“If you were in New York and he was with your daughter, when did he have a chance to tell you what to say?” Lynch asked.
“He gave it to me before I left to go to New York,” Nola said. “He said, âIf Jamal calls you, I want you to tell him this.' Then he stuffed the paper into my bag, and I left.”
Lynch sat back in his chair and looked at the assistant district attorney sitting next to him. Harris was no longer impressed with Nola's looks. From the look on his face, Lynch could tell that he was more concerned with the gaping holes in her story.
Nola's lawyer watched the two of them and felt the need to interject, because he saw that things were going badly for his client.
“She's given you what you asked for,” Ryan Gold said, sitting up in his chair. “She's willing to testify that Frank Nichols gave the order to kill John Anderson, and that Jamal Nichols attempted to carry it out, killing Commissioner Darrell Freeman and Emma Jean Johnson.”
“That would be fine if your client's testimony were true,” the prosecutor said, getting up from his seat. “But we all know there's something missing here. It's up to Ms. Langston to tell us what it is.”
“I can't give you what I don't have, Mr. Harris,” Nola said anxiously. “All I can give you is what I know. The rest is up to you.”
“No, the rest is up to you, Ms. Langston,” Lynch said, getting up from his seat. “If you want the deal, you have to give us something we can use.
“And when you revise your story, I want you to consider this. Keisha Anderson isn't with Jamal Nichols because she was forced to be. She's with him because she wants to be.”
Â
Â
The young lovers had spent the last hour devouring one another with their hands and with their mouths. Now, as they sat in the quiet of the simple room, listening to the echoes of the voices emanating from the bar downstairs, they were feeding their hungry eyes with the only sight they wanted to seeâeach other.
They lay on the small bed together, Keisha feeling the whisper of Jamal's breath against her neck. She tried to think only of the moment, only of their love, only of herself. But she couldn't, because something inside her kept bringing her back to the tragedy that had created this perfect moment.
It was difficult for her to reconcile her own pleasure with the death and destruction that had taken place all around them. She knew that she should be mourning with those who mourned, and praying for the families of those who'd lost people whom they loved as much as she loved Jamal.
But Keisha swept those thoughts aside, and instead immersed herself in thoughts of Jamal. She wanted to know who he was. She wanted to know who he wanted to be. But more than anything, she wanted to know what had brought him to her.
“Where'd you come from?” she whispered.
“From the playground,” he said with a playful smile. “Remember?”
She tapped his arm. “Stop playing, Jamal. I really want to know. I mean, Frank Nichols is your father, and I've always seen him. But I only saw you that one summer, and this past month. How come?”
Jamal's smile faded as he considered a question that he'd never posed to himself. Where did he come from? In many ways, he didn't know. But what he did know, he was willing to share with Keisha, just as he was willing to share everything else.
“My mom and pop met in the early âeighties, somewhere between heroin and crack. That's how my pop tells time. Whatever his hustle was, that's what time it was. The 'seventies was heroin. The âeighties was cocaine. Then, around 'eighty-five or so, it was crack.
“Of course, he had other things that helped tell time, too. Women and whatnot. But they was just somethin' to do while he waited for his money to roll in off them corners.
“Some o' his women knew that, some of 'em didn't.”
“Did your mother know?” Keisha asked.
“Like I told you before, my mom was a college girl,” Jamal said, flipping onto his back and putting his hands behind his head as he stared at the ceiling. “She wasn't like them hoes he was used to. She was strong, smart, too good for his sorry ass.”
Keisha could see that the memory had stirred something bitter inside him.
“Jamal, if you don't want to talk about it anymore, it's okay,” she said, reaching over to caress his chest.
“It ain't like I don't wanna talk about it,” he said. “I guess I just never had a reason to get too deep with it.”
“Don't let me be the reason for you talking about something that hurts you,” she said, running her fingers along his face.
“You the best reason I got,” he said, touching her hand with his own.
He took a deep breath before he continued.
“My mom was goin' to Temple law school when she met my pop,” Jamal said. “She wanted to practice international law, travel around the world, see things she ain't never see before.
“She ain't care who Frank Nichols was, or what he could do for her. My mom was the type who could always do for herself. Frank liked that, at least he did at first.”
Jamal smiled as he imagined his parents in their younger days.
“My mom told me that when they met, Frank was talkin' all this revolutionary shit about how black folks should work inside the system, get what they needed from it, then go back and use what they learned to do they own thing.”
Jamal laughed. “He ain't tell her 'bout the system he came through. And he ain't tell her what business he was in, either. All she knew was, he gave her a ride home in a nice Benz, and asked if he could take her out the next day.
“My mom was a year away from finishin' law school when she had me, and she dropped out. She remind me o' that every time she get a chance, like it's my fault she ain't finish when she wanted to.”
“But you know it's not your fault, right, Jamal?” Keisha asked earnestly. “You know you couldn't have done anything to change what happened before you were born, don't you?”
“Yeah, I know,” he said, with a grim look on his face. “I know âcause my mom spent years tellin' me it was Frank's fault. And for years, I believed her. Still do.”
Jamal was silent for a moment, trying not to remember the things that had shaped the violence that raged in his heart. But he couldn't deny the memories, even though he'd tried to suppress them. They were there. And he had to tell Keisha about them, because he didn't want to be like his father.
“My mom went back to Temple when I was little, and finished her last year o' law school. My pop kept comin' around and tryin' to make it work with her. But she ain't want no drug dealer, and after a while he hated her for bein' too good for him.
“The first time I saw him hit my mother, I was five. She was talkin' 'bout takin' me away somewhere like Californiaâ
someplace where Frank could never see me. He smacked her in the mouth and told her she better not ever say nothin' like that again. She got a restrainin' order to keep him away for a year.”
Jamal sighed and tried to keep the memories from consuming him.
Keisha kissed him on his cheek. “It's okay, Jamal,” she said in the hope that it would take his pain away. “It's okay.”
He turned and looked into her eyes, and knew that what she'd said to him was right. It was okay. At least, it was going to be. As long as the two of them could be together, it was all going to be okay.
“Is that why I never saw you?” Keisha asked. “Because your parents couldn't get along?”
Jamal nodded. “My mom thought she was protectin' me from him,” he said. “And maybe she was. But the only thing I saw was, I ain't have no father. And I was mad about it.”
He reached down and held her hand as he recalled the only piece of his childhood that really mattered. The piece that Keisha had given to him all those years before.
“For years, she wouldn't let me see him,” Jamal said. “She wouldn't even let me talk to him on the phone. When I turned thirteen, I had to beg her to let me go down there, just that one time.
“When I finally did come down to North Philly to spend the day with him, he ain't have time for me. He was too busy makin' money. When I asked him if he was gon' take me out, he handed me fifty dollars, said, âHappy Birthday,' and sent me on my way.
“I walked around the corner to the playground on Fifteenth Street,” Jamal said. “Then I met this little girl who looked like she needed somebody.”
Jamal touched Keisha's face as she smiled and looked into his eyes.
“That little girl made me forget about what was wrong,” he said. “And she made think about what was right. I told her I would come back and see her every Friday after that. And even though I had to sneak out the house to do it, I did.”
“Is that why your mother sent you down South?” Keisha asked, searching his eyes.
“Yeah, but it ain't make no difference. I started gettin' in trouble in school, and then I stopped goin', âcause they wasn't teachin' me nothin' anyway. I started doin' what I wanted to do, 'cause, what difference did it make? I ain't have no father.”
Keisha looked at the pain in his face and knew that it was the source of his anger. And as he continued to tell her where he'd been, she couldn't help wondering where he would go from here.
“My mom brought me back up here two years ago,” he said, breaking into her thoughts. “But by then it was too late. By the time I was sixteen, I had got locked up twice for hustlin'. It wasn't even like I had to do it, 'cause my mom had enough money to get me whatever I wanted.
“But I ain't wanna get it like that. I wanted to get it myself. She finally gave up. She told me if I wanted to be like my pop, I could go down North Philly and see what it was like to be him.”
Jamal turned away from Keisha and looked back up toward the ceiling.
“That's when she put me out,” he said gravely. “And my pop, he put me to work.”
Â
Â
John Anderson had spent the past half-hour wandering through Lord & Taylor, trying to summon the courage to go to Nola's office and ask her about Keisha.
It was odd, he thought, that he could draw from the Bible to
counsel others. But in recent years, he had seemingly lost the ability to apply it to his own life.
In his mind, there was only one word that could explain his spiritual malaise: Nola.
He hadn't talked to her in months, and he wasn't keen on doing so now. And so he walked to the sportswear section, pretending to browse through tank tops and shorts, sneakers and socks.
Of course, John wasn't really sorting through clothing. He was sorting through his memories of Nola.
Their affair had been a whirlwindâone that had snatched him into its vortex and spun his life completely out of control.
She'd shown him things he'd never seen before, and seduced him with more than just her stunning beauty. There were lunches at five-star restaurants on Rittenhouse Square, and afternoons filled with the shouts and whispers of their frantic lovemaking.
They often rented suites in Center City's finest hotels. But they made love in other places as well. Places that excited him in ways he'd never imagined. The Crystal Tea Room, located on the upper floors of the Wanamaker Building, was a vast, exquisitely appointed dining room that had hosted presidents and royalty alike. But on the days when Nola wanted him, it played host to their sin. So did her office, and her living room, and the executive washroom at Lord & Taylor.
He tried not to think about the way she felt in his arms, or the scent of her perfume in his nostrils, or the sensation of her lips against his. He tried to block out the incredible sense of guilt he felt every time he'd taken her. He attempted to forget the heartbreak she'd imposed on him by sleeping with his enemy.
Instead, he willed himself to the escalators for the one-floor climb to her office. He dragged his feet as he stepped off the moving stairs and rounded the corner.
He wondered if the sick feeling he had about Nola's meeting
Keisha was correct. Nola had, after all, betrayed him with Frank Nichols. Perhaps she had betrayed him with his daughter as well.
What if she had told Keisha of their affair? What if she had taken her to the places where they had gone? What if she had shared the things that he had told her about his past?
John didn't really want the answers to those questions. He was about to go back to the escalator and leave the building when one of Nola's coworkersâa manager in the evening wear section of the storeâspotted him and called out his name.
“Reverend Anderson,” she said, walking over to him, with her hand extended. “It's been such a long time since we've seen you. How have you been?”