George Pelecanos - The Cut

“It’s not.”

“Hollow points and a clip-on are in the bag. You can keep the bag, too.”

Lucas reached into the back pocket of his swim trunks and pulled out his wallet. He handed Bobby the cash they had agreed upon and something extra.

“That’s a thousand too much,” said Waldron.

“It’s for the surveillance job,” said Lucas. “You did good work, and you saved my ass.”

“I’m always available.” Waldron’s close-set eyes flickered. “For this, too, whatever it is.”

“I’m good, Bobby. Thanks.”

A few minutes later he was walking through the living room, the day pack slung over his shoulder.

“That was a quick visit,” said Rosemary Waldron, seated in a recliner, a fresh bottle of beer in hand.

“I just came by to borrow a few video games,” said Lucas.

“You’re always welcome here, Spero.”

“I appreciate it, Miss Rosemary.”

Lucas tossed the bag onto the rear deck of his Jeep and covered it with a blanket. His blood ticked electric through his veins. The feeling was familiar and right.

Lucas took a shower and changed into jeans and a white T-shirt. Out in his living room, he studied the sketches he had made of the Mobley Detailing building in his notebook. He looked at the front facade, the entrance door and bay doors, and the rear, its windows and back door. He went through the photos he had taken from his iPhone, and the ones he had shot of the surrounding landscape. After a while he had the external layout committed to memory. That was all well and good, but the interior was a complete unknown. Lucas had no idea where Ernest was being held inside those walls. If in fact Ernest was in that building at all.

He needed help, but he didn’t want Marquis Rollins or Bobby Waldron further involved. He thought of Lieutenant Pete Gibson and his longtime hard-on for Ricardo Holley. Gibson might want in. But that wouldn’t work, either. What Lucas was about to do had to stay with him alone.

The room had darkened by degrees. The day was bleeding off.

Lucas sat at the kitchen table, his notebook and phone before him. He was staring at a wall meaninglessly when the phone began to ring. His young next-door neighbor Nick Simmons was on the line.

“Nick, what’s up?”

“Thought you might like to know, there’s a police officer out on Emerson, standing by his car. He’s lookin up at your windows.”

“Where are you?”

“Inside my house.”

“Hold on.”

Lucas got up and went to one of the windows that fronted Emerson. He stayed back in the living room, just far enough so he couldn’t be seen. Larry Holley, in blue, was out there on the street beside an unmarked black Crown Vic that was obviously an MPD vehicle. He was standing with his arms crossed, leaning against the rear quarter panel. He seemed to be waiting.

“I guess I’ll go out there and see what he wants,” said Lucas.

“Okay,” said Nick.

“If you see something going down-”

“What?” said Nick. “Call the police?”

“That is a problem,” said Lucas.

“I would say so.”

“Forget it,” said Lucas. “Just draw your blinds and go about your business.”

“I can do that, too.”

“Thanks for the heads-up.”

Lucas ended the call. He was barefoot, so he found a pair of shoes and put them on. He walked downstairs and out of the house. He crossed the lawn and the street. He neared the Crown Vic, and Larry Holley stood away from it and uncrossed his arms.

Lucas stopped, staying out of Holley’s reach. He put his weight on his back foot.

“You looking for me?”

“Maybe we ought to take this someplace else.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.”

Holley looked at Lucas’s defensive posture, the veins popping out on his biceps. “You’re a little jacked up.”

“I guess I am.”

“Why come outside, then?”

“You’re every citizen’s bad dream. A bent cop can do whatever he wants. I can’t really hide from you, can I?”

“I came to see you for one reason only: to speak with you.”

“That’s it?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re on duty?”

“I’m Ten-Seven.”

“If you’re here to take me down-”

“Told you, I’m not.”

“If you are, let me make this clear: if anyone has an idea about fucking with my family, they better rethink it. I’ve got everything documented and in the hands of an attorney. Your name, too, and your involvement in this. Everything. Something happens to someone I care about-”

“What about your involvement?” said Holley. “You put the part about killin Nance in those documents, too?”

“That was self-defense.”

“What I heard, his hyoid bone was broke. Seems to me you coulda just choked him out. With your military background, you must know how to render a man unconscious without ending his life.”

Lucas said nothing.

“We all got dirt on us,” said Holley. “Don’t try to act like you’re clean.”

Lucas’s anger drained away. He studied Larry Holley’s face. He was the younger, mirror image of his father, but they were different in a crucial way. There was vulnerability in the son’s eyes.

“How’d you get involved in this?”

“Can’t say, exactly,” said Holley. “I’m not claiming I’m innocent. When my father approached me, I could have said no. I took that step. I wanted to please him, see? But I never thought it would end up in all this death.”

“What did Ricardo ask you to do?”

“Identify targets. That’s what I did with Tavon and Edwin. Boys in the game think they got it all figured out, but they never do. I tailed them in my personal vehicle and rolled up on them at a Brookland home when they were picking up a package. I told them how it was gonna be. Fifty percent to us, fifty to them. They didn’t have a choice.”

“You took the package right there?”

“I delivered it to my father and Mobley. They wholesaled it, I guess.”

“What do you mean, you guess?”

“My father keeps me in the dark about damn near everything having to do with the business side. I was told to have the boys lie to their man Hawkins. To tell him the product got stole so the pie didn’t have to get sliced up too deep. They went along with it. They were too scared not to.”

“Because you were police.”

“Yes,” said Holley quietly.

“If they went along, why were they killed?”

“I don’t know,” said Holley. “I don’t. We had done two other retrievals, one on Twelfth Street, and the last one in Northeast. It was time to pay the boys off. I was there that night. I was supposed to watch the transaction and make sure it went down straight. The idea being, a patrol car idling on the street will keep all the other knuckleheads away. But I got called off by my father. I didn’t know Nance and Bernard White were gonna do what they did.”

“White’s the muscled-up dude?”

“Yeah. Him and Nance were partners. Amateur hitters. Trash.”

“And now they’ve got Ernest Lindsay.”

“Ricardo, Beano Mobley, and Bernard. That’s right.”

“You left your name off the list.”

“I’m not with ’em anymore.”

“How’re you gonna break off from your own father?”

Holley shook his head. “Did you have one who loved you?”

“I did,” said Lucas.

“That’s all I ever wanted, man. I waited my whole life to meet up with my pops. I dreamed on how that reunion was gonna be. Ricardo only reached out when he found out I was MPD. And that was just to plug me in to his scheme.”

“Do they have Ernest at the building in Edmonston?”

Holley nodded. “There’s an office, and another room behind it that leads to the back door. He’s in that room.”