Prince of Thieves

by Chuck Hogan

  Jem stood there with his 9mm drawn on Doug. Doug froze, losing it a moment in Jem's sight, Jem holding the pose, grinning-- then returning the gun to his holster and snapping the leather catch. "You want the Tec-9?"

  "Don't care," Doug said, dizzy. "Just put a gun in my hand."

  Jem tossed him a loaded Beretta, Doug basket-catching it. Jem admired the Tec in his hand, an oversized pistol with a clip feed in front of the trigger. "Yeah," he said, then put it down on the bed and fit his thumbs into the front of his gun belt, strutting around the room. "All those years watching Cops finally paying off." He smiled, enjoying himself, grinding his jaw the way dust makes you do. "I'd've made a good cop. A rich cop." He stopped and tried his delivery-- "License and registration, ma'am"-- impressing himself, continuing his cop strut around the room. "Fucking ticket to ride, man. How you ever gonna walk away from this?"

  Doug couldn't see any way to go forward or backward. To walk or to stay. He looked at the gun in his hand. I'm not that guy anymore. But here he was.

  "By the way," said Jem. "I put you in after all."

  Doug shook his head. "Put me in what?"

  "The third floor. Shyne's dollhouse. I took the chance. Maybe you'll change your mind. You walked away once before and found your way back again."

  * * *

  FRAWLEY WAS STALLED IN traffic downtown, grappling with his car phone, wipers slashing rain. He couldn't get any numbers for Fenway Park from information. Nobody from the Task Force was in the Lakeville office yet, so the field office was calling New York for Provident Armored's headquarters number. He did manage to catch Dino at home and stop him from heading out to Lakeville. Now Dino was calling him back.

  "My captain took it straight to the commissioner. You're sure now."

  Frawley leaned on his horn. "I got it from the sister."

  "Coughlin's sister?"

  "They're going in strong. Some bullshit about a 'last job,' MacRay leaving after. That's all I know."

  "Any clue how security works at Fenway?"

  "None, but Dean-- you gotta keep patrol cops away."

  "There'll be nothing on the radio."

  "And no helicopters to scare them off."

  "Easy now, Frawl. We got Entry and Apprehension Team suiting up as we speak. That's our SWAT. They're on a scrambled freq. Do we know where these tea-pissers are jumping from?"

  "We know nothing but the time." Frawley looked at his radio clock. "And it's fucking eight forty-five now! What's with this traffic?"

  "That's another thing. It's the rain, but also my cap says they got two separate major jams, one westbound on Storrow, one in Kenmore Square."

  "Kenmore Square?" said Frawley, punching the thin ceiling of the Tempo. "That's our guys!"

  "A semi stalled across the intersection. The one on Storrow is an oversized rental van jammed under one of those height-restricted bridges. Both vehicles were abandoned, left locked up and running."

  "Fucking-- it's them, Dean!"

  Frawley hung up and threw his phone, unable to bear the thought of missing these guys. Of not being there to hook up MacRay.

  Screw the field office. Frawley bumped over a curb, gouging the Tempo's undercarriage on the street corner, swinging up one of the side streets climbing Beacon Hill, heading directly to Fenway.

  * * *

  DOUG SAT NEXT TO Jem in the backseat of the big Thunderbird, parked at the corner of Yawkey and Van Ness. Gloansy sat behind the popped ignition in front, Dez next to him. The windows were all cracked open in the drumming rain to keep their view from fogging. Doug saw the G everywhere, on the spilling rooftops, in surrounding windows, in every car that passed.

  The can was three minutes overdue; the news radio station was in hysterics over the traffic tie-ups. Jem thumped his black shoes into the floor, marching in place as he sat, the sound like a pounding heart.

  "I don't know," said Doug, going secretly crazy. "I don't know about this."

  "Can's stuck in traffic with the rest of them," said Gloansy.

  "I don't know."

  Dez turned his head. "What do you mean?"

  Doug was trying to give them at least a chance. "Doesn't feel right."

  Jem said, "Everything's cool. We're gonna do this."

  "I think something's up."

  "Check this out." Jem unbuckled the clips on the front of his raincoat. In addition to the Glock in his holster and the semiauto Tec-9 strapped off his shoulder, he wore four fat pinecone grenades, World War style, affixed to his cop belt with black electrical tape. "From my gramps," Jem said. "Guy was a fuckin' war hero." He flicked at the little metal pins, still in place.

  Dez said, "Those live?"

  Gloansy said, "For Christ. You're gonna blow us up in here."

  "Insurance, ant-dicks. You think they'd let anything happen to historic Fenway? These are our tickets out. One for each."

  Dez glanced over the seatback at Doug, Doug fed up with his altar-boy disapproval.

  Jem clipped up his coat again, white-blue eyes brimming with dusted confidence. "We're gonna do this. We're gonna do this."

  Lightning brightened the street, Doug thinking it was a flash-bang charge, the G swooping down on them. He waited for thunder. There was none.

  He couldn't sit still another moment. He opened his door and stood out of the T-bird, shutting the door before any of them could say anything, starting away through the rain.

  He turned onto Boylston, the chime ringing as he pushed inside the package store. Bewildering, the lights, the colorful promotions-- it had been a long time. He cut down a long aisle of wines to the back cooler. Two sixes of High Life longnecks waited for him on the rack. He grabbed both and brought them to the counter.

  There was a cop waiting there: Dez, dripping on the floor. "What are you doing?"

  Doug had no money in his uniform pockets. "Give me some money."

  Dez said, "Put it down. Come on. Let's go-- "

  "Shut the fuck up." Doug turned to the cashier. "Put these on the police account." Without waiting for an acknowledgment, he walked out past Dez.

  Dez caught up with him on the rainy sidewalk. "Duggy! What's happening to you? You don't need this-- "

  Doug shoved Dez back with an elbow. "I fucking told you not to come."

  Doug returned to the car first, his wet coat crinkling as he sat. "The fuck was that?" said Jem, before seeing the twin caddies of tall boys.

  Doug said, "Thought you wanted to be there for my first one back."

  Jem's smile grew wide and fierce, all-encompassing. "Duggy Mac is back."

  Doug passed one of the sixes over the seat to Gloansy as Dez returned, settling in, not removing his orange hood. Doug reached for his Leatherman, finding it missing. A twinge of panic as he pictured it sitting forgotten on his bureau-- a tool he had carried with him on every job.

  No matter. The trick, when you don't have an opener, is to use one beer for leverage, inverting it and hooking the cap of the beer to be popped, then twisting and pulling back the top one like snapping a stick in two. Doug cracked one for Jem and one for himself.

  Genie mist escaped out of its small mouth. Doug's chest was pounding.

  Jem waited for Gloansy to crack two, then said reverently, "To the Town."

  Jem rapped fists with Doug, neither one spilling a drop. Doug said, "Here's how."

  He brought the bottle to his lips, the beer splashing hard to the back of his throat, tasteless at first, swallowed like seawater. Then came the tang, the bite. His throat worked the brew along until the bottle was empty and weightless, the taste settling into his tongue like surf foam sinking into sand.

  The first belch was an echo from a dark abyss. He popped open another and caught sight of Dez, slow to drink his first, disappointment and disapproval evident in the sag of his shoulders. Doug drank harder.

  The other part of Doug was coming out now. The old Doug MacRay, the one resigned to his fate. The Jem in him who was damned and knew it. Never prison again. His only goal now.
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  No tomorrow: that was what Billy T. had been all about. No consequences, nobody to disappoint, not Dez, not Frank G., not even Doug himself. Nothing could touch him now.

  Jem cracked open his third, ahead of Doug, meaning Doug was without another bottle to open his. He was working on the cap with his Krazy Glue fingers when Jem let out a war whoop.

  The red light was on over the ambulance door on Van Ness.

  The silver Provident truck turned off Ipswich, starting down the road, slowing at the rising door. It swung around, stopped, and began to back inside.

  The black Suburban pulled up at the curb outside Fenway as the bay door closed.

  Jem dropped his empty on the floor, kicking open his door to the street and the rain.

  Doug stood out on the sidewalk, the downpour cracking loud against his hood. Dez got out in front of Doug, standing there, not looking at him, waiting for Gloansy. Those two started up Van Ness toward the Suburban as Doug crossed the street through blowing wet sheets, side by side with Jem, walking toward the Gate D entrance and looking for the G in every raindrop, thinking, ambush, ambush, ambush.

  52

  The Last Job

  JEM PULLED HARD A few times on the chained gate.

  The red shirt sitting dry and comfortable on the folding chair inside looked up from his newspaper, then dropped it at the sight of the cops, hustling to the entrance.

  Jem said, "Was it you who called?"

  He was a young guy, cinnamon-skinned, puffy, maybe Samoan but not huge. "Huh?"

  "Nine one one call, we got. Open up."

  "I didn't... it wasn't..."

  "Robbery call. Who else is here?"

  "Robbery?" He looked around, panicked.

  "There's no one else here?"

  "Sure there is, but-- "

  "Call says you're being held up. Right now."

  "Then I need to phone security."

  "Phone whoever you want, but we gotta get in there first, do our jobs. Then make your call."

  He nodded and unlocked the chain, admitting Doug and Jem.

  Doug stiffened up to hide his jumpiness. "Go ahead, lock it back up if you have to."

  As the red shirt did, Doug and Jem both unclasped the bottoms of their coats, baring their holsters. With the rain and the lack of lights, it was darker than a night game in there.

  "Where's everyone else?" said Jem, starting down the ramp.

  "Some around the corner there. Let me-- "

  "And what is your name, sir?"

  "My name's Eric."

  "Eric, point me in the right direction here. Let's make sure everyone's safe, then we can all sit down and make our phone calls."

  Eric nodded obediently and showed them the way, moving down the slope toward the corner. Doug glimpsed the open Employees Only door, and then, wider, the tunnel.

  The motorized flatbed pushcart was on its way toward the first aid station at the tunnel's end, loaded with thick bundles of plastic-wrapped cash. One gray-and-black Provident guard operated the cart's handle controls, the other backing him up with one hand on his holster. Doug double-checked their ears, seeing no wires.

  Jem started after them, his voice booming inside the tunnel. "Who called 911?"

  The guards stopped, turning fast, spooked.

  "Who called it?" said Jem, hand at his waist, coattails flapping. Doug pushed Eric down to the floor, telling him to stay still, lie flat.

  The guards looked at each other, hands on their holsters.

  The anxiety in Doug's voice worked as he said, following Jem, "We got a distress call. Who made the call?"

  The guards stayed between Jem and Doug and the money cart. "No call from us."

  "Who called it?" said Jem, pressing closer.

  "Hold on," said one guard, raising his off-hand.

  "ID!" said Jem, not stopping. "Let's see some ID! Both of you!"

  "Hold on, hold it, now," said the guard, half into a protective crouch.

  "Whoa, whoa!" said Jem.

  "Don't do that!" shouted Doug.

  "We didn't hit it!" said one guard.

  "We're on the job here!" said the other.

  Two Fenway Park security blue shirts appeared at the mouth of the tunnel behind them. "What the...?"

  "Get down back there!" commanded Doug.

  They put their arms out like this was all a big misunderstanding. "It's okay!" they yelled. "They're okay!"

  Doug drew his Beretta, keeping it low at his hip, muzzle down. "Everybody on the ground, now!"

  "For our safety!" said Jem, also drawing. "I want IDs from everybody!"

  Twenty yards away, Doug just kept asserting himself. "Get down!"

  "Wait, hey!" said the guards.

  "On the floor!" yelled Jem.

  The blue shirts lay facedown.

  The panicky guard pulled his sidearm clear of his holster. Doug swung up his Beretta, aiming, bracing it on his opposite forearm. "Gun!" he yelled. "Gun!"

  "Drop your weapon!" bellowed Jem, aiming his Glock. "Put it down now!"

  "No, no!" said the other guard, covering his head, backing away.

  Jem and Doug came at them gun-first, with legit tension: "Drop your weapon! We got a call! Put it down!"

  Guard yelling, "We did not call!"

  Doug stopped ten yards away. The four of them barking back and forth over drawn guns until the retreating guard dropped to his knee, took his hand off his holster, and laid on his belly, arms out.

  "Stop resisting!" they yelled at the other one. "Get down! Get down!"

  Cursing, the panicky second guard yielded, lying down arms-out, still holding on to his gun.

  Doug and Jem came up fast, Jem stepping on the armed guard's wrist, covering both guards, Doug going to the blue shirts beyond the cash cart, gathering hands and binding them with plastic ties. The can idled just around the corner from the mouth of the tunnel, backed in-- the driver unable to see or hear anything.

  Doug ripped off the blue shirts' security radios and tossed them away. "Lie still," he told them, rejoining Jem, pocketing the other guard's gun and yanking his stiff hands behind his back. "Jesus Christ," spat Doug's guard, red-faced, gruff. "The fuck're you two doing? We're on the goddamn job here!"

  "We got a call," said Doug, binding the guard's wrists. Doug then pulled up the black bandanna knotted around his neck, covering his mouth and nose and leaving only his eyes visible. Jem did the same as Doug turned and started back for Eric.

  The puffy guy was already sitting up. Incomprehension, at first-- masked cop with gun raised, coming at him-- then Eric got to his feet and, with one hand on the tunnel wall, began to run for his life.

  Doug yelled at him to stop as the round whizzed past. The crack of the gunshot echoed in the tunnel, and Eric turned, still galloping, his cinnamon hands reaching for the hip of his jeans as though trying to catch the bullet that had just entered his side. He ran like that a few more feet before collapsing-- the shock of having been shot bringing him down, not the round itself.

  Doug turned, seeing Jem with his 9mm still aimed, his knee and his opposite hand on the backs of the two squirming guards.

  Doug rushed to Eric, who was gripping his wide hip in horror. But all four limbs were moving, and he had plenty of padding to absorb the round. Doug hoped the rain would do the same to the gunshot report.

  He wrestled one of Eric's wrists away from the tiny wound, then the other, binding them behind his back. "There'll be help here soon," said Doug, leaning on his shoulder for emphasis. "Stay down and shut up."

  He ran back to where Jem was, wasting a glare at him, then yanking his guard to his feet. The guard twisted and fought, Doug finally bouncing the guy off the wall, stunning him before muscling him around the corner.

  Doug got the full view of the silver can there, the Provident medallion bold beneath the rear windows. He dumped the guard down against the brick wall and walked up to the passenger side of the cab to get the driver's attention.