David Hosp - Among Thieves

“Thanks.”

“It’s not much.”

“I know.”

“I really do want to help. So does Lissa. So does Kozlowski.”

She looked at him with a puzzled expression.

“Okay, I don’t know about Koz. He’s tough to read. I’m sure he’d want to help if he gave it any thought, though.”

Sally thought about it. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why do you want to help? Why does Lissa want to help? What do you care?”

Finn stubbed out the butt on the fire escape and threw it over the side. “You’re the daughter of a client.”

“That it? My father’s a client, that’s why you’re helping me out?”

He nodded. “That’s why I agreed to take you in. I didn’t know you then.”

“And now?”

He shrugged. “I’d help you out even if you weren’t Devon ’s kid.”

“I guess that’s something,” she said.

“It’s a start,” he said. He reached out and tousled her hair. It was an awkward gesture, and her first instinct was to slap his hand away. In a strange way, though, she liked it. She couldn’t remember anyone ever doing that to her before. Most of the physical contact she’d had in the past had been either violent or inappropriate. Even her father, who clearly cared about her, seemed afraid to hug her.

She reached up and tousled his hair back. “It’s a start,” she agreed. Then she moved toward the window.

“One last thing,” he said.

“What?”

“You still shouldn’t smoke.”

She looked back over her shoulder at him. “Neither should you.”

Eddie Ballick stood at the edge of the water. There was no moon out that night, and a heavy layer of clouds blacked out the stars. The harbor was as dark as he’d ever seen it. He wondered briefly whether he was doing the right thing, but the thought was fleeting. He wasn’t someone who dwelled on such matters.

“Do you think he’s coming?”

The question came from Jimmy Kent. Jimmy had been with him for more than a decade. If Ballick had allowed himself to have friends, Kent might be one. Ballick viewed him as competent and trustworthy. Other considerations never entered his mind.

“I don’t know. There were only four of us, and he thinks one of us crossed him. Bulger’s gone; that leaves three. Rumor is he’s coming after us.” It was more than a rumor. Vince Murphy’s murder confirmed it as far as Ballick was concerned. Many people might have wanted Murphy dead, but Ballick could think of only one man who would carry out the job in the way it had been done. “Are we ready?”

Kent nodded. “Our three best guys. Positioned just the way you told me.”

“Good.”

“I wish we had more,” Kent said. “There’s still time to get some of the others.”

Ballick shook his head. “He’s too smart for that. If he thinks he’s outmatched, he’ll wait. I can’t surround myself forever. If he thinks I’m an easy target, he’ll come quickly, and we’ll be able to deal with him. Or not. Either way, it needs to happen now, and this is the best place for us.”

“What if they send others after him?”

“There are no others. It’s him, and that’s it. If he fucks it up, it’s over.”

Ballick had chosen a good spot; Liam had to give him credit for that. The shack was located on a narrow strip of land jutting out into the water, sandwiched in between a deserted boatyard and an open marsh that pushed up against the high metal fences of a gas station and two car dealerships. There was only one way in-a long narrow driveway with trees running down both sides. A steel swinging-arm gate was locked across the entrance to the driveway. It wouldn’t keep a man on foot out, but it would present an obstacle to a full assault by vehicle. The driveway set up a bottleneck that would make anyone approaching an easy target.

Liam had been watching the place for more than a day. He kept tallies in his head of everyone coming or going, and watched the patterns of activity. He knew Ballick wasn’t alone. If his count was accurate, there were four others on the property. His count was always accurate.

Five men presented a challenge, but not an insurmountable one. Even the best that Boston ’s underworld had to offer had never been to war. They were little more than bullies, and they wouldn’t understand the principles of ambush and counterattack.

The key was determining where they were positioned. He could be pretty sure that Ballick would keep his most trusted man with him as a last line of defense. It was likely that two others would be hidden in the trees along the driveway-one on either side to catch him in a cross fire if possible. That left one more. Where he would be hidden was the main mystery. The driveway ended at a spot where the land broadened, and beyond was a parking lot and scrub that eased into the marsh. The property was littered with derelict boats up on cradles, stacks of docks and floats and lobster pots ready to be put into the water once the weather warmed, as well as piles of netting and unidentifiable junk. The place presented a thousand places for a sniper to sit and wait, fully concealed. If he guessed where among the mess the fourth man was hidden, he would make quick work of all of them. If he guessed wrong, he’d be dead before he was aware of his mistake.

Liam was concealed at the edge of an outcropping of small trees and bushes around twenty yards from the gate. From his position, he had a perfect view down the driveway, and could see the corner of the fishing shack in the distance. He was armed with his nine-millimeter, four clips, and his knife. Sean Broadark was in a car parked across the street, his head down. Liam’s instructions had been explicit, and he knew they would be obeyed. Broadark was a soldier.

As he lay there, a beat-up Honda with a square plastic sign advertising Domino’s Pizza pulled up to the gate. The driver hesitated, then got out of the car to examine the lock. When it became clear that he could not swing open the arm, he got back into his car and leaned on his horn, giving off two long blasts.

Liam reached into his coat, pulled out a pair of night-vision binoculars and focused them on the driveway; it was all about to begin.

Kent looked at Ballick when he heard the car horn. “Go check it out,” he said after a moment.

Kent put the hand that held his pistol into the outer pocket of his coat and walked around the corner of the building. As he headed toward the driveway, he glanced at the stack of lobster pots behind which Tom Shavers, the best shot among all his men, was concealed. It was a perfect sniper position, with a clear view of any approach to the shack. The tarps over the pots gave complete cover. They had ripped a seam in the tarps so that Shavers could see out. In the darkness, there was no chance of him being spotted.

Kent walked quickly up the driveway, his head on a swivel, looking for anything out of the ordinary. He knew that two others were in the trees along the driveway, but he couldn’t tell exactly where. He hated being out in the open.

As he got to the end of the driveway, the driver of the Honda got out of his car and opened the rear door. Kent ’s grip on his gun tightened in his pocket. “What the fuck are you doing?” he called out.

“Pizza,” the driver said, pulling a box out of the back.

“We didn’t order any pizza,” Kent replied. “You got the wrong address.”

The driver looked at the sign just next to the gate. “This is eleven-oh-eight?”

“Yeah, but we didn’t order any fuckin’ pizza.”

The driver was a young man with long hair and a fuzzy chin. He looked stoned as he bent down to look again at the sales slip in the car’s interior light. Then his head popped up above the car roof again. “That’s the address they gave me,” he said.