“Where you goin, Kaniewski?” said Waldron. “Is it time to change your tampon?”
A couple of the men at the bar smiled charitably. Then they kept drinking.
“I’m gonna catch a smoke,” said Waldron, and he headed for the side door, which led out to a patio and yard.
“What’s eating him?” said Lucas, after he was out of earshot.
“Bobby’s just ornery like that,” said Marquis. “You gonna hit him up for some iron?”
“I don’t think so,” said Lucas. “Not yet.”
Waldron had an arsenal of firearms, ammunition, knives, combat gear, and body armor he sold and rented out to select people he could trust. He bought the hardware at gun shows and from private dealers. The ammo and armor had been easily purchased over the Internet.
“So this thing you called me about,” said Marquis. “Should I be updating my will?”
“I don’t know. We’re dealing with three guys. One’s an Internet scammer, the other’s a thief and, when it comes to women, probably a sociopath. The third one, I’ve got nothing on him. But I’m not looking to bring a gun to this party. You pull a gun, you have to shoot it.”
“What you gonna do if they have guns? Point your finger and go bang?”
“If it works out like I want, I’m just gonna piss this guy off enough for him to leave.”
“And me?”
“We’ll take two rentals. I’ll go in for the meet, you hang outside the perimeter. When he leaves, tail him or his crew to wherever they go. I need to find out where these guys stay. Once I do that, I can figure out a way to get into their crib and steal back the painting.”
“You make it sound like a picnic in Rock Creek Park.”
Lucas shrugged. “It’s what I do.”
“What about the lay of the land?”
“The dude just gave me the location this morning. It’s over there in Ward Nine.”
After the increased migration of east-of-the-river residents from the 7th and 8th Wards of D.C. into Maryland, and the attendant rise in crime, some folks had been describing PG County as Ward 9. It was not a term of endearment.
“We Prince Georges County residents don’t like it when you describe our home in that derogatory way.”
“Sorry. The spot he picked used to be a strip mall in Oxon Hill. Now it’s a bunch of empty stores with no tenants.”
“A deserted strip mall.”
“He wants me to meet him around back.”
“Where it’s even more deserted. This gets better the more you talk about it.”
“We’re gonna check it out first, of course.”
“Of course.”
Lucas drank some Bud and placed the bottle on the bar. He looked at Marquis’s outfit and grinned. “Can’t touch this.”
“Huh?”
“MC Hammer’s closet has some empty hangers in it today.”
Marquis reached over and flicked the leg of Lucas’s Dickies. “I used to have a pair of trousers like that.”
“And then your father got a job.”
“You should own two pairs.”
“One to shit on, and one to cover it up with.”
“You heard all those, huh? And here I was, thinking I was gonna make you smile.”
“Let’s finish these beers,” said Lucas. “Go have a look at that mall.”
Billy King sat in a window booth of Captain John’s, overlooking a marina and sound. The restaurant was located on the mainland side of Cobb Island, Maryland, around fifty miles from D.C., down Route 5 and 254, where the Wicomico and Potomac Rivers meet.
Captain John’s large, open dining room was crowded with locals, powerboaters, and day-trippers. King was eating steamed crabs spiced with Old Bay. A pitcher of beer, a mug, a paper cup holding vinegar, a wooden mallet, and a nutcracker sat on the table, which was covered in brown butcher paper. The attaché case and gym bag containing the coins were locked in the trunk of his black Monte Carlo SS, parked in the lot.
King pulled the claws off the crab, flipped it over, tore open the envelope, separated the top shell from the body, broke the body in half, discarded the “mustard” and intestines, and found the treasured back fin. He dipped this in vinegar and ate it. He’d get to the claws later. God, it was good. For a while he’d lived in Louisiana, where they boiled their crabs, and they were okay, but there was no comparison to steamed blue crabs from Maryland, properly spiced. He tossed the inedible stuff in a pile that was heaped in the middle of the table and wiped a paper towel across his face. All the beer he’d drank, he had to take a piss.
On the way to the head he walked by the bar and saw a woman seated alone. A lot of hair, midforties, nice ass in a white pair of jeans, a strong sit-up rack from what he could tell. She was drinking clear liquor in the afternoon. That was good.
On the way back he walked slow and easy, and waited for her to get a look at him in full. Some women were scared off by a guy his size, but just as many craved it. Her eyes nakedly appraised him, and he knew he was in. He got beside her and touched his forearm to hers as he leaned on the bar.
“’Scuse me,” said King.
“That’s all right,” she said, with a smile. “No harm done.”
Up close she looked closer to fifty. Long as she was on the wet side of menopause and her motor ran, that was all right by King.
To the bartender, King said, “A shot of Jamie. That would be neat, professor. And please give my friend here whatever she’s having, on me.”
“That’s kind of you,” said the woman.
“My apologies for being so clumsy. I’m not the delicate type.”
“I can see that, hon.”
“Billy Hunter,” he said, and extended his hand. She took it, and he squeezed it firmly. Now she’d know his strength.
“Lois Wilson. Pleased to meet you.”
King smiled, showed her his white teeth. He brushed his blond hair back off his forehead. Women liked that move, too. “Pleased to meet you, darling.”
She blushed. Lois the Ho-ess, thought King. I’m gonna peel you back and turn you inside out.
“What are you doing in these parts?” said Lois. “I know I haven’t seen you here before.”
“Meeting a man at the marina. I’m looking to buy a boat. It’s a sickness.”
“Don’t do it,” said Lois.
“I know,” said King ruefully.
“I have a twenty-two-foot Whaler. It belonged to my ex. It’s a money pit, Billy. The gas alone...”
“I just can’t help myself,” said King, liking the way the conversation was going. “Look, I was hoping to get a drink later on, maybe someplace, you know, more of a real bar than a restaurant. You know of any?”
“There’s a little spot on Neale Sound Drive, on the island proper.”
The bartender served Lois her vodka tonic and King his Jameson, straight up. King knocked his back at once and placed the empty shot glass on the bar.
“Maybe I’ll see you over there tonight,” said King, dropping cash on the stick.
“Maybe,” said Lois coyly.
King walked back to his table to finish his crabs. Wasn’t no maybe about it. She’d be at that bar, waiting on him. And soon after that, he’d look down and there she’d be. Hanging on the end of his dick, panting like a grateful dog.
Another crab house was set just across the road. King met a man named Arthur Spiegel in its lot. Spiegel wore gray slacks and a white short-sleeved button-down shirt with an oxford collar. His eyeglasses had bifocals and thick black stems. He looked like a math teacher. In fact he was a bridge man to black marketeers who dealt in coins and gold. King and Spiegel were in the front seat of Spiegel’s Lincoln Town Car, facing the water. Spiegel was inspecting the goods in the open attaché set on the armrest between them.
“These Liberty five-dollar gold pieces are barely in the fine category,” said Spiegel.