I didn’t have time to be strung along. I needed to know if I was going to have something I could go back and tell Christian.
“Pump your breaks, sis. I’m not playing at all. Stick with me and I’ll take you to the first of many places to build up the story. You just have to be careful with the information until you have it all together, because once you blow the whistle on this, we might all have to run for cover. Barker is dead set—and I do mean dead set—on becoming the future mayor. He has defended the biggest dealers in our area. And he is not only powerful, he is ruthless and don’t give a fuck about nothing. He is the Devil in a suit,” Kyle warned.
“I don’t know about y’all doing this,” my mother said, her voice shaky. She’d returned to the living room with a plate of food for me, but I hadn’t even heard her come back. I was too busy being keyed into what Kyle and I were discussing about the story line.
“I don’t think anything is worth selling your soul to the Devil for. This man sounds like someone you need to steer clear of,” my mother went on. My first thought was that she had some nerve. I had watched her sell her soul to the drug devil a few times. She couldn’t judge me at all. I kept those bad thoughts in my head, though.
I flopped back down on the couch and sat quiet for a few seconds. Christian’s voice rang in my head: “Nothing is guaranteed . . . not even the job you have right now. If you don’t pull your weight around here, there are thousands of other hungry young reporters out there that would love to be in your shoes.”
That was enough. I wanted whatever Kyle was going to give me. I wanted my job. I wasn’t listening to anyone other than my inner voice, which was telling me this was going to be my big break.
My mother set the plate of liver, onions, white rice, and gravy in front of me, but all of a sudden I wasn’t hungry. Kyle switched on the TV. “Watch this . . . I bet the nigga is on TV smiling and kissing babies right now as we speak about his ass,” Kyle said, flipping through channels until he came to our rival station’s news.
I sat up straight and watched. My heart was beating so fast, I felt the movement behind my eyes. Sure enough, as fate would have it, there he was, the now-infamous Anton Barker, standing behind the reporter waving and smiling like the quintessential politician. I couldn’t front, the man was fine. He had a nice build, which was not too skinny, but not too muscular. His hair was salt-and-pepper, and so was the goatee that ringed his smooth cocoa-colored skin. His suit was clearly custom-made and expensive. It looked like he spared no expense on his upkeep and appearance. I liked it. I liked it a lot. I watched the television screen and stared as my rival station nemesis, Jay Jones, walked over with her goofy smile and microphone. Even she made googly eyes at Barker as she jockeyed for a good position and camera angle.
“We are here at the biggest mayoral campaign event for top candidate Anton Barker since he announced his bid for mayor of Norfolk. The people seem to love him. This crowd has eclipsed every other candidate in the race. It seems that the people of all sections of the city love Mr. Barker. We have reported before how it seems Barker has a stronghold on all classes of voters.”
I watched, glued to the television, as Jay Jones pushed her microphone past all of the other reporters and wedged her way in, to get a word with Barker.
“Mr. Barker, sir. Tell us how you manage to appeal to so many people. We’ve seen you defend what some would call the dregs of society, but now here you are, being loved by everyone,” Jay Jones said, her microphone directly in front of Barker’s mouth. He straightened the lapels on his jacket, flashed a beautiful, gleaming white, straight-toothed smile, and spoke eloquently.
“Well, let’s just say I am a man of the people . . . all people. I come from humble beginnings and worked my way through law school. It wasn’t easy, so I understand the plight of every man, woman, and child in Norfolk. From the rich to the poor, I’ve been around them all. I will continue to serve the people,” Anton Barker answered, never letting his smile drop from his face.
I was flabbergasted by his words. He was smooth, gorgeous, and now I knew that he was also a liar. I shook my head, side to side, and squinted at the television. It took a special kind of person to lie so smoothly. I was convinced in those few minutes of watching Anton Barker that he could sell salt to a slug or talk someone right into a brown paper bag. From what Kyle had just said, the beautiful specimen of a man I was looking at on TV might as well have been a serial killer, based on the crimes he had defended and the ones he had also committed. It could only take a psychopath to switch identities like that. And what better type of story to report on than one about a two-faced, double-crossing, double-life–living psychopath that was running for the top office in our city?
* * *
I stood up. I was too uncomfortable to stay seated at that point. A bunch of theories and story preps ran through my mind at once.
“What you thinking, twin?” Kyle asked me, noticing my face. He suspected that I was onto something.
“I have to have this story. This is going to make my career, and there is nothing else I want to do now,” I said, kind of in a trance. “He has got to be stopped if everything you’ve said is true.”
I could actually envision myself breaking the story to Christian. She’d jump up and hug me so hard that I wouldn’t be able to breathe. This is the kind of story that would put her past work to shame. They would be begging me to be on that news desk. I might even steal Christian’s job out from under her, like she did to Lucy.
“I know I have no place in telling you-all what to do. We’ve lost some years and you both are grown, but this all just doesn’t sit right with me. I feel danger down in my gut and bones—danger for everyone involved, not just you, Khloé,” my mother said, looking like she was on the verge of tears.
But when I became a reporter/journalist, I knew what I was signing up for when I applied for the job. I couldn’t afford to let someone else get an exclusive story on him. I’d be in the unemployment line the following day. Now what I can do for my mother was assure her that everything would be fine.
“I promise you, I will be careful, Mama, but if there is a scandal going on in Norfolk, I am going to be the one to break it. I don’t care if I do have to sell my soul,” I said, meaning every word I had uttered. I was ready to go after the infamous Anton Barker full steam ahead. Six p.m. news desk, here I come, I cheered in my head. I could picture myself now, getting a whole new wardrobe and hiring a glam squad because I would have to be on point.
3
DOWN AND DIRTY
“A’ight, Khloé, you see that cop right there?” Kyle pointed through his windshield as we sat in his car hidden across from the Norfolk Second Patrol Division station house. My legs swung in and out nervously. Kyle had called me at home. He told me to hurry up and get dressed; he had to show me something related to my story.
“Which one? There are a few,” I replied, craning my neck to see whom he was talking about. “There’s one that’s not in uniform. You mean him?” I squinted to see.
“Yup, that one. He is a detective. He’s a dirty detective in every sense of the word. He works directly for your boy, Barker, the possible future mayor, and all of his clients, but he pretends he’s out here solving murders. More like out here committing them and then solving them like he’s the best,” Kyle told me.
“Are you serious?” I asked. I know Kyle was getting tired of me asking that, but some things were just so unbelievable.
“Man, I know of at least six murders commissioned by people associated with Barker and his clients and cleaned up by this cat in front of us. He plants evidence, he gets rid of evidence, and I’ve heard sometimes he carries out the murders himself too. The reason I said to follow him is, I think after a while, he will lead us right to Barker’s hideouts.”
I sat staring out of the windshield in astonishment at what Kyle was saying. How could someone who’d sworn an oath to protect and serve be doing what Kyle was saying.