Page 67

"They still on us?"
Freeze struggled to turn around; he was bleeding pretty bad. "I don’t see anybody."
I drove around for awhile to make sure we’d really lost them, who ever they were, this time. Then drove as fast as I could to Perry’s house. Freeze had passed out at some point, so I had to carry him. He was in pretty bad shape. Perry said if it had been any longer he’d be dead. He took care of our wounds and I made him promise not to tell Black, but he found out anyway.
"You saved his life, and he saved yours."
"That’s just one more reason why we’re so tight."
"You ever find out who those guys were?" Wanda asked.
"Yeah. They were cops. They had a sting set up on Forty-eight. We just picked the wrong guy to rob that time."
* * *
Chapter Seventeen
Monday July 20: 4:42 PM
I slept late the next day. It was well into the afternoon before I finally rolled out of bed. It was almost five and I was still feeling a little groggy from the pain pills I had gotten from Perry. I thought about going back to bed, but I picked up the phone and checked my messages.
Felicia had called and left me this message;
"The least you could have done was call me and let me know that you made it back safely. Anyways, I didn’t call to fuss. I just wanted to say that I miss being with you. Bye, bye, honey."
I was really starting to like Felicia Hardy and I missed being with her too. I started to call her back, but then I remembered the last time I started feeling this way about a woman. I hung up the phone and called Mrs. Childers instead. It had been more than a week since the last time I saw or talked to her.
I left a message on her voice mail and asked her to meet me at Sparks Steak House on 46th Street around nine. I was a little late getting there and much to my surprise she was there, looking impeccable as usual. "Hello, Nick."
"Hello, Mrs. Childers. I hope I didn’t keep you waiting very long?"
"I’ve been here about a half hour. But that’s okay, I wanted to get out of the house anyway. Have a seat."
"Thank you." Once I was seated, her smile turned to a frown. I guess she noticed the cuts and bruises on my face.
"What happened to you?"
"I ran into some people who had something to prove."
"It looks like they did a good job. Are you all right?"
"I’ll be fine."
"What have you found out for me, Nick?"
"Well, Mrs. Childers, I don’t think your brother is missing, or that anything happened to him. I think Jake is somewhere hiding."
"What makes you say that?"
"He was involved with Chilly in some type of scheme to develop synthetic crack."
"Synthetic crack?" she looked at me strangely. "I’ve got a good idea, but just what exactly is synthetic crack?"
"Basically, Mrs. Childers, it’s crack without the cocaine."
"How is that possible?"
"I really don’t understand how the formula works, your brother’s the chemist. But the long and short of it is, that it didn’t work. At least seven people have died from it."