The Payback Game

by Nathan Gottlieb

  “Oh, the usual stuff. Drug trafficking. Extortion. Obstruction of justice. A couple of alleged murders.”

  She shook her head. “How can you help defend a man like that and live with yourself?”

  Boff smiled. “How? His checks didn’t bounce. Basically, Hannah, I will work for anyone who pays me. Except rapists and child molesters, out of respect for my wife.”

  “And how many vile criminals have you kept out of jail? Do you keep score?”

  Amused by her hostility, Boff decided to mess with her.

  “Oh, dozens. Too many to count. My track record for getting acquittals for alleged murderers is especially strong. I’m proud of that. My finest moment in court was when I helped a man charged as a serial killer to go free.”

  Hannah made a face. “Jesus Christ! How many people did your slimeball client kill?”

  “Well, he was accused of murdering six people. Give or take a body. I forget. But the jury found my client not guilty.”

  “Did he kill again after you got him off?”

  “Whoever the serial killer was, yes he killed three more people. He was never caught.”

  Hannah looked disgusted. “So you set this dirtbag free and then the killings resume? How’d you feel when you heard about the new murders?”

  “Me? I didn’t feel anything. Like I said, my client was innocent.”

  She looked away and didn’t say another word. Boff smiled to himself.

  A few minutes later, Pedro returned and sat down.

  “I talked to some people, Frank. They hadn’t heard anything about Quebec Gold. But one of them said something interesting. A dealer named Reggie Bassett’s been hiring a lot of muscle and adding quite a few sub-level peddlers to his food chain. Bassett’s a big dealer, but not so big that he needs to expand. So I’m thinking, if Reggie Bassett is the one who’s gonna sell this Quebec stuff, then that’d explain why he’s taking on more people.”

  “Pedro, is this the Bassett who was busted for dealing and sent away for ten years?”

  “Yup. He got out three years ago. Now he’s one of my biggest competitors. Although he had a major setback about six weeks ago and almost went under.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “Had a trailer truck loaded with H and coke coming in from Mexico. In Arizona, some local yokel cop pulled the truck over to make a routine spot check to see if there were illegal aliens in the back. When he ordered the driver to open the rear doors, the driver shot him dead and took off. The video recorder in the cop’s car caught the whole thing, including the truck’s plate number. Long story short, the Arizona state troopers busted the driver and confiscated all the drugs. Bassett was out the two million he’d paid the Mexicans and didn’t have enough cash to pay all his people for close to three weeks. Then?” Pedro snapped his fingers. “Just like that, he was back up and running full steam.”

  Boff nodded. “So somebody must’ve pumped some cash into his operation.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Do you know who?”

  “No. But Bassett has a big operation, so whoever it was, the guy had to have a sizable chunk of cash.”

  “Where does this Bassett operate out of?”

  “Bed-Stuy. He has a brownstone on Gates near Nostrand Avenue. He bought an empty building next to his and stationed some of his people in it for added security.” Pedro glanced at his Rolex. “Well, anyway, I gotta go.”

  “Thanks for the help.”

  “De nada.” Standing up, Pedro shook Boff’s hand and melted into the crowd with his bodyguard.

  Hannah watched them disappear. “What does that information do for us?”

  “It means I might have to rethink a lot of things.”

  “Like what?”

  “Let me sort it out first. Then I’ll tell you.”

  On the walk back to the car, Boff thought about Reggie Bassett suddenly coming into a good deal of money. He had a pretty good idea where the drug dealer got it. If Earl Bassett was indeed embezzling cash from the nonprofit, it wasn’t a big stretch to think he’d lay off some of it on his cash-strapped brother.

  Chapter 37

  After dropping Cullen and Hannah off at the boxer’s apartment, Boff headed to the gym, waited for his son to finish his workout, and then drove Steven home to Riverdale.

  “How’d your session go?” he asked along the way.

  “It was my best yet, Dad! I knocked a guy down who’s been fighting for two years. He hit me hard a few times, but I didn’t fall down. Ryan says the more you get in condition, the less likely you’ll go down. Coach is going to get me my first amateur fight in two months.”

  Hearing this, Boff frowned. It was pretty obvious to him now that Steven was never going to quit boxing and return to basketball. Worse, if his son did well in the amateurs, then, like most boxers, he’d skip college and turn pro. Just what he needed. An uneducated fighter in the family. And unless Steven turned out to be a world-class boxer like Cullen and made a lot of money, his son’s options in life once he finished his boxing career would be limited.

  Steven interrupted his father’s thoughts. “How come you’re so quiet?”

  “I was just thinking about my case.”

  “How’s that going?”

  “Well, I thought I was chasing a fastball, when maybe I should’ve been looking for a curve.”

  “Huh?”

  “It means the case is coming together, but perhaps not in the way I thought it would.”

  Not being interested, Steven said nothing further, so his father filled the silence the rest of the way home with a CD of Jerry Lee Lewis. Once they reached his condo building, he parked in the underground garage and then walked two blocks with Steven to a D’Agostino supermarket to get things for dinner. Jenny was making one of his favorite dishes: stuffed peppers with garlic and angel hair pasta. Inside D’Agostino’s, Boff took out the shopping list she had given him earlier in the day, put all the things she had requested into the cart, paid for the groceries, and left the store. He and Steven were carrying the bags home when a gray van approaching them slowed down.

  Boff glanced at the driver. He was a heavyset guy with thick, muscular arms and was wearing a ski hat in the summer and dark sunglasses on an overcast day. Knowing what was about to happen, Boff dropped his grocery bags and was about to yank Steven down to the sidewalk when the van’s side panel slid open and a man with a silenced handgun popped off three shots. All three bullets slammed into Boff’s chest and knocked him flat on the sidewalk. The van’s door closed as the vehicle sped away.

  Stunned, Steven dropped to his knees next to his father. “Oh my God! Dad! Dad!”

  Boff was wearing his Kevlar vest, but the gun must have been a powerful one. His chest felt like it had been hit by a sledgehammer. He blacked out.

  “Dad! Don’t die!”

  Boff groaned and opened his eyes.

  “You’re alive!” Steven was crying. “Don’t move. I’ll call nine-one-one.”

  But as the boy started to reach for his cell phone, his father grabbed his arm. “I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m wearing Kevlar. Just let me catch my breath a moment.”

  Spotting a man and a woman running toward him, Boff placed a hand over the bullet holes in his shirt.

  “What happened, mister?” the man said. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine. My bum knee just gave out.”

  “Do you want us to get you help?”

  “No. Thanks for offering, though.”

  As the couple walked away, Boff forced himself to sit up so he wouldn’t attract any more attention. Then he held out a hand to Steven. “Help me get up.”

  With his son tugging him, he managed to get slowly to his feet. “Steven, did you get the van’s license plate?”

  “No.”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “Because I was fucking worried about you!”

  Boff frowned. His son was just a kid, not a trained op. “That’s okay, son, it’s no big deal.
The plates were probably stolen anyway. Let’s put the groceries back in the bags.”

  Once they had picked up everything that had fallen out of the bags, they resumed walking home.

  “What was that all about?” Steven asked.

  “They probably mistook me for somebody else.”

  “My ass, they did! It’s this case you’re on, isn’t it?”

  Boff hesitated. He tried to think up a lie, but he knew no lie was going to explain away getting shot three times.

  “Yes, it’s this case,” he finally said. “And I’m going to ask you to do me a big favor. Don’t say a word about this to your mother. She’ll get all upset and order me to drop the case.”

  “So why don’t you drop the case? Aren’t you scared they’ll try this again?”

  Boff stopped walking and looked directly at his son. “Let me tell you something about me, son. I may be scared. But I’m also angry. Nobody pushes me around. Not now, not ever. Any chance this scumbag had of seeing the inside of a courtroom just flew out the window.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  Boff regretted the words the second they spilled out of his mouth. “Nothing, Steven. Let’s just drop it.”

  They resumed walking. “I won’t tell Mom anything, Dad. But, you know, even if I don’t tell her, she’s going to see the holes in your shirt.”

  “No, she won’t. Here’s the plan. You’re going to walk in the apartment first and tell your mother I stopped at a neighbor’s apartment and will be right in. Then tell her you want to talk to her in the den about how well you did at the gym.”

  “What does that accomplish?”

  “While you’re keeping Mom occupied, I’ll walk in, yell that I have to take a wicked piss, hustle to the bedroom, take the shirt and vest off, slip into a new shirt, and then put the groceries in the kitchen. That way, she’ll never know I was shot at. Understand?”

  “Yeah, but what if she finds the shirt later?”

  “She won’t. I’ll get rid of it.”

  When they got home, everything went according to plan. Boff wanted to tape an ice bag to his sore chest, but that would’ve given him away, so he settled for four tabs of ibuprofen. After they had chatted awhile, Jenny went to the kitchen to start cooking dinner. While she was doing that, Boff called Cassidy.

  “Will you be at Bailey’s tonight?”

  No, I’m going to the opera. What’s up?

  “How’s ten o’clock?”

  Fine.

  Dinner went well except for Sharon taking her usual shots at her father. Boff loved his daughter, but part of him was glad she was flying back to California the next day to begin her summer internship with a law firm. All this dickering with her was draining his energy and ruining Jenny’s great meal. Even though he had finally broken the ice with his son a few months ago and gotten him to call him Dad, instead of Boff, he wasn’t bothering trying to bring Sharon around. She was a much tougher nut to crack.

  As they ate, he wondered if he and his daughter would ever have a relationship. The chances of that happening would get even worse once she graduated from law school and went to work as an assistant D.A. Although he would never admit it to her, it hurt his feelings that she wouldn’t treat him like a father. With that on his mind, he took a stab at a civil conversation with her. “Sharon, good luck on your new job.”

  But the words did not have the desired effect. “Like you really mean it.”

  “I do. Honestly.”

  “Well,” she said, “I don’t need your good luck, Boff. Save it for one of your vile felons.”

  And with that exchange, he dropped the conversation. When dinner was over, he helped Jenny load up the dishwasher, kissed her goodbye, and headed over to Bailey’s.

  He found Cassidy waiting for him in a booth.

  “Where’s your protégé?” Boff asked as he sat down.

  “Hannah said she’d had all of you she could stand for one day. What happened?”

  Boff smiled. “I did what I do best. Got under her skin.”

  “How?”

  “I bragged to her about some of the repulsive people I’ve helped keep out of jail.”

  Cassidy wrinkled his face. “Why’d you do that?”

  “I guess I didn’t like the way she was passing judgment on me.”

  “Man you’re a vindictive son of a bitch.”

  Boff leaned forward. “You think that was vindictive, Mike? Wait until you see what I do to the person behind these murders. I was shot three times in the chest in a drive-by this afternoon. When my son was with me and could’ve been hit. Luckily, I was wearing Kevlar, and he wasn’t shot.”

  Alexis came over with a fresh mug of draft beer for Cassidy. “What’re you drinking, Frank?” Cassidy said.

  “A draft is fine.”

  After the waitress left, Cassidy said, “When did you start wearing Kevlar?”

  “The day I confronted Galvani outside the precinct and accused him of being dirty.”

  “What was the point of that?”

  “I wanted to rattle him. And to let him know he’s not going to get away with what he’s doing.” Boff shrugged. “Probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do, but what the hell. I got some enjoyment out of it. I mean, if I have to risk my life hunting down a killer, I might as well have a little fun, right?”

  “Whatever floats your boat. Meanwhile, Hannah told me about what happened in upstate New York. What do you think was in those bags?”

  “Quebec Gold.”

  “What’s that?”

  After Alexis returned and set down their drinks, Boff recounted what he’d learned from Schlosberg in the park, then told the old reporter what they’d discovered using the drug-sniffing dog.

  “Well, what your DEA friend told you makes a lot of sense. But what do we do with this information?”

  “Work on a plan where I can give Schlosberg the Angels and the Quebec Gold and take care of the rest in my own way.”

  Cassidy smiled. “Do I need to ask what way that is?”

  Boff sipped his beer and said nothing.

  “How will you do it your own way without leaving your fingerprints?”

  “I’m working on a few scenarios. When I come up with my endgame plan, I’ll let you know. Meanwhile, I found out from my information broker that Nicky had hired a corporate accountant to audit the nonprofit’s books.”

  Cassidy looked puzzled. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

  Boff told him about his suspicion that Bassett was embezzling.

  “Whoa!” Cassidy exclaimed. “If that’s true, it’s a serious charge.”

  “My thought exactly. A charge serious enough that it would explain why Nicky was killed.”

  “But we already know why he was killed. He was going to write about the dead cop.”

  Boff shook his head. “It may not be that simple. If Nicky ordered an audit, he probably suspected Bassett was stealing from the nonprofit.”

  The old reporter thought about that a minute, then nodded his head. “Yeah, I see where you’re going with this. You think Bassett was afraid Nicky would fire him and go to the D.A, so he paid for a hit?”

  “I believe so. But we’ll need more info before we can draw that conclusion. Do you think you can get the corporate accountant who was doing the audit to meet with us?”

  “What’s the guy’s name?”

  “Stuart Hamilton. He works for Plante & Young.”

  “Spell the names.”

  Cassidy took out a pen and wrote the information on a paper napkin. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Boff smiled. He knew Cassidy would find a way to come through.

  “I’m thinking, Frank, that with the knife attack on Hannah and now somebody trying to kill you, maybe it’s time I pull her off this.”

  “Well, I certainly wouldn’t mind if you did. But Hannah’s got her mind set on breaking this story in the Eagle. I don’t think even you could get her to stand down. She’s a pretty stubborn young
woman.”

  “Stubborn? That’s putting it mildly.”

  “Just as long as she sticks with Danny, she should be all right. He’s developed some decent street smarts from hanging around with me.”

  “You want me to tell him you said that?”

  “Not on your life.”

  Chapter 38

  Boff called Wallachi on the drive home from the pub and told him what he suspected about Earl Bassett and his brothers.

  “Pete,” he added, “I want to do surveillance tomorrow on the brother who’s a mechanic. I figure he’ll knock off work around four or five.”

  What’s your interest in this mechanic?

  “I want to see if I can pin down whether he’s a Hells Angel or not.” Boff glanced at his watch. “Let’s meet at the gym tomorrow. Say around three-fifteen.”

  That night, Boff had too much on his mind to get to sleep. He slipped out of bed around two o’clock without waking his wife, poured himself a glass of Almaden Chablis in the kitchen, and took it into the living room. For the next hour, he played around with his new perspective on the case. It felt right, but he wanted to be sure. If he decided to go forward with it, then there were things he had to set in motion for his endgame scenario. Around four o’clock, after his third glass of wine, he climbed back into bed and slept like a baby.

  He was hardly awake in the morning, when Schlosberg called with news.

  We’ve got a spike on the Quebec Gold! A pretty big one, Frank.

  “Let’s meet in the library park. Forty minutes okay?”

  I’ll be there.

  When Boff arrived at the park, Schlosberg was sitting on a bench in his usual spot eating a kabob. There was a grease-stained brown bag next to him.

  “I stopped at a street vendor near the park,” he said. “The guy sells spicy chicken kabobs on a stick. I got three for each of us.”

  As Boff sat down, Schlosberg reached into the bag, pulled out a kabob, and handed it to him. He took a bite and said, “This is terrific, Marty.”

  “The vendor told me he marinates all the ingredients in a mix of garlic, ginger, orange zest, honey, and soy sauce. So maybe I should nominate him for a Vendy.”