“Lucas!” Her eyes were frantic as Luke sat down heavily on the floor next to her, and rested his head on his knees. He was drunk and in shock. But slowly he turned his face toward her with a gentle expression.

“Mama, it’s no big deal. Someone tried to shoot me today. They missed by an inch.” He closed his eyes on the last words, as though afraid of her eyes.

“Someone what?” She held his face with both her hands and slowly he looked up at her again. It had not yet registered in her face.

“Someone tried to kill me, I guess, Kezia. Or scare the piss out of me. Either way, but everything’s cool. I’m just a little punchy, that’s all.”

She thought instantly of Morrissey now, and knew Lucas had too. “My God … Lucas … who did it?” She was sitting next to him, trembling, and her stomach felt as though it were riding a wave.

“I don’t know who. Hard to tell.” He shrugged and suddenly looked very tired.

“Come on, man, let’s get you to bed.” Alejandro helped him slowly to his feet, and he wasn’t sure if he should be supporting Lucas or Kezia. She looked almost worse. “Can you make it, Luke?”

“Are you kidding? I’m not hurt, man. I’m gassed.” He chuckled proudly for a moment, as he walked into the bedroom. Alejandro shook his head with a worried frown on his face, as Kezia settled Luke against the pillows. “For chrissake, Kezia, I’m not dying. Don’t overdo it. And get me another drink, will you?”

“Should you?”

He laughed at the question and crossed both eyes with a grin. “Oh Mama, should I!” The smile she returned to him was her first in ten minutes, but she could feel her knees shaking as she sank onto the edge of the bed.

“My God, Lucas, how did it happen?”

“I don’t know. I went up to talk to some guys in Spanish Harlem today, and we were walking down the street after the meeting and whap, someone almost winged me. The motherfucker must have been aiming for my heart, but he took lousy aim.”

Kezia sat staring at him in shocked disbelief. It could have been like Morrissey. He could have been dead. There were chills on her spine as she thought of it.

“Anyone else knew about the meeting?” Alejandro looked frightened as he continued to stand there and look at his friend.

“A few people.”

“How few?”

“Not few enough.”

“Oh God, Lucas … who did it?” Suddenly Kezia’s head was bowed and she was sobbing as she sat there. Luke leaned forward and circled her with his right arm, pulling her toward him.

“Come on, baby, take it easy. It could have been anyone. Just some crazy kid out for a laugh. Or maybe someone who knew me. Could have been some heavyweight right-winger up there who doesn’t dig prison reform. Could have been some pissed off left-winger who doesn’t think I’m enough a ‘brother.’ What the hell difference does it make? They tried. They didn’t get me. I’m okay. You’re okay. I love you. So … no big deal, please. Okay?” He sank back on the pillows then with a dazzling smile. But neither Kezia nor Alejandro was swayed by the bravado.

“I’ll get you another drink.” Alejandro left the room, and had a drink of his own in the kitchen. Shit. It was coming to that now. And with Kezia in the picture. Terrific. He heaved a long sigh as he walked back to the bedroom with a tall glass of straight bourbon for Luke. Kezia was crying again when he walked in, but this time softly. The two men exchanged a long look over her head and Luke nodded slowly. It had been quite a day. And they were both wondering if it was going to be like this all the way till the hearing. It could have been a cop for all they knew, and they both realized it, even though they didn’t tell that to Kezia. But the reality was that Lucas was popular only with those he worked with on the outside or the men in prison all over the country who benefited directly from all he did. Not many others really understood. And as loved as he was, he was equally hated.

“I’m going to hire you a bodyguard.” She looked up with a sniff, as Luke took a long sip of his bourbon and Alejandro sat down in a chair near the bed. She was still sitting near Luke.

“No, you’re not, pretty lady. No bodyguard, no bullshit. This happened once. It won’t happen again.”

“How do you know?”

“Baby … don’t push me. Let me run this show. All I want from you is your beautiful smile and your love.” He patted her hand and took a long sip of bourbon Alejandro had handed him. “All I want from you is what you already give me.”

“Yeah, and not my advice.” She said it sadly, her shoulders sagging. “Why won’t you let me hire a bodyguard?”

“Because I already have one.”

“You hired someone?” Why didn’t he tell her anything anymore?

“Not exactly. But I’ve been followed by the cops for a while now.”

“By the cops? Why by them?”

“Why the hell do you think, Mama? Because they think I’m a threat.” It put an aspect on things that she didn’t like. And it suddenly brought home to her that in a sense Luke was considered an outlaw, and that in living with him, she was on that same ill-favored side of the law. She somehow hadn’t totally absorbed her position in all this before. “And don’t kid yourself, sweetheart, it could just as well have been a cop who tried to get a piece of me today.”

“Are you serious?” Her face grew even paler. “Would they do that to you, Luke?”

“Damn right. If they thought they could get away with it, they’d do it in a hot second. And enjoy it.”

“Oh God.” The police taking potshots at Luke? They were supposed to give decent citizens protection. But that was the whole point. And Kezia finally knew it. To the cops, Lucas wasn’t “decent.” He was only that in her eyes, and Al’s, and his friends’, not in the eyes of the rednecks, and the Adult Authority, and the law.

Luke exchanged a rapid look with Alejandro, who slowly and unhappily shook his head. Bad things were coming. He could feel it. “But I’ll tell you one thing, Kezia. I don’t want any bullshit from you. You do exactly what I tell you from now on. No visits to Al up in Harlem, no traipsing through the park alone, no disappearing into the subway. Nothing except what I tell you you can do. Is that clear?” He was wearing the face of a general again as he said it. “Is it?”

“Yes, but …”

“No!” He was roaring now. “Just listen to me for once in your life, damn you! Because if you don’t, you goddamn stupid naive asshole … because if you don’t,” his voice began to tremble and Kezia was shocked to see tears in his eyes, “maybe they’ll get you instead of me. And if they did …” His voice began to crack and grow soft as he lowered his eyes, “if they did … I couldn’t … take it….” She went to him with tears on her own cheeks as she put her arms around him and let him rest his head on her chest. They stayed like that for what seemed like hours, with Luke crying in her arms, and what she did not know was that he was torturing himself for what he was doing to her. Oh God … how could he have done this to a woman he loved … Kezia…. At last he fell asleep in her arms as they sat there, and when Kezia slid him down onto the pillow and turned off the light, she suddenly remembered Alejandro sitting in the chair. She turned to find him, but he was long since gone, with heartaches of his own, and no Kezia whose arms he could cry in. And like Luke, the tears that he cried were for her.


Chapter 23


Lucas put down the phone with a look of dismay, and Kezia instantly knew.

“Who was it?” But she didn’t need to ask. She knew, whatever the name, whatever the city, it didn’t really matter. He always wore that face, and sounded the way he had, for calls about prisons. But now, when Christmas was so close….

“It was one of my crazy friends out in Chino.”

“And?” She wasn’t letting him off the hook.

“And …” He ran a hand through his hair and bit the end of a cigar that had been lying on the desk. It was almost midnight and he had been strolling the house in his shorts, barefoot and bare-chested. And … they want me to come out. Think you can handle that, Mama?”

“You mean come out with you?” It was the first time he had asked her.

“No, I mean stay here. I’ll be back by Christmas. But … it looks like they need me. Or at least they think they do.” There was something gruffer in his voice, pure macho, all man. And a vibrant chord of excitement that ran through his words, no matter how careful he was to conceal it. He loved what he did. The meetings, the men, the riots, the cause. He loved getting back at the “pigs,” and helping his brothers. It was what he lived for. And there was no room for Kezia in that world. It was a world of men who had lived without women for long enough to know that they could do without them, if they had to. They had a hard time learning to include them again. And this was one place where Luke wouldn’t budge. He wouldn’t have considered taking her with him, not for a moment. Not when there was danger involved. Not after last time in San Francisco. Not after he’d almost been shot. She knew she had been crazy to hope that he was inviting her this time. He wasn’t.

“Yes, I can handle it, Luke. But I’ll miss you.” She tried to keep the sadness from her voice, and the terror, but he knew. She looked at him and shrugged. “So it goes. You’re sure you’ll be home by Christmas?”

“As sure as I can be. They’re afraid riots might start. But I think we’ll probably get everything straightened out before that happens.” Maybe. If. She wondered if he really wanted to, or if he’d rather play with the fireworks. But she knew that wasn’t fair. “I’m sorry, Mama.”

“Me too, but I’ll be okay.” She walked over to him and slid her arms around his neck. She kissed him gently on the back of the head and smelled the fresh richness of the cigar. He was going to “war.” Again. “Lucas …” She hesitated about saying it, but she had to.