Chuck Hogan - Devils in Exile

The seagull was back in the tree. He wanted to come back in. He wanted Maven’s eyes.

Maven awoke propped up on a few pillows. A notebook computer was set on his chest.

“Because I know you wouldn’t take my word for it.”

The man was in his chair, legs crossed. The other man, the white Jamaican, was behind him.

Maven’s right arm was unstrapped. He looked at the computer screen. This was some kind of trick.

“Go ahead. I put up some recent articles from the paper. You don’t have all day.”

On the screen were half a dozen windows open one on top of another. He had trouble reading the type and had to keep blinking and looking away, regaining his focus. So he could not read sequentially and instead had to absorb the writing in static chunks.

Massacre in Easton.

Cranberry Farmers Arrive Home to Bloodbath.

Nephew among dead in reputed drug deal gone bad.

Recent spate of Hub-area drug violence.

Maven scanned the print for names.

Curt Bellson.

James Glade.

Carlito Suarez.

The article noted the number of dead Iraq War veterans on the list. Three besides Glade and Suarez.

Sidebar: Veterans and Crime .

Another window, another article.

Gangland Slaying in Fort Hill.

Broadhouse, one of the kingpins, had been murdered in his home along with three associates.

Another window.

Milton Mansion Sees Night of Deadly Violence.

Crassion, another kingpin, dead. A so-called mob hit.

Sidebar: Recession brings consolidation, contraction in urban drug trade.

Another window.

Chelsea Piano Factory Shootout Claims Four.

Local Drug Baron Disappears.

A surveillance photograph showed a tough guy walking into a bar, a younger version of the man sitting in the chair. The caption gave his name as Lockerty.

The third kingpin.

“He hit us all. Bing, bang, boom. Only missed me because — guess what? — I was out here at the shore. With you.”

Maven let his head fall back. He was dizzy from reading and from the information gleaned.

“You still don’t get it, do you? It’s like I kidnapped a retarded kid nobody wants back.”

Maven lifted his head again to look at Lockerty.

“It’s Royce, you fuck. You did his bidding for months, knocking over the competition, cutting deep into mine and Broadhouse’s distribution. Yeah — Royce was Crassion’s boy. Until he turned on him a few weeks ago. I figured all this out. Crassion’s plan was to use his secret soldier Royce to jack his competition and, in doing so, squeeze street supply down to a dribble, raising prices all over town. You were Royce’s hit squad. I guess he needed you out of the way, cleaning his own house before he went scorched-earth. Set you up at that berry farm to end the bandit phase of the plan. A citywide coup. Crassion got what was coming to him, that fucking phony — and now Royce is king. Running everything single-handedly. An empire you helped him build.”

Maven looked again at the laptop on his chest. Was it real?

“You dumb fucking slug. See for yourself. Not like we’re setting you up a home office here. One more minute. Clock’s ticking.”

Maven didn’t know what to do. He looked at the keyboard, wondering how to prove Lockerty wrong. He tried opening up a search engine, but had difficulty getting his stiff hand to work. So he reread the articles he had.

In the “Related Articles” sidebar, he read:

Drug War Link to B.U. Grad’s Murder?

Maven stopped breathing. He moved his finger over the trackpad, trying to get the tiny arrow cursor on the highlighted article.

He finally clicked it and waited for the page to load.

He didn’t read any of it. He just stared at the photograph of Samara Bahaar, dressed in her cap and gown.

The bloodletting around town in part vindicated lash. This didn’t mean that his overseas transfer wasn’t still going through: it was. Or that Windfall wasn’t going to die a slow death in someone else’s hands: it would. But at least he was able to stay out on the street, keeping active, making moves.

He saw Samara Bahaar’s parents at the police station but never spoke to them. The father wore a suit and the mother a yellow patterned sari. The father carried a fraud conviction from a few years back, and a ten-month bid. But nothing tied the murdered college graduate to the bandits. Her friends said that she had met Maven at Club Precipice some months before. They knew that his name was Neal, that he rode a motorcycle, and that he was a real estate agent. They thought he lived on Marlborough Street, though one friend insisted it was Commonwealth Avenue. The parents knew nothing of him, though her younger sister, a high school senior, confirmed that Samara had confided in her about a boyfriend named Neal, a Realtor who was not Indian, who had helped her find her new apartment.

The killer had entered her apartment by key, no sign of a break-in, the girl smothered in her sleep. No agency was listed on the real estate agreement, so Lash visited every office in the Back Bay area, to no avail. Lash did not pursue it any further.

Because Maven was dead. The Sugar Bandits were dead. Maven’s motorcycle had been found in an alley in Cambridge, stripped down for parts. Two identical bikes registered to the other two masked men from the bog massacre, Suarez and Glade, had also been recovered around town.

Lash wished that he had pushed Maven harder. Specifically, he regretted not having intervened directly with Samara Bahaar. Tricky’s death still walked with him, part of his permanent shadow now. What kept Lash moving ahead was the hard truth, long-ago learned, that good people get hurt sometimes. That he controlled nothing in this world. He only policed it.

As Maven’s body healed, his mind deteriorated.

Left alone in the room, tied to the bed with nothing to occupy him, his brain began to feed upon itself. Eating away the better parts of him.

They let up on his sedation, though the straps remained. With no reason to interrogate Maven, Lockerty had taken to taunting, telling Maven what he and the Jamaican were going to do to him once he was fully healed. Lockerty thought he was mind-fucking Maven, but Maven was already well around the bend.

Royce visited one night. Standing back in the shadows, his arms folded, watching Maven lying in the bed.

“Danielle,” said Maven. “What did you do to her?”

Royce never answered, never moved.

“I try to put myself in that bed, you lying there helpless, knowing what’s coming. Knowing you will never see the outside of this room. And you don’t say anything. I want to know, how is it you’re not begging me for mercy? For anything ?” Lockerty was up and walking around the chair, hiking up his pants. “At least give me the common courtesy of turning you down flat. Or — wait a minute. Are you dumb enough to still have hope? I want to know what keeps you going.”

Lockerty was turned away from Maven, stretching his back, when Maven said, “Revenge.”

Lockerty stopped. He turned. “It speaks.” Lockerty went back to the chair and sat down, newly engaged. He looked at his captive in the bed. “Go on.”

“You want to hurt me?” said Maven, his voice hoarse from disuse. “Get on with it. I’ve earned a beating. I deserve it. Not for ripping you off. For being a patsy. I’ll take whatever you give.”

Lockerty grinned. “Your tough talk is making me hard, soldier.”

“I’m gonna get through it. Whatever you got. It’s the only way.”

“Only way to what?”

Maven laid his head back upon the pillow. “To escape. And go after Royce.”