A Firing Offense

by George Pelecanos

  “Relax,” I said unconvincingly. “Five minutes.”

  Tony and Wayne were whispering behind the divider that separated Fisher’s cubicle from mine. There was also the low, unidentifiable hum that exists in all commercial buildings late at night. I stared up at the drop ceiling.

  The alarm company phoned ten minutes later. I gave the woman my employee ID number and explained that I would be working for a couple more hours. She thanked me and hung up. Though I had been gone more than a week, our personnel director had not called the alarm company to have my name stricken from the list. I had counted on her inefficiency.

  “All right,” I said, “let’s go.”

  We were back against the wall and retracing our steps. At Marsha’s desk I made a right, the others following. I turned the knob on the third door to the left, opened it, and stepped in.

  Except for a block of light that fell in from a large rectangular window on the eastern wall, the room was black. The window looked out into the warehouse. Next to the window was a door, which led to the stairwell landing, which led to the door of the loft. At the bottom of the stairs another door opened to the warehouse itself.

  I tugged on Tony’s windbreaker and pulled him closer. I pointed out to the loft and then to the second row of stock that rose up to meet it from the warehouse below.

  “Tony, when I let you into the loft, get over to the railing and drop down onto the boxes in that row. You’ve got a long way to crawl to get to the back of the warehouse, but you’ve got time, understand?”

  “Yeah,” he said, staring out the window with his mouth open. “When?”

  “They should be here soon.”

  “What then?” Wayne said.

  “There’s an office downstairs with glass walls. We’ll go down the stairwell, out the door to the warehouse, then get into that office—as far back into it as we can. When they’re all together in the back, we make our move.” I pointed to the break in the middle row. “That’s where you cut in, Wayne.”

  “Ain’t no thing,” he said, and looked at Tony.

  After fifteen minutes a sound came up from below, far away but heavy. We stepped back from the light of the window. One drop of cool sweat rolled down my back.

  A figure emerged from below the loft and walked slowly towards the left aisle. The loose-limbed Jamaican was wearing his knit cap and vest. The grip of a pistol stuck up above his rearmost beltloop. He was followed by the tall albino with the single braid. The albino was cradling a shotgun that had a pistollike grip.

  “Check that shit out,” Wayne mumbled.

  “Mossberg,” Tony said. “Twelve gauge.” For the first time there was a hint of apprehension on his young face.

  “When it goes down,” Malone said, his eyes straight ahead, “I’ll be coverin’ that yellow motherfucker. Everybody got that?” The others nodded.

  “I go now?” Tony asked.

  “No,” I said. “There’s two more, be along soon.”

  As I said that, two others followed from beneath the loft. The first man was the one who smashed my face. Both wore heavy jackets that stopped at the waist. I could not see if they were armed.

  “Wayne,” I said, before they left our sight. “The man in front has killed before. When you step out, you cover him.”

  “They all look like they done some killin’, chief,” Wayne said.

  “Maybe so,” I said. “But I’m sure about him. Let’s go, while they’re in the back.”

  They followed me to the door in the left corner of the room. We moved out to the stairwell landing. The steel below our feet gave off a soft echo. My key unlocked the next door. I opened it a few inches and looked out at the loft and the warehouse. I jerked my head to Tony in the direction of the railing.

  Tony tightened his gunstrap. The MAC hung snugly against his back. He looked back at Wayne, tucked in his head, and was out the door.

  He moved quickly across the loft. He climbed over the railing above the second row of stock. He stepped off about two feet to a console carton below. The carton moved under his weight. Then it stopped moving and he was on his stomach, crawling towards the back of the warehouse.

  I eased the door closed and pointed down the stairs. The rain had begun, and muffled the vibration of the steps as we descended. I reached for the knob, and turned it slowly until there was a small click. I cracked open the door and looked out.

  I heard faraway voices and the rain. I slid out the door and moved along the wall to Dane’s office door. The knob turned in my hand. I left the door ajar as I moved into the darkness.

  Malone and Wayne followed me in. Wayne closed the door behind him. They found me in the rear of the office, sitting on the floor with my back to the wall. They sat near me. I felt clammy and wet. I pulled the gun from my knapsack and tossed the knapsack aside.

  A motor kicked in. The sound of it grew louder. A spinning shaft of yellow light approached with the sound. I held the Browning tightly between my legs. Then the sound diminished and the light faded.

  “Forklift,” I said quietly and saw Malone nod.

  There were more voices. I crouched up on the balls of my feet. Two tallish, thin men I didn’t recognize were standing with the albino thirty yards from the office. They would be the buyers. One of them wore his dreadlocks long and out, and carried a briefcase in his right hand. He kept his other hand in his jacket pocket. So did his partner. The albino and one of the buyers traded unsmiling nods, then were gone behind the last row of stock.

  “All here now,” I said.

  We listened to the rain and each other’s breathing. Some time went by like that, then Malone spoke.

  “We best go, Country,” he said quietly.

  “Okay,” I said.

  I stood up and moved to the door. I undid the safety on my gun. I looked out, saw no one, and opened the door.

  Wayne was out without a word, bolting across the floor to the center aisle. He held his gun up next to his head and pressed his back against the cartons. He began to edge his way to the back of the warehouse. I could see sweat reflecting off his forehead.

  I walked out and moved quickly to the end cap of the second row. I felt Malone move with me. We glanced at one another. He moved his pistol from his left to his right hand. I wiped my palm across my jeans, got that hand around the grip of the Browning, and jacked a round into the chamber.

  The rain had intensified. It beat against the metal roof with a steady rumble. Below that sound was the bass of their voices. We stepped away from the boxes, moved into the aisle, and walked towards them.

  They were standing in a group at the end of the aisle. The buyers had their backs to us and the briefcase was at their feet. The other four were facing them. Everyone was armed.

  We came within twenty yards of them. Then the loose-limbed Jamaican, the one who had blown me a kiss, locked his eyes into mine and stiffened. I stopped and raised my gun, pointing it in his direction. The buyers turned to face us.

  “Don’t nobody move,” Malone said evenly.

  Wayne appeared suddenly from the right, stepped in quickly, and put the barrel of the Colt to the head of the South Carolinian who had broken my nose. He pulled back the automatic’s hammer. It locked with a click that rode over the sound of the rain. The man dropped his gun from his left hand and let it fall to the concrete floor.

  The Jamaican seemed to study me and then grinned. I squinted and looked down the sight of my gun to his chest, but it wasn’t enough. A cowboy, just like Dane said.

  He began to raise his gun from his side. He must have crouched down into a shooting position just as I squeezed the trigger.

  The slug tore into him above his shirt collar, on the Adam’s apple. A small puff of white smoke and some fluid shot away from his neck as he was blown back to the floor.

  Wayne squeezed a round off into the head of the South Carolinian. His scalp lifted and his forehead came apart like an August peach. Then Wayne moved his gun to the face of the man’s startled partner
and shot him twice at close range. As he fell back, I saw a nickel-sized spot steaming above the bridge of his nose. His mouth was moving as he went down, but he was dead before he hit the ground.

  Malone had shot the albino twice in the chest. The tall man stumbled, and still standing, pumped off two loads in succession from his shotgun. Malone screamed. In my side vision I saw him falling backwards in a “V,” still firing. The albino was tripping forward. I emptied two more rounds into his long torso.

  The dreadlocked buyer was spinning slowly from the rapid fire of Wayne’s automatic. The second buyer raised his gun in my direction. I screamed Tony’s name.

  I saw fire spitting down from above. I covered my face with my arms. There was the sound of ripping cardboard, splintering wood, and concrete ricochet. Glass exploded around me, and I went to my knees.

  Then there was only the sound of the rain hitting the roof. I stood up. Tony dropped the empty clip from above. It hit the floor and bounced once. He slapped in another clip.

  Wayne walked towards me through the smoke, his feet crushing glass. He stopped at the second buyer. The man was kneeling with his head tucked between his knees. Wayne pointed his gun at the back of the man’s neck and looked at me. I shook my head.

  The powder smell was heavy. I waved smoke from my face and turned. Behind me someone screamed out for Jesus and moaned, then stopped moaning. I knelt down over Malone’s body.

  He had taken a blast low in the abdomen and one in the chest. The gutshot had opened him. His upper lip had curled up and stuck on one of his teeth, so that it looked as if he were sneering. I pulled the lip away and down. Then I closed his eyes.

  “Let’s move, chief,” Wayne said.

  I reached into Malone’s wet trouser pocket and pulled out keys. His blood stained my fingers. I tossed the keys back to Wayne.

  “Get the van,” I said. “Pull it up to the warehouse door.”

  Wayne walked away. I held my gun on the buyer until Tony made it down to the floor. He nodded, saw Malone, and looked back at me. I picked up the suitcase and turned to the man still kneeling on the floor.

  “Get the forklift going,” I said, “and load the van with the goods. Do it and you’ll live.”

  He got started. I sat against a carton and smoked a cigarette while he moved the bodies to the side. Tony rode the forklift with the man for several trips until the VCRs were all loaded. Tony walked back and stood over me.

  “It’s done,” he said. “What now?”

  “Put him in the van,” I said, motioning towards Malone. “Tie the other one up and wait for me. I’ll be out in five minutes.”

  I switched on the light in Dane’s office, found my knapsack, and pulled a phone number from its front compartment. I put the Browning in my knapsack and carried it and the briefcase to Dane’s desk. I lit another cigarette and dialed the phone number.

  “Hello.”

  “Jerry Rosen, please.”

  “This is he.” The voice was deep and rich.

  “This is Nick Stefanos.”

  “I’m sorry, Nick, but it’s very late. If this is about your termination—”

  “Shut up,” I said. “Don’t say a word, understand? Just shut up and listen.” I heard him swallow. “I busted up your deal tonight. All four of your employees and one of your customers are lying dead in the warehouse.” He cleared his throat. “I own the remainder of your supply now. If you want it back, bring Jimmy Broda with you to the roof of the Silver Spring parking garage tomorrow morning at nine o’clock sharp. We’ll make the trade there.”

  “I don’t—”

  “I told you, no talking. Now you’d better get down here. Someone will be waiting for you to confirm everything I’ve told you.” I hung up and stubbed out my cigarette. I grabbed my knapsack and the briefcase, and left the warehouse.

  * * *

  THE WIPERS STRUGGLED TO clear the rain from the van’s windshield. I was driving south on Eleventh Street, into the darkest center of the city. The liquor and convenience stores were closed now and few of the streetlights were lit. People walked through the rain, drenched and unprotected, in slow, druggy steps.

  The briefcase was next to me on the seat. Tony and Wayne sat in back, on opposite sides of the cartons. Malone lay between them, covered by the blanket.

  Tony pointed me into an alley near a Bible Way church. I stopped at the head of it and cut the lights. A stream carried small bits of trash down the center of the alley.

  Tony said, “Wait for me in there, Wayne.”

  Wayne exited the van through the back door. He walked into an open garage and was consumed by its blackness. I continued down the alley with the headlights off until Tony told me to stop.

  “What you gonna do with all this ’caine?” he asked.

  “I’ve got plans for it.”

  “You make more at the cookin’ house,” he said, and looked me over slowly. “You got plans for Homeboy’s money, too?”

  “Yeah,” I said, and stared him down with all the energy I had left.

  “I’ll take mine,” he said.

  I counted twenty thousand in worn bills from the briefcase. He shoved the stack into his jacket. I looked at the lumpen figure in the back and then at Tony.

  He nodded and pulled the blanket off Malone. I grabbed him under the arms and lifted. Tony held his feet. We stepped out of the back of the van and carried him into the rain.

  “Set him down,” Tony said, and we placed him in the middle of the alley.

  For some reason I straightened Malone’s shirt. I looked up from where I knelt. Tony was standing over me, dripping wet and staring into my eyes.

  “Just another dead nigger,” he said. “Right?”

  He turned and walked away. I watched him meet Wayne at the door of the garage. They passed under the glow of the alley light, then disappeared into the night.

  I let go of Malone’s hand and returned to the van. I drove slowly to the end of the alley and began to turn out. In my side mirror I saw Malone’s body shift and move, carried by the stream. Then it stopped moving. I accelerated out of the alley.

  I drove to upper Northwest and parked on a side street in a residential neighborhood. I moved to the back of the van.

  I didn’t sleep. For the rest of the night I stared at the cartons and listened to the rain. And with one wringing hand I clutched the blanket that was smeared with Malone’s blood.

  THIRTY

  THE RAIN HAD tapered off by dawn. I started the van and drove north. Just over the district line I stopped at a convenience store that had a public rest room.

  I cleaned up in the rest room, then bought two coffees, an orange juice, a bag of nuts, some beef jerky, and a deck of Camels. I returned to the van, drank the orange juice and one of the coffees, and ate the nuts and jerky.

  After that, I drove the half mile to the parking garage and took the van up to the roof. I parked next to my Dodge and locked the briefcase in my trunk. I shoved the barrel of the Browning in my jeans and covered the grip with my sweatshirt. Then I drove the van to a sub-roof four floors down and locked it up. I walked back up the open-air stairwell to the roof.

  I leaned against my car and drank the second coffee. I had a cigarette with the coffee, then another. The sky was already clearing though the wind carried quite a chill.

  A long, late-model Cadillac rolled up the ramp and onto the roof, passing me slowly. Rosen was driving. The buyer we had left in the warehouse was in the backseat. Next to him sat Jimmy Broda. He glanced at me blankly as they passed.

  They parked in the far corner of the roof. I remained against my car. A few minutes passed, then Rosen got out of the car and walked towards me. I blew out the rest of my smoke and crushed the butt under my shoe.

  Rosen was a heavy man of medium height with a tendency to put on pounds. His scalp showed through his thin permanent, and he wore a beard that only partially masked the fatty rolls of his neck. There were dark semicircles beneath his eyes.

  Rosen exten
ded his hand as he reached me. He had on one of those diamond horseshoe rings that are impressive only to the pompous shitheels who wear them. I refused his handshake. He placed his hand back in his cashmere overcoat.

  “Nick,” he said solemnly. “Let’s make this civil, shall we?”

  “Is everything in order?”

  “The warehouse, you mean? Yes. Though you left me quite a mess. Fortunately, the man you left behind decided to join me rather than return to his people empty-handed. He handled most of the mop-up work. No one will miss them. As for the inventory that was destroyed, I’ll have my accountants write that off as pilferage.” He stroked the tip of his beard. “What are you going to do with all the money, Nick?”

  “It’s already gone,” I lied.

  “That’s right,” he said. “You had to pay off your little army. But you lost one, didn’t you? From my man’s description, that would be your friend Malone, from our Connecticut Avenue store, correct?” I didn’t answer. “My sympathies. Of course, no one had to die. They should have let you take it. We would have settled it later. But they had to make a play. Fucking Schwartzes.”

  “You talk too much,” I said.

  “I’m sorry. It’s because I’m nervous. This is all new to me.”

  “Why’d you get into it in the first place, then?”

  “I wanted it,” he said. “When I saw that Ned Plavin’s ambitions were in line with mine, I convinced him to bankroll the operation up here. I chose D.C. for the same reason all the gangs come down from New York. Law enforcement here—face it, Stefanos, it’s a joke. The cops are passing out jaywalking tickets downtown. And the mayor? Well, maybe he could take care of things. If only he could pull his head up off the mirror.”

  “Get back to our business,” I said.

  “You’re going to think I’m blowing smoke up your ass, but frankly, Nick, you did me a favor last night. I’ve been wanting this whole thing to end. I know where I made my mistakes. It was stupid to try and move the goods through the warehouse. Plus, those guys who worked for me”—he waved his hand in front of his face—“they killed that Shultz boy, on their own. I never ordered that. And I didn’t know what to do with the Broda kid.” He spread the fingers in both of his hands out to suggest helplessness.