“Dime bags? How much should I buy?”
“Come on, Billy!”
“Only kiddin’, bro!”
“Just see if he’s there,” Jack groused.
“Okay, relax!” Billy snickered. “Dewey lay, right? If I see him, I’ll call you.”
Jack took a breath, recovered the Zen that Billy had drained out of him.
Let it go. Let it flow.
HE HEADED TOWARD the Harmonious Garden, walking north on Baxter Way past cop cars, prisoner vans, and corrections personnel at the monolithic Tombs facility. He greeted some of the uniformed corrections van drivers whom he’d met while signing off prisoner transfers to Rikers Island. They slapped palms as Jack continued toward the Chinese restaurant at number 99.
The Harmonious Garden was a cramped fast-food joint that had a back door leading to a cinder-block bunker slapped up in the courtyard between buildings. The hidden bunker also led to the rear exit of 79 Mulberry Street, so gamblers could secretly walk through the block without being seen on either street.
Jack knew the On Yee tong covered the little operation with pocket money and probably supplied the bootleg cigarettes and whatever alcohol and drugs they were peddling. He wasn’t surprised that the Ghosts ran the gambling joint under the noses of the Fifth Precinct, two blocks away, and the DOC, in the shadow of the Tombs.
The Chinese were still invisible to many of the uniformed, or uninformed, officers in the area, who mainly wanted to finish their shifts and not have to deal with the bewildering, insular Chinese community.
He ordered a quick som bow faahn plate, put his cell phone on the table, and kept a discreet eye on the back door. Billy should be almost there, he thought, sipping the hot cup of house tea the waiter had plopped down onto the plastic tabletop. He was wondering how he could get to Fay Lo without him lawyering up, when the back door swung open.
Jack watched as a gang member stepped through, wearing an oversized pair of knockoff Dolce amp; Gabbana sunglasses. A short and scrawny guy, thought Jack as the gangsta summoned a waiter and began placing orders. A punk ass with a dailo attitude.
The cell phone buzzed, and Jack saw Billy’s message: SAW HIM. HE JUST LEFT OUT BACK.
Thanks, Jack thought sardonically, timing is everything. He turned his attention back to the junior gangbanger and now saw the Chinese word for “dog” tattooed on his neck.
Dropping a few dollars on the table, Jack pushed back and rose from his seat.
“Hey gou jai!” he called out. “Doggie Boy!” Like he was an old acquaintance.
Doggie Boy sized Jack up, sneered, and spat, “Who the fuck are you?”
Jack flapped open his jacket to flash the gold detective’s shield. “Let’s talk, kai dai.”
“Fuck you!” yelled Doggie Boy, suddenly darting out of the side door of the restaurant.
Jack sprinted after him, both of them zigzagging across Baxter Way. They were almost to the Tombs when Jack pounced and slam-tackled him into the side of a corrections van. The uniformed officers recognized Jack and prepared for backup response.
Jack twisted Doggie into an arm lock, forced him into the van.
“You make me chase you, punk kai dai?” Jack threw him against the wall of the van.
“What the fuck?” Doggie protested. “I didn’t do nothing!”
“Then why’d you run?” Jack said as he cuffed him to the prisoner’s railing.
“I got enough trouble without cops.”
Jack pulled a switchblade out of Doggie’s jacket. “Well, now you got more trouble coming,” Jack threatened.
“Fuck you! I didn’t-” Doggie cursed as Jack bitch-slapped him across the face, sending the fake D amp;G shades flying and revealing the bruises still evident around Doggie’s eyes.
“Owwww fuck!” Doggie howled.
Jack braced him against the prisoner bench and showed him the river photo of dead Sing.
“Oh shit!” Doggie cursed, shaking his head. “What the fuck is that?”
“He owed Fay Lo,” Jack said. “And you punk asses killed him when he couldn’t pay up!”
“What? No, man! You got that shit all wrong!”
“You suckered him and killed him!”
“No, man! Thass crazy! Who da fuck collects from a dead man?”
“Yeah, you were trying to make an example out of him.”
“Thass crazy, yo! Swear to God, we didn’t have nothing to do with killing him!”
“Who did then?”
“How the fuck should I know?”
“Look, boy. You keep boo-shitting me, and I don’t have the time to waste. We’re already here at the Tombs. See my brothers outside? They can process you quick, get you off to Rikers.”
“Naw, man. No way. I didn’t do nothing!”
“Yeah, you. And your Ghost punks.”
“No way!” Doggie continued protesting. “Thass crazy.”
“I’m going to charge you with promoting and protecting an illegal gambling enterprise,” Jack said, stone-faced. “And weapons possession for the stiletto. Then I’m going to bust the blockhouse and tell them you gave it up, and we had to arrest you just to make it look good. Gonna tell them you’re my snitch now, okay, bitch? How you think that’s going to play? And you probably got priors and probation and whatever other shit you got on your sheet that will put you on the express back to Rikers anyway. You know how the brothers there will welcome your tight little Chinese ass, right?”
Jack’s last sentence seemed to get Doggie Boy’s attention.
“But I didn’t do nothing,” he started to whine.
“Right. You caught a beating for nothing outside Fay Lo’s. I know who did it,” Jack bluffed. “But here’s your chance to tell your side-why they tuned you up.” Jack pointed to the uniformed guards on the street. “Or I turn you over to them.”
Jack paused, pushed open the van door, and turned to leave. “Last chance,” he offered, watching Doggie’s eyes glaze over for what seemed like forever.
“All right!” Doggie yelled bitterly before surrendering what the rival gang boys had beaten out of him.
“The guy was into Fay Lo for five K,” he began. “Mostly from card games. They knew he worked at one of Bossy Gee’s restaurants and knew he was mad at Bossy’s people.”
“Go on.”
“He delivered to Bossy’s house and knew the location. So Fay Lo washed the debt in exchange for the address.”
“Why Bossy’s address?”
“I don’t know.”
Kidnap, arson, robbery, or murder? wondered Jack. “What’s the address?”
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t bullshit me, boy!” Jack barked. “Bossy’s boys tuned you up for something you didn’t know?”
“They wanted to know how we knew the address.”
“And you gave Sing up.”
Doggie nodded. “They wouldn’t stop beating me!”
“You got him killed,” said Jack.
“He got himself killed!”
“So what happened? You went to the house …”
“Not me! I don’t have the rank for that. Only the dailos.” He took a quick, hard breath. “Fuck! First I get beat by those Dragon faggots, now I get beat by the cops!”
“I never beat you, punk. You called me ‘fuck’ one time too many, that’s why you got slapped. You can’t take a bitch-slap, you better get the fuck out of the bad-boy business.”
“All bool-shit! That’s all I got,” Doggie said. “So charge me or let me call the lawyer. No fears!”
Bossy or his people-probably the Dragons, who were arch enemies of the Ghosts anyway-killed Sing as some kind of payback, figured Jack. But payback for what? He stared down Doggie Boy, thinking, Charge him now and arrest him for illegal gambling, but open a pool of worms on Chinatown organized crime and confidential informants. And attract an Internal Affairs investigation into possible police misconduct.