by Janey Mack
That doesn’t sound good.
Gorilla stepped forward and extended a hand. “Lovely to see you again, Miss Jackson.”
Check the building, my bare butt.
She extended her hand. He bent and kissed her dimpled knuckles. “I am sure you do not remember me. I am Ivanović.”
“I know who you are.”
“I have thought of nothing but you for many days.”
Leticia actually blushed. “You cupcaking me?”
“Yes?” Gorilla said warily. “If you mean to ask on date?”
Her shoulders began to undulate. “Oh, we’ll have us a date.” She pulled her hand from his and waved him out the door with a handful of neon lilac square-tipped nails. “You run along now, let me talk to McGrane.”
Gorilla left, closing the door behind him.
“I know you be workin’ some big chip angle, but you wanna make some serious OT?”
Good Lord, no!
“Doing what?” I asked politely.
“You know how they have all them car shows and auctions at McCormick Place Convention Center?”
“Sure.”
“Somethin’ went bootsie, cuz now the muscle car guys gonna roll it all outside in a couple weeks. Not sure where yet, but I need some quality peeps who can boot at the ready.”
Gee, sorry, Leticia. I think I’ll take a pass. I’m trying to stop doing things that make me want to kill myself.
Subject change. I set the envelope of cash onto her desk. “For next week.”
“About that . . .” A speculative gleam danced in her eye. “When we tearing this towing op up? It’s time for me to go on TV again.”
“Uh . . .”
“McGrane. You think they don’t got no seat belts on the milk truck? How stupid you think I am? I don’t know what shit you got goin’ on with that tow truck, but them bonuses are the only thing keeping my retention rate outta the toilet.”
“Leticia, I’m sorry I—”
She raised her hands in front of her face. “Don’t wanna hear it.” She dropped her hands, picked up her drink, and took a slurp. “You give me a week heads-up afore it stops, we take us a field trip, and we be chill as Otter Pops.”
“So what’s with the uniform?”
Leticia wiggled her brows and pressed the intercom button on the telephone. “Agent Sanchez, please report to my office.”
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?
Leticia stuffed the last bite of Crunchwrap in her mouth, screwed up the wrapper, and tossed it in the trash. “We found ’em.”
“Who?” I asked.
“Those Robin McHoodie cart-egging, meter-payin’ motherbitches,” Sanchez spat from behind me. “What’s pendeja doin’ here?”
“She can handle.” Leticia swung her feet off the desk and stood up. “Plus she all up with the cops ’n’ shit.”
“Cops?” I said.
“We gonna go all bounty-hunter militia on their ass and citizen’s arrest ’em.”
Sanchez smacked her fist into her palm. “Can’t fuckin’ wait.” She wore a roll of duct tape around her wrist like a giant bracelet.
A low curtsy to the Queen Mary of all bad ideas.
“Uh, guys. That’s not how this works. At all.” I rubbed my forehead. “This is breaking and entering, kidnapping, assault.”
“We don’t need this friggin’ pussy-ho,” Sanchez said.
“Oh, they’re gonna go nice and peaceful-like, won’t they, McGrane?”
Cat wrangling at its finest—keeping Leticia and Sanchez out of jail.
Leticia tipped her head to the side, put her hand to her mouth, and yelled, “Ivanović!”
Gorilla filled the doorway. “Yes?”
Sanchez pressed her lips tight together. She hadn’t forgotten his Frijolero comment.
“Us girls,” Leticia said. “We’re gonna take us a lil’ trip. Wanna come?”
“Shit.” Sanchez ran her hands along the burled walnut console in between the rear captain’s chairs in the Range Rover. “Friggin’ car is nicer than my house.”
We were back at Ashland and Belmont, home of the unwashed and frowsy.
Leticia put her hand on Ivanović’s bicep and squeezed as we neared A Peace of the Sixties. “Slow down. That’s it. Their hidey-hole’s under The Hemp House.”
Gorilla pulled into an alley. “What is tactical plan?”
Leticia and Sanchez looked at each other and shrugged.
Yeah, they have a plan, all right.
“Kick the friggin’ door in and bust their asses!” Sanchez said.
“That’s it?” I said. Jaysus Criminey. I’m a fecking cop!
Leticia nodded. Gorilla shook his head. “That is not a plan.” He sighed and pointed at me. “She knocks on door. Asks for help. They open door. We go in, subdue. Call police.”
“You know it, Sanch!” Leticia said.
“Why does McGrane get to knock on the door?” Sanchez complained.
“Because she is only one that is not dangerous or in uniform,” Ivanović said. “You are certain they are there?”
“A safe bet.” I glanced at my watch. Eight twenty-five a.m. “Potheads aren’t exactly early risers.”
No good will come of this.
Hoping to stave off far worse, I got out of the car.
Hank’s Law Number Five: Make it look easy.
The others followed, Gorilla keeping them a suitable distance behind me. Cigarette butts, cans, wrappers, and some un-environmentally-conscious plastic bags with The Hemp House cluttered the sidewalk. I took the cement stairway to the basement apartment under the store and waited until Gorilla had Leticia and Sanchez in position.
The door was covered in peeling black paint with randomly plastered rainbow-colored The Hemp House stickers. I knocked on it, hard.
Nothing.
I turned to the gang and raised my shoulders. Sanchez jabbed a finger at me. I kicked the foot of the door. Hard.
“Maaan, do you know what time it is?” croaked a voice from behind the door. “Step back. So’s I can see you.”
I stepped into peephole range.
“Uhhh. Girl? Do I know you?”
“Does it matter? I left my cell here like three days ago!” I kicked the door again. “Let me in!”
“Gahhhd. Chill.” He unfastened several locks and opened the door.
The first thing that went in was my boot. The smell of wet garbage and pot seeping out of the apartment was eye-watering.
“Ho-there, sister.” A skinny white guy with dreads wearing a greasy blanket poncho fingered his goatee. He stood in my way, his foot and leg behind the door. Maybe a weapon, too. This wasn’t new to him. “I think you got us confused with somebody else.”
I heaved a world-weary sigh. “I just want my damn phone.”
“I’m like the resident pot hermit, and I ain’t never seen you in—”
Gorilla dropped over the rails and kicked in the door. Dreads hit the floor, wind knocked out of him. We entered, Gorilla with gun drawn. Leticia and Sanchez burst in behind us.
I had my Kubotan out. No fecking way I was pulling my Kimber.
Not yet.
A guy in a dirty Warhol-styled Mao tee struggled to sit up from the couch. Assorted bongs and a vaporizer covered the coffee table.
Leticia fanned a hand in front of her face. “Damn, this place smells like ass!”
Gorilla and I left the two guys to Leticia and Sanchez. We went through the three bedrooms and bathroom, rousting and rounding up three more men.
“On couch!” Ivanović barked, motioning with his gun with one hand, grabbing a guy by the neck and shoving him with the other.
They did as they were told. There’d be no stand for pride. That had been lost long ago.
“Do you know who we are, motherbitches?” Sanchez demanded.
Mao picked up a pair of trendy black-rimmed glasses from a milk crate end table and put them on. “Oh fuck . . . Meter maids? Hey, how ’bout everybody take it easy.” Mao scratched his arm nervously, fla
shing a Gucci watch and needle tracks. “Smoke a bowl while we talk this shit out, you know? Plenty to go round, man.”
His parents supported his major in World Cultural Pluralism. Now they’re supporting his heroin habit.
Sanchez got right in his face. “Asswipe! Don’t you open your fucking mouth again! You wanna throw eggs at me? You think thas some funny shit?”
Mao curled into the couch arm.
Sanchez kicked Dreads in the shin. “Leticia!” she yelled over her shoulder. “Open that fridge, see if they got any eggs, yo!”
But Leticia had passed through the galley kitchen. “McGrane, get in here!”
I threaded my way through the beyond-disgusting kitchen into a tidy dining nook.
Leticia pointed at the dining nook wall, which held five hooks, each with a green hoodie with red feather. “They think they some mofo superheroes. Stupid-ass suburbials.”
The nook held a rectangular dining table and chairs. Plastic bins, neat and orderly, contained checks, money orders, bank receipts, and envelopes at one end. At the other, reams of paper that were actually self-folding envelopes.
The header had a mouse wearing a hoodie beneath a Robin Hood–style hat, holding a bow. Across the page, his arrow was stuck in the coin slot of an expired parking meter. Beneath the cartoon was a message in hokey Ye Olde English type.
Greetings Kind Traveler,
Our faire city is rife with rascals out to rob the poor and penitent. But we bow down before no man. We fight not for glory nor wealth, but for freedom alone.
In other words, we saved ye from a vile and unjust parking fine. Huzzah!
Please send us half your parking fine, so we can continue to rail against the tyranny and oppression of limited parking.
Huzzah!
Robin McHoodie and his Merry Men
Leticia came up behind me and picked up a container of a dozen rubber stamps and ink pads. “Each addressed to different P.O. boxes.”
The average expired meter fine was sixty dollars.
This wasn’t a little operation. This was thousands of dollars. City dollars.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. Shite.
“This ain’t little, is it?” Leticia grinned.
“Nope,” I said. “Aggravated Battery of Government Employees, Obstruction of Governmental Administration. Class 1 Felony fraud. Class 4 Felony marijuana possession. And more.”
Much, much more.
She put an arm around my shoulder. “Here’s what we’re gonna do, McGrane. You’re gonna call your brother, have him come in here, and make the bust. I’m gonna call the local news.”
“No media, Leticia. Seriously. I need five minutes, and Ivanović and I can’t be here when Cash shows up.”
“Thas cool.” She gave a shimmy of delight. “Sanchez and I can get our story straight.” She leaned away from me. “Yo, Sanchez. Tape ’em up!”
I walked outside, ignoring the whining and moaning of the Robin McHoodies and the unmistakable tearing sound of duct tape.
Cripes. I’m a Chicago police officer.
I called Cash.
He answered on the third ring. “Whassup, Snap?”
“I need a favor.”
“How big?”
“Massive.” I took a deep breath and explained.
“You’ll need me and Koji.” He snorted. “Jaysus feckin’ Christ, how do you—”
“Cash, we’re talking five drug addicts duct-taped in an apartment. I don’t know how dangerous they are, but they’re wily.”
“This is gonna cost you . . .”
“I know. I know. I know. Anything.”
“No, Maisie,” Cash said, ominously. “It’s going to cost you everything.”
Gorilla and I pulled away as Cash and Koji rolled up in separate cars.
He hadn’t let me move to the front seat, but he appeared quite chipper. A date with Leticia and scaring the hell out of five spoiled druggies put a spring in his step.
And I was opportunistic enough to take advantage. “Will you please to take me to see my uncle Edward?”
“Why does this Edward not come to see you at Mr. Renko’s apartment?”
“He has dementia. Silverthorn Estates is hospital apartment living—doctors and nurses watch over him.”
Still in the throes of passion, Gorilla grunted his assent and drove me to the assisted living facility.
He parked in the visitor’s lot. “I come with.”
I let him shepherd me into the lobby. Instead of taking the private elevator, I went to the reception desk and flashed my Onyx-wing badge. “I was wondering if I could get a pass for my friend, Mr. Ivanović to visit my Uncle Edward Dunne?”
She typed something into the computer. “I’m afraid not. He’s had a difficult last two days.”
I turned to Gorilla. “I really need to see him.”
He gave a heavy sigh and sunk his hands into his pants pockets. “I wait in lobby.”
I was inside the elevator, pressing the fourth- and fifth-floor buttons before the doors even opened all the way. Detective/RN Anita Erickson met me. “What gives, Rook?”
“I need Kaplan, Sawyer, and Dunne for a debrief ASAP. I don’t know how long my babysitter’s gonna wait.”
“Sawyer’s out. Scorpion’s in her office. Head there and I’ll see what I can do.” She took off in the other direction, talking on her micro headset.
I hustled through CSI Central and knocked on Kaplan’s door. With a click it sprang ajar. I pushed it open and went to close it. “Leave it,” she ordered, coming around the desk in an amber-colored pantsuit. She gestured to the conference table. “Take a seat. Edward will be here momentarily.”
Edward bustled into her office before I was able to sit down.
Kaplan opened a folder. “The information we obtained from the train was solid. The VINs on the parts have all been burnt off, which raises evidentiary difficulties. We need a track back to Renko and his men.”
I shook my head. “Renko hates computers. He makes a list of parts ordered, disguises them as people’s names, and hand-delivers them to the garage. He selects a year for a specific phone book, a single letter and number, neither of which I could discern, and the garage owner opens one of a dozen Chicago phonebooks from the 1980s and deciphers the code.”
“Clever and innocuous.” Edward chuckled. “Nothing like returning to the tried-and-true book cipher secret code of the seventeen hundreds.”
“But we have time for that.” Kaplan raised a shoulder in unconcern. “The real prize is the evidence we’re now tracking. The trailers unloaded at ten different garage and auto parts distributors throughout New Jersey and New York. When we move, that’ll take a nice bite of flesh from Don Constantino’s working crew.”
“Unless, of course, Walt trades it to the Feds,” Edward said.
Kaplan looked me straight in the eyes. “Nice work, Agent McGrane.”
Whoa! Didn’t see that one coming.
“Thank you.” I tucked my hair behind my ears. “Stannislav prefers to physically see every aspect possible.”
“How so?”
I pulled over the map of the CEC Intermodal train yard and tapped a finger on the bluffs. “We watched his containers load from this mesa top over here.”
Edward circled the spot with a highlighter.
“We flew to New York, drove into Newark, and watched them unload there, as well,” I said. Kaplan looked at my hands. My fingers were twisting and wringing against each other. I laid my palms on the table. “I’m not here to debrief the chop.”
“Oh?” Kaplan said.
“Renko is going to hijack two closed-transport semis loaded with new luxury cars and ship them to Juárez. I don’t know the street value, but retail’s in the neighborhood of one-point-two million dollars.”
Kaplan leaned forward. “Where and when?”
“This week. Friday? Tomorrow? I have no idea.”
“Danger to hostages?”
I looked blankly at her.
She gave an irritated shake of her head. “The drivers?”
“Renko may be incredibly violent, but he’s equally disciplined. Killing the drivers would force attention on an act that neither the carmakers nor the insurance companies want to go public. I can’t guarantee the drivers will be untouched, but they’ll be left alive.”
“When will you know?”
“I won’t.” I shook my head.
Kaplan scoffed. “It’s your job as a field agent to find out.”
“Danny,” Edward warned. “Maisie’s continued intel is far more valuable to us than a flash-bang collar.”
“Besides. If I do find out when and where,” I said, “it’ll be too late. I’ll be with him.”
Kaplan sat back and folded her arms across her chest. “HRT?” she asked Edward with a snake-like smile.
Hostage Response Team?
Cripes. The Feds?
“Walt will have to clear it.” Edward turned to me. “Best guess, how many would be with you?”
“If he ships them via intermodal rail. If he takes me to watch”—I tapped the circled hill on the map—“we’ll be here watching from his Range Rover. Driver, two guards, Renko, and me. Five.”
Kaplan nodded. “Doable.” She pushed away from the table. “I’ll get our freelancer in here ASAP.”
We watched her slim, sticklike figure march out of the office.
“Blood in the water,” Edward said. “She can’t help herself.”
“Yeah.” I cleared my throat. “Blood.”
“Master criminals are often extremely charismatic, Maisie. It’s human nature to like him.”
“I better bounce. Renko’s man is waiting.”
Edward gave me a sad smile. “Undercover work can leave some sizeable scars.”
I’m starting to figure that out.
Chapter 36
My phone rang on the way out of Kaplan’s office.
Hank!
I trotted over to an unused glass cubicle and answered the phone.
“You a ‘go’ tonight, Peaches?” he said.
Abso-firmative-lutely! “You bet.”
“Where should I pick you up?”
“Um . . . It’ll be easier if I come to you.” I crossed my fingers. I’ll think of something.