[2010] The Ghost of Blackwood Lane

by Greg Enslen

  Whoever designed this airport was an idiot, Gary thought. It was as if no planning at all had gone into passenger flow, or the proximity of parking to the gates, or the way the shops and restaurants were grouped. Clearly the airport had been expanded since the original construction, and it looked as if new terminals and garages had simply been tacked onto the original structure. Of course, the airport was a relic from the seventies and sorely in need of an update, but Gary still wondered at the need of some designers to favor form over function. His superiors at MacMillian would never have let him get away with this kind of shoddy planning.

  Last night, Gary had dreamed of being in a fire. He’d been surrounded by flames and a strangely billowing smoke colored a thousand different shades of blue. He had absolutely no idea what any of it meant.

  Gary climbed from the car and opened the trunk, and Mike pulled Gary’s suitcase out for him. For the tenth time since he’d picked Mike up, Gary wanted to thank him for coming along. This was going to be hard enough, and it was great to know that he had someone with him he could count on.

  They were leaving from Terminal 3, Gate 32, on the northern side of the airport, and they were early enough to grab a drink at one of the airport bars before heading down the lengthy terminal toward the gates. They checked their bags at the ticket counter and walked to the bar after passing through security. Gary got them a table, and after a minute, Mike settled down at their table with two tall glasses—Mike’s was beer, and Gary’s was coke.

  “Do you have the picture?” Gary asked again.

  Mike tapped his shirt pocket. “For the fourth time, yes. Don’t worry—it’s safe. Any dreams last night?”

  Gary looked at him.

  “No. The last time was night before last—it seems that since I’ve decided to go back, the dreams haven’t been as bad. Explain that one. It’s the same dream, but more manageable, somehow. And I’ve had a couple of new ones, though I think they’re all related.”

  Mike nodded, keeping his thoughts to himself.

  They chatted for a while longer, avoiding the subject. They talked about the Los Angeles Kings and their trading away of Wayne Gretzky. They discussed the layout of the airport and the improvements that could be made, such as improving the flow of passengers through the security area, and talked about the new FAA control tower, which Mike mentioned had just been completed.

  For the first time in a long time, Gary didn’t feel troubled or particularly nervous—this was all going to be resolved, and soon, and then he would be able to get on with his life.

  The plane left on time, and as they banked out over the ocean, Gary’s window seat looked down on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. The water crashed against the shore far below, and for just a few moments, he could pick out the small grey shadow of the Point Vincenté lighthouse.

  Chapter 28

  Tony assured himself that there was no way anyone could have predicted it would all happen so quickly. He reminded himself that he needed to remain calm, remain in charge. Tony had his guys out, working hard, and so far, things were going well.

  Tony glanced down at his notes—he and his captains had just completed their regular Friday morning meeting. Just because some of them were thugs, it didn’t mean they couldn’t run things in an organized manner, and regular meetings were a part of that.

  The Beverage Company business had almost solved itself—as soon as Tony’s representative had threatened the president of the drink company, the man had folded. There was no way the company could get its drinks and beverages to area stores unless the trucking company showed up to move them, and Tony controlled the trucking company. For the first time in almost ten years, protection money changed hands in the St. Louis area, and Tony’s organization had grown $20,000 richer in a matter of moments.

  This was the way the business was supposed to be run, Tony thought as he stood and started pacing around the room. This is the way things had been run back in New York City, back when his grandmother had run her own small crew through the dirty streets of Queens and Brooklyn, scamming and stealing for the Luciano familia. There was an honorable history to their family—in fact, back in Sicily the members of the Mafia had been known as “men of honor” or “men of respect.” Either one worked fine for Tony.

  So far there had only been a couple of casualties, both related to this cocaine business. Looking back, maybe it had been a mistake to get involved with that side of the business so quickly—they should’ve held off and gotten settled in some of the other new activities before branching out into drugs.

  As it was now, Tony was trying to grow the other illegal activities and, at the same time, prepare for a war.

  The East Dogs had been making loud noises about their territory. Nothing bad had happened in the past two days, other than the disappearance of one of the new dealers working in the disputed territory. Tony thought the man had probably been taken to inform on his organization. He didn’t envy the man, but there wasn’t much that remained a secret about the Luciano family—they were making a big move into the cocaine business, and that was that.

  And business was picking up—the initial shipment from D.W. was long gone, and Vincent had made two smaller buys from alternate suppliers, moving a fair amount of product in the past week. There was no way to estimate the amount of street demand they would have to satisfy, especially if there were no other strong rival group fronting the stuff in the area. Vincent was preparing to make another large buy tomorrow night, different from the smaller, more cautious purchases they had made in the past. That, combined with what they had been able to steal or intercept from the East Dogs, ensured enough supply for at least another month.

  But Tony was more worried about that side of the business than he was letting on. He quietly wondered if going with Vincent’s instincts had been the right thing to do.

  His thoughts were interrupted by his brother walking into the room and sitting down. The man looked completely calm and relaxed, almost an exact opposite to his fidgeting brother. Tony resented the man’s calm—this buy had to go perfectly tomorrow. All the seed money and their profits from the last week were going into this one big buy, securing what would be enough coke to fill the trunk of Vincent’s Mustang—over 150 pounds of the stuff.

  Even though they had set up an excellent processing center right there on the docks near where the exchange would take place, Vincent insisted on transporting the product himself. The thinking was that D.W. didn’t need to know any more about the Lucianos’ operations than he had to, and having them deliver the goods right into the processing area would afford him too much information about the Lucianos’ setup.

  The exchange of goods for cash would be made in the parking lot across from the new boat, and Vincent would then take the drugs and drive away, circling back and returning to the warehouse after D.W. and his people were gone. It seemed the best thing to do, and the safest. No one was sure where D.W.’s loyalties were placed, and trusting anyone in the criminal world was usually a mistake.

  But it made Tony nervous, Vincent driving around on the streets of East St. Louis with a million-and-a-half dollars worth of cocaine in the trunk of his car. Vincent was no idiot—he must’ve been able to see the anxiety written on Tony’s face.

  “Don’t look so glum, brother!”

  “I know, Vincent,” Tony said, nodding. “Things are going well, but this buy tomorrow night has me very worried. There are so many things that can go wrong, especially with the way you have it set up. I understand that we don’t want D.W. knowing where we process the drugs, but....”

  Vincent put up his hand and stopped him. “I know, it’s a risky move. But doing it at the riverboat is perfect—anything goes really wrong and we dump the product in the water. You give them the money while they load the stuff into my car, nice and easy. I drive around for a little while, then drive my car right into the warehouse and we unload it. No problem.”

  Tony looked up at him sharply. “A million and a half in coke?
There’s no way that can go into the water—that money represents all of our capital. If anything goes wrong with this buy or we lose the coke, the familia will not recover.”

  He looked into Vincent’s eyes, gauging what he saw there before continuing in a low, quiet voice. “I think we should stop the buy, put it off until we’re a little more on our feet.”

  Vincent leaned away from the table, and Tony wondered what the man was thinking. Tony wasn’t naïve enough to assume that Vincent didn’t have aspirations of running the family himself, but Tony didn’t think he had the courage or the people to make a move anytime soon. And they’d never really gotten along after Tony cut him out of the family business. Tony had made the logical decision, but Vincent had never really let it go.

  Vincent steepled his hands and fingers, reminding Tony of their father. He’d always done that when he was about to say something important. Was Vincent even aware of what he was doing?

  “Tony, I understand you’re worried about this buy. Frankly, I’m worried too. A lot of things could go wrong—D.W. might not show, or the East St. Louis cops might get tipped off, or Shotgun and his crew might show up and make things interesting. But look at it this way—one purchase, like the one we’re going to make tomorrow night, and we’ll own this entire market for the next twenty years. Tomorrow night’s product will go out onto the street at a low price, undercutting Shotgun’s prices, effectively putting him out of business. Now, we might get some grief about that from him, but I don’t think it’ll be anything we can’t handle. And with him gone, we’ll own a market with a 400% return on investment, minimum, and that’s figuring for lost shipments. This is the future, brother. We have to seize the moment. The buy will go smoothly, we’ll have secured a major supplier, and Shotgun’s crew will disappear.”

  Tony nodded through the speech, wondering when his brother had gotten so savvy about business. As far as Tony knew, his brother had only run little scams and pulled down money tending bar. But based on what he was saying, the man was a lot more intelligent than Tony had ever given him credit for.

  And that last part....

  “What do you mean about Shotgun’s crew?”

  Vincent shook his head and patted the table in front of them with one hand. “Let’s just keep you out of that, okay? There are things in the works, things that should happen tonight and tomorrow night to make a lot of our problems go away.”

  “You mean war? Or something else?” Tony asked, already fearing the answer.

  “No, brother. This will not be a war. This will be a preemptive strike against a gang of street punks and junkies. They can’t run things nearly as well as we can. Half of their dealers are using the stuff, snorting or shooting up the profits. They don’t know how to run a business—Shotgun has been getting along by the skin of his teeth for too long.”

  Tony wondered about the details, but Vincent didn’t elaborate.

  “Do you have good guys?” Tony asked.

  Vincent nodded. “Yeah, a few from Miko’s crew, two made guys with experience in Chicago and Denver. They came over when Miko talked to his contacts in Denver, passing along our new direction. They just got in last night, but Tony Regato out in Denver vouched for them.”

  Good. They didn’t have a lot of experience locally with hits or leaning on people. But that was all changing, and quickly.

  “Okay. Let me know how the hits go, and I’ll decide tomorrow whether or not we make the buy.”

  Vincent looked up at him sharply.

  “No, brother. We make the buy either way—it took a long time for me to set this whole thing up. They’ve gotten it into the country already, a big deal for them, and we have to take it or they’ll never sell to us again. We’ll come out looking like idiots and have no product to sell when Shotgun’s crew goes away.”

  Tony looked at his brother carefully, gathering himself. “I guess you didn’t hear me, brother. I know you want this sale to go through, and you’ve worked hard to set it up, but this whole new side of our business makes me uncomfortable, and I need a little while to think—”

  “Uncomfortable?” his brother practically shouted, leaning in to the table. “This makes you uncomfortable? This buy makes great business sense and will turn us a bigger profit than all of your little pissant money laundering and loan sharking schemes could pull down in a year! We have to make this deal!”

  Tony didn’t like the way this was going. He sensed something in Vincent’s eyes. “Vince, this isn’t a debate. I run this family, and you need to remember that.”

  Vincent grew quiet.

  “Okay, now here’s what we’re going to do,” Tony spoke slowly, looking at his brother. “Make this Shotgun thing happen tonight and call me tomorrow morning. If things go well, we’ll move forward with the buy, okay? But this shipment will be our last for a while—I need some time to figure out if this is a business I want the family involved in. I know that it’s a good money maker—Lucky knew that too when he tried to corner the coke and heroin markets from Sicily after he got deported. I know it’s good business, but it still makes me uncomfortable. I think we need to concentrate on the other activities, establish our base a little more, before we branch out in this direction. The cops won’t look too kindly on us if we get really dirty, and we’re not ready to withstand a lot of close scrutiny. We’ll need more of them on the payroll.”

  After a few moments, Vincent nodded.

  “Okay,” Vincent said. “I can live with that. As for tomorrow night’s buy, do you want to be there? That is, if it happens.”

  “Yeah. We need a solid front for D.W. to see, and if we decide to buy anything else from them, they’ll negotiate better if they see us both. The dock and parking lot are secure?”

  Vincent nodded and stood, smiling. “Yeah, we’re doing it in the main parking lot—off the boats and with easy access to the roads if something goes wrong. But nothing will, brother, and after tomorrow night, things will look a lot different to you. I promise.”

  Chapter 29

  The plane from LAX landed three hours later at Lambert International Airport, just north of St. Louis, Missouri, right on schedule. After Mike and Gary collected their bags, they headed for one of the dozen car rental counters near the exits to the parking lots.

  Gary took care of the car and in only a few minutes they were on their way, heading east.

  St. Louis, Missouri, was a sprawling city, completely nondescript except for the downtown area and the stunning Gateway Arch near the riverfront. The rest of the city was as generic as any other decaying urban center. As Mike and Gary passed the red brick buildings and strip malls of the northern suburbs, they could have been driving through the outskirts of any of a dozen other Midwestern cities—Akron or Indianapolis or Kansas City or Oklahoma City—they all looked the same.

  Gary vaguely remembered this area of town, but he’d only been to the airport a couple of times to pick up relatives, and he really hadn’t paid attention. His mind was elsewhere—he was wondering about the girl in his dream; even in his mind, he had trouble saying her name.

  More out of habit than anything else, his hand reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his tarot deck. He shuffled it mindlessly with one hand as he drove. If it made Mike nervous, he didn’t say anything—he was watching out the windows at the blighted buildings flashing by, one after the other.

  After a couple of passes through the deck, he set it in his lap and flipped the top one over, glancing down at it as he drove. It was a reversed Three of Swords, which could mean any number of things, none of which were particularly good. Mostly it symbolized distraction and confusion, mental anxiety, loss, and alienation—accurate, considering his current state of mind. After a moment, he tucked the deck away in his pocket and watched as the road curled southward.

  The Gateway Arch suddenly loomed ahead from behind a group of low brick buildings, the graceful arc of stainless steel bright against the blue, cloudless sky behind it.

  Gary remembered t
hat monument so well—seeing it every day growing up, looming on the horizon or curling up into the sky above him on his many visits to its foot. He remembered riding up to the top in those strange round elevator cars. Visitors could walk around the top gallery, looking out the slit-like windows on either side of the metallic arch. He remembered once staring out the windows, looking down at Busch Stadium; a day game was in progress, and he could see the little baseball players on the grassy field. He remembered watching for a few minutes before her hands alighted on his shoulders, urging him to leave so they could move on to the next destination on their date—

  The pain engulfed him, with no warning. It was an instant migraine, worse than anything he’d felt before.

  He let go of the wheel.

  Gary bent over in pain, holding his head in his hands.

  The pain was there, and nothing else. His head throbbed with his pulse. He pushed in with both hands on either temple.

  The car drifted over into the next lane, toward the center median and the concrete dividers.

  “You okay, man?” Mike asked, glancing over at him for the first time—he must’ve been staring at the Arch, too, and hadn’t noticed Gary’s response—and gasped, grabbing for the wheel. The car jerked back into its lane, and Mike shouted at Gary to pull over.

  For a long moment, Gary didn’t respond, but finally he nodded, sitting back up. He could feel the migraine back off a fraction, and he concentrated, lifting his foot up off the accelerator. He watched as the world swam around him, alternating fuzzy and sharp. His heart was racing, pounding in his chest. A part of his mind told him that Mike was directing the car onto the shoulder, and his foot began applying the brakes, ignoring the harsh honks and squealing of tires behind him.

  Seeing the Arch—there was a memory, about her and him.

  The car came to a stop, and Gary came back into the moment, realizing that Mike was shouting at him.