Esposito’s relief was genuine, as was his contrition, but he hadn’t understood Nick at all. “Not for me, Espo. Not just for me. Not even mostly for me. You’re chasing your own tail. What happens when you catch it?”
Esposito seemed almost stunned; he had gambled on forgiveness, but he hadn’t counted on compassion, the possibility or the need. Nick hadn’t intended any insult, but he knew the terrible recognition, when you take off your hat because your head’s a little hot and a stranger drops a dollar in it. Esposito blinked and shook his head, rubbed both hands through his hair. Nick smiled at the recollection of the high sign from Michael Cole’s interrogation, the cue to break in on the interview. The smile was another dollar in the hat. Again, he didn’t mean it.
“C’mon, Espo. Let’s go where we’re going. Let’s do what we gotta do.”
Nick took his shoulder and pulled him along. Esposito stepped unsteadily.
“Let’s see this through. Everybody thought it was my night tonight. Everybody felt it, the change of luck, the way things seemed to line up. It was my time, my turn. You know what? Today wasn’t a complete disaster. We broke the case. We didn’t get him, but someone will. He’s done. Now that everybody’s got their head out of their ass, me and you both, let’s do what we gotta do. Throw away the rabbit’s foot and tell me what we got, how we can finish this.”
“Gimme a minute.”
They walked west, clumsily through the snow, uphill and down, toward the river. Esposito marched forcefully but without speed, determined to move his mind away from himself. As they approached the covered walkway that bridged the railroad tracks, Esposito put his arm out for Nick to stop.
“He’s got the gun for me, Malcolm does. That’s what he says. But I don’t trust him. Yesterday, it was like pulling teeth. Today, he talks like he’s room service—‘Absolutely! Right away! Is there anything else?’ ”
Nick looked at the footprints leading across the walkway, down to the river. There were a few more coming toward them than leading away, reasonably fresh. What was he, an Indian? Stop it. Stick to what you know.
“Are we early or late?”
“Early. I told him two hours. Less than an hour since I talked to him. Quiet here, private, especially now.”
“You ever meet him here before?”
“Shit. Yeah. Mostly here.”
“So, you think Malcolm’s renegotiated the deal. With who?”
Esposito checked his phone for missed calls and shook his head. He kept the phone in his hand, at the ready.
“I’m afraid that them being brothers, it might mean something after all.”
The tribute to sibling unity was not what it might have been, under other circumstances. They walked over the bridge, over the dry concrete, then back into the snow, the steep slope down to the river. Nick slipped, and Esposito tried to grab his shoulder, and both landed on their asses. Neither of them could quite manage a laugh. Help was not help here; a hand was not a help. Nick tried to remind himself to trust his eyes, not his luck. They staggered to their feet, and then down the path, to just above the river, above the boulders by the feet of the bridge. They’d had a beer here, in better weather, after that day with the santero, the death and the rescue, maybe for atonement. Nick had last spoken with Daysi not far away. Esposito had chosen this place for other confidences and ceremonies as well. A kind of rhyme there, yes, but before Nick could dwell on that, Malcolm called out. Nick didn’t like that he was ready for them, that he’d seen them first.
“Hey, Espo! You’re early.”
“Hey, Malcolm, there you are! Am I early? Moving around in this shit weather, I thought I was late.”
“Nah, you know. Maybe it’s me. Was gonna call you, but I lost my phone. For real!”
Nick was glad that he wasn’t obliged to join them in the small talk. Malcolm and Esposito were better actors than he was, but the lines were terrible, halfhearted excuses, lies that were as shameful for their laziness as for their deceit.
“You got that thing for me?”
“Yeah.”
Malcolm handed a package to Esposito, which he held and weighed, unwilling to expose its contents to his touch or the elements.
“So … you got your partner here…. What’s up, Meehan. Haven’t seen you for a while. Glad you’re feelin’ better.”
Nick didn’t smile, didn’t try to. Esposito must have told him that Nick had been sick, missing the previous meets. Malcolm extended his hand, and Nick shook it. Esposito pushed past the civilities.
“And you didn’t handle it yourself, right? Good. You hear from Michael? He call?”
“He didn’t have to. I saw him at the house. You guys are messin’ with his head. It’s bad. What he do? What you tell him he did?”
Nick was impressed by the control of information Esposito had shown. Clearly, he’d told Malcolm nothing about Jamie Barry. And he was surprised that Malcolm had accepted the lack of disclosure, that he hadn’t asked how Esposito knew that Michael had come back. Nick was also taken aback that Malcolm had agreed to find his brother’s gun without asking how they knew one was there. Malcolm sounded entertained by it all, and that bothered both detectives. The way he talked wasn’t a bluff of nonchalance but the bemusement of a spectator, a man who didn’t have a stake in the game. In jail, Malcolm had told them he didn’t care about his brother, and Nick had believed him. Esposito must have been right; Malcolm had gotten lazy once he’d gotten what he wanted, once he’d gotten out of Rikers. No, that didn’t quite fit, either.
“Shit,” said Esposito. “Michael’s out already? What he say?”
Nick wished Esposito had tried to bluff, had kept the worry out of his voice. There was no fear in Malcolm when he answered.
“He says he shot your partner—you, Meehan—but you musta known it was coming. And you, Espo, tried to send him to the nuthouse. The problem with Michael, like I tried to tell you, is he’s always right. So when things don’t work out, it’s because there’s big-time CIA shit going on. You can’t talk to him. You’re either stupid or you’re in on it. I was gettin’ ready to leave when he comes in, all shook up, more pissed off than ever. It takes me back. I gotta remember, this was his first night in jail. I been fucked with by the police my whole life. I know what goes and what don’t. I know you got high-tech cameras, I know you tap phones, you got tricky shit goin’ on. Me and you, Espo, our shit is the trickiest! But when he starts tellin’ me he’s gotta figure out how you stayed so still when you hit the ground, Meehan, I just laugh. Oh, man, was that the wrong move, does that flip him out!”
Nick knew how that might happen. He noticed that Malcolm slowed down for the last part of the story, told it less like a joke about a stranger. He was sad about how it ended. That made some sense, but not enough.
“He comes at me. I take him down. I hold him down till he gives, even though he don’t say he gives. He could never fight, and I still got the big-brother shit going on. But I let him go, and he runs in his room, slams the door. I’m glad I didn’t have the gun on me, his gun. I wasn’t shittin’ you, Espo. It was hard to find. I only got it when I went to the freezer today, see if there was something to eat. I pick up this box—brussels sprouts. Nobody, nobody in my house, would ever eat that shit. Plus, it was heavy. I gotta give him that. It was a good way to keep everybody from messin’ with it. Anyway. I was thinkin’ about headin’ back down South myself, settin’ things up, like I said.”
Malcolm’s accent followed his itinerary, drifting down across the Mason-Dixon Line. “Ah” for “I.” Like ah said … Nick thought Malcolm was moving a little fast.
“So, Espo, you think we’re good now, with the tape of—”
“What tape?”
Nick could see Esposito tense up. The baroque avoidances in their own conversations on the matter might have been extreme—“That thing with that guy, and the other one”—but the only reason to speak of a tape would be for the benefit of a tape. The three looked at one another, unsure what could b
e said, whether they were past talking. Hands shifted in pockets—dodgy movements, menacing and feigning menace—jacking up alarm. Had Malcolm really given Esposito the gun, any gun, and did he have another? They couldn’t see one another, which might have been a blessing, buying a moment. Everything Nick had warned his partner against, all the code-red contingencies, now threatened, and the only way out of the hole was to dig deeper. Nick could not go further, could not go back. What next? Snow swirled down, and he tilted his head back, opened his mouth, to catch snowflakes on his tongue. One, two, three, all of them sweet and clean.
A man lumbered down the path, taking small, reluctant steps, heel heavy, guarding against slipping down the hill. There was an odd tempo to his respiration, once he was in earshot, up and down, fluttery breathiness, then low, labored moans. He was heard before he was seen in any detail. He fascinated the three of them, as a distraction and a grateful delay, but also because he was all mismatch—tan overcoat, too dressy and light for the weather, holding something dark by his chest and a newspaper over his head like a rickety awning, unready and unwilling to be here.
“Malcolm! Meehan! He’s got my gun! Tell him I’m a cop!”
Nick didn’t know the face, but he knew the voice. Esposito knew neither. Malcolm knew both. The man was not alone. Michael was behind him, and it was he who spoke first, firm and ready, as if bringing the meeting to order.
“Get down. Hands out, hands up, everybody.”
The man sank to his knees, and Michael pointed the gun at Nick, at Esposito, before returning the barrel to the back of his hostage. They obeyed out of amazement, hands still in gloves, unready to shoot. Michael addressed his brother.
“You left your phone.”
So Malcolm had told the truth; Nick had even gotten that wrong. Michael held it up in his free hand. He flipped it open and pressed a button. Seconds later, there was a muffled ring from somewhere within the IAB man’s coat. The man looked up at Nick, pleading in his eyes. The mystery prick, revealed. Younger than Nick had thought, thin and red-haired, pale and sharp-featured, practiced in expressions of severity, not this. Eyes, mouth, cheek muscles seemed like they wanted to have nothing to do with each other, bits of his face all trying to leave at once, to be first to the exits. A camera was around his neck, with a long lens. How long had he taken pictures, until he’d felt what he thought was a gun to his back? Nick guessed Michael didn’t have a gun, until he’d taken the IAB man’s. The man had descended with the newspaper over his head, as if his mother were in his ear, telling him to mind the cold and the wet. An Irish mother, maybe, waiting at home for him, supper on the stove. The redheaded man looked to Nick. “Tell him, Meehan! Tell him who I am! You know!”
“Don’t lie,” said Michael. “He’s dead if you lie.”
“He’s a cop,” Nick said, though he suspected that the truth would not spare the man, that it might not spare any of them. The suspicion was what kept Nick from smiling at Michael’s deluded idealism, his insistence on the perfect fraternity of all policemen.
“No shit, he’s a cop,” said Michael. “I followed my brother here. I knew I’d see at least one a you here, maybe two. This one was spying in on you, I figured, but I was only sure when his phone rang. It was the last call my brother made. This gun I got? It’s his. I’m glad it’s a cop’s gun. Still, Mee-han, I wanted to hear it from you.”
Michael shot the IAB man in the head. The head went forward, stop-action quick, frame to frame, here then there, and the torso tilted after. Bodies in motion, bodies at rest. Michael shifted the gun back to Nick with a fluidly mechanical movement, like the hand of a clock. His head darted back and forth among the three hostages before fixing on Nick.
“Wanna laugh now?”
Nick did not. Michael had wiped the smile from Nick’s face, as intended.
“What you did to my brother—”
Malcolm strained not to yell when he interjected, “Michael! These guys didn’t have anything to do with Milton! Stop this. It’s crazy!”
“Shut up! I’m not talking to you! I’m talking about you.”
Even in the heated first words of the outburst, Michael still looked at Nick, as if the sight of his brother were unbearable.
“I shoulda known when I found out he got to see Moms at the funeral home. I shoulda known when he got out, came home. You people. What you done to my moms—at least that was quick and clean. With Malcolm, how you turned him, what you turned him into, that’s sick and disgusting, the lowest of the low …”
Michael had practiced for the moment, had seen it a thousand times in his mind, maybe never as richly fulfilled. He raised the other hand with the clarity of a semaphore signal, holding Malcolm’s phone, and the thumb moved among the buttons, knowing which to press.
“Well, that was the last call. Who was the call before that? There’s all kinds a calls to this number, back and forth, like they were in love. Why do I know whose phone’s gonna ring? Who made my brother a traitor? You know how I know? Because it’s always the quiet ones; those are the ones you gotta watch.”
As Michael glared at Nick, holding the gun in one hand, the phone in the other, trying to maintain the bravura posture, another phone rang. The sound was slightly stifled, but its source was plain enough, and not expected. Michael looked flustered, no longer so sure of himself. When Esposito held up his phone—his case, his call—Michael’s arm sagged, and the gun dipped down. Everything had been perfect before this, better even than planned. Nick and Esposito were slower than Malcolm, who rushed forward—“Fuck this shit!”—and tackled Michael, grabbing for the gun. It went off, as guns do, and Malcolm howled and fell back, angrier still, taking Michael with him, both of them twisting in pain. The gun waved in a two-handed grapple, and Nick dropped onto it, knee first. He snatched it up and rolled away from them—“Got it!”—then he rose and looked over. Esposito had grabbed Michael by the collar and belt, as he shrieked, flailed, and kicked. Malcolm roared, rolling and holding his leg. “Kill that prick!” And Esposito cursed senselessly before flinging Michael aside, as if he just couldn’t stand to touch him anymore. Nick never knew if it was intended, to throw Michael over the drop, to the rocks, to the river—or just away. Michael was the quiet one, the quietest, after that. The others didn’t speak, but they heard one another breathing. The snow still fell, and Nick tasted it on his tongue.
After a minute, two, ten, Nick got to his feet. Malcolm packed snow on his leg, the mid-thigh, not near the femoral artery, not bad. Esposito had his hands on his knees and was peering down the slope, watching for movement. He stood up slowly and then turned around. He looked at Nick, then to the ground, at the IAB man, the redhead in the red snow.
“He knew you, Nick. By name. Malcolm, too. He didn’t ask for me to help. I’m guessing he knows who I am.”
There was nothing accusing in his voice. Esposito leaned down and took the camera from the body. Nick handed Esposito the gun, a 9mm semiautomatic, that had just passed through too many hands.
Nick felt cold, and stuck to a kind of cold truth. “I’ve never seen him before in my life.”
Truth at its coldest, the element in its solid state; you could warm it to liquid, heat it to gas, but it was too dangerous to breathe. Esposito nodded.
“Guess we know who he was, though.”
Nick needed to say nothing to agree.
“I still can’t for the life of me figure out why these guys try so hard, why they want me so bad.”
The words themselves could have seemed boastful had the voice not been joyless—confused, almost afraid. But Nick understood what the IAB man was after.
“He believed in you, Espo. He never doubted.”
The simplicity of the observation startled both of them. No one else had held Esposito in such esteem, had thought him so limitless and singular, that to watch him was a privilege, worthy of consecrating all working hours, if not all waking ones. Even as Esposito’s faith in himself had been shaken, and Nick had lately struggled, ske
ptical of all purpose and virtue, this last disciple had remained defiant in the lion’s den. Esposito could not exult in the loss of this man. Nick did not want to stay.
“I’m gonna go, Espo.”
“All right. I gotta have a talk with Malcolm. I’ll take care of it.”
As Nick mounted the path, his footprints obliterating those of one, maybe two, dead men, it occurred to him that his partner’s assurance could have meant anything—two things, itself and its opposite—a guarantee of Malcolm’s safety or his silence. I’ll take care of it…. Nick listened for another gunshot, but he heard only the wind, which rose as he did, more steadily. Before he entered the walkway, he waited; the tunnel caught the wind in its mouth, made it rumble and growl. He didn’t look back, but watched as the snow seemed to fall upward in the squalls. Not fall but fly, hovering then darting, chasing or chased. Moths on fire, drawn to themselves, blinded by their own light. Unnatural nature, forgetful of its own laws. Nick waited a little longer, then kept walking.
As he headed east on 181st Street, Nick turned his mind to what to do next, in the simplest, most practical terms. He could go to the precinct or go home. He wanted to get out of his clothes and shower, but he didn’t keep extra clothing, a toilet kit, and towel in his locker, as everyone else did, because he lived so near. He was afraid that when he warmed up and dried off, he wouldn’t go back out. All he really needed to do was a few computer checks, fill out a form, to raise the alarm on Costa. And the rest? His hands had begun to shake. His body began to stiffen and seize up. The day’s labor, the night’s cold, both had cost him. The task of typing a sheet of paper seemed monumental, physically daunting; paperwork of any kind seemed lunatic and make-believe. What would his memo-book entries for the last hour read: “Seventh circle of hell inspected, all apparently normal.” When he realized that if he went to the precinct, he would see people he knew, people he liked, who would ask him radical, unanswerable questions—like “How are you?” and “What’s going on?” He knew he could not do it, could not face them. He went down to the subway, where an uptown train took him home.
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