Chasers (35 page)

Quincy bent down on both knees and lifted Rev. Jim in his arms, cradling his dying body. “You crazy bastard,” Quincy said to him, his voice cracking, both their bodies coated in blood. “Hang on to me, just hang on. We’ll be on the ground in a few minutes.”

“Do me a favor, would you, Quincy?” Rev. Jim said, each word a struggle.

“Name it,” Quincy said.

“Fight back,” Rev. Jim said. “You’re too good a cop to end it with a Hefty bag wrapped over your head. And you’re too good a man. So skip that, will you? Fight back.”

Quincy nodded, eyes burning, the scaffold making its descent. Rev. Jim looked toward the sky at the smoke and the flames filling the air around them and rested his head against Quincy’s shoulder. “You take my point,” Rev. Jim whispered. “It’s better to die with a friend.”

And then he did.

9

The Apaches stood in front of the altar, three rows of flickering votive candles illuminating their faces in an otherwise empty church, their heads bowed in silent prayer.

“He was our heart,” Boomer said.

“He deserves more than the minutes we can spare right now,” Dead-Eye said.

“He’ll get that,” said Boomer, “as soon as all of this is behind us.”

“And he deserves to be buried proper,” Dead-Eye added. “Soon as our dustup is over, whoever’s still standing should see to that.”

“I’ll keep his ashes until then,” Quincy said.

“He always used to say he never wanted one of those police funerals,” Boomer said. “He would have hated the flags and the guns going off.”

“What did he want?” Ash asked.

“A Viking funeral,” Dead-Eye said, a smile flashing below his wet eyes. “Put out on a boat, piles of wood all around him, us shooting flaming arrows his way as he floats off to the deep sea.”

“Then that’s what he’ll get,” Quincy said, reaching down to pet Buttercup, who was resting under the warm lights of the candles.

Boomer nodded. “I know what else he would have wanted,” he said.

“What?” Ash asked.

“For us to finish the job,” Boomer said.

10

Dead-Eye stood on the walkway on the Queens side of the Whitesstone Bridge, three lanes of cars and trucks zooming past him, the clouds overhead threatening rain, the river below choppy and looking cold. Ash was next to him, her back to the traffic, her hair whipping around her face, eyes taking in the majestic view. “This is what passes as a public place to Robles?” she asked.

“Never expect logic of any kind from a drug dealer,” Dead-Eye said. “No matter what happens and what crazy shit he’s got up his coke spoon, just remember: if we
stay
cool, we’ll
be
cool.”

“Thanks for the heads-up, Yoda,” Ash said. “But if I had to call this game, I’d be sitting on one of those sailboats down there, glass of wine in hand, heading for no place in particular.”

“Somehow, I doubt we’ll ever live to see days like that,” Dead-Eye said.

“I’ve never even been on a boat,” Ash said, brushing strands of thick hair from her face, tiny drops of cold rain beginning to fall. “Not even a Circle Line ride up to the Statue of Liberty. But when I was a kid, being out on the water was all I dreamed about. I used to have this image of taking this big boat out in the middle of a wild ocean, sails stretched by the wind, me at the helm, land nowhere in sight.”

“Why’d you never do it?” Dead-Eye asked, scanning the traffic around them for any sign of Robles.

“I guess I just turned my back on it and went in the opposite direction,” Ash said. “I chose fire over water, not even fighting them but working the pieces to see who it was that started them. I don’t regret any of it. I just wonder a bit now and then and think how different it might have all been. Only natural, most people spend their lives wondering what it’s like on the other side of the fence.”

“Most, maybe, but not all,” Dead-Eye said. “It might look a whole lot better on the other side of that fence, but who’s to say that it is?”

“You’re a world-class pessimist, you know that?” Ash said. “It’s not just you, either. Most cops I’ve crossed paths with come with that mind-set. And the better the cop, the darker the view.”

“Every cop’s got a good reason for feeling that way,” Dead-Eye said.

“What’s yours?” Ash asked. “Of course, if you don’t want to go near it, not a problem.”

“Lucinda Jackson,” Dead-Eye said.

“She family or a friend?” Ash asked.

“Never met the young lady,” Dead-Eye said. “I was in my first month working homicide, coming off a tour in plainclothes. My attitude had taken a nick here and there, but I still looked with hopeful eyes.”

“Until you caught a case,” Ash said.

“Not much of one, either,” Dead-Eye said. “Lucinda lived, if you want to stretch the word enough, with a crack mother and her cracked pimp. Her real father wasn’t much better, doing a stretch upstate for a statutory. She was eighteen months old and weighed about as much as an eight-week puppy. All she knew of life was steady beatings and not much food. Then one night her crying got too loud for the cracker and the pimp, and they did the only thing that seemed logical to their demented minds. They shoved her inside a toaster oven and kicked it to high. Played with the timer like it was a radio dial. I cannot bring myself to ever imagine the pain that innocent child felt before mercy took hold.”

“You were the one who found her body?” Ash asked.

“What there was of it,” Dead-Eye said. “There was no money to pay for a funeral, and the only family she had were the two who made her life a hell. She deserved better than to be tossed into a hole in an unmarked grave. So I paid to have her buried out in St. Charles on Long Island, headstone and all. We gave her a full service and got the police chaplain to serve Mass and say prayers over her coffin. She even got a police escort out to the cemetery. About a dozen cops made the ride out and stayed with her until she was buried. Boomer was one of them.”

“The doers get nailed?” she asked.

“The doers that cross paths with me
always
get nailed,” Dead-Eye said. “You know, Lucinda would have turned twelve this coming June had she lived, and not a morning passes that I don’t flash on her face. Those people down there, riding on them waves, in those tilted sailboats you used to dream about, are so very lucky. The shit we see stays invisible to them. And it’s our job, if we do it right, to keep it that way.”

Ash looked over Dead-Eye’s shoulder at a black four-door Benz that had slowed to a halt in the right-hand lane, red hazard lights flashing, the engine running on idle. “Speaking of shit,” she said, “it looks like our little band of brothers has finally arrived.”

Dead-Eye turned just as Robles stepped out of the back seat, followed by one man from the passenger side and a second from behind the wheel. The driver popped the trunk and pulled out three red cones and lined them up behind the Benz, alerting the oncoming traffic to switch lanes. Robles stepped onto the walkway and moved slowly toward Dead-Eye and Ash. He was wearing a pin-striped suit, with shoes shiny enough to help guide a man’s shave. He had an expensive brown topcoat slung over his shoulders and a small cigar in the corner of his mouth. He stopped in front of Dead-Eye and leered over at Ash. “I don’t know if you’re recruiting better,” he said to Dead-Eye, “but at least you’re recruiting better-looking.”

“Nice outfit,” Dead-Eye said. “Wait until Julio Iglesias finds out one of his suits is missing.”

“Save the smart-ass for the cop bar,” Robles said. “You got something you need to say, let me hear it.”

“I lost a couple of friends this week,” Dead-Eye said. “One of them was a cop, so he knew there might be a chance he’d step on a land mine. But the other one wasn’t; he was a civilian and had no play in this fight we’re in.”

“You waiting for me to cry?” Robles asked.

“Just listen, dealer,” Dead-Eye said, his words harsh and his body coiled and ready for any action that might come his way. “You’re still fresh in this town, still used to doing business like you did back on the home front. Kill anybody you get the itch for, never worry about any consequences. But this is NYC, and in this city there are
always
going to be consequences.”

“A badge here,” said Robles, “means the same to me as a badge anywhere else. I either buy it, rent it, or toss it aside. And if there’s a woman behind it and I get the urge, I might even fuck it.”

“I think that was meant for me,” Ash said. “He’s such a romantic little prick. And I do mean little.”

“You see, that’s my point,” Dead-Eye said. “It’s not just badges you have to worry about. Everybody you touch has somebody out there they can reach. And one of those somebodies is going to be looking to fuck you up.”

“Like who?” Robles asked.

“Like Nunzio Goldman.”

“I heard about him,” Robles said, a smile crossing his bleached teeth. “He ended up on the well-done side of the menu. He must be one of them friends you been running off the mouth about.”

“More like family,” Dead-Eye said. “But not just to me. He was tight with a lot of cops, that part is true. A few of us got to know him well and came to love his ass. But he was even tighter with some that worked the other side of the street. Your side, you might say. With them he shared a history, and he shared blood. Now, I don’t know if any of this applies to the SA crowd you dance with. But to Italians and Jews—and Nunzio was a blend and a shake of both—a shared bloodline is as serious as fucking cancer. And that’s what I’m here to tell you. Killing him the way you did and walking away may work fine in your little bodega. But out here you will have to face up to the consequences.”

“Which are what?” Robles asked, tossing his cigar over the side of the bridge. “Other than having to listen to your line of shit?”

“I’m a fraction of your concern,” Dead-Eye said. “I reached out for your ticket, eager to take you down, but somebody already had their hand out, with a bigger claim to even Nunzio’s score than either me or Boomer could muster.”

“I read you now,” Robles said. “You set up a meet, feed me the name of Nunzio’s hook, and I let you and your friends skip out from under my weight. Okay, then. Tell me who he is and where he is, and while I got him next in line for the barbecue pit I’ll think about whether or not to go light on you and your cop buddies.”

“His name is Tony Rigs,” Dead-Eye said. “He’s Nunzio’s half brother. And I don’t mean a fucking midget, either. Same mother, different father. And looking for him should be a snap, even for your dried-up raisin of a brain.”

“Why’s that, cop?” Robles asked.

“He’s right behind you,” Dead-Eye said.

Robles did a fast whirl, coat flying off his shoulders, and saw Tony Rigs standing with his back resting on an iron beam, hands inside the pockets of black slacks, a mellow look to his face. Robles glanced over toward the Benz and saw his shooters hovering close to the car, hands open flat and at their sides, surrounded by six men wearing overalls and construction hats, a blue truck with a cherry light flashing on top blocking the sedan’s path.

“Tony’s crew is doing some repair work on the bridge,” Ash said. “Now how lucky would you say that is? Him being here the same time as you?”

“Nothing’s going to happen,” Robles said, spreading out his arms, the swagger still in his voice and manner. “Not here, broad daylight, with all these cars driving past. You can’t take that kind of risk. You may not care about dying, but for cops like you two, ending up in jail is a whole other chapter.”

“You see,” Tony Rigs said, stepping up next to them. “Told you he couldn’t be as stupid as you painted. So you might not want to be here for this, no need to get yourselves jammed up. You were good friends to Nunzio, all of you. He cared for you as much as you cared for him, cried like a baby when any of you went down. And now you’ve done right by him, and I’ll see to it that it gets finished.”

“You better do what he tells you,” Robles said. “He’s got it in him to deal with someone like me, but you don’t and you never will. No matter how many colorful names you think up and pin on yourself. A street fighter like me goes down, it can only come from the hard hand of another hood. Never from the hand of a cop. Especially not a nigger or a muchacha.”

“Let it wash off you, Dead-Eye,” Tony Rigs said. “This isn’t your time or your place. It’s mine.”

“You’ll take them all?” Ash asked, nodding toward the three shooters by the sedan.

“Trust me, I’ll have a very lush garden this summer,” Tony Rigs said. “It won’t lack for nutrients.”

“You’ll always be left to wonder about how it would have ended between you and me,” Robles said, his focus on Dead-Eye. “Those are the kinds of questions that can eat at a cop, make him want to reach out for a bottle or a gun. Very often both.”

“Not really,” Dead-Eye said. “You can kid yourself if you want, but gun to gun, you could never take me. Not only do
I
know that, but
you
do, too. And you’re going to die knowing it.”

Dead-Eye gave a nod to Tony Rigs and reached a hand out for Ash. He stared at Robles for a few moments and then turned and moved down the walkway toward the pay tolls and his parked car. He was about ten feet away when he pushed Ash to the ground and whirled back to face Robles.

The dealer had caught Tony Rigs with a sucker punch to the side of the face, sending him off balance, then turned, pulled a .44 from his waistband, and aimed it straight at Dead-Eye.

He never got off a round.

Dead-Eye walked back toward Robles, two .38 Specials in his hands, firing a series of rounds from each as he moved forward, every bullet finding a mark. Robles dropped his gun and fell to his knees, blood pouring out of his open wounds. Dead-Eye then fired a final shot, square into his forehead.

“Wonder no more, dealer,” Dead-Eye said. He holstered his guns, walked over to Ash, and helped her to her feet. Together the two Apaches walked with their heads down, in silence, off the Whitestone Bridge.