David Putnam - The Replacements

He shook his head. “We hit that place with a warrant two weeks ago and tore it up. We didn’t find anything, and I mean nothing at all. These people are organized. They have attorneys on retainer, they even have a public relations firm looking out for their reputation. They are being repackaged and rebranded as good guys, community leaders.”

“The evidence is there. You just didn’t know what to look for. It’s there. Get your old warrant and have a judge standing by to sign an addendum. And get me out of here. We go to the clubhouse, hit it, and if I’m right, you let me walk right then and there.”

“The LA district attorney’s not going to be happy.”

“You ask me to trust you, now you’ll have to trust me. You let me go, then after I track down Jonas Mabry, I’ll surrender myself to you, and we can complete the paperwork on this little deal while I sit in custody. You have my word on it.”

“Barbara said you are one of the most honest men she has ever met.” He offered me his hand.

I took it. A lump rose up in my throat as I recalled that I had promised her I would not take Mack with me, and I had let her down. This was my chance to redeem Mack too.

The concealed FBI radio speaker under the dash spoke continuously, the voices eager and anxious, setting up the raid I had orchestrated. I sat in the rear of a sleek black Cadillac Escalade with the windows blacked out in reflective limo tint, in a rundown neighborhood with tired houses and weed-filled front yards. Kids rode bikes and skateboards back and forth, waiting for something to happen, trying to peer in. The air conditioner ran on high.

The clock tick-tocked in my head. I didn’t want to look at the digital time on the dash, the little red numbers that never stopped marching on and on. I couldn’t take my eyes off them. Six-oh-five. I had less than two hours to find Marie. How could I do it in two hours? I couldn’t think of any past scenario when I had worked on the Violent Crimes Team that fit into what had to happen and allowed a resolution in less than two hours. I wished Robby Wicks sat next to me to lend some of his arrogant confidence. He’d have a plan, no matter how cockeyed crazy or over the line into the gray. But he’d have a plan and be able to sell it to me. “A cake walk,” he’d say. “We’ll take these bastards down and be drinking a beer in one hour and twenty-five minutes.” No way could he back up his outrageous claims, not with credible reason. Even so, I’d find myself saying, “Yeah, I’m with you, let’s do it.”

I tried to peel my eyes off the clock and force my brain to think.

I didn’t even know if the golden doughnut would still be there. We had the safe open, but we had fled before taking that extra step to check. The golden doughnut could possibly link the SS organization to the armored car robbery. Planned and executed by them. Robbery was a predicate crime. The statute of limitations was up on the robbery. But the guard had been killed, and there wasn’t any statute limit for murder. The worst part about the plan, I had to throw Drago under the bus. He would have to testify. He wouldn’t, of course. He had that misplaced loyal gangster code coursing through his veins. I only hoped Dan Chulack would let me go pending trial. If nothing else, the recovery of a million two had to be worth something, a big feather for the FBI.

The FBI agent assigned to watch me sat in the front seat, his jaw set tight from anger at having to babysit. I said, for the fifteenth time, “Where’s Dan Chulack? The deal was for two hours, it’s been almost four.” The inactivity and the inability to control the situation made me want to smash the window, climb out, and run down the street, moving somewhere, anywhere, at least doing something.

Finally the FBI SWAT team arrived in a long caravan. They got out already suited up, dressed all in black. Their long guns hung from team slings across their chests. The ballistic helmets and goggles made them look like aliens from a foreign world.

Okay, here we go. From another car, Dan got out and walked up to the SWAT team leader. They spoke a few words. Dan shook the man’s hand, wishing him luck. Dan walked up to the Escalade, all too slowly. Couldn’t they all move a little faster? Just a little? Didn’t they know what was at stake? A woman’s life and three small, helpless children?

Dan got in.

“What the hell? You said two hours.”

He held up his hand. “I know, I’m sorry, I had a lot to coordinate. I just got the warrant addendum signed. We had to do this right. We want it to hold up in court later.”

“What, at the risk of the lives of a woman and three children?”

“I said I’m sorry. After we do this, I’ll personally put every possible resource at your disposal. Is there something I can do right now, something we can get started on?”

I couldn’t think of a thing and it gave me a headache.

“How’s my friend John Mack doing?”

“I’m sorry, I should’ve told you, but as I said-”

“Just tell me.”

“He’s out of surgery and his prognosis is great.”

I sighed and sat back. I took a breath, “What about Drago?”

“Banged up. He’s got a broken leg. He’s shot in the foot, that one’s recent, and he’s got a gunshot wound to the leg.” Dan smiled, “You know anything about the gunshot wounds?”

I didn’t answer and said, “That’s great about Drago. What about Roy Boy?”

Dan shook his head, “He’s alive, but they think he might be paralyzed from the chest down.”

Dan paused, then said, “Well?”

He wanted the information about the evidence for the predicate crime needed for the RICO indictment.

“Can you call Chief Wicks and have her meet me at the clubhouse-”

“Here she is now.”

Barbara pulled up in a maroon Crown Victoria. She got out and came up to the Escalade as the SWAT team mounted the step-sides of the SWAT vehicle and held on to the exterior rail at the top. We were finally rolling. Barbara got in the back next to me, cool, not catching my eye. I didn’t blame her. The Escalade started up. We moved in behind the SWAT vehicle. We were two miles away from the clubhouse. I didn’t know what to say to her.

“Mack’s going to be okay?” I asked.

“Define okay. He’s going to prison, and he won’t ever be a cop again.”

“I made a deal.”

Her head whipped around. “You what?”

“That’s what this is all about. I made a deal that Mack walks if we find enough evidence to put away the SS.”

Hope in her expression faded as I said the second part about evidence and the SS. “Evidence?” She said, “Did you actually see anything at all while you were in there?”

I looked away.

“That’s what I thought. This is a fishing expedition.”

“It damn well better not be,” Chulack said.

We rode in silence for a few seconds. Every increment of time went by far too slow. Tick-tock.

“Do you have the file on Jonas, the one that was in the back of his T-Bird?” I was grasping at the least little bit of intel that would help bust through the mental road block.

She still didn’t look at me. “No.”

My mind scavenged around for something, anything at all to keep her talking. I had the need to hear her voice. Maybe we would happen on something of mutual interest, and that would once again bring us close together as friends. And, as friends, we could figure this thing out. I had an itch, a niggling in the back of my brain, that I had missed something. Something vital and I just needed it to float to the surface. Talking with her could trigger that effect if we could put aside this emotional wound between us.

We rounded the last turn and headed for the clubhouse one block away.