The Hard Stuff

by David Gordon

  *

  Donna was late to work, just ten minutes but still she was usually like clockwork, walking in with her first latte of the day on the dot. But that morning the trains had been even more of a nightmare than usual—she found out later someone had tried to jump—which she should have taken as a sign: the day was going to be fucked. She was hungover for one thing. She rarely got drunk and never went out drinking on a work night—but then she hadn’t, had she? The party had come to her. And she’d ended up playing poker and getting slowly bombed with her own mom. And with Gladys, Joe’s grandmom, which still felt more like a dream than reality—or maybe one of those things you were relieved to realize was only a dream when you woke up. Again, there was nothing illegal or even unethical about it. Joe was not wanted for anything or officially being investigated, never mind Gladys. Nor was there anything specifically wrong with her move at the club earlier: just a couple of federal law enforcement officers rousting a known OC hangout, trying to shake out information. They’d even bagged a fugitive in the process. But if she were honest with herself, she had to acknowledge the pattern: one way or another, there was something about Joe that made her cross lines. And that worried her.

  Her coffee tasted like crap. It wasn’t Sameer’s fault. He’d mixed her the same magic potion he did every time in his plexiglass cart out in front of the office. It was the inside of her mouth that tasted like a sewer into which a poisoned rat had crawled to die. She could feel the fur on her tongue. So she was washing a couple of aspirin down with a bubbling glass of Alka-Seltzer when Andrew stopped by and let her know that her shit morning had just turned into a shit day. And night, most likely.

  Andrew and Donna were friends and backed each other up in meetings or on the street. So when the CIA local field office reached out to their office’s head field agent as a courtesy to bring them in on intel that the CIA had received about a possible exchange going down between the diamond thieves from the Midtown heist and terrorist-linked heroin traffickers and Andrew realized that the information had not crossed Donna’s desk as it should have—that it was as if she were specifically being avoided—he felt he had to stop by and let her know what was up.

  “They’re working directly with NYPD,” Andrew told her. “Basically their boss just told ours to cover his own ass and not look like he’s ignoring protocol. So now I’m being sent along as liaison, chaperoning their date. But I haven’t been told shit about when or where or who. Too classified for us mortals.” He made quote marks in the air: “Security concerns.” The implication was clear: hints about a leak in the FBI and a shadow of doubt cast over Donna.

  “Son of a bitch,” she muttered. She tried to repress a burp from the Alka-Seltzer, then remembered it was only Andy and let it rip.

  He frowned distastefully. “Which one? There’s too many around here to keep track of.”

  “My ex-husband. Son of a bitch numero uno. If it’s sketchy, even for the CIA, and it somehow screws me, then he is in on it. Believe me.”

  “So what will you do?” Andrew asked, sitting on the edge of her desk, eyeing her barely touched latte. He’d been late today, too, thanks to the jumper, and he hadn’t had time to stop. One loser ruining the morning commute for how many thousands? And he hadn’t even jumped. “You drinking that or what?” he added.

  “No, go for it,” she said, and he gratefully drank. “There’s not much I can do,” she went on, following her thoughts. “Yet.”

  Andrew grinned. “Sounds like you’re scheming up something.”

  “Always. Just keep me posted later, all right?”

  “You got it, sister.”

  “And watch your own ass, too. I don’t want any bite marks or bullets in it.”

  *

  That morning, when Gio told Carol that he had several important business meetings set up for that night, that he’d be in the city and then working late in the office, Carol decided it was time. So, without even blinking, she told him right back that she had an important conference that night, too, discussing some at-risk patients with psychiatrists and educators. Was she getting to be as good a liar as he was? In any case, he bought it, kissed her, said he was so proud of her for doing such good work, and suggested that maybe they could have his mom just come by and cook for the kids. They were too old for sitters but this would just be a visit from Nonna, cooking their favorite gnocchi.

  The thing that really got Carol, that made her start crying for a second in both rage and sadness when he left, was that he was right. That was just the right way to handle it. He was almost certainly a cheater and a liar. He was without a doubt a racketeer, a thief, and a gangster, and she knew in her heart he was a killer. But he was also a great dad.

  *

  That morning, when Detective Fusco showed up for work, he got a rude surprise. Well, actually, it was not all that surprising. He had been on Gio Caprisi’s payroll—and under his thumb—for years. A compulsive gambler, he’d racked up debts, then traded information in payment, and he was now so compromised, so implicated that he could never untangle himself without risking his career at the very least—more likely prison—or if Gio got to him first, his life. Dirty or not, he had been a cop too long to have any illusions about who he was dealing with. Gio “the Gent” Caprisi was charming and seductive all right, like a cobra. The last snitch Fusco had ID’d for him ended up in a dumpster, chopped to pieces. There was always room in the trash for one more.

  The irony of it was that Fusco was good at his job. He was a highly capable detective with a clearance rate way above average, so when he was offered a spot on the Major Case Unit, an elite team handling serious crimes like bank robbery or kidnapping—or big-ticket diamond heists—he took it as his due. He’d earned it, despite everything. Gio, of course, was thrilled. His boy was in the big league, and his new job put him directly in the flow of information coming to and from the Feds. But Fusco knew all along he was playing with fire, and that morning when the call came from his boss, he had the feeling they’d just drenched him in gasoline and asked for light.

  The CIA had intel about a deal going down: the hot diamonds—from, as the news put it, the “spectacular daylight robbery in Midtown”—possibly being traded for a heroin shipment brought in by smugglers with terrorist connections. A team was being hastily pulled together from Major Case, OC Task Force, and the FBI and CIA as advisers. Why Organized Crime? The assumption all along had been that the diamond heisters were pros, the best of the best, and while there was no question they were “organized,” thieves of that caliber were rarely in gangs or crime families. Rather they formed a sort of independent guild unto themselves. But the dope was different. There was no way to distribute that amount of heroin without access to a network, most likely either the black gangs in Harlem or Brooklyn or the Hispanic crews who controlled the dope trade in the Bronx and most of Manhattan. Anyone who tried to set up shop on the streets they owned wouldn’t live long enough to get rich.

  Also, and this was what made his stomach flip, the CIA was telling them that there was “uncorroborated and nonspecific but semireliable chatter” that the operation involved members or associates of the Caprisi crime family. And then there was the bit that scared him shitless: they also claimed to have intel that one or more compromised law enforcement officers from an unspecified agency might be involved.

  That was bad. That was Fusco’s ass, basically. Even if he wasn’t the “officer” in question—and how could the CIA of all people know about him anyway?—it still scared him since if Gio went down and his family underwent a major prosecution, he was very likely to be caught in the undertow. One phone call, one meeting, one image on a security camera somewhere, and he was fucked.

  On the other hand, what if Gio Caprisi—his curse and cross, the vampire who fed off his blood—what if he really vanished, was swept off to life in prison or witness protection or wherever they put him? Then maybe Fusco’s own crimes would vanish, too, flushed down the same drain. Even his gambling debts w
ould be canceled if Gio was canceled. It wasn’t like a student loan to be traded and passed around. There was a real possibility that maybe, in this one night, all Fusco’s problems could be wiped.

  So when he and his team got their invitations to the party that night, he hesitated. Call Gio and warn him: yes or no? All day long he asked himself that: yes or no? And while he was a good cop and an excellent detective, Fusco, clearly, was a lousy gambler. He knew it. And even as day turned to night and the team headed to the location, a dark, quiet street in Dumbo, and began to get into position, he hadn’t decided which way to bet. The game plan, dictated from above, was to hang back and let the exchange happen, then seal the block and trap the players. Squad cars and plainclothes were set up on the surrounding streets, ready to move in. Fusco was actually in his car, parked out of sight, waiting with the agents that the CIA and FBI had sent along to “observe and advise.” A stiff prick named Powell, a typical spook, riding shotgun in Fusco’s car, adjusted the radio and AC like he owned it, with a cooler but less confident young FBI agent named Newton in back with Henderson, a close-to-retirement hack from OC Task Force. He finally decided: go with your gut. And his gut said call Gio. They say the house always wins? Well, Gio was the house. So, at the last possible second, he announced he had to smoke, then stepped out of the car, ducked around a corner, and called. Then he texted URGENT 911. Then he called again. But Gio didn’t pick up.

  34

  And so that’s why that evening, as Joe and Yelena were heading back to their car grinning big, he with the blank gun and his shirt soaked in fake blood, she holding the plate she’d made, and Juno and Cash were pulling out to follow the stones, and Liam and Josh were rushing downstairs to get to their car to trail them, with everything having gone off like clockwork, precisely according to plan, without even a (real) bullet fired, it all instantly went to shit as the law came crashing in.

  Juno’s warning came just as the cop car appeared. “Yo five-o!” he barked into their earpieces right as the police car, which had been cruising silently, hit its lights and sirens as it came around the corner fast behind Joe and Yelena’s car, blinding them in the headlights.

  “Don’t move. This is the police,” a voice announced redundantly over the loud speaker as they squeaked to a stop, bouncing on their shocks, and spilled out from both sides drawing their weapons. Yelena dove for the car. She was unarmed but had left an AR-15 on the back seat, and she grabbed for it now. Joe immediately opened fire.

  The gun was full of blanks of course. They’d filled the magazine, unsure how many shots Yelena would need for the trick, so now he had seven empty rounds left, which he blasted straight at the faces of the cops as he, too, sprinted for the car.

  The cops, however, did not know they were blanks. Therefore, they reacted in the way any sane animals would, seeing a man aim a pistol right at their faces and pull the trigger: they freaked out. They recoiled in terror from the muzzle flash bursting right in their eyes. One fired, wildly, hitting nothing but a wall down the block as he ran back to the patrol car for cover. The other dropped to the ground, almost as if he’d been hit. Joe emptied the gun at them and got behind the wheel of the car.

  Meanwhile, Fusco’s unmarked car had pulled in behind the cop car, but by then Yelena had her rifle and, rising through the sunroof was firing real bullets into the windshield of the cop car and over the heads of the newcomers, who scrambled for cover. Joe slammed on the gas and they bounced off over the cobblestones. Over the radio, Fusco and Powell berated the cops with the shattered windshield, who were still ducked and covered and who were blocking the narrow street. Finally, realizing they were alive and unhit, the traumatized cops got back in their patrol car and got rolling. Fusco followed, with Powell roaring beside him, and Henderson on his walkie in the back, trying to call for backup. Andrew, meanwhile, was deep in thought. He had the weirdest sense of déjà vu, almost as if he’d seen this woman before. And there had been speeding cars and bullets that time, too.

  At that point, just a handful of seconds after Juno’s yell, Joe and Yelena heard more yelling on the earpiece, from Josh and Liam, and then, from around the upcoming corner, more shots and more sirens.

  “Josh is hit. Josh is hit,” Liam called, and as Joe and Yelena reached the corner, the black Audi shot by, driven by Liam and pursued by another cop car, its siren wailing. Joe joined the chase.

  *

  As soon as Josh and Liam saw that Felix and the others were in motion, they rushed downstairs to retrieve the car they’d left parked at the curb and catch up to Juno and Cash, who were tracking the diamonds from a discreet distance. But right when they were running out of the street door, a police car came flying around the corner. The uniforms inside had been sent to intercept the black BMW containing Felix, Vlad, and Heather, but seeing two men with rifles getting into a sleek black car, they figured this was it, jolted to a stop, and, yelling their warnings, opened fire. Josh fired back, giving Liam cover while he got the car going, then ran and jumped in beside him as he rolled out. That’s when he got winged.

  “Josh is hit,” Liam called to the others. He peeled out, while Josh pulled his door shut, grimacing as blood seeped from the hole in his shoulder. The bullet had gone clean through. He hunted in the glove box for something to press against the wound and found a pack of Kleenex, which were immediately soaked.

  The cop car sped after them, siren blaring, and a moment later, in the rearview, Liam could see Joe and Yelena come around the corner and fall in behind them, with another police car and the unmarked car chasing them.

  “How bad?” Joe’s voice came over the earpiece.

  “I’m okay,” Josh grunted.

  “Through the shoulder but he’s bleeding bad,” Liam said.

  He made a right and then a left, zooming through the mostly empty streets, trying to avoid the tangle of dead-end blocks up ahead that he knew would trap them in Vinegar Hill. As a result he found himself turning onto a wider, busier street. And there was Felix, tooling along with Vlad beside him and Heather in back, looking at them and their parade of police in sudden confusion and alarm. Assuming they were coming after them, Felix gunned the engine. Liam, out of necessity, sped up to stay ahead of the cops, and Joe and Yelena came next, with the other cars chasing them in turn. As they passed the corner, another patrol car fell in line, merging into their lane. Liam rode Felix’s bumper, with his lengthening tail behind him. Meanwhile, a block over, on a parallel street, Juno and Cash, who had been trying to keep a low profile so as not to alert the quarry, now had to speed up to keep the diamonds in range.

  “Liam, do you know a doctor you can go to?” Joe asked over the earpiece.

  “I do,” Liam said. “But I don’t think he’d appreciate me bringing the law with me.”

  “You still on the rocks, Juno?”

  “Yeah, man,” Juno answered. “You know Cash is cool behind the wheel. But if we keep up like this they’re gonna make us, or we’re gonna get pulled over ourselves.”

  “Right,” Joe said, glancing over at Yelena, who was checking her guns to be sure they were all loaded with real bullets. He checked both side mirrors and glanced in the rearview at the cops on his tail. “Let’s see if we can give you both some breathing room,” he said. Then he signaled as he changed lanes.

  They were Downtown now, in the wider streets near Borough Hall, surrounding the municipal buildings and courts, which was convenient. Traffic was sparse at night, plus, if they were caught, there wouldn’t be far to go. Joe swerved right, taking the Lexus over the curb and across a large plaza bounded by the courthouse on one side and trees and benches on the other. The two cars behind him followed, while the others continued after Liam, splitting the party in two.

  Now Joe floored it. With no traffic ahead of him and the wide plaza to himself, he pushed the engine and was quickly speeding past the others, who were still jockeying on his left, along Cadman Plaza.

  “Okay, here I come,” he told Liam, then glanced at Yele
na. “Get ready,” he told her.

  She pulled her seat belt tight and braced herself, the rifle in her lap. “Ready,” she said.

  Joe veered left, cutting through the benches and across the sidewalk, then between parked cars and back onto the road. As Liam changed lanes to give him some space, Joe aimed his car right at the cop car behind Liam and hit it, full speed, clipping the right front corner with the front left side of his car. The impact sent the cop car spinning out of control, and it slammed into a bus stop on the corner. Liam and Felix both shot through the intersection, amid honks and screeching brakes. Traffic stopped. Liam sped off, passing Felix, who turned down a side street unpursued—or so he thought—except for Cash and Juno, who were tracking him from a block away, cruising like a shark in shallow water. Joe went into a controlled skid, ending up angled across the lane, blocking the line of police cars behind him as the light went red. He stopped.