Took

The next day I got up kissed Sepia, Then showered, shaved and got dressed...I got in my car and drove around town..No easy feat in a city like Philadelphia. The two guys, Kevin Parker and Alvin Hunter looked like playas...and so what better way to find guys like that than to talk to playas.

I ran into Fathead Newton's enforcer, Roscoe in a diner in West Philly....He and Ralph Mole were having breakfast when I dropped in and sat down at their table. If I had been anyone else...I might have been killed and dropped in the river...These were after all , gangsters...The diference was...I was kind of sort of a friend of theirs...At least someone they respected.

"Heyyy Kev..How you doin baby?" laughed Roscoe..

"Well, I'm doin..." I said.

"You must be workin on a case...You don't hang out in these parts much." said Ralph Mole.

"Matter of fact..I am workin on a case...Some big time lawyer in New York hired me to find these two guys...You know em?" I said and plopped down the two photos.

Roscoe and Ralph looked at them and they pointed to one photo.

"This one we know....The other one...I might have seen with him...but this one we definitely know...That's Freddie Boy...Freddie Parker...a big time heist guy..." said Roscoe.

"Really? I thought these guys was playas." I said.

"Freddie used to rob banks, payrolls, jewlrey stores...Man, this guy was good..one of the best." said Ralph Mole.

"You said "Was" , What...He's dead?" I asked.

"Nah..He's doin a bid up at Rockview State Prison...Nine years....He's a guest of the state." said Roscoe.

"Okay..that's one...how about him? You definitely don't know him?" I asked.

"Nope...don't know him." said Roscoe and Ralph.

"Well that's okay...you helped me find one..thanks guys." I said.

"Anytime Kevin, Anytime." they said as I left.

I went to an Attorney I did know, Robert Foxworth!! He had some pull with the people in the Department of Records at City Hall...They helped me find one Alvin Hunter.....I found his birth certificate, His drivers licensce with his last known address in East Oak Lane of all places and his record!! He ,Fred Parker and Wally Basemore had robbed a bank in Northeast Philly ten years ago...Three Million Dollars....Never recovered! Wally Basemore was killed in a shootout with police... He and Fred Parker were arrested and convicted and sentenced to 10 - 25 years...Only, Alvin only did three years and was paroled... Fred was in his ninth year in prison..He was eligible for parole next year.

"Looks like you're lookin for a real hard case here Kev." said Robert Foxworth.

"Well, somebody's lookin for him and his partner...His partner isn't going anywhere...but I wonder if this guy is still around?" I said.

"Well, I pulled some more records on him...Apparently when he got out of prison, he went to community college and got an associates degree...Then he went to Cheyney State and got his bachelors...After that, he got his Masters, just last year at Temple...He's got a good job downtown at some company...He's a middle manager... Looks like this guy went straight." said Robert.

"Yeah, it does.." I said.

Still, I was curious.....I drove to the address... It was a modest little house on a tree lined street.

Not exactly a row house, there was a little seperation....There was two cars in the driveway..A white BMW and a White Toyota Carrolla... His fiance was a nice looking brown skinned woman in her early or mid thirties...They came out in the morning , kissed each other and drove off to their perspective jobs...I followed them for a few days...She taught school and he worked at a Bank..In many ways they reminded me of myself and Sepia....A young Black couple trying to make it. If this guy had been part of a bank robbery crew, that was way behind him.....But then, there was the question of the money....Where was it? He didn't live like he had three million dollars..He and his girl lived very modestly...

I did a further check of the records and found that he had gotten a loan for his house ,just like anybody else and had put twenty percent down...His car was pre-owned and bought off of a lot and her car was her own...Where was the money from the score?? I was certain that that was why he was being looked for....But that was not my concern...I had found him and that was all I was supposed to do. I appeared at the Park Hyatt as was agreed and I gave Arthur Conley the information he wanted.

"So Freddie Boy is in the slams huh? Hahahahahahahaha...He aint goin nowhere...But ole Alvin done gone the straight and narrow eh? Well how about that? I'll be damn...Good work Kevin...I was told you were the best...." he said and he gave me an envelope filled with hundreds...I counted it....120G's...

"Thanks Mr. Conley...I guess that concludes our business." I said.

"Indeed it does." He said. He and Nigel looked at me....I didn't suppose we were going to shake hands..So I just walked out of their suite and took the elevator to the street...Easiest money I ever made.

A few days later, Sepia and I drove to Clerow's house... He was fixing chilli and some nachos....His little daughter was running around and his wife, Cora-beth was sitting as his sister in law Anita was tending to her. Chance Howard, her boyfriend, and Robert Foxworth's law partner was over also...

"How's it going Clerow?" I said.

"I'm doin good Kev...just collecting my rents is all...kinda bored..You got any juicy cases goin?" he asked.

"I just finished one." I said.

"You did?" he asked... I put $3000.00 in his hands...

"That's for the baby." I said.

"Aww Kev, come on man, you aint gotta do that." he said.

"Just take it." I said. "This case was easy...All I had to do was find somebody...No guns, no violence, no surveilence....It was over in a matter of days." I said.

Just then Anita called out to us....

"Hey you guys....check out the news..." she said.

"A young man with a criminal past , who had turned the corner and straightened out his life was found brutally murdered today.... 36 years old Alvin Hunter was found badly beaten to death today... Police have no suspects. Story at 11:00" it said.

"Oh my God...That's the guy...That's the guy I was paid to find." I said.

I got on my phone and called the number that Arthur Conley had given me....It was no longer in service. I got in my car and raced to the Park Hyatt ......No one by that name had ever registered there I was told... I asked them to take me to the suite I had met them in....It was empty!!!!!!!!! I showed them the business card I had and I gave them the description of the other man who had been with him...Nigel......The hotel people told me the same thing...While they remembered seeing them, they were not registered guests. I asked them who the room was registered to and I was told a Mister Godsey...Ike Godsey!!

No one remembered ever seeing "Mister Godsey" and the bill was paid in cash.... I had been took ,hoodwinked, bamboozled and now a man was dead....I didn't like this....Mr. Arthur Conley ,Ike Godsey or whoever he was had a lot of explaining to do.

(To Be Continued...)