Los Angeles Noir by Denise Hamilton Read Free Book Online Page B

birthday, Cravitz felt like a man reborn. He’d helped his friend; now he would try to help others.
    Cravitz paused to admire his neon sign blinking Universal Detection . He peeled off.
    There were scores of revelers out in Leimert Park. Cravitz took Vernon to Angelus Vista and sped west, up the slopes home to View Park.
    Cravitz rose at 4 a.m. on Saturday, Halloween day, and promptly got things going. Two hundred sit-ups, zip, zip. Then he put on John Coltrane and oiled his magnificent head with cocoa butter until it sparkled like obsidian. He scanned Jet, Guns & Ammo , and the Wall Street Journal on the john and concluded a leisurely toilette with a brisk wash-up, a vigorous flossing, and a shave.
    He put on his robe and slippers and strode out into darkness of his rose garden. His rambling View Park home was situated along the ridgelines of the north-facing heights. He clambered to the garden summits.
    As the sun rose, Cravitz touched his forehead reverently against the earth and said a prayer to the awakening world and to his ancestors and vowed, as he had every year for a decade, to be a good man and do at least one good thing for someone more needy than himself. For twenty-four hours he’d drink only water and fast from his bad habits: gratuitous violence, pussy-chasing, wine, and greasy-ass food consumption.
    Things were going swimmingly until Cash called.
    “Happy Halloweeeeen, little brother,” the old dude began.
    Cravitz winced. His big brother Cash had burned up careers as a policy man, a dope man, a loan shark, and a hustler. He’d done time at Folsom, at Vacaville, and at Pelican Bay. For many of L.A.’s starry-eyed wannabes, he stank of money, power, and the streets. He was now in his fifties but still had the tastes and habits of a small-town hood.
    “It’s your world, play-ah . S’up?” Cravitz said not very convincingly.
    “Naw, you d’play-a, play-a ,” Cash bellowed.
    “What ya want?” Cravitz said.
    “Y’boy Yip been here,” Cash said.
    “Already?”
    “Yep, he ran by early this morning. I was just gettin’ outta my breakfast meeting with Bennita and ’nem. The muthafucka was staring at Bennita like she was made outta cake.”
    “How did he look?”
    “Skeerd as a cat.”
    “Scared?”
    “Did I stutta?”
    “You give him the keys to the place in La Caja?”
    “He got ’em and gone.”
    Cravitz breathed a sigh of relief.
    “He didn’t leave that pretty gun, though. That Mexican ain’t dumb as he looks. Th’ chump oughta give it to me. Woulda been mines long time ago if I’da had my way.”
    “I don’t know why Yip is so spooked.”
    “And, honey, is he. Talkin’ freakish. Didn’t even sound like hissef,” Cash said, then added with an amused cackle, “Yip fuckin’ somebody’s wife?”
    “Yip’s a choirboy.”
    “Oh, he fuckin’ somebody’s boyfriend then. Somethin’ up,” Cash said, then dropped the subject. “When you comin’?”
    “Now,” Cravitz said.
    “Well then, c’mon, boy. I done took care of y’friend. Now I needs you t’ take care of some messy bi’ness, f’me.”
    Cravitz knew his brother, a man of fixed habits, was taking his morning grits and waffles at the Chit Chat Room, his four-star Southern-style eatery in the mezzanine of the Château Rouge. He was feeling happy, frisky, and evil, and, as usual, trying to bum a little free labor.
    “How messy?” Cravitz asked.
    “Middlin’ messy, I figure,” Cash went on with a chuckle, “You remember Bingbong Jackson? You know, that piecea pimp I used to hang wit from Vegas?”
    “Umhuh.”
    Cravitz had a low opinion of Bingbong. He had won his distinctive moniker during childhood. Every time he tried to snatch the purse of some unsuspecting grandmother, he’d whack her in the mouth— bing! —but then she’d take her purse and clobber him with a haymaker— bong! Bingbong Jackson, whose real name was Ernest Grandvale Jackson IV, might have been the most low-rent, beat-up, wannabe