Free Southside (9781608090563) by Michael Krikorian Page B

y’all under a whole lotta pressure. I need serious credit here. Look, I know where we stand. I know I done a lot of wrong in my life, but I been trying to go legit. But I still have some boys to consider like Tiny Trouble. He’s my sister’s boy. So I’m just going to ask you two, you gonna forget how you got this tape?”
    â€œNo,” said Sal. “You been up front with me and I appreciate it.”
    Hart shot the senior detective a look.
    Funeral continued, “On the other hand, I can’t have it out there that I gave up this tape. Can’t have the streets know where you got it from. Just say police have discovered in a search or something, but you cannot say I gave it to you. Even if it is just to nab a journalist. Any cooperation at all with the police and well, ya know, the boys, young-and-old school, don’t approve of that. A man could get shot offa this. Even me. I’m only doing this, and I want you to understand this, I’m only doing this to score some points for my sister’s kid andmaybe get a little grace in the future. Plus, I really don’t give a fuck about Lyons. He been making a career writing about our misery and he try to come off like a brother, like he down with us. Now he trying to be a hero, when he ain’t nothing but a fuckup. If this tape was some Sixty confessing he kilt Jesus Christ, I would not give it up. You feel me? But the reporter, shit.”
    â€œJesus. Play the fuckin’ tape, Thomas.” said Hart. Funeral shot him a look but pushed the remote’s play button. Silence in the house. The tape rolled.

CHAPTER 14
    The voice of King Funeral: So why you want to do a story on the Hoovers? We been cool lately. It’s them Sixties niggas and them Grape Streets, they be the ones starting shit. The fuckin’ Mexicans, too. F-Thirteen. Florencia. Do something about them, fool.
    Mike Lyons: I had a big story on the Rollin Sixties already. About Wild Cat. You know him?
    Funeral: I know him. We cool. We was at the SHU in Corcoran together.
    Mike: I didn’t know that.
    Funeral: You don’t know a lot of shit. You just think you do. You just think because you know ten percent and all them other reporters at the
Times
only know one percent that you the gang man, the expert, but you don’t know what the fuck is going on.
    Mike: Educate me, then.
    Funeral: I’m not your teacher.
    Mike: Look, first of all, you don’t know anything about me and my past.
    Funeral: I don’t need to.
    Mike: I lived in South Bronx slums and East St. Louis. Where I lived makes the worst blocks on Hoover Street look like Disneyland.
    Funeral: Fuck you. New York is old, motherfucker. Them’s the old days. John Corleone times. This is today. We got sets all over the country. Even the Bloods are setting up, taking over in New York. Even in the Bronx. L.A. gangs is the takeover crews. You feel me? Invaders. Marauders. Just because we got some flowers on someblocks don’t mean shit. We also have the firepower. So don’t try and impress me with your badness. Please.
    Mike: All I’m saying is, you know what, forget it. You probably ain’t never been out of California and you know everything.
    Funeral: Oh, so you gonna come down to my crib and disrespect me.
    Mike: I ain’t disrespecting you. I wouldn’t do that. I’m just tryin’ to get the true story. We going to do a story on you guys, you’re a famous set, you know that.
    Funeral: We ain’t no damn set. We a straight-out cartel.
    Mike: Okay, but the other reporters and the editors they’re fine with just talking to the cops and shit and writing and publishing the story about the Hoovers that way. I’m the only one reaching out and trying to get the story from you guys.
    Funeral: Reason no reporters come down here is they liable to get their ass shot.
    Mike: Worse things can happen.
    Funeral: Like what? What, you don’t care? Is that