anything about the eighteen-month-old boy who was in the store every time she came in to talk to him, or about the constantly changing cast of teenage girls who hung around, including one or two who looked slightly pregnant. His wife was a cashier supervisor for New Jersey Transit, a notary public and an ordained Pentecostal minister. In their own way they got along fine, Rodney and Clover: they’d been tolerating the hell out of each other for more than twenty years.
Strike’s back started to knot up from the bottle work. His thoughts returned to Rodney’s greedy partner. “Stealing from you how?”
“Stealing from me hand over fist, that’s how.” Rodney turned his head away from the coke and sneezed. “You know, Erroll won’t hurt nobody no more? The nigger killed a TV reporter once—four, no maybe five, six other motherfuckers that I know of. I say to him, Yo, Erroll, this boy done stole my money, is stealing my money.”
Rodney hissed in disgust and shook his head, his hands a blur of bottles and stoppers. “But Erroll’s all worried about dyin’ now, you know, he’s feeling bad’n shit about his life, like he’s gonna make amends and not do nothing bad no more.” Rodney laughed. “The motherfucker startin’ to sound like my goddamn wife. ”
Strike nodded. “Lot of people think heaven is in this bo-bowl, here. That’s all the heaven they want.”
“I tell you one thing, bawh.” Rodney passed a finger alongside his nose. “If God invented anything better’n drugs, he kept it for hisself. That’s the damn truth.”
Strike rolled his eyes: this was Rodney’s second-favorite saying, right behind “A dime’s a dime.”
They went back to working in silence for a while, about two hundred bottles ready to sell, maybe six, seven hundred more still in the bowl.
“Yeah, ol’ Erroll … Right about now I just pay him to walk around scare the piss out the people with that damn face of his.”
Strike held his peace, waiting Rodney out.
“See, people get killed around here ‘cause they can’t see two minutes in front of they nose. Somethin’ feels good now., that’s all they want to know about. But you know, if you fuck that girl her boyfriend gonna kill you. If you get high off that product you supposed to be sellin’, if you get greedy, go into business for yourself when you supposed to be out there for the man, well, the man gonna kill you.”
Yeah, Strike thought, and that’s exactly what Rodney’s pulling on Champ. Fucking Rodney should be talking into a mirror right now.
Suddenly Rodney put down the bottles, lifted his hands and let them drop on his kneecaps, as if he was too upset to go on. “Goddamn greedy motherfucker.”
Strike worked faster as a way of keeping still, sensing that Rodney was finally about to spell it out.
“That boy do nothin’ but lay back, pass some baggies, rake in the dough. We clearing two hundred a ounce each, me an him, sellin maybe seventy ounces a week. Nice indoors work, clean, safe, all the dope heading out of town, out of state, Jersey City, New Hampshire. Shit, it almos’ legitimate the way we got it set up.”
Allowing for the lying-dope-dealer factor, Strike figured thirty-five ounces at about a hundred each. Strike found himself starting to fume: Are you telling me something or are you asking me something? He didn’t know what he would say if it was ask.
“We got no hassles with the knockos, no ten dollars here, ten dollars there, no pipeheads all licky-lipped with their greezy little eyes. I tell you, man, it’s sweet.”
Strike dreamed his dream: no more bench, no more retail, no more Fury. But right behind it came a newspaper photograph of a maverick dealer who set himself up in Dempsy last year and was found by the police with the brass peephole of his apartment door embedded in his face, courtesy of a shotgun blast from the hallway. Fucking with Champ: Strike was torn between visions of paradise and survival.
“Least it was
Strike’s back started to knot up from the bottle work. His thoughts returned to Rodney’s greedy partner. “Stealing from you how?”
“Stealing from me hand over fist, that’s how.” Rodney turned his head away from the coke and sneezed. “You know, Erroll won’t hurt nobody no more? The nigger killed a TV reporter once—four, no maybe five, six other motherfuckers that I know of. I say to him, Yo, Erroll, this boy done stole my money, is stealing my money.”
Rodney hissed in disgust and shook his head, his hands a blur of bottles and stoppers. “But Erroll’s all worried about dyin’ now, you know, he’s feeling bad’n shit about his life, like he’s gonna make amends and not do nothing bad no more.” Rodney laughed. “The motherfucker startin’ to sound like my goddamn wife. ”
Strike nodded. “Lot of people think heaven is in this bo-bowl, here. That’s all the heaven they want.”
“I tell you one thing, bawh.” Rodney passed a finger alongside his nose. “If God invented anything better’n drugs, he kept it for hisself. That’s the damn truth.”
Strike rolled his eyes: this was Rodney’s second-favorite saying, right behind “A dime’s a dime.”
They went back to working in silence for a while, about two hundred bottles ready to sell, maybe six, seven hundred more still in the bowl.
“Yeah, ol’ Erroll … Right about now I just pay him to walk around scare the piss out the people with that damn face of his.”
Strike held his peace, waiting Rodney out.
“See, people get killed around here ‘cause they can’t see two minutes in front of they nose. Somethin’ feels good now., that’s all they want to know about. But you know, if you fuck that girl her boyfriend gonna kill you. If you get high off that product you supposed to be sellin’, if you get greedy, go into business for yourself when you supposed to be out there for the man, well, the man gonna kill you.”
Yeah, Strike thought, and that’s exactly what Rodney’s pulling on Champ. Fucking Rodney should be talking into a mirror right now.
Suddenly Rodney put down the bottles, lifted his hands and let them drop on his kneecaps, as if he was too upset to go on. “Goddamn greedy motherfucker.”
Strike worked faster as a way of keeping still, sensing that Rodney was finally about to spell it out.
“That boy do nothin’ but lay back, pass some baggies, rake in the dough. We clearing two hundred a ounce each, me an him, sellin maybe seventy ounces a week. Nice indoors work, clean, safe, all the dope heading out of town, out of state, Jersey City, New Hampshire. Shit, it almos’ legitimate the way we got it set up.”
Allowing for the lying-dope-dealer factor, Strike figured thirty-five ounces at about a hundred each. Strike found himself starting to fume: Are you telling me something or are you asking me something? He didn’t know what he would say if it was ask.
“We got no hassles with the knockos, no ten dollars here, ten dollars there, no pipeheads all licky-lipped with their greezy little eyes. I tell you, man, it’s sweet.”
Strike dreamed his dream: no more bench, no more retail, no more Fury. But right behind it came a newspaper photograph of a maverick dealer who set himself up in Dempsy last year and was found by the police with the brass peephole of his apartment door embedded in his face, courtesy of a shotgun blast from the hallway. Fucking with Champ: Strike was torn between visions of paradise and survival.
“Least it was
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