The report of a black man abducting real-estate developer Dominick Stevens outside the Omni Hotel came over the radio shortly after nine. Halfway between Nancy’s clinic and his office, Kelson pulled over and listened, then searched for the WGN-TV stream on his phone.
They had video of the abduction from an Omni security camera. A fuzzy-looking Dominick Stevens walked from the Omni carrying a paper cup of coffee. A large black man approached from behind and put a massive hand on Stevens’s shoulder. He took the coffee cup, set it on the sidewalk, and then – with his back to the camera, as if he’d scouted security beforehand – dragged Stevens to a white van. He pushed him in through a sliding door, climbed into the driver’s seat, and pulled from the curb. Kelson magnified the image. The license plates were obscured.
The anchorwoman said the police were asking Chicagoans to report sightings of white late-model Chevrolet G20 cargo vans. Then she cut to a profile of Stevens and his political and financial friendships.
Doreen Felbanks’s call interrupted Kelson’s third viewing of the video. ‘What are you doing?’ Her voice had an edge.
‘Don’t be mad. You said Mengele wanted me to get rid of Stevens.’
‘I said he wanted you to kill him. I said nothing about having someone yank him off the street.’
‘Stevens is off the table.’
‘No one’s off the table,’ she said. ‘You know what will happen to your—’
‘I’m coming after you,’ he said. ‘You think you’ve got me, but I’m right behind you.’ And he hung up.
Seconds later, his phone rang again but he silenced it. He knew what she would say, knew the threats to Nancy and Sue Ellen, knew the warning about what would happen to him personally if he failed to follow directions. And he knew what he would say, what he couldn’t unsay. He didn’t want to hear or say any of it.
He pulled back into the street and, instead of continuing to his office, drove south toward Rodman’s Bronzeville apartment. But then another report came over the car radio. Dominick Stevens had contacted another station, WBEZ. He was safe and with friends, he said. The video and eyewitness accounts were mistakes, misunderstandings.
‘Yeah, right,’ Kelson said, and kept driving.
Rodman’s neighborhood looked as it always did. ‘A place that holds on by its knuckles,’ Kelson said as he looked out the windshield. ‘No pulling itself up. No tumbling in a freefall.’ It had people like Rodman to thank for the calm – people who chased drug dealers from the alleys and lived their lives steadily and quietly and with their eyes open for the next threat from above or below. Kelson felt those eyes on him as he got out of his car and scurried to Rodman’s building.
He climbed the two flights of stairs to Rodman’s apartment and knocked. The door swung halfway open and Rodman beckoned him inside.
Dominick Stevens and Francisca Cabon sat on the living-room couch under the portraits of Malcolm X, Rodman’s girlfriend Cindi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Their baby slept against Stevens’s chest. A beaten-up red suitcase stood against the wall.
‘Huh,’ Kelson said.
‘Told you,’ Rodman said.
Cindi came in from the kitchen with coffee. She smiled at Kelson. ‘DeMarcus said you’d be joining us.’
‘I’ve never been to a party like this,’ Kelson said.
‘Had to get them out of the way,’ Rodman said. ‘After dumping the Felbankses in Dominick’s bed, someone broke into Francisca’s place last night.’
‘Bastard tried to kill me,’ Francisca said. ‘Would’ve done it too, except I was up with Miguel.’ She reached for the baby, and Stevens handed him to her.
‘Huh,’ Kelson said again.
Rodman downed half of his coffee. ‘Like I said, no shame in running away if your enemy’s got bigger guns. I invited Francisca and Dominick to spend a little time at our B and B.’
Stevens toasted him with his coffee cup. ‘Here’s to Nirvana.’
‘Mi casa es su casa,’ Rodman said.
‘What the hell?’ Kelson said.
‘Don’t overthink it,’ Rodman said.
But a headache dug into Kelson’s skull. He asked Francisca, ‘You saw the guy who came after you?’
‘Wasn’t like he was a ghost.’
‘Did you recognize him?’
‘I recognized the kind. Full of himself. Slick.’
‘Good-looking? Highly principled? No man left behind? An angel of death?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘How’d you scare him off?’
‘I’m not stupid. Alone in that building with Miguel? I have a gun. When he shot at me, I shot back. He didn’t expect that, I think.’
‘Did you hit him?’
‘I didn’t even aim at him. You think I want to kill somebody?’
‘How about your roommate?’
‘Elena? She moved out a couple days ago – met a boy at a club.’
Rodman said, ‘Francisca called Dominick afterward. She was in his room at the hotel this morning when I picked him up.’
She put a hand on Stevens’s thigh. ‘Dominick had DeMarcus come back for me.’
Kelson said, ‘You went back to the hotel after kidnapping him?’
‘Couldn’t leave her there,’ Rodman said. ‘And I didn’t kidnap him – I just gave him a ride.’
‘And what’s the deal with you?’ Kelson said to Stevens. ‘Your girlfriend’s like sixteen. You couldn’t wait until she graduated from high school?’
‘Eighteen, bastard,’ Francisca said. ‘I finished two years ago. Graduated early.’
‘Huh,’ Kelson said.
‘Racist,’ she said.
‘Um,’ Rodman said, ‘we’ve got important stuff to deal with.’
‘I fell in love,’ Stevens said. ‘Lock me up for it.’
‘We do that to men like you,’ Kelson said. ‘Unless they’ve got enough money – like you.’
Rodman said, ‘What about Nancy and Sue Ellen?’
That shook Kelson out of it. ‘I talked to Nancy. She won’t budge.’
‘Maybe she doesn’t get a choice. At least not about your girl.’
‘If you try to grab Nancy off the street, she’ll break your knees.’
‘I don’t want to grab anyone,’ Rodman said. ‘I’m talking about drawing a circle around them. No one gets through.’
‘You have friends who can do that?’ Kelson asked. ‘Because I don’t.’
‘I can call favors,’ he said.
Stevens said, ‘And I’ve got friends.’
That brought a smile to Kelson’s face. ‘You I don’t get. The man who’s doing this will roll over the kind of guy who runs to the Omni when he’s scared.’
Stevens gave him back a smile. ‘I have the right kind of friends.’
‘Accept the offer,’ Rodman said to Kelson.
‘Fine,’ Kelson said. ‘Call them.’
‘Now say thank you,’ Rodman said.