Having been on the front page, having people know my name and my face, it was everything I wanted but nothing I'd expected.
Not for the first time I wondered if perhaps I'd be happier elsewhere, if Amanda and I lived in a place where I could report in a town where the media wasn't the focus of the media itself, where good work could be done out of the spotlight.
Where nobody else would get hurt.
News was in my blood. Had been for a long time. But was this what I wanted, what I'd dreamed of? At first it had been. That first day at the Gazette, seeing Jack
O'Donnell at his desk, the first time I read my own byline, each of these was one of those moments in your life that you remember for years. What was happening now, though, I didn't want to remember. But if my father was going to survive, and if Stephen Gaines's killer was going to be brought to justice, I sure as hell couldn't forget.
It was only a few days before my father went in front of a grand jury. That jury would more than likely indict him for the murder of his own estranged son. No doubt once that judgment was passed along, my father would go through the same ringer I did when I was wrongly accused of the crime. Only for him, he would be incar cerated, a slab of meat lying in a cage for the wolves to pick at whenever they chose. Even though I escaped with a pierced lung, my ordeal never made it to court.
I had to get my father out before that took place.
There was one person who had knowledge of 718
Enterprises. One person who likely knew both Hector
Guardado and my brother. One person I knew enough about to make him listen.
I had to wait about eighteen hours before I could confront him.
It was going to be a long day.
I sat on the front stoop sipping from a cup of coffee, one of those great, old-fashioned cups that were made of cardboard and had cute little illustrations of mugs with wings on the side. Coffee cups these days seemed to be tall, sleek models that looked more like tubes of enriched uranium than something you drank to wake up in the morning. The deli I got this from had no logo, no branding, and the bag they gave it to me in had one of those cheerful INY slogans on the side. Those were the bags you gave out when you didn't have a Web site, and didn't have spontaneous MP3 downloading capa bility.
There was no definitive time when he'd be home. I'd arrived at 7:00 p.m. on the chance it was an early day.
So far it had not been. Around eight-thirty I went for a quick walk up and down the block to keep my blood flowing, and to make sure people in the neighborhood didn't get suspicious.
Finally at eight-thirty, just as I was beginning to feel the need to pee, I saw him walking down the street.
He carried the briefcase lightly. It was clearly empty.
As he got closer I could see that his suit was wrinkled, stained through with the sweat from a day spent going house to house, subway to subway.
When he got close enough to the point where he could see me, I stepped out onto the sidewalk. Right in front of him. He was bigger than I remembered, and the ill-fitting suit didn't fully stretch enough to hide the muscles in his arms. The shock of black hair that had surely been neatly combed that morning now sat askew on his head, beads of sweat traveling down his forehead and nestling in the collar of his formerly white oxford shirt. The man stopped for a moment, eyed me curi ously, defensive, as though he half-expected me to take a random swing at him.
"Scott Callahan?" I said.
"The hell are you?" Scotty replied, taking a step back.
"My name is Henry Parker," I said. "And you're going to want to talk to me."
Scotty walked in front of me the whole way, like a prisoner heading toward the electric chair, knowing there was no chance of reprieve. On the street, Scotty had told me to go to hell. I responded by telling him ev erything I knew, how I'd followed him the other day.
How I'd observed him going into each of those houses, how I knew he was selling drugs.
I had to leave out my stealing Hector Guardado's briefcase. He didn't need to know I was so close. I wanted to have leverage on Scotty, but put too much weight on a person and rather than talk they'll simply buckle. If Scotty thought I knew so much to the point where I could incriminate both him and 718 Enter prises, he'd feel no reason to talk to me. He needed to feel there was a way out. If there was a chance at survival, there was a chance to talk his way out of it.
I told him my name, my job. That he could end up on the front page of the Gazette tomorrow. Naturally I didn't tell him this was a personal investigation, but chances were Scotty Callahan would not be the kind of guy who'd consider filing a suit for libel.
We went into a 24-hour coffee shop, somewhere quiet where we wouldn't be disturbed and didn't have to worry about being kicked out. Scotty walked with his head down, and for a moment I felt sorry for the guy.
He was still in his rumpled suit, still carrying the same briefcase. As he walked, the case flopped against his side like a fish running out of air.
I led him to the back of the restaurant, where we took a booth. A waitress came by and dropped two menus on the table with a thunk. One good thing about New
York coffee shops, they took the food from every menu in the city and crammed it under one roof. You could order anything from a BLT to baby back ribs to sushi.
Though I wouldn't recommend coffee-shop sushi.
Scotty slid into the far end of the booth. He looked tired, and I could imagine that this was literally the very last place on earth he wanted to be. After a long day delivering house to house, I was sure a cold beer and a warm bed were the next two items on his agenda.
They'd have to wait a little while.
"You're making a big mistake," Scotty said. "I don't know anything."
"See right there," I said, pointing at him. "That's how I know you're lying. Anyone who says 'you're making a big mistake' knows a whole hell of a lot."
"Great, so you're a mind reader. Read my palm and let me the hell out of here."
"You stand up before I say you can, and you know what the front page of the paper says tomorrow?" I held up my hands as though spelling out a movie matinee for him. "It says, 'Scott Callahan, drug dealer.' Now, I don't know what your dreams and am bitions are, Scotty, but I'm going to guess you'll have a tough time finding gainful employment after that happens. So we're going to sit here, I'm going to have a big-ass chocolate milk shake, and we're going to talk. Then, maybe, if I feel like you've been honest, you can go."
"And if not?"
I held up my hands again, framing the marquee.
"Then consider yourself Spitzered."
"You're a classy guy."
"Yeah, and how's the drug-dealing business going?"
"I'm not a drug dealer," Scotty said. The anger in his voice told me he actually believe what he said.
"Now, I'm not sure what the actual term 'drug dealer' is in Webster's, but I'm pretty sure that if you go door to door selling drugs, you'd find a picture of yourself next to that definition."
The thing was, I had no proof of Scotty being a dealer. I could link him to 718 Enterprises, and Hector
Guardado, and possibly even my brother, but I hadn't actually witnessed him doing it. Thankfully by denying it with such vehemence he proved it for me.
"I'm not a dealer," he said. His voice was quieter this time. I wondered if Scotty had ever sat alone in the dark thinking about what he was doing, what he'd become.
The softness in his tone told me he had. "That's not what