The King of Swords

by Nick Stone

  He stopped.

  ‘Why are you investigating me?’ the man repeated, no change in his tone, no impatience; someone with the upper hand and all the time in the world to play it.

  ‘Because I’m a fucken’ cop, genius!’ Max snapped. ‘Where’s Sandra?’

  No reply to that. Without moving his head or body, Max quickly glanced about him. Hints of metal and the very slightest outlines of the people holding it, figures in dark relief. He thought he could smell stale sweat, cigarettes and aftershave. He could smell candy too.

  ‘Give me back what’s mine and I’ll give you your woman.’

  This time the man spoke to Max’s left. Max didn’t turn to follow the sound.

  The beach party was carrying on regardless, in splendid isolation. They were mangling ‘God Only Knows’.

  ‘You mean Ismael? He’s in police custody. I can’t bust him out of that.’

  ‘He’s not in custody,’ the man said. ‘He’s in one of your safehouses. Look–’

  ‘The Emperor tell you that?’ Max interjected, trying to tilt things his way, lessen the odds.

  It didn’t work.

  ‘Look in your mailbox,’ the man continued in exactly the same smooth, emotionless way, ‘you’ll find a number there. If you have what I want, call no later than 7.00 p.m. tomorrow. No stalling, no delays or your woman dies.’

  ‘Well, you hear this, Boukman–or whoever the fuck you are,’ Max snarled, turning around. ‘You hurt a hair on her head, you’re a dead man. You, your whole fucken’ crew and that cocksucker who’s been protectin’ you all these years–you’re all fucken’ dead!’

  He waited for a reaction.

  None came. His rage was swallowed in a vacuum, there was just the same controlled silence between them; beyond that, the noise of the world.

  And then, one by one, anti-clockwise, he heard guns being de-cocked, then low murmurs in a language he didn’t know drifting away from him, dispersing all over the beach in different directions, like a flock of songless birds.

  He thought he heard a woman laugh.

  Max stayed put and, in his head, counted very slowly to a hundred. When he finished he started again, in reverse.

  At zero he took a few tentative steps forward, paused, listened, walked a little further, paused, listened–then ran like a motherfucker back to his apartment building.

  62

  ‘You sure she’s still alive?’ Eldon asked Max as he handed him a tumbler of whisky.

  ‘Yes, I’m sure of it. I can feel it. I can feel her.’ Max took the glass and downed half its contents in one continuous motion.

  ‘Amputees can “feel” lost limbs too, Max.’ Eldon frowned.

  Max gave him a sharp look. ‘Well, in cold, practical terms, Eldon, it doesn’t make any sense for Boukman to have already killed Sandra. He wants Ismael back.’ Max swallowed the rest of the whisky and put the glass down. ‘But either which way it’s fucked. Say I turn up with Ismael, Boukman might kill the three of us on the spot, or maybe he’ll pop Ismael and Sandra, and leave me alive so I can take the rap for springin’ a suspect and watch Sandra die over and over again in my memory. And if I don’t go through with it, he’ll kill Sandra anyway. This motherfucker is not going to negotiate. It’s either his way or no way.’

  It was 4.15 in the morning. Max and Joe were sitting at the coffee table in the corner of Eldon’s office, flanking their boss, who occupied the couch. It was a full house. Also there were Jed Powers; Emilio Anorga from the DEA–a stout, big-chested, thick-limbed man, whose bushy black horseshoe of a moustache with ends stopping at the edge of his chin had earned him the nickname YMCA, after the Village People; Daryl Loewen–a redheaded ex-Marine with near translucent eyelashes and skin so pale he always wore a hat outdoors to stave off sunburn; and Rico Casados from SWAT, who friends called Chief Firestorm partly because of all the shoot-outs he’d been involved in and because his mother was Seminole.

  Max had called Joe first to tell him what had happened. They’d talked tactics for an hour, then Max had called Eldon, who’d told them to come over to his office. They’d assumed it would be just them, but Eldon had summone dawar council.

  ‘You got any ideas?’ Eldon looked from Max to Joe and back to Max. His wart was stop-sign red.

  ‘Yeah.’ Max finished his drink and lit a cigarette. Eldon slid his marble ashtray over the table to him. ‘We’ve got the names and addresses of the main SNBC players. Boukman has an inner circle, people he trusts. He’ll have at least some of those people at the meet, for back-up. We put them under surveillance. Tail them. They’ll know where the meet’s going down, and they’ll be heading there well before me.

  ‘Solomon’s going to assume that if I turn up to the meet, I’ll have back-up, that this’ll be a police operation. So we put that idea out of his head completely. We plant a news story that Ismael’s been busted out of custody. We get it out on the radio and TV, we get it out on all the police frequencies. Boukman’ll be tuning in somewhere for sure.’

  ‘Like that Capricorn One movie where they fake the landing on Mars?’ Rico laughed incredulously.

  ‘Something like that, yeah.’ Max nodded. ‘It’ll have to look convincing if it’s on TV.’

  He looked at Eldon for signs of disapproval, saw none, carried on.

  ‘Now, we’ve traced the number he left me to a callbox on 73rd Street in Liberty City. I figure Boukman’s going to play phone tag with me before he tells me where to meet. When I call I’ll be told to go to another phone somewhere else and wait for it to ring. He’ll do that a few times. All the while I’m driving around, he’ll have me followed to make sure I’ve got Ismael with me, and that I haven’t brought back-up. I can wear a wire. You can have a chopper tail me.’

  Eldon smiled.

  ‘We’re one step ahead of you ’cause we’re sitting on the SNBC right now,’ he said.

  ‘How come?’ Max looked at him quizzically.

  ‘We talked to Ismael yesterday after Liston left.’ Eldon flicked his eyes in Joe’s direction. ‘We cross-referenced the names he gave you in case he was holding out.’

  ‘Was he?’ Max asked.

  ‘No, but he was very helpful with additional details–minor points.’ Eldon smiled his lupine grin, all gleaming, sated teeth.

  ‘How long’s surveillance been up?’

  ‘Since seven yesterday evening.’

  ‘Seven? Did you tail anyone to the beach last night?’

  ‘We sure did.’

  ‘So you knew I’d met Boukman?’

  ‘No. We couldn’t get close enough without blowing our cover. Sixteen people went out there. Twelve were SNBC elite. One was Bonbon, two were these women he always has with him, and there was one other–a man. Must’ve been Boukman.’

  ‘Did you get visual ID?’

  ‘No. They took photographs, but they didn’t get his face.’

  ‘Shit.’ Max felt disappointed. They’d almost had Boukman there and then. They could’ve taken him down. But what would have happened to Sandra?

  ‘We’ll run with your plan,’ Eldon said. ‘I’m going to start making some calls now. Emilio, what can you bring to the party?’

  ‘Twenty or so troops,’ Anorga said.

  ‘Rico?’

  ‘Three units,’ Casados replied. ‘What kind of numbers you anticipating?’

  ‘No idea. He ain’t gonna come to this light.’

  ‘Weaponry?’

  ‘Better shit than us. They’re criminals,’ Eldon said. ‘What about you, Daryl?’

  ‘There’s one thing we’re not considering here.’ Loewen leant slightly across the table towards Eldon. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Ismael.’

  ‘What about him?’ Eldon frowned.

  ‘You’re not really taking him to Boukman?’

  ‘That’s the idea.’

  ‘You can’t do that.’ Loewen shook his head.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘You can’t use him as a bargaining chip. He’s too val
uable.’ Loewen had a nasal tone which gave everything he said the irritating, whiny undertone of a mosquito on a sleepless night. ‘So what do you suggest?’

  ‘Get a vehicle with tinted windows. Put a dummy in there.’

  ‘A dummy?’ Eldon looked at him like he was talking shit in a foreign language. His wart went crimson.

  ‘You’ll be putting a key witness in a massive criminal conspiracy in the line of fire.’ ‘So?’

  ‘What about the deal you offered him?’

  ‘What “deal”, Daryl? I didn’t offer him any “deal”,’ Eldon said. ‘What about the DA, what about his lawyer? Weren’t they supposed to be meeting today?’

  ‘Yes, they were,’ Eldon said, ‘but things have changed. Ismael talked. On the record.’

  ‘But what about the investigation?’

  ‘This ain’t an investigation any more, Daryl. This is war. They touched one of us, so we kill all of them. Miami justice at its simplest and most efficient. No one fucks with my crew and lives happily ever after,’ Eldon said coldly. ‘Consider this piece of shit, Daryl. Ismael is Boukman’s money man. Just ’cause he uses a pen and a calculator instead of a gun doesn’t make him any less of a scumbag. In fact, it makes him more of one. All you ever hear from these little ghetto fucks we roust is how they “‘never had no chance, never had no choice”. You know that litany–never had no schoolin’, never had no dads, never had no mamas, never had no chance, never had no choice–what else were they supposed to do but hit the highway to crime? A lot of people with liberal stirrings buy into that crap. I don’t–even if it is maybe a little bit true. But let’s say it’s completely true. What kind of excuse does Sam Ismael have? None what-so-fucken’-ever! He had schoolin’, he had a daddy, he had a momma, he had a chance–and he blew it–he had a choice–and he chose wrong. So fuck him!’

  ‘We’re deliberately putting a suspect in harm’s way,’ Loewen insisted.

  ‘It’s a bit late in your fucken’ day to turn into a paragon of virtue, Daryl!’ Eldon roared and Loewen flinched. ‘Ismael ain’t even a suspect now. He’s guilty. He’s confessed. Signed and sealed. That piece of shit helped run a multi-million-dollar drug empire. The Lemon City programme he fronted? He knew people had been killed over that! Whole fucken’ families–children, Daryl, children. And they took the fucken’ babies. God knows what those voodoo fucks did to ’em! So give me a fucken’ break with your pieties! Get your head straight and your code in order!’

  Max saw Joe smirking at Eldon and shaking his head.

  ‘Who are you protecting, Daryl? The innocent woman who’s been kidnapped, or some asshole cocksucker criminal who’s life ain’t worth a second of hers? We’re here to get her and Max out of this alive. That’s all you should be thinking of right now. If you’re gonna get an attack of ethics then fuck off, we don’t need you!’ Eldon yelled, his temper gauge deep burgundy.

  Eldon and Daryl went eye to eye across the table. Both men’s shoulders tensed. Daryl looked like he wanted any excuse to punch Eldon. Eldon looked like he was going to give him one. A heavy anticipatory silence fell around the room.

  Eldon broke it.

  ‘Are you with us, Daryl?’

  Loewen didn’t reply.

  ‘Are–you–with–us? Daryl?’ Eldon repeated, his bottom lip quivering. Max had never seen him quite so angry before.

  ‘I can commit twenty-five men,’ Daryl said weakly and sat back in his chair, pissed off but defeated.

  ‘Thank you, Daryl,’ Eldon said sarcastically, staring at him like he’d just tossed him off a plane at high altitude.

  ‘Who’s running the op?’ Max asked, to refocus the room.

  ‘I am.’ Eldon turned to Max.

  ‘You? When was the last time you handled tactical ops?’

  ‘About 1881.’ Eldon chuckled. ‘Jed’ll coordinate, but I’ll be right next to him. You ain’t going through this on your own.’

  ‘That’s absolutely right,’ Joe said. ‘I’m goin’ with you, Max.’

  ‘No.’ Max shook his head. ‘I already stand a good chance of losing one person I care about. I ain’t pushing that to two.’

  ‘You’re not losing anyone,’ Joe countered. ‘I got you into this, I’m getting you out.’

  ‘He’s right,’ Eldon said, without looking at Joe. ‘No one goes to hell alone.’

  63

  Friday morning. Carmine woke up and found Solomon standing at the end of his bed, partly illuminated by the thin spears of light slicing through the gaps in the blinds and falling across his dark blue shirt and parts of his face. Carmine wasn’t so much looking at Solomon as at what he was holding–the M21 sniper rifle he’d used to hunt gators with Sam. He’d left it in the store. They must have collected it with Risquée’s thawed remains.

  ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Do this one thing and you’re free to go.’

  ‘Free…? To go where?’ Carmine sat up. He hadn’t been out the house in two days. His mother had grounded him. He’d barely left his room, except to eat, piss and have his bath. His mother had hardly spoken to him. She’d seemed preoccupied, worried even. He hadn’t dared ask her what was wrong because he knew she’d blame him and probably go into a ShitFit.

  Solomon didn’t answer his question, simply carried on standing there with the rifle in his hands.

  ‘What’s this “thing”?’ Carmine asked.

  ‘I’ll tell you in the car. Get dressed.’

  64

  Friday morning, 8 a.m. Wearing his tux and a fresh set of facial bruises, Ismael was brought back to MTF in the back of a mail van. He was put in an interrogation room and left alone. He asked for his lawyer. He didn’t get an answer. He asked to see Max or Joe. He was told they were unavailable. He asked for his lawyer again. He still didn’t get an answer.

  2 p.m. The bogus news story hit the airwaves. TV and radio carried a report about an ambush on three unmarked police cars ferrying murder suspect Sam Ismael back to Miami on the junction of North West 29th Street and Coral Hills Drive. Two security trucks (reported stolen out of Tampa the day before) had blocked the convoy and about eight men wearing monkey masks, black boiler suits and armed with assault weapons had poured out of the back of the trucks and surrounded the cars. The suspect–Sam Ismael–had been abducted and bundled into a green Plymouth Barracuda. Meanwhile the cops had been disarmed, the radios smashed, and their cars shot up. As the attackers were fleeing, one of the officers–Pirro Oviedo–managed to reach his weapon, but had been shot and killed before he could use it. There was now a city-and state-wide manhunt for Ismael and his abductors.

  TV news showed repeated images of paramedics stretchering what appeared to be a body in a bag from the scene.

  4.30 p.m. Ismael was put in the back of a police cruiser, made to lie down with a blanket thrown over him. He was then driven out of MTF and taken to an underground parking lot near the courthouse across the road, where Max and Joe were waiting for him in a black bulletproof Deville sedan with tinted windows. The car was on loan from the DEA, who’d recovered it in a raid on a drug dealer’s house.

  ‘My lawyer’s not coming, is he?’ Ismael asked Max when he saw him.

  ‘No,’ Max said, studying Ismael’s swollen nose, black eye and the bruise to his left cheek. They’d worked him over good–more than they needed to. He almost felt like apologizing, but it wasn’t the time or place.

  Ismael, understanding exactly what was happening, gave Max a bitter, yet resigned smile.

  ‘Is my family safe at least?’

  ‘They’ve been moved to the embassy,’ Max answered. But with the way things were going, he wasn’t sure if it was true.

  ‘Then let’s go,’ Ismael said.

  Max opened the passenger door. Ismael got in, followed by Joe.

  They headed out towards Little Havana, where Max would make the call to Boukman’s number.

  4.50 p.m. Max called the number he’d found in his mailbox from a booth on Calle Ocho.

  It
rang three times before it was answered.

  Max heard traffic in the background.

  ‘This is Mingus. I have what you want.’

  A man’s voice came on the line. According to the surveillance they had on the booth, the man Max was addressing was a skinny, tall, young black male in dungarees and with short dreadlocks. He’d been watching the callbox since the morning.

  ‘Come to the place you’re calling,’ the man said slowly and mechanically, like he was reading from a piece of paper.

  ‘What?’ Max asked.

  ‘The phone you’re calling. You a cop. You know where it’s at.’

  ‘Who did he kidnap?’ Ismael asked as they drove to their next destination.

  ‘My girlfriend,’ Max said.

  ‘He’ll kill you both, you know–maybe me too–quickly, if I’m lucky.’

  ‘It won’t go down that way.’

  ‘You hope.’

  ‘I know,’ Max corrected him.

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘I wouldn’t be here if I thought differently.’

  ‘Is that why you’re smoking two cigarettes at once?’ Ismael sniggered.

  Max looked from the Marlboro burning between his fingers to the ashtray, where another cigarette was smouldering at the halfway mark. He crushed it out.

  ‘If you think you’re going to trap him, you’re not.’ Ismael caught Max’s eye in the rearview mirror.

  ‘Hey!’ Joe snapped at him. ‘Shut the fuck up, will ya? You’re ruinin’ my good mood.’

  Ismael looked out of the window at the clear blue sky, the palm trees passing by like they were on a conveyor belt, the open-topped cars, the people in them heading to the beach in sunglasses and smiles, the whole road drenched in golden afternoon sunlight.

  ‘Shame,’ he sighed, ‘such a beautiful day.’

  65

  5.30 p.m. For the past hour and a half, all the tails on the SNBC members had reported the same thing. Six cars carrying between four and five people, and a red transit van, had left various locations in Miami at around the same time, and were all taking the same route: straight up North West 7th Avenue, left down North West 119th Street, up Opa Locka Boulevard, and then right down Unity Boulevard.