each step she took she felt a growing mix of dread and excitement. A few men in the crowd near the door glanced her way and smiled. She smiled in return.

“Hey, baby,” one drawled to her. “Wanna dance?”

“Maybe later,” she said.

She was a Gibbons girl, after all. She had been trained her whole life for a moment like this. Big Red wouldn't know what hit him by the time she was finished with him.