by Warren Court
Rico was in there about twenty minutes, much too long for a payoff. I knew that it was something more. That Enzo was having a word with his guy Rico. Probably, most definitely, about me.
Then Rico came out. He looked around but didn’t see me; I slid down a bit so that just the top of my head was above the dashboard.
I don’t know why, but after Rico drove off, I started my truck and followed him out of Bannister’s. Enzo wasn’t going anywhere. Even when he found out about his brother and figured that I was coming after him, he wasn’t going to leave town. That concept was unfathomable, him running away. Also, he wouldn’t know where to go.
I thought about my own escape plans as I followed Rico out of Bannister's parking lot, my plans of sailing down south. This supposed new life I was going to create for myself down there. Would I bring any of this down there with me? Did I really think I could murder someone and get away with it? What was I doing? If I had any sense, I’d be heading to the border right now with the intent of driving all the way down to Mexico. I had the cash thanks to Soos. Killing Enzo wasn’t going to bring Don back.
Rico was going east and I held back, putting three cars between his sedan and me. He was driving like a typical detective, faster than the speed limit, weaving in and out of traffic. It was this behaviour that helped me to see what was going on. I let a fourth car get in between Rico and my truck. I was an expert on surveillance and the old skills came back to me easily; now I could see the surveillance box.
I first spotted one cop car, unmarked, that was following him. It was definitely a cop. I checked out the driver: a young white male with a scraggily beard, but he was focused on Rico. Then I spotted the other two and was sure I spotted a third up ahead of Rico. I pulled back even further and watched them. Rico had a tail. And a good one. As fast as Rico drove down Main Street, the box was never broken. These guys made all the same moves as Rico, but they did theirs with more elegance; their actions didn’t cause any horns to honk or brakes to lock up.
Wow, I thought. Rico has a tail. Well, good for him. Good for the Hamilton police department. I wondered if Rico knew they were on to him. Once they go so far as to put a tail on a fellow officer, they don’t back off. And anyone following Rico for more than a day would realize he was as dirty as they come.
And in the end, that was how they got me: I was more paranoid about getting whacked by my fellow corrupt officers or the Scallas. Internal Affairs wasn’t even on my radar. The mountains of blow I was doing at the time can do that to you. No, in my mind my fellow cops, especially that scum-sucking officer who gravitates to rat-fucking Internal Affairs was too stupid to catch on to a dirty cop like me. How wrong I was.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Rico pulled over in front of the Crazy Horse bar on Jarvis Road. I was far back enough to see two of the SPIN cars pull over. One went into the parking lot of a pizza shop across the street; the other pulled up in front of a fire hydrant about a block ahead of the Crazy Horse. The third car swept through the block and I saw it make a left. It would double back and reposition itself to continue the surveillance when Rico left the bar. The box never broke even when you went into a building. It was there waiting for you when you came back out again.
I passed the Crazy Horse and saw Rico go inside. It’s a cop bar; I used to go there myself when I was on the job. I kept going and made a right. I could see the SPIN car’s driver looking in his rear-view mirror. I zipped down a side street and turned onto an alley that brought me to the back of the Crazy Horse.
I saw two cooks that I knew worked at the Crazy Horse out back smoking. I nodded to them. They recognized me.
“Guys, there’s no parking out front. You don’t mind if I go in this way, do you?”
They laughed and moved aside. I slipped into the bar through the kitchen, which was disgusting. I was glad that in all my time spent in this establishment I had never once taken a meal; drinks only.
I saw Rico up at the bar. He already had a cold bottle of beer in front of him and I came up beside him. He almost jumped out of his skin when he saw me.
“Jesus, Jack. This is a cops’ bar. What are you doing here?”
“Free country, isn’t it? I hoped I might catch you here.”
I ordered a beer and took a stool next to him. There were half a dozen other customers scattered around the place; I knew they were all cops. The Crazy Horse was one of those places that the local lowlifes knew to avoid, and it was out of the way so that college kids or tourists wouldn’t find it. That’s why the cops liked it: they could separate themselves, insulate themselves from society in here. A safe place for them to get ridiculously plastered, sometimes while they were on duty.
The bar was dark and the music subdued; it mixed with the sound of a television set behind the bar. I could feel the eyes of the other patrons on my back. Ex-cops were still welcome in the Horse. But they knew who I was. Why I was an ex-cop. I had never intended to walk into this place again. But I couldn’t deny that being here rekindled some fond memories of my time on the force. Camaraderie. Drinking in here with Rico and the others. I took a swig and came to the point.
“What was all that bullshit yesterday? About being my pal, wanting to help me? I think you were keeping tabs on me. Is there a contract on my head, Rico?”
“We go back a long way. That’s a hell of a way to talk to a friend.”
“Is that what you are to me, Rico? A friend?”
“I’m just trying to help. There are people out there that would hurt you, Jack.”
“I’m leaving the country in a couple of days, a week at the most. They just have to sit tight and they’ll never see me again.”
I was testing Rico. He hadn’t yet heard of Bruno’s demise. And he wasn’t aware that I had followed him from his rendezvous with Enzo. I wondered if he knew he had a SPIN team working him. Like me, he was an expert on surveillance and counter-surveillance. But also like me, he had a hundred-dollar-a-day coke habit.
We both finished our beers and I sprang for two more. I put a tenner on the bar and the bartender gave three back. Another reason the Crazy Horse was a cop bar; it was cheap. I didn’t recognize the bartender ’cause they never stuck around long enough to get to know them. Cops are the worst tippers. Not only that, but bartenders and waitresses like to be the stars of the show in a bar. In here the job was the star. The staff got tired quickly of conversations that were hushed up as they approached to take orders.
“So, what should I do, Rico?” I said. Pressing him. Revelling in his discomfort.
“I would leave, Jack.”
“What about the border? Won’t I get pulled in?”
“Why? You done something wrong?”
Absolutely not, I told myself. What I’d done out there on the lake was the right thing to do. Otherwise I’d be dead. And Bruno was the right thing to do, though it had been sloppy. I’d do it again, but better.
“How do I square it so I can leave? Peacefully?” I asked Rico. I was being sincere.
“What do you mean?”
“You know. The guy who’s running the show. How do I square it?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I gripped Rico’s arm and held onto it. He tried to pull away. I heard laughter across the room stop short. I had regained everyone’s attention after it had just drifted off me.
“Be careful, Jack,” Rico said. “Not in here.”
“You tell Macintyre I can keep my mouth shut. I just want out.” I released him. “Good luck with your career,” I said, and left the same way I came in.
Chapter 15
On my way back to my boat, the first news story about Bruno’s death came over the radio. There were no details, no names released, but it was a dead man found at his home on the mountain. I knew the reporters would be quickly confirming whose house it was.
I went back down to my boat, more determined to leave immediately than ever. The weather was worsening; the skies were low
and overcast. Rain on and off. To hell with it; I could motor through to Toronto and beyond. Plenty of small yacht clubs I could hide in and skulk down the shore of the lake to the St Lawrence. I could just leave my truck at the club. Leave the registration in the glove box for Cindy and leave the keys to it with Marty.
I cleared off the bunk and cracked a hot can of beer. I tried to rest but my mind was racing. Every noise seemed to be amplified through the hull. At any moment I expected a tactical team to come on the boat and take me in for what I’d done to Bruno.
I stretched out on the bunk, the Browning Hi-Power on my belly. God, it was stupid carrying this thing around. Nice little match for the Bruno killing; enough to put me away for life. I wouldn’t get life, though; I’d get killed in prison. But I needed the gun.
There was movement on the jetty and my boat started to roll slightly. Someone was coming down the dock. They didn’t stop at the other boats; they kept coming. Then there was a knock on my boat’s hull. I picked the Browning Hi-Power up and pointed it at the hatch. Good thing about boats: very tight entrances, hard to rush in if someone is ready. Then someone was climbing aboard. I heard them. Felt them. The Purpoise rocked violently.
“Crouch, are you down there?” It was a woman’s voice, one I hadn’t heard in five years.
“Yeah,” I said. I noticed a little choke of fear in my voice. Maybe the woman heard it too.
I opened the cabin door to see Imelda standing in the cockpit of my boat. She was wearing a nicely tailored dark blue suit and a white blouse. She had one hand on her hip, near the gun on her belt, and the other hand was holding on to the boom.
I tossed the gun onto the bunk before I left the cabin and came up on deck slowly.
“It’s rude for you to come on my boat without asking.”
“I didn’t know if you were here,” she said.
“What do you want?”
“To talk,” she said.
“I’m not on the job anymore; I don’t need to talk to you,” I said, aware of the hostility in my voice. My last encounter with Imelda was while I still had my badge and it had been ugly. I knew what it was like to have the cuffs put on me. All those years I’d been doing it to other people, putting the bracelets on nice and tight and hearing them complain. And then it had happened to me, and it was Internal Affairs that had done it. It was humiliating. Especially seeing as we’d started together on the force and had sort of been friends.
“But I’m asking nicely,” she said, and she sat down on one of the cushions. She crossed her legs and let her head sway back and forth in time with the boat. She knew her way around them.
“You have her rigged for single handling. Doing a passage soon?”
“Yeah, like you know anything about boats. Who told you that?”
She grinned.
“Want a beer?” I said.
“On duty.”
“I’m not.” I had two in an ice bucket and pulled one out. It was colder than that first one and I could still taste the Glenfiddich in my throat.
I sat down across from her. I could see the glint of the Browning Hi-Power sitting on the bunk, but she could not see it from where she was sitting. She’d take it from me if she saw it.
“How long’s it been?”
“Five.”
“Your ex-partner, Rico Mendes. I want to talk to you about him.”
“He’s a creep, a skunk, a good cop and a bad one,” I said. I wasn’t holding anything back now on how I felt about Rico. In times gone by, I would have said he was a great cop even knowing how bad he truly was.
“Yes, we know all that,” she said. “His reputation precedes him.”
“Then let me ask you this: why is he still driving around with a gun and a badge and I’m down here sweating it out on this boat with neither of those things?”
“That makes you mad?”
“Not mad enough to roll on anyone, if that’s what you’re thinking. And you being Internal Affairs, that’s probably the only thought you’re capable of.”
“It’s the job.”
“Not my job.”
“That old worn-out cliché—cops hate Internal Affairs. Is that it?”
I nodded.
“Internal Affairs hate dirty cops. Know who else does? The entire justice system. And the public they’re sworn to serve. I’ll run with that crowd any day.”
“I hate Rico. True, I’m mad he’s still on the job. True. Will I roll on him and every other dirty cop he’s connected with? No fucking way. What can they do to me—fire me?”
“Put you in jail. Right alongside some of the people you helped put away. Fun times.”
“I’ll take my chances. If you guys still had anything on me you would have made your move a long time ago.”
“You hear about Bruno Scalla?”
“Nope,” I said.
“Someone aired him out at his home. You must have heard about your pal Don. He got his knees drilled. That’s a Scalla trademark. Enzo likes to use his hands, but Bruno likes to slowly drill the guy’s kneecaps out. Now Enzo is super mad. He’ll want to throttle the guy who got his brother.”
“He won’t see it as a tit-for-tat kind of thing?” I said, and chuckled.
She laughed, too, a nice easy laugh I liked. It was genuine. I liked the fact she could cut through all this cop bullshit and enjoy a good joke. As morbid as it was.
“No, I think he’ll want to close the book his way. With his hands wrapped around the neck of the guy who did his brother.”
“Maybe that person will get him first?”
“Maybe. Anyway, Jack, I won’t take up more of your time. She handed me her card. When you want some help, give me a call. You know what I want in exchange.”
“Sure, Officer. Whatever you say.”
She got up and stumbled just a bit and I reached up and grabbed her arm. It was firm and warm and I helped her up onto the dock.
“Thanks,” she said. I watched her walk away. Several heads of boaters turned and watched her go too. One turned to me and smiled and raised his eyebrows. I grabbed the other beer and sat down to think it out.
Chapter 16
Cindy’s little Jetta was in the shared driveway between her apartment building and the next one. That was unusual. She usually put it out in the street; blocking that driveway was a pain.
Still, I didn’t think anything was amiss when I pushed the button to her upper apartment. It was a four-unit block, and she had the upper right-hand corner unit. After pushing Cindy’s button twice more I pushed her neighbour’s, the guy directly below, and he came out. He was wearing this very revealing short Japanese-style robe and I could tell he was naked underneath. I knew from Cindy that this guy was creepola and I had been keeping my eye on him. She was paranoid he had drilled cameras up into her apartment, and we had searched for them one night but found nothing.
“Help you?” he said.
“Looking for Cindy. Her car is outside.”
“She left with a bunch of guys last night. She got in their car.”
My heart almost exploded with fear. I pushed past the creepy neighbour and ran up the stairs. The door wasn’t even locked and I went in. The place was a shambles; there were clothes from a drying basket strewn on the floor, and a coffee cup and the remains of dried coffee on the kitchen floor. They had come in and taken her. I looked back down the stairs; Creepy Neighbour was staring up at me, his penis in full view.
“Cover up, you pervert,” I shouted down at him and punched the wall. The light on her answering machine was blinking. She still used one of those. She worked as a part-time order taker for Swiss Chalet and needed a land line in addition to her cell phone. Her cell was nowhere to be seen. I crossed the floor and pushed the answering machine button. First message, only message.
Jack, my boy, we have your friend. You have our money.
It was a voice I did not recognize, but I knew it was a Soos associate. Soos wouldn’t be stupid enough to leave an extortion message on tape hims
elf.
Be at the warehouse near the DVP by four this afternoon or you know what will happen. We’re going to feed your friend to a dog, piece by piece. Bring the money.
I punched the button until the message stopped. I knew the warehouse; it was the only one that Soos owned. It was in the shadow of the Don Valley Parkway, in the east end of downtown Toronto. He pushed merchandise through it, mostly legit. Occasionally a hot load. It was past the pickup spot where I’d picked up Louis and the money last night. Not accessible from the water; I would have to drive. It was one way in, one way out. They’d see me coming.
