Henry Chang - Death Money

They’d found nothing matching on the can of abalone. There were only Gaw’s prints on the pack of Marlboros taken from his apartment.

Jack frowned as he kept reading.

On the carton of Marlboros taken from Gaw’s Town Car, there was a match on both Gaw’s and Sing’s fingerprints.

They’d both handled the carton at some point .

On the Zippo lighter, they’d found only Sing’s fingerprints on the insert, but both Gaw’s and Sing’s prints on the metal case.

Killer and victim linked again .

Jack had gotten two hits out of four. If this were baseball, he mused, he’d be considered a star. He felt the urge to squeeze Gaw about how he’d happened to be in possession of Singarette’s lighter, hidden in the apartment.

Not that he would be expecting an answer.

AT THE TOMBS, Jack was greeted by somber black faces.

“Immigration came by,” the one named Ingram said with a frown.

“INS agents, on the overnight,” said Crawford, the tall one.

“They chained him and jacked him, man,” added Johnson, the youngest.

Immigration and Naturalization Service. Their agents were mostly law enforcement from other federal branches, sometimes military, but usually veteran officers. A big part of INS work was transporting criminal immigrants.

He knew two cold-case homicides trumped an attempted murder of a New York City cop and a possible homicide, but someone must’ve wanted Gaw really bad for INS to jack him out of the Tombs in the dead of night, within seventy-two hours of detention. Over a murder case, no less .

He knew it would jam his investigation to a halt.

“Did they say where he was going?” Jack asked.

“To Hong Kong,” Ingram answered. “Said he was going to meet Chinese justice.”

Jack nodded acknowledgment, knowing Chinese justice could mean a “Beijing haircut,” a nine-millimeter, hollow-point bullet to the head, ripping out the bad brains. Life is cheap in China . Then they’d bill the criminal’s family for the bullet.

Or it could mean years in a dark, airless cell.

Or it could mean disappearing inside the Chinese prison system, where maybe, with the Triad’s help paying off the warden and guards, Gaw would be set free. Free to resume his Triad life.

Or they just might decide it’s cheaper to shank him to death in prison, if rival Triads didn’t get him first.

Jack wondered if Bossy had his fingerprints on any of it. Wondered if the Hip Chings were connected somehow. Screw it , he decided, marching to Mott and Pell.

Bossy’s office.

He didn’t know if Bossy’d be there, but Jack pressed the button anyway. The receptionist buzzed him in and tried to stall him, but he barged into Bossy’s office and caught him by surprise.

Bossy coolly waved the indignant receptionist away, her cue to visit the ladies’ room. Jack gave her until the sound of the closing door before he began.

“Weapons were shipped to your office,” he said. “Probably your pretty secretary signed for them.”

Bossy maintained his frozen smile, clenched his fists, raised an eyebrow.

“Your driver Gaw’s good for the killing,” Jack continued. “And maybe I can’t prove it now, but I know you had a hand in it somehow. Maybe you got over on me, but it all comes back around, you know? And with your family’s history, I’m sure you know what that means.”

Bossy smirked, declined to dignify anything Jack had said with a response. He folded his arms, leaned back, and waited for Jack to leave.

The phone rang outside, and the receptionist quickly reappeared, throwing fearful looks in Jack’s direction. She answered the call but didn’t relax until he finally left Bossy’s office, her eyes following him until he turned and went down the stairs. He didn’t care about the surveillance camera on the wall or worry about Internal Affairs breathing down his neck.

Sing’s case was a matter of record now, and there’s wasn’t anything Bossy could do to alter that.

The party at Grampa’s was spur of the moment, with Jack having spread the word through Huong and giving the Tombs cops a heads-up. It was a raucous, alcohol-fueled scene, occupying the booths along the side wall, with the Commodores and Isley Brothers jamming loud on the jukebox.

Grampa’s kitchen served the party plates of clams casino, fried chicken wings, and Chef Kim’s signature onion-smothered steaks and chops.

Jack threw the party at Grampa’s knowing a few extra blacks and Latinos weren’t going to raise any eyebrows here. He was happy to see his African American Tombs brother cops-Ingram, Crawford, and Johnson-enjoying cocktails in the second booth and digging the music. It occurred to Jack how much Ingram, Crawford, and Johnson sounded like a law firm.

He started his second boilermaker. Payback is a bitch, like they say . The party was small thanks for those who’d helped on Sing’s case.

He’d invited Ruben, Miguel, and Luis-the tres amigos- sitting in the third booth. Cervezas all around, and smoking up a storm cloud. The three Mexican truckmen seemed to fit well with the Loisaida Boricua regulars at Grampa’s.

He leaned back and imagined the headline scoop he owed Vincent Chin and the United National : KILLER OF CHINESE DELIVERYMAN EXTRADITED TO HONG KONG FOR PAST CRIMES. They’d have to do dim sum sometime . Taking a gulp of the icy beer, he still marveled at Ah Por’s bank clue. More yellow Taoist witchcraft . He fired up a cigarette and considered how his stitches weren’t pulling so much anymore. The boilermakers were beginning to scatter his thoughts, and the jukebox thundered on.

The only one who seemed out of sorts was Billy Bow, who sat across from Jack in the corner booth. Billy scarfed down a baked clam and chased it with some Dewar’s.

“So it boils down to stinky tofu,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “One Chinaman with a paper name snuffs another Chinaman with a paper name, both here illegally mind you, and no one except you really gives a shit how they jacked the killer back to China? Man , that’s fucked up.”

Billy had a way of putting things, especially when he’d had a few drinks. His words held some truth, however. Gaw and Sing were two invisible men who no one paid much attention to. One eked out a living on the edges of the restaurant industry. His invisibility got him killed . The other was a Triad criminal hiding in plain sight for twenty years. He cultivated his invisibility, and it allowed him to kill .

If Gaw hadn’t killed Sing, their lives would have gone on, almost predictably, and no one would have even known they existed.

Jing deng , Jack mused, destiny . Always in control.

Billy took another slug of the Dewar’s, turned his cynicism toward the rest of the party.

“Too many niggas and spics here tonight,” he muttered.

“Billy, stop ,” Jack said. “They all helped me during the case. Just like you did.”

“Yeah, but … I know, but …” He shook his head.

“So relax , all right?” Jack pleaded. “Have another drink.” Then he leaned in, spoke just loud enough to be heard, “And don’t be such a fucking hater, okay?”

Before Billy could protest, Jack gave him a brotherly pat across the shoulders.

“And remember,” Jack continued. “I owe you a date at Chao’s.”

Billy brightened immediately, the thought of pussy erasing the racist spike in his brain. “That’s right !” he remembered alcoholically.