Dutch (18 page)

She found herself over the next few weeks slipping into a too-comfortable comfort zone, something she hadn’t planned to do,
something she couldn’t help but do. She was drawn to Dutch from the moment he asked her could he play her card game. It was
as if he had cast a spell on her. Nina didn’t want to let go. The more time she spent with him, the more she wanted to see
him, to touch him, to be next to him.

Between his business trips to France, running the streets, taking care of all his businesses, and everything else, Dutch spent
all his spare time getting to know Nina. He had gathered a lot about her over several months, knowing where she worked and
lived and traveled in her daily routine. He remembered everything she said as if his memory was a recorder. He listened to
her when she talked about problems and offered her strong, sound advice, usually street advice, pumping her up to meet whatever
challenge she faced. He believed in her more than she believed in herself, and that was the only weakness in her that he had
found.

He sent her flowers and imported sweet chocolate; he always brought a bottle of wine when he went to her and often asked if
she needed anything. He was always ready to shower her with whatever she wanted or needed. Her response, however, was always
a stern, flat “No” or “I’m fine.”

Dutch loved her independence. And he was glad she had her bank job. However, Nina used it against him and would not give in.
The average broad, dead brother or not, would be rolling with him and he knew it. He still hadn’t had sex with her after four
months. And while he wasn’t pressed, he wanted to say that they were more than friends.

Dutch knew what he wanted. He wanted Nina to be his wife. He wanted to wake up looking at her face every morning and go to
sleep with her by his side. He had never believed he could feel so strongly about a person. His actions expressed only love
for her, and she had to feel it, she had to know.

Dinner at her place came around again and Dutch finally had his chance to make a move on Nina. They were sitting on the couch,
laughing at something she said. She slapped his leg and he gently placed his hand on top of hers. Holding her hand, he looked
in her eyes. He reached for the back of her head and slowly kissed her lips, exploring everything there was to explore as
she gently sucked his tongue. He felt his dick harden as he swirled his tongue in and out of her mouth. Moving his body toward
her, his hands slowly slid from the nape of her neck down her back to her ass. He palmed her butt and thighs and sucked the
skin of her neck. As he pushed her back against the cushions he pulled at her bra and reached between her legs.

“Stop, Dutch. No,” she said, pushing him away and standing up to adjust her clothes and ponytail.

“Wha?” Dutch couldn’t believe it.

“I… I can’t. I’m just… I can’t.”

“Listen, I respect everything about you, ma. If you don’t want to, I understand. I’ll wait my life for you. You hear me?”
Dutch pleaded for her to understand.

He knew other men made false promises of “I love you” to get into a woman’s panties, but it wasn’t his reality to say anything
to get what he wanted.

“Why are you here? What do you want from me?” Nina asked, looking confused and unsure.

“I don’t know. Why are you here?” he asked back, looking at her seriously.

“I live here.”

“Well, I was invited over.”

“Maybe you just refuse to leave me alone because your male ego can’t handle the fact that there’s something in this world
that you can’t have.”

Dutch looked at her and didn’t say anything. But his eyes told her that she was wrong.

“Come on, Dutch, admit it. How many women have you gone after that you didn’t get? And you know they say we always want what
we can’t have.”

“Nina, let me let you in on something. Correction number one, you are the first woman I’ve ever gone after in my life, and
that’s word to my moms, B. And correction number two, I don’t want you. I’m trying to figure out what is so special about
you that’s worth me wanting in the first place. Shit, that’s what I’m startin’ to think.”

“Well, excuse me.”

“And, if I did want you, why would you be what I can’t have? Why?”

He asked the one question that was at the core of their relationship

“Because I’m not a possession,” Nina said.

“Then what are you? Possessive?” asked Dutch, hitting the nail on the head and seeing it in Nina’s response as they both laughed.

“You know, they say possessive people are insecure!” he said, hitting another nail on the head.

“Let’s take a walk. I want to show you something,” she said, truly at a loss for words.

Her apartment wasn’t far from where she had grown up in Pioneer Homes. They walked to the projects’ outer courtyard, where
she pointed to a wall.

It was dark but Dutch could see a mural on it. He made out the name “Trick” in big, bold, capital letters. And he could see
the image of a young black boy’s face with the initials RIP underneath.

“That was my brother. He was killed four years ago right in front of our apartment.”

“Drugs?” he asked as he looked at the wall again and understood her pain.

“I didn’t want you to think what I’m feelin’ is you or got anything to do with you. I had fun with you these past few months.
I actually have the best times when I’m with you. I like you, Dutch… I really do. I don’t want you to think I’m not feeling
your person. You are so smooth and so handsome. It’s just that, he was my blood,” she said as a tear dropped down the side
of her face. It was a little tear for both her brother and for Dutch, whom she had to let go.

“You think I’ll end up like him, that you’ll lose me, too?” asked Dutch.

“No, not that,” she said, looking in his eyes as if it were much worse. “No, people die in traffic accidents on their way
to church. So, it’s not the loss, it’s the respect. The respect I have for my brother’s life, for his memory. I can’t see
myself living off what he died for. I can’t be a part of it.”

“So, if your brother died in a car accident, would that mean you would never ride in a car again?” he asked as she looked
away.

There wasn’t much for Dutch to say. His heart was shattered by her words and crushed by her silence. He respected her values,
her conviction, and her loyalty to her brother. She had made it clear that she had her world and he had his, and there would
be no mixing of the two. Like Dutch, she too had rules, and while she strained, she never bent.

“Nina, you ever heard the saying, when you love something, set it free? If it is meant to be, it’ll come back to you?”

She shook her head yes as she looked into his eyes.

“Then I’ll say no more and I’ll leave you alone.”

They were exactly the same in opposite ways, which made their situation bittersweet. Nina didn’t say anything. She just looked
at Dutch with sad tears in her eyes for her brother. But she wouldn’t bend, not even for Dutch.

He had slipped, but it was the sweetest mistake he had ever made. Looking at the mural one more time, he shook his head.
This all your fault, you know that, right?
he asked, hoping one day, maybe, that Nina would change her mind.

D
etective David O’Neal,” said the one-eyed white man sitting on the stand, identifying himself before the court.

The man on the stand looked normal. Except for the black patch over his right eye. Jacobs had made sure, however, that O’Neal
made a grand entrance in his wheelchair. He had no legs.

Michael Glass pinched the bridge of his nose with his index finger and thumb as O’Neal rolled by. The jury uncomfortably watched
as he climbed onto the witness stand with exacerbated labor.

Dutch found it ironic that O’Neal had lost his legs. The old man had never stood on his own anyway. He was like a leech, and
Dutch regretted that the blast hadn’t killed him. Now here he was to testify.

“And how long have you been on the police force, Detective?”

“Twenty-three years, but I’m retired now,” O’Neal answered.

“Can I ask why? Was it age?”

“I’ll tell you why! ’Cause of that sonofabitch over there!” O’Neal roared as the judge banged his gavel.

“Counselor, please control your witness.”

“I’m sorry, Your Honor, I really am. But how would you feel if one day you wake up, kiss your wife, and go to work and before
you’ve finished your morning coffee, your whole body is being ripped apart and you wake up like this?” O’Neal asked, gesturing
to his nonexistent legs.

“I understand, sir, and I empathize with you, but this is a court of law,” advised the judge, feeling pity and sadness for
the fallen police detective.

“I understand, Your Honor.”

Jacobs allowed a moment to pass so O’Neal could adjust himself, then began again.

“Now, Mr. O’Neal, you claim Bernard James is the cause of your early retirement?”

“Yes, he ordered that the Twenty-ninth Precinct be blown up. He had a psycho walk into the station, strapped with C-4. He
blew up himself and my fellow officers,” claimed O’Neal as he fought back his tears, remembering the horrific afternoon.

“Now, Mr. O’Neal, how can you be sure that it was Bernard James who was responsible for the explosion on November 11, 1998?”
asked Jacobs.

“The suicide bomber was named William Brent. He also went by the name Bill Blass. He was a small-time hustler. I had known
him for quite some time. Apparently mailed his wife a letter prior to entering the station that morning,” O’Neal explained.

Jacobs walked over to his table and returned with an envelope and a sheet of paper.

“Is this the letter to Mrs. Brent postmarked November 11, 1998?”

“Yes, that is the letter,” said O’Neal as he inspected it.

“And would you read the letter to the court, please.”

“Objection, Your Honor!” Glass bellowed as he stood from his desk. “Defense has never received a copy of this letter during
discovery, Your Honor.”

“Your Honor, the letter was obtained by my office from Lieutenant Service of the Twenty-ninth Precinct two weeks ago. It was
too late to admit the letter into discovery,” Jacobs explained.

“Overruled. You may proceed, but this letter better be taking us somewhere relevant, Mr. Jacobs,” Judge Whitaker said, allowing
the testimony to proceed.

O’Neal looked at the letter and then looked at the jury. He fixed himself to be more comfortable then began to read.

“Dear Monique, by the time you get this, I’ll be dead, but I wanted you to know that it’s because of Dutch. He said if I don’t
do what he say, he gonna kill you, the kids, and my whole family. So, this is my sacrifice. I gladly make it, too. All I ask
is that if you get this letter, you deliver it to the proper authorities, the DA or somebody like that. Don’t give it to no
regular cop, though. I love you, pray for my soul. Love Always, Billy,” O’Neal concluded, then looked up. Jacobs took the
letter from him, thanking him for reading it to the court.

“Your Honor, the state moves to introduce this letter as State Exhibit J-43,” said Jacobs, with the case all figured out.

Michael Glass stood up and exclaimed, “Objection, Your Honor, the letter did not once mention my client’s name, and secondly,
that letter doesn’t give a clear portrait of him being instructed by anybody to blow up a police precinct.”

“It said Dutch! Everybody knows who Dutch is!” O’Neal blurted out.

The judge banged his gavel and looked over at the witness.

“Mr. O’Neal, I’m not going to warn you again. Strike the last comment.”

“Your Honor, I believe it has been established beyond a reasonable doubt that Bernard James is in fact known by the moniker
Dutch.”

“No, we may have established Bernard James as a Dutch, but we cannot say beyond a reasonable doubt that Bernard James is the
only Dutch in the city. How many people could there be with the same nickname?” asked Glass, looking confused over the subject
matter.

“May I see the letter, please?” asked the judge.

He took the letter and decided he wanted to eat the slice of banana cream pie his wife had sent with his bagged lunch.

“Court will take a ten-minute recess while I review this letter in my chambers.”

He banged his gavel as Dutch thought of Bill. His name used to ring bells everywhere. He had longevity, which gave him a respected
notch on the urban ladder. He had seen the rise and fall of many a young hustler, so Dutch respected Bill Blass for his expertise
and street-savvy wisdom, even though he was not a major player.

Angel had walked into Dutch’s used-car lot on Elizabeth Avenue to find Dutch and Craze playfully arguing while they sat in
an ’84 Volvo.

“Man, you ain’t never stole no Accord wit’ out poppin’ the neck, lyin’ muhfucker.” Dutch laughed.

“Nigga, fuck you,” Craze retorted.

“Y’all still two little kids,” Angel said, leaning into the car.

“Yo, tell this dumb-ass nigga, you gotta pop the neck on Accords,” Dutch instructed Angel.

“Fuck that, listen, I got somebody in the car wantin’ to talk to you.”