Free All I Did Was Shoot My Man by Walter Mosley

won’t be any trouble.”

    “Thanks again.”

    Then came the necessary lull when I was supposed to ask why he called.

    “My phone died,” I explained instead. “That’s why I didn’t get your call. You know, I usually plug it in. But Dimitri moved out and Katrina tied one on. Between those two fiascoes I guess I was a little thrown off.”

    “You remember the Mycrofts, don’t you?” he asked, no longer able to hold back his business.

    I’d never met the billionaire family, but I knew that the Mycrofts’ live-in maid was Velvet Reyes’s mother.

    “ What’s up with them?” I asked.

    “Shelby called me last night. He was very disturbed.”

    “Oh?”

    “It’s their son—Kent. They have two children, Kent is the elder. For a while there he was estranged from the family but he’s been back for a couple of years—enrolled at NYU.”

    “College man, huh? He need a math tutor or something?”

    “Your kind of math, LT.”

    “Spell it out, Breland.”

    “It has come to the attention of Mr. and Mrs. Mycroft that their son has fallen in with a very bad crowd down in the Village. He’s an extremely emotional and impressionable young man and they fear for his safety.”

    It was lawyerspeak. I knew from his elocution that Breland felt pressured.

    “ What kinda crowd?” I asked.

    “ We didn’t get into specifics.”

    “No? Are we talkin’ about the Little Rascals or the Purple Gang?”

    “I’m sure it’s nothing you can’t handle.”

    “And what is it exactly that the Mycrofts want me to do?”

    “
I
want you to go see them and give them any help you can.”

    The prospect of visiting a rich man didn’t appeal to me. I hadn’t adopted my father’s political zeal, but I didn’t like the company of the upper classes.

    Prejudices aside, however, I am a private detective in a downward-spiraling economy. When the country’s got a healthy GNP the husband or wife wants to know if a spouse is cheating—they’re willing to pay a man like me to find out. But when jobs are scarce that same spouse knows they need the extra paycheck.

    “I don’t know, Breland.”

    “You don’t know what?”

    “These friends of yours seem to have more than their share of trouble.”

    “They have more than their share of cash too.”

    “The last time I dealt with them I had to break a promise I’d made to myself.”

    “It’s not like that this time.”

    “You said you don’t know what the problem is.”

    “He’s just a stupid college kid, LT. Any trouble he’s in is nothing like the other thing.”

    “If it’s so simple why do you need me?”

    “Shelby likes to keep things quiet and confidential. His investment fund caters to blue bloods and old money. The kind of folks that don’t appreciate scandal.”

    “How much money?”

    “Half the Reyes thing.”

    I wasn’t worried. I knew that Breland was telling me the truth, that as far as he knew this was a routine job. I wanted him to squirm a bit, however. Having covered up for Velvet still stung.

    “It would be a deep favor for me and a good payday for you, Leonid.”

    “Just a college kid took a bad turn on the way to the john, huh?”

    “That’s all.”

    “I’ll tell you what, Breland. I’ll go talk to these people and see if it’s as simple as you say.”

    “Thank you.”

    “But you have to do something for me in return.”

    “ What’s that?”

    “You still got that old girlfriend, the assistant to the director of the department of records?”

    “Jeanette? I don’t see her anymore, not since Madeline and I renewed our vows.”

    “But you still know her number, right?”

    “ What do you need?”

    “I want to know the name and address of the family that adopted Zella Grisham’s baby.”

    “I don’t know . . .”

    “You want me to go talk to these friends’a yours or what?”

    “It’ll cost something.”

    “I’ll pay it.”

    “I was asking for a favor, Leonid.”

    “I did your