Chương 84

The van drove on without stopping. Louis tried to count the turns but gave up after the fifth. After that, he no longer knew which direction they were heading. At last, the van slowed and stopped. Louis heard a heavy metal door scrape open ahead of them. The van rolled forward, and cooler air came through the seams. Music came through the walls nearby, followed by the sound of a crowd. Gladice tilted her head.

"This is what I call a night out." She winked.

"Let's get drunk and make some bad decisions." Angelique snorted.

"We already did that. And we are still paying for it." Jacob opened the rear doors.

"Welcome to the party." He stepped back to let them out.

"Y'all follow me. And try not to stare at folks. They're not used to white folks in this part of town, especially not pretty ones." He looked at Angelique.

"And especially not you, princess." Angelique gave him a look.

"I can handle myself."

"I don't doubt it." Jacob grinned. They were in a concrete loading bay built into what looked like an old civil-defense shelter. Moisture darkened the corners of the walls. A faded yellow line marked the unloading strip beneath the van. Jacob took them through the blast doors. Two guards waited at the end of the corridor. They looked at Jacob first, then studied Louis and the others. One guard said, "These the ones?"

"Yeah."

"Hand over weapons." The other guard stepped forward, extending a plastic bin.

"All of them." Angelique put her knife in first. Louis laid the M1911 on top. One of the guards carried the bin away. Jacob waved them on. They followed him through a metal door. The bunker opened into a central hall with broad levels descending around it. Strings of colored lights hung from the ceiling. The bar ran along one wall beneath a mural. Bottles lined the shelves behind it. Everyone Louis could see was black. Jacob led them along the edge of the dance floor, past women at the rail and men at the bar.

Near the wall, an older couple shared a plate of fried fish. The DJ kept his head down over the board while bass shook the room. A server passed them with a tray of wings and highballs.

"We are being stared at," Donya whispered to Louis.

"Then smile and wave," he whispered back. She did not smile. A raised VIP section curved around the rear of the room beneath the old command balcony. Low leather booths curved around heavy tables. From there, anyone seated could see the dance floor and the entrances. Marcus Ellington sat in the central booth beneath a hanging lamp, smoking a Cuban cigar. A silver ashtray and a half-full glass of whiskey sat on the table before him. Marcus lifted the glass.

"Mr. Collins. You brought a whole lot of company for one drink." Jacob stopped at the edge of the booth.

"Got 'em here, boss."

"Good work." Marcus waved him off with one hand.

"Go take five, Jacob." Jacob nodded once and left. Louis slid into the booth first and sat with his back to the room, the cane propped against the table within reach. Gladice sat beside him, Angelique next to her, and Donya and Willa took the outer end of the booth. They set their backpacks and bags on the floor at their feet. They kept glancing around, though the open stares had eased once Marcus greeted them.

"Thank you for the invitation, Mr. Ellington," Louis said.

"Marcus." Marcus took a second cigar from his waistcoat pocket and held it out to Louis.

"Cigar?"

"No, thank you. I don't smoke." Marcus nodded and put it away. He took a sip from his glass and looked over the group.

"Good to see you again, Sergeant Simington." He nodded to Gladice.

"I take it this is Miss Bourbon." His eyes moved to Angelique, then to the others.

"And the rest of y'all are..."

"Friends," Louis said.

"From Boston and Chicago."

"Friends in trouble," Marcus said.

"Same as you." He set the glass down.

"The kind of friends a state tries to kill for looking wrong."

"Something like that." Louis kept his eyes on Marcus.

"Let's talk business. Can you get us out?" Marcus stubbed out his cigar in the silver ashtray.

"Right to it. I admire the focus, Mr. Collins."

"Louis."

"Louis." Marcus leaned forward slightly.

"You need a whole lot of things. Right now, business is not the most urgent one." Angelique asked, "What is?"

"The roads are dead for the night. Ain't nobody getting anybody out before dawn unless the Lord Himself has started chartering aircraft." Marcus signaled to one of the servers.

"Food and drink. Whatever they want. Bring the menu." The server nodded and went toward the bar.

"Since y'all are here," Marcus continued, "you should eat. And you should let me show you why Atlanta still stands in spite of what sits above it."

"I thought we were here to negotiate terms," Gladice said.

"The night is young, Sergeant." Marcus spread his hands on the table.

"Sometimes we all need to remember what we are trying to keep alive."

"You're very philosophical for a man who runs Old Downtown," Willa said. Marcus turned his attention to her.

"And you're real clever for a girl whose face is on every news screen in this country."

"I try."

"Good. Clever people should eat well." The server returned with menus and a tray of glasses. Marcus said, "Take your time. It's all on me." Louis opened the menu. The others did the same. He thought about how odd it was to sit at a table and pretend to choose between chicken and fish when the world outside was trying to decide whether to kill them before breakfast. Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. Marcus watched while they read the menus.

"The bourbon ribs are the best in the city. Y'all don't skip the cornbread."

"Good to know." Louis closed the menu.

"We will trust your judgment." The server came back to take the order. Marcus ordered ribs, wings, catfish, fried green tomatoes, cheese grits, pickled okra, sweet tea, club soda, ginger ale, and two beers. He glanced at Donya.

"No liquor for you, I think." She shook her head.

"No. Alcohol is a sin." Marcus laughed once under his breath.

"Then you're in the right place. We all sin here. Just differently." After the server left, Marcus turned back to Louis.

"So tell me." Marcus took a sip of whiskey.

"What's it like, being a Collins?" Louis had not expected the question. He said, "That depends on which day you ask me." Marcus raised an eyebrow.

"Today?"

"Today it feels like being a target."

"And before that?"

"Before that it depended on the hour. The room. The expectations." He shrugged once.

"Sometimes it's a good life. Sometimes it is the life I was born into and had no choice but to use."

"Interesting." Marcus set his glass down.

"I ask because your father, he's a man who builds. He took a place full of drift and made it into something the world pays attention to. Even folks who hate him respect the shape of what he has done."

"He is very good at that," Louis said.

"So are you." Marcus leaned back.

"You survived a place that kills most people who enter it without his name. You brought out your friends and two girls the church wanted dead. That ain't the kind of thing an ordinary rich white boy does." Louis did not smile.

"I had help." Marcus looked around the booth at the four women.

"So you did." Two servers brought the food on separate trays. They set down the plates and moved away. The smell of smoked meat and butter reached Louis as the plates filled the table.

"Go ahead," Marcus said.

"Eat." Louis took a rib first. The meat was tender, and the sauce was sweet at first, with heat following as he chewed. He washed it down with soda and picked up a hushpuppy from the basket in the center of the table. The hushpuppy was crisp on the outside and not too sweet. The others ate without talking. Gladice had already finished a rib and was working on a wing. Angelique tried to cut a rib with her knife and fork. After a few attempts, she set them down, picked up the rib, and bit into it.

Donya kept her eyes on the catfish as she ate. Willa stirred the grits once, tasted them, and took another spoonful. Marcus watched them in silence. When Louis finished the first rib and wiped his fingers, Marcus spoke again.

"Tell me, Louis. Why you think you're still alive?"

"Because I got lucky," Louis said.

"Ain't just luck." Marcus shook his head.

"You made decisions. You found the right people to trust. You moved when others might have waited. You have instincts."

"Maybe."

"I think so." Marcus took a piece of catfish from his plate and ate it in two bites.

"Tell me about the Dominion."

"What about it?"

"Is it as good as they say?" Louis looked at him for a moment before answering.

"It depends on who is speaking and what they want." Marcus smiled.

"That's a politician's answer."

"Or a realist's."

"All right then, realist." Marcus set down his fork.

"What makes it different from here?" Louis took another rib while he considered the question. The meat came free from the bone easily. He chewed slowly before answering.

"We don't have religious fanatics running the government. We endorse the values of power, pleasure and progress." Marcus nodded once.

"And you believe that?"

"I do." Louis looked him in the eye.

"Because I have seen the alternative."

"And you would rule the Dominion someday."

"If I become competent enough." Marcus laughed.

"You're honest, Louis Collins. I like that." He lifted his glass and drank.

"What would you do if you were in charge?"

"I would make everyone in the world dream of living in the Dominion."

"That's a big dream."

"I come from a big family." Marcus held his gaze for a moment. Then he set down the glass, leaned forward, and lowered his voice.

"How do black people live in the Dominion?" Louis answered at once.

"Like everyone else in the country. They live according to their own choices, preferences, and merit."

"And what about the ones who don't have much of any of that?"

"There are always people who are left behind." Louis met his eyes.

"We ensure the baseline is high enough."

"Is that so?" Marcus lifted his glass again.

"And who decides that?"

"My father.""'Course." Marcus drank.

"And what happens to folks who don't fit into his dream?"

"Then they need to adapt. The world does not wait." Marcus set the glass down hard.

"I been hearing that same story all my life, Louis. White men, different flags." He gestured across the club.

"You see this place? This city? It was built by men who said they had a vision. Now we live in what's left of it. We survive in the cracks, 'cause their dream didn't include us."

"Marcus." Louis kept his voice low.

"The Dominion is not the same as the Holy States."

"No?" Marcus said.

"And what if your father decides some folks don't fit his dream?"

"Such as?" Louis asked.

"Folks who can't keep up," Marcus said.

"People without the right education, the right money, or the right kind of ambition. People who don't want to live the way your father thinks the future should look. Or anyone who questions whether the Collins family should rule forever." Gladice stopped chewing. Angelique set down her rib. Louis kept his eyes on Marcus.

"Then they will be left behind," Louis said.

"But they will have a better life than they do here. And their children will have a better life than their parents ever did."

"But it's still a place where one family decides the shape of the world for everybody else." Marcus shook his head.

"I ain't saying your father is evil. I'm saying power like that always has a cost. And folks at the top are rarely the ones who pay it."

"I have never claimed otherwise." Louis pushed the plate away. Willa spoke for the first time since they had sat down.

"You talk about dreams, Marcus," she said.

"You sit here in a city built on white supremacy, a nuclear crater, and a black market run by your men, and you judge the Dominion for being ruled by one family. That seems like you're holding others to a standard you don't apply to yourself." Marcus turned his head slowly toward her.

"I didn't ask for your opinion," he said.

"But since you gave it, let me ask you something. You from Boston, right? What you know about this world?"

"I know I would rather be in a place that gives me an internet connection, a laptop, and the freedom to argue with a dictator's son than a place that would have burned me at the stake this morning." Gladice took a long drink of beer.

"Can't argue with that." Marcus raised a hand.

"Ain't what I'm saying. The Holy States is a pit of fanatics and fools. But that don't mean what you got up there is a paradise. It just means the devil you know is less likely to stone you for showing a little ankle." He looked back at Louis.

"Your father built the Dominion by understanding that control ain't just about guns and laws. It's about knowing what folks want and giving them enough of it to keep them docile. Pleasure, comfort, distraction. That's your family's weapon. And it works, long as people are willing to trade freedom for security."

"We don't have freedom without security," Louis said.

"And we don't have security without control. That is the reality of leadership in our time."

"Maybe so." Marcus finished the whiskey in his glass and set it down with a sharp click.

"You know what this place was before?"

"A shelter," Louis said.

"Yes. It was built for white folks. To protect them from the bombs they were scared of. The rest of us were supposed to die outside." Marcus leaned back against the booth.

"Then the world changed. The shelter was abandoned. Now we own it. We made it ours." Marcus continued.

"After the Second Civil War in 2012, after this city took an atom bomb and bled, my people made a choice. We decided that if nobody was gonna build a place for us, we would build it ourselves. We made this." He gestured across the club.

"Old Downtown. The streets. The market. The rules. The ways to move and trade and survive when the world above tells us we don't belong. So you see, I have seen what happens when a vision does not include everyone. I have lived in the cracks. And I do not intend to go back." Louis listened. Marcus lowered his voice.

"So if you're gonna sit here and tell me that your father's Dominion is different, I need to believe it. I need to see it in your eyes.

'Cause if you're gonna rule it someday, you will have to decide who gets to be inside the dream and who gets left outside in the dark." Louis took a sip of soda before answering.

"I don't know what the future holds. I only know that I never leave my friends behind. I never turn my back on people who help me. And I will fight anyone who tries to keep me from protecting the ones I care about." He looked around the booth. Gladice gave him a small nod. Angelique held his gaze. Donya let out a breath and lowered her eyes to her plate. Willa adjusted her glasses and kept her face still. Marcus looked around the booth, then back at Louis. He nodded.

"Good answer. Now eat. You will need your strength for what comes next." Louis picked up the rib and finished it. The others began eating again. It tasted better now. The conversation had made him hungrier.