Choked Up

by Janey Mack

  Flynn put a hand on his back. “Towel’s in.”

  “Ssss not broke,” Rory said, swiping at his nose. “Jes gimme a feckin’ minute.”

  “He can’t go home like this,” I said. “One look and Da won’t rest until . . .”

  Flynn rubbed his forehead. “Well, what the hell am I gonna do with him?”

  “I’ll take him,” I said. “Let him sober up in Hank’s guest room.”

  Flynn jerked a thumb at Ragnar. “You think your friend will be okay with that?”

  “Absolutely.”

  He laid a hand on my head and mussed my hair. “Sometimes I think I don’t know you at all anymore.”

  Ragnar was positively jovial after kicking Rory’s ass. And Rory, skunk-drunk and fury spent, was as happy to have taken his licks, as dished them out. They were fast friends by the time we hit the freeway, comparing fight stories.

  Fine by me. I had plenty to think about.

  Rory’s snitch. What was urgent enough for Rags to roust me from Hud’s but not so important that he could make time for a bar fight? And how exactly were we going to slip past Hank’s night sentry, Chris, without Rory getting wise?

  I took the easy one first. “Uh, Rags?” I interrupted. “Got a number for that pal of yours, Chris Ledoux? I’m thinking about scoring his extra Sox tickets.”

  “Er . . .” It took him a few seconds to catch on. “You bet.” He handed me his cell phone. Rory, blissfully unaware, blarneyed on.

  I scrolled through his contacts, clicked on Ledoux, and typed.

  Arriving with overnight guest. Please stay out of sight.

  Maisie

  Minutes later, Ragnar drove into Hank’s driveway. Sentry and dog, nowhere to be seen.

  Perfect.

  Rory opened the door and slowly climbed out.

  I hung back. “Why’d you come into the bar tonight, Ragnar?”

  “Mant’s ghosted. Got the call to bring you here and tell you Bannon won’t be back ’til morning.”

  The dashboard clock read 4:05 a.m. “Does that qualify?” “Fuck if I know.” Ragnar shrugged.

  “Okay,” I said. “Thanks for not breaking Rory’s nose.”

  “What can I say? I’m a classy guy.”

  Rory slung a heavy arm across my shoulders. I grabbed him around the middle, and we stumble-walked up the sidewalk.

  “Thanks, Snap.” He leaned against the door while I typed in the security code.

  “Anytime.” I pushed open the door. “All this over a snitch, huh?”

  Rory sagged forward into the foyer. “Thass the feckin’ thing of it. Kid’s only fifteen. A cripple for the rest o’ his life now, yeah?”

  Political correctness was never your forte. “Where’d you take him? Lurie Children’s?”

  “Nah,” he said with surprising frankness. “I called Joy.”

  Dr. Joy Schaffer was a pediatric surgeon and Rory’s ex-girlfriend. A slinky brunette with an easy smile and the unflappable cool of a frozen lake. No matter how hard he tried—and he tried damn hard—Rory couldn’t quite get over her.

  I led him to the guest room. He flopped down on the bed.

  I pulled the blinds and went into the en suite bath and got towels, spare toothbrush and toothpaste out of the cabinet. “So. You set a juvie snitch up in a private hospital? That’s—”

  “Safe as I could make it and get him treated. Joy’s stretching to gimme three days. After that, I dunno.” He shook his head.

  I leaned against the guest bath doorjamb. “Quite a luxury, then, for you to nurse a two-day hangover.”

  “Aww, feck.” He threw an arm over his face and groaned. “Bring me a glass of salt water.”

  I returned with the salt water, aspirin, and three bottles of Gatorade.

  “Thanks.” Rory took the glass and went into the bathroom. He started retching before I made it to the door.

  I took a shower and sluiced the stink of smoke and wired-up monkey grease from my skin. Afterward, wrapped in a towel, the night’s tension melted away beneath the blow-dryer’s somnolent heat until I caught my reflection and a brutal dose of conscience in the mirror.

  Even the smattering of freckles across my nose was accusatory.

  All I ever wanted to do was to make the table club, to be one of them. And now that I was on the job, I was using my brothers for my own ambition. Tonight, I stole Cash’s righteous collar and was scheming to heist a maimed teenage snitch from under Flynn and Rory.

  God, I suck.

  It was after four o’clock and Hank still wasn’t home. I put on underpants and an Army T-shirt, not letting myself think about his hunt for a psychotic hit man.

  “Your worrying,” he said once, after an assignment, while I was lying across his chest in bed, “means you don’t trust me or my ability.”

  “No.” Tears of frustration blurred my vision. “I don’t trust other people.”

  He flipped me onto my back, looming over me. “Situational awareness, Peaches.”

  “But—”

  He pinned my arms over my head, holding me by the wrists. There was nothing better than lying powerless beneath him.

  “Trust me.” He nuzzled, his scruffy chin into my collarbone. “Promise me you’ll never worry.”

  I did.

  “I take it back,” I said aloud to the empty room. “Where are you, Hank?”

  I crawled into bed, missing him like hell, certain that no matter how tired I was, sleep would never come.

  I was wrong.

  Chapter 13

  Face mashed into the pillow, arms over my head, I slept dead to the world.

  Rush Limbaugh’s theme song blared. I fumbled across the nightstand for my phone. “Leticia?”

  “Do you know what goddamn time it is?” she squawked.

  “Uh . . .” I rolled over onto my back and looked blearily at the clock. “6:04 a.m.?”

  Hank isn’t home yet.

  “And what goddamn day it is?”

  “Saturday?”

  “Since you’re all coherent an’ shit, enlighten me as to why I’m calling you at the crack of dawn on my day off?”

  Oh shit. Cutting my shift. I got up and started pacing, trying to force blood to my brain. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think—”

  “Hell right, you din’t. Booting a Bentley? This is Chicago. Someone own a car like that, they so connected you think three times before you write the ticket, then you hold up and think again.”

  The blood drained from my head into my stomach and roiled. “Whose was it?”

  “The Honorable Mrs. Coles,” she said.

  Fuck. Me.

  “You boot the mayor’s wife’s car outside a bunch of hoochie clubs? Whee! You kicked the proverbial hell outta that tatted girl’s hornets’ nest.”

  My brain, encased in Jell-O, could form no response.

  “McGrane? You there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Lemme tell you how this is gonna play out. You gonna bust your tiny white onion down to my desk. In the bottom drawer in a file labeled Hillsdale College you’re gonna find the North Impound ID swipe cards and keys.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Then you’re gonna get your sorry and subservient self to North Impound by 7:00 a.m. sharp so one o’ the mayor’s crew can pick his Bentley up and erase all goddamn traces of your stupidity.”

  “Got it.”

  “No, what you got is a temporary suspension. I’ll see you in my office first thing Monday morning.” She disconnected.

  From bad to worse faster than IRS hard drives spontaneously combusting.

  Grinding on two hours’ sleep, I raided Hank’s medicine cabinet, searching through the go pills and no-go pills. Amphetamines and sleeping pills. Dexedrine and beta-blockers. Modafinil.

  “Less speed, more focus,” was how Hank described them. I shook out a couple of tablets, washed them down with water straight from the tap, and put on jeans, a black tee, and a blazer, and armed up with the Kimber Solo, boot knife, and p
epper spray.

  I went into the kitchen and scribbled a note.

  Hank,

  I stepped in something at work. Rory’s sleeping it off in the guest room.

  Home in time for lunch.

  Xoxo

  Maisie

  I popped the tab on a Xenergy Cherry Lime and chugged it on the way to the garage. And stopped short. My Accord was at my house. Hank took the G-Wagen and the Super Bee was getting detailed after the stringer and spending the week in the police impound. Which left . . . I looked at the key rack and grinned.

  The Indian.

  Which came with the added benefit that Chris the sentry wouldn’t be faced with the dilemma of staying on duty or chasing me down. He’d never catch me.

  I grabbed the keys and a helmet and started the motorcycle before I hit the garage door clicker.

  Hank’s Modafinil kicked in somewhere on the freeway. I was flying at a steady 85 mph, at one with the bike. Everything seemed to have slowed down. Become clearer. Colors brighter. I felt calm, full of focus, and perfectly alert.

  By the time I recovered the keys from Leticia’s desk, I had a plan and ten minutes to make it to North Impound.

  Piece of cake.

  I parked Hank’s bike in front of the office door, cracked my knuckles, and sent my sole ally at Special Unit, Edward Dunne, a text.

  I have a lead, but I’m not ready to take it to Kaplan yet.

  Edward Dunne: What do you need?

  Photos of “The Bull” and his crew.

  Edward Dunne: For how long?

  3 hrs.

  Edward Dunne: You’ll have them in twenty minutes. Coded to erase by noon.

  Thanks!

  I hung up the phone. Quarter after and still no mayoral lackey had shown up. It’d be just like that jerkoff Coles to make me wait until noon.

  Come on. Come on. The clock was ticking.

  And so was my Tag Heuer. Holy cat, it’s loud.

  I bounced in place, shadow boxing, killing time. It was dying a slow death. I needed to interview Rory’s Serb before my brother sobered up, talked to Da, and they dumped the kid into Witness Protection.

  Seven thirty. A black-armored limo drove up and parked across three handicapped spots. The door swung open and out stepped an enormous black man wearing the 1920s Hollywood’s ideal of a proper driver’s ensemble. Cap, double-breasted jacket with brass buttons, jodphurs, and high boots. The whole nine yards. Embarrassing and intimidating at the same time. “Holy shit!” He tipped down his mirrored sunglasses. “Maisie-save-my-ass-McGrane. Who’d you piss off to get this detail?”

  “Coles.”

  “Oh no. No!” He started laughing. Howling, actually. Covering his mouth, he pointed at me and slapped his leg. “Damn, girl. Thought you’d learned your lesson after you booted his ass the first time.”

  “You’d think.” I smiled. “How you been, Dozen?”

  “Same ol’, new day.”

  A chunky Korean mini-me version of Poppa Dozen popped out of the limo’s still open driver’s door.

  Dozen tipped his glasses back up. “Did I tell you to get out of the car?” He snapped twice and pointed at the car. The little man got back in and closed the door.

  “Jesus.” Dozen shook his head. “What the hell kind of driver is that?”

  He sat down on the hood of the limo and took a crumpled pack of unfiltered Camels from inside his jacket. He lit up while I watched, momentarily entranced by the acrid smell and the slow curl of smoke from his exhale, the diamond studs in his ears, the nick on his cheek from shaving. “You know you gonna lose your job, right?” he said.

  “Nah.”

  “The hell you ain’t.”

  “I didn’t know it was his car. And I did manage to get his mayoral butt out of Swag before Vice busted him for . . . ah . . .”

  “Not a word. Not ever.” Dozen whipped off his glasses, his yellowish whites a bloodshot road map. “You best cut throat right now, a’fore I mop you.”

  “Okay, okay.” I forgot how scary Dozen could be. “I get it.”

  “The hell you do. Coles hates you so bad, if you was on fire and he had water, the mutherfucker’d drink it, then go piss in the corner.”

  Hank’s Law Number Two: Respond to threats with complete confidence.

  I gave a rough chuckle. “Can’t we all just get along?”

  “You a cold piece, McGrane. You get up in the man’s union business, red-face him on TV, then save his skinny-ass neck. Right there you in the shit. But do you want to climb out? Hell no. You dive in like some crunking Jacks Cousteau. Coles offers you a job and you tell him to suck his own dick?” Dozen shook his head and slid the mirrored shades back on. “The man don’t want you down, girl. He wants you dead.”

  “Gee, when you put it that way . . .”

  “Shit.” He flicked his glowing cigarette over my shoulder and stood up. “Where the car at?”

  “Come on.” He followed me into the North Impound office. I found the gate keys and the car on the computer, and after an exercise in massive irritation—unlocking and locking and card swiping through three separate gates—got both the Bentley and Poppa Dozen out of Impound.

  The Bentley’s window slid down and Dozen leaned out. “Coles is a ruthless mutherfucker, McGrane. Watch your back, hear?”

  You betcha.

  He drove off, followed by the armored limo, and I hustled back into the office. North Impound opened at nine. Assuming a twenty-minute bumper for the early-to-work-ers, which granted, were in short supply at the Traffic Enforcement Bureau, I had a nine-and-a-half-minute window to find the paperwork and delete the files from the computer. Highly illegal and the real reason I suspected Leticia drafted me for this mission.

  I cleared all traces in six.

  Modafinil rocks.

  Chapter 14

  Halstad’s posh private hospital had less security than the average elementary school. Still, finding Rory’s informant wasn’t going to be a slam dunk. An eighty-five-dollar flower arrangement with a bear and balloons and some chipper small talk was all it took to discover the children’s ward was on the seventh floor and that Dr. Schaffer wasn’t expected in for rounds until 1:30 p.m.

  I spent a solid fifteen pretending to be on my cell in the waiting room, hanging around for a patsy. A ditzy blonde came toward me in white scrubs with a bright red-and-white-striped apron and a fist-sized explosion of ribbons pinned to her hair. She pushed a beige metal cart loaded with inexpensive toys, magazines, coloring books, and crayons.

  Perfect.

  I held the flowers in front of my face, took three quick steps, and crashed right into her cart.

  “Omigod! I’m so sorry. Are you okay?” she gushed. “I soo didn’t see you.”

  I rubbed my leg, pouring it on. I winced. “No, no. My fault.”

  “Is there anything I can do to help you? I could, like, deliver your flowers.”

  “I wish,” I said. “I was supposed to bring these to some kid except I wrote down who they were from not who they’re for. And if I don’t deliver them, I’m totally fired.”

  “I really shouldn’t . . .” she said, even as she pulled a clipboard from the cart. “Um, what do you know about the patient?”

  I tapped the balloon with a car on it. “Male. Teenager maybe? My boss wasn’t sure if he’d be in the children’s or adult wing.” I could tell by her face that wasn’t enough. I stammered, “The sender’s name has those weird letters, like Russian? Any patients with those?”

  She flipped through the pages rapidly. “A bunch of boys over twelve. None with strange letters.”

  “If I could just take a look—”

  “Sorry, but that’s soo not allowed.” With a sympathetic frown, she put the clipboard back in the cart pocket and moved away.

  I rapped my knuckle against my forehead. Think, Maisie. What would Rory—

  “Miss! Wait.” I trotted after her down the hall.

  She stopped.

  “Is there a Seán Ó Ruda
í on the list?”

  The candy striper flipped through her clipboard and nodded vigorously, happy to be of service. “Room 714. How’d you ever remember?”

  It’s Irish for John Doe. “The cart must’ve jarred it loose.”

  I entered 714. The kid lay in the bed, sleeping. His arm was suspended in a sling, up and away from his body. Fifteen he might be, but with a man’s growth of beard. Dr. Joy would be hard-pressed to keep him under wraps in Pediatrics for three days.

  I set the flowers on the dresser, walked over to the bed, moved his Call button out of reach, and shook his leg.

  His eyes flew open. With a spastic jerk he reached for the Call button, turning gray when he realized it was gone.

  I raised a finger to my lips.

  He nodded, eyes dull.

  Mom called them “commodity eyes.” The look people get when they realize they can be bought and sold and for exactly how little.

  “I am here to help you,” I said quietly. “But you must help me first.”

  He nodded, not believing. “Are you police?”

  “No. There are other people who want them brought to justice. Could you look at some pictures?”

  He gave a twisted grimace and a head tic I interpreted as a nod. I pulled out my BOC iPhone. “Are any of these men the killers you told Detective McGrane about?”

  “Detective McGrane saved me,” he said.

  “I know.” I smiled. “He’s one of the good guys. So am I.” I opened each of Edward’s eleven photos separately. The kid identified Lukic Kraljić and Nicola Svetozar, two known hitters from Renko’s gang. I showed him the remaining three photos and he picked out Stannis’s lead gorilla, Nebojsa Ivanović, as a witness.

  Rory said the kid could ID two. I was done.

  The only photo I hadn’t shown him was Stannis’s. I didn’t want to.

  “Can you show me who hurt you?”

  He glanced at his hand in the sling. “No.” Eyes wet, he rubbed at them with his good hand. “I did not see. Blindfold.”