Nickel City Storm Warning (Gideon Rimes Book 3) Gary Ross (most popular novels txt) 📖

“Ramos. Copy that, chief. The bartender’s giving out napkins like Halloween candy.”

“Bishop.” Her voice quavered. “I wish one of those sons of bitches would try that door.”

“How’s Betty?” Pete asked. His voice held a note of concern I wasn’t used to hearing.

“Wiping her eyes like everybody else,” I said. “Okay, team, it was tough to hear, but don’t drop your guard because you’re glad it’s over.”

“Copy that,” each said in turn.

Drea rejoined Zulema in front, and hands shot up. The first question came from a small woman in a wide flower print skirt, who stood when Zulema pointed to her.

“The book ended before your daughter got married but I read somewhere you went to London for the wedding. How is she, and are you still worried for her safety?”

Drea smiled. “She still feels the pain of losing her dad, but Miranda’s moving on with her life. She avoids social media, lives in a very secure building in a city of nine million, and never shares her travel plans. My son-in-law’s name was fictionalized in the book, to give them added privacy, and Miranda no longer uses her given name. She finished her doctorate at an institution I won’t reveal and now works—I will not say where—under a completely different identity. Best of all, they’re expecting their first child.”

When the applause subsided, Zulema pointed to a bushy-haired man in a tropical shirt under a linen sports jacket.

“Have police made any progress in finding the men who invaded your home?”

Drea shook her head. “I used to talk to Lieutenant Wesley in Fairfax two or three times a week. She kept me up to date with what her department and the Maryland state police were doing. Things got more frenetic when the Richmond homicide and the Virginia state police joined the party after what happened to Jody Cropper. But the joint investigation went nowhere. Now Wesley and I touch base about once a month.”

“Gotta be infuriating,” the man said, shaking his head as he sat down.

“If they’re off the grid, they have an angel who can afford to keep them hidden,” Drea said. “A person of means who secretly supports white supremacy. That’s infuriating.”

Zulema pointed to a woman in green, who stood, brushing glossy gray hair back from her face. “I heard you sold the television rights.”

“Yes, to Hulu.” Drea waited for the smattering of applause to fade before leaning closer to the microphone. “Let me answer your next two questions before you ask. First, I have no idea what they’re doing. Buying the rights means they’re the only ones who can film the book. It’s not a guarantee they will. Second, no, I will not watch it if they do.”

The next speaker was near the center of the room, a thirtysomething man in an open-collared white shirt and khaki pants. He had brown hair combed to one side and large black-framed glasses. “In more than one interview, you’ve said you’re tempted to write a book called Racism for Dummies.”

Drea laughed, as did many in the audience.

Unsmiling, the man waited for the laughter to end. “Will we see that book soon?”

“I say that a lot when I’m frustrated,” Drea said. “What the average person knows about racism in America can be ticked off on one hand. Lincoln freed the slaves. Indians were put on reservations. The South had separate water fountains. Some guy named King had a dream.” She gestured to Sam, who passed her a glass of water. She took a drink before resuming. “Everybody knows about the Civil War but many people deny it was fought over slavery. After Lincoln was shot, Andrew Johnson canceled the order to give forty acres and a mule to freed slaves to give them a foothold in the economy. FDR’s New Deal helped families buy homes but not Blacks house-shopping in white neighborhoods. Is that why we’re hearing about the wealth gap? And there’s so much more. Boarding schools where Native American children torn from their families were physically and sexually abused in an effort to kill the Indian inside. The Chinese Exclusion Act, which speaks for itself. Internment camps where Japanese-American citizens spent World War II without being charged with a crime. Lynching, from the single incident to wholesale slaughter in Black towns. American eugenics programs that inspired Nazi Germany.” She paused, as if catching her breath, and drank more water. “It’s hard sometimes not to be frustrated when you’re Black in America.”

“Amen to that!” someone in the audience said, provoking another round of laughter.

“Why mention race at all? you ask,” Drea said. “Aren’t you overreacting, being too sensitive? Is it overreacting when YouTube shows us everything from Blacks shot during traffic stops to college kids who think blackface is funny to whites stomping around ERs demanding white doctors for Mom or Gramps in the middle of a heart attack?” When she sucked her teeth, hard, the microphone sharpened and amplified the sound. “Give me a cardiologist, damn it! I don’t care what color they are or whether they pee standing or sitting, as long as they know their way around my heart.”

Again, there was laughter, this time mixed with applause.

Still standing, the questioner waited for enough silence to ask a follow-up. “But is that ignorance or something else?” Something about his tone was different this time. There was a note of challenge Drea seemed to miss.

“Ignorance but more,” she said. “An arrogance born of privilege. Long ago one of my husband’s Puerto Rican colleagues told us about playing chess in a park with his nephew from San Juan. He was trying to teach the boy how to play and at one point said, ‘Jaque mate.’ Spanish for checkmate. A woman walking her dog made a point of stopping to say, ‘This is America. We speak English here.’ She had no idea the man she was talking to had a prosthetic left leg, having swapped his real one for a Purple Heart in Vietnam.”

There was a