Chuck Hogan - Devils in Exile

Traffickers making adjustments out of fear was the clearest evidence yet of the bandits’ influence on the drug trade.

Termino was the point man in Royce’s absence. He, Maven, Glade, and Suarez ditched their kayaks on a sandy barrier beach of low dunes named Dead Neck, entering the frigid water in insulated neoprene and dive boots, swimming out into Cotuit Bay under cover of night. A breakwater calmed the surf as they snorkeled around the west end of the island, one hundred meters off the densely wooded shore, each man tugging a watertight bag strung from a gas-filled bob.

They cut in toward the fifth dock from the turn, floating easily and watching the house lights through the oaks, monitoring the shore for any activity. Satisfied with the stillness, they walked out of the water onto beach grass and opened their wet bags, exchanging snorkels and dive masks for light vests, balaclavas, and weapons. Maven made sure his 9 mm MP5 submachine gun was moisture-free, then extended the butt stock of the hybrid handgun-rifle. The others pulled on their masks and started up the dune on either side of the wooden stairway, looking every bit like amphibious commandos.

This drill they had repeated each of the previous four nights. They knew the layout of the property, they knew everything.

The others took entry. Maven went alone through pines to the front of the estate, spotting the lookout halfway down the curling drive of crushed white seashells. He stood on the near side, allowing Maven to come up on him silently over grass, catching the goon on the side of the head just as he started to turn around. Maven relieved him of a handgun and a Nextel mobile, then bound him in ZipCuffs and a gag and loaded him into the back of the tile truck parked before the three-car garage.

A glance through the windows revealed that the dealmakers had been subdued. His all clear was three taps on the glass, masked Termino responding with a nod. Maven then did a full perimeter walk before entering, making double sure there was only one lookout.

Four men lay prone on the floor. The one guy freaking out wore navy blue corduroys, a collared shirt, and a kelly green whale belt: the homeowner’s son. Guns and mobiles were set out on a wide coffee table with ammo mags and phone batteries removed. The bags of heroin were piled on the granite counter in the center island of the kitchen, smelling like the seafood section of Stop & Shop. Glade transferred cash into two large backpacks.

Suarez ran the kitchen sink, washing down the scag and chasing it with Drano. The bags of pot they left on the floor. The homeowner’s son — receding hairline, the stink of failure all over him like the dead-fish smell — continued to whine under his gag, wanting to register a sternly worded complaint.

Maven made a circuit of the ground floor. Paneled walls, museum-quality lighting, inch-thick rugs. He looked at a large, carefully drafted map of the island, hand-lettered and handsomely mounted, an antique from its legitimate oystering days. The owner’s son was a broker who had been “borrowing” from the family money entrusted to his care to fund his own vices and crude interests — money he planned to earn back twofold through risky investments, none of which had yet panned out. The family was down in Hialeah; they didn’t know this yet.

Maven was in the front of the house, looking at the old seaman’s map that now hung on the wall — one man’s tool another man’s trophy — when he heard a sound out of place. A creak. A step.

He started toward the intersecting hallways, keeping his dive boots silent on the thick rugs. As he turned the corner toward the shore side of the house, he saw a crouched form emerging from an old servants’ set of stairs. He saw a handgun silhouetted against the kitchen light as the body sprang forward.

The gunman got off a single round before Maven plowed him over with a forearm to the back of his head. The man hit the floor with such force that the gun in his hand cracked in two at the wooden grip.

Maven dropped a knee into the man’s back, turning to see where the shot had gone.

Suarez was on one knee before the sink, neck arched in pain, one hand gripping his back.

His vest had absorbed the round. Suarez’s face went dark when he realized what had happened, and he straightened in pain, pulling his MAC-10 machine pistol off the kitchen counter in a blind rage. He turned to execute the shooter — but Maven collapsed on the unconscious man, shielding him with his own vested back until Glade and Termino intervened.

Maven ZipCuffed the shooter and they finished fast, taking the money, phones, and weapons and leaving the way they had come, down the grassy elevation to the sand at the empty dock. Masks and guns went into wet bags with the cash, snorkel gear coming back out.

Suarez was grunting in pain, still muttering under his breath. The gun report had put a pealing into Maven’s ears like a distant alarm. He was knee-deep in the frigid water, towing out the bad guys’ guns and phones, when Suarez hooked his arm, hard.

Maven turned fast, responding to the grip. But instead of anger, he saw gratitude.

“Thanks, man,” said Suarez.

For knocking out the shooter, and for stopping Suarez from killing him. Maven clapped him on the chest and they pushed out into the water.

Halfway to Dead Neck, Maven sank the bag of guns and phones to the bottom of the bay.

Maven came up from the sink with his face dripping, staring at himself in the restroom mirror. The water dribbling off his chin, the tightness of his sore muscles, brought him back to that night before, the job on the Cape. Despite two hot showers, he could still smell salt water on his hands. The sick feeling he had got when he saw the shooter emerge from the shadows was still with him.

It could happen that quickly, that easily. One slipup. Game over.

He dried his face, taking a squirt of cologne from the complimentary dispenser on the counter, patting his neck and jaw. Salt water is good for the complexion, it turned out. His neck was smooth and clean, no razor burn, nothing. He looked strong and ridiculously healthy. That was what money did for you.

He accepted a linen towelette from the black-jacketed attendant. “Thanks, brother,” said Maven, depositing a finsky into the glass tip bowl.

“Thank you, sir,” said the attendant, opening the restroom door.

Maven stepped into the swirl of light and sound that was Precipice. Royce said that the best nightclubs maintain just the right mixture of sexy and sinister. Precipice had that: walking through it was like patrolling a dark cloud during a lightning storm. The pulsating lights, the music thumping from the walls, that pheromonal musk of sweat and perfume and alcohol that was pure sexual incense: every club had these things, but here the mix achieved a sort of exotic frenzy.

The VIP room included a catwalk overlooking the downstairs dance floor. Red velvet curtains draped doorways leading to interconnected rooms, some so dark you couldn’t guess their dimensions upon entering. As many times as he’d been here, Maven still, at least once each night, lost his way.

The club was located on the edge of the Theater District, before it gave over into Chinatown. The outrageous $60 cover charge weeded out students and barhoppers, who could find what they were looking for on Lansdowne or Boylston Street at one-sixth the price and one-tenth the hassle. Unaccompanied women were admitted free if they looked the part, and judging by the traffic-stopping scrum outside, looking the part was apparently the goal of half the twenty-one-year-olds in town.

Maven circumvented the balcony and ducked off into one of the velvet curtains, searching for a smaller bar. Indigo neon light signaled it, and he made his way to the corner rail, yelling out an order for a Seven and Seven and laying a fifty on the bar.