They were looking at one another straight in the eyes, as if reading the real dialogue between them.
"Favor for a favor?" Willy suggested.
Nate chuckled. "I didn't forget. That's why I'm still here to talk to you. What're you after?"
Someone squeezed by them to pay at Riley's counter.
"You up for a walk around the block?" Willy asked.
Nate glanced over his shoulder at Riley and raised his eyebrows.
"It'll keep," Riley answered enigmatically.
That put Nate back in his good mood. He was intrigued by Kunkle's reappearance, but he doubted it would fatten his wallet. Riley's comment, however, implied the night might still be young, as he'd been hoping.
Nate patted Willy's right elbow. "Follow me. I got just the place."
He led the way down the block and up a side street. Before a dilapidated brownstone with the front door connected to the sidewalk by a set of broad steps, Nate ducked to the right and climbed down a narrow metal staircase to what had once been the service entrance. It was so dark at the bottom of this trench that Willy could barely see the back of the man before him.
Nate gave the door a coded knock and waited. A small, weak light went on overhead for no more than two seconds, before the door swung back just wide enough to let them both into a small, quiet antechamber that reminded Willy of an air lock. A huge, barrel-chested man with no hair and a goatee gave Nate a broad smile and a pat on the shoulder. "How're tricks, Nate? Keepin' busy?"
"You know it, Jesse. How's your sister?"
"Much better. I'll tell her you asked."
The man's voice was friendly and relaxed, but his eyes hadn't left Willy's face since the moment he'd come into view.
Nate laid a protective hand on Willy's shoulder. "This is Willy, Jesse. An old friend who did me a big favor a long time back."
"And the man," Jesse said simply, his smile only half in place.
"That's true," Nate agreed. "You got the eye. But he's still okay."
Jesse weighed that in his mind for a moment, and then gave a single nod with his large head. "Well, then I guess he's okay with me, too."
He took one step toward the rear of the small room and pushed a button Willy didn't see. A back door opened with a click, and they were instantly met with the sounds of laughter and music and ice chinking against glass. Nate had taken them to an after-hours bar, the new century's equivalent of a flapper-era speakeasy, and as big a business during the predawn hours now as any of its predecessors had been all through the 1920s. New York prided itself on being a twenty-four-hour town, and it wasn't going to let any arbitrary bar curfew stand in its way.
Nate exchanged greetings with half a dozen people as he led the way around a pool table and down a row of booths to a bar at the far end of the room.
There the bartender instructed them, "Place your orders, gentlemen," as if they'd just arrived at the Ritz. The place wasn't that fancy, but it wasn't a dive. Dimly lit and simply but tastefully decorated, it could have held its own against any of its legitimate brethren. There was also a decent CD player leaking out good jazz, and since almost everyone present was over fifty, there was the mellow feeling of an old-fashioned men's club.
Nate ordered a rum, Willy merely bought an overpriced tonic water and was handed a warm bottle without a glass.
"Over here," Nate said, indicating a tiny table wedged against the far wall near a back door labeled, "Outhouse."
They settled down, comfortably far from the music, and sat almost knee to knee.
Nate had the contented look of a man watching an old home movie. He shook his head, took a sip of his drink, sighed with a contented smile, and said, "Officer Kunkle. Man, oh, man. I wasn't sure I'd ever see you again. I thought maybe you were like the nomad in the desert or somethin'-the righteous man who delivers the word of truth and then vanishes forever." He pointed at the arm and added, "And I guess if you'd been standing a few inches in the wrong direction, that'd be the fact of it, too. You ever get my letter?"
"I got it." Willy didn't detail its effect on him.
"Well, I meant every word in it, and I still do. That was an act of grace in an ungenerous world. You did yourself proud that night."
"That's just because it was your bacon I spared. You would've called me a patsy if I'd cut someone else the same slack."
Nate laughed and took another drink. "I am disappointed at the depth of your cynicism, but I can't deny your point. In any case, you did me the big favor, and I will always be grateful."
Willy removed the evidence photo he'd stolen from Ogden and laid it on the table before Nathan Lee. "You know where this stuff comes from? It's called Diablo."
Nate looked at the picture without touching it, his face suddenly grim. Narcotics were what got him in touch with Kunkle the first time, and he'd never dabbled in them again. The fact that the same man was back discussing the same topic didn't bode well.
"I know what it's called," he said shortly.
"Comes from around here, right?"
"Why you want to know?"
Willy hesitated. A cop's first impulse in a conversation is to never volunteer anything. Every word you say is to get the other guy talking. And you sure as hell never reveal anything personal.
But Willy was the one asking favors here, and, training and paranoia aside, there wasn't much to be lost sharing a little with Nate.
"My ex-wife was found dead with that shit in her arm."
Useful or not, the effect of this admission was telling. Nate's eyes opened wide and he stared at Kunkle in amazement. "No wonder you're lookin' a little ragged. She live around here?"
"Lower East Side."
That surprised the older man. "Huh. It happens, but usually a home brew like that doesn't travel far from home. The local appetite's enough to keep the dealer happy."
"So, it is made nearby?"
Nate ignored the question, trying to step back a bit first. "Officer Kunkle, I know I owe you, so don't get me wrong, but is this something you want to do?" As Willy's face darkened, he quickly added, "Now, hold on, don't get me wrong. I'll help you out. I will. But see it from my side, too. That's all I'm askin'."
Willy's expression didn't soften, but he didn't say the harsh words that first came to mind. Instead, he asked, "What do you want?"
Nate waved both his hands at him. "Nope. That ain't it, either. I don't want a thing. But you come back after all this time, and you got one arm messed up and you say you're still a cop and then you show me the picture and say that dope killed your ex-wife. If you were me, you gotta ask yourself: What's goin' on here? You see what I'm saying?"
Once more, Willy fought the urge to react impulsively and tell him to mind his own business, and struggled instead to address Nate's concerns.
He took a swallow from his warm tonic water and then explained, hoping for the best, "I am a cop, but not from here anymore. I work in Vermont."
Nate's eyebrows shot up. "Vermont?"
Willy cut him off. "Yes, Vermont. I'm kind of a state cop up there, like a statewide detective. It doesn't matter, for Christ's sake. The point is, I got a phone call that my wife had died and I had to come down. They're writing it off as an accidental overdose-locked doors, needle in the arm, history of drug abuse. They just want to clear their books."
"They wrong?"
"I don't know for sure. I think they might be." Willy knew Nate would have liked more, but he was disinclined to hand it over. He also wasn't sure he wanted to actually air his misgivings, for fear they might lose credibility even to him.
Fortunately, Nate seemed comfortable working with that little. "I do know somethin' about this Diablo. That's why I was surprised you found it downtown. It don't really go there. She have a reason to come up here to get it?"