by Tod Goldberg
My cell phone rang. It was Fiona. “Sam is taking Father Eduardo to your mother’s, and then he said he was going to check out the plates on the police cruiser,” she said. “Am I free to spend the rest of my afternoon shopping, or would you like me to beat Barry some more?”
“Actually,” I said, “I think it would be good if you joined Barry and me for a little recon mission.”
“Really?”
“Yes,” I said. I told Fiona about acquiring the printing plate, a fact she was as excited about as Barry was, which made me concerned that the two of them had more in common than I’m sure Fiona would be comfortable knowing. And then explained to her that I had another move planned. “When Junior’s men take over the printing plant, we need to find a way to keep them there and keep them immobilized.”
“You could have Sam tell them all about the pilgrims. People always love to hear about that.”
“Funny,” I said, “but no. I was thinking something along the lines of a chemical agent.”
“Mustard gas?”
“Preferably something that won’t kill everybody.”
“You’re never any fun,” she said.
“Do you know where we might find ourselves a large quantity of fentanyl?”
“Do you need to stop smoking?”
Fentanyl is what comes on the backside of smoking-cessation patches, but when it’s turned into a gas, it’s also a very effective chemical for subduing a human being. Problems occur when people don’t know just how much gas one might need to use to effectively render a human unconscious (or, in what is often a better outcome, exceptionally relaxed) versus the amount that will kill them, which is what happened in Chechnya, except that the Russians didn’t just use fentanyl when they tried to smoke out the terrorists that had overtaken a school; they used a chemical derivative that renders the nervous system obsolete, particularly, as it happened, in the small children who’d been taken hostage.
But dissolve a small amount of fentanyl and the chemical portosyt together, which Lowe’s and The Home Depot keep in the garden section in huge cakes to help with the growth of new strains of certain field grasses, and you end up creating a gas that will cause disorientation and drowsiness, followed, usually, by sleep, but that won’t turn off your central nervous system. It’s the perfect chemical agent to use when putting down a rebellion, provided the rebels don’t have gas masks. It’s also known to be a very popular party drug in parts of Belgium where, apparently, falling asleep is the height of fun.
“I need to stop the Latin Emperors,” I said. “But what I’d really like to do is get them to steal the fentanyl for us.”
“Oh, Michael,” Fiona said, “I love it when you double-cross people.”
“I’m looking for a warehouse,” I said. “Something with cameras. Know of any?”
“I just sold some guns to some very nice Australian separatists who were planning several very interesting, nonlethal attacks on their government,” she said. “Let me ask them if they have any leads and I’ll call you right back.”
“Australian separatists?”
“Everyone hates their government, Michael,” she said, “not just burned spies.”
Usually, planning a heist requires a certain amount of qualitative thinking mixed with just a hint of immorality and a dash of spite. If you’re robbing something so large that you actually need to plan a heist versus just walking into a bank with an Uzi, the spite issue is paramount. Most criminals work quickly because they work from need. Out of drug money? Rob a liquor store. Or they work from specific, unreasonable obligations they’ve made for themselves. Like a billion-dollar pyramid scheme that needs constant attention. But in order to orchestrate a big score, to embark on the sheer amount of planning that goes into a high-level action, a driving personal desire helps keep you excited through the down times.
Sometimes, however, planning a heist comes down to a single word that has bedeviled bad guys since the beginning of time: opportunity. See a truck from Best Buy rolling through your neighborhood? Need a television? Need five televisions? Have a gun and some friends with dollies? You have an opportunity.
I couldn’t help but think, as Fiona, Barry and I sat parked across the street from Harding Pharmaceutical Labs of America, that the opportunity to rob Harding glimmered like a diamond. The building was a one-story warehouse structure with a loading dock on the east end and was surrounded by a chain-link fence, atop which stood video cameras. A nice precaution.
There was also a sign that promised an armed response by a private security company, which was also a nice precaution.
When you’re staking out a place to rob, it’s important to know just what an armed-response sign means. And that means spending some time examining the cars in the parking lot of the place you’re considering robbing. If you don’t see any security-company cars in the lot, that usually means security isn’t on-site, or if they are, they aren’t armed. For insurance purposes, most security companies require their armed employees to check in at their offices first, receive their guns and then leave again in a company-owned fleet car.
If the parking lot has an empty space reserved for the security company, that means the security company tends to come by at prescribed intervals, or it means that there’s a security guard on duty who also drives around the property, looking for criminals, when he’s not sitting behind a desk, reading Harlequin romances. This person might be armed, but it’s unlikely, and, nevertheless, if he’s not there, it’s irrelevant.
The mere sign itself indicates a response, not a presence. If you’re savvy, this makes a difference. If you’re a crackhead looking to steal a home theater system, it probably doesn’t.
Harding had neither a space nor a car in the lot. Employees and visitors each drove into the facility through a big, open driveway that was on either side of the chain-link fence. They’d taken precautions here, but I had a pretty good feeling that’s all it was. The building was certainly alarmed, but beyond that, an armed response was likely ten to fifteen minutes away, which was fine, as Harding Pharmaceutical wasn’t exactly making nerve gas in their offices.
A simple look at their Web site told me that what the mythical guards were guarding was, in most hands, absolutely nothing of value. They warehoused various “stop smoking” products from a variety of corporate partners who used their fentanyl, but since the chemical wasn’t being made in the building-they handled that in lovely Newark, New Jersey-it was merely a shipping port for a variety of Southern locations. The Web site also touted their frozen-storage facilities for products like chlorine dioxide hydrate, a product so volatile and toxic when defrosted that you’d need to be a chemical engineer to make it worthwhile to possess, unless, of course, you intended to bleach wood or process flour.
“How did your Australians find this?” I asked Fiona.
“They needed chlorine dioxide hydrate,” she said.
“For what?”
“I don’t ask questions,” she said.
Sometimes, being a burned spy is actually a blessing.
“They break in?”
“No,” she said, “they bought their supplies using a purchase order. They are very organized.”
“Barry,” I said, “what’s the market value of fentanyl?”
“Pure? I could name my price. But if it’s just on patches, it’s worthless. I’d tell my clients just to go to Target and buy what they want.”
“What about, say, half a truck full?” I said.
Barry thought about that for a moment. “Would the truck be included?”
“If need be,” I said.
“There could be a profit,” he said.
“What if we just needed the truck to be ditched somewhere after they took the product?”
“The truck could be stripped in this scenario?”
“Of course,” I said.
“And who gets the money?”
“I thought maybe a donation could be made to Honrado,” I said, “and then the res
t could go to the charity of your choice.”
“The International Barry Appreciation Society is holding a charity dance next month,” he said.
“Make some calls,” I said. “See if you can get someone ready on a moment’s notice.”
“I’ll be in my office,” he said, and then Fiona let him out of the backseat so he could walk down the street and conduct his business. Better I didn’t hear him making his connections.
“How many guys you think we’d need to hit this place, get a truck and not get anyone killed?” I asked.
Fi pushed hair from her eyes and exhaled hard. “Michael,” she said, “you bring the Latin Emperors here, and someone is going to get hurt. What time were you thinking of doing this?”
“Night,” I said.
“So some custodian can get stomped to death?”
“Broad daylight would be a little brazen even for the Latin Emperors. They aren’t exactly a tactical force. I need them to leave as much evidence as possible,” I said, “but that doesn’t include slugs in heads. You have a better idea?”
Fiona watched the delivery bay for a few moments before responding. “You might consider sending a pretty girl over with a problem. See if she can maybe lock someone in a closet.”
“Too risky,” I said. “We can’t have you leaving prints all over the place or appearing on camera. But it’s too risky having these knuckleheads out here when something might go wrong. We need a third force.”
We spent another few minutes watching the building, until Barry walked back up and Fi let him back into the car. “I’ve got a guy who is happy to take on this complex project,” Barry said.
“Good,” I said. “This is a Barry project, right? I’ll never see these guys?”
“They’re New York Russians,” Barry said. “They’ll be selling smoking patches on Coney Island before the police have even begun investigating this.”
The police.
Sometimes it’s the obvious things that make the most sense. I pulled out my phone and called Sam. “Any luck tracking down that plate?” I asked.
“My special powers know no bounds,” Sam said. “Or will have no bounds as soon as I meet a friend of mine in a bit.”
“So you don’t have it?”
“Not yet, no,” Sam said. “But it’s like all things, Mikey. In due time. Due time.”
“It’s due time,” I said. “If we’re going to make this all work out, I need to get that plate confirmed.”
“No fear, Mikey. It’s going to be like that time we took down that evil criminal mastermind.”
“When was that?”
“You know, Mikey, any of the times. I’ll call you when it’s in hand.”
I hung up with Sam and looked back out the window. “You see any police cars roll by since we parked?” I asked Fiona.
“No,” she said. “Why would they?”
“Exactly. So it will be a good thing when one pulls up here and tells the night crew there’s a problem.”
Barry leaned into the front seat. “You got police on your payroll, too?”
“I do now,” I said. I put my phone on speaker, dialed another number and waited for someone to pick up.
“Good afternoon, Harding Pharmaceutical. How may I direct your call?”
“Shipping, please,” I said.
“One moment,” the operator said. “I’ll transfer you to Marty Delabate.”
Fiona and Barry were quiet, but were clearly puzzled.
The call picked up. “This is Marty.”
“Marty,” I said, “this is Dan from Newark. How you doing?”
“Good, good,” Marty said. If you’re going to pretend to be someone else on the telephone, it’s usually a good idea to assume an identity that is so common, it’s likely the person you’re trying to fool will think they’re the one with a problem for not knowing precisely who you are.
“How’s the season treating you?” I said.
“Fine, fine,” Marty said.
“Looking forward to getting down there in the fall,” I said. “You know how it is up here.”
“Don’t I ever,” Marty said.
“Listen,” I said. “I’ve got a note here on my desk about a shipment of patches leaving there on Saturday. That still right?”
“Let me check the system,” Marty said.
“Running slow today,” I said, “or else I would have gotten on myself.”
“It’s crawling today,” Marty said. “Okay. Let’s see. Yeah, we’ve got a three P.M. headed up north, and then we’ve got a six P.M. going to shops between Naples and Tarpon Springs.”
“That’s the one I didn’t have,” I said. “Okay, great. Thanks a bunch, Marty.”
“No problem, Dan,” Marty said.
I turned off the phone. “Got any plans for Saturday night, Fi?”
16
Sam hated cop bars. It wasn’t personal. He just preferred a bar where you could get something more than a domestic beer and a shot of Jack Daniel’s. And then there was the issue of the kind of women who frequented cop bars. Not that Sam kept up on all the latest hairstyles for the fairer sex, but he was pretty sure that teased and crimped hair bleached to the point of translucence was not being shown anywhere near the runways these days. And yet sitting along the bar at Cuffs were three women whose hair looked to be conducting electricity. They weren’t bad to look at otherwise, but Sam just didn’t care for women who smelled of Budweiser and Jack Daniel’s and whose hair had a separate area code.
Sam could have lived without hearing “Magic Carpet Ride” for the rest of his natural-born days, too, but it seemed to be on heavy rotation on Cuffs’ jukebox, having already played three times in the past hour while he waited for his friend Ross Angel to show up. Ross wasn’t exactly a cop; he was a meter maid. Or, as his business card said, PARKING ENFORCEMENT OFFICER, which meant he had a badge and access to the systems Sam periodically needed access for, as well. Sam didn’t know Ross well-he’d been introduced to him by another friend, this one at the DMV, after Ross had a small problem with a loan shark over some gambling debts. It wasn’t a huge debt-$500-but the shark was starting to make threats, and Ross couldn’t very well call the cops. So Sam did what he could to help the poor bastard-which, in this case, just meant that Sam dug deep and paid off the shark. Now Ross owed him a periodic favor, one low enough on the totem pole that Ross could be of any use at all, which meant Sam mostly used him to help parking tickets disappear. Still, he felt pretty confident Ross could come through on something a bit larger, like the identity of the cop who drove the cruiser Fi spotted. But now Sam was worried, since Ross had chosen to meet at Cuffs, which meant his judgment had to be impaired.
The jukebox spit out the opening strains of “Back in Black”-easily the fifth AC/DC song played in the past hour, too-just as Ross finally entered the bar. Sam waved his bottle of Bud Light at him, and Ross sidled over the long way, making sure to pause by the bar for quick conversation with the ladies before sitting down.
“You a regular here?” Sam asked.
“No, no,” Ross said. “They got trivia here every Tuesday, so I come in for that periodically. And on Wednesdays and Fridays they got half-priced wings, so I tend to drop by then, if I’m around. And Mondays they got a pretty chill DJ. Saturday and Sunday, if they got a game on, I might drop by. But that’s it.”
Meter maids, Sam thought, spent so much of their lives accounting for time that, apparently, they just didn’t have a good sense of it in their personal lives. Either that or Ross was just a strange, strange man.
“Any luck with my errand?” Sam asked.
Ross put a finger over his lips and then looked over both of his shoulders. Because nothing conveys secrecy better than shushing someone and then looking over your shoulder. “You know where we are?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Sam said, “you picked the place.”
“I thought if we were here, no one would think it was suspicious that we were together.”
Od
dly, Ross’ explanation actually made a bit of sense, but was also entirely senseless. “Listen,” Sam said, “top secret mission here, Ross. Lives are at stake. Communists could be landing on our shores at any moment. So, do you have a name for that plate or not?”
Ross reached into his pocket and pulled out a slip of paper and handed it to Sam. “You didn’t get this from me.” It was as if everything Ross said was cribbed from a bad crime novel. It didn’t surprise Sam. He suspected Ross had a lot of free time to read. “Unless there’s a commendation coming. If there’s some hero shit going down, it would be fine if you mentioned me. Just trying to get a leg up in the force, you know?”
“I know,” Sam said. “If we get before the Hall of Justice with this, I’ll recommend you immediately be made an honorary Superfriend.”
Sam unfolded the paper and saw the cop’s name: Pedro “Peter” Prieto. A pretty common Cuban name. He had to hope that Ross’ own latent desire to be a detective got the better of him and caused him to do some legwork.
“What do you know about this guy?”
“He writes off a lot of minor tickets,” Ross said. “He’s what we call a neighborhood guy. Everyone he grew up with comes to his house when they have a fix-it ticket or a parking ticket. Just one of those things.”
Just one of those things. Of course, if you happened to be wanted for some larger crime and got a fix-it ticket, it would help to have someone there to write it off. “What’s his beat?”
“Little Havana, mostly. I don’t know much about him except for his daily logs I pulled. He does some traffic pickups over by the Orange Bowl, too. We don’t exactly hang out. Cops and Parking Enforcement aren’t on the same feed line, but I see him here and there and he’s come to me with a couple favors over the years. You’d be surprised how much a ticket for an illegally lowered car can be, seeing as they mount up. That’s one thing I’ve never understood. Lowering your car. Why do that?”
“To look cool,” Sam said.
“Really?”
Sam wanted to say, “No, they do it to look like assholes,” but decided against it. Let the poor man live in blissful ignorance. “This Prieto,” he said, “how old is he?”
