Robert B. Parker’s Cheap Shot

62

Hawk called me at midnight.

“I got a lead, babe.”

“A lead,” I said. “That’s part of my lexicon.”

“Got word some shitbag want to talk.”

“Better.”

“Says he knows where to find Lima.”

I had gone back to my apartment for my spare gun, an S&W .40-cal, which, for a spare gun, wasn’t a bad option. I had a leather rig for it, wore it over my T-shirt and under a workout jacket. My beloved A-2 was still air-drying at Susan’s.

“He mention the kid?”

“Nope.”

“Where?”

“He wants that money,” Hawk said.

“Of course he does,” I said. “We get Lima and we’ll talk.”

“That’s what I told him.”

I checked my watch. “Where and when?” I said.

“Right now,” Hawk said. “Time waits for no man.”

“Except us.”

Hawk gave a “ha” and told me he’d be around in fifteen.

I finished a cup of coffee and loaded some spare bullets in my jacket before walking down to Marlborough. Hawk pulled around from Arlington and stopped in front of my apartment. I got in and he sped off. We cut up Berkeley to Beacon and then took Clarendon, heading south. “Back to Roxbury,” I said.

Hawk just smiled, the bright green instrument panel of the Jag lighting up his face and large hands on the wheel. Clarendon hit Tremont and we took Tremont all the way into the neighborhood.

“You got a name?” I said.

“Nope.”

“How’d they find you?”

“DeVeiga,” Hawk said. “Reached out to him in the hospital. DeVeiga told this guy we could be trusted.”

“Part of the kidnap?” I said.

“Probably.”

“Who sold out his partners,” I said. “Not exactly someone to trust.”

“We be careful,” he said. “Kid don’t have much time. If Lima still breathing, he’s going to be on edge and ready to get out of Boston. He can’t take the kid with him.”

We didn’t speak for a long time until we came into Roxbury. Hawk dialed a number and asked where and then hung up. Hawk shook his head with great disdain. “Man wants to meet at Burger King,” he said.

“Did you expect the Four Seasons?” I said.

“Kinjo pay up if the man is right?”

“Up to Kinjo.”

“And if the boy is dead?”

I didn’t answer. The ethics of laying down a bounty were pretty complex. Hawk drove along Route 28 into Dorchester and crossed over to Washington Street and a late-night Burger King. The restaurant sat on a corner with a large but empty parking lot facing a long row of recently remodeled three-story brick apartments. A large sign boasted this was part of the Codman Square Redevelopment Initiative.

Hawk parked at a crooked angle and we got out of our car.

A few minutes later, a white Crown Vic pulled in beside us. A thick-bodied black man in a white shirt and matching white ball cap crawled out and approached us. He had on dark baggy jeans and running shoes so white they gleamed. He had a mustache and goatee trimmed to a razor’s width and a coiled gold chain around his neck. He looked at Hawk and tilted his head in recognition.

We did not shake hands or introduce ourselves.

“Where’s the money?” he said.

“Ain’t no money,” Hawk said. “Money comes when we get Lima and the kid.”

“Kid’s dead.”

“How you know?”

“How you know he ain’t?”

“Where?”

“I want my fucking money, man,” the man in white said. Hawk looked from left to right and then over his shoulder at the Burger King. I rested my backside against his Jag, careful not to apply any pressure. I smiled good-naturedly at the young thug.

“What’s your name?” Hawk said.

“Papa B,” the young man said. He tilted his chin up with pride.

“You know who I am?” Hawk said.

“Yeah,” he said. “You the Hawk.”

“You know about me.”

The boy swallowed. His eyes darted away for a moment and then back on Hawk. He crossed his arms over his chest and then nodded a few times.

“Where?” Hawk said.

“I want that money.”

“You deliver,” Hawk said. “We talk. You fuck us and you get dead quick.”

The boy reached into his baggy jeans and gave Hawk a crumpled piece of paper. Hawk read it, turned his head to me, and then nodded. He turned back to Papa B and told him we’d be in touch.

“Come on, man,” he said. “I got to get something. I ain’t doing this for free.”

Hawk walked up so quickly on the boy that the boy flinched. Hawk tilted his head down into the boy’s, nearly nose to nose, and said, “You kill that girl?”

Papa B didn’t answer.

“You in with them?” Hawk said.

Papa B didn’t answer.

“You turn on your pals?”

Nothing.

“If you wastin’ our time,” Hawk said. “I will be back for your ass.”

I looked to Papa B and raised my eyebrows. There was little to add to Hawk’s comments. We got into the Jag and pulled away from the Burger King and headed to the address scrawled on the scrap of paper.