by Matt Rogers
Ronan said, ‘No. I’m not. And not yet.’
‘Why not? We have them right where we fucking want them.’ After no reply, ‘You spent months ranting about how much you hated them.’
‘Don’t you?’
‘If you want the truth: no. Not to the extent you and Arnold do. I know the same went for Dom and Zach and Troy. We weren’t as close to Brad. He became some superhero and I don’t think the rest of the boys could relate. They didn’t see Brad’s achievements for what they were. They just saw them as a mirror, held up to show them what sad sacks of shit they were. Actually, I’m surprised you didn’t go that way. You never got jealous?’
‘No. He helped me when I was at my worst. He kept me alive.’
Ronan had never shared any of this, and it was out before he could catch it on his tongue.
Otis went quiet. ‘You were gonna off yourself?’
‘I mean,’ Ronan said, backpedaling, ‘not really. I was exaggerating. He just talked me out of some bad spots.’
Otis said nothing.
Ronan could hear the silence, hear the questions it asked. Have I been following orders from some suicidal basket-case?
Before Ronan could stop himself, he said, ‘How long did you say Troy would be?’
‘An hour at most.’ Otis lit a fresh cigarette. ‘Trust me, I wasn’t happy about it either. The rat just took off. Said he couldn’t deal with Dom and Zach being gone. He was crying when he drove away. Can you picture that?’ A pause. ‘Pathetic.’
Ronan inhaled smoke like it was priceless medicine, staring at the forest floor underfoot. He didn’t answer. It spoke volumes that he believed King’s word over the man squatting next to him.
Otis exhaled a chuckle. ‘I thought you’d lost your marbles, y’know.’
‘In regards to what?’
‘All those midnight drills here over the last few months. Goggles and rifles and interlocking fields of fire. The five of us sweeping through the woods, refreshing our skillsets, bringing those reflexes back. I thought you liked the creepiness of it, like you thought you could haunt these guys you despised so much. Didn’t realise this was always going to be the place it went down. But this land … this is our turf. They’re fucked if they try anything.’
‘I want to make sure of it. That’s why I’m holding off—’ Ronan shook the detonator ‘—on this. They were right, on the phone. We blow this, they have nothing to lose.’
Otis made to interject.
Ronan held up a hand. ‘I know. We can take them here regardless. But it’s worth being sure. Once they’re out of the picture, you can do the honours.’
He mimed pressing the button.
The plastic shield stopped his finger, smudging a fingerprint.
Otis’ teeth showed in the faint moonlight as he smiled. ‘You sure you don’t want to just let them go?’
He didn’t know that’s what Ronan had spent the last ten years tearing himself up over: whether what they’d done in Afghanistan was redeemable, if the course could be corrected or if it was too far gone, if he had nothing left to do with this life but spiral deeper into the hole.
Talking to the preacher had given him the clarification he’d always sought.
‘Let them go?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Why let all our hard work go to waste?’
53
Slater saw the recognition dawn in Dominique Newton’s eyes.
The traditionally handsome forty-eight-year old must’ve used those icy blues for all sorts of conquests, maybe a few of them voluntary. Now those eyes widened as he read some of the names on the list with strikethroughs, connecting them to relatively recent news reports of dead men across America. Newton might have envisioned the names in a tree, twelve roots that led up to a single trunk: a deceased heroin dealer named Dwayne Griggs.
Slater said, ‘You know why you’re on this list?’
The deflation of defeat, then a guilty nod.
‘You know what Griggs was holding over you?’
Another nod, this one guiltier.
‘So do I,’ Slater said. ‘I have a stack of high-quality photos sitting at home, ready to be mailed to every major newspaper in this city. Which one do you think they’ll lead with? Maybe the one of you in the driver’s seat of your squad car with a woman’s head in your lap? That’s an effective one, I think, what with her hands cuffed behind her and all. But that wasn’t all Griggs left me. There was a name scrawled on that photo. You remember that name?’
Newton said nothing, white with fear. He wasn’t to know that Slater had burned all the evidence in a shack in Marshfield, and that the details were simply committed to memory, which was, thankfully, near-photographic.
Slater leaned in close. ‘Raquel Perry. Ring any bells?’
Newton looked like he might faint.
‘She was a rape victim,’ Slater said. ‘And you forced her to blow you on the way to the station to report it. I can’t imagine what you threatened her with. Maybe you told her you’d throw the case out. At least if she serviced you, the original perp would go to prison. You, on the other hand … well, you’re still free to do what we just caught you doing.’
‘What do you want?’
Slater stood up and faked like he was going to kick Newton in the face. When the sergeant brought his hands up, Slater dropped the heel of his boot between the man’s legs, crushing his genitals. Newton moaned and retched and folded over where he was seated. Slater crouched down, hauled him back upright, and waited for the tears and the spluttering to dissipate.
‘Sorry. Didn’t make myself clear. You only talk when I tell you to. A word out of line, and that happens again.’
Newton dribbled spit into his lap, eyes bloodshot. ‘I think you tore—’
Slater grabbed him by the shoulders, shook him hard enough for the man’s head to loll around on his shoulders. ‘You don’t get it. I don’t care. Save your whining for someone who does.’
Newton blinked back tears and nodded slowly.
Slater said, ‘You ever Googled Raquel Perry’s name?’
Newton shook his head without any delay. He was a fast learner.
Slater said, ‘Of course not. Why would you?’
He said nothing until the sergeant lifted his head up to meet his gaze, which took nearly fifteen long seconds.
Only then did Slater say, ‘She committed suicide. Last year. Hung herself in her bedroom, a couple of weeks after her rapist got sentenced to fourteen years. I guess she knew that you were still walking around, that the trial hadn’t really achieved anything.’
Newton looked away.
Slater said, ‘Griggs always had that on you, and it’s why you let him run his operation while you and your supposed “Task Force” searched and raided anywhere but where the drugs actually were.’
King bristled ominously in the background.
Slater said, ‘Right?’
Newton nodded.
‘Well,’ Slater said, spreading his arms wide, ‘at least Dwayne’s dead now, huh? Bet you heard about that the moment it made the headlines. Bet that was one of the best days of your life. Only problem is, now I have what he had on you, and that puts you on my shit list.’
Newton went to speak, then clammed up, eyes flashing with panic as he remembered what happened when he last spoke out of line.
Slater said, ‘Now you can talk.’
‘What do I need to do for you?’
‘There we go,’ Slater said. ‘That’s the spirit.’ He looked all around. ‘This is your crash pad, right?’
A nod.
‘Not listed in your name, I take it?’
A shake of the head.
‘For you and your task force?’
A nod.
‘You didn’t deny that your boys had prior knowledge of Griggs, so I’m guessing they’re more than willing to turn a blind eye to just about anything you ask them to.’
A nod.
‘I’m guessing they’d also be capable of doing you certain favour
s, maybe certain off-the-books shakedowns, intimidations. Maybe Griggs even asked you to hit rival gangs.’
Hesitation, then a nod.
Slater looked over his shoulder at King. ‘Smooth sailing.’ He turned back to Newton. ‘You’re going to summon the task force here, immediately. You’re going to get them to save your life.’
Newton lifted his eyes. ‘How?’
‘By making them fight for us.’
54
As Newton placed the call under Slater’s supervision, King went to the tiny bathroom.
The walls closed in on him the moment he shut the door and sealed himself in. He’d already flicked the light switch but it took a couple of seconds for the overhead bulbs to flare. The glare resonated off the tiles and made his vision sway. He reached out and put a hand on the sink, felt the cool solidity of the porcelain, like an anchor. He wasn’t overwhelmed, nor was he anxious — all the triggers were there, but he didn’t buy into them, didn’t allow them to take control of his mind and shift his perceptions. He knew he was close to the edge, though, which was why he’d excused himself in the first place.
So he could be alone to pull himself together.
The danger he was in meant nothing. He’d put his life on the line so many times he no longer felt anything substantial when it happened. You get used to anything. What made him sick to his stomach was the image of Junior in that basement, sealed in a dark concrete tomb, threatened by a group of men who had nothing to gain from the child’s demise. Every so often King got a glimpse of pure evil, and if he stopped and thought about the concept for too long it sent him reeling.
He clutched the sink with both hands until the swimming vision dissipated. It was just a matter of riding it out, reorienting himself with what he could control and what he couldn’t. Yes, the worst-case scenario was unfolding. Yes, his family’s lives hung in the balance. Yes, he’d monumentally dropped the ball, allowed a bitter enemy he knew nothing about to outmanoeuvre him. But the fact of the matter was he was here, now, and nothing could change what had happened.
All that was left to do was blaze a path forward, relentless and hyper-focused and refusing to make so much as a single mistake.
That was what he envisioned as he brought himself back, narrowed his gaze and channelled every iota of rage he felt toward Ronan.
Iron mind.
He stepped back out into the living room and met a curious glance from Slater. King nodded reassurance, and the man relaxed. I’m good.
Slater said, ‘There’s four of them, and they’re all on the way here.’ He jerked a thumb at Newton, sitting slumped against the wall with his knees tucked to his chest, his throat turning purple in real-time. ‘Sarge here spoke to a guy named Drew Reyes, the supposed ringleader of this task force. They’re a quartet of “detectives” who were effectively given free reign to be cowboys so long as they came back with a slew of arrests for drugs and drug-related violence. And they’re good at that. They’ve been pulling record numbers for a couple of years now. Alonzo pulled some dirt on them while we were on the way over, some serious assaults on perps under the guise of “resisting arrest,” but that was never going to be enough to blackmail them into helping us.’
King said, ‘Lucky for the ace up our sleeve.’
Newton’s head fell, the ramifications of what he was going to have to do striking home.
‘That’s right,’ Slater said. ‘Sarge is going to do whatever it takes to demand their allegiance for the night. Even if that means making threats of his own. Isn’t that right, Dom?’
Newton nodded, only the top of his skull visible, as if bowed in prayer.
Slater bent in closer. ‘Because you know what happens if you don’t.’
If Newton put his mind to it, he would realise that his life was over. He was in the grip of two vigilantes who knew exactly what he’d done and were hellbent on using it to their advantage. If he was objective, he’d already know what was going to happen when they didn’t need his help anymore. But we’re all human. We’re never completely objective. We think we can get away with things others can’t. We think we’re special.
Newton certainly thought he was. ‘We work together on this and it’s squashed?’
Slater stared, didn’t blink. ‘What’s squashed?’
‘These men,’ Newton said, ‘are the best of the best. The things I’m going to have to do and say to get them to fight for you … it’s going to take everything I’ve got. I may make enemies out of the four of them. I’m going to be walking a fucking tightrope after tonight for the rest of my career, so if I do this for you, please call it even. Please. You know what I’m talking about.’
Desperation rippled through the crash pad.
Slater ignored everything the sergeant had said. ‘You ever practice seeing things from a different perspective?’
‘What?’
‘Like, I don’t know, try to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. You ever tried that?’
Newton clammed up, sealed his lips. He had an idea of where this was headed and suddenly seemed allergic to participation.
Slater stared off into space, kept the volume of his voice low. ‘While we wait for Drew and his boys, let’s practice an exercise. Let’s put ourselves in the shoes of the woman who we saw leaving this place, tears running down her cheeks, ruining the eyeliner she’d probably just reapplied.’
Newton didn’t know where to look, what to say.
Slater said, ‘Let’s picture her going about her day, trying to make ends meet, probably working hard at a job she doesn’t like. She’s on her way home and minding her own business and then you get your grubby little hooks into her. She has to pleasure you with her hands and her mouth and everywhere else, and then she has to go home and pretend it never happened, try to go on with her life. She probably has a boyfriend or a husband who loves her, who thinks the world of her. She probably thinks the world of him. She has to pretend some cop’s dick wasn’t in her an hour before. And she has to remember it for the rest of her life. She’ll probably turn to substances to numb the memory of it. If we’re lucky, she won’t kill herself like Raquel Perry.’
Newton was white as a sheet, sweat beading over his forehead.
Slater said, ‘I hope that answered your question.’
Newton cleared his throat, took a breath, as if summoning his courage. Slater knew what was coming.
The sergeant said, ‘If nothing I do will squash it, then why should I help?’
Slater smirked. ‘Because what you still have to offer is the only reason there’s not a bullet in your head already. You should do everything in your power to drag this out, impress me the way I know you can. That’s the only way to find out whether I’ll have a change of heart.’
Newton probably didn’t believe him, but the survival instinct would keep him cooperative all the same.
A pair of engines decelerated outside the building. Tyres screeched and doors slammed. Furiously paced footsteps stomped up through the small complex, the party making a beeline for the crash pad.
Slater stood up, smoothed a crease out of his pants, and eyed King. ‘You ready?’
King shrugged. ‘This’ll be dicey.’
‘Nothing we haven’t dealt with before.’
They both faced the door.
The footsteps reached a crescendo and the door burst inwards, swinging in a violent arc on its hinges.
Kicked open by a boot heel.
55
The first guy to come steaming in was average height, but built like a barrel.
He jabbed a finger in King’s face in stereotypical Italian fashion and, with an accent that confirmed his ethnicity, said, ‘And who the fuck do you think you are?’
He had bronzed skin and thick stubby fingers and tattoos covering the backs of his hands. He wore a long-sleeved jacket but King had no doubt the tats snaked their way up his arms, mapped over veiny biceps and bulging shoulders. He looked like he lived in the gym. He had to be forty, but still h
ad all his long black hair and had opted to slick it back with wax.
From the corner, Newton said, ‘Cool it, Niccolò.’
Niccolò whipped round at the familiar voice, eyes widening as he saw the sergeant hunched on the floor, bloodied and bruised. ‘What you doing sitting down, Sarge?’
‘I don’t have a choice.’
Niccolò opened his mouth to explode in textbook Italian rage but a pair of hands shoved him in the back, forcing him deeper into the apartment so he stopped blocking the doorway. He almost stumbled into King and seemed close to swinging a punch out of outrage. King held his ground, didn’t back up an inch. Niccolò had to correct course and came to a stop beside King, simmering, eyebrows flared.
The next cop to step into the crash pad was the one who’d shoved Niccolò. He was the same height, just as muscular, his skin a lighter shade of brown. He was dark-haired, and looked Hispanic. He had an angular face and curious eyes that weren’t visibly hostile, but King had spent decades reading cold men, and knew at a deeper level this man was even angrier than Niccoló. He just didn’t show it. He looked from King to Slater and said, ‘I’m Drew.’
The ringleader.
King said, ‘Jason.’
Slater said, ‘Will.’
Drew nodded, betraying nothing. He regarded Newton sitting on the floor and shook his head in something close to bemusement. ‘What have you got yourself into, Dom?’
Newton didn’t answer.
The last two cops filed in, both obviously no-nonsense hard-chargers, but a little more apprehensive than both Drew and Niccolò. King knew the type. Gifted men, supremely good at their jobs, but subservient to order. They had no problem being told what to do and where to do it. Whatever it was, they’d be good at it, but they weren’t going to go off the rails anytime soon, weren’t going to poke the hornet’s nest.
They were, in generalised terms, elite servants.
They introduced themselves as Ethan and Harris. Both white, both stern-faced, both unquestioning. They filed in and stood behind Drew. They had nothing more to contribute.