Silence again, Rillet milking the tension for every ounce. Jac’s breathing rapid and shallow within the hood, his pulse double-beat, wondering whether next to expect a bullet or his hopes confirmed that it was just a game.
There was a bang then, but it was too distant for a gunshot: a door swinging open and banging back in one of the adjacent rooms, then a frantic rustling as someone ran through the debris and prone bodies, and a breathless, urgent voice:
‘Someone out fron’…. Come on der’ tail!’
‘Yo’ brought someone here, Mack!’ Rillet screamed.
‘No… no! We’re alone. Din’ bring nobody,’ Mack quavered, struggling for conviction.
‘You fuckin’ brought someone here! Snoopin’. An’ that somethin’ I definitely ain’t got no movemen’ on…’
And as quickly as Jac felt hope enter his grasp, it was slipping away again.
As Nel-M saw them turn into Tricou Street, he thought twice about following them. He didn’t want to end up getting car-jacked or his nice paintwork spray-painted or shot at by some punks.
A car just didn’t look right on the north part of Tricou unless it was rusted, graffiti’d, standing on bricks and stripped, or pumped with bullet holes.
Two bars visited, questions on the street, then the Red Rooster cafe; now heading out with some black guy who looked like a retired basketball coach.
Nel-M knew that the Ninth was Larry Durrant’s old stomping ground, but then the same held true for seventy per cent of New Orleans’ black criminals. Nel-M was trying to get to the point where he knew what McElroy was pursuing in the Ninth: something to do with Durrant, or a new client?
When he saw them enter the warren of dilapidated crack houses ahead, he thought that he had his answer: new client. But then from what he’d heard, the guy operating on Tricou, Lenny Rillet, was meant to be a heavy hitter. And McElroy was way down the feeding chain at his firm, didn’t normally get that calibre of client. Anything more complex than a straightforward plea petition, and he wouldn’t have been let within a mile of the Durrant case.
Nel-M decided to keep watching, see what might transpire or where McElroy might head next that would make all the pieces finally slot into place.
Nel-M saw the fifteen-year-old clocker come out and give the street a quick up and down once-over; but, sixty yards down on the opposite side, it didn’t seem he’d taken much notice of Nel-M’s presence.
The clocker, though, at the same time as heading in to alert Rillet, also signalled his buddy towards the back of the shotgun houses.
A routine they’d played out several times before, the second clocker headed along the back yards of the neighbouring houses, and slipped out again onto the road forty yards behind Nel-M’s car.
Nel-M didn’t see him at first. He only picked up a shadowy flicker of movement when the clocker had already scampered twenty yards closer; and, as Nel-M focused intently on his rear-view mirror to be sure of what he thought he’d seen, there was movement too from ahead with the first clocker starting to head his way.
‘Ohh… Shiiiiii….’ Nel-M hit his ignition, slammed into drive, and swung out, flooring it.
A shot came from behind, thudding into metal somewhere on his trunk, and now the clocker ahead was moving into aiming stance.
An ignoble epitaph that would be: killed by two clockers barely in puberty. Nel-M headed straight for the clocker ahead, ducking down at the same time. He heard the shot zing past, saw the kid start squaring for a second shot — but Nel-M was bearing down fast, less than ten yards away. The kid hesitated for an instant, then, realizing that Nel-M’s car would hit him halfway through firing, he leapt out of the way as Nel-M flashed past.
Nel-M kept low, heard two more shots: one missed, but the other hit his back window, shattering it into a thousand ice-pellets.
Breath held, Nel-M did a quick self-check for injuries: pain, blood, flesh or clothing fragments where they shouldn’t be? Nothing. He eased out again and swung off hard at the next cross street.
Nel-M was already fifty yards past the crack house as Rillet came out with Mack Elliott and Jac. They had their hoods yanked off, which Jac could now see were white pillow cases. Rillet stood behind them, looking clownish and ridiculous — though nobody would dare tell him that — in a George Bush mask. Dubbya meets the Ku-Klux Klan in front of a crack house.
‘Yo’ know that car o’ that man?’ Rillet asked.
Mack answered first. ‘No. Never seen him befo’. An’ don’ know the car.’
‘Me neither,’ Jac echoed. ‘Don’t recognize the car or the man.’ Even at first sight, the man inside had been little more than an indistinct shadow. Now he was a good seventy yards away.
Silence again, the George Bush mask giving nothing away. No sign of whether Rillet accepted their claims or not.
But watching the fading brake lights of the Pontiac Bonneville as it turned off of Tricou Street, Jac was suddenly struck with an idea. If he lived to implement it.
25
Soon after Alaysha had put Molly to bed, she took the gun out of her drawer and held it in her hand, turning it slowly, getting the feel of it, flicking the safety catch on and off. A Colt Cobra.38, it felt heavy in her grip, alien, but at the same time reassuring.
Her mother had been anxious about her taking it, getting her to swear on the Madonna and promise that she wouldn’t use it. ‘Unless your life is in danger because Gerry has a gun too.’
‘No, I told you mom. It’s just to frighten him off. He’s not going to come calling with a gun.’
Not him. But the other knock she feared at her door was another matter. They’d have a gun pointed through the gap before the chain was barely off.
She swallowed hard, felt her hand trembling against the weapon in her grip. Sudden concern that if and when it came to it, she wouldn’t have the resolve to actually pull the trigger. She gripped the gun in both hands and stood up, bracing herself in aiming stance, and, after a second, felt the trembling subside; not completely, but enough to squeeze off a shot without missing wildly.
Alaysha went to put the gun back in the drawer, but then at the last second decided it wasn’t a good idea to have it anywhere within Molly’s reach. She opened her wardrobe and put it on a high shelf, tucked under a few of her clothes.
‘Is that Jac McElroy?’
‘Yes. Yes, it is.’
‘I understand that you’re handling the Larry Durrant case?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Because I’ve got some information that I think you’ll find interesting.’
‘Who is this?’
‘That’s not important. But if you want some information that’ll help crack the case, you might want to talk to me.’
‘That’s very true, I would. So, tell me. What it is you know?’
‘No, not over the phone. It’s too sensitive. We should meet.’
‘Whoever told you that I was handling the Durrant case, should also have told you that I’m not that active on it right now. The plea petition’s already in, so now we’re just waiting on its outcome.’ Jac sighed heavily. ‘But, okay, now you’ve intrigued me — let’s meet.’
They arranged to meet at 12.45 p.m. the next day at a coffee bar on Camp Street. Jac could walk round the corner at lunch-time from work. The man said that he’d be wearing a light-blue jacket and carrying a salmon-pink folder under one arm. It was all spy vs spy stuff, but the next day, sitting by the cafe window sipping at a latte, Jac wasn’t looking out for the man. He knew already that he wouldn’t show.
The idea had come from Stratton’s suggestion about a fake call on his land line to send his snoopers on a wild goose chase, combined with Alaysha’s comment from the other night: ‘But it’s not just what, Jac, you have no idea who — just who is trying to kill you? The final catalyst had been seeing the Pontiac Bonneville speeding away from Rillet’s crack house the other night.