Among Thieves

Chapter Fourteen

Eddie Ballick stood at the edge of the water. There was no moon out that night, and a heavy layer of clouds blacked out the stars. The harbor was as dark as he’d ever seen it. He wondered briefly whether he was doing the right thing, but the thought was fleeting. He wasn’t someone who dwelled on such matters.

“Do you think he’s coming?”

The question came from Jimmy Kent. Jimmy had been with him for more than a decade. If Ballick had allowed himself to have friends, Kent might be one. Ballick viewed him as competent and trustworthy. Other considerations never entered his mind.

“I don’t know. There were only four of us, and he thinks one of us crossed him. Bulger’s gone; that leaves three. Rumor is he’s coming after us.” It was more than a rumor. Vince Murphy’s murder confirmed it as far as Ballick was concerned. Many people might have wanted Murphy dead, but Ballick could think of only one man who would carry out the job in the way it had been done. “Are we ready?”

Kent nodded. “Our three best guys. Positioned just the way you told me.”

“Good.”

“I wish we had more,” Kent said. “There’s still time to get some of the others.”

Ballick shook his head. “He’s too smart for that. If he thinks he’s outmatched, he’ll wait. I can’t surround myself forever. If he thinks I’m an easy target, he’ll come quickly, and we’ll be able to deal with him. Or not. Either way, it needs to happen now, and this is the best place for us.”

“What if they send others after him?”

“There are no others. It’s him, and that’s it. If he fucks it up, it’s over.”

Ballick had chosen a good spot; Liam had to give him credit for that. The shack was located on a narrow strip of land jutting out into the water, sandwiched in between a deserted boatyard and an open marsh that pushed up against the high metal fences of a gas station and two car dealerships. There was only one way in-a long narrow driveway with trees running down both sides. A steel swinging-arm gate was locked across the entrance to the driveway. It wouldn’t keep a man on foot out, but it would present an obstacle to a full assault by vehicle. The driveway set up a bottleneck that would make anyone approaching an easy target.

Liam had been watching the place for more than a day. He kept tallies in his head of everyone coming or going, and watched the patterns of activity. He knew Ballick wasn’t alone. If his count was accurate, there were four others on the property. His count was always accurate.

Five men presented a challenge, but not an insurmountable one. Even the best that Boston ’s underworld had to offer had never been to war. They were little more than bullies, and they wouldn’t understand the principles of ambush and counterattack.

The key was determining where they were positioned. He could be pretty sure that Ballick would keep his most trusted man with him as a last line of defense. It was likely that two others would be hidden in the trees along the driveway-one on either side to catch him in a cross fire if possible. That left one more. Where he would be hidden was the main mystery. The driveway ended at a spot where the land broadened, and beyond was a parking lot and scrub that eased into the marsh. The property was littered with derelict boats up on cradles, stacks of docks and floats and lobster pots ready to be put into the water once the weather warmed, as well as piles of netting and unidentifiable junk. The place presented a thousand places for a sniper to sit and wait, fully concealed. If he guessed where among the mess the fourth man was hidden, he would make quick work of all of them. If he guessed wrong, he’d be dead before he was aware of his mistake.

Liam was concealed at the edge of an outcropping of small trees and bushes around twenty yards from the gate. From his position, he had a perfect view down the driveway, and could see the corner of the fishing shack in the distance. He was armed with his nine-millimeter, four clips, and his knife. Sean Broadark was in a car parked across the street, his head down. Liam’s instructions had been explicit, and he knew they would be obeyed. Broadark was a soldier.

As he lay there, a beat-up Honda with a square plastic sign advertising Domino’s Pizza pulled up to the gate. The driver hesitated, then got out of the car to examine the lock. When it became clear that he could not swing open the arm, he got back into his car and leaned on his horn, giving off two long blasts.

Liam reached into his coat, pulled out a pair of night-vision binoculars and focused them on the driveway; it was all about to begin.

Kent looked at Ballick when he heard the car horn. “Go check it out,” he said after a moment.

Kent put the hand that held his pistol into the outer pocket of his coat and walked around the corner of the building. As he headed toward the driveway, he glanced at the stack of lobster pots behind which Tom Shavers, the best shot among all his men, was concealed. It was a perfect sniper position, with a clear view of any approach to the shack. The tarps over the pots gave complete cover. They had ripped a seam in the tarps so that Shavers could see out. In the darkness, there was no chance of him being spotted.

Kent walked quickly up the driveway, his head on a swivel, looking for anything out of the ordinary. He knew that two others were in the trees along the driveway, but he couldn’t tell exactly where. He hated being out in the open.

As he got to the end of the driveway, the driver of the Honda got out of his car and opened the rear door. Kent ’s grip on his gun tightened in his pocket. “What the fuck are you doing?” he called out.

“Pizza,” the driver said, pulling a box out of the back.

“We didn’t order any pizza,” Kent replied. “You got the wrong address.”

The driver looked at the sign just next to the gate. “This is eleven-oh-eight?”

“Yeah, but we didn’t order any fuckin’ pizza.”

The driver was a young man with long hair and a fuzzy chin. He looked stoned as he bent down to look again at the sales slip in the car’s interior light. Then his head popped up above the car roof again. “That’s the address they gave me,” he said.

“I don’t give a fuck what address they gave you,” Kent said. “I’m telling you, we didn’t order any fuckin’ pizza. Get the fuck out of here.”

The driver ran his greasy fingers through greasier hair. “Fuck,” he muttered. “I hate this job.” He tossed the pizza box into the backseat. Then he slid into the driver’s seat and pulled away.

“Fuckin’ moron,” Kent said. He stood there, his eyes searching the street. He’d never seen Ballick so concerned, and he didn’t understand why. Kent had his best men in place, and they were ready for anything. After a moment he turned and started back to the little shack by the water.

He took two steps before the shot tore through the center of his back. It felt as though he’d been hit with a baseball bat, and he pitched forward onto the pavement. In his mind he was moving, his gun out as he whirled around to shoot back, shouting directions to the men in the trees. In reality, he lay still. The bullet had blown through his spinal column just between his shoulder blades, and the instructions from his brain had nowhere to go. His mouth was moving, but no sound came out. Blood fought its way up his esophagus and trickled out of the corner of his mouth onto the driveway. He was dead within seconds.

Liam was moving as soon as he pulled the trigger, silently shifting his position ten feet to the left. The bushes where he’d been standing exploded from the rounds fired from the trees along the driveway. He watched the flashes and took careful aim at the spot from where the shots came on the left, firing six quick rounds into the trees.

Then he was moving again, running toward the driveway.

More shots rang out from the right-hand side of the driveway, and Liam could hear the shots whistle by him. Then he heard a number of gunshots coming from behind him, and he knew that Broadark was returning fire, just as instructed. The gunshots from the trees stopped, and Liam kept moving, hurtling the metal fence and diving toward the far edge of the row of trees.

The trees were now his allies, providing him with cover as he moved quickly down the row toward the shack. Halfway down the driveway, he came across the body of one of Ballick’s men. He was slumped against a tree trunk, his neck tipped back at an awkward angle, his eyes wide open, staring at the overhanging branches. Liam bent down to feel his neck for a pulse, though he knew there would be none. He could see the hole that had been ripped in the man’s chest.

Now he had a decision to make. He’d seen the man who came out to chase away the pizza delivery boy take a long look at the canvas mass to the left of the shack, and it gave him a good indication that the fourth man was hidden there. The approach would be better from the other line of trees. At the same time, that line would require that he cut across the narrow drive, leaving him exposed. He decided it was necessary-not only to give him a better angle at the fourth man, but also to make sure that the shooter in the opposite row of trees was dead. There had been no shooting from there since Broadark ripped off his rounds toward the rifle flashes. It was possible that the shooter was merely playing possum, waiting for Liam to get overconfident and show himself in the open. It was unlikely-these men weren’t that well trained. Liam was that well trained, though, and he knew better than to leave any loose ends.

He crouched down low, in a runner’s stance, slowing his breathing and filling his lungs. Then he fired out with his legs, driving forward across the driveway.

He kept his head moving, looking out for shots both from in front of him-from the man in the trees-and to his left-from the canvas-covered stack. He was almost hoping that the man under the tarp would take a shot; the chances of a hit at that range on a moving target were slim, and it would confirm the man’s location. He was fairly certain that the fourth man was there, but confirmation would have been nice.

No shots came.

Liam slid under the branches of the trees on the far side, and almost toppled into the other shooter. He was lying there, a few feet from the tree trunk, breathing heavily. A rifle lay a few feet away. Liam moved forward, kicking the gun even farther away from the man and kneeling on his chest. There were at least two wounds he could see; one in the belly and one in the throat. Neither had been fatal as yet, though the throat injury looked severe. It appeared as though the front half of the man’s windpipe had been blown out. As he sucked for breath, Liam could see the hole in the man’s neck whistle and contract; any air he was getting was coming from there, not from his mouth or nose. He looked down at the man, and could see his lips forming the words, Help me, please!

Liam nodded to the man. Then he pulled out his knife and slipped it into the wound, slicing deeply in one motion, severing the carotid artery that had somehow been spared when the man was shot. The man’s eyes went wide with terror, but darkened in a matter of seconds as a flood of dark red flowed from the wound, around his neck and into the soft ground beneath him.

Setting his gun on the ground, Liam pulled the body into a sitting position and slipped the sweater off it. He removed the man’s shoes and wrapped them in the sweater, tying the bundle tight. Then he picked up his gun and moved down toward the last tree in the line, which sat no farther than thirty yards from the shack.

He crouched under that last tree for a few moments, watching the area in front of him. Whoever the fourth man was, he was the best trained of them all, and he hadn’t given up his position. He also, undoubtedly, had seen Liam move across the road, and had a rough idea of the direction from which Liam would be coming.

After a while, it became clear that the fourth man had no intention of betraying himself, and Liam decided to take the fight to him.

He picked up the bundle he’d made of the dead man’s sweater and shoes and moved to the side of the tree closest to the driveway. Holding his gun in his left hand, he threw the bundle as hard as he could with his right hand out from under the tree branches, then dove to the other side of the tree’s coverage.

As the shirt and shoes skidded across the driveway, tumbling in the dark night toward the shack, several gunshots rang out from under the canvas, and Liam could see quick flashes illuminating the slit opening in the center. The man was a decent shot, at least, as the bundle jumped and hopped, hit twice by the bullets.

It was the confirmation he needed.

He slid to the edge of the branches and aimed carefully at the opening. Then he unloaded the rest of the clip at the spot from where the shots had come.

He waited a moment, listening carefully for any signs of life. There were none. The nature of his mission-and the betrayal that had inspired it-ran through his mind. Then he slid a fresh clip into his gun, took aim at the opening in the canvas that was now flapping slightly in the breeze, and fired another fifteen rounds.