Break

by Ty Patterson

  The other was through the kitchen. He could jump up and grab the sill of the window above that opened into an office on the upper floor. That space was also leased by him.

  He had similar escape routes at his apartment building. It was standard operating practice for him. There had to be multiple ingress and egress options wherever he spent considerable time.

  He surveyed his installations, tested them to check that they sent alerts to his cell and burner phones.

  He washed his hands at the kitchen sink and went down to the parking lot.

  * * *

  Back to Darrell’s school in the evening, because there was no other way to find out about Sheller.

  Shadowing him with custom-built Ray-Bans over his eyes. Provided by Meghan. Their stems were bored out and miniature cameras fitted into the hollows. They projected the rear views on a small portion of their lenses, turning the upscale eyewear into a counter-surveillance device that let him monitor his six.

  The school boy was with Manuel, but even from a distance it was apparent the previous camaraderie was absent. The students didn’t joke with each other, didn’t high-five or fist-bump the other. They seemed to speak in monosyllables and rarely looked each other in the eye.

  They didn’t go to Mother Gaston. They cut down to Rockaway Avenue and continued down it, all the way to Hegeman.

  They leapt over a chain fence that had a Keep Out, Private Property sign on it.

  Cutter checked it out on his first pass. The remains of a garage, by the looks of it. The crumbling building was leaning against a line of stores and shops. The rusting hulks of vehicles in its yard. A car wash standing forlornly in the corner.

  Some developer must have bought the plot to rebuild it, which never happened. An island of desolation in the neighborhood that the Lions had taken over.

  Their presence was visible. Hard-faced men and youngsters huddled around a central figure. Nails, he recognized on his second pass. Giving out instructions to his people while Darrell stood at a distance.

  Nothing of significance happened. They’re right in the open. Any passing cruiser can see them. It spoke of the clout the Lions had that they could flaunt themselves so openly. They’ve posted sentries in any case. That thug at the light, the one on my side of the street, they’re gang members. There’ll be more that I can’t see.

  Their job would be to keep away inquisitive people and warn if any cops arrived.

  Cutter sat at a juice bar on the opposite sidewalk and ordered a drink. Some of the hoods glanced his way, but his old-man getup didn’t seem to arouse any suspicion.

  He heaved himself up when night was falling, crossed at a light and hobbled past the chain fence.

  Nails was crouching in front of Darrell. Wagging his finger furiously at the boy, who was shaking his head. He went to the end of the street and leaned against a store wall drunkenly. Sang aloud as he waited for the gang to disperse. Nails came out of the lot, surrounded by his men. He got into his vehicle, which tore away. Two other rides followed at a distance.

  Nope. Can’t risk following him. Not when I’m alone.

  But he had an idea.

  * * *

  ‘This is a piece of junk.’ Meghan sniffed in disgust as she examined the burner.

  ‘You think I’m going to use a three-hundred-dollar phone for surveillance?’ Cutter demanded.

  ‘He’s got a point,’ Beth nodded sagely. ‘So, you want us to install cloning software on your device so that you can transfer it to another phone, and that second phone—’

  ‘Will clone a third phone when it’s close to another one. I am interested in cell number three.’

  Nine pm in the Agency’s Columbus Avenue office. Just him and the twins, who had stayed back to work on some mission’s opsec. They had invited him when he called to see if they were around.

  ‘You’ll have to explain better,’ Meghan frowned when he finished.

  He studied them. Nope, he couldn’t see past their bland faces, didn’t know if they were pulling his leg. Nevertheless, he launched into what he wanted.

  ‘It’s Darrell. He hangs out with the—’

  ‘We know. You told us,’ Beth interrupted.

  ‘I want his phone to clone Nails’ cell when they’re close. But first, I’ll have to clone his device.’

  ‘Yeah, but he’ll be close to so many others as well. His classmates, his teachers—heck, his mom. The software isn’t intelligent enough to know which device should be copied.’

  That floored him. ‘Why do you think I came here?’ he yelped.

  ‘What you’re asking is science fiction,’ Meghan told him solemnly.

  Cutter’s face fell. He tried to keep the disappointment off his face and made to rise.

  ‘Lucky for you,’ Beth cracked, ‘we can do the impossible.’

  ‘We’ll get the software to activate at a certain time only,’ Meghan explained. ‘After school and until midnight. We’ll program it to ignore his mom’s phone.’

  ‘He spends time with Manuel, his friend.’

  ‘We’ll get his number,’ she said patiently. ‘Block that, too.’

  ‘I might have to ditch that burner.’

  ‘Your main phone will have that program. It will connect to a cloud account that will deploy the software to all the burners connected to it. All the data from all the cloned phones will get backed up there.’

  ‘The cops are nosy. Difiore—’

  He stopped when the twins turned their backs on him and typed away on their keyboards.

  ‘Gina Difiore and Peyton Quindica?’ Meghan asked.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Tough cops, both of them,’ the elder twin murmured.

  ‘Yep, you sure hit the jackpot there.’ Beth smirked as she turned back to him. ‘They’re trouble for the likes of you.’

  ‘Don’t I know it. What if they find that software on my phone?’

  ‘They won’t. You know, Nails has a real name. Steve Patchey.’

  He leaned forward, intrigued. No, he didn’t know. ‘He’s got a record?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Her fingers performed some magic, and an NYPD file came up. ‘Don’t ask how we can access that. You wouldn’t understand,’ she told him pityingly.

  He read it swiftly. Burglary. Assault. Kidnapping. All of them on black and other minority victims.

  No wonder Sheller’s appointed him as leader. He’s a Lion even if he has no tattoo.

  ‘Now, make yourself useful.’ She shooed him away when he had finished. ‘Make us some coffee and let the adults work.’

  Lines of code were flying on their screens when he returned with their steaming cups. Neither of them looked at him as they reached out blindly and sipped.

  ‘Good,’ Beth grunted. ‘You want to come work here as our chef?’

  He hurried to the couch before they got any more employment ideas for him. Plopped himself on it and flipped through a magazine as he bit into a cookie.

  He was snoozing when a throat cleared beside him. ‘Resting my eyes.’ He sprang to his feet.

  ‘We didn’t say anything.’ Meghan chuckled and handed him the phone. ‘You’ll have to hook this to Darrell’s cell. We couldn’t work around that. Then, the software will do its job.’

  ‘It will upload everything from all devices to that cloud account you gave us,’ Beth told him as he pocketed the device. ‘A file for every device.’

  He thanked them and cocked his head toward the ceiling.

  ‘Rest of the crew are sleeping?’

  He knew each one of them had apartments above the office.

  ‘Nope,’ Beth replied. ‘Recon run. You don’t need to know anything more.’

  Cutter left into the night.

  He had a reconnaissance mission himself.

  * * *

  ‘You think he’ll find out?’ Beth asked her sister as they turned off the lights and headed to the elevator.

  ‘That we cloned his phone? Nope.’

  It was a protective measure
. They now had eyes and ears on their friend.

  Werner would alert them if Cutter was in danger.

  58

  Saratoga Avenue was dark when he reached it at two am. There were street lights but only a few of them worked, casting a dim glow around their immediate vicinity.

  Carmel’s building had a motion-sensor front light over the keypad. He knew from his previous visit that there were no cameras. He went down the length of the street to check the parked vehicles, and on his return pulled a balaclava mask over his face and gloves on his hands. Tested the backpack and ensured it was securely fastened, with straps running across his chest.

  He took a running leap and pivoted off a ground-floor apartment’s windowsill, jumped higher, caught hold of another ledge, and climbed his way up to Carmel’s living room window.

  He tried it gently. It was fastened from the inside.

  That wasn’t a deal breaker.

  He had automatically checked out the window during his visit to the apartment. Old, wood frame. Simple latch on the inside. No wiring for any alarm.

  He hung off the sill with his left hand while his right came up with his Benchmade. He jammed its point into the soft wood and sliced away a sliver of frame. That made room for his blade to go deeper inside. Rinse and repeat until he connected its point to the latch, jimmied it free.

  He held his breath when the window creaked as it swung open. No one stirred, however. He clambered in swiftly and closed the window. Breathed shallowly and lowered his chi, his inner energy, and felt things out with his senses. The apartment was warm and had the lived-in feeling that empty ones didn’t.

  He skirted the center table and padded through the hallway. Carmel’s bedroom door was closed. No light showing through.

  A dim light in the kitchen illuminated the passage as he went to Darrell’s door and tried the knob. He ghosted inside when it turned easily.

  The sounds of breathing. A shapeless lump on the bed, beneath the duvet.

  He went over to Darrell and peered over his body. Nope, no phone. He slid a hand gingerly beneath the pillow. Still nothing. He moved the hand beneath his shoulders. The boy twitched but didn’t turn. His fingers touched the hard shape after several seconds of probing. He fist-pumped mentally when he extracted the phone with two fingers and cable-connected to his phone.

  Beth’s instructions had been clear. He had to do nothing else. There would be a warning beep when the software was uploaded, which would be his cue to disconnect the phones.

  He brought out a business card from his backpack, scribbled on it, and placed it on top of Darrell’s school bag. Removed the cable and powered Darrell’s phone off and on when the warning sound came on.

  Its screen glowed to life, looking no different.

  He shrugged in the darkness. The twins had promised him the software would work. He trusted them.

  ‘I still think you should quit the gang, bud,’ he murmured softly. ‘Call me if you’re in trouble.’

  No reaction from Darrell.

  Cutter exited the apartment the way he had arrived. He was counting on Carmel not noticing the slashed window. Even if she did, what would she do? Nothing was stolen.

  She’ll suspect someone tried to break in but won’t call the cops.

  People of color rarely did, he thought bleakly. Not when the crimes seemed insignificant. There wasn’t a great deal of trust in the police.

  59

  Darrell woke up at eight am and stumbled sleepily to the bathroom. By the time he had freshened up, his mom was ready for work.

  She hugged him hard, enveloping him in her unique scent that was all mother. He resisted and grumbled because that’s what teenagers did, but secretly reveled in the contact. She ruffled his hair and told him breakfast was ready and warned him not to be late.

  His eyes fell away guiltily when she sighed and marched out of the apartment.

  There was no way he could tell her he was involved with a gang. I’ll get out of it, Mama. My way, and we’ll be safe.

  While dressing for school, he remembered the previous night. He thought he had heard Cutter’s voice asking him to leave the gang, but that wasn’t possible. It must have been a dream.

  He froze when he saw the card on his backpack.

  Cutter was here!

  He looked around wildly, as if the Fixer was still in his room.

  How did he get inside? Did he steal anything?

  No. He isn’t a burglar. He came to warn me.

  Darrell’s lips jutted out stubbornly. No one was going to tell him what to do. That reminded him. He checked his phone. Yep, full charge. He checked his Bluetooth earbuds. Those were juiced up, too.

  He raised his shirt and taped his phone to his bare chest. Practiced turning on the voice-recording app he had downloaded. Lowered his shirt and finished dressing. Stood in front of the mirror and practiced until his hands found their way automatically to the right spot on his phone.

  He was ready to record his gang.

  He had one last detail to check out before leaving for school.

  How did Cutter get inside?

  He found the window and grinned to himself. That’s how.

  He wouldn’t tell Mama, and if she discovered it, he would confess that it was he who had slashed the window.

  Cutter’s entry route would be of use to him.

  60

  ‘Tell me,’ Gunner commanded.

  Cray bobbed his head and spread several printouts out on the table.

  Eleven am in a Lions-owned bar in Harlem. Just the two of them, with a protective ring of hitters outside the room.

  ‘That bodega Boyce and his friends held up,’ the tech expert began as he held up a photograph of the store, ‘its owners are Grogan’s friends.’

  Gunner nodded. He had been expecting something like that. ‘How did that happen? The Jew getting together with the Chinese?’

  ‘I had to dig into police records for that. Relax. I left no trail. I’m one of the best hackers in the country.’ He said it like it was fact, not a boast.

  The Lions’ founder believed him. The National Security Agency’s cryptoanalysts had rated Cray’s skills highly and had declared him to be a security threat.

  ‘Grogan saved Chang and Lin Shun, the Chinese owners, from a mugging a few years ago. Moshe Sternberg was passing by as well. He helped too. That’s how the four of them met. The Chinese lost their son in that incident. I suspect that got the Jew close to them.’

  Gunner drummed his fingers, stopped when Cray noticed. He didn’t like to show any mannerisms in front of his people. They were a sign of weakness. He glanced at the images of Sternberg and the couple.

  ‘Is Grogan an owner too?’

  ‘Nope. Those three are equal owners.’

  ‘Jews,’ the felon spat. ‘They control everything.’

  ‘He’s one-third—’ Cray subsided when Gunner glared at him. Jews were responsible for many of the world’s problems. It didn’t matter how large a piece Sternberg owned. ‘From the police records, Grogan was heading to the store when Boyce and his pals held it up.’

  ‘What about the second time? How did he get there? He almost got Nails.’

  ‘That’s the troublesome bit. The owners said they didn’t call Grogan. He sticks to a schedule when visiting the store. The holdup was outside his window. He said he was passing by.’

  ‘You don’t believe him?’

  ‘It’s too coincidental. If I can track his movements, I’ll know for sure. If I can get his phone records, that will even be better. I’m working on those.’

  ‘What about Martinelli and Crump? Was he the man at their places?’

  ‘No cameras, boss, so can’t be sure. But the height fits. The stranger was stocky at both places and Grogan is lean … but he could be wearing a disguise.’

  Gunner didn’t need any video confirmation. He was sure the intruder at both places was the Fixer. His fingers started to curl into fists before he stopped himself. He straightened th
em consciously and wiped his palms against his jeans.

  ‘Who’s his partner?’

  ‘A black woman.’

  ‘Black.’

  ‘Yeah. She and her husband ran a PI business from that address. They were doing well until he died of an illness. Grogan saved her from a mugging in Central Park. He seems to have a habit for that. He bought into her business after that.’

  ‘He’s a PI too?’

  ‘Nope. Never applied for a license.’

  ‘Because of his time in ADX?’

  ‘No one knows about that, though, boss. He was using a different identity.’

  ‘He didn’t want attention.’

  ‘Well, he’s not shy about giving TV interviews. Arnedra Jones, his partner, is the one who runs the office while Grogan does the field work. But,’ Cray paused dramatically, ‘there’s no one at their office today. Calls go to a recorded voicemail. That they will get back.’

  ‘Where does she live?’

  ‘Bronx. Three blocks from where Warren hangs out.’

  Warren, one of their cell leaders in that borough.

  ‘Get him to check out her building.’

  ‘Ahead of you, boss. Her apartment’s empty. I got her phone, tried it, no response. I got Warren to send some of his men to look it up. They posed as construction people she had booked a job with. Neighbors said she left in a hurry yesterday. They don’t know where. I hacked into a few airline manifests, but no record of her.’

  Grogan’s taking precautions.

  ‘Ripper—maybe we shouldn’t have killed him in that manner, boss. Looks like he knows you’re alive.’

  Gunner’s eyes blazed. ‘If I want advice, I’ll ask for it,’ he rapped out.

  Cray raised his hands in a whatever-you-say gesture. ‘I found something else about him. I told you he was Delta—’

  ‘Yeah, tell me something new.’