THE KILLING YARDS

A Novel

JASON ALLISON

For Nicole

Dance, dance, for the figure is easy,

The tune is catching and will not stop;

Dance till the stars come down from the rafters;

Dance, dance, dance till you drop.

—W. H. Auden, “Death’s Echo”

“To say that anybody running a club is innocent is ludicrous.”

—Steve Lewis, New York City nightlife industry legend

They’ll tell you they were there. That they closed the place down, night after night, security pushing them out into the first hints of sunlight. Soaked in sweat, coats in their hands, if they grabbed them from the check room. We donated the forgotten to charity. Standing order. But you’ll never read about that.

The street and the cold, simultaneous. Winters in the city were brutal. The wind funneled down cross streets, whipping trash into little cyclones. The blast sobered the drunk and leveled the high, if only for a moment. They wandered home shivering, still processing what they’d experienced.

They’ll say they partied with me. That we shared magnums of Cristal in VIP rooms they could never get into. Or that we did lines in the co-ed bathroom, got a suite Midtown, the endless afterparty. Lies, all around. I never let drinking or drugs interfere with work. That was my place of business. I mean, I was no saint. In those days no one in the city was. But we all love the lie. The story we tell ourselves. What we might have been.

Others accuse and slander. I let it all go now. The ones telling you this or that about me and mine? Deniers and wannabes and never-weres.

Truth is, they came.

To a neighborhood the city had left to rot. Where there was something, once, then nothing, there was me.

The line stretched down the block. Our occupancy cert authorized three thousand. There were nights we clocked triple that number. Hours they stood out there, praying they’d be chosen to pay the toll. Steve Rubell called it “making a salad.” Steve was a visionary and I miss him.

A quick once-over, a flick of the head, and they were in. Through the heavy curtains, and their world goes black. Disorientation by design. The bass comes through their boots, up their legs, rides their spine. The beat, exclusive. Muffled. Pounding. Rhythm seeds anticipation, and anticipation pulls them forward. Onto the floor, their eyes adjust, and the world opens wide.

They are reborn.

The shitty jobs, tiny apartments, asshole roommates, the bridges and tunnels they traveled, all of it left at the door. Inside, they were free. Inside, they could be the lie they told themselves or the truth they hid.

But lies fall apart and the truth breaks our hearts. I knew it couldn’t last.

The ones who weren’t there see the place misty-eyed. Romantic. They have that luxury. They don’t know what surviving demanded of us. To them, it’s a story. But this club was my world. And not all of us made it out alive.

If you’re looking for an apology, it ain’t coming.

After all, we were New York City.

PART I

Jimmy

Jimmy Lettner wove through the voyeurs ringing the dance floor. The ones who couldn’t let go, no matter how much Heineken they downed or ecstasy they swallowed. They moved to Frankie Dubbs’s set like they were afraid they’d be recognized for what they really were. Tourists. Watchers. Outcasts.

Jimmy didn’t judge them. He felt the same.

Angel stepped up, clipboard thumping against her thigh. “We’re nearly out of Grey Goose.” She spoke soft into Jimmy’s ear. Shouting in a club was useless.

“Again?”

“It’s been nonstop.” She waved her board at the main bar.

Drinkers packed five-deep shouted orders. Bartenders hustled at triple speed, towels tucked into their leather aprons. They were overwhelmed. Jimmy made a note to add more.

“How long till you’re out?”

“Thirty minutes. Maybe less.”

The music boomed loud. Abattoir’s system had cost six figures and required a team of five techs to keep it tuned.

Overhead, one of the queens swung from the wraparound balcony. Lorraine on Saturdays; Ray the rest of the week down at the UPS garage. Lorraine swept across the floor, thirty feet up, arcing on the rig-mounted cable. He wore rainbow-colored patent leather boots and a purple ball gown studded with tiny mirrors. House lights reflected in a thousand directions. A cross-dressing human disco ball.

Lorraine loosed a wad of drink tickets. The floor erupted. The crowd went full apeshit. Suits and the chic, the bridge-and-tunnel set and artists, gays and the straights and the in-betweens. They came for the spectacle. They came for the show.

They did not, Jimmy reminded himself, come for him.

“I hope that harness holds,” Jimmy said.

“What’m I doing here?” Angel asked. “We dropping to the cheap stuff?”

“I’ll crack open the lockup.”

“How long?”

“Twenty minutes.”

“Make it ten.” Angel returned to her bar.

In the booth Frankie worked a live remix of Lady Miss Kier’s vocals.

Jimmy surveyed his club. T-Roc made a come here motion. Jimmy headed to him.

“Wish you’d wear the piece.” T-Roc tapped the radio receiver in his ear.

“If I need to know something,” Jimmy said, “you’ll find me.” Pagers, radios, and cellular phones were chains. Jimmy needed his mind free for the numbers.

T-Roc led Jimmy through the heavy blackout curtains and into Lairage.

“Got a tourist claiming he knows you.”

T-Roc insisted on wearing a suit, a bespoke 50 long, year round. Jimmy had protested. The buttoned-down look clashed with his club’s culture. T-Roc insisted. A .380 hung under his armpit. Jimmy wasn’t supposed to know this, but he did.

The incoming crowd paid their cover at the Toll Booths. Workers took entry cash and granted entry. Partiers got their hand stamped, list depending. They merged into the gates replicating old slaughterhouse funnels. The design was symbolic; the person you were died at the door. Didn’t matter that Abattoir was six blocks south of Manhattan’s defunct steer-killing industry. The name sounded cool. It oozed French. Jimmy ran with it.

Abattoir had been open four months, each better than the one before. Jimmy’s reentry to the scene confounded New York’s other club kings. Abattoir was too big, its operating costs too high. The competition predicted apocalypse.

The competition got it wrong.

Abattoir’s take was remarkable. And unexpected, truth be told. The city was bleak; unemployment topped 11 percent, trash-lined gutters, street killings filled the Daily News and the Post. But crowds found the cash. Nearing one AM and the flow was steady. Bodies were money. Jimmy kept the count.

“Guy’s name is Vince,” T-Roc said. “Says you and him go back.”

Jimmy had known a Vince, long ago. “Bring me to him.”

The crowd parted for Jimmy’s security chief, his 280 pounds, his menacing glare. Jimmy didn’t hesitate to use his crowd’s prejudices against them: T-Roc was Black, where Abattoir’s crowd was mostly white. Though they’d deny it, the dancers filling the floor had preconceptions. T-Roc intimidated downtown artists and prep school grads alike. Then again, he’d also served two years upstate.

But that didn’t matter to Jimmy. He had done three.

Streetside. Fall in the air and bodies on the block. Yellow cabs dropped off inbound partiers and trolled tomorrow’s early risers. Jimmy figured a good three hundred stood waiting. Club kids and dance freaks and finance types and names on lists. Squares in suits. Jersey girls with big hair and bigger tits. They shouted and waved. They screamed and pleaded with Tina and Diamond, the gatekeepers. Their lists held the names of the Chosen. Be touched and enter.

“Ladies,” Jimmy said to Tina and Diamond. “You good?”

“We’re the best, baby.” Tina popped her gum.

Door work was an art. An unscrupulous sort could pull down a grand a night in handshake fifties. Tina and Diamond never took bribes. Jimmy was certain, because he knew everything that happened in his club.

Diamond unclipped the rope and let a man in a mermaid getup waddle in. The crowd surged, receded. Barbarians at the gate.

Jimmy wondered if any of them knew who he was. He avoided the gossip rags, ignored journalists’ requests for sit-downs. Part of Jimmy was still that shy kid from Long Island.

Part. Not all.

Next to T-Roc stood a prime piece of Nassau County trash.

“There he is!” Vince Panucci wore a too-tight Armani Exchange shirt and showy gold. His try-hard getup screamed clubland amateur.

“Long time, Vince.” Jimmy tapped a Camel from his pack, lit up.

“Too long. Your girls at the door say I can’t get in. I call bullshit, I know the owner.” Vince talked fast. His pupils were pinholes. He was tripping. At Glen Cove High, Vince had played middle linebacker and dated cheerleaders two at a time. He had been a bully and an asshole. Now his pants were too tight, his gut too big. Teenage muscle had grown soft. Vince was a spectacle.

Jimmy was undersized and unathletic. His cheeks were scarred by acne. Prison had taken most of his hair, turned what remained gray. Jimmy had aged into living camouflage. He didn’t mind. Jimmy Lettner was forty-one years old. His assets ran into two-comma territory. He ran the hottest club in the country.

“I thought maybe you could take care of an old friend.”

Vince stood there. No ring on his finger, dressed the fool. A sad shell of a man wishing he was young again. A wave of pity hit Jimmy. But also something else.

“Come on.”

Jimmy spun on his heels. The crowd had swelled; thirty-three hundred stood queued. Here because of Jimmy. The old rush hit. Jimmy lived for nights like these.

The Toll Booths. Four registers. Reams of receipt tape. Zero credit cards. Abattoir ran on cash.

“What’s the word, Randy?”

“Green, boss. By the fistful.”

Randy Watkins thumbed a stack of twenties. In no other industry would a twenty-year-old be trusted with tens of thousands of dollars. Well, maybe one.

“Your friend a comp?”

Jimmy could grant entry to any guest at any time—it was his club—but rarely took advantage. Vince, though, deserved special treatment. From his pocket Jimmy produced a roll of cash as big as his fist. He peeled off a twenty, handed it to Randy.

“My buddy’s fallen on hard times. I’m taking care of him personally.”

Randy raised an eyebrow pierced by three steel loops. Jimmy turned to Vince and smiled. He was shorter than Vince by six inches, lighter by ninety pounds. Vince had scared the shit out of Jimmy in high school. Twenty years later, Jimmy was king of the city.

“Hey, man, you didn’t have to do me like that.”

Jimmy held out another hundred to Vince. “For drinks.”

Vince snorted and worked his jaw. But he took the cash.

“Have a great night.”

Into Lairage. Videos projected on the walls. Cartoon versions of the subway. Time-lapse graffiti art. Two androgynous types making out. Michelle knew art, suggested the clips; Jimmy’s wife had the eye.

Through the curtains and Jimmy’s club opened her thighs.

The floor dominated a massive, open space walled by century-old brick. Small nooks ringed the perimeter, dark caves where anything went. Offices were on a second-floor wraparound balcony. Three bars serviced the main room. A fourth sat near the toilets. They were all swamped.

The floor pulsed; Abattoir’s heartbeat, a steady 130 bpm. A thousand bodies formed one organism. The lighting rig popped in reds and whites. Snapshots of movement, faces frozen in ecstasy, over and over and over. Arms waved, bodies moved. Jimmy smelled sweat and booze and cigarette smoke. His party. His world.

A strobe flashed, floor level. A miniskirted waif had snuck in a disposable.

Jimmy pulled the radio from his belt. “Camera. East side, by the sofas. Tall blond, gold dress.”

Abattoir was a no-camera zone. The mandate loosened inhibitions. Jimmy provided freedom, space, music, and liquor. The crowd brought desire. Caligula, redux.

Charles Oakley walked by, six-foot-eight and sneering. Sly Stallone regaled two Ford models. Uma Thurman shared a cigarette with Dennis Hopper. Laurie Anderson and Jeff Koons sat close on a sofa. Bret Ellis and Binky Urban shared a couchside smoke. RuPaul cruised the scene. She towered over the crowd and drew all eyes. A publicist had called earlier; a client named DiCaprio wanted in. Could Jimmy take care of him?

Of course. Provided he had the look and paid the cover.

Abattoir was classless. One door, one floor. No special treatment. No exceptions.

Serge was standing next to Jimmy. He did that, appear out of nowhere. Frankie brought the tempo down. Lights flashed. Serge’s face read trouble.

“I got someone downstairs.”

Security closed on the camera-smuggler. The waif gave up her Kodak and her rights. Her friends were presented the option: Stay or go?

They chose to stay. They always stayed.

“You heard me?” Serge asked.

The bar queue ran seven deep. Abattoir printed money. Jimmy kept the count.

The Dungeon’s brick work glistened. The old building’s walls pumped sweat year round. When Jimmy had first toured the building—Michelle had headed construction while he was incarcerated—he’d run his fingertips along the stone, felt the moisture on his skin. It had a metallic odor. Familiar, somehow. Union guys shrugged. An unsolvable problem.

“How much he have on him?”

“Seventy-nine,” Serge said. “Who knows how many he had to start.”

“Jesus. How much cash?”

“Six-sixty. Tens and twenties exclusive.”

The number was big.

“You grabbed him clean?”

“Nobody saw.”

“Good.”

Supplies filled the basement. Glassware, pillows, sofas, loungers, rugs, holdover art from previous installations, replacement lights, endless speakers. The walk from the stairs to the vaults took a long time. The building seemed to stretch, as if it never wanted Jimmy to leave.

“He give you any lip?” Meaning, Did you fuck him up?

“Not this time.”

They stopped at a heavy steel door. Medieval prison-chic. A heavy padlock hung from the hasp. Three of Abattoir’s basement chambers stored liquor. The fourth held cleaning supplies and one unwelcome asshole.

Serge Thanakis dug the key from his pocket. His tight face was all angles and lines. Trim for his forty years—fit where Jimmy was skinny—black hair cut short and styled slick. Serge had modeled in his youth, catalog shoots that never went anywhere. Now he put off a vaguely military vibe, but Serge had never been in the army. He had served only Jimmy.

Serge heaved the heavy door open. Inside, lit by a single bare bulb, was a rail-thin kid of about twenty. Wheat, on account of his sandy hair and Midwestern birth. The kid sat on an upturned ice bucket. His wrists, ankles, and mouth were wrapped in duct tape. Jimmy stepped inside. Wheat’s pale blue eyes went oh shit wide. Serge tore the tape from Wheat’s mouth.

“The fuck, man!” Wheat shot a bony finger at Serge. “You got to get a handle on your boy, Jimmy. This shit’s kidnapping, right here.”

Serge stood motionless. He put off an air of unbreakability. One of the reasons he and Jimmy had become partners. One of the many.

“This what you do now? Narc on paying customers? Man, you wait’ll this hits the scene. So fucked. You are, like, so fucked.”

Wheat went on and on. Jimmy let the kid run himself out. It didn’t take long.

“You done?”

Wheat breathed heavy. Jimmy pulled another Camel from his pack. He lit up, pulled a chair from a stack. Jimmy set it down so its back stood between him and Wheat. He straddled it and studied the prisoner occupying Abattoir’s basement.

Hollow cheeks, yellowing skin. Wheat coughed and it sounded thin. Maybe he had the virus. It had torn through the city, the part of the city that paid Jimmy’s bills. “I’m just saying, there’s other ways to make a point.”

“I tried other ways. You didn’t listen. Last time we caught you selling we had a conversation, you and I. Did we not?”

Wheat’s red-lined eyes danced. A bony knee bounced. He was either rolling or terrified. Probably both.

“I made my position clear. But here you are. Again. This is your third trip downstairs. Seems I’m not getting through.”

“Man, look, if you’re aiming for a cut, we can talk. I’m amenable.”

“As if I need cash from someone like you.”

Jimmy held his arm out. Serge handed him a bag filled with round, yellow pills. Jimmy brought the ecstasy close. He fought to keep his face neutral, his hand still.

Polaroids of memories flooded Jimmy’s head, flash-frozen, sun-washed and fading. This was where it had begun for Samantha. Or so Jimmy imagined. He didn’t know which drug Sam had tried first, only that his oldest daughter had been clean before Jimmy went upstate and dead when he came home.

He pushed her memory away, plucked a pill from Wheat’s stash bag. The chalky tablet was imprinted with a five-pointed star. Just like last time.

His girl. He’d made a promise.

Jimmy tossed Wheat’s stash back to Serge. The banishment talk was pure theater. It was impossible to bar any single patron; there were too many faces. If they were on a list and had the look, they got in.

Jimmy thought for a moment he should slap the kid, break a chair over his head like in the movies. But Jimmy never played the heavy. He lacked the mindset.

That’s why he had Serge.

Wheat started whimpering. “Everyone’s using, Jimmy. I’m just servicing a need.”

The need.

Drugs were part of the scene. No, drugs made the scene. Jimmy knew from experience, personal and professional. He and Serge had built Abattoir on dirty cash. Pills at first, then coke. Their side hustle yielded tax-free start-up capital.

But the life was in Jimmy’s rearview. Green Haven had taught him. Jimmy swore he’d never go back to prison. Wheat’s freelancing posed a threat.

“What people do to themselves doesn’t concern me. They wanna cop in the Deuce, that’s on them. I’d rather they don’t bring the stuff into my club, but, consenting adults, right? Thing is, knuckleheads like you don’t appreciate my position.

“If the Liquor Authority proves I had knowledge of you, in here, operating unimpeded, I am properly fucked. My right to serve alcohol’s suspended. No liquor means no crowd. No crowd, no Abattoir. And that, I can’t allow.”

Jimmy flashed to that night on the BQE. How the cop dog would not stop barking. Jimmy’s conviction—his only arrest—was for felony criminal possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute. He’d accompanied Serge on a delivery. If he got roped into another case, he’d be looking at years in the double digits. So Jimmy ran his spot clean. Not that Abattoir was on the city’s radar.

Nightclubs were the least of Dinkins’s concerns, what with Crown Heights burning, an economy in the gutter, and bodies dropping to gunfire nightly. But an election was coming. Giuliani preached a return to law and order.

And then there was Samantha.

“Can’t you just say you didn’t know?” Wheat’s eyes were wet.

“What I learn becomes my responsibility. I let you pitch in here, I am consenting. This is my club. I don’t consent. I impose. I order.”

Wheat’s jaw quivered. “I’m just trying to make some cash.”

Jimmy regarded Wheat, this broken kid from some homophobic one-stoplight town. He’d come to New York to find freedom and ended up in Abattoir’s basement, hog-tied and pleading.

Not Jimmy’s fault. He had tried. Speeches hadn’t worked. Exclusion hadn’t worked. This kind of disrespect couldn’t go unaddressed. This was Jimmy’s club. Hell, this was his city. Scope the lines down the block, crowds crashing the rope. Wheat required instruction.

“How many sales you make tonight? Ballpark.”

“I dunno. Twenty?”

“That means forty,” Serge said to Jimmy.

“At least,” Jimmy said.

It wasn’t the E that worried Jimmy; ecstasy was a harmless party drug. It was the cocktails, the mixing and matching. Ecstasy, ketamine, GHB, Rohypnol. That’s how kids OD’d. That’s how kids died.

Samantha.

His daughter’s Integra, inverted. One wheel forever spinning. Her door sawed through, jagged sheet metal. His images of the night were grainy. They weren’t even real. Jimmy remembered imaginings of Sam’s death. He was still in Green Haven. A judge had denied his request to attend the funeral. Michelle and Christi stood graveside without him. Jimmy had abandoned his girl in her final moment.

Jimmy spun away, shut his eyes. Bass pounded the low-ceilinged chamber. Serge advocated for full measures, always. The business was cutthroat, he said. Perception mattered. He was not wrong.

I order.

I impose.

Wheat was talking again. “And I swear, Jimmy, you let me outta here and I won’t ever—ever come back.”

Serge glanced at his watch. No night was endless.

“Take him out the back,” Jimmy said. “Find a quiet spot, and kill him.”

Jimmy walked out of the vault and recrossed the basement. The bar needed restocking. The door was under siege. The dance floor was full. Cash changed hands by the second.

Jimmy kept the count.

Serge

The tunnel wasn’t on any blueprints. A subcontractor had stumbled across it during the build-out. Serge ordered the installation of a lockable fire-safe door. A fat envelope ensured its omission from the as-built.

Even then, Serge had anticipated the need for an emergency exit.

“Come on, Serge, please, don’t do this. You’ll never see me again, I swear. I swear it, just don’t fucking kill me.”

Serge gave Wheat a shove and the kid tripped on a loose cobblestone. The zip ties looped around his ankles didn’t help.

“I’m not gonna kill you, stupid. But Jimmy can’t see you leave.” Serge swept the night-black void with his light. “Now stand up. You’re embarrassing yourself.”

Serge hefted Wheat upright, got him moving. The floor began to slope upward.

“Hold this.” Serge handed Wheat the light. The kid’s wrists were still duct-taped together.

Serge pressed a shoulder to the plywood overhead, slid it aside. He took the light back, poked it and his head up. Empty. Silent. Serge helped Wheat through the hole, then followed.

They stepped into the basement of the abandoned building on the south side of Twenty-Seventh Street, across from Abattoir. A factory once, maybe a warehouse. Forgotten now, like so much of the city.

Serge prodded Wheat up to street level. Twin train tracks ran the length of the long, narrow building before vanishing under its western wall. Serge shut his eyes and listened. Heard nothing. They were alone.

He almost wished they weren’t.

“Who’d you come with tonight?”

“No one, Serge. Just me.”

A lie, straight up. Club kids never flew solo.

“Don’t make me ask twice.”

“Just the regular crew. Jenny Jenny. Dreamy Dee. Sunshine.” Wheat paused. “They’re not part of this, Serge. I swear.”

“I believe you.” Serge didn’t. “Who’s your connect?”

“Come on, man. Don’t put me in that spot.”

“Have you forgotten my boss ordered you dead not two hours ago?” Serge hated calling Jimmy his boss. He preferred partner. But there were illusions to maintain.

Wheat started crying and Serge almost felt bad. Jimmy didn’t want this kid dead. He wasn’t a killer. The threat was a show. The act only vibed authentic because it had been, once. Jimmy and Serge ran nightclubs. Jimmy and Serge used to run drugs. One had funded the other, until a police dog on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway sniff-searched Serge’s Mustang. They both got collared but Jimmy claimed ownership of the coke. Serge’s record carried two felonies; a third would’ve gotten him a decade. In Green Haven Jimmy found Jesus. His criminal reformation meant Abattoir ran clean. But Serge still carried the weight of their early days. Fixing problems Jimmy couldn’t. Like now.

“You said you wouldn’t kill me.”

Serge had said a lot of things. He pulled his revolver from the small of his back. Wheat stumbled back, fell on his ass. The zip ties again.

“Talk and you live. Don’t, and you’ll never talk again.”

Wheat composed himself best he could. “I don’t mess with the guy I pick up from. He’s got a lotta weird tattoos. On his hands, his neck. But he’s a pure bagman. The guy who pays me’s named Mike.”

“Mike what?”

“Like I asked for his first and last?”

Serge inhaled. It conveyed displeasure.

“He’s got this accent,” Wheat said with rising panic. “I don’t know where from. Germany, maybe?”

“How’d you get hooked up with him?”

“Mike stepped to me. At Sanctuary, during Loopy’s Thursday night party. Was recruiting workers, and fuck knows I need cash.”

Sanctuary. Luc Delacroix’s spot crosstown.

“Why aren’t you pitching there? Why Abattoir?”

“Cause you got the biggest club in the city. The most customers.” Wheat opened his mouth like he had more to say, then shut it.

“Spill.”

Wheat didn’t. Serge drew back the Smith’s hammer. The cylinder rotated. Its metallic click echoed in the emptiness.

“He told me to. Mike told me to sell at Abattoir.”

With a thumb Serge eased the hammer down. Wheat had been directed. Abattoir was being targeted. This was new. A rage rose in Serge.

“Tell me about this Mike.”

“Uh, white guy. About your height but way older. He’s got crazy hair, like that weird uncle you only see on Thanksgiving. That accent, like I said. Acts friendly but it feels fake. And he’s always wearing gloves.”

That accent. Mike could be Mikhail. Brooklyn crews fleeing the sinking Soviet boat had established beachheads in Local 1, the pipefitters union. Waste management, too. The feds had been crushing the Italians for years. Russians, Domos, and Blacks were filling the void.

Serge considered Wheat’s story. Ecstasy’s popularity was surging. Didn’t cost as much as coke, wasn’t addictive like heroin. Kids loved it. Suits, too. So much so Serge had pitched Jimmy on getting into the mix. Revenue diversification. Jimmy shot the idea down. The life was behind them.

Behind Jimmy, maybe.

“You the only dealer Mike’s got in here?”

“Fuck if I know. My position’s not the question-asking kind.”

“You go dry every night?”

“Not always. But usually.”

“And you only pitch here?”

“Sometimes I deal in other spots. If I got leftovers.”

“You only sell ecstasy?”

Wheat shook his head. “Special K, too.”

“How do you and Mike communicate?”

“He gave me a beeper.”

“Give it here.”

Wheat pulled the pager from his belt, handed it over. Serge scrolled through the callbacks.

“These your customers?”

Wheat nodded. His jaw was quivering.

Area codes covered Manhattan, the boroughs, Jersey, Long Island, Westchester, and Connecticut. Wheat was pulling sales from three states. Thank you, Abattoir.

“Which one’s Mike?”

“He uses different lines. I don’t keep track.”

“Show me the last number Mike used.”

Serge scrolled through inbound beeps. There were a lot and Wheat eyed them with his jaw half open. Serge could tell Wheat had no idea. Club kids were a mess. Serge pocketed the pager.

“He beeps you, you call back and meet up? Cash for product?”

“Just like that.”

“How’s he get around?”

“Cabs. Black cars, though. Not yellow cabs.”

Liveries. That indicated the outer boroughs. Brooklyn and the Russians got warmer.

“When’s he next gonna reach out?”

“Monday? Maybe Tuesday.”

Thirty-six hours. Forty-eight on the outside. Serge composed himself. His next questions were heavy.

“You been locked up at all?”

Wheat hesitated long enough to tip a lie. “For bullshit.”

“Your most recent, what’d they charge you with?”

Wheat didn’t answer. Serge took a step toward him.

“Sale. It was for sale.”

“Observed?”

“Direct.”

To a cop, then.

“That case still open?”

Now Wheat stepped back. “Yeah, but it won’t be for long. My lawyer says the DA’s gotta drop the charges. Some kinda legal issue. I’m good, Serge. For real.”

Wheat was the opposite of good. If he got charged for a fresh sale with a case pending, a judge would set bail. Bail meant Rikers Island, and Wheat wouldn’t last the night. He’d talk, turn the law onto Abattoir, which Serge had so far managed to avoid. An incarcerated Wheat would blow it all up. Rikers was a backbreaker.

Serge knew. He’d been there.

No choice, then.

After getting locked up, Jimmy had taken ownership of their coke for a reason. Serge had done things. Ugly things. Daro Xhaxhka flashed in Serge’s head. How he had needed two saw blades to cut the Albanian’s hands from his wrists.

Goddamn it, Wheat.

“Gimme your ID.”

Wheat dug into his pants, tossed Serge his wallet. Scott Hill lived on Second Avenue just south of St. Marks. One more Lower East Side shithole. Serge pocketed the ID and wallet.

“That’s all I know. And I swear, Serge, I swear I swear I am never coming here again.”

That was true. But the decision wasn’t Wheat’s to make.

“Can you take this off now?” Wheat held up his duct-taped wrists. “My hands hurt.”

The warehouse was midwinter cold but sweat poured down his forehead. It ruined his makeup. Rainbow eyeshadow had become a brownish mess. Wheat’s eyes were big and blue and Midwest-naive and in that moment Serge felt for the boy. But he saw no other way.

The gun was growing heavy.

“Come here.”

Serge set his flashlight in his teeth, cut the tape with his switchblade. Wheat peeled the rest off. Serge folded the blade against his thigh and repocketed it. He pulled the light from his mouth.

Wheat stood there, rubbing his wrists. Serge had wanted the kid to fight, to run, to try to save himself. It would have made what came next easier.

Serge hoped Wheat wouldn’t look at him. Daro Xhaxhka had.

“What was that?” Serge swung his light into a corner.

Wheat tracked it reflexively.

Serge put a round into Wheat’s head.

A flight of pigeons rose from the crossbeams. They flapped unseen in the shadows, a dozen mute witnesses. The gunshot echoed on and on and on. Serge pressed a hand to his ear. All he heard through it was a piercing, high-pitched whine.

He shined his light on Wheat. The kid’s face was intact. The hollow point hadn’t exited. Nothing to be done there. Serge scooped the duct tape off the cement. With his knife Serge cut the zips from Wheat’s ankles.

Serge rose, checked himself for blowback spatter, came up clean. His hands were shaking. His stomach churned. He headed for the basement stairs. Halfway down he stopped. Serge’s dinner threatened an uprising. He set a hand on the railing and breathed slow. An experienced operator once told him that killing got easier the more you did it. Serge hadn’t tested the theory until tonight.

The nausea passed and Serge got moving again. Down through the opening. Serge reset the plywood above. The tunnel was a void. Halfway to Abattoir, Serge stopped.

The NYPD raided nightclubs semiregularly. They tossed management with impunity. Cops had tests that could match bullets to guns. In Serge’s waistband rested a murder weapon, its barrel still warm.

Serge dropped to one knee. He tested cobblestones. One shifted in his hands. Serge pried it from the mortar with his knife. He wiped his prints from the revolver with his jacket and set it and Wheat’s ID and wallet in the depression. Under ideal circumstances he’d ditch each separately. But this night was not ideal. Serge replaced the cobblestone. It sat high but no one came down here. No one but him.

Serge’s world went black. His light had died. Rats scuttled in the darkness. They drew closer. Serge felt them approach. In Abattoir, Jimmy sat counting the night’s receipts. Before leaving, he’d slap an envelope in Serge’s hand. Payment for services rendered. Serge drew a paycheck for the IRS but lived off the envelopes. Decent money, but not enough. Not nearly. Serge didn’t push, though. Jimmy had lost years for Serge. Samantha had died while he was inside.

But Jimmy owed Serge, too. For Daro Xhaxhka and Wheat and for protecting what they’d built. For doing what Jimmy couldn’t. Serge didn’t know how to balance that ledger.

But he was learning.

Ben

“Do this again, would ya?”

“Slow down. We’re working.”

“You’re in Public Morals, Bennett. This is our work.” Kevin Carney gave the bar his back and scanned the crowd.

Ben Hopkins hadn’t touched his Captain and Coke. Nothing new there; Ben didn’t drink. This made him an oddball in Public Morals. The NYPD was drawn to irony, even when it didn’t get the joke.

Especially then.

“Jump Around” by House of Pain blasted from Coliseum’s system. The track revealed the club’s poseur shitbox status. Their sergeant, Ike Digby, had issued Ben and Kevin city cash, photocopied and inventoried in the unlikely event of its recovery. A hundred each, enough for two cops to get shitfaced in the name of justice. Thing was, Ben couldn’t drink. Genetics. He faked his way through work nights. If his team learned Ben couldn’t stomach liquor, he would never be trusted.

As if he were now.

“You call that ADA back?” Kevin yelled over the music. “Whitcomb?”

“She needs me, she’ll bring me in.”

“It’s unwise to make an enemy of those people.”

Cops feared the Manhattan district attorney’s office. Michael Dowd had just spilled to the Mollen Commission. The dirty cop admitted to on-duty home invasions and snorting coke in the Seven-Five locker room. He was a brazen thug of the highest order. He had carried a gun and shield in the city’s service.

Local papers roasted the NYPD. The Department was corrupt. Its officers untrustworthy at best, criminal at worst. Cops bunkered in response. Dinkins is after us. Vote Republican. Salvation lay with Giuliani. The city was awash in cop/citizen tension. Every encounter could spark a riot.

Welcome to the party.

Bennett Nathaniel Hopkins had been a cop for two years. He’d twice put in for Narcotics, twice been passed over. Too suburban. Too soft. Too white. PMD drafted Ben out of the Tenth on a six-month temp loan. Ben had nine weeks to prove himself worth retaining and get on the detective track. Legend held some made the cut. But not a single PMD lifer could name one.

The bartender set down Kevin’s vodka tonic. The big cop slammed it in a gulp. “This guy’s serving us fucking water. I gotta piss.” Kevin stumbled off in search of a bathroom. Or alley. Either would do.

Ben pushed off the bar, took a walk. He clocked a white kid in wide-legged jeans against the wall. Solo, sober, and alert. Ben settled in, watching surreptitiously.

A crew of Long Island party boys approached John Doe Jeans. The deal went down quick. Cash to JD Jeans, drug to the Vinnies. A nearby bouncer yawned. Ben had clocked club sales fifteen times in his last six tours. He knew the numbers.

Ben had what experts labeled an eidetic memory. Standardized tests indicated academic brilliance. The scores lied. Ben stored and sorted names, dates, and facts, but that didn’t make him smart. It made him a computer.

Worse, Ben couldn’t pick and choose his memories. Ugly ones occupied a lot of headspace. When Ben was young, he hid himself often in the huge house in Rye. Saw things he shouldn’t have. His parents fought. Screaming matches that sometimes got physical. The scenes made him hate his father and join the NYPD. Ben’s freakish recollection made him a cop superstar. Police work wasn’t hard. Ben remembered. That was enough.

JD Jeans lit a fresh smoke. Fifteen hand-to-hands, zero collars.

Public Morals had a mandate and a mission. Liquor, prostitution, gambling. General vice. Drugs weren’t PMD’s patch. Ike’s orders were not to be disregarded.

An Asian woman skirted the dance floor. Ben’s age, tight jeans, killer lips. Your classic eye-catching party girl. But she also put off stillness in a world of noise. She moved with grace, swept her black hair over a shoulder. Ben felt a heat in him. Six months had passed since he’d split with Jennifer. Six months of self-imposed celibacy. He missed the feeling of—

Another kid touched hands with JD Jeans. Sixteen.

Fuck the mandate.

“My man!” When Ben stepped, he played a drunk-off-his-ass Wall Street suit cruising for weekend highs. Somehow, the act worked. “You holding?”

“Depends on what you’re lookin’ for.”

“You got any E?”

“Thirty a pop, five for a note.”

Ben made a face. Narco undercovers preached patience and negotiation. They spent weeks in predeployment training. Public Morals turned its rookies out raw.

“Sounds high.”

“Market sets the price.”

“I’ll take the five.”

Ben slipped Jeans the city’s cash. Jeans handed Ben a small Ziploc bag. A bouncer stood six feet away. Jeans’s sales were blatant. Security’s inaction signaled possible complicity.

Intriguing, that.

Ben walked off and reposted against a support beam. He eyed JD Jeans over a shoulder. Kevin finally semi-stumbled of the bathroom, hand in hand with a short Puerto Rican girl. His face was flushed bright pink. The girl split and Kevin whirled, unsteady. Ben hustled over.

“Jesus, Kev. Your fly’s open.”

Kevin looked down. “So it is. You think she’d’ve cleaned me up, for what she charged.”

Kevin set his Becks bottle—when’d he get a beer?—between his teeth and secured his gear. He nearly tipped over. Ben’s partner was properly sloshed.

“Your ten o’clock,” Ben said. “Skinny white boy in black jeans.”

Kevin extended an arm and counted off. “Twelve, eleven … the prick against the wall?”

“Yeah.”

A woman in a leather corset walked by. Kevin grabbed her arm. Ben pried it off and apologized. The girl blew smoke in Ben’s face and kept it moving.

“What’d he do?” Kevin asked, still eyeing the corset.

“You mean what did I do.” Ben flashed the clear zip, the ecstasy inside.

“Benny. Ike warned you about copping drugs.”

JD Jeans ditched his smoke and stepped off.

“Just roll with me,” Ben said. “Okay?”

“Ike ain’t gonna be—hey baby, what’s your name?”

Ben dragged Kevin onto the floor. Hot bodies traded sweat. Ben knifed through them, eyes on. Jeans found a wall and rode it to a tunnel leading to a fire exit. He slipped past a bouncer into the tunnel. When Ben tried to follow, the bouncer shot an arm out.

“Exit’s up front.”

In the tunnel Jeans turned around. His face popped fear and he bolted for the fire door. Ben pushed the bouncer. The bouncer pushed back. Kevin yelled something that might’ve been “Police!” and threw a wild right hand. Chaos descended. Ben felt a fist in his gut. Flashlights lit the fracas. A bouncer 10–13.

Ben extricated himself from the pile. He crashed through the door. The alley stunk of rotting food. Eighth Avenue was cut off by a mound of garbage that Jeans was trying to scale. Ben clawed at the kid’s legs. The kid kicked and screamed, but Ben dragged him off Mount Trash.

“Take the shit!” Jeans yelled. “Just take it!”

“I’m a cop. Gimme your hands!”

Ben pinned Jeans to the concrete and cuffed him up. The stink got worse. Jeans had landed face down in a puddle of piss. Ben rolled him onto dry land.

A thud sounded behind Ben. Security had ejected Kevin with prejudice. He leaned against the wall, hunched at the waist and breathing heavy. Coliseum’s fire door slammed shut.

“You okay?”

“They’re lucky … I’m not looking … for a collar.” Kevin pressed his hands against his lower back and winced. “Oh great, you got him. Ike’ll be thrilled.”

“Let’s get outta here.”

Ben tossed Jeans, came up with tens and twenties in cash and nine tabs of ecstasy. The stash matched Ben’s buy: chalky yellow with a five-pointed star stamped in. Jeans stayed silent throughout. He’d been pinched before.

Kevin made a hole in the trash and they exited the alley onto Eighth Avenue south of Forty-Seventh. Cars and cabs rolled north. Foot traffic was sparse and undesirable; the Playpen sex shop was just down the block.

Ben reached for his kel to call Ike, but the fake beeper/real radio was gone. “Shit.”

Kevin stood there. Ben stood there.

“We gonna stand here all night, or what?” Jeans asked.

“Shut up,” Ben and Kevin said in unison.

Kevin was still rubbing his jaw. “I’ll find the Sarge.” He started to walk off, then turned back. “Hey. You catch how when he hit that fire door the alarm didn’t sound?”

Ben shrugged, clueless.

“That’s a serious fine.”

“Just go get Ike.”

Five minutes later, a dirty white Ford Aerostar rolled up. One headlamp was dark and duct tape held the front bumper in place. It squealed to a stop. Kevin rode shotgun, head down.

Sergeant Ike Digby pulled himself from the behind the wheel. He walked slowly over to Ben and JD Jeans, eyes scanning the block. Ike stood six two, was bearded and Black. His gold sergeant’s shield hung around his neck, 24/7. Ben never worried about friendly fire. Ike did.

Ike went from Ben to Jeans and back. He turned to Kevin in the Ford. “You’re gonna wanna join us, Carney. What I got to say ain’t gettin’ said twice.”

Kevin climbed out and posted up next to Ben. Ike shook his head. His nostrils flared.

“One of you stinks like piss.”

“He resisted and things got messy,” Ben said.

“I ain’t resist. I just ran.”

“Everybody runs,” Ike said. “Don’t think yourself special.” To Ben: “Those bracelets yours?”

Ike had warned Ben about carrying cuffs. Undercovers do not go hands on. Ben had ignored the order before.

Ben nodded.

A crew of Coliseum bouncers watched Ben and Kevin and Ike from the club’s main door.

Ike registered their interest, put his fingers to his forehead. “Do I need to go in there?”

Ben considered his missing kel, Kevin throwing fists, two NYPD undercovers taking police action in violation of the Patrol Guide and Ike’s admonitions.

“It’d be better if you didn’t.”

“What’d you get him on?”

“Direct sale.”

Ike cupped his ear with a hand. “Come again?”

“Direct sale.”

“What of?”

“Ecstasy.”

Ike titled his head skyward. “Lord, why do you test me so?” To Kevin: “Thought I told you to keep the rookie under lock.”

“I told him it was either this or nothing.”

Ben bristled at Kevin acting the cagey vet. He only had a month on Ben. But the Carneys had worn the shield going back to Commissioner Roosevelt. Ben was first-generation NYPD. A college boy. A tourist.

“Throw him in the car.” Ike circled the Aerostar, climbed in.

Ben slid the minivan’s door open, shoved Jeans inside. When he set a foot in the van, Ike’s glare froze him.

“You disregard orders, you hoof it back to the barn.”

PMD worked out of the Seventh Precinct in the Lower East Side. Clear across Manhattan.

“Are you serious?”

“We all got roles to play, and yours ain’t cop. Not anymore. Your job’s to watch, buy, and walk. You don’t like it, you can go back to humping the radio. But as long as you work for me, you’ll do as I say. You fools think about that on your walk.”

Ben heaved the door shut. The Ford drove off.

The question only took Kevin a second. “Wanna get a drink?”

Michelle

Michelle Lettner reviewed her agency’s listings. Dogshit across the board, except maybe a hollowed-out brownstone in Hamilton Heights. A to-the-studs gut. The owner wanted five figures. The neighborhood was Beirut adjacent, but Michelle saw gold where others couldn’t. She circled the MLS number with a Sharpie.

There was a time Michelle moved Schnabels, Fischls, Basquiats. Attended gallery shows unadvertised to the masses. Knew before anyone whose work was about to go supernova. Another life.

Her daughter came down the stairs, book bag slung over her shoulder. “Do we have any bagels?”

Christi had gained fifteen pounds in three months. Emotional eating, the books called it.

“We can grab some on the way.” Michelle paused, hesitant. “Are you going to that dance this weekend?”

Christi dug in her bag. Silence meant no.

“I thought Alyssa was going.”

“She is.”

Christi wouldn’t look at her. The aversion hurt. As if Michelle were to blame for their family’s implosion.

Kids were perceptive sometimes.

Christi slouched at the breakfast bar. She wore an oversized sweatshirt and tights. Her unkempt hair tied by a scrunchy. Zero makeup. Michelle couldn’t help herself.

“You have so many other outfits.”

“It’s school.”

“It matters how you’re seen.”

“You would think that.”

“You’re at a point in your life where the decisions you make will impact the woman you become.”

“And I’ll be better if I dress like you?”

Michelle wore billowy pants in winter white, a D&G sweater in contrasting black. Perception mattered. Even if no one noticed the effort.

“If you don’t care about yourself, no one else will.”

“That how you landed Dad?”

Christi was goading her again. Any excuse to scream at a world that took her sister. Since Samantha’s passing—seven months now—Christi had spiraled from sadness to rage to apathy back to rage. She hated her sister for dying, Jimmy for abandoning them, and the universe for, well, everything.

They stood there, mother and daughter, a thousand thoughts passing unspoken. Michelle wished there was a guide for this, raising one child after losing another. All she knew was life went on. She would go on.

“It won’t always be this way.”

“Then wake me up when this part’s over.”

Christi walked out. Michelle remained in the kitchen. She would apologize in the car. A soft voice. Contrite. For Christi.

For Sam.

Jimmy staggered downstairs just after ten. Michelle sat at the dining table. On it lay listing sheets for properties about to hit the market. This was how Michelle had found 648 West Twenty-Eighth Street. She and Jimmy had turned the hollow shell into Abattoir.

Jimmy fisted a yawn.

“There’s coffee still.”

He filled a mug, took a sip.

“When’d you get in?”

“Same as usual.”

Jimmy stood there, regarding their home as if he didn’t know it. Like he hadn’t lived there for sixteen years. Like he’d rather be anywhere else.

“What time you heading in?”

“I’m meeting Eva at noon. She’s pitching me on Destination.”

Eva Gould was an industry hybrid, a combination agent/promoter. She was fearsome and feared and had lately converted to the church of hip-hop.

“I thought you’d passed.”

“I did. Eva doesn’t know when to let go.”

“Maybe she’s onto something.”

“Michelle, really? After what happened at City College? You get a panic like that in Abattoir, we’ll be living on the streets.”

Industry talk always brought Jimmy to life. He found the world beyond his doors dull.

“I’m just saying. Nobody’s hosting hip-hop nights south of Harlem.”

“There’s a reason for that.” Michelle kept her face neutral. Jimmy correctly read it as a question.

“Because the money we’d have to spend on security would crush the take. Destination’s a floater because venue owners don’t make enough to justify the expense.”

“Those owners aren’t you.”

Jimmy pretended he didn’t dig the flattery, but Michelle knew she’d hooked him. She retrieved a stack of magazines from the living room. Spin, Rolling Stone, Details, Interview, Vibe.

“I bring these home, but you don’t read them anymore. Hip-hop’s going to cross over. Hell, it already has. The kids in Christi’s grade love it. White, suburban teenagers. With allowances.”

“They don’t matter. They’re underage.”

The air rushed from the kitchen. The ID the cops found on Samantha claimed their seventeen-year-old was twenty-two. Michelle and Jimmy looked in opposite directions. Neither wanted to cry. They’d done that enough.

“Is Eva considering Sanctuary?”

“She claims Luc’s interested.”

“Because he wants to keep it from you.”

Luc Delacroix was Sanctuary’s trippy owner/operator and Jimmy’s top industry rival. While Jimmy was in Green Haven, Luc opened Sanctuary in a converted church on Sixth Avenue. The spot popped big. Jimmy came home and unveiled Abattoir. It popped even bigger.

“The cops and City Council have left us alone. Destination would complicate things.”

“You’re assuming the worst.”

“Prison does that to a man.”

Jimmy had been anti-Destination since Eva’s initial approach. His reluctance came down to the crowd. To Jimmy’s paranoid imaginings of Black kids rampaging through his club. Twisted visions seeded by biased tabloids and local news anchors. Pre-incarceration Jimmy welcomed all comers, provided you had the look and paid the cover. Now Abattoir was a success, and success had made him scared.

Prison changes a man.

Michelle laid a hand atop Jimmy’s. He felt unfamiliar, and that reminded Michelle they weren’t young anymore.

“Luc can’t compete with Abattoir. There’s not another club in the city like yours.” She could have said ours, didn’t.

Jimmy glanced at the counter where he had left the envelope. The State Liquor Authority forms required Michelle’s signature. She wouldn’t give it easy.

Easy ended the day Jimmy pled guilty. Michelle blamed Serge, always would. He had introduced Jimmy to the hustle. Every terrible development since could be traced to him. If Serge had gone away that night instead of Jimmy, Samantha would still be alive.

God, Michelle missed her girl.

“The SLA paperwork needs signing,” he said.

“Sure. Just let me look it over.”

Jimmy fidgeted. He didn’t know what to do with his hands. He was a stranger in this home, had been since his release. He sat at the far end of the dining table they never ate at. Michelle tried to remember their last meal as a family. She couldn’t, and the realization saddened her. When did they become strangers?

“How’s she doing, anyway?”

“Anyway?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“It’s the phrasing. Like she’s an afterthought to you.”

“That’s not fair.”

“You treat her like she’s made of glass. She’s your daughter, Jimmy. Talk to her.”

Help me, Michelle wanted to say, cause I’ve been alone out here a long time.

“I don’t know how to be around her. What I should say, what I can’t. She still blames me for …”

Their girl loomed larger in death than she had in life. Michelle supposed that said something ugly about her marriage.

She shuffled some papers. “There’s a three bedroom coming up in Sutton Place. Motivated sellers, twenty-four/seven doorman, low maintenance. View of the river and the Queensboro Bridge. Two garage spots, which is plenty. Christi wouldn’t need a car in the city.”

Jimmy’s chest rose and fell. Rose. Fell. “She’d have to change schools.”

“I think that’d be for the best.”

Jimmy turned to the window.

“It’s a bad look, don’t you think?” Michelle said. “Guy running the biggest club in Manhattan being a secret commuter. Abattoir’s thriving, God knows we have the money. You being home more would be good for Christi.”

And Michelle could finally return to the city. She missed the streets, their energy.

Jimmy stared at the tiles under his slippered feet. “I don’t know.”

“I still see her, Jimmy. Every day, or just about. A flash only, out of the corner of my eye. Going into her room, or coming down the stairs. But I swear it’s her and my heart jumps and I think for a second, I think, maybe this has been one long, terrible nightmare and I’ve finally woken up and she’s back and she’s here with me. With us. This wave of relief hits. I feel light. I feel alive. It comes, but then it’s gone, twice as fast. Because she’s not here. And she’s never coming back.”

Jimmy’s chin was quivering.

“I can’t live with a ghost. Her memory, always. But not a ghost.”

Jimmy got up and turned away, crying. He spoke over his shoulder. “Leave me the listing.”

He headed back up the stairs. Michelle picked up the SLA forms. The papers that authorized Abattoir’s right to sell alcohol on-premise. Bureaucratic and boilerplate. Predictable. Still she read.

Because Michelle’s name was on Abattoir’s liquor licenses, not Jimmy’s. Felons were locked out of the State Liquor Authority by law. Jimmy could not vote. Jimmy could not own a gun. Jimmy could not open a club. Not without Michelle.

Some might call that leverage.

Michelle signed the forms. She flipped through the Sutton Place listing. Some paint, window treatments, new furniture. Nothing Michelle couldn’t handle. She folded the listing into the SLA papers and placed them on the counter.

Jimmy would come around on the move. He’d have to—Michelle had already made an offer.

Ben

Public Morals, midweek. Down days gave Manhattan’s bars and clubs the rare cop-raid reprieve. Investigative dicks hunched over IBM Selectrics, two-fingering their way through reports no one read. Ben had finished his hours ago. He’d been pretending he had more to do. Never be the first student to hand in your test. Especially in the NYPD.

Ben collected his DD-5s, dropped them in Ike’s basket. Behind his desk, Ike held his phone to his ear with one hand. He snapped at Ben with his other.

Ben pointed at himself. Mouthed, Me?

Ike pressed the phone to his chest. “The fuck else I’m talking to?” He went back to listening. “Uh huh. Right. No, I got you. Yeah. I’ll send him over, Lou. I got you, right away.” Ike hung up and scowled some, like he was thinking.

Ben considered what he might have done wrong. The Palace bound its rules in a thousand-page book. But cops kept another set, unwritten. The culture defined right and wrong, and Ben was an interloper.

“Have a seat.”

Ben sat in a sticky chair wrapped in green vinyl. Smoke danced from a stick of incense. Ike’s radio was tuned to Hot 97. An upside-down wire hanger pulled the signal. On one wall was a pistol range target poster bearing Michael Jordan’s grinning face. It was punched through with .38 caliber-sized holes. Ike employed Knicks fans exclusively. Apostates were converted or expelled.

Ike opened the drawer at his belly, slapped a beeper kel on the desk. “I believe that’s yours.”

“I’m pretty sure I returned—”

“The words you’re lookin’ for are thank you.”

Ben clipped the kel to his belt. “Thanks, boss.”

Ike eyed Ben for a long time. “What’m I supposed to do with you?”

“Sir?”

“About your continued and blatant disrespect. I’m asking how best to address it.”

“I’m not out there trying to offend you, Sarge.”

“Imagine what you could do if you set goals.”

Ben bit his lip. He didn’t want to go back to Patrol. He hadn’t done well there, socially. “How can I fix this?”

“How indeed, Bennett.”

As Ike pondered that, he nodded slow. He did most everything slow, though he’d prefer the word measured. Isaac Digby had survived a decade of midnights in Bed-Stuy. A Black cop policing a Black neighborhood in the time of Eleanor Bumpers, Larry Davis, and Al Sharpton. On top of that, Ike had killed two men. He claimed both deserved the trip. Ben had no reason to doubt the man.

“I get this vibe from you, one of unyielding righteousness. Like you’re the only man in the Department knows how this job’s done. Which I personally find amusing, given your lack of experience.”

The radio spat out “Shut ’Em Down” by Public Enemy. The incense made Ben’s head throb.

“You call that ADA Whitcomb back yet?”

Fucking Carney. “Kevin told you about that?”

“He did not. Trish—that’s ADA Whitcomb’s Christian name—called me direct, said you’ve been dodging her. But thank you for letting me know you’re the type who’d give up a fellow officer. I’ll store that tidbit away.”

Ben had just stepped on an NYPD land mine. Rat status was a career ender. He had to fix this, now. Ben got up and shut the door.

“Here we go,” Ike said.

Ben sat back down. “The senior guys—and I won’t name names—they give us advice.”

“Hang on a second.” Ike pulled a bottle of Jack from a different creaky drawer. He poured some into a dusty Sergeants Benevolent Association mug, took a sip. “Continue.”

“They say ninety-nine percent of the time when an ADA calls you in, they don’t need you. They just make you sit around for hours before sending you home. They say it’s ’cause our cases …” Ben trailed off. He hadn’t planned this out.

“Go on, Bennett. Enlighten me.”

“Because our cases are bullshit.”

Ike swigged his whiskey. Ben continued.

“I mean, for real, what do we do here? We write summonses and lock up prosts. We shut down clubs that reopen two days later. No one I arrest’s ever going to trial.”

“And this bothers you.”

“I thought it’d be different.”

“Didn’t we all.” Ike studied his whiskey, set it on his desk. “I’ll admit, this unit don’t see many trials. Can’t remember the last time we locked up a proper villain.”

Nine weeks to make a case. Ben took his shot. “Maybe we’re hitting the wrong targets.”

PMD’s targets came from the List. Locations handed down by chiefs in the Palace. The brass ran the List, the List ran Ike, and Ike ran the unit.

“And you know which are the right ones.”

“The club scene’s hot with drugs. Coliseum’s dying. All the action’s going to Abattoir.”

A long silence.

“What do you propose?”

“That we put it on the rotation. If I could get done in Abattoir, we could make a case.”

“Maybe. Question is, could you get in?” Ike made a face. No fucking way.

His casual dismissal pushed Ben deeper into the sticky chair.

Ike finished his whiskey. “Know what your problem is, Bennett?”

“Yeah. Nobody here likes me.”

“And why do you think that is?”

A swell of laughter rose in the bullpen. Jokes Ben either wasn’t told or didn’t get.

“Cause everyone thinks I’m some college boy playing cop.”

Ike almost smiled. “That college thing, it bothers you.”

“It bothers them.”

“I’m not so sure that’s the issue.” Ike leaned his forearms on his desk. “You’re comin’ at this problem wrong, Bennett. You’re not an asshole cause you went to a good school. You’re an asshole cause you want everyone to know you went to a good school. I’ve dealt with your kind before. The standout. The seeker of attention. You’re what the job calls a glory hound. The fellas feel it, and they don’t care for it. I count myself in their camp.

“See, undercovers need to render themselves invisible. I’ve had guys—and girls—step to the same spot a dozen times and never get made. But that ain’t your goal, is it? Your defendants need to know it was you who got ’em dirty. It’s an ego thing.”

Ike had nailed Ben cold. His life had been planned prebirth: Lehman Brothers, summers in the Hamptons, holidays on the Côte d’Azur. Empty and vapid and meaningless. Ben rebelled. But becoming a cop wasn’t enough. Ben had to be the best. The old man had to learn Ben was his own man. Teaching that lesson had caused some problems.

“What should I do?”

“I’d advise humility, but I doubt you’d listen. So, we go another route.” Ike shuffled some papers on his desk. “That was Ciretto’s boss on the line. Seems your former precinct caught a body two nights past. No ID, no witnesses. The DOA’s prints just came back.”

Ben felt himself buzzing. “And?”

“And, though I shudder to inform you of this, I’m lookin’ at the last cop who arrested him.”

“A homicide?”

“Yes, Bennett. It’s a homicide.”

“Who’s the vic? What do they need from me?”

“Keep your dick in your pants. The Squad’s gotta interview you as a matter of procedure. All you are’s a box that needs checking.”

Ben realized his right knee was bouncing. “Right. Sure. Who’s the DOA?”

“Scott Hill. Ring a bell?”

Hill’s street name came to Ben quick.

He called himself Wheat.

Jimmy

Jimmy sat in the Keep, his red-walled office on Abattoir’s second floor. An ornate, oversized desk in gloss black under his forearms. Gargoyles were carved into corner posts; Dracula-light. Michelle had pulled it out of a shop on Spring Street.

Chloe Harris set a stack of twenties in a money counter, pressed the button. She was a light-skinned Black woman from Mount Vernon with a small scar on her left cheek that she never spoke about. A week after Abattoir opened, she approached Jimmy, asked if he needed another accountant. Good timing, as he had none. Other than himself.

The LED counter ticked up, up, up. Chloe banded bills, noted the total in her ledger. In pencil. Jimmy mandated paper records. They burned easy.

“When’s the next drop?” she asked.

“Serge’ll head over this afternoon.”

“Keep on like this and you’re going to need a bigger safe.”

A five-foot tall Mosler sat in the wall behind an original Keith Haring. That morning it held $122,743. Jimmy knew to the dollar. Jimmy kept the count.

Elise O’Brien walked in. Abattoir’s nominal general manager. She pulled twelve-hour days and had never stolen a dime. Every nightclub experienced shrinkage, but Jimmy trusted Abattoir’s inner circle like he had no one else in the industry.

“I’ve told you about locking the door,” Elise said.

“Noted,” Jimmy said. “What’s up?”

“She’s here.”

“What’s your read?”

“The usual. She was bugging out over the flyers for JDM’s gig.”

“We talking about Eva?” Chloe asked.

“Who else?”

“That’s my cue.”

Chloe collected her books. She wore pale jeans, an oversized sweater. Elise rocked chunky boots and a schoolgirl skirt over black tights. Her page girl bob popped bright purple against her pale white face. Chloe kept her hair in a tight black braid. The life had no dress code.

“Serge around?” Jimmy asked.

“He told Randy he’ll be late,” Elise said.

Jimmy would have to talk to him about that. Serge had earned flexibility, but not enough to make his own schedule.

“I don’t know why you two put up with her,” Chloe said. “The woman’s an ass.”

“No choice,” Elise said. “Eva reps half the DJs worth booking, and is trying to sign the rest.”

“There’s always a choice.”

Chloe started toward the door. An idea hit Jimmy.

“Chloe, wait. You wanna maybe hang out? See a different side of the business?”

“Eva’s been here plenty, and you’ve never asked me to sit in before.”

“Hadn’t thought of it.”

“Right.” Chloe paused. “’Cause what I’m thinking is, crazy white bitch is here to pimp her hip-hop party, and you think having a Black woman in the room might help. Am I warm?”

Elise looked away, embarrassed. Jimmy knew he’d fucked up.

“That wasn’t what—”

“I’m an accountant, Jimmy. Not a prop.”

Chloe opened the door. Eva Gould pushed past her, inbound hot.

“The building’s old, honey,” she said to Chloe, “and these doors aren’t soundproof. But at least you’ve got the balls to say exactly what he’s thinking.”

Chloe ducked out double-quick.

Jimmy rose from his desk. “Eva. Good to see you.”

“We gotta hurry this up, I’m having coffee with Luc in an hour.” Eva flipped one of the cash boxes open, pulled out a rack of twenties. “And you have the nerve to complain about my riders.” She tossed the money into the box.

Eva Gould was Upper East Side prep school gone sideways. Long, curly black hair, blackout shades, a Versace jacket over black leather pants. She had been born into money, then got into music and made her own. First as a promoter, then as a booking agent, more recently as a manager. While Jimmy was incarcerated she’d evolved into a hip-hop evangelist, and believed he needed converting.

“Elise.” Eva lit a Newport Light.

Elise made to leave, but Jimmy stayed her with a hand. He needed the backup. “You wasted a trip, Eva. Unless Destination’s numbers have changed, we’re going to pass.”

“All you people south of Ninety-Sixth Street are gutless racists.”

“You grew up half a block from the Met.”

That brought the sunglasses off. “You’ll make triple what you spend on security. And you know it.”

“It’s not just expenses. I get kids slashing each other bloody on my floor, it’s me on the SLA’s hook. Not you.”

Actually, it would be Michelle. But Eva didn’t need to know that.

“This expectation of violence is a media creation. My people aren’t like that.”

“How long’d it take you to get here from Bushwick?”

Eva screwed her smoke into Jimmy’s desk. Not in an ashtray; on the desk. “Hip-hop is going to be the biggest genre in the business. You might not get it, but your daughters—”

The Keep went stone silent. Jimmy managed to push Samantha’s face from his mind.

“I’m sorry,” Eva said, softer. “But the kids are listening to this stuff. I’m not bringing you what’s already popular. I’m giving you a chance to break acts that are going to sell out the Garden one day. Abattoir can birth a movement. The scene’s wondering, is Jimmy Lettner still a tastemaker?”

“Still a tastemaker?” Elise said. “Abattoir’s turning people away nightly.”

Elise didn’t say, for now.

Abattoir’s crowd ran full-on artsy, club kid regulars, sexually ambiguous party queens, Manhattan sophisticates, trust fund layabouts, Wall Street desk managers, celebrities, pro athletes, and bridge-and-tunnel straights. The demo had cash. It spent. But it wasn’t infinite.

And that demo was overwhelmingly white.

By not having a night that catered to the quarter of the city that was Black, Jimmy was leaving money on the table. Nightclub life-spans were measured in months. Longevity demanded constant reinvention. Eva’s proposal made sense.

Problem was, and what no one else knew, was Jimmy had investors. The silent kind whose photos were pinned to FBI corkboards. For them, catering to Blacks was a nonstarter.

And that made Destination unworkable.

“I can’t do it. Not now.”

Eva glared at Jimmy for about a month. “You better learn how to spin, cause your booth’ll never see my DJs again.”

Eva walked out in full huff mode.

“Think she’s serious?” Elise asked.

“Eva’s about the cash. She’ll come around.”

Jimmy rubbed his palms against his eyes. Colors exploded in the darkness. Eva drained him, every time. He could use a bump.

A bump?

He gripped the edge of his desk. Jimmy hadn’t used in years. Coke got him arrested, prison cut off his intake, Sam’s death made him swear off it for life. He hadn’t considered using since. Until today.

Elise was talking.

“What was that?”

Elise’s head tilted slightly. “You okay, Jimmy?”

“Never better. Why?”

“Don’t take this wrong, but you look a little run-down.”

Jimmy operated on three hours’ sleep. He didn’t exercise. He ate Chinese takeout, Original Ray’s pizza, and assorted street meat. But he wasn’t drinking or using and thought he was good. Elise indicated otherwise.

Jimmy forced a weak smile. “This is the business we’ve chosen.”

“Right. Well, I’ve got bartenders to interview.” Elise walked out.

Jimmy lit a Camel and stepped onto Abattoir’s wraparound balcony. Down below electricians tweaked the lighting rig. Their voices echoed in the emptiness.

Sometimes Jimmy came up here when the club was full and the lights blazing. He stood over what he’d built and watch the floor pulse. How the crowd melded and merged. Thousands became one. Because of Jimmy. The knowledge filled him with a satisfaction he never got from Michelle or the kids.

Kid. God, why?

Truth was, Abattoir was Jimmy’s true love. He’d do anything to protect it.

Serge entered the scene. He clocked Jimmy at his perch. Jimmy regarded his number one. His right hand for nearly twenty years. The man he’d gone to prison for.

Serge flicked his head toward the door. We need to talk.

Jimmy screwed his cigarette into the wall. The work was done in daylight.

Ben

The Tenth Precinct sat on Twentieth between Seventh and Eighth Avenues. Dilapidated walk-ups ran off in either direction. Fire escapes doubled as laundry lines. Tenants came and went through broken lobby doors. The command covered Chelsea from Seventh to the Hudson. There were ground rules: better east, dicey west. Tenth Avenue marked The Land of Once Was. The rusting High Line, bombed-out buildings, abandoned cars. Tenth was the red line. Tenth was the DMZ.

“Hopkins. Over here.”

Ben let himself through the Detective Squad’s wooden gate. Dicks three times his age worked with their sleeves rolled up and ties unknotted. Cardboard bankers boxes climbed the walls. Dueling fans fought over a cloud of cigar smoke.

Ralph Ciretto sat surrounded by cabinets and his desk. As if he’d been there forever and the building had gone up around him. Ben slid a chair over, sat.

“You have trouble finding a spot?”

“I took the subway.”

Ciretto stared at Ben like he was speaking French.

“I’m told Wheat got killed.”

From beneath his desk Ciretto produced a slice of pizza, devoured half in a bite. He was a big man, all neck and shoulders and gut. Light skin, a mustache running down both sides of his mouth. A USMC tattoo covered his left forearm.

“Why do you call him Wheat?”

“That’s what one of his boys called him the night I locked him up.”

Ciretto pulled a spiral pad from the mess papering his desk. “His buddy, you lock him up, too?”

Ben shook his head. “I couldn’t tie him into the sale.”

Over Ben’s shoulder, a young detective laughed. Ben didn’t know him, let it go.

Ciretto switched to a booking sheet. “Says here you were the A/O, but you’re tellin’ me you were the undercover.”

“I had to take Wheat myself.”

The detective behind Ben stopped typing. Ben sensed he was listening.

“Why?” Ciretto asked.

“A lotta guys in PMD don’t wanna take drug collars.”

“You blame them?” the other detective asked.

“Don’t mind Pete,” Ciretto said. “He’s a miserable fuck.”

The younger dick came over. “Four years in Narcotics’d make you miserable, too, Ralphie. Pete Cobb.”

Ben shook his hand. Cobb was short and solid. Had that orange tanning bed glow, gelled and spiked hair.

“You were an undercover?” Ben asked.

“Three years. Then I got flipped.”

“I put in for Narco. They passed me over.”

“Be thankful. Smart cops do not wanna be around cash and drugs right now.”

“At least Giuliani won,” Ciretto said. “He’ll set things right.”

“You guys live in the city?” Ben asked.

“Fuck no,” Cobb said.

“I’m up in Somers,” Ciretto said. “Pete’s a Suffolk boy. How about you?”

“I live uptown.”

“As in Manhattan?” Cobb asked.

Ben nodded. “The Heights.”

“That’s two-gun territory,” Cobb said.

Ciretto made the sign of the cross. “How’d it go down? You collaring Wheat.”

“The Palace had us hit Coliseum cause they’d had a slashing the weekend prior. On the way out, I spot Wheat huddled up with a crew by a phone booth. I got the feeling Wheat was pitching. So I step to him. Wheat’s into it, wants to take a walk, but his boy’s not feeling it. ‘You don’t know him, Wheat. Let’s go back to Abattoir.’ He hounded us until Wheat told him to fuck off. Me and Wheat go down Forty-Seventh. The Tickets booth on the island? He says he’s got E and names his price.”

“How much?”

“Forty a pill.”

Cobb choked. “Made you pay the white boy tax.”

“I get that a lot.”

Ciretto nodded again. Keep going.

“Wheat goes ninety-Z and I put his descript over the kel. My team’s staged on Eighth but Wheat’s heading toward the Deuce. Singing to himself, twirling.”

“Twirling?”

“Like a ballerina.”

“A ballerina.”

For a few moments no one spoke.

“Okay,” Ciretto said.

“Soon enough I figure out my boss hadn’t read the kel.”

“Those things never work,” Cobb said.

“I realize either I grab him myself or he’s gone.” As Ben spoke, he realized he had personally collared five hand-to-hands in three months. Most undercovers went careers without making an arrest. Maybe Ike was onto something.

“What about your ghost?” Cobb asked.

“We got separated.” Because Kevin Carney was shitfaced. “I grab Wheat and put him down. I flagged a foot post, and she raised up my sergeant.”

“Did Wheat talk?”

“I pushed for his connect, but he wouldn’t roll.”

“What about drugs?” Cobb said. “What’s hot out there now?”

“Ecstasy’s popping up more and more. Been hearing a lot about K, too.”

“K?” Ciretto asked.

“Ketamine,” Cobb said.

“It’s a sedative,” Ben said. “Vets use it.”

“Army guys?” Ciretto asked.

“Animal doctors. It’s an anesthetic. You know, for surgeries.”

“Jesus fuck,” Ciretto said. “What happened to smoking crack like a normal skell?”

Across the room an old man described what his wife was wearing the last time he’d seen her.

“My turn?” Ben asked.

“Within reason,” Ciretto said.

“How’d Wheat get killed?”

“Feels like an execution. A thirty-eight, one round behind the ear. The ME dug the slug out of his brain and FIS says it’s good for a match. But I’d bet Pete’s pension that gun’s in the Hudson. The duct tape indicates the killer’s a pro.”

“Duct tape?”

“The ME found methyl acrylate residue on Wheat’s wrists. Indicates he was bound at some point.”

The case folder sat on Ciretto’s desk. It was supermodel skinny.

“You have photos?”

“Still waiting on Crime Scene to develop their film.”

“Where’d it happen?”

Cobb this time. “Abandoned warehouse on Twenty-Seventh, right off Twelfth.”

“That’s near Abattoir.”

“Across the street,” Cobb said. “You guys hit that spot often?”

“My boss won’t let us.” Ben paused. “You think there’s a connection, him being killed so close to the club?”

“Who knows?” Cobb said.

“Correlation don’t mean causation,” Ciretto said.

“That stretch is prime real estate for junkies and prosts,” Cobb said. “He could’ve been trying to cop. Could’ve been a robbery gone wrong. Maybe he was selling himself and his john wasn’t satisfied with the experience.”

“But the tape,” Ben said.

“It’s a puzzler,” Ciretto said.

“Who found him?” Ben asked.

“Came in as an anonymous 911 job. I’m guessing a skell stumbled on him, called it in. The MLI found ecstasy up his ass.”

“Yellow with a star stamped in?” Ben asked.

Ciretto nodded.

“That’s what I bought off him.”

And what Ben had bought off JD Jeans in Coliseum. A single brand dispersed wide. The connection screamed for attention. But Ben didn’t say anything.

“You reach out to Narcotics?” he asked.

“We’re not gettin’ any help there,” Cobb said. “Narco’s overmatched. Crack and heroin on every corner, Alphaville blowing up nightly. Ecstasy don’t move their needle.”

Two thousand homicides a year. Nobody cared about a club drug.

“That’s all I got,” Ciretto said.

Ben’s spotlight dance was over. He rose.

“In case you need something and Ralphie’s off.” Cobb handed Ben his card. He held onto it long enough for Ben to feel intention in the offering.

“What happens now?”

“What always happens,” Ciretto said. “I work the case.”

Ben made his way to the door.

“Oh,” Ciretto said. “Almost forgot. I’d like to talk to that buddy of his”—Ciretto reclicked his pen—“the one he was with outside Coliseum. You get his name?”

Ben ran the night back. Wheat acting the fool, his friend gumming up Ben’s buy.

Wheat pushing back. Wheat getting loud. Wheat sending him packing.

Ben asking the kid’s name, to drop in a future conversation. Undercovers are sponges; soak the city up.

That’s Dreamy Dee. Don’t mind him. I got what you need.

Dreamy Dee. Frequents Coliseum and Abattoir. Known club kid. An easy find.

“Sorry,” Ben said. “He didn’t say.”

Serge

A skeletal hooker pissed beside a van sitting on cinderblocks. Traffic rolled by unbothered. The hooker yawned, mid-pee. It was two in the afternoon.

Jimmy came down the loading dock stairs. He and Serge set a brisk pace east on Twenty-Eighth. Nightclub generals on the march. A breeze off the Hudson brought the stench of barge trash. Serge reloaded a new smoke. They hurdled a prone bum’s outstretched legs.

“Do I need to be concerned?” Jimmy asked.

The tabloids and local news hadn’t reported a body near Abattoir. Wheat had fallen through the city’s many cracks. But Serge had yet to dish on Wheat’s claim that the drug sales targeted Abattoir. That omission needed fixing. They had shared interests, Serge and Jimmy. They just weren’t always aligned.

“Remember Wheat?”

“The kid I scared in the basement.”

Serge managed not to laugh. “Yeah.”

“You catch him pitching again?”

The muzzle flash. The blacked-out building gone nuclear. Wheat’s last moment, freeze-framed forever.

“Haven’t seen him since. But I talked to him that night. He claimed he’d been directed to sell in Abattoir.”

A cop siren whooped. Aspiring johns drove off. Hookers withdrew to the building line.

“Directed by who?”

“Some guy calling himself Mike. Probably a work name. Had an accent, I’m thinking maybe Russian. Here’s the kicker. Wheat was recruited at Sanctuary.”

Jimmy stopped walking. “Luc.”

Luc Delacroix claimed to be a cosmopolitan French ex-pat, an omnisexual former artist/former writer/former poet. He used heroin therapeutically, cocaine recreationally, and marijuana never. He acted the libertine and was a Page Six fixture. He lived in the remodeled rectory of Sanctuary, the abandoned Sixth Avenue church he’d bought cheap and fashioned into the city’s hottest club—until Abattoir opened.

He was, in reality, the cashed-up Canadian son of some industrial titan. Daddy’s wealth had seeded Luc’s nightlife business. Which made Luc a dilettante and a poseur. If Wheat’s confession was true, it indicated a proper underworld partnership. A dangerous evolution.

“Luc’s a lot of things. But drug-trafficking mastermind?” Serge needed Jimmy to arrive at the obvious conclusion on his own.

“He’s been jealous of me going back to Imprimatur. Think about it. Abattoir’s the best place to move product. We draw the right crowd and can’t be policed. It’s what we’d do, if we were still in the game.”

If.

“Shit. Eva’s meeting with him now.”

“That Destination party?”

“I turned her down. The Frog won’t.”

Serge turned Jimmy by the elbow, got him moving again. The sidewalk ahead was closed. A building’s facade had collapsed. Bricks everywhere. They crossed the street. Shuttered storefronts and gutted apartments. Riot gates for days. Abattoir was an island on an island.

“Harvey was just talking about Giuliani,” Jimmy said. “Thinks he’s gonna be a problem for us after he takes office. Said we ignore the man at our own peril. I think that applies to anyone threatening our operation.”

Harvey Cohen was Jimmy’s showboating lawyer. He craved press attention, cocaine, and blow jobs, from men, women, or other. He was seventy years old and put no one’s interests ahead of his clients’—except his own. Serge and Michelle despised Harvey. It was the only opinion they shared.

They arrived at the patch of concrete where they kept their rides. Black smoke wafted from a makeshift chimney rising from a tin shed. The shed’s door popped open, and an old-timer named Wheels shuffled over. He had dark skin and bright white hair and carried a ring the size of a frisbee loaded with keys. Serge had never seen more than four cars in the lot.

“Mr. Lettner. Serge.” Wheels removed his Mets cap, ran his hand through his hair. “I feel this oughta come from the owner, but informing you’s been put on me. You’ll need to find another place to park. Owner sold the place.”

“Where’re you gonna go?” Jimmy asked. Like he cared.

“A grandniece in the Carolinas offered me a bed. I see what this city’s turning into, and I am not welcome.”

Jimmy frowned and nodded and asked the question he’d been aiming at. “Who’d they sell to?”

“I’m not advised of such developments. All I know’s they don’t want me on their property. I can’t take your money after January one. Sorry, but that’s how it is. I’ll get your ride.”

Wheels headed toward Jimmy’s black E-class. Jimmy spun in a slow circle, scanning. The block was old-city, mixed-use zoning: three-story walk-ups and cratered-out warehouses. Craggy faces cruised sketchy bodegas. Doped-up zombies streetwalked day and night. Nobody bought anything down here they couldn’t shoot into their veins.

“About our situation,” Serge said. “You want me to look into it?” He had to let Jimmy think the decision was his. Like always.

“Find Wheat’s supplier. Let him know I won’t stand for incursions of this kind. Put the word out, river to river. Abattoir’s a closed city.”

Serge sucked nicotine by the lungful. “Serious operators only speak one language.”

A language understood by Serge, Daro Xhaxhka, and Wheat. But not Jimmy.

Never Jimmy.

Lines appeared in Jimmy’s forehead, the corners of his eyes. Serge figured he looked the same. They’d grown old, him and Jimmy. Their shared past had built Abattoir. Serge’s past had necessitated Jimmy pleading to the coke in Serge’s car. Jimmy never asked what happened to Daro Xhaxhka. The Albanian simply went away.

Wheels pulled up in Jimmy’s Mercedes.

“Know what?” Jimmy said. “Set a meeting. We’ll appeal to Luc’s better angels.”

“And if they’re uninterested?”

“Then we’ll close him the fuck down.”

Jimmy laid a hand on Serge’s shoulder. Twenty years passed between them. Serge felt their weight.

Jimmy climbed in his ride and roared off.

Serge’s pants pocket vibrated. He pulled out Wheat’s pager, checked the digits against his list. Sure enough, the number had popped before. Keeping the thing was unwise. Serge should have thrown it in the Hudson days ago. But he hadn’t.

Mike was in there. Was just a question of finding him.

Jimmy

At the corner of Twentieth and Sixth, an orthodox church abandoned by the diocese rose into the slate-gray sky. Jimmy and Serge headed toward Sanctuary on foot. A cop car roared crosstown. An old woman pushed a carriage holding a filthy stuffed bear. A junkie convulsed on a cardboard box.

The church had stayed too long.

A Gothic arch framed midnight-black doors. Jimmy stopped at the steps. His nerves were bubbling.

“In case this goes bad …”

“I’ve got something on me,” Serge said.

Jimmy touched his forehead, felt sweat. In December. All he wanted was to run a clean club.

Before Jimmy could knock, the doors swung inward. A short, white man in a custom pinstripe suit stood in the opening. A pocket watch chain looped from belly to belt. Riley Sloan was small; he barely broke four feet. But he had style and taste and knew everyone. Jimmy had tried to recruit him for Imprimatur, then Covet, then Abattoir. Riley turned him down every time.

“Riley,” Jimmy said.

“Jimmy. Serge.”

Behind Riley stood a nightlife Amazon. Blond cornrows hung to Trini Day’s waist. Gym-swollen arms bulged large. She saved Luc on payroll: Trini ran Sanctuary’s door and served as her own bouncer.

“Spread your feet.” Trini intended to search them.

“Come on,” Jimmy said. “Is this necessary?”

“My door. My rules.”

Serge shifted his feet, antsy. Jimmy raised his arms and widened his stance. Trini tossed him. She was not shy. When she squeezed Jimmy’s crotch, Jimmy threw Serge a look. Give it up.

Trini turned to Serge.

“I should warn you,” he said. “I’m carrying a gun.”

“I should warn you,” she said. “I don’t need to.”

Trini pulled a black semi-auto from the small of Serge’s back. This piece threw Jimmy. Serge carried a revolver. The hardware change got Jimmy wondering as to why.

Sanctuary’s main room. The nave cleared of pews, bars along either wall. The DJ booth rose from the altar. A lighting rig suspended on chains, idolatrous pop art on the walls: paintings depicted Mary as the DJ, Christ dancing on a speaker.

Above them two phone-booth–sized cages hung from the rafters. Each held a dancer. One looked down at Jimmy with pleading eyes. The other must have passed out; a leather-gloved arm dangled through the bars. Above the altar, framed by purple floor-to-ceiling curtains, hung an inverted cross framed in neon.

“Not bad,” Jimmy lied. The design was exceptional. Stylish sacrilegious chic. Jimmy found himself envious.

An oaken door behind the booth creaked open. Enter Luc Delacroix. He had lank white hair swept back to his shoulders, wore tuxedo pants flared at the ankle and a midriff-baring black baby-doll shirt. He was pale bordering on deceased. Blood dotted a forearm vein. Luc sucked on it as he approached.

“James. How long has it been since you were paroled?” Luc spoke with the Hollywood accent of a World War II partisan.

“I wasn’t paroled, Luc. I maxed out.”

“I don’t know what that means. What brings you to my home? A desire, perhaps, to reignite your creative drive? I hear your wife bears responsibility for Abattoir’s style.” Luc smiled wide. Ugly yellow teeth filled his mouth.

Jimmy ignored the dig. He had come to make peace. Or at least to try. “I wanted to—”

Two white men, thickset and heavy footed, stepped from the same door as Luc. Cheap suits, scuffed shoes. Loose jackets hid shoulder-slung pieces. Outsourced muscle, clearly. Jimmy shot Serge a look; his read was the same.

Luc’s goons leaned on the bar. They had square heads and cauliflower ears. Ink on their necks and hands. Jimmy’s prison radar thumped. Inmates developed a sixth sense. It let them know who to watch, when to run. When to pray.

“Who’re they?”

“New hires. Sanctuary is expanding rapidly.”

Hard men in Luc’s employ. Drugs flooding Abattoir’s floor. The life clawing at Jimmy’s heels.

“Can we sit?”

Luc clapped his hands. “Rene! Deux chaises, rapidement!”

A barefoot boy in a Depression-era bathing suit emerged from a basement bulkhead. Gray skin, dead eyes, a bowl haircut. Fifteen years old, tops. He set two folding chairs down. Luc slapped the boy’s ass as he walked away.

“So tight, that one.”

They sat.

“Riley.” Luc raised a withered finger.

The little man vanished behind the bar. The house rig came to life. Lights spun. Color flashed in every direction. An Asian in a topknot rose in the DJ booth. He rubbed his eyes, like he’d been sleeping. He plated a twelve-inch and dropped the needle. Acid house boomed. The cage girls started dancing. Prisoners of Luc’s never-ending party.

“Can we lose the music?” Jimmy shouted.

“I think no.”

Jimmy dragged his chair closer. Nobody was professional anymore.

“I’m coming to you as a fellow businessman. We may be competitors, but we have the same goal.”

“And what would that be?”

“Keeping our doors open and our floors full.”

“Revelatory, James. You crossed the island to tell me that?”

“My attorney thinks Giuliani’s going to come after our industry.”

“You should know I do not consume politics.”

“Regardless, it’d be smart not to bring any unwanted attention our way.”

“Based on your crowds, I had assumed you were already not bringing attention to Abattoir.”

The rig blazed bright. Luc’s DJ swung into a downtempo thumper. The cage girls kept moving. Jimmy’s anger was building.

“Why do you come to me today?” Luc said. “I would like to hear the actual reason.”

Translation: How much do you know? What are you prepared to accuse me of? Jimmy had called the meeting to impose limits. To dictate terms. Now, at the gate, Jimmy wavered.

The morning of Sam’s funeral, Jimmy had sworn off the life. Backsliding meant breaking that promise. He owed his girl the best version of himself. Jimmy took a last stab at diplomacy.

“I came to talk. Whatever you’re doing, it’s got to stop.”

“What am I doing, James?” Luc was daring Jimmy to say it. Hell, he was begging.

“This’s my last warning.”

“Had you issued a first?” Luc grinned. Stage lights reflected off corn-kernel teeth.

Rene sat on the bar. The boy stared hate at Jimmy while picking his nails with a blade the size of his forearm. Trini’s juice-enhanced traps popped huge. Luc’s imported thugs stood ready. Jimmy had Serge and Serge was capable, but he was just one man.

The DJ bumped the bpm. The cage girls struggled to keep up. Sanctuary’s lights cut through the old church like swords.

Jimmy squirmed. Coming here was the wrong play. Abattoir was safe. Abattoir was home.

“There was a time you were a man of great vitality, James. You stood up to the corrupt trade unions, gave a home to transgressive artists, cared not a lick what the fascist jackboots thought. You were once a man who would not have accepted what I am doing inside his club. Night after night after night.”

The DJ dropped the beat. Bass crashed into Jimmy’s skull. The light show went supernova. Luc ran a wet tongue across thin lips.

“I have been fucking you for months, and still you prostrate yourself before me.”

Rage hit Jimmy in a rush. He found himself, the version he’d buried in Green Haven. He shot from his seat. His hands trembled. He balled them into fists.

“Cut the music or I cut your throat.”

Luc raised a finger. The DJ killed his mix. The cage girls collapsed, panting. Rene hopped off the bar. He ran the flat of his knife across his cheek. Serge moved close, and that gave Jimmy strength.

“I came because I thought you were a businessman. I see now I was wrong. The game you’ve been running ends today. It ends now. I find one more of your people moving drugs in Abattoir, I’m sending you his fucking head.”

Jimmy’s heart rate pushed triple digits. His blood pumped loud in his ears. He needed himself level. Straight. A Xanax would help.

Or five.

Luc brought his needle-pierced arm to his mouth, sucked on it. “Your act doesn’t work anymore. You are a sham, James. A shell of yourself. What I am doing will continue, because you cannot stop me.”

Trini Day stepped to her left. Luc’s muscle pushed off the bar. Rene and his blade inched closer.

Serge came alongside Jimmy. “What you’re asking for’s a war,” he said. “Nobody here wants that.”

Luc tapped a finger to his chin. “If I find one more of your people dealing in Abattoir, I’ll send you his head. Your words, James, yes?” He rose, moved behind Rene, massaged the boy’s shoulders. “I find your words revealing. One more. One more. The implication being you’ve discovered others.”

Rene licked his knife. Blood ran down his chin. An erection tented his bathing suit.

“Tell them your love’s name,” Luc said into Rene’s ear. “The one who’s gone missing.”

“Wheat.”

Jimmy’s prison radar hit DEFCON 1.

“A boy close to Rene’s heart. Which makes him close to mine. Last seen in Abattoir. Unseen since.”

The basement dungeon. Wheat bound and begging. Jimmy’s words to Serge, a phony threat meant to intimidate. To dissuade. Serge knew Jimmy’s act. He wouldn’t kill Wheat.

Or would he?

Luc’s move on Jimmy began as business, but his connection to Wheat went beyond ecstasy. The revelation reshaped Luc’s play. Expanded it. Shutter Abattoir. Make Jimmy bleed. Extract revenge.

Outgunned and on unfavorable ground, Jimmy had only one option: deny. “These kids are unpredictable. You know that.”

“Most, yes. But Wheat was the rare breed. A clubber to the death.”

To the death.

“I don’t know what to tell you. I’m sorry this kid’s missing, but thousands of people come through my doors. I’m not responsible for them making it home. I’m telling you for the last time, stop pitching in Abattoir. You won’t like what’ll happen if you don’t.”

Rene stroked his knife and rubbed his crotch. One of Luc’s strongarms cracked a knuckle. Trini rolled her shoulders. For a few moments, Jimmy worried he might never see Christi again.

But then Luc blinked.

“We shall see, James. We shall see.” He turned away, walked back the way he’d come.

Rene stared cold death at Jimmy. Riley and Trini escorted him and Serge to the door.

“My piece,” Serge said.

Trini just laughed.

Outside, concrete canyons funneled crosswinds. Jimmy leaned into them. Get back to Abattoir. Abattoir was safe. Jimmy figured the Frog had two goals: earn undeclared cash off Jimmy’s crowd, and, once he’d bled Abattoir dry, shut it down.

And Jimmy had in-house issues. Why had Serge switched guns? The question needed asking.

Jimmy found a garage ramp, pulled Serge into it.

“This crap about Wheat. Did you do something you shouldn’t have?”

“No, Jimmy. Course not.”

Serge had been loyal for years. His words rang true.

Jimmy almost believed them.

Serge

Serge and his cousin walked down Pearl Street toward the East River. On their left stood the Smith projects. Trash-lined pathways, gunshots after dark. Serge had grown up in a place like that. He would never go back.

The wind picked up and Serge bunched his coat at the neck. Rain slid across them at a diagonal. Yanna Dimitriatou was talking, but Serge wasn’t listening. His mind was still on Luc’s power play, his new muscle, what their presence implied.

Yanna snapped her fingers in his face. “You in there, malaka?”

“Sorry, was just … What were you saying?”

“I was saying I’m comped for life. Me and four of my girls.”

“Two.”

Yanna stopped under the elevated FDR Drive. She dangled an envelope over a sewer grate, like she might drop it. “You asked for like fifty numbers this time. I could get fired for this. Hell, I could get arrested. Four of my girls, plus me. For life.”

“Fine. Whatever you want.”

Yanna smiled, handed Serge the list. “Why so many this time?”

Serge ignored her, tore open the envelope. Inside was a sheet of paper. Phone numbers written in pencil. A few were identified by names and addresses—landlines—but most were compass points: northeast corner of; 100 feet southwest of. Pay phones. There were a lot of those.

It paid to have family working for New York Telephone.

Serge pocketed the list. “Thanks. I gotta go.” He started toward his Lexus.

“Your mom’s hoping to see you for Christmas.”

So close. Serge turned around, headed back. Yanna looked up at him. Traffic droned on overhead. The elevated FDR darkened the street. Serge scoped shadows for fiending junkies and shifty-eyed stick-up kids.

“You missed Georgie’s wedding and Rita’s birthday. We never see you anymore.”

“That’s cause I’m working.”

“Nobody works more than you, Serge. Nobody.”

From somewhere on the river a tugboat’s airhorn blared. A gull hung unmoving over the whitecapped water. It flapped and struggled in the gale but made no headway.

“Eleven months,” he said.

“What?”

“That’s how long Studio 54 was hot. Nightclubs have a short lifespan. Spots that blow up in March go dark by Thanksgiving. And there’s no pensions or health insurance. That means I gotta hustle.”

“I’m worried about you. You look exhausted.”

Yanna didn’t get it. Her father ran a thriving construction company. Three decades, twelve employees, six vans. All licensed and bonded. Yanna had never wanted. Not like Serge had, his mother pulling doubles at the cleaners, suing to change her son’s name from Walenski to Thanakis, his deadbeat father undeserving of a named heir.

Serge took care of his mother but lacked the spine to do it right. He mailed money orders to avoid face-to-face shame. His shortcomings galled him.

Over the river the gull gave up, turned south, vanished into the concrete sky.

“The party ends sooner than we think,” Serge said.

Serge found a spot easy, a rarity in Bay Ridge. Spoons buzzed him in. Serge climbed five stories quick. Spoons let him in, quad-locked the door. Black Flag blared from a CD player. Henry Rollins screamed over a thumping bass line.

“Kill it.”

Silence. Serge set his gym bag on Spoons’s plywood and cinderblock coffee table. From it he pulled two large Ziploc bags filled with ecstasy. Red pills stamped with four parallel lines. Serge’s signature. Wheat had been selling yellows. The competition’s product. Wheat had to go.

Say it enough and you’ll eventually believe it.

Spoons weighed a bag in one hand. He was late twenties, pasty pale, Iggy Pop-thin, bleached-blond hair chopped short, wore second-skin jeans and was always shirtless. Serge had met him at a Jesus Lizard show at CBGB, signed him up.

Spoons was Serge’s link to the street. He recruited and supplied the dealers Serge never met. Those dealers roamed Abattoir, pushing Serge’s product. Jimmy was right about the club: It was a perfect drug den.

Jimmy might have left the life. Serge hadn’t.

“We could move a lot more.” Spoons had been pushing Serge to bump his orders for weeks.

“I’m working on that. Where’s the take?”

From under the sink Spoons pulled a stack of cash sealed in Saran Wrap. “Forty-eight forty, all in.” He tossed Serge the cash.

Serge shoved it in his bag. “How much could you move? I want real-world numbers, don’t get aspirational.”

“Two thousand per drop, with a midweek re-up. And a reserve I can pull from as needed.”

The number floored Serge. Figure four thousand pills a week at an average of twenty bucks per, forty for the tourists. A $350,000 monthly gross was conservative. Serge was eyeing $65,000 take-home every thirty days. Free and clear.

“For real?”

“Everyone wants a taste.”

Four thousand doses a week.

“I order that much, you’re responsible for the whole thing. Whether you sell it or not.”

“I appreciate the confidence.”

Serge’s ecstasy importer was a Battery Park playboy named Avi Brenner, who inspired fear in no one. But his product came from Israel, through ex-Mossad contacts. Serge did not want to meet them. Ever.

From a cabinet Spoons pulled a fistful of small sandwich bags. He spread Serge’s ecstasy onto a plastic tray. Black-nailed fingertips slid tablets into a feeder channel. His hands and mind worked fast.

“You come to a decision on the K?”

“It’s not right for us. Not now.”

Ketamine was dicey. Serge had seen kids lost deep in K-holes. Curled up in Abattoir’s darkest corners, moving in slo-mo, staring at their hands like they didn’t know what to make of them. Trying to process why their world had gone liquid, or pure light, or had become sound. To make sense of the senseless.

“Your call,” Spoons said.

Another bag, sealed and ready. As he watched Spoons work, Serge felt a stab of guilt. Samantha’s death had made Jimmy a chemical abolitionist. Noble, but untenable in their world. People came to Abattoir to lose themselves. To do that right, you had to get high. Jimmy had forgotten what he was. What they were.

But Serge remembered. Daro Xhaxhka wouldn’t let him forget.

Wheat wouldn’t let him forget.

After Jimmy went away and Imprimatur closed, Serge had stopped hustling. Jimmy feared being drawn into a federal RICO. Serge worked for Christian de la Renta at Coliseum, the Twins at the Pit. His retirement fund went three years without a sizable deposit.

Jimmy swore he’d make Serge whole. Promised a proper partnership for two aboveboard businessmen. But then Sam died, and Jimmy changed. When Abattoir’s LLC was formed, the paperwork listed only Michelle.

“You understand,” Jimmy had said. “It’s got to be blood.”

Spoons filled another bag.

“I’ll call my connect,” Serge said to him. “We’re gonna go big.”

Michelle

Michelle’s Bimmer flew down Fifth Avenue. Green lights to the horizon. Post-rush hour traffic was nil. Central Park passed in a blur.

“Did Christi get into Dalton?” Jeanie Berger asked.

Michelle shook her head. “Ashford-Rand cashed our check, though.”

“They do fine work there. Christi will love it.”

Michelle wondered if her daughter was still capable of love. A red ball flashed and Michelle mashed the brakes. On the corner a bum dropped his pants and squatted. He wiped himself with a fistful of newspaper. Jeanie nearly threw up.

“That is disgusting.”

Jeanie Berger was an Upper East Side doll, a midforties-fit platinum blond. Public shits horrified her, but not Michelle. She had grown up in nightclubs. Had attended David Mancuso’s Loft parties: both spots, on Broadway and Prince Street. She’d witnessed—and given—bathroom blow jobs and dodged dance floor pukings. She’d seen a man gouge another’s eye out with a shattered Heineken bottle. She’d watched tripping girls piss like thoroughbreds between parked cars. Michelle had been young. She wasn’t sure about Jeanie.

“I have nothing against Dinkins, but I am glad Giuliani won. We need a strong mayor to clean this town up.”

Maybe.

Michelle had read the preelection profiles. The city budget was underwater. Giuliani was a crusader in need of early wins. The nightlife industry was an easy target for a media-savvy mayor looking to make a splash. Harvey had agreed with her. For once.

Green light. Midtown. Tourists gaped outside department store windows. Michelle found open road. Christmas lights became star trails.

“Michelle, Sparks is on Forty-Sixth.”

“I just need to make a quick detour.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Michelle had met Jeanie at the New York Hilton, some real estate conference. Jeanie was moneyed and divorced, the latter bringing the former. Real estate was a hobby for her. For Michelle, it was how she had kept their home while Jimmy was inside.

Michelle thought of Sam and strangled the steering wheel.

The Twenties now, full dark. Night had come on. Jeanie tested her door locks.

“You have a relationship with Ted Holland at the Sherman Group,” Michelle said.

“I wouldn’t say that. Relationship implies a certain familiarity.” Jeanie’s strained voice confirmed society rumors. Ted Holland was married. And not to Jeanie.

West on Fourteenth Street. Union Square’s sketchy overflow filled the sidewalks. The smell of weed filtered through the BMW’s air vents. Jeanie Berger clutched her Fendi purse tight. “Where are we going?”

“I tried to land a meeting with Ted. Did I tell you this? His assistant handed me off to some midlevel associate.”

“I’m sure it was nothing personal.”

Except Michelle figured it was. Abattoir’s landlord was an old-school independent operator, but the Sherman Group was a proper real estate development firm. A nine-figure market cap, offices on two coasts. It dealt with upstanding citizens exclusively. Or so it claimed.

Past Ninth Avenue, now. Full war zone. Addicts and streetwalkers prowled empty sidewalks. Graffiti-covered buildings, mailboxes, light posts, bombed-out cars. A stray dog limped across the unlit road. A shirtless, shoeless man howled in anger.

“Get me in a room with Ted. He’ll listen to you.”

Jeanie swallowed, said nothing. Maybe that’s why Ted liked her.

“Jeanie. I know Harriet. Don’t make me say something to her that you’ll regret.”

Jeanie looked away. Michelle didn’t like cornering her like this, threatening to spread incendiary gossip to uninvolved wives. But she learned long ago that this city did not give freely. What you wanted had to be taken.

Roll-down riot gates and overflowing dumpsters. Mortared cinderblocks filled windows, rusting chains hung from steel doors. A few working beef warehouses remained. J.T. Jobbagy Meat Company. C.W. Packing, Inc. Caduro Meat Co. The last remnants of a once-thriving industry.

“What do you need from Ted?”

“That.”

Michelle curbed her Bimmer on West Sixteenth Street just east of Tenth. A massive building rose from the darkness. Twice the size of Abattoir. A battered, reddish-gray brick facade. Baumgartner and Sons etched into the stonework. Fifteen-foot windows pockmarked by shattered glass. A graffitied FOR LEASE sign bolted to the wall.

A large loading dock lay dead center. That would be the entrance. Door staff working the Box, security behind. Lines stretching off in either direction. Guest lists and walk-ins, separated for efficiency. An empty curbside for drop-offs, a pen for the paps. Maybe rent a nearby lot, offer valet service. The neighborhood was a blank slate.

Michelle killed the engine. “Come on.”

Jeanie looked at her like she was insane. “I’m not getting out here.”

Her concern was legit. Zombies roamed unchecked. But if Michelle was afraid to walk the block, how would she convince Jimmy this was where their next club should be?

Would be.

“Lock the doors.” She tossed Jeanie the key. “If something happens, get out of here.”

“I don’t know how to drive!”

Michelle climbed out, crossed the street. The stench of urine hit her nose. A shape approached. Something that might have been a man, once.

“Gimme a dollar, lady.”

His gray face was spectral and covered in sores. Sweat dripped down his forehead. He was layered thick for winter; Michelle counted four coats.

Jeanie honked the BMW’s horn. The zombie made the connection.

“You got way more than a dollar.”

Michelle’s breath came fast. She might have given the guy something, had he asked. But she couldn’t obey a command. There were principles involved.

“Leave me alone.”

The man laughed. He had four teeth, all black. “Gimme what you got, and you can stare at buildings the whole night.”

“The permission’s not yours to give.”

His eyes became slits. Michelle’s heart rate crescendoed. She wondered what she was doing. She was a wife. She was a mother. The city was dangerous. Muggings were frequent. People killed for pocket change. Men raped for less.

But in that moment, on that deserted stretch of unlit asphalt, in a part of the city its leaders had left to rot, denying this man was all Michelle cared about.

The zombie’s face was gaunt. The sores indicated illness. He wasn’t a fighter. He got by on fear and preyed on the weak. Michelle had survived too much to be one more mark.

“If you rob me, I’ll fight. Try worse, and I’ll leave you with more holes than you woke up with.” She paused. Her mouth was very dry. Her hands shivered, and not from the cold. “You see my car. You’re right, I’ve got money. The cops won’t forget about me. They’ll hunt you down, one way or another. Can’t get high in jail, and you don’t want to dry out inside. The DTs are awful. How your gut burns, the aches in your teeth.” Jimmy had detoxed on Rikers. He still had nightmares.

The man snorted and shifted his feet. But that was all he did. Michelle’s read was right.

“Walk away before this becomes something neither of us want.”

A long silence passed. Michelle’s chest pounded. She heard it. The zombie eyed her hard. He stunk of rotten eggs. He wiped a gloved hand over his snot-filled nose.

“Crazy fuckin’ bitch.”

He vanished in the shadows under the derelict High Line. Michelle’s fingertips tingled. Her vision sharpened. The city came into focus. Her heart still drum rolled, but not out of fear; from facing her fear and coming out the other side.

That was the draw.

For years the cultural elite had been braving the Lower East Side to party at The World. The journey was perilous. Patrons got stuck up en route. Victims negotiated at gunpoint for their door money. Crowds risked death to experience Arthur Weinstein’s creation. There could be no higher compliment.

Icy air filled Michelle’s lungs. She was alive and thankful to be and thought instantly of Samantha and felt guilty for having the sensation. For having any sensation. For the millionth time since her daughter died, Michelle reminded herself the world still turned and she was in it.

She lifted her chin. The building rose before her, broken and uncared for and huge and majestic. It dwarfed Abattoir. The occupancy cert would authorize forty-five hundred, easy. It would be the largest nightclub in the world. Michelle had already settled on a name.

Expanse.

Ben

The night was shaping up to be a rerun of a rerun. Massage parlors, bar inspections, prost sweeps. Ben tossed the paper aside, crossed the PMD bullpen, knocked on Ike’s office doorframe.

“Can we talk about tonight’s tac plan?” Ben sat without being invited.

Behind his desk Ike Digby counted out tens and twenties. City cash to be spent in pursuit of maintaining order. Or the illusion thereof. He finished, scratched the total on a spiral pad. “Why do you keep pushing your ideas on me, Bennett? As if you’re the ranking man. Had the good Lord not taught me the wisdom of patience, I might be upset.”

The window AC roared. Mid-December, and PMD was meat locker frigid. As Ben considered his next move, he flashed on Dante’s ninth circle of hell. What he was thinking could get him transferred— or worse.

“I don’t got all night,” Ike said.

Fuck it.

“Ralphie Ciretto’s got no leads in the Wheat killing. But I might.”

Ike stared Ben down for a long time. “Go on.”

“The night I bought from Wheat, he was with someone by the name of Dreamy Dee. Dee didn’t want Wheat to hit me off. Said he wanted to go back to Abattoir. Implying they’re regulars.”

“You’re making an assumption.”

“I’m assessing information.”

Ike glanced out the clouded window. “You want to do Abattoir, then. Find this Dreamy Dee.”

“That’s the plan.”

“And Detective Ciretto’s good with this?”

Ben hesitated, but not for long. “He doesn’t know. About Dreamy Dee, I mean. I haven’t told him. Yet.”

“You withheld the identity of a potential homicide witness from the detective tasked with solving said homicide.”

Ben said nothing.

“Excuse me.” Ike pulled his bottle of Jack from the drawer, filled his mug. “I like to have a buzz going when I issue suspensions. Deadens the pain inflicted by the suspendee’s astonishing stupidity.”

Ben pulled his chair close. Ike redrawered the Jack.

“I give up Dee, what’s Ciretto gonna do? Pull him into the box and scream at him for a few hours. Maybe he breaks, maybe he doesn’t. But bracing him’s the book play, and Ciretto’s gonna follow it. But what if I buy from Dee? I could ingratiate myself.”

“Ingratiate yourself.”

Ben nodded.

Ike swigged his whiskey. “Lay it out for me.”

“Ciretto thinks Wheat’s murder is drug related. So do I. They found ecstasy on the body, same color and stamp as what I bought from him. Ecstasy’s huge in the club scene. A concentration of customers means there’s money to be made. It’s only a matter of time till violence follows. Or maybe it’s already here.”

“What’s your plan?”

“I’m thinking of a long-term case. I step to Abattoir, buy what I can. I keep my ear out for the word on Wheat’s killing, and when we have enough and lock the hand-to-hands up, we leverage them into cooperating. We solve Ciretto’s case for him.”

Ike finished his whiskey and breathed deep. “This is not—and I can’t believe I’m saying this—this is not the worst idea you’ve had. But we got a mandate from the Palace and an understanding with Narcotics. PMD doesn’t work drug sets.”

“Narco’s overworked and undermanned. You said it’s been a long time since this unit’s seen a real case. Wheat’s murder is a way back into the game.”

Ike set his whiskey down. “You ever testified in a trial, Bennett?”

Ben shook his head.

“A hearing?”

“No.”

“Ever been cross-examined by a self-righteous, true-believing, cop-hating defense attorney?”

“No.”

“Cause if you had, you’d understand the last place a cop wants to be’s a courtroom.”

“Don’t you miss locking up bad guys? We didn’t take this job to tag the working man for fire code violations.”

“Bennett Hopkins. Hero of the underclass.”

“Ike—Sarge—we can do this.”

“And what do I tell Captain Desano? Her career prospects ride on our productivity. And she is not what I’d call an understanding woman.”

“We tell her nothing. Leave Abattoir off the tac plans. I’ll step there after we hit the Palace’s targets. Maybe we stay late a few nights.”

“The fellas’ll love that.” Ike glanced up at his bullet-riddled Michael Jordan target. “You really think you can get something out of this Dee?”

“I wouldn’t offer if I didn’t.”

“You must see something I don’t when you look in the mirror.”

That was why Ben wanted to work Wheat’s murder. Because the Department, Ben’s father, even Ben himself suspected he couldn’t.

“Let me do this, Sarge. Please.”

Ike’s gaze drifted. Ben figured he was remembering a time when he did more than ticket bartenders for serving minors. Or maybe he saw the faces of the men he’d killed. Ben couldn’t tell. Old-timers were unreadable like that.

“Tell the boys we’re hitting Abattoir. On my authority.”

Ben stood up too fast and bumped his knee on Ike’s desk. “Yes sir.”

“And Bennett? Stop fuckin’ grinning.”

Jimmy

Frank Bates wheeled the oxygen cart in front of him. A plastic tube ran from it to Frank’s nostrils. Jimmy was convinced the contraption was a show for the FBI. Vinnie the Chin in his bathrobe.

“You really think the feds’ve got your place bugged?” Jimmy asked.

“After what Giuliani did to our friends at the Ravenite, we have to assume the worst.”

They walked slow down Pleasant Avenue. Three friends on an afternoon stroll. The third being Mario Luongo, Frank’s driver/bodyguard. His left arm hung in a sling. Jimmy didn’t want to know why.

Frank was pushing seventy and weighed a buck-thirty. He wore a grandpa cardigan and a winter hat with flaps that covered his ears. Bottled oxygen filled his lungs. A harmless old man. But Frank Bates was a killer. A Genovese family underboss. And Jimmy owed him his life.

“Mario, tell Mr. Lettner what happened to your arm.”

“Fucking cops, that’s what.”

“You got locked up?” Jimmy said.

“Something with the VIN on my Caddy. I don’t know.”

“Mario disagreed with the officer’s position,” Frank said. “Emphatically.”

“My lawyer says they got no case. When this is all over, the city’ll be paying me.”

“God willing.” Green Haven had taught Jimmy that all prisoners were innocent and every cop a liar.

They turned west toward First Avenue. Patsy’s Pizza was just ahead, Rao’s two blocks south. Beyond that the Puerto Ricans held sway. To the west, the Blacks. The Italians clung to their patch like a dying man to his rifle. The Alamo, Harlem style.

“What’s on your mind, Jimmy?”

Jimmy drew himself up. “I’m concerned about you raising my premium.”

Frank Bates ran Empire Wholesalers. Empire stocked almost every club in Manhattan. But no owner dealt with Bates by choice, Jimmy included. The liquor distributor was a mob front and charged outrageous premiums. Those who didn’t pay found their wells empty or their clubs torched.

“You don’t like our rates? Shop around. Might encounter some issues with deliveries, though. The drivers being Teamsters, and all.”

Before surrendering for his sentence, Jimmy had made an arrangement with Frank. Genovese affiliates would guarantee Jimmy’s safety in prison—for a price. Jimmy paid and Jimmy lived.

Then came Abattoir.

The build-out drained Jimmy’s cash reserves. Near the end, after Jimmy was released and he’d taken over from Michelle, Locals 3 and 1 held a work stoppage. Jimmy went to Bates. Frank loaned Jimmy money to pay off the same unions he controlled; Bates shylocked cash back into his own pocket at 20 percent. Payoffs made, hammers resumed swinging.

But Bates issued a rider in perpetuity: Abattoir would purchase all liquor from Empire at a premium over the already inflated rate. Which Frank had just raised. Again. Jimmy needed cash to fend off Luc. Which is why he was strolling East Harlem with a pair of murderers.

“I need to keep Abattoir fresh. Reinvent the product. It’s good business, Frank. The better I do, the better you do.”

Bates squinted into the distance. He wobbled as he walked.

“I know you want your piece,” Jimmy continued, “but there are limits. No matter how hard you squeeze a rock, it won’t bleed.”

“A stone, maybe. But you’re flesh, Jimmy. Flesh and bone. You can bleed. You can break.”

Jimmy swallowed.

Frank continued. “Must I remind you I’m the reason you’re still among the living? Without me, you would have been passed around Green Haven like a high school whore. I consider you a friend, Jimmy. And we’re good to our friends. Our enemies, though …”

Half a block passed before Jimmy could breathe again.

“I meant no disrespect. I’m grateful for what you did. For what you’re doing. But I’m a legitimate businessman trying to make a clean living.”

“We both know what you are.”

“The life’s behind me. I don’t deal in drugs anymore.”

“Your daughter, rest her soul.”

Jones Beach. A five-year-old Samantha trying to build a sandcastle, but she’d started too close to the water and the tide was coming in. Waves brought down her towers and rounded her walls. But Jimmy’s girl kept building.

His mind’s image of Samantha was scratchy and fading. His memories of her were degrading. Jimmy feared one day his little girl would vanish forever.

“And your righteous protestations ring hollow. I’m told anything can be bought in Abattoir. Seeing as our relationship is about to evolve, you need to get that under control.”

Frank’s words pinged Jimmy’s prison radar. Evolve?

“I’m handling that. A few weeks back, we found this kid selling pills. I scared him shitless. Told him he can’t ever come back.”

“Oh, you told him.” Frank twisted around. “You hear that, Mario? Jimmy told him.”

Mario grunted.

Frank stopped walking. He breathing was labored, and he adjusted the dial on the oxygen tank. “Word of advice, me to you. Men making money on your back only respond to demonstrations of strength. I know of what I speak.”

An old woman pushing a cart passed. Frank said something to her in Italian and the woman smiled.

Back to Jimmy. “You coming today saves me a trip downtown. You’re going to be taking on an associate of mine. My nephew, actually. Renzo is Maria’s youngest. He’s in Miami for a few more weeks. Got into a thing. Kids. What’re you gonna do?”

Jimmy’s prison radar went full Pearl Harbor. Frank’s family, in Abattoir.

“Frank, what is this?”

“The next step. You’ve proven yourself, Jimmy. The club, your management. It’s past time our relationship deepened.”

Jimmy felt lightheaded. He stopped walking. He breathed quick.

“You had to know this was coming. We gave you your business. We gave you your life. Precious things don’t come free.”

Jimmy had told himself if he paid the points on Abattoir’s loans, Bates would stay off his back. He’d take the easy money and let Jimmy work clean. What a fool Jimmy had been.

“Okay, but about the bump in our rate. I don’t have it. I’m not that liquid.”

“Renzo’s sharp. He’s run the numbers. You have what we need. And if you don’t, you’ll find it.”

Manhattan spun under Jimmy. It took all his strength to remain vertical.

“And regarding liquidity, I’d rather you didn’t lie to me. Sutton Place ain’t Canarsie.”

How did Frank know about the condo? The deal had just closed.

A gold El Dorado rolled north on the avenue. Merengue blasted from its system. A Puerto Rican flag flew from a window. Rage flared in Frank’s eyes, then faded. He shuffled back to his warehouse.

Jimmy couldn’t move. The mob had just made him a partner.

Ben

Broadway and Seventy-Second. Midnight coming on. Ike and Ben strategized at Gray’s Papaya. No seats, all counter. A cross breeze blew through steady. Ace of Base pumped from a shelf-mounted boom box. Ike downed his hot dog in three bites.

“I don’t know how much longer we can keep doing this,” Ike said.

Three weeks had passed since the start of Ben’s unsanctioned murder investigation. The holidays had come and gone. Ike’s team worked nonstop. Late nights and early mornings. Club prowls till dawn.

Ben had stepped to Abattoir five times. The girls working the door laughed. Ben shifted targets, went attainable. He wandered Coliseum in search of Dreamy Dee. He got head shakes and shrugs. Ben hunted for ecstasy. He made three buys. Lab reports gutted him. Ben bought breath mints and chalk. A theory formed: Ben stunk of cop. Or maybe voyeur. He couldn’t be sure.

Ben slammed a coconut drink from a paper cup. “How bad is it?”

“Desano has noticed the downturn in our production.”

“What’d you tell her?”

“Oh, you know, just that we’re running our own unauthorized, secret squirrel homicide investigation that hasn’t yielded fuck all.” Ike scoped the street. “Was tough already, trying to corral these yahoos into doing real work. Only gonna get worse.”

Morale was in the shitter. Rumors swirled about the Mollen Commission. Cops from Staten Island to the Bronx were anxious: How deep would they go? Do they know about that cash I lifted? Did that cop I stepped on rat me out? Am I next?

Machines behind the counter bubbled neon-colored juice. Something in Ben’s stomach growled. A crew of kids piled in. Seven deep, boys and girls. They fell over one another, shouted their orders. The boys wore eight-inch platform boots. The girls’ hair was colored the same as Gray’s rainbow drinks. Thick makeup, across the board. The paper hats manning the counter rolled their eyes.

“Your people,” Ike said.

“If I was their people, they’d hit me off.”

“Maybe you’re not getting done cause nothing’s going on.”

Ben had considered this. That his club scene/drug den/homicide crossover theory was delusional. That Wheat’s killing was coincidental. That he was wrong.

Option One: Ben gives Ciretto Dee’s name. Ciretto makes inquiries. Browses mugshot binders. Whatever Homicide dicks do.

Option Two: Ben’s drug theory was sound. Dee existed and had Wheat-related intel. But Ben was the wrong man for the job.

Ben tossed all contradictory evidence.

“Abattoir’s pumping.”

“Maybe. But the fellas are grumbling. I smell sedition in the air. Can’t keep this going forever. New PC’s gonna shake shit up.”

“You know him at all?” Bill Bratton had been running the city’s Transit Police until Giuliani tapped him for the Big Job.

“Man’s from Boston. Tells me all I need.”

One of the club kids jumped onto the counter. She sang “All That She Wants” into her hot dog, then mimed an enthusiastic blow job. A line cook beat her off with a broom. Another dry-humped the condiment stand. A third tossed napkins to the ceiling. The assistant manager yelled in angry Arabic. Ike tucked his hands into his armpits and watched the show.

One of the girls pulled her top down. Stuffing fell from his bra. Ben clocked an Adam’s apple. Another girl snaked her way under the counter. She gulped orange drink straight from the tap. Her friends howled. The manager pushed her. She pushed back. A boy with jewels glued to his cheeks clawed at the manager’s back. The manager threw a wild punch and missed. A middle-aged couple walked in and right back out.

Cop instincts kicked in. Ben pushed off the counter. He grabbed Jewelface, spun him around. Ben’s hand swept his coat. “Cut the shit.”

Jewelface clocked Ben’s belt-mounted shield. His eyes popped wide. “Cops!”

Riotous club kids scattered. They fled Gray’s through both doors. Jewelface tried pulling away. Ben hung on, pressed his chest to the counter. Ike swept up his fruit punch and stepped aside.

“The hell, man!”

Ben raided Jewelface’s pockets. Sweaty cash in small bills, a bogus New York State ID, house keys on an orange plastic clip, a dime bag of sketchy marijuana. Ben slapped the weed on the counter.

“You planted that!”

Ike set down his drink. “You’re gonna want to stop talking, now.”

Ben went deeper. Coin pocket. Back pockets. He found glossy card stock. Black text on red.

SLIM RICKIE AND THE MACHINE PRESENT:

SASHY TO SLAY AT ABATTOIR

FEATURING DJ TECTONIC

FRIDAY JANUARY 21

DOORS OPEN 10:30

DOORS CLOSE WHEN YOU PASS OUT

$10 ENTRY & ½ PRICE DRINKS WITH THIS INVITE

652 WEST 28TH STREET

At the flyer’s bottom lay gold:

THIS PASS GUARANTEES ADMISSION

Jewelface squirmed. “Come on, man.”

Ben freed him. “Take your stuff and go.”

Ike pivoted to Ben. Tilted his head. The fuck?

Jewelface policed up his gear, weed included. He bolted out of Gray’s.

Ben studied the flyer. Wheat had been found four hundred feet from Abattoir’s door. An old-timer’s wisdom came to Ben: There were no coincidences in police work, and I’d rather be lucky than good.

Ben held up the flyer.

Ike squinted at the text. “Get in the fucking car.”

Serge

Bass hit Serge in the sternum. One AM and Abattoir was over capacity. The bar was packed deep. Serge inhaled pheromones and Drakkar Noir. Slim Rickie’s nights had taken off big. Her clientele was downtown chic and drug trip-keen. Serge was grateful. His ecstasy sold out nightly. He needed more product. He needed someone to answer his calls.

A dozen pages to Avi Brenner over three weeks. All unreturned. The silence galled Serge. He was on a clock.

And Wheat’s intel still needing handling.

Serge had eyeballed half the phones on Yanna’s list, had learned nothing. Surveillance demanded patience or manpower. Serge had neither. As long as he remained a one-man operation, Mystery Mike remained a ghost and Luc a threat.

On the plus side, the Canadian had gone quiet over Christmas. Three weekends had come and gone. Abattoir experienced no shootings, no stabbings, no bodies. Serge didn’t know what to make of that.

He lit a smoke. His radio earpiece clicked on.

“Serge to the main bar for a drop.”

Jimmy was right. Abattoir printed money.

Behind the bar, T-Roc stood guard as Angel switched tills. Serge and Jimmy kept eyes on. The DJ booth was packed with handlers and hangers-on. Serge read Eva Gould’s scowl from a hundred feet out. Jimmy still hadn’t signed Destination, thank God. The NYPD policed the hip-hop set hard: Destination would bring the law’s attention to Abbatoir. And that Serge couldn’t have.

Next to Serge Jimmy bounced from one foot to the other. Lines ran across his forehead. Sweat dotted his brow. The eager fiend bop. Serge knew it well. Jimmy’s public antidrug stance went beyond Sam’s death. Jimmy used to do coke. Nosebleed levels of coke.

And the man was jonesing.

“Anything you want to tell me?”

“What?” Jimmy looked at Serge. No, past him.

“You using again?”

Jimmy pulled back, sharp. He put off shock and indignation. Before Jimmy found words, T-Roc stepped from the bar. A steel box was handcuffed to his wrist.

“We ready?”

Jimmy glared at Serge. “You stay down here.”

T-Roc and Jimmy melted into the crowd. Serge dropped his filter to the floor. Jimmy’s reaction confirmed Serge’s suspicion: Jimmy was either using or about to. Another problem added to Serge’s list.

Slim Rickie tugged at his arm. “I need my cut.”

“You’ll get paid tomorrow. Like always.” Serge’s lips were an inch from Rickie’s ear. She smelled like candy.

Slim Rickie was among the scene’s top party promoters. She had worked with every major club, but Abattoir had become her home. She was five foot nothing, white-girl skinny with fire engine-red hair in a pixie cut. A lollipop stick poked from her mouth. Her street team—the Machine—held court on a purple sofa. Boys and girls all trying to out-outrageous one another.

“Please?”

Rickie pulled the Blow Pop from her mouth and set her lips in a pout. She was fifteen years younger than Serge and rumor was she preferred women, but Serge had had fantasies. He was driven, not a monk.

“Jimmy’ll take care of you.”

Promoters were a sketchy, unreliable bunch. Serge usually avoided them. But Rickie and the Machine were chemical users and abusers. She and Wheat moved in the same circle. Getting close might have benefits. And she had those lips.

“Come onnnn. I need my money nooooow.”

Lights cycled and recycled. Strobes flashed bright. Billie Love stepped up, Rickie’s second-in-command. He was tall and lean and Black and wore a white leather bustier and a ship captain’s hat. He ran a lithe hand across Serge’s chest. “Hi, Sergey.”

“How you been, Billie?”

“Better than anyone, baby.”

“Your girl’s jonesing hard.”

“Am not!” Rickie yelled, confirming she was.

“We just want what’s ours.” Billie spoke with an exaggerated southern drawl. He’d come north from Louisiana. New Orleans offered too small a stage.

“Why the rush?”

“Ican’tsayJimmy’llfreakyouknowhowhegets.” Rickie’s words ran into each other.

“And you think I won’t?”

“We think you’re a realist,” Billie said.

“Okay then.”

Rickie turned to Billie. Billie flicked his wrist and snapped a fan open. He fluttered it under his chin. “If you trust the man, ask him.”

“I need two bills so we can get high.”

Rickie’s drug needs confirmed, Serge gamed angles. Her connect could be Mystery Mike-related, which made him Luc-related. Which made him Wheat-related. Serge sensed opportunity.

“Who you buying from?”

“So you can narc ’em out to Jimmy?” Rickie said. “Fuck you, Serge. You either got my cash or you don’t.”

“Our cash, baby,” Billie said.

“Relax. I’m looking for a new hookup. Someone reliable.”

Rickie tongued her Blow Pop nice and slow. “Thought you’d grown out of that.”

They were close now. In Abattoir’s darkness, Rickie could pass for either gender. That didn’t bother Serge. Not at all.

He flashed on the boys that hung around Don Cosgrove’s photo studio. How their heads hung as they left. Serge wondered why, until Don finally showed him. Serge left his first shoot changed but unashamed. Most boys never went back. But Serge did. Those sessions gave Serge a binder full of pro headshots and an understanding of how the world works.

This for that.

Rickie put off epic fearlessness. Serge had been fearless, once. Now he knew too much.

“You want an advance, I want your connect. Fair trade.”

“Oh my lord,” Billie said. “Just tell him.”

“Fine,” Rickie said. “But we’re not getting done here. My guy doesn’t do Abattoir anymore.”

The beat shifted. Downtempo. Heavy. Ominous.

“Why’s that?”

“A friend of his got killed,” Rickie said. “And he’s all spun up thinking he’s next.”

Serge tried very hard not to move. “Who got killed?”

“Wheat. Didn’t you know him?”

The gunshot. The flash. The pigeons. Blood looks black in moonlight.

“I don’t think so,” Serge said.

“He knew him,” Billie said.

“How do you know he got killed?”

“We just know.”

“It’s crazy out here, baby,” Billie said.

Implications swirled. Rickie’s connect was Luc/Mike adjacent. If word of Wheat’s death had hit the street, Luc knew. His post-peace summit silence recontextualized. Now it felt ominous. Big moves demanded planning. Resources. Serge got the feeling things were about to get worse.

He peeled five hundreds off his roll. Abattoir’s lights went nuclear. Rickie’s eyes popped junkie-wide. Billie clocked the cash and licked his lips.

“This buys me his name and number.”

“You fuck with him, and the Machine heads to Sanctuary.”

“Deal. But Jimmy can’t know I asked.”

“Double deal.”

Billie clapped like a schoolboy.

Rickie snatched the cash. “He ditched his beeper, but he goes by Dreamy Dee.”

Ben

The girl who stamped Ben’s hand triple-checked the invite. Probably wondering how a square like Ben got one. He moved with the crowd, felt an energy spots like Coliseum and the Pit lacked. Curtains parted and techno crushed Ben’s skull. Lights exploded, died, exploded again.

Abattoir welcomed the NYPD.

Ben had stepped to the club ghostless. Ike’s one condition for Ben’s solo flight: If he wasn’t streetside in sixty, Ike would move on the club hard.

Good fucking luck.

Abattoir was massive. The crowd numbered in the thousands. The ceiling hung so high it didn’t exist. Drag queens in ball gowns swung from rafter-mounted cables. Light bounced off century-old brick. The audio mix was perfect.

Ben knew straight away he didn’t belong. He needed a prop, made his way to the bar. Men and women pressed against him. Someone grabbed his crotch. His shirt became drenched; his sweat and theirs. Ben started dancing; the crowd demanded it. The floor drew in bystanders and trucked no dissenters.

Party as revolution. Join or die.

Ben snagged a Heineken. Nerves hit. He was a poseur. He was a narc. Everybody knew. He slammed the beer. Fifteen minutes gone. Move.

Dark nooks lay under brick arches. Ravers and queers and cross-dressers and art types and outer-borough assholes and coked-up office drones blowing their Christmas bonuses. They touched faces and licked thighs and undid belts. A woman rode a kid who couldn’t have been more than sixteen. Two party boys in gold hot pants gave dueling hand jobs. A crew of Guidos blasted lines of coke.

Ben stepped to a white girl with goth-black hair. “You know where I can get hooked up?”

She ran leather gloves across Ben’s face and went orgasmic. A Black man in a tartan kilt strolled by. Goth Girl corralled him. They locked faces and Ben was forgotten.

He was too self-aware. Ben ordered another beer, downed half. His stomach lurched. His head ached. His body was rejecting the alcohol. All he had to do was get through the night.

Ben stepped to a white guy rocking a skater’s buzz cut. “I need a little something. You holding?”

The guy looked Ben up and down. For you? No fucking way.

Ben walked off, dejected. During his time in Public Morals he had copped in Coliseum, a now-shuttered club called Evoke, and a couple other lesser spots. Abattoir was different. Abattoir was elite. Ben didn’t belong. He felt naked. The vise on his head screwed tighter. Forty minutes gone.

Ben could not leave empty. He might not get back in.

The beat cranked. The floor swelled. Abattoir shook the city.

Ben finished his beer. He felt light and bold and sick all at once. Consequences inbound. How long till they hit?

He headed for the bathrooms. A semicircular bar fronted dual-entry corridors. All stalls, no urinals. Men and women mingled freely. Gender didn’t matter. Gender didn’t exist.

A pair of finance types tag-teamed coke lines. A six-foot drag queen put his palm to his mouth, threw his head back. A girl emptied her stomach into a toilet while her girlfriends sorted pills on her heaving back. Bouncers clocked usage and ignored it.

Abattoir was hot for product. Ben recorded it all. He made mental notes for later transcription. The scene reinvigorated him.

Ben skirted the crowd. His head throbbed, his stomach rolled. He pushed it all down. He drifted, drifted, and saw her.

The woman from Coliseum, the one Ben had scoped before buying off JD Jeans. Korean, maybe. A drink in one hand. Downtown cool and sexy anywhere. Ten minutes left on Ike’s timer. Ben had to get done.

Her face was kind. Ben took a shot.

“I’ve seen you before. In a Coliseum a month ago.” Forty-two days. Ben remembered to the hour. “You were alone that night, too.”

“You’re tracking my solitude? That’s not creepy at all.” She smiled as she said it. Encouraging.

“If you’re not here by yourself, where are your friends?”

She raised her chin at the dance floor.

Ben moved closer. “Brett.”

“Hannah. How do you know Rickie?”

Ben blanked and Hannah touched the stamp on the back of his hand.

“I found the flyer on the sidewalk.” Ben’s stomach lurched one way, then the other.

“No, you didn’t. Nobody loses a Slim Rickie invite.”

A techno track throbbed. Hannah looked directly at Ben.

“I robbed a kid.”

“That I can believe.”

A tiny diamond poked through one of Hannah’s nostrils. She put off tranquility. Confidence. She was comfortable. She was home. Neither spoke for a long time, and Ben was okay with that.

“Why do people like you find places like this interesting?” she asked.

“People like me?”

“Tourists. This isn’t your scene.”

The floor was full. Strangers met, touched, revealed themselves without a word. Ben wore a mask over a mask. A sheltered rich kid pretending to be a cop pretending he wasn’t. Why hadn’t he seen it before?

The speech poured out of Ben fast. It had to be true; he wasn’t that good a liar.

“Maybe I’m jealous. Look at them out there. There’s no fear, no shame. No regrets. They don’t care what I think of them. What anyone thinks of them. The music, these lights. It’s, I don’t know … religious.”

“That’s a nice story.” Hannah pressed herself against Ben. “But what are you really looking for?”

Ecstasy. Coke. Sticks. K. That was Ben’s answer. This was his job. Say it. Get done.

“I don’t know.”

Hannah touched his cheek. “You’re so sad.”

Ben hadn’t dated since Jennifer. Hadn’t seen his parents since September. His college friends worked in FiDi and closed eight-figure deals. Ben came home at dawn and slept till two. His life was lonely at both ends.

“We’re all running from something,” Hannah said. “What’s chasing you?”

The music dipped, a break before the rush.

Ben had been an overachieving outcast in the Tenth. Six months in PMD had earned him zero friends. The job brought only frustration. Ben questioned his skills and his path. A troubling likelihood emerged: Ben had become a cop to enrage his father.

His proclaimed ideals, the drive to succeed, his showy, righteous declarations all fell away in the face of that one, simple, sad, tired trope. Ben wanted to be special. He wasn’t. The realization gored him.

“I don’t want to feel like me anymore.”

“Then you’ve come to the right place.”

The DJ started his uphill climb. The beat pushed Ben. “You have anything that could help me out?”

Hannah eyed her drink, the floor, Ben. “I’ve got to go. My friends, and all.”

Rejection, again. “Yeah.”

Hannah reached out, pulled Ben to her. She stood tall to meet him. Her breath brushed his cheek. “Don’t ever stop running.”

She melted onto the floor. Ben realized she’d had her hands in his pockets. He pulled out two red tablets. Hannah had slipped him ecstasy. As Ben fingered the pity pills, an idea took shape.

Ben had been right: Abattoir was hot, drug use rampant. But Ben had failed: He couldn’t get done. Before the Mollen Commission, a cop’s word came second only to God’s. But Michael Dowd’s confession had seeded doubt. Ben needed proof. Six weeks remained on his PMD loan. Make a case or go back to Patrol.

Easy choice, that.

Ben sprinted to the toilets. He peeled three twenties off his buy stash. Beer fogged his brain, but Ben crafted a tale. Abattoir was coffin-dark and packed to capacity. Ben clocked open-air usage. Security was lax. He got done by a tall white boy in glasses and a backward newsboy cap. Ben named him John Doe Kangol. Two for sixty. No, he didn’t get the kid’s name. No, he didn’t get the kid’s number. Sorry, Sarge. You know how it is. A spot like that on a night like this.

The report would come easy. It would validate Ben. The truth, tweaked. Ben had copped in Abattoir. His drug market theory evidenced and legitimized. Ben dropped the cash in the toilet and flushed.

He made for the exit. Wintry air filled his lungs.

He vomited midblock.

Jimmy

The Keep thrummed to Tectonic’s mix. One floor down, Jimmy’s club pulsed. He pulled himself tight to his desk. Across it sat a steroid-juiced beast. Renzo Scalesi had arrived.

And he was a big, big fan.

“Seriously, I can’t believe I’m in the same room as Jimmy Lettner. Covet. Imprimatur. Abattoir. You’re a legend.” Renzo turned to his Serge, a ropey white guy with cauliflower ears named Stoney. “Can you believe this?”

Stoney picked at a thumbnail. “I cannot.”

Serge stood posted in front the Haring. In front of the Mosler. Not that it mattered. Renzo was T-Roc’s size, but younger, leaner. Veins popped from hairless forearms. A gold cross hung from a Cuban link chain. It bounced off chemically swollen pecs. Renzo wore a skin-tight white V-neck tee and frameless glasses. Jimmy’s new apprentice, per Frank Bates.

“Your uncle said there would be changes.”

“That, right there, is why he’s the man. Always about the business.” To Serge: “You’re lucky to work for him. The things you must’ve learned.”

Serge said nothing.

Renzo produced out a small spiral pad, the kind third graders carry. “First thing, I need access to your books. We’re going to be funneling unrelated revenue streams through the club. Don’t worry, it’s a pure paper operation. You won’t be involved in the day-to-day. As for our piece, my uncle and I settled on ten percent, weekly. I’m talking gross, of course. Not net.”

Jimmy felt like he’d just been gut punched. Money laundering and a weekly skim. Most businesses couldn’t hide transactions on that scale. But Abattoir ran on cash and paper records. The perfect dirty money machine.

But Abattoir was also Jimmy’s baby. He wouldn’t raise her with the mob.

“What you’re asking’s not possible. The numbers don’t work.”

“No? Hmm. Okay. Lemme bounce this off you. The city’s authorized Abattoir for an occupancy of 3,250. Assuming you go over—and every club does—I’m making you for 4,000 entrants a night. Figure three-quarters pay an average $15 cover—and that’s conservative—we’re talking $60,000 nightly. And that’s before anyone orders a drink.

“Which brings us to the bar. That’s your cash cow right there. I reviewed Abattoir’s purchase orders with Empire, going back to day one. Over the last two months, you averaged a twelve percent increase by volume, week over week. Working off an industry-standard eight times markup on an average order of $14,000, that’s another $112,000. My back of the envelope math has you taking in $322,000. Per week. Tell me I’m wrong.”

Jimmy couldn’t. Renzo’s figures were spot-on. Renzo kept the count.

“Pay up, motherfucker.” Renzo held a hand out to Stoney, who slapped a hundred dollar bill into it. To Jimmy: “Stoney here suffers from occasional lapses of faith. Ain’t that right, Stoney?”

“Occasional.”

Jimmy should say something. Push back, defend his patch. But Renzo was a monster and the entity he repped had survived for more than a century. Jimmy was just a businessman running a nightclub.

God, he could use a hit.

“Frank didn’t mention money laundering,” Serge said.

“Oh, were you there?” When Serge didn’t respond, Renzo went on. “It doesn’t matter what my uncle said then, what matters is what I’m saying now. Picture his words comin’ outta my mouth. Question me, you question Frank. You can do that, Thanakis, but odds are you won’t like the answer.”

Serge’s upper lip twitched. Jimmy changed the subject.

“This isn’t the best time. Nightlife has a reputation, and Giuliani’s going on about restoring law and order.”

“Restoring,” Stoney said.

“The mayor’s gotta worry about the asteroids shooting up Flatbush, going apeshit on Eastern Parkway,” Renzo said. “This place? Us? We are under the radar, my friend.”

Jimmy drew a deep breath.

“You should be honored, Jimmy. I want to learn from the best.”

“Learn?”

“The business. Nightclubs. Your world.” Renzo turned to Stoney. “I don’t think he gets it.”

“He does not,” Stoney said.

Back to Jimmy. “I’m here to learn how you do what you do.”

“Is Frank looking to replace me?” Jimmy said, only half joking.

“What? No, course not. Abattoir is Jimmy Lettner. But you’re one man, and my uncle’s got footholds in Miami, Vegas, Chicago. I want to take your model and go national with it. Abattoir’s a kingdom. Together, we’ll turn it into an empire.”

Renzo smiled wide. His veneers gleamed.

Jimmy set a Camel between his lips. He worked his lighter’s flint wheel, but it wouldn’t fire. Renzo produced a fancy butane job. The blue flame hovered like a knife at Jimmy’s neck.

Jimmy sucked down half his smoke. This was too much. He needed a bump. Jimmy did his best work on cocaine. He took a last, useless shot to save face in front of Serge.

“Renzo. I run a clean business. I pay Frank what I owe on time. And I order tens of thousands of dollars in alcohol from Empire. Cleaning dirty cash through Abattoir jeopardizes a reliable source of revenue. Why take that chance?”

“If you never took chances,” Renzo said, “you wouldn’t be in that seat.”

That, Jimmy conceded, was true.

“And don’t try running that clean club bullshit by me. We both know what it’s like down there.”

Serge, now. “Frank’s got issues with drugs in Abattior. But if we start policing our patrons, we’ll drive them to Sanctuary.”

“When it comes to getting high, I am not my uncle.”

Renzo pulled an amber vial from a pocket. He unscrewed the cap and took a hit. Jimmy tensed. He gripped the desk tight. The blow called to him. He felt himself weakening. He needed Renzo out of the Keep. He needed to get high.

Jimmy rose. “I gotta hit the floor.”

“Yeah, of course. Hey, who does your books?”

The books. Jimmy’s numbers. “I’ve got a girl.”

Renzo grinned something evil. “Get her in here, then.”

Jimmy made a call. Seconds later, Chloe walked in.

“This is no girl, Jimmy. This is a woman.”

“Chloe, this is Renzo Scalesi. He’s going to be working with you.”

“A pleasure.” Renzo offered a massive hand.

Chloe didn’t move. She clutched her ledger to her chest like a shield. Jimmy felt disgusted with himself for putting her through this. But there was nothing he could do.

Not yet.

To Jimmy, Chloe said, “What is this?”

“I need you to show Renzo the numbers.”

Chloe’s expression fell. No, no, no. Abattoir’s numbers were sacred. Jimmy owned them, Chloe cared for them. Outsiders hadn’t earned the right.

“I’ll come over in two minutes,” Jimmy said to his desk.

Chloe shot him a look of absolute betrayal. He had put her in a spot with Eva and now Renzo. Jimmy was a good boss, didn’t use people. Or so he had thought.

Stoney followed Chloe out. Renzo lingered in the doorway.

“Like I said, it’s an honor.” He shut the door.

Jimmy spun to Serge. “What do you think?”

“I think if Luc doesn’t end us, Bates’s nephew will.” Serge lit a fresh smoke. “We’re in a bad way here, Jimmy.”

“I know.”

“We gotta handle our situations.”

“I know.”

Abattoir had headlined New York City’s club scene for nearly half a year. Now it faced threats at every door. Luc’s takeover bid. The Wheat kid missing and presumed dead. Frank Bates dry-cleaning dirty cash through Abattoir’s books. Renzo Scalesi in Jimmy’s house.

Five months. A good run for peace in this town. But that time had ended.

Jimmy was at war.

PART II

Ben

Ben didn’t know his doorbell worked. He threw his legs out of the bed and hit cold parquet.

Verticality sent Ben woozy. Blankets piled three-deep on his bed. The radiator needed fixing. The bell rang again.

“Coming, I said. Jesus Christ.”

Ben peeped the peephole. Ike Digby stood in the hall. Ben put a hand to his head. It throbbed something awful. Wasn’t today Sunday?

“The longer you make me wait, the worse this’s gonna be.”

Ben threw the deadbolts, swung the door open. Ike walked in.

“You better have a woman in here, keeping me waiting fifteen minutes.”

Fifteen minutes? “I didn’t hear the bell.” Ben fisted a yawn and shuffled to the tiny kitchen. He scooped Café Bustelo into the coffee maker. “You want?”

Ike shook his head and took in Ben’s sad, single man digs. Bare walls, frat house sofa, dingy lighting.

“What’re you paying?”

“Three-fifty a month.”

“Neighbors know you’re a cop?”

“I doubt it.” Ben’s neighbors spoke mostly Spanish.

Ben lived in a converted studio on Fort Washington Avenue, just off 187th Street. Washington Heights this far west had been mostly Jewish until cocaine arrived on the scene and the neighborhood shifted Dominican. Suburban buyers flooded the Heights via the George Washington Bridge. Dealers shuffled kilos from car to car, conducted bulk sales in broad daylight. Shootings followed. Bodies dropped night and day. The Jews fled to Riverdale and points north. Rents took a dive, and Ben got the place cheap.

On the table was yesterday’s New York Times. Ike picked up the newspaper. “You seen this, about the Amsterdam Theater?” He shook his head. “Disney in the Deuce. Never thought I’d see the day. They start shuttering porno theaters, you and me’re gonna be out of work.”

“How’d you know where I live?”

“It’s on your Ten-card, dumbass. I know where everybody lives.”

The coffeemaker beeped and Ben filled a Yankees mug. Caffeine cleared his head. What it revealed made Ben shudder. Earlier that morning, he’d fictionalized a buy report. Did Ike know? Is that why he was here?

“What’s up, Sarge?”

Ike laid a Polaroid on the counter. A classic cop shot: crime scene close and overlit. The back of a hand. On it was an ink stamp. The same as Ben had gotten at Abattoir. The one that was on him still. Ben compared his hand to the photo.

“You don’t shower before bed?”

“I was tired.”

“No wonder you don’t have a woman.”

Ben brought the Polaroid close. “This is a DOA.”

“Ain’t you observant. I need you downstairs in twenty, looking your prep school best.”

“But we’re RDO.”

“Don’t look to me like you got plans.”

True enough. “Where’re we going?”

“Downtown, Bennett. You and me’ve been summoned by the Palace.”

Ben had never been in the chief of detectives’ office. The place screamed 1981: fake wood paneling, dark, oversized furniture, a wine-red carpet. Ben touched his tie knot for the twentieth time.

“I appreciate you coming down here on a Sunday, Ike.”

“I don’t believe I had a choice, Chief.”

“No, you did not.”

Chief William “Big Bill” McManus shifted heavily in his seat. He was a hefty white man with a bowling-ball gut and Dodge City mustache. He had huge, rough hands, a withering gaze, and evoked a breed of New York City cop Ben had thought was extinct.

Next to him sat Tyler Easton, a young white guy in a sharp gray suit and slicked-back brown hair. He vibed educated and confident. The last two players were Amy Valero and Donna Lockwood, DEA and the United States Attorney’s Office, Southern District of New York, respectively. Valero was about Ben’s age, with brown skin, short black hair in a severe fed ponytail, and a ratchet-tight expression. Lockwood was pudgy and pink-faced with curly red hair. Both looked like they’d rather be anywhere but the Palace on a winter’s Sunday afternoon.

“This morning,” McManus began, “the Five-Oh Squad responded to an apparent suicide in Fieldston. Jared Dodson, aged seventeen, hung himself in his parents’ garage. Initial investigation indicates Dodson was on drugs. His friends claim they partied last night in Abattoir, a nightclub up in the Tenth. You wanna take this next part, Tyler?”

“Absolutely, Chief. I was sent here by Mayor Giuliani. He has a particular interest in this tragedy. Morgan Dodson—that’s Jared’s father—is a partner at Loeb, Chaugh, and Buckley. They are a venerable, respected firm in this city. In light of—”

“The DOA’s dad rang Gracie Mansion,” McManus said.

Easton forced a smile. He didn’t like being stepped on. “I was dispatched by the mayor because Morgan Dodson is a citizen and a friend. As you can imagine, the mayor is deeply concerned about the ease with which dangerous drugs can be obtained in Manhattan nightspots. He believes Dodson’s tragic suicide is emblematic of a city gone to rot. The mayor has made addressing crime a central tenet of his term and has promised to support law enforcement in ways the previous administration did not. This meeting is the first step in a refocused, comprehensive, cooperative law enforcement strategy. One intended to cripple the drug dealing tolerated by prior city leaders.”

Valero scratched notes in a leather-bound pad. Ben and Ike traded uneasy looks. City Hall never made a cop’s job easier.

“How do we know Dodson was high?” Valero asked.

“Right now we’re getting that from his friends,” McManus said. “The OCME will cut him tomorrow, but the tox will take weeks.”

“You’ll have results in seven days,” Easton said. “I made a call.”

McManus snorted through a clogged nostril. Easton leaned in, somber and serious.

“There’s something else. Tomorrow’s Times will run a story on Dodson’s suicide. It will frame the city’s dance club scene as an open-air drug market and hammer the NYPD for their inability or unwillingness to police it.”

McManus stretched his neck. “And how’d the Times get turned onto this?”

“I imagine Morgan tipped a friendly reporter.”

“But I thought Dodson’s father and the mayor were friends,” Ben said.

Under the table Ike kicked Ben’s foot.

“They are,” Easton said. “But he’s a litigator with a dead son.”

McManus rubbed his temples.

“Was Dodson taking any prescription meds?” Lockwood asked. “Did he have a psych history?”

“Those questions are irrelevant,” Easton said. “Mr. Dodson’s son killed himself after buying drugs in a New York City nightclub. That is the issue we’re here to address. The only issue.”

“It’s relevant if I’m going to bring a case,” Lockwood said.

Neither Lockwood nor Easton spoke for a few moments.

“Donna,” Easton said, “the mayor doesn’t want to call Mary Jo about this.”

Meaning Mary Jo White, the head of the Southern District. Lockwood pursed her lips and scribbled in her pad.

Valero, now. “Do we know what illegal substance Dodson might have used?”

“It could have been anything,” Ben said.

Ben’s shin caught another under-table Ike Digby kick.

“Explain,” Valero said.

“If he copped in Abattoir—and the stamp on his hand proves he was there—he could have bought anything. I was only inside for an hour, and I saw coke, ketamine, ecstasy, and pills. Unchecked usage, just like the Times’ story’s going to claim.”

McManus shut his eyes. He looked very tired. He was new to his position, having been given the bump by Commissioner Bratton after Bratton had been installed by Giuliani. Weeks into McManus’s reign, and the Times was about to set him on fire. Ben wondered why anyone wanted to hold rank.

“According to NITRO,” McManus said to Ben, “you’re the only undercover to have recorded a positive buy in Abattoir. I pulled PMD’s tac plans going back three months. Abattoir’s not listed, not once. Why were you there?”

Ben’s stomach caved. His newfound undercover fame was built on a bogus buy. But before Ben stuttered his way into a suspension, Ike cut in.

“It’s a self-initiated case, Chief. The nightlife scene falls under Public Morals’ purview. Officer Hopkins had gleaned intelligence indicating an uptick in the availability of drugs in the club set. In light of this, and, given how busy Narco has been, I made the decision to target Abattoir. Last night’s buy was the first in a planned long-term investigation.”

“What’d you buy and how much?” Valero asked.

“Two tabs of ecstasy for sixty dollars,” Ben said.

Valero and Lockwood traded a look Ben didn’t like.

“Do you buy MDMA often? That’s the scientific name for ecstasy.”

“I know what methylenedioxy methamphetamine is. And yeah, I buy it on the reg. Just a few weeks ago, I collared a kid who hit me off in Coliseum.” A thought hit. Ben leaned in, eager. “I bet we could leverage him into cooperating. His case is still open.”

“Those charges have either already been dropped or will be,” Lockwood said.

“What do you mean?” McManus asked.

“Officer Hopkins is charging defendants under the New York State penal code. But MDMA isn’t listed in New York’s Public Health Law. Not yet. Ecstasy isn’t recognized as a controlled substance on the state level. That may sneak past a swamped ADA working Intake, but supervisors will catch the mistakes and address them.” To Ben, she said, “Your arrests aren’t, strictly speaking, legal.”

Kevin’s warnings about ignoring the DA’s office. ADA Whitcomb’s messages, her call to Ike direct. If Ben hadn’t dodged her, he’d’ve realized he’d been collaring citizens for noncrimes. Framed photos of long-dead chiefs hung high in the chief of detectives’ conference room. They judged Ben and found him wanting.

Across the table Amy Valero was smiling at Ben. And not in a kind way.

“I think we’re losing the thread here,” Easton said. “The mayor is seeking an inter-agency task force targeting the New York nightlife drug trade, with the US Attorney taking the prosecutorial lead.”

McManus stiffened; cops distrusted feds. Always, but especially now.

Easton said, “He expects the NYPD’s full cooperation on this, Bill.”

Giuliani had been a hard-charging Southern District prosecutor. He won the mayoralty on a law-and-order platform. As a Republican. In New York City. The first since Fiorello La Guardia.

Thank his heavy PBA support.

After Dinkins had endorsed a civilian oversight board of the NYPD, Giuliani spoke at a City Hall rally/riot. Angry off-duty cops marched in the thousands. They shut down the Brooklyn Bridge. Forty-two were disciplined administratively, none charged criminally. Giuliani had inflamed and encouraged. A deal was inked that day. Time for McManus to pay up.

“Can you work with us on this, Donna?” McManus said.

Valero and Lockwood held a silent fed huddle.

“Do you think Abattoir’s owners are profiting from the trade,” Valero said to Ben, “or just turning a blind eye?”

Valero wanted fed-level justification. Was Abattoir dirty at the top? Maybe yes, maybe no. Ben had suspicions. He had zero evidence. So Ben lied. He was getting good at it.

“I think it’d be impossible to sell at that scale without management making accommodations.”

Ike side-eyed Ben. This indictment of Abattoir’s management was news to him.

McManus turned back to Lockwood. “What do you say?” Valero whispered in her ear. Lockwood listened and nodded.

“Cooperation could further our collective goals,” she said.

Easton rapped a fist on the table. “The mayor will be very happy to hear this.”

Ben’s next move came to him quick. The task force was a way into Wheat’s murder. Into solving the killing before Ralphie Ciretto. Ben had weeks to make a case and get the shield. He might not get a second chance.

“I have a theory about one of the Tenth’s open homicides.”

Ike’s boot nearly broke Ben’s shin.

“Which?” McManus asked.

“Scott Hill. Street name of Wheat. Six weeks ago, he was found in an abandoned warehouse across from Abattoir. One round to the head, execution style. There was ecstasy on his body, and I collared him previously.”

“What for?”

Shit. Ben had not thought this through. “Felony sale. Of ecstasy.”

Valero coughed into a fist. Lockwood shook her head.

“Wonderful,” McManus said.

“I think we should look into whether Wheat’s killing and the Abattoir drug trade are connected.”

For a few moments McManus stared silently at Ben.

“The mayor loves a RICO case,” Easton said.

Valero now: “If we can prove a link to the trade, we could charge the murder as a predicate felony.”

Murder clearances generated positive ink. The mayor, Commissioner Bratton, and Chief McManus were new to their jobs. They could use a win. So could Ben. His illegal arrests forgotten, a detective’s shield in his sights. His father proved wrong.

Next came the hard part. Ralphie Ciretto was old. He didn’t get the club scene. Pete Cobb might be a prick, but he was young and hungry. Ben’s buy built this case, and that gave him power. Ben tucked his feet under his chair.

“There’s a detective in the Tenth, Pete Cobb. He’s a former narcotics undercover and would be a great addition to this case. He’s familiar with Wheat’s killing.”

“The homicide’s his?” McManus asked.

“No, Detective Ciretto caught it.”

McManus rubbed his chin. Ike sat back, crossed his arms. He was not pleased.

“Have you spoken to Cobb about this?”

“Yes, sir.” Ben hadn’t.

“I’ll consider your request.”

McManus rose, and everybody else followed. Business cards were traded. Ben played receiver; he had none of his own. Amy Valero’s had a gold-embossed shield. Ben rubbed it with his thumb. Everyone filed out. McManus asked Ben to hang back.

“You want Cobb working the murder with you?”

“He’s the right fit, sir.”

“And you’re not worried how it’ll look, you stepping on a thirty-year man to get what you want?”

The Department abhorred cop-on-cop crime. But Ben had no job friends, no debts owed. He was driven to get the shield. To prove he was his own man.

“No, sir.”

“I’ll make the call.” McManus laid a hand out. When Ben shook it, the chief pulled him in close. “I may be the chief of detectives, but make no mistake, this’s the mayor’s investigation. Embarrass me again, and I’ll string your entrails from the fucking rafters.”

As Ben waited for the elevator, he rewound the meeting, assessed it. Ben had lied outright, forged reports, and shivved a senior dick. The chief rewarded him for his sins.

Welcome to the NYPD.

Serge

Serge heaped sugar into his coffee. Outside, yellow cabs rolling down Broadway threw up arcs of gray slush. Overflowing trash cans sat buried to the rim. Road salt everywhere. There was no place more beautiful than New York during a nighttime snow, no place uglier the following morning.

The coffee shop off Astor Place kept NYU kids alive. Caffeine mainlined, 24/7. A version of Serge reflected in dirty windows. Bleary eyes, hair needed a cut. A rush of icy air blew through the shop. Serge turned to the door. Finally.

“My friend.” Avi Brenner slid into the booth opposite. He wore an oversized, bright red Marmot.

“I thought we said noon.”

“Serge, please. I just woke up.”

Avi worked himself out of his puffy coat. He was in his early twenties, white with short, curly black hair and a perfect five o’clock shadow. He dressed designer, exclusively. Gucci shades, Hermes belts, Versace sweaters, Louis Vuitton luggage. Low key was not in Avi’s vocabulary.

“So many times, you call me. I say to David, Serge must want to make a big deal.” His accent was Israeli by way of Williamsburg.

“Watch what you say. There’s ears everywhere.”

“You self-important motherfucker. You think the cops care about you and me? Read the papers. Two thousand murders in this city last year. We can do what we please. Know why? Because we don’t kill each other.”

The muzzle flash, the pigeons.

When Serge bounced back to the moment, Avi held a coke vial in his hand. He uncapped the cylinder and took a double hit off the tiny spoon. Serge scoped the shop for curious eyes, found none.

“See?” Avi said. “Nobody cares.”

The counter man dropped a coffee and kept moving. Maybe Avi was right. Maybe Serge was being paranoid. Didn’t help that he had ten large in a JanSport between his feet and a dead kid in his dreams.

“How’s David?”

“Terrible. He’s in love.”

David was Avi’s partner and roommate. He and Serge had met at Abattoir and had connected Serge to Avi the following morning. The trio talked customs bribes and profit margins over bagels and lox.

“The girl from Staten Island?”

“She makes him crazy, screws up his head. Which screws up my numbers. I keep telling him, David, you work for me. This girl’s got to go. Monogamy and our business don’t get along. I am the proof, yes?”

Avi partied nightly with a rotating cast of hardbodies. He dressed to draw attention and spent without thinking. He lived flagrantly and had no plan. And plans were why Serge had called this meeting.

“I need to increase my orders.”

“Oooh. Business time.” Avi rubbed his palms together.

“I’m looking for six thousand a week. With room to go higher.”

“Serious numbers, my friend.”

“I believe in full measures. Always.” With a foot Serge slid the bag to Avi.

Avi studied Serge for a long time. Then he lifted the bag onto the seat, but didn’t open it.

“Can you handle this or not?”

“Of course I can. I’m thinking timing.”

“I need it yesterday. You ignored me for three weeks.”

“I was in Haifa. Life is not work.”

Maybe not for Avi. His father was a movie producer in LA. Avi ran ecstasy for thrills and the doors they opened. His name sat near the top of Abattoir’s unofficial Always In list. Jimmy preached door equality, but some egos needed stroking.

“We are talking consignment, I assume.”

Serge nodded. “The bag’s a show of faith.”

“Faith won’t save you if you’re short when the bill comes due.”

“I know.” Serge’s knee bounced under the table. His eyes hurt. His head was foggy. He was running on coffee and doughnuts. A crash was coming.

“I hate saying this,” Avi spoke softly, “because you and I are friends, yeah? But an order of this size comes with commitments. Commitments you have to honor. You get that, right?”

“I’ve been doing this since you were in high school.”

“I know, I know. It’s just … I like you, Serge, but I love Abattoir. I don’t want to see either take a hit.”

Serge found himself on the flip side of conversation he’d had a hundred times with Jimmy, back when Jimmy was coked-up and made six-figure decisions on emotional coin tosses. Serge had always been the pragmatist. But now he was laying himself out on instinct. The swerve unsettled him.

“My partners are not friendly like me, Serge. They are special forces, hold-my-machine-gun type Jews. They know which bones to break. I say this out of love.”

A sanitation truck rolled by at speed, its plow burying bagged trash under filthy slush.

“I understand,” Serge said.

A few quiet moments passed.

“Okay, then.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“When can I expect the first batch?”

“Two weeks. Maybe less.”

Serge offered his hand, and Avi shook it. “There’s something else. Luc’s moving on Abattoir.”

“As in a takeover?”

“Maybe. He’s selling E on our floor.”

“I didn’t even know he was in the game.”

Avi read disappointed. Like he’d overlooked a potential client.

“He’s got backing.”

“How do you know this?”

A kid told me before I killed him. “There’s been chatter. I’m thinking Russians, maybe.”

“Russians?”

“We had a sit-down and Luc had fresh muscle on hand. Square heads with prison ink.” Serge ran a hand over his face. He was so tired. “I don’t have the time to run it down proper.”

“If I were you, I’d make the time.”

Avi was right. Serge’s half-assed stakeouts of the phones lifted from Wheat’s pager had produced zip. Maybe his reluctance was a subconscious choice. If he found Mike, he’d have to kill him. Serge had enough trouble sleeping.

Across the table Avi vibed contemplative.

“What do you know?” Serge asked.

“Maybe something, maybe nothing. Been hearing stories about this new flavor coming out of Amsterdam. Real popular with the rave set over the bridge. Word is it’s being distro’d by a Russian crew.”

“You’ve told your connect this?”

“Fuck no. You think I want to start a war?”

Too late there for Serge. He sipped cold, bitter coffee and chewed on facts. Across the river meant Brooklyn. Slim Rickie ran outlaw parties in abandoned warehouses over there. Rickie’s drug connect was Dreamy Dee. Dee and Wheat were tight. Mike had supplied and directed Wheat. The obvious conclusion? Dee also worked for Mike.

Avi’s intel about Russians moving a new strain coalesced with Wheat’s pre-death dish. Mike was real. Serge needed backup. Russians were not to be fucked with while undermanned. Serge pushed himself out of the booth.

“I gotta go.”

“Talk soon, yeah?”

Serge hit the street. He crossed to a bank of pay phones covered in graffiti. He’d avoided making this call on account of Wheat, the questions that would be asked. But Serge had no other option. He dropped the coin into the slot and dialed. Five rings passed before he picked up.

“Seventh Squad. Cobb.”

“It’s me. We need to meet.”

“Brother, you ain’t kidding.”

Michelle

Morning sun slanted across midtown streets. Central Park sat buried under pure white, untouched powder. The Sherman Group’s Fifty-Seventh Street offices offered tremendous views. On the street, the city was unforgiving. From up on high, she was majestic.

Jeanie Berger had come through. Across from Michelle sat Ted Holland and two executives Ted did not name. They thumbed through Expanse’s business plan. Spiral bound, cream bond paper, thirty-six–pound weight.

The morning had been a blur. Michelle up at five, rehearsing her pitch. Dropping off Christi at Ashford-Rand. Then Midtown for the meet. She hadn’t even eaten.

Ted set the prospectus on the conference table. “These numbers feel high.”

“Those numbers are conservative,” Michelle said. “They’re based off the business Abattoir has been doing since it opened. Expanse is larger. So is its projected revenue.”

Ted put off stern patrician aloofness. Tall, white, thin lips. Starched collars, gold cufflinks. Midfifties. Unemotional, calculating. What did Jeanie see in the man? Oh yeah, his eight-figure net worth.

Ted’s silence went on and Michelle began to worry. Signing a lease should not be this hard. Expanse had gone untenanted for four years.

“In the last three months,” Michelle said, “there have been five commercial property sales within a half mile of Abattoir. Two abandoned industrial, two multiunit residential, and a parking lot. Developers are interested in West Chelsea again because of our club.”

“And the Meatpacking District is the next big thing.”

“It will be, once we open Expanse.”

Ted said nothing, so Michelle kept going.

“The Sherman Group’s on the hook for sixteen industrial or commercial properties in the neighborhood. You have tenants in three. You’re hemorrhaging money, Ted.”

“The business is cyclical.”

“Sure, but you can either wait for the upturn or help it arrive.” Michelle leaned in. “Let me plant the flag. Studio space will go first. Once the artists move in, it’ll be restaurants and luxury rentals. Trendy, upscale retail. A few years later, hotels. The city’s going to do something beautiful with the High Line.”

“The city’s been promising that since Koch,” the man to Ted’s left said.

The man to Ted’s right snorted, shook his head.

Michele bristled. Selling these men should not be this hard. “Ted. You either want to work with me or you don’t.”

The No Names looked at Ted.

“Would your,” Ted began, “husband be involved in the new venture?”

There it was: the Jimmy Issue. Abattoir’s location had been Michelle’s third choice. Other landlords had refused a deal because Jimmy was a felon. The tabloids had tracked his case. The Post ran photos of him entering Green Haven. How many times would Michelle have to apologize?

“Due to his past, Jimmy cannot be part of ownership. I am the legal face of our business. But Jimmy manages Abattoir and is largely responsible for the club’s incredible success. We run a clean, law-abiding establishment. I acknowledge my husband’s mistakes, but I will not apologize for them.”

“You feel comfortable saying that even after what just happened?” the man to Ted’s left asked.

They knew something she didn’t. “I’m sorry. You’ve got me at a loss.”

The man to Ted’s left spoke. “And she’s the owner?”

The man to Ted’s right: “Not a good sign.”

Ted’s left, again: “Not at all.”

Ted slid a copy of The New York Times across the twenty-seat table. Michelle unfolded the paper and clocked the headline. Pressure gripped her chest, her stomach. She snatched a breath and held it. The Times raged in an eighteen-point font.

Teen Kills Self After Night at Trendy Manhattan Hotspot

Michelle lay the paper down. She didn’t want them to see the pages shudder in her hand. She kept reading. Seventeen-year-old Jared Dodson had hung himself after partying at Abattoir. Friends reported the boy was high. Dodson’s father claimed his son had bought an unnamed illegal substance in the club. Underage, drug-fueled, and dead. Echoes of Samantha. The final paragraph listed Michelle Lettner as Abattoir’s owner and claimed she hadn’t responded to requests for comment.

Shit-shamed in the newspaper of record. Death drugs coursing through Abattoir. This was one man’s doing, Michelle was certain. Fucking Serge.

Michelle barely kept it together. She had walked into a meeting cold and been blindsided. Why hadn’t Jimmy mentioned this? Where was Harvey’s heads-up?

“Can you explain that?” one of the No Names asked. Michelle wasn’t sure which.

She shook her head. “We cannot be held responsible for the actions of our patrons. You’ve been in clubs, Ted. You know what they’re like.”

“I’m afraid I don’t. They’re not really my thing.”

Ted was lying. Jeanie had dished on his afterhours trips to the Pit. He was a regular who got off by being pissed on. Outing Ted’s fetish was Michelle’s Alamo play. She hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

“It’s impossible to search every guest. If someone’s bent on sneaking pills or coke or whatever into our club, they’re going to do it. That’s the unfortunate reality.”

“The story says he bought the stuff at Abattoir,” Ted said.

“He was seventeen,” the second man said.

“It’s a bad look,” the third said.

Someone’s son had died, and these men were concerned with optics. Then again, so was Michelle.

“It’s a terrible look. But Abattoir’s one of the cleanest nightspots in the city. As for the deceased, I feel for the family, Ted. In ways you can’t even imagine.”

Sam’s funeral. Holding Christi up. How her youngest wailed. Part of Michelle never left Nassau Knolls. She was graveside still, waiting for Jimmy. Knowing he wouldn’t show.

Knowing why.

A long silence passed. During it, Michelle made a mental list. Call Jimmy. Call Harvey. Issue a statement. Douse the fire before it catches. On one wall hung a framed construction photo of the World Trade Center. Skeletons of steel cut through clouds. The Sherman Group had been cofinancers. Their pockets ran deep.

“What are the chances you lose your liquor license?” Ted asked.

“Absolute zero.” Michelle had no idea.

The No Name to Ted’s left cleared his throat. “If we go forward on this, we will insert a protective clause in the lease demanding a substantial balloon payment if a member of Expanse’s management is arrested on narcotics-related charges.”

“How big a balloon were you thinking?”

“The Goodyear fucking blimp,” he said.

“Five million,” Ted said.

Michelle tried not to react. A seven-figure lease break would bankrupt her and Jimmy. And its triggering was not inconceivable. Jimmy had sworn off the life, but what about Serge? He had pulled Jimmy into the trade. Serge cost Michelle her daughter.

“Deal,” Michelle said.

More meaningful looks across the table.

“We’re willing to consider this further. But if this story spirals, we will never meet again.”

“It’s a tragedy, Ted. But that’s all it is.”

Michelle’s words disgusted her. She was a member of a terrible club and knew better. Michelle had lost a child. But she wanted Expanse and needed that lease, and to get them she played down a teen’s suicide.

The meeting broke up. The pressure in Michelle’s chest threatened to crack ribs. She wrangled a receptionist’s phone and punched in Jimmy’s office. No answer. She tried Elise next.

“Abattoir.”

“Elise, it’s Michelle. I need to speak to Jimmy.”

“Hey, Michelle. Jimmy won’t be in till noon. He’s got a meeting.”

Mondays were the industry’s Sabbath; no business conducted. There was a time in Jimmy’s life when “meeting” was code for midday coke binge. Had Michelle misread him again?

“Who with?”

“He wouldn’t say. Hey, have you seen the Times?”

Elise was still talking as Michelle hung up.

Jimmy

The Upper East Side was a foreign country. Old, old New York. The Goulds’ five-story townhouse had a pool in the basement and a four-person elevator. Crown moldings, chair rails, pastel wallpaper showing girls picnicking pondside. Gold trim everywhere. Very ancien régime.

Jimmy shifted on the baroque sofa. Eva clocked his discomfort and smiled.

“Where are the lord and lady?”

“Zurich. Or maybe Chamonix.”

Eva Gould: hip-hop impresario, hooked into the streets. Mom and Dad ski the Alps. Their baby girl crashes in their Manhattan castle.

“How about you, Trey?” Jimmy said. “You like this place?”

Next to Eva sat Trey D, short and Black, with a shaved head. He wore an LA Raiders tee and a gold rope around his neck thick enough to scale Everest with.

“I like money,” Trey said. “And if you got it, I say spend it however the fuck you want.”

He laid a hand on Eva’s thigh and their connection came into focus. She and Trey were a thing.

Eva lit a Virginia Slim. “You’ve told me for months Destination wasn’t the right fit for Abattoir. What changed?”

“Let’s say I had an epiphany.”

More like an invasion. Luc Delacroix wanted Eva’s party. Landing it meant denying the Canadian. That was all Jimmy cared about.

“Who says I haven’t signed with another venue?”

“If you had,” Jimmy said, “I’d know.”

Eva blew angry smoke in Jimmy’s direction.

“Plus,” Jimmy said, “I wanted to get in a room with the man generating so much heat.”

Trey licked a finger and touched his chest. He made a hissing sound. Vibe magazine’s premier issue had done a piece on him, one of those one-to-watch jobs. Trey—born Earl Joyner in Money Earnin’ Mount Vernon—claimed street cred and an ear for talent. Eva handled logistics, but Trey was tight with the talent.

“We’re a package, Jimmy,” Eva said.

“I know. And I want you both. I want Destination. I’m talking partners.” Jimmy laid the contract on the table.

Trey laughed. “This motherfucker gets right to it. I heard you was a shark.” Trey’s smile melted. “You a shark, Jimmy? Or you one more spineless white boy gonna flee the scene when shit gets rough?”

Trey’s words carried a Bronx spin. He scoped Jimmy hard, a bold intimidation play. Jimmy had felt that stare plenty in Green Haven. But his prison radar didn’t fire.

“I have seen the future.” Jimmy turned his palms to the ceiling. “And its name is Trey D.”

Trey howled. “Eva said you was crazy.” From his jeans he pulled a small glass vial, set it on the table. “I’m wonderin’ how crazy.”

Jimmy ignored the coke. Pretended it didn’t exist. Prayed for its disappearance because he didn’t know how long he could hold out.

“Jimmy’s a once-was,” Eva said. “It’s all work, church, and home for him now.”

Don’t look at it. Don’t look at it.

“Eva’s right. I’m sober four years.”

Trey just stared at him. A grandfather clock kept time, sixty beats per minute. The coke called to Jimmy, Do me. How he wanted to. God, it would feel good. Wake him up. Jimmy tried to shake the thought from his head.

He cleared his throat, smoothed the contract. “You’d get eight Sundays guaranteed, with a week-to-week option after that. After those first two months, either party can opt out. Standard split on the door, plus Eva’s fee. Your arrangement with her’s your business. I don’t get involved.”

“As if I’d let you,” Eva said.

Trey’s hand found her thigh again. He dug Eva’s unrelenting fuck you attitude. Trey picked the coke off the table. A gold Rolex hung from his wrist. Maybe imitation. Maybe not.

“Last chance,” he said, showcasing the coke.

Sam popped, nine years old at Disney World. The four of them on line at Space Mountain. Pigtails, Minnie Mouse ears. Jimmy’s memory was bleached and faded. The filmstrip slipped from the sprockets and his mind went black.

“I’m sure.”

Jimmy was sure he wanted a hit. He was electric on blow, a nightlife grandmaster. Jimmy on coke would close this deal in a minute. He knew this, and it terrified him.

Trey pocketed the vial. Jimmy was happy and sad to see it go.

“Eva, I gotta ask the man some questions.”

Jimmy tensed. Trey had conspiracy on his mind.

“I’ll be upstairs.” Eva screwed her Virginia Slim into a gold ashtray and walked out.

A door shut and Jimmy moved quick. “Look, whatever you’re thinking—”

“Relax yourself. I needed her gone so you can know where I stand. First thing”—Trey patted the pocket holding the coke—“I’d never disrespect a man who lost his daughter. It’s just that Eva’s got these expectations of thuggery. I play to them to keep her warm.”

“You were testing me?”

“I needed to know your state of mind. I’ve heard stories.”

Jimmy didn’t blame Trey. Covet and Imprimatur were hedonism realized. Free coke in the office. Pills filling candy dishes like M&Ms. Hot, young bartenders and shot girls offering themselves up in hopes of landing a prime shift. Jimmy turned them down, at first. But he’d never been good-looking, and the attention eventually broke him. Jimmy and Michelle never spoke about that time. They buried his infidelity like they had Samantha.

“I’m not that man anymore.”

“Good. Cause we can’t do business if I don’t trust you.”

Trey’s voice had softened. His snarling, inner-city growl was gone. The affect, the showy posing, flashy streetwear; it was a costume. A theory formed: Trey D was an act. Jimmy played his hunch.

“That Vibe piece didn’t say where you went to school.”

“Mount Saint Michael. Class of ’86.”

“Good school.”

“Extremely.”

Back in Glen Cove, Jimmy had been a North Shore house party ghost. Present but unseen. He floated through kitchens, left no impression. Solitude let him observe. Jimmy clocked behaviors and made notes. If he threw a better party, he’d pull more girls. Jimmy forced his way into the life because the life wouldn’t have invited him otherwise. And now Eva’s streetwise rap connect was a suburban Catholic school boy. Trey and Jimmy were outsiders storming the cool kids’ gates.

“Security’s my concern. You get that, right?”

“Absolutely. Giuliani’s got my people raised up.”

“He could be a problem for us both.”

“I think me more than you.”

Jimmy looked down at his hands, then back at Trey. “I can’t have violence in my club.”

“You really think my crowds are gonna bloody your floor?”

“I’m … concerned.”

“Good.”

“Good?”

“Shit yeah. I’d be concerned if you weren’t concerned. Destination’s going to pull from all over. Hollis. Edenwald. Brownsville. Bed-Stuy. These people cling to a pride that comes from being a dot on a map. Pack them in tight, add alcohol, always gonna be knuckleheads popping off.

“I brought this up with the Frenchman. Luc had this laissez-faire attitude. ‘Let the children be and they will find peace.’ Anyone says that’s never been to the Patterson Houses on a summer Saturday. For you and I to do this—to do it right—we’re gonna have to lock Abattoir down.”

“I won’t turn my club into a prison.”

“Jimmy. This’s the crossover moment for me. Destination has to be neutral ground. No colors, no fighting. Leave your beefs at home. Imposing that mindset—at least in the beginning—will require a show of force. I’m talking metal detectors and pat downs. Men and women alike. Only way this works is if no one’s exempt. Talent included.”

“You wanna search your own acts?”

“We’d be stupid not to. Trust me on that. We’ll have to maintain a sixty-forty women-to- men split. At a minimum. Fistfights get everyone tossed. Confiscate blades, but turn away anyone with a piece.”

“You’re expecting we’ll find guns.”

“Only until they learn to leave ’em home.” Trey extended a hand across the table. “We doing this or what?”

Nightclubs had always been a dicey proposition. For Jimmy, the risk was the pull. It juiced him even better than blow. If Destination popped, it’d bring a serious high. Once an addict, always an addict.

Jimmy shook Trey’s hand. The Rollie was real. Jimmy felt its weight.

“Eva,” Trey called, “time to sign on the dotted line.”

Eva came back down the stairs. “We settled?”

“Like the fucking pie-oh-neers,” Trey said.

Four copies, signed and countersigned. Jimmy for Michelle, Eva for Trey. Handshakes all around. Jimmy tingled. He had just kneecapped Luc. The Canadian still demanded a proper response, but this would do for now.

Jimmy floated down the townhouse steps. He felt lighter than air. He flagged a cab on Fifth. The Crown Victoria was clean and smelled pine fresh. Jimmy settled in, Abattoir bound.

He got to thinking a bump would do him nicely.

Ben

Amy Valero spat a sunflower seed shell into an empty coffee cup.

“He usually late?” Ben asked.

“Always.”

Local law thought feds were too clean for real work. Valero disproved the rule. The battered Yankees hat pulled low, zero makeup, ratty jeans. Her rusty, two-tone Bonneville was littered with Big Mac boxes. She’d have made a righteous undercover. Maybe better than Ben. Though that bar was low.

“How long have you been running him?”

“Long enough.”

“How’d you flip him?”

Valero breathed deep and turned away. Ben had tried connecting all morning, generic partner background bullshit. Valero wasn’t having it. They rode from DEA’s Manhattan office to Staten Island in silence.

“ATF Newark grabbed him trying to sell a pistol,” Valero finally said. “Freddie and incarceration don’t agree, and he starts talking up this ecstasy ring. ATF doesn’t care about club drugs, so the AUSA signs him up as a cooperator and calls my boss, who also gives zero shits about club drugs and dumps him off on me. And here we are.”

Here was Moravian Cemetery, near the peak of Todt Hill. A mountain by city standards. Snow-covered headstones dating to the 1700s. Ben blew into his ungloved hands. The Pontiac’s heater wasn’t up to the task.

“How’d you wind up in the DEA?”

The Pontiac’s V6 idled high, that needy Detroit whine.

“Look, if you’d rather—”

“I grew up in Massachusetts, went to UMass Boston. A criminology major who spoke fluent Spanish and wanted to join the FBI. Figure I’m in, right? One day, this recruiter comes to campus. I’ve got my transcripts and résumé, this paper I’d written on serial sexual homicide. I start talking to the recruiter about what I can bring to the FBI. This agent cuts me off, says the Bureau turns down applicants from Yale. He never took his eyes off his newspaper.” She spat a shell into the cup. “I’m here to make a case and get to the Bureau. The DEA’s a waystation.”

One more motivated careerist. Ben could relate.

“How’d you end up in PD? Not many city cops grow up in Rye.”

Valero had backgrounded Ben. Ben would’ve done the same, if he knew how.

“I dunno. Police work seemed interesting.”

Valero laughed. It felt like an insult.

“What?”

“It’s like this. The cops I’ve met fall into two categories. You’ve got your pension-hunters—who don’t care at all about policing—and your fundamentalists. They’re the ones who live, eat, and breathe the job. The first group’s useless and the second’s insufferable. You not knowing which you are makes me question this arrangement.”

Ben knew why he was here. The NYPD was his sad, small rebellion. A rejection of his father’s life and wrongs. But the job had a culture, and Ben didn’t fit. He wasn’t a cop’s cop, refused to be his father’s son. Ben needed a purpose. He needed a home.

“I just want to do something good with my life.”

Valero eyed Ben direct.

“Too naive?” he asked.

“A bit. But doesn’t make it wrong.”

Valero offered Ben her bag of David’s. He scooped a handful of seeds. As he split shells, her eyes snapped to the rearview. “Here he comes.”

Up the hill walked a small man in a big coat. He climbed in behind Ben and stomped snow from his booted feet.

“Fuckin’ Alaska out there.”

Valero handed Freddie McGee a case of Newport Lights. He opened the case, unwrapped a pack, took one out and lit up.

“This him?”

“Freddie, this is Brett.”

Freddie grunted. He was junkie-skinny, pale, and red, a whisper-thin ginger beast. His North Face was four sizes too big, and his light blue eyes sat deep in his skull. Freddie didn’t vibe hardcore druggie, but he didn’t fit the uber-cool Abattoir crowd, either.

Ben offered a hand. Freddie let it hang.

“No good.”

“Freddie …” Valero said.

“He’s a square, Amy. Like all the others. No way I can get him done in Abattoir. No fucking way.” Freddie’s cheeks went concave as he sucked down half his cigarette.

“He’s already bought in Abattoir.”

Freddie sent smoke into the Pontiac’s headliner. It was stained a dark yellow. “That true? You’ve scored in the beast?”

Valero had added Ben’s fictionalized buy report to her federal case file. No going back now.

“Yeah.”

“How many times?”

“Five. In the last two weeks.”

Valero blinked fast. The city paid Ben to lie, and he was getting good at his work.

“What’d you cop?”

“Ecstasy. What’re your people selling?”

“E and K. Weed on the off nights. On top of that, I can hook you up with coke, Rohypnol, GHB. Heroin, too, if you’re really jonesing.”

Freddie was talking up a hard drug supermarket. If he was legit, he was gold. Ben masked his excitement. Ike’s warning: Informants inflate their worth. Believe at your own risk.

“If you’re hooked in, why couldn’t you get the other agents done?”

“Shit, man, where you want me to start? Too old. Too square. They were lost in the sauce from jump. I told Amy, you wanna make a case, gimme someone I can sell up the chain.”

Three DEA undercovers had produced zero positive buys and no targets ID’d. All Freddie had produced were unverified a.k.a.’s: no government names, no booking-photo faces. Nothing actionable.

Knowing this, Ben and Ike had huddled, pre-pre-meet. Ike had reached out to buddies on the El Dorado Task Force. No one wanted to work Valero’s case. Club drugs didn’t get agents promoted. As the only Abattoir-proven undercover in the city, Ben’s bogus buy had landed him in Valero’s car. He thought of Hannah and flinched.

“I hope you ain’t another washout,” Freddie said. “I can’t add no more names to my list.”

“You don’t keep lists,” Valero said. “I do. Strike out with Brett, and you and me are done. You’ll do the full forty-two months.”

Freddie snorted through a clogged nose. Valero nodded to Ben: Your turn.

“You’re part of this crew?” he asked. “Are you selling?”

“Fuck no. I’m what you call criminally adjacent.”

“Is Abattoir theirs to work exclusive?”

“Nah. They got competition.”

“What makes you say that?” Valero asked.

“Product. My people sell reds, right? Always and only. But I been seein’ yellows, too. Lotta yellows.”

Ben’s brain buzzed. Wheat’s ecstasy was yellow, but Freddie touted reds. This indicated multiple operations working Abattoir. Built-in security, selective entry, beyond PD’s reach. The big question loomed: Was management involved?

“Has security ever ejected your boys for pitching?”

Freddie shook his head. Ben’s heart rate inched higher.

“You and me step to Abattoir this weekend,” Ben said. “Who’re you introducing me to first?”

Freddie started picking at a thumbnail.

“Freddie,” Valero said.

The snitch looked out the window. Freddie’s slouching, shrugging, silent act irritated Ben. He snapped his fingers an inch from Freddie’s face.

“Give me his name.”

More silence.

“TJ.”

“What’s his government?”

Freddie shrugged: Beats me.

“You got him ID’d?”

Valero shook her head. “Ran TJ as an alias, got nothing. Ran the initials as proper pedigree and got the phone book. Showed Freddie a dozen possibles, but he didn’t pick TJ out.”

Ben raised his eyebrows. Silent cop-speak: TJ might not exist.

Valero lifted four fingers off the wheel: Maybe.

“Why’s this guy a mystery man?” Ben said.

“He’s never been through the system.” Freddie was going to draw blood, the way he went at that nail.

“Who’s TJ’s connect?”

“I dunno.”

“How does TJ re-up?”

“The guy gets him the package.” His voice was getting smaller. Freddie’s dodging screamed, Liar!

“You sure you can get me done in Abattoir?”

“Only one gonna keep you from buying’s you.”

Ben thought on Freddie’s dish. Doubt set in. Faceless ecstasy connects. Valero unable to attach a name to TJ. Freddie’s reluctance to provide details. Freddie was a felon working off time. His withholding galled Ben. He was the police; he ran Freddie. Not the other way around.

“You and me need to set some rules. Maybe the other agents didn’t push you. Maybe they didn’t care. I can’t say. What I do know is how our arrangement’s gonna work. I ask a question, you answer. I point out a face, you give it a name. You talk me up to the scene. I’m a Wall Street party type with cash to burn. You play both sides, you go to prison. You lie, you go to prison. You blow me up as the law, I’ll rat you as a fed snitch and turn you to the wolves. You get me, Freddie?”

Freddie shivered in his oversized coat. Sweat dotted his forehead. He was freezing and melting at the same time.

“Answer up.”

Freddie sucked his teeth and wiped his nose. He looked Ben in the eye but said nothing. The dismissal enraged Ben. He reached over the seat back and poked Freddie in the chest, felt only ribcage. Under his giant coat, Freddie was a skeleton.

“Do you understand me?”

Freddie’s face had turned bright red.

“Fucking answer me.” Ben felt himself getting angrier. He poked Freddie harder.

“Brett,” Valero said.

“I said answer me.” Harsher. Louder.

Another poke and Freddie snapped. “Get your fuckin’ hands off me.”

Ben slapped Freddie hard across the face. The sharp crack punched through the car. For a few moments, nobody moved. Valero’s hands strangled the steering wheel.

Freddie rubbed his jaw. A palm-shaped white patch brightened his pink face. Ben felt a trembling in his gut. Guilt. Freddie wasn’t some brawling, hardcore thug. He was a mouthy kid acting out. Ben pretended he didn’t know the rage was in him. But it had been for years.

Tears welled in Freddie’s eyes. Not the emotional kind, more a physical reaction. He did not wipe them away. He’d been hit before, and by better.

“I get you. Brett.”

Ben didn’t speak. He wasn’t sure he could.

“That it?”

The idling Pontiac whined.

“Can I go?”

Freddie’s shame-stare hit Ben deep in his gut. He turned around, stared out at the snowy cemetery.

“I’ll be in touch,” Valero said over her shoulder.

Freddie climbed out and disappeared down the hill. Valero dropped the Pontiac into drive. The big sedan struggled for grip in the snow before Valero straightened it out.

“I understand that we get frustrated. This work can provoke certain emotions. But if you ever—ever—pull a move like that in my presence again, I’ll arrest you myself.”

Ben slunk low in his seat. He had never struck an undeserving man.

He wondered what else he was capable of.

Serge

The Port Authority, daylight-bleak. Piss on the floor and in the air. Bums excavated trash cans in search of aluminum by the nickel. Others sprawled out prone, hung over from last night’s Firebird. Or antifreeze. Or dope, cooked hot and mainlined.

Serge dodged savvy commuters and inbound rubes. He ducked into Artie’s coffee shop. Cobb was counter-side in the back. Serge sat next to him, ordered a coffee. He set the morning’s Daily News between them.

“Two months since we last spoke,” Cobb said. “And us chatting’s suddenly at the top of your to-do list. I’m surprised it took this long.”

Blame Wheat’s murder, Cobb’s inevitable questions. But also Cobb himself. Serge had met Pete Cobb while working Coliseum during Jimmy’s incarceration. One of Christian’s in-house photogs snapped Cobb fingering a girl. No big deal; blatant exhibitionism was de rigueur. But Cobb went full apeshit. Waitresses and bottles and tables flew. Security brought the mess to Serge. Cobb begged him to destroy the film. Serge made Cobb for another husband hunting some weekend strange. That’s the story Cobb should have told. Instead, he indebted himself for life.

“Look, man,” he had said, drunk and desperate. “I’m a cop. I got a kid. Just help me out.”

It got worse. A bouncer knew the girl, had tossed her before. She had just turned sixteen. An NYPD detective diddling a child, captured on Kodacolor 400. Legal, sure, but also the kind of salacious semi-scandal that ruined cop careers—if it hit the papers. Serge and Cobb struck a deal. Cash for police skinny, and the photo would never see daylight. Cobb agreed. Serge hung on to the negative, though. It sat in a safe deposit box on Ditmars Boulevard. Just in case.

“On the phone,” Serge said softly, “you got me feeling I should be concerned.”

“Yeah, but you called this meet. That means you go first.”

Cobb definitely knew something.

Like that, Serge was back in the abandoned warehouse, the night of. The muzzle flashed; Wheat became a once-was. Serge picked up his coffee, set it right back down. Nerves. “You know Luc Delacroix? Owns Sanctuary?”

“Sure.” Cobb cruised all the spots, hunting girls half his age.

“He’s selling inside Abattoir.”

Cobb tore off a hunk of toast, dunked it in ketchup. “Selling what?”

“Buicks. The fuck you think I’m coming to you for? Ecstasy for starters. Probably ketamine and coke, too.”

“You sure this is Luc and not your boss?”

Serge stared at him.

“He’s got a history. So do you, for that matter.”

“That was a long time ago. And why would I give up my own boss?”

“People pull dumb shit daily. Maybe you’re plotting a coup. Maybe you think you can do the thing better than him. Or maybe you’re like me, the entrepreneurial type.”

Serge stared some more. Eventually, Cobb gave in.

“All right. You know this how?”

Cause a dead kid told me.

“I just do. Me and Jimmy called a sit-down to make peace. Luc came off hyperarrogant. He had Slavic muscle covered in Cyrillic prison ink. Luc claimed they were his security.”

“Cyrillic?”

“The Russian alphabet.”

“The things we learn.” Cobb downed a slice of bacon. “Maybe they were. His security, that is.”

“I been around long enough to know bouncers from enforcers. These guys are authentic. When Jimmy confronted Luc about him dealing in Abattoir, Luc practically admitted it.”

Cobb raised his empty mug. The waitress clocked him and went in the opposite direction. “We got a service problem in this country.”

“Can you run a name down for me?”

Cobb searched the counter like he’d lost his keys. “I seem to be lacking resources.”

Serge elbowed the newspaper. Cobb slipped the envelope from between the pages, pocketed it clean. He’d’ve made a righteous magician.

“It would appear I can.”

“Luc’s connect is a Russian by the name of Mike. I’m thinking he’s out of Brooklyn.”

Now Cobb stared at Serge. “What?”

“That’s it?”

“It’s not enough?”

“My man, half of Brighton Beach goes by Mike. You’re asking me to find a needle in a giant pile of needles. Russian needles, no less. They’re prickly. You got nothing else might narrow this down? Anything at all.”

The numbers off Wheat’s pager would help. But that list, culled postmortem, would also land Serge at the top of the cops’ suspect list.

“No.”

“Then what do you got? You got sky-high junkies and club freaks yap-yap-yapping. But cause it’s you, I’ll do what I can.”

For a few moments neither of them spoke. Two pals sharing a greasy breakfast.

Then, “You ever hear of a kid named Wheat?”

Serge’s wind rushed up and out. “Doesn’t ring a bell. Why?”

“He was found dead in a warehouse across from Abattoir. You really don’t read the news, huh?”

“Not if I can help it. Overdose?” Serge felt a lightness in his head. He reminded himself to breathe.

“One to the skull.”

“Shitty way to go.”

“As if there’s a good one?”

“I suppose not.” Serge should have ordered food. Eating would give his hands something to do.

“I like to think the movie cuts to black. I bet you don’t even hear it.”

Serge had tried convincing himself Wheat didn’t feel a thing. But he couldn’t buy in. Serge believed when your time was up, the universe made sure you knew it.

“You looking at anyone?”

“Nah. It’s a legit mystery. Kid had a prior for sale and we found ecstasy up his ass. I’m thinking a deal gone wrong.”

The old Bronx wallet. Serge had missed Wheat’s backup stash. Now cop compasses pointed to a drug beef. One that circled Abattoir.

“Makes sense. You know the guy working it?”

“Intimately. And so do you.” Cobb patted his own chest.

Complication times two. Serge didn’t know if Cobb handling Wheat’s murder helped or hurt him.

“Another guy had it, some zip nearing the end of his run. I saw potential and made a move. Out-of-town white kid gunned down in the big, bad city. Tenacious detective who wouldn’t let the case go cold. Close this, and I’m on the grid for promotion.”

Hurt. Definitely hurt. A fresh odor hit; a toilet had backed up.

“That spot, though,” Cobb continued. “Feels weird. Unnecessary, somehow. If it was a deal, why not do it on the street? Or in an alley? Not like patrol’s keeping their eyes out.”

Serge’s takeaway: The cops hadn’t found the tunnel. Or Cobb was keeping that to himself and baiting Serge. Everybody was playing everyone, all the time.

“It’s like you said, people pull dumb shit every day. You had something for me.”

Cobb pushed his empty plate away. “The feds are looking at Abattoir.”

When Serge was seventeen, he got stabbed. Nothing serious, just a teenage brawl that got out of hand. He’d felt wetness on his thigh, a red blot on his torn jeans. Serge hadn’t felt a thing. He had since learned that’s how knives worked. You didn’t know you’d been cut until you were bleeding. If Serge looked down now to find a dagger in his gut, he wouldn’t have been surprised.

“The feds?”

“I made my way onto this task force. Southern District, the DEA. Public Morals. Seems they got an undercover working Abattoir and are pushing this theory on how management’s profiting unmolested from the drug trade. Hate to be the bearer, but, they aim to molest you, brother.”

Intestines nicked, stomach punctured. Blood poured by the bucket. Serge’s gut, warm and wet. Serge ran a hand through his hair. Most local cops were lazy, and the rest could be bought. Witness Pete Cobb. But feds were trouble of a whole other kind.

The unsmiling waitress finally refilled Cobb’s coffee cup.

“About time,” Cobb said. “Oh, and the mayor’s office is involved. I missed the meeting, but some spit-shined private school type was in attendance. Offered Gracie Mansion’s full cooperation. Giuliani’s got a hard-on for your industry, on account of the dead rich kid.”

“What dead rich kid?”

Cobb laughed movie villain-evil. He slapped the Times Metro section on the counter.

Serge clocked the headline and bolted for the street.

Michelle

“I want to know why you didn’t know this was coming.”

Michelle waited as Harvey Cohen reloaded his Luden’s. Cough drops were one of his many addictions. Harvey had a Page Six rep for depravity, was gray-skinned, had a turkey’s neck, and dyed his hair undertaker-black. He was a media whore and defender of crooks, criminals, and cons. He was also Jimmy’s longtime lawyer. Harvey had negotiated his plea to the cocaine in Serge’s trunk. For that, Michelle hated him.

“I didn’t know you paid me to read the paper,” Harvey finally said.

“I don’t pay you anything,” Michelle said.

“And now you see what that buys you.” Harvey smiled.

“Enough,” Jimmy said. “We need a way forward on this.”

The Keep. Michelle hadn’t been here in months. She’d come direct from the Sherman Group, a copy of the Times in hand. Jimmy hadn’t read it. Jimmy didn’t know. Until Michelle enlightened him.

“We’re in danger of overreacting.”

“Harvey,” Michelle said, “a kid killed himself. A kid who spent the night in Abattoir.”

Harvey pointed at the newspaper. “That inflammatory account reeks of unfounded insinuation and is the product of angry parents’ misplaced rage. Suicide reflects poorly on families, Michelle. It implies failure.”

Somehow, Michelle managed not to scream.

“I’d bet my practice this kid had issues. I could have Richie look into that.”

“Absolutely not.” Michelle didn’t want Harvey’s ex-cop PI digging through a dead boy’s life. Questions had been raised after Sam’s wreck. Whispered insinuations. Maybe Harvey had forgotten. But Michelle and Jimmy remembered. No, Michelle remembered. Because she was there.

“We’re not going after this kid,” Jimmy said.

“They claim we refused to comment,” Michelle said. “Did you get a call?”

Jimmy shook his head.

“We?” Harvey worked his cough drop against his teeth. Click, click, click.

Michelle seethed. To Harvey she was only The Signature, the name scrawled on Abattoir’s paperwork. Michelle had found the building, pitched the vibe, managed the renovation, sorted contractors, signed the checks. When Jimmy came home, she stepped aside. Maybe she shouldn’t have.

“Talk to Michelle as you would to me,” Jimmy said.

Harvey raised his hands and bowed his head. “As of now, there’s no proof the boy was high on anything. This is a smear piece built on the word of his friends, who were probably high themselves. If we sue for libel, I will tear them apart.”

Harvey lived for the courtroom and reduced witnesses to tears. He advocated constant litigation and billed appropriately; coke and hookers did not come cheap.

“What can we expect from the SLA?” Michelle asked.

“They’ll bring you in for a hearing. Worst case, they shut you down for a night. Two, tops. You’ve run a clean spot. No on-site arrests or prior community complaints. The ABC law is clear on penalties.”

“You’re sure about that?” Michelle asked.

Harvey pressed a handkerchief to his nose and blew. He tossed the embroidered silk square in Jimmy’s trash. “Debra Shefflin oversees the SLA’s downstate office. She can be very understanding of bureaucratic obstacles faced by small businesses.”

Translation: Shefflin took bribes.

“I still don’t understand why we haven’t issued a statement,” Michelle said.

“When we address every nonsense article, every gossip rag allegation, we give them life. Let the waves recede. Trust me. I’ve done this once or twice.”

Serge burst into the Keep, borderline frantic. “We got a problem.”

“The dead kid,” Jimmy said. “We’re on top of it.”

“Fuck the kid. It’s way worse than that.”

The dead kid.

Fuck the kid.

A vise gripped Michelle’s chest. Is this how parents of the boy in Samantha’s car spoke of her? Did they, even? Or did Dominick Esposito’s mother bottle her rage, like Michelle?

“Hello, Serge,” Harvey said.

Serge ignored him. To Jimmy: “The cops are looking at Abattoir. They’ve opened a case.”

Jimmy blinked about a thousand times.

“What kind of case?” Michelle asked. But she already knew. The messenger betrayed the message.

“Drugs. The feds are involved, the mayor’s office, too. This kid in the paper’s got them all spun up.”

Michelle’s right hand balled into a fist. She had seen this coming, tried to stop it. Serge would bring Jimmy down. It was inevitable. The man could not help himself.

“Fucking Luc.”

Michelle spun to her husband. “Luc Delacroix?” Back to Serge. “You got my husband wrapped up with Luc?”

“Me? Fuck you.”

Jimmy was up in a shot. “Don’t talk to my wife like that.”

“If she wasn’t your wife, I wouldn’t be talking to her at all.”

The Keep grew claustrophobic and sauna warm. The three of them steamed until Harvey cleared his throat.

“I had counseled against a public statement,” he said, “but Serge’s news is making me rethink that position. Seeing as none of us are profiting from the drug trade.” Harvey eyed them each in turn—we’re not, right?— “we could plausibly deny Abattoir’s involvement, convey our deepest sympathies to the decedent’s family, and offer to cooperate with the authorities.”

“Cooperate?” Serge said. “Are you crazy?”

“If Abattoir’s management is a target, the feds won’t take us up on the offer. A rejection would let us know where you stand. Either way, I now believe an empathetic-yet-defiant statement may help with the media.”

Michelle’s plan, reworded and regurgitated. Jimmy pondered. Serge lit up a smoke. He stunk of sweat and cigarettes and fear. Michelle wondered how she’d gotten here, pushing forty and crafting defenses against federal prosecutions.

“We’re not helping the law,” Jimmy said after a long time, “but a statement of concern and understanding is in our best interest.”

He locked eyes with Michelle. Michelle nodded.

“I’ll be at my office,” Harvey said. “I think the three of you need to have a long, honest conversation.”

After he left, Serge locked the door behind him. Jimmy pressed his palms to his eyes. When he pulled them away, his face had a vacant look to it.

“What’s going on with Luc Delacroix?” Michelle asked.

Serge and Jimmy held a silent exchange, some language known only to men who’ve conspired in felonies.

“Luc’s moving drugs in Abattoir,” Serge said. “We think he wants to shut us down.”

Jimmy and Luc had dueled for industry supremacy for years. Michelle hadn’t thought Delacroix capable of this type of escalation, but small men never failed to disappoint.

“Is he selling cocaine?” Michelle asked. Jimmy’s history was known. Coke was an affront. Coke made this personal.

“Probably,” Serge said.

“Are you selling again?”

Serge snarled. Slit-narrow eyes said, Fuck you.

“You’ve got a history,” Michelle said.

“We all do.” Serge stepped closer. “All of us.”

Michelle had partied. Used. Shared pills and smoke and LSD and coke. But she never traded product for cash. Serge could not claim the same.

“How do you know Luc’s doing this?”

“We can’t tell you,” Jimmy said. “We just do.”

His withholding worried Michelle.

To Serge. “How’d you learn about the cops?”

“I’ve got friendlies.” Translation: Serge had cops on payroll.

What a nightmare. Michelle sucked on her cig, ran a trembling hand through her hair. The Keep was silent until Jimmy laughed. The sad kind, when you’d rather cry. Michelle knew the feeling.

“And here I just booked Destination,” Jimmy said.

“Jimmy, no,” Serge said. “The cops hate the hip-hop crowd. Abattoir hosting Destination now’s like sending up a Fuck With Us flare. Does Eva have paper with you?”

Jimmy leaned back and nodded. His eyes drifted.

“Jesus. Why didn’t you talk to me?”

Nothing.

“Jimmy?”

Jimmy sat there, dead-eyed and brain-vacant.

Serge set his hands on the desk. Michelle’s desk. “Why didn’t we discuss this?”

A long silence passed. Michelle worried her husband had finally broken.

“Jimmy, why—”

“We didn’t talk about it,” Jimmy said, “because this is my fucking club!”

Michelle and Serge snapped to. Attention, gained.

“I wouldn’t have made the move had I known what you knew. But I didn’t, because you weren’t here. You’re never here. You’re my number one. You’re supposed to catch what I miss.”

“The dead kid got by Harvey. I didn’t hear you berating him.”

The dead kid. Michelle sucked nicotine like oxygen.

“My lawyer shouldn’t have to keep us informed. The three of us oughta know what’s going on in our house.”

“Oh, I’m included now?” Michelle said.

“You’ve always been a part of this. You know that.” Jimmy’s expression tightened around the eyes. “You stay on top of the news. How come you didn’t know?”

His tone threw Michelle, then infuriated her. How dare Jimmy question her in front of Serge. In front of anyone. Michelle forced herself to remain calm.

“I was in a meeting.”

Jimmy didn’t speak, didn’t move. Maybe he thought the days of Michelle taking meetings were over, given the cash rolling through Abattoir. The club had bought the Sutton Place condo, paid for Christi’s tony prep school tuition. But for Jimmy, income came second to its source.

The industry had always been Jimmy’s true love. Michelle had long ago accepted this. She gave up her life, left Manhattan and the art scene, took on the suburban mother role. Jimmy’s arrest and incarceration had forced her out of retirement. Turns out, she’d missed being involved. And she was good at what she did.

Still Jimmy stared at her. What meeting?

“We need a plan,” Serge said.

“I have a plan,” Jimmy said. “The same it’s always been. Me here, every day, making sure when those doors open, a crowd’s flowing through ’em. That’s my fucking plan. What’s yours?”

Serge lit a fresh smoke. Michelle lit a fresh smoke. No one spoke and Michelle felt a tension in the Keep, in Jimmy. Time dragged until Jimmy suddenly hurled a whiskey glass against the wall. It shattered gunshot-loud. Serge twitched. Michelle didn’t.

“I lost three years of my life for you. They should’ve been Sam’s.”

No. They should have been Serge’s.

Serge said nothing. Studied the tip of his cigarette. Michelle sensed an opening, took it.

“Hold onto Destination. If the industry thinks you don’t honor contracts, talent stops spinning at Abattoir. Corporate events will dry up. Our suppliers will push to renegotiate terms. And Eva’s a litigious bitch with huge piles of daddy cash. Why invite a lawsuit you could otherwise avoid?”

“No,” Serge said. “Break the deal until the cops move on.”

“Why’re you so worried?” Michelle asked. “I thought you were clean.”

“Did you not hear me?” Serge said. “The law is in Abattoir. Dealers are gonna get locked up. They’re gonna be spoken to. And people like them’ll say anything to save themselves.”

“You would know about that,” Michelle said.

Veins in Serge’s neck throbbed. Michelle had gone too far, there. But they’d all held that opinion. Jimmy had pled guilty to keep Serge from talking. He wouldn’t say what about, but Michelle had her suspicions. An Albanian had harassed Jimmy during the Paradise Garage days. He was aggressive and persistent. Then he just went away. The dots connected themselves.

Elise buzzed on the intercom. “Renzo’s downstairs.”

“Thanks,” Jimmy said to her.

“Who’s Renzo?”

But Jimmy was already up and coming around their desk. “No one you need to worry about.”

He escorted Michelle to the door with a hand at the small of her back. His touch felt foreign to her. They’d made love once since Samantha passed. It was awkward and hurried and felt obligatory. Their relationship wasn’t always cold. There was a time Jimmy’s hand was glued to Michelle. He held her wherever they went: 150 Wooster, The Roxy, Au Bar, Pyramid. Now he was pushing her out.

Michelle stopped on the wraparound balcony. “What’s really going on?”

“A lot. But I’m handling it.”

Jimmy was trying to ape his youthful overconfidence. But he had aged; Michelle saw it in his eyes. Abattoir was under attack. Michelle wondered if Jimmy was the man to lead it.

“I still love you,” she said.

Jimmy glanced at the floor. “And I love you.”

Michelle wondered if either of them was being honest. So much had changed, been lost. After a few silent beats, Michelle headed down the stairs. A hulking beast in a skin-tight shirt and frameless glasses leaned on the bar. A chill passed through Michelle. That man was dirty in ways Jimmy wasn’t. That man had ended lives.

Michelle knew the look.

She wore it herself.

Serge

Manhattan was midnight-dark. Sanctuary loomed Gothic. Uplighting flooded stained glass, spires, triple crosses on high. Pavement shook under Serge’s feet. A heavy acid house track throbbed car windows. Serge lit a smoke. His nerves overpowered the nicotine.

The picture was bleak. The Times piece about the dead kid had set Frank Bates off. The families avoided media attention, Gotti excepted. Renzo had machine-gunned questions on his uncle’s behalf. The meeting became the kind detailed in sweeping indictments. Jimmy had talked, against Serge’s advice. He laid out Luc Delacroix’s narco war on Abattoir, his OC backing. This enraged Renzo. No one sold in his club without paying rent.

His club. He had actually said that.

Renzo stalked the Keep. The steroids had him raging. “We can’t let this go, Jimmy. Luc will think you’re weak. And if your enemies think you’re weak, they’ll be emboldened.”

Serge restated his position. Abattoir did not possess the manpower to fight a full-scale war. He did not offer Wheat’s pages as means of finding Mike. Sharing that would make them co-conspirators after the fact.

“Let me handle this,” Renzo had said. The beast was begging.

Jimmy looked to Serge. Serge shook his head. Relying on Renzo indebted them to him.

“Do it,” Jimmy had said.

Which is why Serge stood now on Sixth Avenue, unarmed. A light mist fell. Trini Day manned Sanctuary’s ropes. Bouncers flanked the doors. Trini locked onto Serge from twenty feet out. A bare, muscled arm pointed his way. The crowd parted. Serge stepped to the Box.

Trini swept her waist-length blond dreadlocks over a shredded shoulder. Bare abs popped despite below-freezing temps. “The last time you were here, I disarmed you. So I’m inclined to ask, what the ever-loving fuck are you doing at my door?”

“I need to see the man. I come in peace.”

High-pitched synth repeats drowned out the cracks in Serge’s voice. His heart thumped double-quick. He’d been tasked with a mission. Renzo’s orders: Get inside. Distract Luc. That’s where Serge’s knowledge of the plan ended.

“Wheat still hasn’t turned up.”

The gunshot cracked again in Serge’s memory. “I don’t appreciate the insinuation.”

“What’s a girl to think?”

“When I find one, I’ll tell her.”

Trini half-smiled. A queued-up loudmouth complained about the wait. Trini leaped off her perch and threw him across the sidewalk. His skull shattered a Camry’s window. Blood darkened the sidewalk. A cop car rolled down the block. It did not stop. Nothing to see here.

Trini turned on Loudmouth’s friends. “You want in?”

The stunned crew nodded.

“Then you don’t know him anymore.”

Trini reposted behind the ropes. Her bouncers never moved. “Act out in my club, and I’ll do worse to you.”

Trini stepped aside, let Serge pass.

Jimmy

The portable radio on Jimmy’s desk rattled. Bass seeped through the floor. Money counters whirred. Randy bound stacks of paper with paper cuffs. The take had grown exponentially. Jimmy needed reliable hands in the Keep. Randy got the bump.

“Another thousand.” Randy secured the rack in a cash box, closed it.

Chloe scratched figures in her ledger. On Jimmy’s orders she’d started keeping two sets of books: the one Renzo doctored, another more or less legit. Doubling the numbers posed a challenge to Jimmy. They swirled in his head. But Jimmy corralled them. Tamed them.

Jimmy still kept the count.

Down below, Abattoir was fire-code-violation packed. Tina and Diamond had been overwhelmed at the Box. T-Roc had to marshal a response. All hands, red alert.

Everyone wanted to party in Abattoir.

Because of Jimmy.

“Jimmy. Jimmy.” Chloe stood across from him. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m just stretched thin.”

Jimmy moved his hands over his empty desk. Truth was, Jimmy was in Sanctuary with Serge. Renzo had advocated for retaliation. Jimmy had authorized his play without knowing what it was. A poor decision, in hindsight. But he couldn’t let Serge see Renzo back him down.

All Jimmy wanted was to run a clean club.

Randy secured the cash boxes in the Mosler. He heaved the safe’s heavy door shut, spun the dial.

“Big crowd tonight,” Chloe said. “You heading down?”

“In a bit.”

Chloe and Randy exchanged a look.

“What?”

“It’s past one, boss,” Randy said. “And you haven’t left this room. That’s not like you.”

“How long have you worked for me, Randy?”

“Five months.”

“Not that long, then. So maybe you’re not the best authority on my habits and practices.”

Chloe flicked her head to the door. Randy left, clearly wounded.

Jimmy dug the last Camel from his pack. Chloe’s mouth was tight.

“I know, I know. Tell him I’m sorry.”

“You can tell him yourself.” Chloe sat opposite Jimmy. Heavy talk incoming. “Do I need to find another job?”

“Of course not, I’d never fire you.”

Chloe smiled, shook her head. Like Jimmy didn’t get the joke.

Downstairs, DJ Lopes transitioned to a downbeat drum and bass track. Jimmy didn’t care for the new sound out of the UK. And as he thought that, he felt old.

“Is Abattoir okay?”

“You just ran the count. We’re better than okay.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Jimmy knew exactly what she meant.

“Renzo’s temporary.”

“His people don’t consider themselves temporary. And I’m worried about what they’re doing to you.”

The life was pulling Jimmy in a dozen directions. Chloe sensed it, which meant Michelle sensed it. As if their marriage could get worse. Harvey’s statement had gained zero press traction. The media latched onto other stories. Four Hasids had been shot on the Brooklyn Bridge. This, barely a year after the World Trade Center bombing. Bad vibes, all around.

Harvey’s new plan was his original plan: Let the storm pass. Jimmy agreed and Michelle raged. Neither she nor Harvey knew Jimmy had men in Luc’s house tonight.

It all came back to Serge.

Cars whizzing by, the air buffeting. Jimmy and Serge on the cop’s bumper. That fucking dog would not stop barking. Jimmy had chalked their arrest up to bad luck, but Serge always thought someone dimed them out. Probably associates of that Slovakian Serge had run off.

Chloe was still standing there.

“That’ll be all.”

“Remember to lock the door.” Chloe rose, walked out.

Downstairs, the night was raging. In Jimmy’s head the numbers merged, melted. He couldn’t focus. Cops in his club, Giuliani’s industry hard-on, Frank Bates’s unwanted partnership, Luc Delacroix moving on Abattoir.

Jimmy’s head ached. The club needed him to be a razor. Abattoir depended on his staying sharp.

There were substances that could help with that.

Abattoir was a box filled with bodies covered in sweat. Dance floor chaos calmed him. This was Jimmy’s world. He had built it. No one would take it away.

A guy wearing only a jockstrap walked past. A topless woman in a clear plastic tutu. An androgynous boy/girl covered head to toe in ultra-white body paint. Jimmy welcomed them. Jimmy loved them. Jimmy ignored them. He was on a mission.

At the bathroom bar, shirtless bartenders filled glasses and popped bottles. Jimmy squeezed through, anonymous. He wasn’t the show.

Dim lighting and doorless stalls encouraged exhibitionism. Men and women lined the sinks. They slammed pills and blasted K and snorted blow. Jimmy twitched at the exposure.

Think of the numbers.

The numbers collided into one another. They rejected order. A bump would set them straight, long and level. A skinny guy in a leather vest held a coke spoon to a nostril. Not too big, apparently solo. Jimmy had cut himself off from his pre-incarceration connections. The days when he could get grams delivered with a phone call were long gone. He needed a hit. This guy had what he wanted. Simple math.

Jimmy started toward him.

Samantha held him back.

Twelve years old, in black and white. She begged him to lock himself in the Keep, to add one more night to his string of sobriety.

Look at what happened to me.

The scene called it Zek. Xanax, crystal meth, ecstasy, and ketamine. A fat envelope kept everything but the E from the medical examiner’s report. Michelle still didn’t know the extent of her daughter’s narco experimentation.

And so, the Promise.

The skinny guy bumped again. He rose off the floor. He floated on a cloud. Jimmy needed that cloud.

I’m sorry, baby.

Jimmy poked the Vest in the shoulder. “There’re no drugs allowed in my club.”

The Vest was baffled. He looked left and right. The entire bathroom was getting high.

“Who the fuck are you?” the Vest asked.

Wrong thing to say. Jimmy pulled the radio from his belt. “I need security in the bathroom.”

The Vest tried to slide past Jimmy. Jimmy cut him off.

Flashlight beams sliced the dark. Bouncers inbound.

“You all right, Mr. Lettner?”

The asker was a mohawked Puerto Rican from the Bronx named Jorge, though he pronounced it George. Established and trustworthy. The other was a new jack Jimmy didn’t know. Jimmy sent him back to his post.

“This guy’s got coke in his pocket. Get it off him.”

Jorge didn’t move.

“What’s going on?” the Vest asked.

A glare from Jorge silenced him, fast.

Jorge spoke low into Jimmy’s ear. “I’ll toss whoever you want, Mr. Lettner. But T-Roc says we don’t confiscate drugs.”

“Who pays you?”

When Jorge didn’t answer, Jimmy repeated the question.

“You do, Mr. Lettner.”

“Then get to work.”

But Jorge still didn’t move. The principled fuck. Jimmy felt patrons drilling him. This was taking too long.

Back to the Vest. “Give it up and you can stay. Don’t and you’re gone. Choice is yours.”

The Vest grumbled and dug into his pocket. Everybody wanted to stay. He handed Jimmy a vial filled with powder. A few days’ worth of blow. Jimmy’s heart jumped. It had been thirty-seven months since he’d last held cocaine.

“Can I go now?”

The show had drawn attention. Jimmy thought back to Wheat. To empty threats and failed half measures.

I order.

I impose.

“My club, my rules. Show him the door.”

Jorge carried the Vest out of the bathroom. Jimmy spun around. Pill-popping patrons looked away. No one wanted to get the boot.

Back to the Keep. Jimmy shut the door, killed his radio. He sat at his desk. The impounded coke called to him. For half a second, regret fought through his desire. Jimmy had just robbed a patron—in full view of other patrons. Abattoir held its secrets well, but word would circulate. He had fucked up. But that’s what addicts do.

Jimmy unscrewed the cap.

That first hit pushed the memory of Samantha from his mind.

Serge

Jimmy played his Abattoir role understated. At Sanctuary, Luc Delacroix was the show.

The Canadian held court from a circular sofa set on risers just off the DJ booth/altar. The neon-ringed inverted cross flashed in time to the mix. Purple stage curtains stretched to the vaulted ceiling. Spotlights painted Luc bright. The ringmaster of a psycho circus.

But Luc’s throne revealed tactical vision. The perch offered 360-degree views. Security posted at roped-off steps. The church’s stone walls protected Luc’s back.

Serge milked a vodka tonic. His right foot tap-tap-tapped.

Luc had to be evicted from Abattoir. But it wouldn’t be long before Renzo realized how much money could be made pushing club drugs. Which meant Renzo required elimination. But killing a made man was suicide. Serge needed another way.

Stoney squeezed next to Serge. On the drive crosstown, Serge had learned Stoney claimed Golden Gloves glory, had clipped his nickname from Roberto Durán. The story’s telling felt like a warning.

“Any trouble at the door?”

“No, me and Trini go back.” Serge spoke low. “I still don’t know the plan.”

“When he calls for you, play the peacemaker. That’s all you gotta do.”

Stoney pushed off the bar.

Serge finished his drink, ordered another.

Sixty minutes passed. A heavy hand found Serge’s shoulder.

“Come.”

The accent rang Slavic. Its owner wore a turtleneck under a too-loose jacket; the shoulder-holster special. The goon started across the floor. Dancers parted wide. Serge followed. With every step he felt like he was moving closer to a great inevitability.

The body man unclipped a rope and headed up the steps. Serge’s heart thumped triple-time. He crested the riser. Luc Delacroix lounged on his side in a pale blue silk robe, one knee tented. Next to him lay Rene, the waif-boy with a thing for blades. A dozen other boys and girls lay seminude and entwined on the giant sofa, eyes glazed in a narco haze. All looked to be in their teens. Luc was on the downside of fifty.

“You were not someone I expected to see here again.”

“I came to talk.”

“And this is the time for reflective conversation?”

Rene suddenly leaned forward. He began snorting like a pig. As if he’d just clocked Serge and remembered that he hated him.

Luc ran a hand up the boy’s spine, ass to neck. “No, no, my sweet. Our friend came to make peace. Do not dissuade such attempts, however … unwise.”

Rene crouched ten feet away. Serge wished he was a hundred.

Luc disentangled himself from the pile of bodies. His robe hung loose; pale skin sheeted a bony rib cage. A blond girl pawed at Luc’s arm. He laid wet tongue on her face and rolled her away.

“I can only assume you believe my guests will provide you safety. The many witnesses to your presence.” Luc slid bare feet into leather boots. Serge clocked needle marks; Luc shot dope between his toes.

“The thought had occurred to me.”

“I reserve my nights for pleasure. There was a time you felt the same.”

“I’d rather not have this conversation at all. But you won’t back off.”

Luc waved a finger. “It is you, Serge, who has the burden. Rene’s great love still hasn’t returned.”

“We didn’t do anything to the boy.” Except kill him.

“I find it difficult to trust a man of your reputation.”

Rene began crawling forward. He wore a black pleather second-skin onesie. Pajamas by the Marquis de Sade. The Slavic gun goon repositioned. Luc’s harem writhed; the underage kids clawed one another. Rene hunched low on the sofa, swaying to the DJ’s thumping mix. Whatever Renzo had planned, it had better start quick.

Luc spoke. “Did James send you? How is Abattoir’s fearless leader doing these days?”

Serge let the dig pass. “I came here on my own. To make peace.”

“And how do we do that?”

“Call off your move on our club.”

“My grievance cannot be settled so easily.” Luc laid an arm across Serge’s shoulders. It was ice. “Wheat will not return to Rene’s bed. Ever. Wheat, you see, was murdered.”

The bass dropped hard. Sanctuary exploded Hiroshima-bright. Serge’s head pulsed. Luc drew him closer.

“Oh yes, I also have sources. Wheat was last seen in Abattoir. His body was found in a warehouse across the street. It gets worse, Serge. He spoke to you. On the night he was killed. You and he were seen.”

Someone had clocked Serge pulling Wheat off the floor?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Tell James I know what he’s done.”

On the sofa, Rene began shaking. Like he was seizing. Behind Rene, Luc’s harem probed one another with hands and tongues. Beyond them rose a dark plume of smoke.

Smoke?

Serge stepped back. His foot found only air. He nearly tumbled down the steps but caught himself. Luc read Serge’s expression, tracked his eyes. Horror hit his face.

Orange flames shot up the curtains hanging behind Luc’s sofa. They backgrounded the inverted cross. The crowd shouted and pumped fists. The fools thought it was part of the show. The jailbait harem tumbled to the floor in dope-addled slow motion. Luc threw his arms up, horrified.

The heat came next. It motivated. Luc’s harem found sobriety, double-timed off the altar. The rush sent Luc’s body man toppling over backward. He rolled down the stairs. Flames shot higher. Angry orange fingers clawed for the church’s spires. Overhead sprinklers fired, sputtered, went dry.

Luc stood on the altar, frozen and helpless. Witness to his club’s immolation.

The crowd finally realized this was no act.

The DJ fled the booth. Dancers on the packed floor panicked, sprinted for the street. Men knocked women over. Women clawed past men. Punches were thrown. Elbows, too. Those who fell were stepped on. Patrons hit exits and threw fire doors open to the night. Bartenders abandoned their posts. Incarcerated cage dancers hurled themselves against the bars, begging to be set free.

Renzo’s plan was arson on a grand scale. Jimmy had chained Abattoir to a madman.

Through the chaos, Serge clocked Rene advancing on him at a walk. As if Sanctuary wasn’t burning around them. In one hand he held a silver blade. Serge backpedaled across the floor. Terrified patrons pinballed off him.

Renzo emerged from the mass of fleeing dancers. He shattered a bottle over Rene’s head. Stoney came next. He held two more bottles. They doused Rene in vodka. Renzo pulled a lighter from a pocket. He found Luc in the madness, drew his attention to Rene’s proned-out body.

“Jimmy Lettner sends his regards.”

Renzo sparked a flame, dropped the lighter.

Rene was engulfed instantly. The alcohol and his outfit fed the fire. Flames glowed bright and burned hot. The stench of scorched flesh filled Serge’s nose. He knew he should run but couldn’t move. He had never seen a man burn.

Rene lay in a heap. The fire consumed him.

Then he moved.

He rose.

He found his feet. Right first, then the left.

A stunned Serge stumbled back. The shape at the center of the flames turned. In the crossing of the old church, a man on fire lumbered toward Serge. One arm slashed wildly.

Jesus Christ, Rene still held the knife.

A shot rang out. Serge snapped back to the moment. Luc’s body man took shaky aim. A second round whizzed by Serge’s ear. Serge ducked low and bolted.

Midwinter air shocked his lungs. Shivering clubbers clogged sidewalk and street. Through the stained-glass windows, Sanctuary glowed orange. Sirens spun up in the distance.

Serge walked off, faux calm. He met Renzo and Stoney on Twenty-First and Park. They rolled north in Renzo’s Mark VIII. Renzo and Stoney stunk of liquor and smoke. Four blocks passed before Serge found the nerve.

“What was that?”

“An announcement.” Renzo draped one hand over the wheel, relaxed.

“We could’ve done it another way.”

“Shooting a guy doesn’t convey the drama you’d expect.”

Cop cars screamed south on Park. The Lincoln rolled north, unbothered.

“You should’ve told me what you were planning.”

“You wouldn’t’ve come.” Renzo turned west, bound for Abattoir. “Hey, I been meaning to ask, does Chloe really have a boyfriend?”

The Lincoln had a CD system. Serge pressed Play. “Hell’s Party” by Glam filled the car.

Renzo and Stoney howled.

Ben

Amy Valero pinned a DMV photo of a white woman with dark curls to a corkboard. A handwritten banner read OPERATION CLOSING TIME. The DEA was as clever as the NYPD.

“Michelle Lettner is Abattoir’s liquor license holder and ostensible owner. She’s never been arrested. Probably why her name’s on the paperwork. I make her for the front man. Woman.”

Ben leafed through Abattoir’s financials. Tax returns—state and federal—bank statements. Ben wondered how Valero got them, what the process was. “A lot of money flowing through those doors.”

“More than they’re reporting, I’m sure.”

The DEA’s New York division ran out of a nondescript building fourteen blocks dead south of Abattoir. Ben, Valero, and Pete Cobb sat in a cramped, windowless room that had previously stored cleaning supplies.

Valero pinned a booking photo of a balding white man to the board. Someone had stolen his shoulders and chin.

“Lettner’s the real player here,” Valero said. “Been in the industry a long time. He owned two clubs before Abattoir, Covet and Imprimatur. Four years ago he gets popped for felony weight coke and does three years. If Abattoir’s profiting from the drug trade, he’s the guy pulling the strings.”

“Guy gets pinched once,” Cobb said, flipping through Lettner’s Triple-I, “does thirty-two months? Talk about bad luck.”

“I pulled his sentencing transcript. Lettner got arrested after a car stop on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. Wasn’t driving, wasn’t even his car. But he pleads and gets hammered by the judge.”

“This happened on the BQE?” Ben asked. The location tweaked him.

“Who was driving?” Cobb asked.

“Serge Thanakis. Lettner’s number one.” Another arrest photo went up. Angular, chiseled face. “It was his Mustang. QDA dropped his charges after Lettner pled. Thanakis has two prior felonies, one for criminal sale, the other for assault. He’s got another four arrests, all sealed. Thanakis and Lettner go way back. His W-2s indicate he worked at both Imprimatur and Covet.”

“Thanakis was driving his own car,” Ben said, “but his boss cops to the drugs?”

“You’d think it’d work the other way around,” Valero said

“Saved Thanakis a decade, at least,” Cobb said. “The Rockefeller laws would’ve crushed him.”

Cobb’s cigarette smoke hung unmoving in the airless room. Ben would pay hard cash for a window.

“Then we have this guy.” A new booking photo went up, a Black man with a shaved head and thick neck. “Terrance Rockport, a.k.a. T-Roc. Abattoir’s head of security, and another convicted felon. Did two years for a firearm, released in ’91. No arrests since. I make him for the muscle.”

“Ex-cons can work nightclub security?” Ben asked.

“There’s no licensing requirements for bouncers,” Cobb said. “If you can throw a punch, you can work a door.”

Ben’s job was clocking crimes in bars and clubs, but this was news to him. Ben didn’t know what he didn’t know.

“Lettner’s legal counsel is Harvey Cohen,” Valero said.

“That guy’s a clown,” Cobb said.

“And an excellent attorney,” Valero said. “According to the last two AUSAs he beat at trial.”

To the board Valero pinned a driver’s license photo of a reedy, older white man with unnaturally black hair.

“No one else in management has a criminal history. Which tracks. Lettner would only need a few trusted hands in-house. Floor sales can be contracted out.”

“There’s been something bugging me.” Cobb tossed a folder on the overmatched table. “DEA doesn’t wipe their ass without a snitch providing guidance. When do I meet yours?”

“Never.”

Per Valero’s SAC, Freddie McGee was to be kept from Cobb. And Sergeant Digby. And every other city cop. The Department could not be trusted. The Mollen Commission was prepping a blue suit bloodbath. Ben had access because he was Closing Time’s only undercover.

“Amy,” Cobb said.

“Agent Valero.”

“Amy, there’s only one person in this room carrying an open homicide. It isn’t Ben, and it isn’t you. I am the murder police. I need access to your CI.”

“I understand your position. But I am not going to jeopardize the safety of a federal asset.”

“Asset. You make it sound like we’re bankers, moving money around. We work people. Criminals, Amy. We coerce. We elicit. Detection’s an art, and requires a skillset that—no offense, here—that your people rarely possess.”

Valero’s mouth tightened. Echoes of her in the Pontiac, post-slap.

“Pete,” Ben said.

“No. I didn’t ask for this gig. You shivved Ralphie and brought me in. I got every right to interview her asset. I got a murder to solve. Tell me I’m wrong.”

Ben couldn’t because Cobb wasn’t. Bodies came first, always. And Ben wanted to close Wheat more than any of them. He had been face-to-face with him, arrested the kid. Though he’d never admit it, Ben felt personally invested.

Problem was, the Palace cared more about Jared Dodson’s suicide than Wheat’s murder. Witness Tyler Easton’s expedited tox report. Blood work indicated ketamine and trace amounts of methamphetamine. It supported either hard-core use or unintended experimentation.

Valero’s theory: The ketamine was laced. Her SAC reported this to Easton. Giuliani claimed poisoned party drugs were killing the city’s best and brightest. Nightclubs were amoral hellscapes. Gomorrah on the Hudson. Raze the scene. Burn it all.

Chief McManus’s revised orders: Find who sold Dodson the laced ketamine. Build a case. Shut Abattoir down. What McManus didn’t say: Dealers got killed daily. Wheat was just one more.

“Read the papers, Cobb,” Valero said. “You’re lucky you’re in the building.”

“A few shields in Brooklyn are dirty, but I gotta pay the price? Worse, my victim’s family has to pay the price?” Cobb got up, began pacing. He chain-smoked. He huffed little white clouds and walked through them. “I knew how this was gonna go. Ralphie prophesied this. He said, ‘Keep an eye on those feds, Pete. They like locking cops up more than bad guys.’ You need me, I’ll be at the Tenth.” Cobb slammed the door on his way out.

Valero steamed in silence. Ben worried when she finally blew, she’d blow ugly.

“We’re not all like—”

Valero held up a hand. “No. Cobb’s right, I don’t trust cops. And given what I’ve seen out of you, my position’s not unreasonable.” She checked her watch. “I’m going to beep Freddie. Time for you to go to work.”

Valero set off for the Hello phone. Ben swung back to the corkboard. Jimmy Lettner, unlikely nightclub kingpin, collared for felony weight by a dog on the BQE. What were the odds?

Really, really low.

New York City highways were narrow. Car stop deathtraps. Highway units ran speeders onto surface streets. Narco and Street Crime popped their targets on avenues. But Lettner and Thanakis had been stopped on the expressway proper. An NYPD rarity.

Question was, why?

Ben found Lettner’s Triple-I. His arresting officer was a Walsh, S., of the Ninety-Fourth Precinct. A patrol rookie. Not Street Crime. Not Narcotics. A Brooklyn uniform had hit the felony jackpot. In Queens.

That meant something. But Ben didn’t know what.

Not yet.

Ben

Freddie McGee was running a scam. Ben was convinced of it.

He had to name three lists before the door girl found his name. Inside Abattoir, things got worse. Freddie stepped to a shirtless Puerto Rican guy in homemade angel wings. He intro’d Ben. But Freddie’s bona fides didn’t play. Angel Wings stepped off and left Ben undone.

A woman in jean shorts and rainbow suspenders over her nipples turned them away.

A goth ghoul in a white mink was next. Freddie fired. Freddie missed.

A club kid balancing a diamond tiara on purple hair nixed them after that.

On it went. Freddie was a scene-wide strikeout.

“It’s your vibe, man. You’re blowing me up.”

This might have been true. Ben rocked his standard finance suit while Freddie slummed in a wife beater and untied Tims. They made an odd pair.

The DJ pumped a remix of “Big Time Sensuality” by Björk. Freddie slammed a Heineken. He set the empty down and accidentally kicked it across the floor. His hands flew when he talked. Freddie was either nervous or rolling. Ben guessed #2.

“Where’s TJ?”

“It’s his night off.”

A lie. The game had no nights off. Ben got to thinking TJ didn’t exist.

“Amy’s fucking up my deal, sticking me with cops who can’t cop,” Freddie shouted over Björk. He bounced from foot to foot.

“Are you high?”

Freddie froze. His pupils were pinpricks. Caught.

“I don’t care what you do when I’m not around. But when we’re working, I need you clean.”

“Or what, you gonna kick my ass?”

Ben had that coming. “You claimed you’re a player.”

Freddie held his hands out at Ben like he was showcasing a used Dodge. “Look at what I’m working with.”

Too white. Too vanilla. Too soft. Narcotics had passed Ben over for a reason.

“I need to piss. Don’t go far.”

Ben squeezed along the edge of the dance floor. Abattoir was fire-marshal–packed. The crowd numbered in the thousands. Ben scanned for exits. A fire had hit Sanctuary the previous night. The Post ran a small piece with a big photo. A spilled drink, flammable curtains, and broken sprinklers sent a kid to Bellevue’s ICU. Word was he wouldn’t last the weekend. Giuliani issued a statement: Nightclubs are evil, I’ll save your kids.

Ben stopped. Hannah strolled nearby, and solo. A tightness hit next, that nervous excitement, like he was sixteen again. Ben ran a hand through his thick hair and headed over.

Hannah made him ten feet out. She was wearing baggy jeans and sipped a clear drink through a thin straw. She was smiling, but only with her eyes. Ben liked that. The DJ shifted the tempo: upbeat house. No more Björk.

“Alone again,” Hannah said. “I’m starting to worry nobody likes you.”

“Nah, I’m …” Ben half turned in Freddie’s direction, thought better of it. “Where’re your friends?”

“I thought we established this.” Hannah tilted her head toward the dance floor.

Ben couldn’t think of anything to say, so he nodded to the music.

“Two weeks in a row. Practically a regular.”

“Ah, you know, I’m here for the experience.” What was Ben saying? Why was he nervous?

“Everybody’s here for the experience. How’s yours?”

Hannah dropped her lips to meet the straw but angled her eyes up at Ben. She was sexy without trying. Ben let himself believe she might be into him.

“Lonely.”

“My gift didn’t help?”

The ecstasy she’d slipped into his pocket. An idea popped. Ben could score E off Hannah. She could facilitate introductions. But that meant wrapping her up in the case. And Ben didn’t want to arrest Hannah.

Not at all.

Her tank top cut off midriff. House lights lit the sweat on her chest. The waistband of her Calvins rode high on exposed hips. She was Asian-exotic in Ben’s world of endless, flat white. Ben wanted her. He drained his beer and stupidity rushed in.

Wash her from the reports. Expunge truth and fabricate lies. He had done it before.

“I liked what you gave me, but I could use something stronger.”

Hannah fingered her drink’s straw. “And I’m the one to make that happen?”

“I hope you can make a lot happen.”

“Tell me why.”

“Why I want to get high?”

“Tell me the truth. I’ll know if you don’t.”

Lights pulsed bright. Behind Hannah two men groped each other. Faces read dance floor nirvana. A woman on a speaker cabinet tore her top off. Hands went up. Release pumped through Abattoir. Ben sensed fearlessness in the crowd. It prompted a question: Why undercover work? Why live a lie?

Ben couldn’t drink, never smoked. He’d grown up safe behind twelve-foot box hedges, had attended top schools. The NYPD was Ben’s rebellion. Two years in, it wasn’t enough.

“I want to feel alive.”

“No, you’re tired of being alive. The life you know. You come because you want someone else’s. You want what you can’t have. You want ours.”

Red flashed on Hannah’s face. Her cheekbones made him weak. He laid a hand on her hip. Hannah didn’t pull away.

“Maybe I just want you.”

“Get in line.”

Ben smiled. Hannah smiled.

“What do we do now?”

She thought on that. “You know Brooklyn?”

“Yeah.” Ben didn’t.

Hannah dug into a pocket. The move pushed her jeans even lower. “My girl Rickie’s throwing an outlaw party Tuesday night. What’s your position on illegality, Brett?”

“I’m for it.”

Hannah laughed as she pressed the card into Ben’s hands. “If you want to know the real me, you’ll be there.”

She began to drift off, stopped, reconsidered. She moved in close and rose on her toes and Ben bent down and their lips met. Tongues followed. Ben shut his eyes. Their bodies pressed close. The music dropped away. Hannah broke free before Ben could wrap her up.

“Come to Brooklyn on Tuesday. But if you tell anyone about it, you’ll never see me again.”

Ben nodded dumbly. He was spinning, and not from the beer. It felt like it hadn’t happened, like Hannah was never really there. Eventually, Ben’s brain rebooted into cop mode.

My girl Rickie.

Slim Rickie. The invite Ben had lifted off Jewelface back at Gray’s Papaya. She was a promoter. Outlaw parties drew the hardcore and defiant. Dreamy Dee might be there. Ben read the card Hannah had given him: VAN DYKE: TO THE END.

Ben went back to where he’d left Freddie. The kid was gone. Ben prowled Abattoir’s darkened alcoves, witnessed a slide show of urban debauchery. Penetration and masturbation. Pills slammed, shots downed, coke inhaled. Ben completed a lap, then another. He scoured the club and came up empty.

Until Freddie grabbed Ben from behind and shoved E into his hand.

“You just got done.”

Ben eyed the five tabs, then the felon who’d scored them.

“You think I’m stupid,” Freddie said. “But I read the papers. The mayor hates Abattoir, and the NYPD needs a distraction. Tell Amy you copped those and I hooked up the intro.”

Freddie was pitching Ben on cop/informant conspiracy.

“Are you out of your mind? We could get locked up for this.”

Freddie’s pale face blanked. Like he didn’t get the straight world’s laws. Then his expression broke like a wave crashing and he looked like a boy outmatched by the world. He stepped into Ben’s space and laid his hands on his chest. No aggression in him, only desperation.

“You need to buy, and I need to keep Amy happy. Say you got this from Trix. I’ll describe him. We come back here enough, the dealers’ll get used to seeing us together. They’ll start hitting us off. After that, they’ll serve you even if I’m not around. Do this and we both win.”

The music thrummed. Shirtless dancers humped speaker cabinets. Cross-dressers swung from the ceiling. They flashed the crowd—tops and bottoms. An air gun fired. Dollar bills floated from the balcony. The crowd surged toward the greenback snowstorm.

Ben and Freddie didn’t move.

“Anyone finds out about this, Southern District will void your cooperation agreement.”

“Anyone finds out, and you’ll get fired.”

Ben had stepped to the scene and the scene had rejected him. He didn’t fit this world. Freddie’s lunatic play offered him an in. The idea was madness. Ben couldn’t believe he was entertaining it.

“Is Trix real?”

“As real as you and me. Come on man, we need this.”

This was a placeholder, Ben told himself. A temp fix to keep Valero happy till Slim Rickie’s outlaw party. Hannah would show him the way. Then Ben would buy and buy. Tonight would be forgotten.

A one-time thing.

“You let this slip, I’ll destroy you.”

Freddie pumped both fists over his head. He joined the rush on the dance floor. Ben drifted to the wall. He told himself he had done a good thing. That he was keeping Freddie out of prison. That his was a selfless act.

The truth was simple: Ben trafficked in lies.

Michelle

The BMW idled among Mercedes, Jaguars, and Town Cars. Girls departed the Ashford-Rand Academy in designer scarves and woolen coats. Boys wore herringbone blazers, twill slacks. Michelle had sworn her children would attend public school. What was good enough for her, and all that.

Their return to Manhattan had changed her mind. Ashford-Rand schooled generational wealth, the city’s next ruling class. Christi deserved to be among them. Michelle wrote the check.

A State Liquor Authority summons lay on Michelle’s lap. She and Jimmy hadn’t discussed their response because he’d spent the weekend in the Keep.

God help Serge if Jimmy was using again.

Across the street, Christi waved at a WASPy blond girl and headed over. Michelle felt a thrill; her daughter had friends. One, at any rate. It was a start.

Her daughter popped the door and fell in. “Hi, Mom.”

“Who was that you were talking to?”

“Heather Branley. We’re in French together.”

Michelle began working the BMW out of its spot. “Where’s Heather live?”

“Oh my God. Her family has this amazing townhouse in the seventies, off Fifth Avenue. It’s like five floors, with a movie theater in the basement. And they have an elevator. In their house. It’s amazing.”

“I can imagine.”

Michelle rolled slowly toward First Avenue. A blacked-out Town Car with livery plates cut in front of her. Before Michelle could mash the horn, the driver waved an apologetic hand out the window.

The streetlight cycled red. The Town Car’s driver got out, started toward Michelle’s BMW. He wore a long overcoat and black leather gloves. He held a paper and wore a warm expression. A friendly, distant uncle.

Michelle relocked the doors just the same.

The stranger waved hello. He was white, in his late fifties, with a face that carried heavy mileage. Thinning white hair blew wild in the winter wind. Under his coat was a limo driver’s rumpled suit. Michelle dropped her window.

“Excuse me, can you help? I am lost.” An accent. Maybe Polish?

“I’ll do my best.”

“I am trying to find”—one hand struggled with the paper, like it didn’t work as intended—“400 East Fifty-Sixth Street?”

“Hey, that’s where we live,” Christi said across her mother.

“Really? That would make you Christi, then. And you must be Michelle.”

Michelle’s lungs emptied. Her chest collapsed. Bones liquefied. Only the seatbelt kept her upright.

“How do you know our names?” Christi asked.

The stranger’s Town Car blocked the street ahead. A medallion cab filled Michelle’s rear view. Parked cars left and right. They were trapped.

“Do not raise your window, Mrs. Lettner. I would prefer not to shatter it.”

The stranger’s voice had changed. Deeper. Menacing. Michelle considered leaning on her horn. But this was New York; no one would care.

“I want only to talk.”

“Mom …”

“It’s okay, honey. It’s going to be okay.” Michelle had lived the scene for decades, seen brutality up close. But something about the man at her window terrified her.

“Your husband’s name is Jimmy. Together, the two of you own Abattoir.”

Abattoir. Luc selling ecstasy in her club. The stranger was here because of Jimmy. The stranger was here because of Serge.

The light flashed green. The cabbie behind Michelle leaned on his horn. The stranger glared at him until he stopped.

“What do you want?”

“Only for you to know what I know. Names, for one.” He looked at Christi. “Addresses, another. What I don’t know is why Jimmy did he what did Friday night.”

Friday night. The Sanctuary fire. Since her embarrassment at the Sherman Group, Michelle read the papers, first thing. All the papers.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The stranger stared at her. His left eye didn’t move, as if unhealed from some long-ago injury.

“Perhaps you don’t,” he said finally. “But I tell you this, Michelle Lettner. You should ask your husband why he put you in this situation. I would be curious to hear his explanation.” The stranger waved a gloved hand at Ashford-Rand. “It is a good school your daughter attends. I would seek admission for my own children, but I suspect they require references. Perhaps you can provide?”

A chorus of horns rose behind Michelle.

The stranger grinned. He had a gold incisor. “It’s good that we met, yes?” He waved at Christi and walked back to his car.

The streetlight shone red. Cabs and buses and delivery trucks churned up First Avenue. The Lincoln tore across four lanes of cross-traffic. Northbound tires squealed, horns blasted. T-bone wrecks were avoided by inches. The stranger never once touched his brakes.

“Are you okay, Mom?”

Michelle couldn’t speak. Her brain formed words. They assured and comforted. But her mouth wouldn’t move. Her hands remained fixed to the wheel.

“Mom? Mom?”

Christi shook Michelle. Her head became unstuck. Horns wailed. Christi looked terrified.

“Who was that?”

“I don’t know, honey.”

But he had threatened her only surviving child. She was sure as shit going to find out.

Jimmy

Jimmy, Serge, Harvey Cohen, and Renzo Scalesi encircled the Keep’s conference table. Cigarette smoke hung in still air. A blanket and pillow covered Jimmy’s blood-red sofa. Three straight nights in the Keep. The move was blow-motivated and safety-related. Jimmy couldn’t have gone home. Michelle would have smelled the coke on his soul.

Harvey popped a Luden’s. “Jimmy, I represent Abattoir as a business and you as an individual. I do not represent this guy.” Harvey threw a thumb in Renzo’s direction.

“I’m part of this outfit, Counselor. Like it or not.” Renzo scanned Chloe’s ledgers as he spoke. Wire-rim glasses sat on the tip of his nose. A brainy look for a guy who had immolated a teenager.

Chloe stuck her head in. “I’m heading home, Jimmy.”

She vibed uncomfortable. She wasn’t alone. Elise and Angel and T-Roc and Randy all steered clear of the Keep. Renzo was a morale killer. Probably because he was an actual killer.

“I still got that table at Forlini’s,” Renzo said to her.

“My mother’s expecting me.”

“Another night.” Renzo flashed his capped-teeth smile, but Jimmy caught a flash of anger behind the mask.

Chloe left.

“Where were we?” Jimmy touched his nose. He needed more blow.

“Your mouthpiece was ranting,” Renzo said.

“It’s a practical legal concern,” Harvey said. “I can’t claim privilege if you implicate yourself in a crime. Speaking of which.” He read from Sunday’s Daily News. “This business at Sanctuary. Unconfirmed reports of gunfire. Talk of possible arson. A patron on life support. Is this who we are, Jimmy?”

“I didn’t have a gun,” Renzo said. “You have a gun, Serge?”

Serge stared at the table. His smoke had burned down to the filter.

“Your presence in Abattoir threatens its existence,” Harvey said.

“You want me to leave? Move me.”

Harvey’s face went purple with rage. He was not often denied. He pulled a handkerchief from his suit pocket, blew his nose, recomposed. “I’ll be frank, Jimmy. You pay me for honesty.”

Renzo laughed. Harvey glared at him.

“You know who this man is. Who he represents. With all you’ve been through, is this Abattoir’s future?”

Jimmy wished it wasn’t. But like Renzo had said, men like him did not leave when asked. They had to be removed. Jimmy admired Harvey for speaking out. It should have been him making a stand. But it wasn’t, and his inaction shamed him.

Harvey tried Serge. “You know I speak the truth.”

“We just have to ride this out.” Serge spoke to his cigarette. His eyes were hollow.

Harvey slammed more cough drops. “Jimmy, you want to voice a position on this?”

Jimmy’s position was homicide, times three. Renzo Scalesi, Frank Bates, Luc Delacroix. Dead and gone. But this wasn’t the audience.

“Renzo’s on the team, Harvey.”

Renzo winked at Jimmy. “Good man.”

Jimmy’s stomach rolled. To his left, Serge seemed to be deflating.

Harvey’s face read shell-shocked. Understandable. Jimmy had withheld his debt to Frank Bates, the dirty cash being cleaned through Abattoir’s tills. Incomplete information confused Harvey and made Jimmy appear weak.

“Do business with him”—Harvey rapped a bony finger on the table—“and you’re doing business with organized crime.”

“Counselor,” Renzo said. “I’m a patient man, but my well is not infinite.”

Shut up, Harvey. Renzo’s a killer.

“I can’t be a party to this. I have other clients, a reputation.”

Serge just sat there, chain-smoking and silent. Jimmy realized he’d lost control. This was his club, his council. But a two-night binge after thirty-five months sober had left him treading mental water. It had all gone so wrong.

Jimmy’s phone rang. It was T-Roc announcing Michelle’s arrival. Jimmy headed down. When he hit the floor, T-Roc pulled him aside.

“One of my men says you put him in a spot this weekend.”

“If you’re talking about Jorge, I asked him to do his job.”

“Tossing patrons for coke’s not his responsibility. What you did opens him up to retribution. Legal and otherwise.”

“That guy was soft as they come.”

T-Roc looked away.

“Say what you wanna say.”

“The man who ran Covet never took what he hadn’t earned.”

“He was using. We need to run a clean club, now more than ever.”

“That what this is? A clean club?” T-Roc’s eyes flicked in the direction of the Keep, Renzo inside.

Jimmy felt a heat rising. “Anything else?”

“No sir.” T-Roc headed back to his chess match against Randy.

Jimmy crossed the floor. Michelle hunched barside, a glass of brown liquor in one hand, a Virginia Slim in the other. Bad combination.

“Everything okay?”

Michelle nodded. Barely.

Behind the bar Angel inventoried bottles. Jimmy flicked his head, and she slid down by T-Roc and Randy.

“What’s wrong?” Jimmy said.

“What did you do Friday night?”

Pressure filled Jimmy’s chest, his throat, his head. It squeezed and squeezed until Jimmy felt like he was about to burst. His hand rubbed his nose. Michelle clocked his coke tell, faced him head on.

She knew. About Sanctuary and Luc and the kid Renzo had set on fire. Violence perpetrated with Jimmy’s blessing. Good God, Michelle knew.

“Tell me what happened,” he said.

“A man cornered Christi and me outside her school. He said to ask you about Friday. The fire at Sanctuary, the one in the papers. Was that you?” Michelle’s voice was calm, her gaze level. Bourbon evened her out.

Angel, T-Roc, and Randy sat ten yards away. “This isn’t the place for—”

“This is the only place. You never leave.”

“Where’s Christi now?”

“I took her to a friend’s.”

“A friend?” Jimmy didn’t know his daughter had any.

Michelle finished her drink and reloaded her smoke.

His family. Goddamn Luc. Jimmy headed to T-Roc. “I need a favor.”

Randy cut in, young and eager. “Whatever you want, Jimmy.”

He was a Floridian from up near the Panhandle, and spoke with a countrified twang rare in NYC’s club world. Jimmy appreciated the offer, but Randy was twenty-two and greener than green, criminally speaking.

“You don’t know what you’re asking,” Jimmy said.

“Yes I do,” Randy said. “There’re rumors going around.”

“What rumors?”

T-Roc shot a Randy a look: Don’t. The kid didn’t listen.

“Outsiders are moving on Abattoir.”

“It’s true, Jimmy,” Angel said. “My bartenders are asking who they’re gonna be working for in a few weeks.”

Word was out about Luc. How long until Jimmy lost face and his staff walked?

“You don’t need to worry. I’m handling it.”

T-Roc and Angel traded looks. Like maybe Jimmy wasn’t. Or couldn’t. To Jimmy’s right, Michelle had hopped over the bar and was pulling bottles from the shelves. The whole club was spiraling.

“I done some stuff,” Randy said. “I may not look it, but I’m reliable.”

Jimmy hesitated at pulling Randy across New York’s clean/dirty border. The passage colored a man for life. But he was low on hands and enthusiasm had its uses.

“Noted.”

Through all this T-Roc had been contemplating his exposed queen.

“Someone threatened Michelle,” Jimmy said to him. “I need you to take her home, and stay with her till I sort a permanent solution.”

The big man swelled as he breathed deep. “Afraid I can’t do that, Jimmy.”

Jimmy thought he’d misheard. T-Roc never refused orders.

“You serious?”

“I appreciate all you’ve done. But my circumstances have changed. I got a family now. I don’t want my boys seeing me through visiting room glass.”

T-Roc’s denial crushed Jimmy. This wasn’t the club he was protecting, but his family. “All I’m askin’ out of you is presence. Nothing bad’s gonna happen.”

“We both know that ain’t true.”

Jimmy was too stunned to speak.

“If you have a family, you know.” Michelle walked over slow, a fresh bourbon in hand. “You know what it’s like to worry about your kids, day and night. How you try so hard to keep the world from their door for one more day, because the time’ll come when you can’t. Then all of this will come rushing in and they’ll have to learn how to survive on their own. And we lie to ourselves and to them saying it’ll all work out. But not all of them will make it. Knowing that hurts most.”

Sam.

Jimmy set a hand on the bar.

“But Christi’s going to make it,” Michelle continued. “I’m sure of that.”

T-Roc thought for a long time. “Where’s your girl?”

Michelle handed T-Roc a napkin. “That’s the address and my cell number.”

Michelle didn’t have a cell phone. Jimmy wondered what else she was keeping from him.

T-Roc pocketed the napkin. “This is as far as I go, Jimmy.” He headed for the door.

“Jimmy.” A hyped-up Randy patted his own chest.

“T,” Jimmy called out. “Take the kid.”

T-Roc stopped but didn’t look back. “I’ll be in my car.”

Randy leaped over the bar. He pulled Jimmy conspiracy-close and spoke whisper-quiet. “I won’t let you down. And if you need anything else, I got connections. Good shit.”

Translation: I can hook you up. Randy’s offer intrigued him. Jimmy couldn’t hit up his former coke sources; a call would tip them to his failed sobriety and advertise Abattoir’s weakness.

“We’ll talk.”

Randy sprinted after T-Roc. Angel went back to her inventory.

Jimmy headed to Michelle. She spoke before he could.

“Did you start the fire in Sanctuary?”

“Michelle, how can you ask me that?”

Michelle looked at Jimmy for a long time, and he realized years had passed since she’d seen him as a lover. They were parents and partners now. That’s all. Michelle finished her drink, set it on the bar.

“Are they in your office?”

Harvey, Serge, Renzo.

“Yeah.”

“Good. High time I knew what was going on in this place.”

Michelle brushed past him, bound for the Keep. It took Jimmy a second to process her intent. Michelle wanted in, all the way. Jimmy’s world was unraveling. He needed to order blow from Randy, ASAP. Jimmy ran to catch up to Michelle.

“That’s not a good idea.”

She kept walking. Long, calm strides.

“Michelle. Please. I’ve got it under control.”

Michelle finally stopped. “Hit pieces in the papers. Luc Delacroix selling on your floor. Men stopping me on the street, telling me where I live. Scaring our daughter. No, Jimmy. What you’ve got here’s the opposite of control.”

Jimmy planted himself at the base the staircase. “I won’t let you do this.”

Michelle lit a new Virginia Slim. Her hands were stone-still. She exhaled and drew close. She smelled of whiskey and that perfume Jimmy could never remember the name of.

“Lock me out and I’ll shut it down.”

It. Abattoir. Jimmy’s life. He tried to say something, anything. Couldn’t. He swallowed sandpaper.

“My name’s on every document that gives this place life. Tell me what’s going on, or I dissolve the club.”

What felt like a tiny stroke jolted Jimmy’s spine. His clouded head went light. Michelle was holding a knife to Abattoir’s throat. To what Jimmy loved most, God help him.

“Don’t be stupid, Jimmy. Spouses can’t be forced to testify against each other.”

Michelle brushed past him and started up the stairs.

Ben

Red Hook at full dark. Warehouses and roll-down gates, chain link and derelict cars. Rusting shipping containers stood stacked and entwined by weeds. Lower Manhattan across the water, the Statue of Liberty in the distance. The cab peeled off into the night and Ben stood alone at the end of the world. He touched his empty waistband. Off-duty and unarmed.

Ben hadn’t told Valero about the outlaw party. He’d do this on his own.

And he needed to see Hannah.

Ben straddled a faded double yellow line. He shut his eyes and the party found his feet. He tracked the vibration to a warehouse off Ferris Street. The fence was pulled back at a corner. Ben touched the pole. Bass rode his arm.

Ben slunk through. He turned a corner and found ravers and club kids, the hardest of the hardcore, covered in sweat despite the cold and off-water breeze. They clumped in groups on the loading dock. Ben moved among them. He clocked pill-trading and needle-sharing. He did not care.

Tonight he was not a cop.

Ben headed inside the abandoned warehouse and the night exploded. Drum and bass thrummed. No lyrics, just rhythm. Cracked concrete provided a makeshift dance floor. Guys and girls on milk crates swept flashlights across the crowd. The DJ worked off a collapsible table. Speaker cabinets were belted to hand trucks for quick set up and break down. Janky power cables ran to a gas generator.

No bar. No drinks. Tonight was about music. Tonight was about the high.

Water dripped from the ceiling. Drops hit rave-heated bodies and vaporized. A camera flash fired. Ben clocked a thin girl with a red pixie bob. Slim Rickie in Technicolor. Hannah knew Rickie, so Rickie must know Hannah. A connection, preestablished.

Ben waded onto the floor. Two songs passed before the crowd let him go. His shirt was drenched. He touched his face, found his fingers black. Before leaving the Heights, Ben had applied eyeliner. A copy of Cosmo had provided guidance. Ben had nearly poked his eyes out.

“Rickie, right?”

Rickie pulled a Blow Pop from her mouth. “Who’re you?”

“A friend of Hannah’s.”

“What’s your name?”

“Brett.”

“You’re not bad.” Rickie spotted someone over Ben’s shoulder and threw up a hand. “Get me and my new friend.”

She wrapped Ben up, stuck her tongue out. The flashbulb popped and Ben went blind. It all happened too fast. By the time Ben could see again, the photog was gone. Proof of an off-duty cop at an illegal rave in his camera.

“What do you do with the pictures?”

Rickie waved again. Then again. Then again. She knew everyone. “We run them in the Incubator. Duh.”

Ben nodded like he knew what that meant.

“Let’s find your girlfriend.”

Rickie led Ben to a corner of the warehouse. A construction light set at floor level threw funhouse shadows onto the ceiling. Hannah leaned on a concrete pillar, smoking. Her left hand rested on her flat stomach. Ben wanted her instantly.

“Lost dog!” Rickie said.

“I’ll take him in,” Hannah said.

“Next time,” Rickie said to Ben, “get a gay to do your makeup. Straights don’t have the patience.”

Rickie kissed Ben on the cheek. Rickie kissed Hannah on the lips. Two men were with Hannah, one white, one Spanish. The white guy had a leather dog collar around his neck. The Spanish guy held the leash.

Hannah wanted to laugh but held back. “Did you do this for me?”

“Is it that bad?”

“It’s pretty bad, yeah.” Hannah turned to her friends. “Go and play, boys.”

The white guy barked like a dog as his friend led him off. Hannah started walking. Ben stayed with her.

“Why the face paint?”

“I wanted to blend.”

“No one here wants to blend.”

They navigated darkness. Hannah moved like she knew the place. She slid under the uprooted loading dock gate. Waterfront smells hit, low tide and barge trash. Hannah sat on the edge of the crumbling concrete break wall. Sludgy water lapped against Brooklyn. Hannah patted the concrete next to her: Join me.

What was Ben doing here? He didn’t belong. He could get fired. This was a mistake. His brain said, Go. His body refused.

Hannah reached up, her hand found his. Her touch was light. Ben sat. He bounced his heels off the break wall.

“Where do you live?” Hannah asked.

“Uptown.”

“So mysterious.”

“You want to visit?”

“Maybe.”

A tug pushing a barge upriver blew its horn.

“I don’t know anything about you.”

“That’s not true.”

“I know your name’s Hannah and you like to party and get high. That’s it. That’s everything.”

Hannah leaned over and kissed Ben, hard. Her tongue was aggressive. Surprise yielded to desire. Ben pulled her close. The kiss went on and the music and the city and the world fell away. When they finally parted, Hannah was breathing heavy. So was Ben.

“All that matters is who I am right now,” she said. “But since you asked … I’m here because I went through a bad time. Emotionally, I mean. My parents gave me a year to sort myself out, no questions asked. In exchange, I promised I’d finish school and never embarrass them.”

As she spoke Hannah rubbed a leather cuff wrapped around her left wrist. Ben nearly asked about that, didn’t.

“How much time do you have left?”

“Eight weeks. Any other questions?”

“Why me?” Ben asked.

“I sense an emptiness in you. And I’m drawn to it.”

To their right a woman in scuffed DMs snorted heroin straight.

Hannah shivered. “That’s my limit.”

“No dope for you?”

“Dad would murder me.”

Ben stared at Hannah a long time. He wanted her. He needed intel. Dreamy Dee. Wheat’s killer. A connect not named Freddie McGee.

“You know a guy named Trix?” Ben suspected Freddie’s ecstasy dealer didn’t exist. That Freddie was a fraud.

“I don’t think so. Who is he?”

Theory confirmed.

“This guy in Abattoir sold me bad ecstasy. I wanted to know if he had a reputation.”

Hannah set her palms on the concrete and leaned back. “You getting high without me?”

Ben shrugged.

“You want to get high with me?”

Narco vets swore all deep cover work eventually hit this point: Prove yourself or risk the case. The Palace understood the game. Forced ingestions were forgiven, if reported. But Ben was off-duty. He had no procedural justification. Knowing this, he rationalized.

Their case was stalled. Freddie was a liar and Trix didn’t exist. Ben needed in. Tripping with Hannah would open doors. Ben could clock faces and names, ditch Freddie, report new contacts to Valero. He could run the case from the field.

And Ben wanted to feel.

He’d been stone sober his entire life. A square’s square. Ben lashed out by becoming a cop. He couldn’t even get rebellion right.

The work was madness, the rave an asylum.

The lie picked up speed. The Department hadn’t run Ben’s piss since the Academy. Drug tests were pricey and the city was broke. No one would know.

No one will know.

“Yeah.”

Back inside. Ben and Hannah wove through the crowd. Strangers danced with their eyes closed. They knew everyone except themselves.

Ravers posted near a support column. Hannah touched a boy’s shoulder. He turned around. The face clicked instantly.

Dreamy Dee had become a nightmare. His long hair had been scissored to the skull. Sunken eyes, hollow cheeks. Like he wasn’t getting enough calories. His white skin was tinged yellow, and he wore an oversized leather coat.

“What’s up?”

“This’s my friend Brett. And Brett wants to get high.”

Dreamy Dee eyed Ben long enough to make Ben worry he’d been made.

“All I got left’s the last of my K.”

Safe. Dee didn’t remember Ben from the night outside Coliseum.

“Have you ever done Special K?” Hannah asked Ben.

Ecstasy was a club-set hallucinogen, but ketamine was a hard psychedelic. Laced K had killed Jared Dodson, according to Dodson’s parents. Ben couldn’t handle beer; what would this do to him?

“Your boy ain’t into it,” Dee said.

“Let’s just dance,” Hannah said to Ben.

She pulled his arm, but Ben didn’t move. He’d been hunting Dreamy Dee for weeks. Finding him—here, tonight—felt like fate. He could not let fate pass. He was going to get done, whatever that took.

“How much?” Ben pulled personal funds from his pocket, unmarked and unlogged.

Dee licked his lips. They were chapped and raw.

Hannah whispered into Ben’s ear. “Don’t do this for me.”

This wasn’t for Hannah; Ben was buying his way into Wheat’s murder. The move carried risks. Dee would be arrested. He might go to trial. His attorney could cross Ben on whether he’d ever used. If he reported every buy. If he was a liar.

No, no, and no.

Ben was a New York City police officer. Dedicated and ethical. He never strayed from the law and abided by the rules set down by the Palace. Prove otherwise, Counselor.

Dee wiped his nose. “Fifty a bump. Two bump minimum. And he does his in front of me.”

“Fuck you, Dee.” Hannah tugged on Ben.

Ben held out five twenties. “You wanna watch? Then watch.”

Hannah’s hand fell away. Dee snatched the cash and slipped Ben the zip. White crystals, like cocaine, only bigger. Ben snapped the bag open. Dee’s crew drew close; come watch the tourist get lit. Ben sprinkled some K on his hand.

Hannah’s face said, Don’t.

Prove yourself. Own the scene.

Ben snorted it up. Dee was smiling. Hannah bit her bottom lip. Ben felt nothing.

“You can buy from me anytime,” Dee said.

“You’re not tripping alone.” Hannah did the rest of the bag. She led Ben to a corner bathed in windowed moonlight. Ben’s skin began to tingle, but that was all.

“What’s Dee’s deal?” His voice sounded like someone else’s.

“His friend got killed a few months back.”

That sounded familiar. Ben blinked real slow. “No shit.”

Hannah sat on the floor, pulled Ben down with her. “Dee won’t go to Abattoir ’cause he thinks he’s next. How’re you feeling?”

“Fine. Totally fine.”

“Don’t fight it. Fighting makes it worse.”

“Fight what?” Ben asked.

Hannah’s face began melting.

The column Ben sat against became a snake.

Ben’s eyes shot moonbeam lasers.

“Oh,” he said. “That.”

The warehouse cracked and shifted and rebuilt itself. Walls were made of Sour Patch Kids. They climbed on top of one another, tiny red and green and orange and yellow almost-humans covered in sugar. They sang in a language Ben couldn’t understand. Maybe Chinese. Maybe Greek. Or alien.

A flash popped nuclear. The floor glowed green. Footfalls drilled holes to the Earth’s core. The holes filled themselves in, waited for the next step. Music had become unknowable. It was noise. It was beautiful.

Another flash: the world dark, then white-out bright, then dark again.

A dog the size of a Pontiac prowled the party. Its eyes were yellow and it was chained to a woman walking on stilts made of knives. She was topless and covered in red greasepaint. She ran a finger down her belly. The yellow-eyed dog eyed Ben and growled.

“You okay?”

“Uh …”

Another flash. Closer. Ben buried his face in his knees. If he moved, the floor would open and he would fall in. He knew this wasn’t possible but also that it was.

Something warm touched Ben. He recoiled. He slid backward and hit Sour Patch Kids stacked to the roof. They pawed at him with sugary little non-hands.

A shape stood over him. The shape had a face. It was familiar.

It was Freddie McGee. And he was grinning.

“I got you, motherfucker.”

Shouts now. The needle skipped and the music died. Partiers scattered. Lights punched through the warehouse. Red. White. Red. White. Red. White. It felt like Ben should move.

Ben knew he should move.

Ben was moving.

Hannah said something. Ben couldn’t make it out. She seemed a thousand yards away but pulled him forward. They ran now, both of them, floor holes chasing them. The Sour Patch Kids parted and the air felt cooler. People were screaming, running.

Ben and Hannah were in water. They skirted weeds and walked on pebbles. Across a shimmering blackness stood a woman draped in green. She held one hand high. From it burned pure fire.

Land again. The water’s edge. There was a building. It wasn’t moving. The world was solidifying. Hannah pulled Ben between two big metal boxes. It felt safe.

She stopped and spun and pulled Ben close and kissed him hard. Their bodies hummed.

“We have to stay here.”

Ben’s feet were cold. They were wet. That’s why they were cold. “Don’t worry, they’re not after us.”

“Who’s not after us?”

“The cops.”

“How do you know?”

The corners of Ben’s world began to square. Someone had tweaked the focus. They were between a pair of dumpsters. Hannah’s face reformed. She was imperfect and broken and beautiful.

“I just do.”

A police helicopter flew overhead. It swooped low in the dark sky and painted the waterfront with its nosecone light. Rotor wash drowned out the world. Trash spun up in a hundred tiny cyclones.

Safe between the containers, Ben and Hannah clawed at each other. Nails raked skin. She bit Ben’s lip and drew blood. He grabbed hair and pulled her head back. He licked her neck and she unbuttoned his pants, then hers.

The helicopter moved on. Hannah climbed on. She breathed fast, moved faster. Ben heard shouts and sirens. He ignored them. They weren’t there for Ben, and Ben was here for Hannah. She had opened his world. She had sold him to the scene. They’d gotten high and come out the other side.

Ben held her tight.

He kissed her hard.

He wondered how he’d handle Freddie McGee.

PART III

Michelle

Central Harlem. Michelle and Harvey sat close on a wooden bench on the seventh floor of the Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Building. The place smelled like a hospital. It was half-past ten. Michelle’s summons was for nine.

She and Harvey had ridden north in the back of his S-Class. Harvey had hit talking points on the way. Michelle had said nothing. Harvey’s driver was an ex-cop, and cops were not to be trusted. Ex or otherwise.

Jimmy had given Michelle the situation in bullet points: Luc’s drug-fueled bid to shut Abattoir down; his Russian organized crime backing; the mafia cleaning cash through Abattoir’s books; the Sanctuary fire, the hospitalized kid; atrocity as retribution; the feds working Abattoir’s floor.

Harvey had again asked Michelle if she wanted to cooperate. Again, no.

Michelle had experience with the law, and Luc had threatened her girl. Michelle had partied in 1970s New York. She had been ogled, threatened, groped, and mugged. Had knives pulled on her, twice. New York had taught her to fight. Motherhood taught her to win.

“Lettner.”

Michelle and Harvey followed a heavyset Black woman through a cramped, overheated office. A tiny room. One table, four chairs. A tape recorder was plugged into an outlet. Harvey pulled its cord from the socket.

“Remember, Debra will come off strong for the record, but it’s an act. Read your statement. Exude empathy and compassion. You can’t be held responsible for some kid who killed himself after a bad trip. The law is clear on this.”

Some kid who killed himself.

The way men talked made Michelle sick. They compartmentalized complicity and clung to half-truths. Questions were asked after Samantha’s accident. Suburban moms fell to a whisper at Michelle’s passing. I heard she was on drugs; I heard she killed herself; her father’s in prison, you know.

Michelle had dealt with it all, alone.

The door opened. In walked a slim Black woman in a drab gray suit.

“Debra,” Harvey said. “Wonderful to see you again.”

He extended a hand, but Debra Shefflin ignored it. Another suit followed. An Asian man in his late twenties.

The fresh face threw Harvey. “I don’t believe we’ve met. I’m Harvey Cohen, counsel for Michelle Lettner.”

“My name is Ken Lee.”

“You’re new to the SLA?”

“No.” Lee glanced at Shefflin.

“Who do you work for, Mr. Lee?”

Lee again looked at Shefflin. Harvey looked at Michelle. Shefflin looked at her file. Something was very wrong.

“Tell him,” Shefflin said.

“I’m an assistant corporation counsel for the city of New York.”

Corporation Counsel advised the mayor and handled the city’s civil proceedings. It was not a state entity. Lee’s presence meant Giuliani had made a call, that Governor Cuomo had taken it. Two tiers of government enforcement were leveled at Abattoir.

“Liquor licensing is a state matter,” Harvey said. “Corporation Counsel has no standing here.”

“My role is purely observational.”

“What division do you work in, Ken?”

“Nuisance Abatement.”

Harvey cracked into his Luden’s. “Whenever you’re ready, Debra.”

“Ken, do you mind?”

Lee replugged the power cable into the wall and pressed Record.

“Michelle Lettner, my name is Debra Shefflin. I am the New York State Liquor Authority investigator assigned to complaint 94-1372. We are here today regarding reported drug activity in …” She flipped a page. “Abattoir, a licensed premise in New York County. Per New York State Liquor Authority regulations, this interview will be recorded. Also present is Ken Lee, assistant corporation counsel for the city of New York.”

Michelle sat up, folded her hands. She was the face of the business. No, she was the business. Time to act like it.

“Mrs. Lettner, are you aware of the suicide of a …” Debra again flipped pages, “Jared Dodson?”

“I am.”

“And are you aware that Mr. Dodson spent the night before his death in your nightclub?”

“Allegedly,” Harvey said.

“There are witnesses,” Debra said.

“Who I haven’t interviewed.”

“Mr. Cohen, if you refuse to stipulate to Mr. Dodson having been in your client’s establishment, we’ll produce the witnesses.”

“Produce away, Debbie. I look forward to questioning them.”

Shefflin uncapped a Bic and scratched a note to herself. “In light of counsel’s request, this interview will be rescheduled.”

Michelle imagined Sam or Christi subjected to an unleashed Harvey Cohen. The awful things he would say, the indiscretions he would accuse them of. All those kids had wanted was to party in Abattoir. Now their friend was dead and Harvey aimed to crucify them.

Michelle wouldn’t allow it.

“Wait,” she said. “We accept that Dodson was in Abattoir.”

“Michelle,” Harvey said, “you don’t have to stipulate to that.”

“I’m aware.”

Harvey stared at her a long time. His cough drop danced in his mouth. Click, click, click.

“Very well,” Shefflin said. “Mrs. Lettner, a postmortem examination was conducted on Mr. Dodson. This examination found evidence of ketamine and methamphetamine in his blood. Witnesses have reported that Mr. Dodson purchased drugs in your establishment. Your failure to adhere to regulations governing on-premise licensees is the reason you’re here. This interview is being conducted in part to determine what penalty, if any, should be issued.”

Debra flipped a page. Her folder was an inch thick. “To that end, I’m going to ask you a series of questions. Before we begin, do you have a statement you’d like to make?”

Michelle did. Prepared by Jimmy and Harvey, double-spaced, one page for brevity. It weaponized Michelle’s motherhood and Samantha’s death and was to be delivered with passion and concern. Michelle hadn’t contributed a word.

“No.”

“Excuse me?” Harvey said.

Michelle would not—could not—abuse Jared Dodson’s memory any more than Giuliani and the media already had. Samantha’s accident had dodged the news. Michelle was still thankful.

“We have no statement,” Michelle said. “Furthermore, we will not contest the SLA’s punishment. Whatever it is.”

Harvey choked on his Luden’s. He punched himself in the gut. The lozenge shot across the table. Ken Lee dodged it by inches. Harvey bent at the waist and hacked at the floor.

“I need a moment with my client.”

“No,” Michelle said. “You don’t.”

Her heel bounced off the sticky tile. Her stomach rolled. This might not be the smart play, but it was the right one. Michelle had ignored Jimmy’s drug dealing and blamed herself for Samantha’s death. Jared Dodson’s mother did not deserve the embarrassment Harvey had planned. No mother did. Michelle would let this go.

“Very well,” Debra said. “But our questions need to be entered into the record.”

“I understand,” Michelle said.

Harvey smoothed his hair. Anger came off him like heat from a summer sidewalk.

“Let’s get started,” Debra said.

The S-Class roared south on the Henry Hudson Parkway. Harvey’s driver served from lane to lane and did not signal. Ex-cops retained special privileges. Harvey stared at the river.

“Can you explain to me,” he said, “what the fuck you were thinking back there?”

Even if she wanted to, Harvey wouldn’t understand.

“Refusing to read our statement, agreeing not to contest the penalty. That was an assassination. You understand that, right? Corporation Counsel represents the city. The city is Giuliani. He strong-armed the Authority into making an example out of you. And you just let it happen.”

Still Michelle kept quiet. It wasn’t easy.

“We will not contest the punishment,” Harvey continued, mocking her. “There’s no legal foundation in the ABC for a three-week suspension. Not based on the evidence. Had we fought, I would have won. If you let me sue them, I will win.”

“It’s my business and my decision.”

But was that decision smart? Michelle had saved two kids from Harvey Cohen’s wrath and closed Abattoir for three weeks. In the room it felt right. But the industry paid no bonuses for ethical stands.

Three weeks without liquor meant three weeks without revenue. Nightlife margins were paper-thin; one lost weekend killed most clubs. But Jimmy always said Abattoir wasn’t most clubs. Michelle prayed he was right.

“Jimmy’s going to hear about this,” Harvey said. “You just wait.”

“I expect he will.”

Michelle clocked Harvey’s driver eyeing her in the rearview.

Ex-cops were not to be trusted.

Serge

The bag wasn’t big enough. Avi Brenner yelled in Hebrew at David over the blasting hi-fi; Cypress Hill on max volume. Avi’s partner left the living room. He looked pissed. Serge didn’t blame him.

“Anytime there is work,” Avi said, “he complains. He thinks maybe this life comes easy, eh?”

For Avi it did. He, David, and Serge were in Avi’s lux eighteenth-floor Battery Park City three-bed, three-bath. The place was father-funded and FiDi adjacent. The World Trade Center bombing had rattled the building’s windows. Avi had slept through the blast.

David returned carrying a Bauer hockey bag. Into it he and Avi loaded the ecstasy. David stuffed dirty clothes on top of the product. Enough to throw off a lazy cop. Which, Serge had found, described most of them.

Avi stood, brushed off his hands. Loose pills littered the floor. Serge wondered where Avi hid his supply. If he even bothered to.

“You gonna want your laundry back?” Serge asked.

“With what you owe me, I can buy a new wardrobe.”

Serge tested the weight of the bag, set it back down.

“Who’s spinning tonight?” David was rail-thin with bony joints and horn-rimmed glasses but wore his yarmulke at a cant. Orthodox with attitude.

“This guy, always the party.”

Avi barked at David and David went back at him. A Hebrew shouting match. Avi threw his arms up. David seethed. Serge studied his cigarette. He knew from disrespect.

“No one,” Serge said once they’d cooled off. “The state shut us down for three weeks.”

“Three weeks?” Avi glanced at the ecstasy-filled hockey bag.

His concern was reasonable. Abattoir was Serge’s only territory, its crowd his only customers.

“I’ll figure it out.”

Avi scratched his chest. He wore a silk shirt with golden snakes on it, unbuttoned to the navel. “I hope so.”

“I meant to ask,” Serge said. “You got any coke?”

“Personal use, or retail?”

“It’s for me.”

From a sleek side table Avi pulled a sandwich bag filled with white powder. He tossed it to Serge. A half ounce easy, maybe a full ounce. His flagrancy shocked Serge. Avi lived in an apartment full of ecstasy and stored cocaine as if it were a remote control. Avi was complacent. Serge knew why: Avi had never been scared.

“How much do I owe you?” Serge began peeling hundreds off his roll.

“Don’t insult me. I’ll just add it to your tab.”

Serge adjusted the Glock at his back and picked up the bag.

“David,” Avi said, “Serge and me need to talk.”

“I’m part of the business.”

Avi’s face hardened, and David snapped at him in Hebrew. Avi raised a hand, a father about to slap his son. They yelled over the music before David headed to his room, slammed the door.

“I swear, Serge, that boy will kill me someday.”

Serge set the bag down. Again. “What’s up?”

“My supplier wants to meet.”

“Meet me? Why?” Serge’s heart rate ticked up.

“You are a big customer now. They are invested in your success.” Avi paused. “And also they want to experience Abattoir.”

Serge nearly laughed. Everybody wanted in.

“When?”

“I’ll find out.” Avi paused, reluctant. “About your payment …”

“When do you need it?”

“Thirty days. Standard retail terms.”

Abattoir was dark for three weeks. Paying on time meant moving a month’s worth of product in a single night. Two, tops. An impossible ask.

“Not a problem.”

Serge headed for the elevators. The bag weighed him down.

Spoons held a pair of jeans David had shoved in the bag. “Mind if I keep these?”

“Knock yourself out.”

Packages of E littered Spoons’s floor. Tens of thousands of hits bound in bags triple-sealed with clear tape. Representing more money than Serge had ever seen, Abattoir’s Keep included. The Misfits blared from the stereo. Hard-core covering fire for felonious conversations.

Spoons worked himself into Avi’s jeans. A circular saw and pry bar lay on the parquet floor near his bare feet.

“You sure you know how to make a clavo?”

“Make a hole, put shit in it.” Spoons smoothed his new used jeans. “What do you think?”

“I think I got worries that go beyond your outfits.”

A stress tumor pulsed in Serge’s stomach. The enormity of his operation’s upscaling had hit. Avi’s offshore connect wanting to meet wasn’t a welcome party. The Israelis wanted confirmation Serge could pay. They aimed to intimidate him. Serge was confident in his read because it’s what he would do.

Spoons plugged in the saw. The outlet sparked and he tumbled backward. Serge rubbed his forehead. The ecstasy had to be moved. If the DEA knocked down Spoons’s door, Serge would spend years in a fed pen. If Serge missed his payment, he’d fill a shallow grave. Like Daro Xhaxhka.

His beeper buzzed. A number he didn’t recognize with a 911 coda.

“You have a phone?”

Spoons poked the outlet with a screwdriver. “In the drawer under the toaster.”

Serge plugged the pink Slimline into the wall jack. He began dialing, hung up. Yanna claimed girls in her office sold reverse directory lookups at twenty bucks a pop. Serge wasn’t New York’s only shady operator.

His beeper again. Same number, same 911. The digits put off call me now urgency. Serge dialed. Cobb picked up on the first ring.

“We need to talk. Can you get to the ferry?”

The ferry indicated bad news.

“Give me thirty minutes.”

Serge hung up, unplugged the phone. He ran doomsday scenarios. Had Cobb figured out Wheat’s killing? Were the feds raiding Abattoir? Had Serge popped on a wiretap? Serge’s threat list ran long these days.

He rubbed his eyes. Serge couldn’t remember when he’d last slept easy. Had to be before Daro Xhaxhka. Dumping a dead man’s hands in a river had stolen years from Serge.

In the living room, Spoons hunted for floor joists with a rubber mallet.

Serge headed for the door.

The Staten Island Ferry was midday-empty. Newspapers littered the floor. An air horn blasted and Manhattan began to fall away. Serge felt no motion; the huge ferries were floating cities.

Cobb and Serge kept an empty seat between them. Few travelers shared the enclosed deck. Those who did read or napped or listened to Walkmans.

“Jesus,” Cobb said. “You look like shit.”

“Why’d you call?”

“The feds made a buy in Abattoir. The DEA broad’s convinced your spot’s a club-drug Mecca.”

The huge boat shrank by half. “What’d they buy?”

“Ecstasy.”

Danger inbound. “What color?”

Cobb eye-fucked Serge like a proper dick. He might have been bent, but dirty cash hadn’t completely dulled his cop instincts.

“There’s two crews working our floor,” Serge said. “It’d help to know which they’re into.”

“I bet.”

Serge waited. He moved reds. Wheat sold yellows. Mike supplied Wheat. If there was a God, Cobb would say yellow.

“Red.”

More evidence for atheism.

“You know the kid’s name? The one they bought from?”

If the DEA was into one of Spoons’s dealers, the feds might know about the apartment. An apartment now filled with Israeli ecstasy. If Spoons went down, he’d flip. The honorable thief myth ended the second cell doors slammed shut. That’s why Wheat had to go. Serge cut any thread that threatened to fray. Before long he’d be naked.

“All the paperwork I get’s redacted. The feds don’t trust the NYPD cause of that Dowd horseshit.”

“The nerve of that dirty cop, fucking it up for the rest of you.”

Cobb spat on the floor. Lower Manhattan grew smaller in the ferry’s wake.

“Look,” Cobb said, “what you’re doing in your club ain’t my business. City’s got bigger worries. Here’s my thing. Our arrangement’s mutually beneficial, right? The only reason I’m part of this task force is cause I’m working that murder.”

Muzzle flash. Blowback. The memory of Wheat’s killing paired with Daro’s hands coming off at the wrists on an unending mental double feature. The saw blades snapping. Blood pooling under Serge’s feet.

“For me to get real access,” Cobb continued, “I need to prove my worth.”

“What are you asking me for?”

“Relevancy.”

The ferry’s air horn blasted. St. George Terminal, dead ahead.

“I bring the feds a homicide, they’ll let me into the case redaction-free. Me locking up Wheat’s killer helps us both out.”

No it doesn’t, Serge thought. Not at all.

“I’ll see what the kids are saying.”

“I’d appreciate that.”

“You got anything else?”

“Yeah. Why didn’t Lettner’s wife didn’t put up a fight with the SLA?”

The boat lurched as the ferry’s engines reversed.

“What?”

“This retired cop drives that shyster Cohen. Says your partner’s wife told the liquor board she wouldn’t fight their punishment. Cohen went ballistic, wanted to sue. Claims he would’ve won, but Lettner’s wife shot him down. I can’t figure why she’d do that.”

Jimmy had claimed the SLA hit was incontestable. Cobb indicated otherwise. Someone was lying.

Michelle.

Her and Serge’s relationship hadn’t always been this way. There was a time the three of them cruised Manhattan till sunup, raiding dance floors and living the moment. But women claim ownership of men, and Michelle planted her flag in Jimmy. Their trio split. Their firstborn released Jimmy back into the wild. He and Serge reconnected. Serge taught Jimmy the drug game, flashed the money he’d made. Jimmy assessed the operation for inefficiencies, fixed them. Serge found a connect for Colombian powder. Together they owned the nightlife bulk trade.

Then came the night on the BQE. Michelle swore she’d never forgive Serge, and Serge believed her. But Michelle rolling over for the SLA made little sense. She couldn’t know Serge was still selling. And why’d Jimmy agree? None of this made sense.

Conclusion: Michelle was running her own game.

Their bodies swayed as the ferry made contact with the dock.

“Why’d Cohen’s driver tell you this?”

“Guy plays both sides. I dunno. Maybe that’s how he sleeps. You got any idea what angle Lettner’s playing?”

“Nope.”

Serge got up. He knew no one in Staten Island, had no reason to be there. But the boat felt like a prison, and Serge needed off it.

Ben

A fan hung from the ceiling. Ben didn’t have a ceiling fan. He touched his head and felt stubble. What happened to his hair? Hannah lay next to him, asleep and naked and half covered in bed sheets. Ben was naked, too. The night came to him in flashes. For the first time in his life, Ben’s memory had holes.

He crept from the bedroom into a small, neat living room. Family photos in tabletop frames. Smiling faces on a beach, a cruise. Clothes were scattered on the floor. Ben put his on, peeled back the blinds. The street signs and license plates were yellow.

New Jersey.

Hair clippings lay on the kitchen floor. On the dining table was an electric clipper. Had he cut off his own hair? Did he do it before he and Hannah had sex, or after? Why did that matter?

The minute counter on a digital clock turned over. It was one thirty in the afternoon. Ben sat on the sofa. He shut his eyes and breathed slow and tried to remember. The effort was new to him.

He had gotten high. Ketamine, he remembered that. He pushed and the night came in fragments. Ben rearranged pieces, guessed at the holes. He sorted memories and settled on three undeniable facts.

You bought from Dreamy Dee.

Freddie McGee was there.

You’re in love with Hannah.

Ben tried discounting the last one. But the thought wouldn’t leave. Ben was into a target, big-time. He filled a glass with tap water, downed it, refilled the glass and drank again.

Washing Hannah from his buy reports would shield her from indictment. But when Valero took the case down, defendants would talk. Hannah would learn that Brett was Ben and Ben was a narc.

Another memory hit: Freddie’s evil face, his shit-eating grin. Ben told himself the image was a product of the ketamine, a misfiring neuron’s leftover hallucination. But Freddie had been there. He’d caught Ben rolling on K. Freddie could get Ben fired. Arrested. Ben’s paranoid cop mind predicted apocalypse. His anxiety ticked higher.

“There you are.”

Hannah stood in the living room in an oversized MIT shirt that ran to midthigh. Her face was bright and open, and seeing it made Ben feel lighter.

“What happened to my hair?”

Hannah walked over, rubbed his Marine-recruit cut. “You were pretty dialed in on me shaving it off.”

“I can’t believe you own barbershop clippers.”

“I had a roommate who worked in a salon.”

“Don’t let me do K again.”

“I told you not to, but you insisted.” Hannah spread Ben’s legs with her knee and sat on his thigh. “I think you look cute.”

“That’s what every guy wants to hear.”

“If I wasn’t into cute, you wouldn’t have made it past the door.”

She wrapped her arms around Ben’s neck and grinned. Guilt crashed Ben’s walls. Hannah had shown him kindness and desire, and Ben was abusing both. How could he keep lying to her?

Hannah tapped Ben’s temple. “What’s going on in there?”

“Wondering how long it’ll take for this to grow back.”

“It’s just hair. Nothing lasts forever.” Hannah got off Ben. “I’m going to shower. Want to join me?”

Ben’s beeper buzzed. Ike’s office. Ben scrolled his incoming list; this was Ike’s eighth page. “Can I use your phone? It’s work.”

“Sure. But whatever your boss wants, tell him you’re busy.” Hannah peeled off her shirt and let it drop to the floor. She stood before him naked and eyed him direct. She didn’t entertain shame or self-doubt. Ben envied her.

Hannah disappeared into the bathroom. Ben waited until he heard water, then called Ike.

“I’d begun to worry you’d forgotten who you work for, Bennett.”

“What’s up?”

“I’m still your sergeant, you know. Don’t matter what building you turn out of.”

“Can you get to the point?”

“Why’re you whispering? What’re you, sick or something?”

“I’m not alone.”

“Bennett Hopkins, swordsman. Hey, ask your girl if she can pull the stick out of your ass. I’d be eternally grateful.”

“What do you want?”

“Just for you to swing by the Seventh. You popped for a DOLE.”

Ike kept talking, but Ben couldn’t make out the words. He could barely breathe. Hannah’s apartment rocked to one side, then the other.

The Palace was giving Ben a drug test.

The restroom was puke green. Urinals on one wall, toilets the other. A pair of dress shoes occupied the farthest stall, toes aimed at the door. An unbroken strip of mirrors ran above the urinals at a forty-five degree angle. Shady cops tried swapping clean piss for dirty. Medical Division staff eyeballed urine streams and swore to their authenticity. Ben wondered how the system worked for females.

Ben had swung by the Seventh, signed the official notification. Ike had noticed Ben’s hair, his twitchy nerves. Ben claimed exhaustion; sharing the truth would make Ike complicit.

“Don’t flush when you’re done.” The Medical Division sergeant locked the bathroom door. Ben thought that odd.

DOLEs were issued randomly or for cause. Ben was told his tax number had come up. Which meant he wasn’t under investigation. But Ben was ten hours removed from a full-on K-hole. Ketamine would pop on the urine screening. The Palace terminated producers of dirty piss without hearing. The Palace suspended and sought to terminate cops who refused tests.

If Ben filled the cup, his career was over. If Ben didn’t, his career was over.

Ben twisted the cap off the bottle the sergeant had given him. The sergeant posted up next to him and snapped on a pair of latex gloves. Ben unzipped. It took a long time for Ben to start. Once he did, he overfilled the cup. The sergeant watched in the mirror. How many dicks did he scope a day?

Ben finished his business and reset the cap.

“On the shelf.”

Ben set the bottle where the sergeant pointed. The sergeant inspected the urinal, flushed it with an elbow. Then he popped open an identical bottle. Was Ben expected to fill two?

The sergeant unzipped and filled it himself. He secured his container with the seals Ben had signed. The sergeant dropped the bottle filled with his urine and labeled with Ben’s name into a bag and walked out.

Ben’s bottle remained where he’d put it. What had just happened?

At the far end of the bathroom, a toilet flushed. From the stall stepped Tyler Easton, the mayoral aide from the Palace meeting. He adjusted his fly as he approached the sinks.

“How goes it, Detective?”

Ben was beyond confused. A few moments passed before he said, “Officer.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s Officer Hopkins.”

“For now, maybe.” Easton washed his hands, opened the door. “Amy.”

Ben’s stomach dropped. Valero was here to collar him. A thousand terrible questions passed in a second. How much time would he get and where he would serve it and how he would tell his mother and who would hire him when he got out and—

Amy Valero entered the bathroom, relocked the door. She bent low and scoped stalls for unauthorized feet. There were none.

Ben’s throat went desert-dry. His career was imploding in an industrial pisser.

“I’m told your time in Public Morals doesn’t count toward promotion,” Easton said. “Is that true?”

Ben swung to Valero. Her face was stone. Back to Easton. “Yeah, it’s a temporary assignment.”

Easton frowned. “Here you are, doing all this work, and when it’s all over, you go back into uniform. Doesn’t seem fair. That sound fair to you, Amy?”

Valero said nothing.

“Well, I don’t think it’s fair. And neither does the mayor. Unlike his predecessor—and despite what we’ve heard from the Mollen Commission—he is convinced the vast majority of officers are like you. Committed public servants dedicated to pulling this city out of the shitter.” Easton registered that they were surrounded by toilets. “So to speak.”

“And while the mayor will not abide criminal cops—” Ben’s stomach clenched tight “—he will reward those who go above and beyond. Men and women like you and Amy, risking your lives while the rest of us sleep. This case—your case—is very important to the mayor’s plans. You’re laying the foundation of a long-term project. If you succeed, I see great things in your future.”

Easton smiled with his eyes and Ben needed a shower.

“I’m told you made progress last night. Which I find surprising, considering you were off-duty. Now, I don’t know how Chief McManus would feel about you working on your own time, but the mayor respects initiative. And chiefs serve at the mayor’s discretion.”

Freddie.

Amy’s snitch had ratted him out. Ben flashed over to Valero, his executioner, her ax a jar of his ketamine-laced piss.

“If you continued employing your …” Easton searched for the words. “Unorthodox investigative methods, do you think the case would produce more indictments?”

Ben reran the question in his head. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Easton wanted Ben to get high. To get deep in the scene and lock up the world. Ben wondered if Valero was wired and Easton’s pitch a setup. But Ben had no options. A federal informant had claimed Ben was using. Corroboration came from his bladder. Ben was trapped.

“I think so.”

“Excellent,” Easton said. “Do you know what happens when a thug throws a rock at a window?”

Ben didn’t know if this was the setup to a bad joke.

“It breaks. And when the steward of that building doesn’t replace the glass, it conveys a tacit acceptance of disorder. The next day, another kid strolls along that same block. He sees the broken window, the rocks at his feet, and shatters another. The next day, another. Then another. No one stops them and the windows never get fixed. Before long, they’re all broken and everyone inside is freezing.

“If menial offenses are left unaddressed, citizens become conditioned to governmental failure. They expect serious ones will be likewise ignored. Misdemeanors lead to felonies, violence generates violence. The snowball rolls uphill. New York recorded 1,960 murders last year. This city has been covered in broken glass for far too long. Sweeping it up starts with you. The club scene is inherently criminal. Drugs. Prostitution. Vice. Operation Closing Time is a display of renewed will.”

Nearing his speech’s climax, Easton paused. “The mayor’s authorized me to grant you total operational freedom and guaranteed protection from any misguided oversight. And when the indictments come down—and I know they will—I suspect I’ll be congratulating Detective Bennett Hopkins.”

The shield dangled. In spite of the hellhole he’d dug himself, Ben felt a rush.

“Amy.” Easton dipped his head and started for the exit.

“What about my drug test?” Ben pointed to his bottled urine.

“What drug test?” Easton smiled, unlocked the door, and walked out.

Valero relocked the door. She picked Ben’s bottle of piss off the shelf, dropped it in her bag.

“I was hoping you were gonna dump that out.”

Valero was not in a joking mood. “There’ll be no more secrets between us. No more midnight trips to Red Hook, no getting high without me knowing about it. You’ll tell me everything. You’ll leave nothing and no one out. And you’re done typing. From now on, I write your buy reports. Push back on my rules, and your test goes public. You’ll be fired and indicted. But if you do what I say, and this clusterfuck of a case shakes out, we can forget today ever happened.”

You’ll leave no one out.

Hannah. A timeline formed: Freddie tipped Valero, Valero called Easton, Easton arranged the DOLE. She held Ben’s career in her purse. He wondered what Easton had promised her.

“Why’d you do this?”

“I don’t trust cops. You’ve proven my policy’s a smart one.”

Ben was so angry, he was shaking. He’d been told his whole life how smart he was. How far he’d go. The world had lied. Ben’s education began on the sixteenth floor of a Queens office block.

He gamed Valero’s angle. Before becoming mayor, Giuliani had served as the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He was politically ascendant and federally connected. Valero wanted out of the DEA. The Hoover Building called to her. Ben’s outlaw party attendance would facilitate the meeting.

“You sold me out for a spot in the FBI.”

“I told you, I’m here to make a case. And how dare you claim victimhood? You got high. You hit Freddie. You’re no victim. You’re just another bully with a badge.”

Valero opened the door and walked out.

A terrible thought crossed Ben’s mind.

Freddie McGee had to go.

Jimmy

Five hours out from its usual door time, Abattoir stood vacant. Giuliani had loaded the gun; the SLA pulled the trigger. Repair efforts had yielded zilch. Debra Shefflin refused fat envelopes. Harvey advocated legal action. Sue the SLA. They would win, Harvey said. He was confident.

Michelle said no.

Harvey came to Jimmy, pleading to be turned loose. He demanded filings and depositions. Michelle fought back, thinking of what he’d do to Jared Dodson’s friends. Visions of Samantha filled Jimmy’s head. In the end, he’d split his vote. Abattoir would take the hit while Harvey worked the press.

Three fucking weeks.

On his balcony perch, Jimmy lit a new smoke. He was still a little buzzed. Turns out Randy’s coke connection hustled top-notch product. It greased the gears in Jimmy’s head, widened his vision. Cocaine still made Jimmy fearless.

“She’s late,” Renzo called from the Keep. “And so’s Serge. Again. What’s up with that guy?”

Randy was behind schedule, too. Jimmy had dispatched him on a rapid refill mission hours ago. The Keep’s sofa made a terrible bed, and Jimmy needed a bump. He slid behind his desk.

“Serge doesn’t need motivational talks.”

“I was thinking more disciplinary.”

“He’s my man. I’ll handle him.”

Renzo cleaned his glasses with his T-shirt. He edited Abattoir’s numbers with impunity. Dirty cash flowed through Jimmy’s club. Jimmy foresaw indictments, IRS agents raiding the Keep.

The service door light flashed white. Renzo produced a small semi-auto, and he and Jimmy headed down. Renzo scoped the peephole, unbolted the door.

“Eva, Trey,” Jimmy said. “This is Renzo.”

Renzo crossed his arms across his broad chest.

“A pleasure,” Eva said. “Truly.”

Trey said nothing and Renzo mean-mugged him like a grade school bully. Jimmy popped his best closer smile and kissed Eva Gould on the cheek.

“Don’t go thinking this SLA situation gets you out of our contract.”

“Absolutely not. We’re committed to making Destination a regular event.”

“That’s what I wanna hear.”

Trey and Jimmy touched fists. Eva slid out of her leather trench, tossed it on the bar. Trey lit up a Philly blunt. Renzo rolled his shoulders. Jimmy sucked on his Camel.

Where the hell was Randy?

This was the first meeting between Jimmy’s new party and partner. Surprisingly, Renzo hadn’t expressed an opinion on Destination. Only that he wanted to meet Eva and Trey. Jimmy hoped this meant Renzo was amenable. He was about to find out.

Trey walked slowly across Abattoir’s floor. Jimmy felt his awe, knew what sparked it. Trey’s acts had never played a room like this.

“The state did you raw,” he said.

“Comes with the business,” Jimmy said. “But in a way it’s a blessing. We’re using the ruling for promotion. Destination: the party the mayor doesn’t want you to have.”

“Leaning into it,” Eva said.

“Makes this shit feel illicit,” Trey said.

Renzo pulled a bottle of Stoli from the bar. He swigged from it direct.

“Harvey’s going to hammer the mayor, talk about how he’s got it out for Abattoir ’cause we’re throwing a party catering to Blacks. We’re a victim of racism, pure and simple.”

“Says the white guy living in an East Side high-rise,” Trey said.

“Tell me again where you went to high school,” Jimmy said.

Trey smiled, and Jimmy smiled. Trey’s hand stroked Eva’s stockinged thigh. Renzo downed another pull. Jimmy felt his aggro building.

“What’s capacity?” Trey asked.

“Thirty-three,” Jimmy said.

“Three thousand two hundred,” Renzo said while eyeing Jimmy. “And eighty-two.”

“Will she fit four?” Trey asked.

Jimmy scratched his neck. The FDNY occupancy cert was a guideline; Abattoir went over regularly. But pulling four thousand patrons on opening night of an untested party in a niche genre was the stuff of fantasy. Those numbers would rock the industry.

“She’ll hold ’em,” Jimmy said, “provided you bring ’em.”

“You let me worry about that,” Trey said.

Trey’s overconfidence reminded Jimmy of when he marched into The World and told Steven Venizelos he wanted Tuesday nights. Tuesdays? Steven had said, nobody goes out on a Tuesday. Jimmy promised that if he didn’t fill the room he’d pay the shortfall personally. He had $300 in the bank.

Natural Born Thrillers ran for eight months.

The World turned people away.

The party made Jimmy’s name.

Three years ago, Steven was found dead in The World’s audio closet. Shot twice in the face. His killer was never found. The party ends sooner than you think.

Eva side-eyed Renzo. The goon unsettled even her. “Good thing I didn’t take this to Luc.”

“How’s your fire system?” Trey looked up. Abattoir’s ceiling hung so high it was invisible. “I don’t want Destination turnin’ into Happy Land.”

Fire was every club owner’s worst nightmare. The one in the unlicensed Bronx nightspot had killed eighty-seven. Sanctuary could’ve topped it, but Luc got lucky. Renzo’s hit still rankled. Jimmy had approved retaliation, not a firebombing. Thank God the only casualty was the kid in a coma. But that was on Renzo. Jimmy’s hands were clean. Hands. Watch. Jimmy checked the time. Randy should’ve been back by now.

Serge entered hot through the service door.

“And here I was starting to think you’d quit,” Eva said.

Serge ignored her, lit a smoke. His face was death-mask pale. He tapped his watch face with a finger. His tense vibe raised Jimmy up.

“Hey,” Trey said, “you got any friendlies in the NYPD?”

“Me and the law aren’t exactly on speaking terms. Why?”

“Word is there’s they got some special detective surveilling my acts.”

“Giuliani wants the city to fear the movement,” Eva said.

Renzo laughed.

“I say something funny?” Eva said.

“If you don’t know, I’m not gonna tell you.” Renzo strolled closer. “It’s good you’re here. I wanted everybody to hear this at the same time. Destination’s not happening. Not at Abattoir, at least. You can take your thuggery to Sanctuary, Coliseum. But it ain’t gonna play here.”

Jimmy’s cigarette fell to the floor. “Renzo, no, that’s …”

“I’ve got paper with Jimmy,” Eva said.

“Exactly,” Renzo said. “You made a deal with Jimmy. Not me or the interests I represent. And those interests have been—since this club’s inception—Abattoir’s partners. And we have been silent for too long. Jimmy needs creative input from a fresh set of eyes. Abattoir’s not the right home for your party.”

Jimmy’s world went red. In all his years in the business, no one had ever told him how to run his nights.

“I decide who plays my venue. I’m Abattoir’s owner.”

“Are you?” Renzo said. “Or should we get Michelle in here?”

Renzo winked and Jimmy nearly puked.

“Jimmy, are you serious with this guy?” Eva asked.

Again Serge touched his watch. Trey hissed angry air through gritted teeth. Jimmy couldn’t think of a way to convince Renzo Scalesi that he was still in charge. Probably because he wasn’t.

Renzo clapped his massive hands. “Now that that’s taken care of, I’m gonna hit the gym. Chest and bis, always a burner.” He strolled out Abattoir’s front door whistling.

Eva slammed a booted foot against the floor. “What the fuck was that?”

“I …”

“We have a contract.”

“I know. Don’t worry, I’ll fix it.”

Jimmy’s head swam. He needed a hit. His eyes settled on Serge and Jimmy realized Renzo had kneecapped him and his partner had done nothing.

Eva started putting on her coat. “Set this right, Jimmy, or I’m dragging you and your pederast lawyer into court.” She walked out the service door, angrier than ever.

Trey stepped close to Jimmy. “Your man’s got issues.”

“He’s not my man.”

“He just claimed otherwise. Look, I got partners of my own, and if you don’t set this right, they will. You get me?”

“Your people will handle Renzo?”

Trey’s face became grim. “You signed the deal, Jimmy. He’s your mess. Not ours.”

In the silence Jimmy heard his own heart beating. Trey walked out. Serge rebolted the service entrance, spun to Jimmy.

“Someone slipped this under the door.”

He handed Jimmy a Polaroid. A flash-lit shot of Randy. Mouth taped shut. Wrists tied to a chair. Rings torn from his eyebrow. His eyes purpled, his nose bent. Blood on his shirt. The kid looked scared beyond words. The morning’s Post lay on his lap.

A message was scrawled along the photo’s bottom.

Lets talk.

Serge

“Whatever this is,” Jimmy said, “Renzo’s to be kept out of it.”

“It’s an abduction. How long you think we can keep that quiet?”

Serge leaped over a puddle that stunk like piss. He and Jimmy double-timed it down Twenty-Eighth Street. The nearest reliable pay phone stood two avenues east. Jimmy scoped every car that passed. He’d gone full paranoid. Serge couldn’t blame him.

“How’d they get Randy, anyway?”

“I don’t know.” Jimmy’s jaw quivered.

An anxious hand jingled the coins in Serge’s pocket, Randy’s lifeline in quarters. A jackhammer started firing. A work crew was demolishing an old warehouse. Artist renderings advertised new condos. Serge slowed to clock the permit bolted to the fencing: The Sherman Group. Jimmy kept on, head down, moving fast.

Serge hurried to catch up. “Did you see that coming? Renzo, I mean.”

Again Jimmy shook his head. He’d been sideswiped. Renzo was a problem begging for a solution. But Serge had questions that needed answering first.

He stopped walking. “Why aren’t you fighting the liquor authority?”

Jimmy stopped, turned around. “Not now.”

“Answer me or make the call yourself.”

The jackhammer thumped in the distance. A nodding junkie sprawled on the sidewalk. A dirty spike poked out of her forearm. Crosstown traffic rolled slowly down Twenty-Eighth.

“It was my idea. Me and Michelle’s.”

Translation: Michelle told me what to do.

“But something Trey just said gave me an idea,” Jimmy continued. “We eliminate Mike, and Luc’s no longer a problem. Trey’s talent is criminal-adjacent. I’m giving Destination a home. Their success depends on Abattoir’s health.”

“Renzo just said we’re not hosting Destination.”

“Fuck Renzo. This is my club.”

Now Jimmy talked big. Now he played the heavy. But when Renzo issued orders, Jimmy had cowered. Eliminating him would fall to Serge. That kind of work always did.

Daro Xhaxhka. Wheat.

“Trey’s people can handle Mike,” Jimmy continued.

“You know this for a fact?”

“I know everybody’s got a number. All we gotta do is hit it.”

Jimmy’s tone revealed doubt, and Jimmy rarely doubted anything that came out of his mouth. Abattoir was in a bad way.

“Okay,” Serge said, “that takes care of Mike and Luc. How do we deal with Renzo?”

Jimmy wiped his forehead. Temps in the low forties, and he looked like he’d just stepped from a sauna.

“That’s a bigger problem. We can’t just kill him. Bates would burn us to the ground. Cutting him out means getting creative.”

An idea had come to Serge after his ferry meeting with Pete Cobb. Serge needed Cobb to keep feeding him information. Cobb needed to cement his task force spot. Abattoir needed to purge Renzo Scalesi. There was a way everybody won.

Except Renzo.

“Let’s go make the call,” Serge said,

Serge wore gloves when handling the payphone. He feared disease more than cop forensics. The corner of Twenty-Eighth and Tenth, Jimmy on high alert. Locals trolled the corner deli. On the back of Randy’s proof of life Polaroid was a number. Serge dialed it and waited.

“Speak.” Traffic in the background; a pay phone.

“I’m calling about my friend,” Serge said. “I was told he’s there.”

Jimmy moved in close. Serge angled the receiver so they could both listen.

“You are the Greek. The message was not for you.”

Serge offered Jimmy the phone. Jimmy shook his head and pointed at Serge.

“I speak for my partner,” Serge said.

“He is your employer, not your partner. Do not let yourself think otherwise.”

The voice was Russian-tinged and butter-smooth. No hate in it, no theatrics. He might have been ordering a taxi. Considering the nature of the call, Serge judged its owner either professional or unhinged. A train roared in the background. The Russian waited for it to pass.

“Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in one hour. There we will discuss the terms of our merger and employee repatriation.”

The line went dead. Jimmy and Serge had misread Luc’s play. The drug sales weren’t intended to shut the club down. They were the first shots in an acquisition.

Abattoir had been targeted for takeover.

Jimmy

The usual cast filled the giant church. Sightseers foreign and domestic, the hungry homeless and batshit crazy, loners in need of guidance, capitalists seeking salvation. Jimmy put the place at one-eighth capacity. He had a gift for estimating crowd sizes.

Saint Patrick’s was Roman Catholic gaudy and gothic. Outsiders thought it was the city’s church, a misconception fueled by television news. Municipal funerals shut down Fifth Avenue. Popes spoke here. Truth was, Saint Pat’s lacked a congregation. The landmark sat dead center in Midtown, surrounded by office towers and hotels. Across the street was Rockefeller Center, the statue of Atlas holding the world on his shoulders.

Jimmy knew the feeling.

Serge and Jimmy headed down the nave. Worshippers sat scattered in pews. At the transept, Serge dropped to one knee and crossed himself. Jimmy hesitated. The Lettners had practiced Catholicism going back to the Ruhr, but Jimmy was the family’s first atheist—until Samantha made him a believer in an afterlife. She came to him now, the portrait Michelle had chosen for her funeral: eyes camera-right, bright smile. The image of Jimmy’s girl was cracked and fading. Less and less of her, every time.

Jimmy kneeled, touched his forehead, chest, shoulders.

“There,” Serge said.

In a pew off the Fifty-First Street entrance sat a small man with white hair and hard, Slavic features. He wore a gray wool coat and black leather gloves. His eyes were closed, and his lips were moving. Next to Mike sat Luc, a black hood draped over his head. Manhattan monk chic. Luc raised a hand, waved with his fingers. Four rows back sat the gun thugs from the Sanctuary meeting.

“You ready?”

Jimmy wasn’t. Renzo deposing his kingship, Luc abducting his men, the law on Abattoir’s floor. He needed more coke. Blow armored him against the world.

“Yeah.”

Jimmy slid across the pew. Serge took the row in front, angled himself toward Mike’s security. At least three men had carried steel into God’s house.

“Hello, James.”

Jimmy ignored Luc, focused on Mike. His face was lined and his nose had been broken, but he was physically unimposing, more old man waiting at the pharmacy than drug kingpin. Jimmy reminded himself not to judge on appearances; if he didn’t own Abattoir, he’d never get in.

“I wasn’t sure you would come.”

“You’ve got my man. You couldn’t keep me from this place if you tried.”

“That is not what I hear. I hear you hide in your office, afraid to face the world.” Mike’s accent tipped Russian origins. It complicated negotiation. Newcomers rarely respected local rules.

“Don’t believe everything you read.”

“I did not read this. Randy told me. After he stopped choking on his own blood.”

Luc giggled.

To him, Jimmy said, “You’re going to ruin us both.”

“I did not start this.”

Serge coughed, resettled in his pew.

“Marx wrote that religion is the opium of the people,” Mike said. “After the revolution, Soviet premiers feared any organization which owed allegiance to foreign leaders. To combat this perceived threat, a number of church-owned properties were absorbed by the state. Some were turned into prisons. The one at the former Solovetsky Monastery became the blueprint for the Gulag. You have read Solzhenitsyn?”

“I don’t know who that is.”

Mike sighed. “When they came for me, I was sent first to a nunnery. I slept in a cell so narrow I could touch both walls at the same time. Days passed. Perhaps weeks. When you are in a place like that, you expect the torture to be exotic. Inventive. The state, you see, had created in me this expectation of fantastic terror. My fear was unfounded because their methods were simple.

“They broke my hands with a hammer. The right first, because that is my dominant. When I was healed enough to hold a spoon, they broke the left. I had already confessed.”

Mike looked down at the gloved hands in his lap as if they were not his. As if they had been issued to the wrong man and could not be returned.

“You were a political prisoner?”

“I was a simple criminal, like you. But there was no crime in the Soviet system. A problem, yes?”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“So you know with whom you are dealing. I was imprisoned seven years for a bag of opium. You possessed enough cocaine to fuel a baseball team and can still sign your name.” Mike faced Jimmy. “This country has softened you. That is why you will accept my offer. You will sell Abattoir to Luc. We will allow you to remain as general manager. For continuity. This is my proposal. I will not hear a counter.”

Luc smiled. His gums were covered in blood.

Mike’s offer was demotion, his business plan a hijacking. He and Luc aimed to steal Jimmy’s legacy. Jimmy glanced at the altar, the stained glass, the saints in stone. Christ on the cross.

“You took Randy as leverage.”

“I prefer collateral. And I did not take your man. You sent him. His cocaine source works for me. You’ve been inhaling my product and paying me for the honor.”

A chill wind blew through the church and a hundred candle flames fluttered. Jimmy’s stomach caved. Randy’s coke connect worked for Mike. Jimmy’s addiction had sat Randy in front of that Polaroid. He gripped the pew bench tight. It was the only way he could stay upright.

“I have been wondering, what did your daughter think of me? A lovely girl, your Christi. A shame you have only the one.”

First Randy, now Christi. This was too much. In this shrine to a God Jimmy didn’t believe in, he realized he could take a life. Images flashed. Jimmy’s hands on Mike’s throat. Mike’s eyes bulging. Panic. Fear. Life running out of Mike slow and Jimmy enjoying the ride.

“You will enjoy working for me, James,” Luc said.

Jimmy touched his forehead. His fall was preordained. It began on the BQE, him jumping in with Serge last minute. That cop dog brought him Frank Bates, Renzo Scalesi, Luc Delacroix, and Mike Whateverthefuckhisnamewas.

One way out.

“You seem troubled,” Mike said.

“I’m thinking about how I’m going to kill you.”

Mike cupped an ear. “What was that?”

“I said, I am going to kill you. All of you.”

“No. You’re not.” Mike indicated Serge with his eyes. “He might, though. The fire is in him. Your people, where are they from?”

Serge said nothing.

“You’ve trained him well,” Mike said to Jimmy. Back to Serge. “Where we come from shapes us. You know the struggle. This city has seeded desire in you. Taught you only success matters. Whatever the method, no matter the cost. I have learned it also. It is why we are here, now, in this place.”

A tour group shuffled past. A flashbulb fired and its owner was spoken to by a guard.

“How do I get Randy back?”

“Agree to my terms.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then your man dies. And he will not be the last. Luc is still distraught by what you did to his boy.”

Luc wiped an invisible tear from his eye.

“He has begged me to kill you,” Mike said. “Begged.”

“Then why haven’t you?”

“You cannot sell me your club if you are dead. At the same time, I won’t have you as competition. If you do not sell, I will drench Abattoir in blood. I will give this city all it needs to shutter you.”

Green Haven had reformed Jimmy. He had run a clean club. But as Jimmy sat among pillars of stone and carvings of saints, clarity struck. The life would never let him go.

With a gloved hand Mike indicated the ceiling. “They carved these flowers by hand, you know. The Gardens of Heaven. Each is distinct, the product of a single craftsman in the days before power tools. The discipline needed awes me.

“This was built by a people in ascendence. But they are dead, and you are an infant splashing in their afterbirth. You think you have struggled. That you have suffered. These notions are not your fault. You have been deluded by places like these into thinking you are their inheritor by right. But I tell you this: It is not about rights, and we are owed nothing.”

Mike shifted on the bench and winced. “Sell me your club and I return your man alive. If I do not hear from you by the time Abattoir reopens, I will take another. Then another. Eventually, I will run out of employees.”

Implication: Hold out long enough, and Mike would go after Jimmy’s family.

“Why are you doing this?” The question made Jimmy sound weak. He didn’t care. He needed to know.

“You are not the only man with loved ones.” Mike rose and slid out of the pew.

“Adieu, James.” Luc and his roughnecks followed Mike out the Fifty-First Street exit.

“What’s our move?” Serge asked.

Jimmy didn’t know. Luc backed by a proper hood. Frank Bates entrenched in Abattoir. Drugs flooding Jimmy’s floor. Cops in the club. Abattoir marked by the mayor.

For the first time in his life, Jimmy prayed.

Michelle

“Are you and Dad getting divorced?”

The question threw Michelle. Christi had fired it off so casually.

“No. No, of course not.”

Michelle didn’t say that her marriage was complex. That it involved felony convictions and tax filings and EBITDA. She didn’t mention the armed man Jimmy had posted outside their building. A man put there by Jimmy’s failings.

Headphones hung around Christi’s neck. Because of Jimmy she had missed parties and school trips. Heather Branley had scored four tickets to the Woodstock anniversary concert. Christi begged and pleaded and cried, but Michelle said no. The Walkman appeared the next day.

“This is the longest he hasn’t been home, since, you know.”

Christi was thirteen when Jimmy got arrested. Years that should have been wondrous and awkward Christi instead spent in stunned numbness. Sam went the other way. She experimented. She raged. She died.

“It’s temporary, honey. Abattoir’s popular, and success breeds envy. There are people who want what we have but go about it wrong.” Michelle had told her the stranger outside Ashford-Rand was a business rival of Jimmy’s and she wasn’t in any danger. If only.

“Is Dad dealing drugs again?”

The constant, dull ache in Michelle’s gut flared. These were questions Michelle would rather not answer.

“That’s behind him.”

“So him sleeping at work, the guy who stopped us outside my school, security following me wherever I go. That’s all because of the club.”

“The business can be rough.”

“And Jared Dodson has nothing to do with it?”

Michelle rearranged Chinese food boxes. She had tried to keep Dodson from Christi. Michelle had thrown out the papers, avoided the TV news, but Jimmy had turned the Liquor Authority’s punishment into a marketing ploy. Harvey railed against government overreach. The tabloids ate it up. No matter how hard Michelle tried, she couldn’t keep the world from her daughter.

“That boy’s death is a tragedy. But it has nothing to do with us.”

That boy.

“The papers say he bought his drugs at Abattoir.”

“The papers don’t always get it right.”

That boy.

A long silence.

That boy.

“Would you say that if we were talking about Sam?”

Pressure lodged in Michelle’s throat. The sadness lingered there, pulsating, before Michelle finally forced it back down.

The investigation had indicated Sam had been doing the speed limit. Then came the whispers. A cop’s wife claimed the report had been edited; Sam’s Integra had been pushing triple digits in a fifty-five. A lack of skid marks indicated a lack of braking; the Acura had nailed the tree dead center. She wasn’t wearing her seat belt; Sam was thrown forty feet. Sam was intoxicated. Sam was depressed.

Michelle refused to entertain the word suicide. It simply did not exist. Because if it did, the line from it to Sam to Jimmy ran through Michelle.

“Yes,” Michelle said. “Absolutely.”

An Andres Serrano original hung on the wall. Eight chairs surrounded the marble-topped tables, but the Lettners only ever needed two. The ticking of a George Nelson grandfather clock provided the only noise in the condo. They lived too high to hear the horns and sirens and garbage trucks and shouts that soundtracked city life.

“Your father loves you more than you can imagine. He just has a lot going on right now.”

“And we don’t?” Christi wasn’t wrong. Abattoir’s storm blanketed them all.

Another long silence passed.

“He should eat here,” Christi said. “With us. My father would do that.”

The request floored Michelle. Christi had ignored Jimmy since Sam’s death. She couldn’t unpack why her father had pled guilty. He was a nightclub owner, not a drug dealer, right?

Right?

Right.

The lie disgusted Michelle. Jimmy went away for three years to save Serge a decade. It painted Jimmy a righteous hero protecting his friend. He hoped his girls would appreciate his nobility. They didn’t. Sam denied him, Christi retreated. But time passes, and inside every daughter lives a girl who just wants her dad.

“Don’t you think?” Christi said.

“I do.”

Christi pulled the headphones from her neck, set the Walkman aside. “Where’d the rangoon go?”

Michelle handed the box to Christi. Something real and loving swelled in her heart. They had lost so much and Michelle would always miss Samantha, more than Jimmy or Christi would ever know. But for the first time in years, and despite Abattoir’s situation, Michelle felt something close to hope. Children could break any wall.

“What’s wrong with your face?” Christi asked.

Michelle wiped her mouth with her hand. “What?”

“You were smiling. I was afraid you were having a stroke.”

An unfamiliar lightness settled over Michelle. An old saying floated to her, something about this not being the beginning of the end, but maybe the end of the beginning. The Lettners’ story would go on. Michelle would go on.

The phone rang. Christi grabbed it. “Hello? Yeah, she’s right here.” She pressed the receiver to her chest. “Ted Holland?”

The city crushed dreams daily.

Michelle took the phone. “Ted, great to hear from you.”

“Sorry to call so late, Michelle. I didn’t want to put this off any longer.” In the background was piano music, the muffled sounds of a crowd. Mike was at dinner. This call was an afterthought. The Sherman Group was passing.

“No problem. What can I do for you?”

“Your attorney’s been very active in the press.”

“We’ve been wronged by an overly aggressive administration.”

“Perhaps.”

Michelle coiled the phone cord around her finger. A holdover habit from her teen years. “Mike, I’m having dinner with my daughter. And it sounds like you’re busy yourself.”

“We like the numbers and your vision. And you, it’s important you know that. But you’re tied to your husband. And his reputation’s a problem for us.”

The tip of Michelle’s finger grew white. “Jimmy won’t be listed as a company officer. He’s essentially an employee.”

“But he’ll be there.”

“Of course. I can’t do it without him.” And Jimmy couldn’t do it without Michelle. They were a team, no matter how much it hurt to admit.

“I’m sorry, then, Michelle. We have to pass. The attention generated by Mr. Cohen is making my colleagues uncomfortable. It doesn’t align with the Sherman Group’s strategic goals. If you restructure your operation, let us know.”

Holland hung up. Christi entered the kitchen and refilled her glass from the tap.

“Of course, Ted. I’d be happy to get those numbers to you. I appreciate you reaching out.” Michelle hung the receiver on its cradle.

“Who was that?”

“A buyer I’m working with.” Michelle pulled a bottle of merlot and poured herself a glass. Harvey’s rants had scared Holland off. Harvey operated with Jimmy’s permission. Had Jimmy known about Michelle’s plans and Expanse, this might not have happened.

This wasn’t Michelle’s first brush with unintended consequences.

Jimmy

Jimmy and Serge sat alone in the Keep. Staff had been furloughed, three-week unpaid vacations courtesy of Rudy Giuliani. Even the mob had vacated Abattoir; Renzo flew south with Stoney and was occupying a pool-side lounger at the Delano.

Three days since Saint Pat’s. Jimmy’s coke had run out. His phone stopped ringing. Club kids moved on. Abattoir DJs spun in other venues. Eva invoked force majeure; nothing personal, just business. Randy still a hostage, no contact from Luc or Mike.

It was all falling apart.

Stubble covered Jimmy’s face. Blankets lay unmade on his sofa. He hadn’t showered in … how long? He was running out of clothes. In Jimmy’s desk lay a Smith & Wesson Model 442. It had cost $600. The serial number was scratched out. Serge told him not to worry about it.

“You could sell.” Serge sat near the cash counters. Jimmy wondered if he’d ever feed them again.

“Absolutely not.”

“I don’t see how else we get him back.”

Neither spoke for a time. Jimmy kept circling an ugly thought. “Would you let Randy go? If you were Mike, and I gave up Abattoir, do you send Randy back?”

“No. Would you?”

“No.”

Reality, then. Randy was dead.

Jimmy had so far managed to keep the abduction quiet. Helped that Abattoir’s crew had dispersed. Elise had inquired, though. Said Randy wasn’t answering his phone, asked if he had picked up his paycheck. Jimmy said he had forwarded it to Randy’s parents outside Tallahassee. That Randy was using the shutdown to reconnect with his folks. One more lie tossed on the fire.

Even when Jimmy was honest, the truth failed him. T-Roc and Randy played chess daily. T-Roc had taken the kid to his first Knicks game. The scene spawned unlikely friendships. Jimmy had tried using Randy’s abduction to guilt T-Roc into action. The plan didn’t work.

“You need to know what’s happened,” Jimmy had said.

T-Roc held up a hand. “Don’t do this to me, Jimmy. You confirm what I’m thinking, you’re gonna compel me to actions I’ll regret. I care about that boy, Jimmy. I do. But he’s not blood, and I can’t get down like I used to. I got worries of my own.”

“But he’s your friend.”

“And that’s why I can’t get involved. I was a violent man. Did terrible things. I get emotional, I’m liable to regress, and that won’t do. I’ll keep watch on Michelle and Christi, handle my responsibilities to the club like always. But that’s where my involvement ends. You need someone to put in work, you got to go elsewhere.”

Jimmy had expected obedience. But T-Roc was also a man with a family and a life outside Abattoir. Jimmy hadn’t considered that possibility because Jimmy’s life was Abattoir.

Why was this happening?

Jimmy ran scenarios, processed possibilities. His undrugged brain moved slow.

Christ, he needed to get high.

Across the Keep, Serge stared at Randy’s abduction Polaroid.

“I could go to the cops,” Jimmy said.

Serge looked up, stunned by the suggestion.

“Cooperate, like Harvey suggested. I could tell them about Randy, how Luc and Mike are selling in Abattoir. I could open our books, give them Renzo. He’s a made man, the feds would go nuts.”

“Do you hear yourself right now?” Serge stood and crossed to Jimmy’s desk. “You give up Renzo, you’re giving up me.”

Jimmy couldn’t process what Serge was saying. His thoughts wouldn’t connect.

“I was in Sanctuary when Renzo immolated Rene. I left with him and Stoney. Conversations were had. The feds’ll charge me as a co-conspirator. Shit, they’ll charge you. What the fuck are you thinking?”

“Watch your mouth. I’m still in charge here.”

“Maybe that’s our problem.” Serge set his fists on his hips and turned away.

Jimmy came around his desk and got in Serge’s face. “When I found you, you were pitching twenties of coke out of dive bar bathrooms. I brought you into the industry. Showed you my world. Without me you’d still be one more small-time hustler.”

“That the story you tell yourself?”

“It’s not a story if it’s true. You’d still be sucking cock for drink tickets if not for me.”

Serge made a fist and drew it back and Jimmy threw his hands up and thought for sure his best friend—his only friend?—was going to hit him. But Serge’s fist just hung there, trembling.

Then it fell away.

“Daro Xhaxhka.”

Jimmy blinked.

“You really don’t remember. Summer of ’85, John Argento had just given us Fridays at Danceteria and we had just started moving powder off the scale. I bought the first new car I’d ever owned.”

A memory clicked. “That Pontiac Fiero. It was red.”

Serge nodded.

“I loved that car,” Jimmy said.

“You were pressed by an Albanian who wanted our night and our coke source.”

“Daro Xhaxhka.” Homemade haircut, twisted nose, too much jewelry. “I thought he was Czech.”

“He was Albanian.”

“You sure?”

“I remember. Because I killed him.”

Jimmy’s legs vanished. Unsteady hands found a chair, Jimmy settled into it. “You never told me that.”

“You were blasted on powder, night and day. It was better you thought he just, I don’t know … gave up.”

Jimmy had no words. Serge went to Jimmy’s personal bar. He filled two tumblers with Bushmills, brought them over. He handed one to Jimmy, sat across from him. Jimmy drank but tasted nothing. Liquor had lost its fire.

“You wanted this place so badly,” Serge said. “Even then, you had the vision. You talked how we were gonna be partners. But I didn’t have your talent, so I had to contribute in other ways. I only know how to do one thing, and what I do costs. I paid, Jimmy. I paid big.”

Serge studied his whiskey. Jimmy wondered what he saw in it.

“Why did you have to kill him?”

“Because you asked.”

Jimmy finished his whiskey in a gulp.

“Make him go away, you said. What’d you think that meant in our world? He had to die, and I killed him. I killed him and hacked off his hands and buried his body. And when he stopped coming around, you never asked what happened. Because you knew. You’ve always known. I do what you can’t. Without me, Abattoir wouldn’t exist. And if Abattoir didn’t exist …” Serge took another drink.

Serge’s confession reframed Jimmy’s libertine past. It backdated his criminality, amplified misdeeds. He was a decent man who’d gone straight. He ran a clean club. He was a good father.

Wasn’t he?

No. Jimmy was a murderer.

The red leather chair enveloped Jimmy. He felt very small.

“We’re dirty, Jimmy. We’ve always been dirty. The difference between us is I know what I am. You’re living a fantasy.”

Serge spoke softly and slowly. Every word cut. Jimmy lied to everyone, himself above all.

But Jimmy wasn’t the only liar in the Keep.

“You killed Wheat.”

Serge’s silence was all the confession Jimmy needed. The men who’d built Abattoir, chained to each other by their past. Jimmy pondered his sins. The lies he’d spun to Michelle. To Samantha. Jimmy pled guilty to save Serge. Jimmy would never use again. Jimmy was a businessman. Jimmy was a saint.

Jimmy was a liar.

He’d long suspected Serge had offed the Lithuanian. That’s why Jimmy had taken ownership of the cocaine and pled guilty. If a judge hit Serge with the statutory max, he might have flipped. All these years Jimmy was only protecting himself.

“Why?”

A long quiet passed.

“He had an open case. If Wheat got locked up again, he would have talked. Giuliani’s right about Abattoir being an open-air drug market. You’re brilliant but blind, Jimmy. You avoid the bathrooms and ignore the kids rolling on ecstasy or tripping on ketamine. And I get it. I would, too, if I lost—”

Sam in black and white. Her as a baby, the photo taken with Michelle’s father’s Canon. Jimmy struggled with the focus. Serge gave him time to recompose.

“Wheat was a threat, and you didn’t need to know.”

Jimmy replayed that night in his head, acted Serge’s role. Wheat caught pitching on-premises. Previously denied and permanently expelled. An example had to be made. Serge was right. But the order should have come from him.

Full measures, always. Serge’s mantra.

“You always told me I’m too soft.”

“This club’s all I got.” Serge’s voice cracked.

Everything came down to Abattoir. Details, Vanity Fair, and The New Yorker ran long-form pieces. It would be remembered long after Jimmy was gone. Jimmy could not change the past. But the future …

Jimmy dialed his phone. She picked up on the first ring.

“Eva Gould.”

“Eva, it’s Jimmy. Don’t hang up.”

“You better be calling to tell me Destination’s good to go.”

“I need Trey’s number.”

“No way. He’s my client, you go through me.”

“Eva—” This conversation leaned felonious. Feds were working Abattoir. Fearing a wiretap, Jimmy invoked Frank Batesian double-speak. “I need to amend our contract, ASAP. It’s heavy work and time sensitive, but a lot more money. If he agrees, it’ll guarantee Abattoir’s existence. Do you get what I’m saying?” He hoped his tone conveyed a seriousness words couldn’t.

Jimmy heard the sharp click and hiss of a cigarette lighter. “I’ll make the call.” Eva hung up.

Jimmy should have done this days ago. But yesterday Jimmy was a reformed felon. Today he was a murderer. Self-knowledge freed him.

“How do we find Mike?”

“I been thinking about that. He gave Wheat a beeper. This number paged it a bunch.” Serge tapped the digits on the back of the Randy Polaroid. “It’s a pay phone in Brighton Beach.”

“Okay. But there’s a million Russians in Brooklyn.”

“The phone’s on the same block as the Little Odessa Car Service.”

“Michelle said the car Mike drove had TLC plates.”

“She thought he was a lost cabbie.”

“We can find him.”

“And if we can find him,” Serge said, “we can kill him.”

Serge

Ten days since Randy’s abduction. No new photos. He was alive, he was dead. Schrödinger’s hostage.

Brighton Beach Avenue between Brighton Fourth and Fifth Streets. Little Odessa. Serge sat in his Lexus SC. Blackout tints hid him from the world. Hunched women lugged groceries. The Q train rumbled overhead. A good sign; an El had backgrounded Randy’s ransom call.

Midblock sat a livery cab dispatch station, signage in Cyrillic. Serge brought up his Radio Shack binos. Behind the cloudy glass an old man sat behind a microphone. The frontage was narrow, but commercial storefronts ran deep. Cab stands had break rooms and clerical offices. Some ran numbers, others, drugs.

This one held a Russian who needed killing.

Serge had sat on Little Odessa Car Service for six days. OC goons came and went. None touched the pay phone. Instinct told Serge Mike was holed up here like Jimmy in Abattoir. A battle of wills. Whoever won, Randy would lose. If he hadn’t already.

Serge knew he should feel rage, guilt, something for the kid. But he didn’t. He had more pressing concerns. In Spoons’s apartment was six figures’ worth of ecstasy. Drugs Serge couldn’t sell, bought with money he didn’t have. Avi’s suppliers still wanted to meet. Avi had been paging Serge. Serge did not return the calls.

Serge’s beeper buzzed. The Keep, plus 911. Serge fired up his engine. He found a pay phone in a Gulf station on Coney Island Avenue.

“I need you here. Now.”

Serge ran to his car.

He left the receiver swinging.

Turned out Mike lacked patience.

Someone had buzzed the service entrance. By the time Jimmy opened the door, Randy’s body lay on the sidewalk. Jimmy had dragged the corpse inside, called Serge. Now Randy lay on Abattoir’s dance floor, arms spread like Christ’s. A small, dark hole sat in the center of his chest. His eyes were open, his face battered. Serge caught Wheat flashbacks but no nausea. He didn’t know what that revealed about him.

“You toss him?”

Jimmy didn’t answer. His face read stunned. Jimmy was cracking. He had grown up shy. Clubland success gave him a backbone, prison tore it out. Jimmy used to talk how cocaine made him fearless. Serge needed that Jimmy here, now. Trey was inbound with muscle. Jimmy needed to bury Renzo Scalesi. Earlier, he’d pitched Trey on how maintaining Abattoir’s independence served them both. Trey was dubious, but Jimmy had given a vintage performance. He was undeniable. But that was before Mike had delivered them Randy’s corpse. Serge pressed Avi’s coke into Jimmy’s hand.

In case of emergency, break glass, snort blow.

“Serge, I don’t—”

“No more lies.” Except the one about Serge dealing E by the pallet.

“But Samantha …” Jimmy’s voice trembled.

Serge grabbed him by the shoulders. “We got a dead man on our dance floor. I need you clear-headed and cold-hearted. You wanna save your club? Do the fucking coke.”

Jimmy didn’t need to be told twice. He dumped the powder on the bar, cut lines with his Amex card. He blasted four long rails. He spun to Serge lit like Times Square.

“What do we do first?”

“Get a fucking mop.”

Trey was ninety minutes late. Randy lay in Abattoir’s basement. Jimmy walked a marathon around the dance floor. He’d called Eva a dozen times, got her machine. Beeped her two dozen, got no response.

The phone behind the bar finally rang. Jimmy answered on speaker.

“Trey?”

“This ain’t Trey.”

A new voice. A bad sign.

“I was supposed to have a meeting with Trey and his associates, and—”

“Trey ain’t authorized to book those kinds of meetings. He’s been advised and disciplined.”

Jimmy’s fingers squeezed the receiver. “Listen, that’s not his fault. I should have asked to deal with you direct. In fact, we should get together, I’ve got a situation that needs—”

“Here’s the deal. You signed a contract and you’re gonna honor it. I don’t care what that requires on your end. But we will not be involved. You have yourself a good day.”

The line went dead.

And with it, Serge’s hopes of someone else killing Renzo Scalesi.

Three AM, Sullivan County. Traffic nonexistent. The drive north took hours. Serge paid tolls in cash and did the speed limit throughout. Pavement yielded to gravel that degraded to dirt. Late-winter upstate woods were bare and bleak. The moon shone bright.

Serge found the spot and killed the engine. He and Jimmy hauled Randy from the trunk. Bodies were uncooperative and hard to move. They’d wrapped Randy in a painter’s tarp and an area rug Serge had pulled from storage. They carried him overland, Serge at the head, Jimmy the feet. It was tough work. Jimmy fell twice. When Serge thought they were safe, they stopped. They listened. Then they dug.

Serge broke topsoil with an icepick, Jimmy shoveled dirt with a bucket. Both wore dishwashing gloves. Abattoir provided disposal supplies. The hole wasn’t deep, but digging it took a long time. When it was finished, they shoved Randy in. It was unceremonious and crude. Randy’s head poked half out of the rug. His eyes were still open. Serge’s nightmare roster grew by one.

They covered Randy in dirt, covered the dirt with rocks and broken branches. Serge swept his feet over the ground and stepped back. The patch looked normal enough. Like it didn’t hold the body of a boy killed young. Serge and Jimmy returned to the Lexus.

Serge dumped their tools across a series of rural dumpsters. He got back on I-87 southbound. They were filthy and soaked in sweat, despite the night’s chill. Jimmy eased the seat back. He tried to sleep but couldn’t. Jimmy had never buried a body.

But Serge had been here before.

Ben

The Liquor Authority had issued its sentence. Three weeks dry. Abattoir sat dark and empty. Ben figured he would get a break. Amy Valero had other plans.

Abattoir’s crowd moved underground. Hannah knew the sites, Valero mandated attendance. She encouraged drug use and had Ben tested regularly. The sergeant at Lefrak filled Ben’s bottles with his urine. The tests proved Ben was clean.

Ben was not clean.

He and Hannah hit every outlaw party in the city. Two or three a night, twenty nights straight. Ben floated through the scene. He popped ecstasy like Altoids, blasted ketamine, inhaled rails of cocaine. The sun became a stranger. Ben’s eyes popped red capillaries, a tiny roadmap of Ben’s sins. His cheeks went concave. He shed weight. Ben caught himself in a bathroom mirror one morning. He looked unwell.

Ben cruised warehouse dance halls and tenement takeovers. His brain rewired and adapted. He identified hand-to-hands and Valero added them to her case. Xanax brought him down; coffee leveled him out. His hands trembled 24/7.

Freddie McGee made sure Hannah Kim was put on paper.

Valero had offered Ben a choice: Give Hannah up or she would tell Southern District about Ben’s dirty urine. Ben considered his position. Cops in the Three-Oh were getting pinched almost nightly. Commissioner Bratton pounded a righteous fist at press conferences. The city would not stand for corrupt cops.

But morally bankrupt ones had their uses.

Ben sang. He memorialized Hannah as a criminal facilitator, part of a drug conspiracy permeating the New York nightlife scene. She would be indicted. She would be arrested. Ben slept with her on the regular.

If Valero knew—and Ben figured she had to—she didn’t say anything. Bedding Hannah solidified his credentials. He stored his gun in Valero’s desk. His apartment became a locker for underwear and socks.

Ben experienced metamorphosis.

He dyed his buzz cut Ric Flair-blond. He pierced both ears and one eyebrow and became Picasso with an eyeliner pencil. Weeks remained on Hannah’s family-funded furlough. Ben told her he was running his vacation days. They would spend what time she had left together. His lie brought her elation. Guilt hit Ben in the gut. A blast of K numbed the blow.

Now Ben sat in DEA’s Tenth Avenue office. One wall was papered with mugshot photos, seventeen low-level hand-to-hands doomed by Ben’s buys. The GSA clock ticked slow. Ben had to be in Rye by six. He couldn’t push his mother off any longer.

Pete Cobb walked in, clocked the perp wall. “Holy shit. You two have been busy.”

Cobb had not been back since his opening night fit. Valero fed him redacted paper via courier. She omitted photos and names. Cobb complained to Chief McManus, and Tyler Easton got involved. A deal was struck. Cobb got to see the case, Sharpie-free. Valero fought. Cops could not be trusted. She was overruled.

“This a pure drug case, or a RICO?”

“Narcotics conspiracy,” Valero said. “For now. Once we make arrests, we’ll debrief our subjects and start working our way up. Donna expects superseding indictments.”

Cobb spotted Ben in the corner and pulled a double-take. “The fuck happened to you?”

“Amy’s working me to death.”

Valero stone-faced Ben like a pro.

Cobb rans his finger from a floor dealer named Johnny Rocket to Jimmy Lettner. “Have we connected any of these guys to management?”

“Not yet. But someone’s going to talk. My money’s on him.” Valero tapped a glossy eight-by-ten of Dennis Rayburn.

Also known as Dreamy Dee. Wheat’s friend and the key to solving his murder. Or so Ben hoped.

“Why him?”

“Hopkins,” Valero said.

“Dee was one of Wheat’s associates. He’s avoided Abattoir since the murder, but I’ve been buying into him at outlaw parties.”

“Why don’t he hit the clubs?”

“’Cause he thinks he’s gonna be next.”

Valero now. “Dee thinks Wheat was killed because he was dealing in Abattoir. He was selling there the last night he was seen alive, and gotten caught pitching before. Dee claims Wheat had been taken by management to the basement, ordered never to come back. Or else.”

“He was threatened?”

Valero nodded. “By Jimmy Lettner himself.”

Cobb clapped his hands. “There it is! There’s your predicate felony, there’s your RICO.”

Ben wished he could share Cobb’s joy. He was responsible for every face pinned to Valero’s wall. This case would make his career. His gold shield was practically minted. It was the worst time of his life.

“You got this from Dee direct?” Cobb asked.

“Third party,” Valero said.

“I need to talk to that party.”

“Not until we take the case down.”

The Dreamy Dee intel had come from Hannah. Ben had begged Valero to keep her from Cobb. After they arrested and flipped Dee, Hannah’s background dish would become irrelevant. To Ben’s surprise, Valero agreed. He suspected it was out of pity.

“This wasn’t the arrangement,” Cobb said. “You’re supposed to share without limits.”

“And you’re supposed to solve Wheat’s murder,” Valero said. “Have you braced any informants? Doubled back on your canvases? I don’t say this to be cruel, but—”

“Could’ve fooled me,” Cobb said.

“—but all you’ve done is wait on a ballistics match or for us to shake the right tree and make a witness fall out.” She swept the room with one arm. “Everything on this table and that wall is here because of Ben and me. You want to be on the team? I still haven’t seen Wheat’s autopsy report. We can start there.”

Valero’s heat presaged another cop/fed brawl. But to Ben’s surprise, Cobb backed down.

“Know what? You’re absolutely right. Lemme run back to the Tenth, grab Wheat’s file. We can review it together. All of us.”

“Thank you.”

Cobb hustled out the door.

Valero turned to Ben. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

A five-bedroom in Rye, dinner at the club, a few hours with the parents Ben hadn’t seen in five months. Liz Hopkins hadn’t exactly begged—that was beneath her—but she’d asked Ben often enough to make him believe she might miss him.

Ben fingered the loose Xanax in his pocket. He wondered if Liz would recognize her only son. What he’d become. What his father would say when he saw him.

If Ben was going, he had to leave now. While Valero studied the perp wall, Ben downed two sticks. “Nah. I pushed it.”

Ben flipped open her folder. Hannah Kim stared back at him. Ben felt sick. He was going to put the woman he loved in prison.

The Hello phone rang. Valero answered it. Freddie checking in. The lying demon who had ratted Ben out. A criminal and thug, unworthy of redemption.

Hannah’s photo begged, Save me.

Ben swore to it he would.

Jimmy

Two days to reopening. A week since Randy’s upstate burial. Jimmy counted sleep in minutes and roamed Abattoir alone. He wore the gun Serge had gotten him at all times. He dared not go home. Mike had proved himself formidable. He’d kidnapped and killed one of Jimmy’s own.

But Jimmy had sent Randy right to him.

Jimmy sat at his desk, scheduling Angel’s staff. The names ran into one another. One stood out: Randy Watkins, assistant manager.

Mike deserved to die. Jimmy needed Renzo—and Bates—out. Both required muscle. Trey D hadn’t come through. While Serge sat outside a Brooklyn cab stand, Jimmy faced an unrelenting hell: sell or face extinction.

Selling was capitulation. It marked Jimmy as a failure, and he’d had too much of that in his life. Opportunities had come to his father. Potential partnerships, growing businesses in need of a reliable numbers man. His old man turned them all down. His fear of failure had doomed Jimmy’s mother to a sad, simple life. Now she lived in Boca in a waterfront condo Jimmy had purchased in cash.

Jimmy pressed his palms against his eyes. When he opened them, the coke Serge had given him was on his desk. A bottomless bag of magic. Jimmy took its reappearance as a sign. Colombian powder whitened his onyx desktop. Jimmy cut and sorted. He rolled a twenty tight.

Blast off.

Jimmy crossed Randy off the schedule. The blow made his hand jumpy and the line ran ragged.

Get through today.

The service door light flashed. Nerves mixed with his coke rush. Mondays were Sundays in the industry. Zero work. Jimmy pulled his gun from his drawer. He fidgeted with the piece, couldn’t remember if the safety was off when it was up or down. He headed downstairs.

He’d had the door reinforced. A contractor had welded steel plating top to bottom. Still Jimmy approached it like a man marked for murder. He eyed the peephole, snapped his head back.

Christi. Here.

Christi was here? She’d never come to any of his clubs.

She buzzed again.

“Hang on!”

Jimmy hid his pistol behind the bar and tried to smooth his wrinkled shirt. He wiped his forehead and nose with cocktail napkins. He unlocked the door and in walked his daughter. From behind reinforced steel, Jimmy scoped the street for threats. He saw none, closed and locked the door.

Christi looked her father over. Jimmy hoped she couldn’t tell he was high. He couldn’t remember when they’d last seen each other. Jimmy hadn’t been home in … weeks? They had barely spoken since his release. Jimmy wanted to hug her but didn’t. They hadn’t embraced since he’d gone away. Since Samantha. His sweet girl.

It was wrong to play favorites with your children, but every parent did. Jimmy’s was dead. And it was his fault. Blame desire. Jimmy wanted to be the party and the party got him into hustling and hustling put him on the BQE.

That fucking dog.

Jimmy realized Christi was alone. One of T-Roc’s men should have been on her.

“What are you doing here? Where’s your security?”

Christi ignored Jimmy and walked deeper into Abattoir. Her head tilted back. She took in the club, its immensity. Abattoir awed and amazed, day or night, closed or open.

“I ditched him in the park. Whatever you’re paying them’s too much.”

“You shouldn’t do that. Those men are protecting you.”

Christi turned to him. “From what, Dad?”

From the men who want your father dead.

“Does Mom know you’re here?”

“No.” Christi took a beat. “The girls at school, their fathers are bank presidents, CEOs. One’s a senator’s daughter. They have dinner with their families and their drivers don’t look anything like Robbie Gee.”

“Who’s Robbie Gee?”

Christi shook her head. “You don’t even know who you’re paying to keep an eye on me.”

One of T-Roc’s, then. Names ran together. Numbers blurred. The count spiraled, snaked back and down and around on itself. Facts fell from Jimmy’s mind, floated into nothing. He had been sharp, once. A blade.

The only fix: more coke.

“I’m sorry. It’s a bad time.”

She stepped toward him. “You’re sweating.”

Jimmy wiped his forehead. “It’s hot in here.”

“No, it’s pretty cold.” Christi toed a question but didn’t share it. Instead she walked a slow half circle across the dance floor. “Where’s your office?”

Jimmy pointed to the wraparound balcony. Near it, the cable the dancers swung from the ceiling on was secured to the railing.

“Is that where you sleep, too?”

“Christi …”

“Are you selling drugs again?”

“I never sold drugs, honey.”

The lie reborn. The lie that Samantha rejected and left her bleeding out on Sunrise Highway. Her face popped now, a blurry Polaroid of a memory of a vacation untaken. A dream of a wish that never was.

“Then why’d you plead guilty?”

“Serge had it tough growing up. He made mistakes and if I didn’t say the cocaine was mine, he would have gone to prison for a long, long time. I’d never been arrested. Not once. Harvey said I’d get three months. But the judge made an example of me because I’m famous. I wish I could go back in time, but I can’t. And I’m sorry.”

Jimmy took a step toward his daughter. Christi took a step back.

“You lied.”

“To protect Serge.”

“You always told us to tell the truth.”

“I owed him.” More than Christi could ever know.

“Mom hates Serge.”

“She has her issues with him.”

Christi lifted her chin and Jimmy realized she’d grown tall and stood with her shoulders back. Her skin had cleared, her straight lines were curving. Jimmy’s daughter was becoming a woman. When had this happened?

“No, she hates him. You’d know this if you ever came home.” Christi tilted her head left, then right. “But if you’re going to be like this, maybe it’s best you sleep here.”

This meaning high. More judgment. Nobody understood the pressures Jimmy faced.

“You have no idea how sorry I am. But right now I have to take care of Abattoir. I built this place for you and your mother, and I’m not going to let anyone take it away. When you’re older you’ll understand.”

When Christi got older, she’d learn that Abattoir was Jimmy’s true love. How he built the club for him. Christi looked at Jimmy a long time.

“Some of the girls from school have been here. They beg me for passes. Or to get them on a list. I’m known in Ashford-Rand as the daughter of the guy who runs Abattoir. They’re not my friends because of who I am. They hang out with me because of who you are. Have you ever thought about what your life does to the rest of us?”

For the first time in years, Jimmy told the truth.

“Every day. I think about you and Michelle and Sam every single day. And I’m not proud of everything I’ve done, but I am proud of you, and I was—I am—proud of Sam. I miss her.” Jimmy started to crack. “Oh God, I miss her so much.”

His plumbing blew. Tears waterfalled down Jimmy’s face. Sam, Randy, his incarceration, the war for Abattoir, his coke highs and lows, his crimes, his infidelities, his failures as a father and a husband. In an empty Abattoir, Jimmy wept. He tried to control himself but couldn’t. He was supposed to be strong. He had to be strong.

Christi touched his shoulder. “Dad …”

“I’m so sorry.”

Christi reached out and pulled Jimmy close, into her, and he shook in his daughter’s arms, sobbing and weeping and regretful for all he’d done and all he still had to do. And he felt her heart pressed against his and she held him up and gave him the strength to raise his arms and hug her back. Jimmy couldn’t remember when he’d last held his baby girl. He tried and tried but came up blank. It seemed a little thing but wasn’t.

And through his weeping Jimmy heard Christi soothing him, a soft shushing sound. Jimmy was upside down and backward. His daughter, not yet eighteen, assuring and reassuring him. That everything would be all right. That Jimmy would be all right. That Christi still loved him.

Jimmy was a father, a husband. A good man.

At least he might be, one day.

Ben

West Chelsea after dark. The DEA offices were empty. Valero had gone home. Even she had to sleep. Ben had said he was staying late to study Wheat’s file.

Ben had lied.

He dug through boxes. Jimmy and Michelle Lettner watched from the perp wall. Hannah had beeped him relentlessly. Ben didn’t call back. What he was doing now, he was doing for her.

Ben located Freddie McGee’s folder, rifled through it. Reams of paper detailing Freddie’s crimes and misdemeanors. Stolen cars, strong-arm robberies, graffiti, and lots and lots of drugs. Valero had built her case on the word of a career criminal. Ben was going to fix that.

Finally he found it. Freddie McGee’s cooperation agreement.

The three-page letter recounted Frederick McGee’s arrest by ATF and subsequent desire to work with authorities regarding illegal drug sales in the New York City nightlife community. If McGee provided “substantial cooperation,” the Department of Justice would seek to dismiss his pending gun charge. It was signed by Assistant United States Attorney Anne Provencher of the District of New Jersey.

Freddie’s rat status, confirmed. If the agreement circulated, Freddie was a dead man.

Ben reran his logic. Tested it for soundness. Red Hook. Freddie had clocked Ben using and ratted him to Valero. She and Easton arranged a bogus DOLE test. Ben’s dirty piss was the evidence, Freddie provided corroboration. The test burned Ben but could be fought. If Valero lost her witness, Ben could claim Valero ordered his usage. The city and the DEA didn’t want a cop/fed he said/she said. Not with Giuliani invested in Closing Time’s success. Freddie’s elimination upended Valero’s leverage. Ben could wipe Hannah from the case.

A drop of sweat fell to the table.

Jesus Christ. Was he really going to do this?

Somewhere, a door opened and closed. Ben waited but no one came. He Xeroxed Freddie’s cooperation agreement and replaced it in the file. He shoved the copy in his pocket and left.

Serge

Avi Brenner’s eighteenth-floor fuckpad, Avi raging at his Girl of the Week. Serge didn’t want to be there, but he had been summoned.

“I told you already,” Avi said. “You have to leave.”

The woman—Black and leggy—leaned on Avi’s kitchen island. She wore a bra, go-go shorts, and rippling abs. She sipped coffee and vibed unimpressed. She’d been yelled at by better.

“Here.” Avi pulled cash from his pajama pants pocket—who carried cash while they slept?—and flung it at her. “I don’t have the time for this, Janelle.”

Janelle didn’t flinch or take the cash. She set down her mug and walked slowly back to the bedroom. Avi stormed after her. A door slammed and through it Serge heard yelling.

“It’s not right,” David said, “the way he treats women.”

Serge could tell David wanted to share. Serge lit a smoke and let him.

“He’s getting worse, too. It’s all the coke he’s doing. Fucks with his head. Makes him unreliable, yeah?”

“Drugs can have that effect.”

Jimmy swore blow made him invincible. Avi probably thought the same. Serge might have thought deeper on their similarities had his stomach not been running an endless spin cycle. The meeting with Avi’s backers was imminent. As in, today. Serge owed six figures and had less than a week to make good. This mandatory sit-down indicated a lack of confidence.

“You ever meet these guys?”

In the bedroom something shattered and Avi screamed.

“Nah. Avi says I’m not at that level. Which, I mean like, whatever. I’m good with it.” David’s tone indicated he wasn’t.

Avi’s bedroom door opened. Janelle walked out slow, a fake Hermès bag over a shoulder and six-inch, blood-red heels on her feet. She ignored Serge and David and did not slam the door.

“No woman looks as good in the morning as they do up on the pole,” Avi said. “You’re smart to be alone, Serge.”

Alone. Serge and Slim Rickie had traded calls, exchanged charged innuendo disguised as industry gossip. Serge pushed her on Dreamy Dee, but Rickie still wouldn’t make the intro. She was holding out, and that intrigued him. Serge always played the long game. Only now, he was running out of time.

“David, come.” Avi clapped his hands, like David was a willful dog. David pulled himself from the sofa. Serge got up, too.

“What are you doing?” Avi said to Serge. “They’ll be here in ten minutes. You sit, you talk. Figure it all out.”

“You’re not staying?”

“They asked for you, Serge. Only you.”

Avi and David left. Serge paced the empty apartment. Eighteen floors down, the Hudson churned. Serge had lived for years as an industry samurai. The man alone. He worked for the day when he didn’t need the scene. Then he could start a real life. But the end seemed further away than ever.

Footsteps in the hall. Serge repositioned his Glock from the small of his back to his right hip. Just in case. The door clicked open. Two men, lean and tan, close-cut dark hair. One stayed near the door while the other checked rooms. Their bearing indicated professionals. The first one’s arm hung a few inches off his body. He was carrying.

The second called out in Hebrew. The man at the door opened it without taking his eyes off Serge. In walked a short, white, black-haired woman with a pointy chin and large, dark eyes. She went to the kitchen, pulled a box of cereal from one of Avi’s cabinets. She had been here before.

“I tell Avi every time, buy the apple cinnamon.” The woman held up a box of Cheerios. “Instead he gets this, this, what is this? Honey nut? Thanakis. You hungry?”

The man Serge owed was a woman.

“No.”

“Suit yourself.”

She filled the bowl, added milk, sat in a leather chair opposite Serge and started eating. An anxious Serge settled onto the sofa. The Glock dug into his hip.

The woman sniffed the air. “Eau de Slut. The diseases Avi must have.”

“You know my name, but I don’t know yours.”

“And there is a reason for that.” Her Israeli accent rang authentic. “You possess no leverage, while I own the deed to your life. And that entitles me—among other things—to your name. Serge Thanakis—formerly Walenski—of 424 West Forty-Eighth Street. Apartment 2D. New York, New York. America.”

Serge forced himself not to swallow.

“But for the sake of conversation, you may call me Rivka.”

Rivka operated with confidence beyond her age. Serge put her at about twenty-five, tops. Heavy but not fat, with an asymmetrical face—it leaned left. Her dark, pseudo-corporate suit was sedate. Rivka was the anti-Avi.

“You wanted to meet me.”

“I did.”

“Avi said that’s rare.”

“It is.”

“I guess that makes me special.”

“Special is not the word I would use. You owe me $112,000. The first payment in a long-term commitment. Avi’s told me you sell my product in your club. That the law cannot touch you. I’m not often impressed, but your system comes close.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“Who says there is one?”

“I have trouble believing you came all this way to compliment me.”

Rivka set the empty cereal bowl on Avi’s coffee table. “My problem arose when I learned Abattoir had been shuttered. Temporarily, I know. But still. I said to Avi, I said, Avi, where will Thanakis sell? How will he pay the consignment? Avi could offer no answer that satisfied me. So I have to ask you direct: How are you going to pay me?”

From his jacket pocket, Serge pulled his pack of Marlboros. Before taking one himself, he offered them to Rivka. Serge lit her up. He managed to keep his hands steady.

“True, the SLA shutdown was longer than I expected. But Abattoir reopens Saturday. It’s going to be epic. I’ve seen the lists.”

“Epic enough to move six figures of ecstasy in a night?”

Serge hunted for an ashtray. With a booted foot Rivka slid the bowl across the table. Serge caught it before it fell off the edge, tapped his cigarette into it.

“Abattoir is the center of club culture in this city. My customers are loyal. They pay cover for the right to buy my—your—product. Think of me as a long-term investment. The IBM of ecstasy.”

Serge rested an arm on the sofa back. He had aimed for confident, hoped he came close.

Rivka ashed on Avi’s white shag rug. “This isn’t what I hoped to hear. I mean, I can see your angle. Truly. But I fronted you this product on expectation of repayment. And I made that decision in large part on Avi’s assessment of you.” Rivka took a long draw, exhaled slow. “If you break this contract, you’re going to make me do things neither of us will enjoy.”

No one spoke for a long time. Rivka would not kill Serge—dead men couldn’t pay—but she could hurt him. Break his body and empty his cash reserves. That would reset Serge’s retirement clock. All he needed was a little more time.

The ecstasy under Spoons’s floor was worth five times what Serge owed. Moving it required time Michelle had given away to the Liquor Authority. It always came back to her.

Avi’s sofa became uncomfortable. Serge fought his body’s urge to move; fidgeting indicated nerves. The silence stretched and Avi’s sofa stabbed at Serge. Stupid fucking Avi, and his dumb, fucking—

Avi.

Avi wasn’t here.

Avi brokered Serge’s orders but didn’t make Rivka’s invite list. Her tone tipped a lack of respect. His absence revealed how poorly she rated him. Avi was a middleman. And middlemen were replaceable.

Rivera’s bodyguards were ex-military. Abattoir needed an army.

Avi wasn’t here.

Middlemen could be replaced.

Serge gamed a Hail Mary angle at light speed. Dangerous. Potentially deadly. It demanded stones and could end ugly. But he saw no other way out.

“Everything you’ve said, Avi’s already told me. Maybe you don’t know, but I’ve been doing this a long time. Moved cocaine by the kilo. I’ve received and inflicted punishment. Avi knows this. But here you are. And your presence”—Serge again ashed in Avi’s bowl—“reveals your weakness.”

Rivka laughed. “Please, Thanakis, go on about how I’m weak.”

“Not you personally. I mean your operation. You’re C-suite management. Handling individual accounts is beneath you. Enforcing my arrangement should fall to Avi. But he’s not here. You don’t think he can do the job.”

That shook Rivka. Serge read it in her nonreaction. Rivka sat stoic and said nothing. Serge leaned forward.

Close this, now.

“With a proper partner you could combine import, wholesale, and distribution into a single, streamlined operation. You could own the entire East Coast.”

“Who says I don’t?”

“Avi.”

Rivka’s right eye twitched. She was hooked.

“He’s told me about a new strain out of Amsterdam. I’ve seen it myself. In Abattoir.” I murdered a boy over it.

“What do you propose?”

“Avi’s become coked-fueled and flagrant. He’s a danger to your business and limits its profitability. I know the scene. I’ve got a network of retail sellers in place. Sack Avi and make me your stateside partner.”

“That’s a bold offer.”

“I believe in full measures. Always.”

A smiling Rivka uttered a single word in clipped Hebrew. Her man near the hallway moved on Serge cheetah-quick. A suppressed semi-auto appeared. Serge’s hand never made it to his gun. Probably for the best.

Serge held up his hands. Rivka’s man pulled Serge’s Glock from his waistband.

Rivka rose and came close. “You ask me to sell out one of my own for a mongrel like you? My father’s company operates twelve vessels. Has offices on four continents. His ships transport hundreds of millions of dollars in trade. I am his right hand. You are a glorified doorman. Never forget your place.”

The gun trained on Serge’s head pressed him into the sofa. Rational thought would have reminded Serge he was worth more alive than dead. But rational thought abandoned men held at gunpoint.

Rivka nodded and her man reholstered his piece.

“I appreciate entrepreneurialism,” she said, “but keep some ideas to yourself.”

“How do I get in touch with you?”

Rivka glared at him.

“For when I’ve got your money. I don’t want one of Avi’s hangovers keeping you from your cash.”

Rivka considered this, flicked her head. Her number two set Serge’s pistol and a business card on the kitchen island. Rivka and her crew left.

Serge’s heart thumped heavy and fast. Blood pumped at his temples. On the card was a phone number. That’s it. Serge collected his Glock. He left the apartment, went down the stairs. On the way down, Serge reran the meeting. Decided his play had merit.

It was Jimmy’s failed pitch to Trey, revamped and redeployed. Partnering with Rivka vested her in Abattoir’s survival. Serge could make her more money than Avi and leverage her men against Luc and Mike. The postwar windfall would accelerate Serge’s timeline. It facilitated success and his industry exit.

The only obstacle was Avi.

Serge leafed through his phonebook. He hoped David hadn’t changed his number.

Ben

“We shouldn’t be out here. You’ve got a long night ahead of you.”

“I’ll be fine.”

Valero meant Abattoir’s reopening in five hours. The scene was electric with anticipation. Ben was expected to work the club till close. Slim Rickie’s invite read club kid ballsy: Can’t Close Us Rudy, an unsubtle fuck you to the forces of municipal bureaucracy. Ben would attend. Ben would buy. Ben would use. He would locate the narco conspiracy on Abattoir’s dance floor and facilitate its shutdown.

Tyler Easton’s bathroom pitch was prescient. That morning the mayor and PC had announced that all NYPD officers—not just narco rangers—would enforce drug laws. The order uncuffed the city’s thirty-six thousand cops. The strategic shift was monumental.

For years, every beat cop who had dragged a dope dealer before his desk sergeant received the Palace’s not-too-subtle message: Leave the game to the players, write summonses, and answer 911 jobs. Palace brass feared clogging the courts and didn’t want cops exposed to cash and drugs. Chiefs feared epic corruption. Witness the Dirty 30. Michael Dowd. The Mollen Commission. The Xanax in Ben’s pocket. The coke in his bloodstream.

Maybe the Palace was right.

“What number is it?” Valero asked.

“198.”

Rain dotted the windshield. Ben and Valero cruised Mastic, on Long Island’s eastern end. Working-class family homes. Valero wheeled a shiny Chrysler Concorde. It smelled factory fresh. The new DEA sled reflected Valero’s rocketing reputation. She was riding Ben all the way to the FBI.

The details of Jimmy Lettner’s car stop gnawed at Ben. He suspected the collar came off a tip. He had braced Officer Walsh, S., of the Ninety-Fourth Precinct, Lettner’s arresting officer. Ben promised a transfer for the Lettner/Thanakis backstory. Walsh was still young, still green, still rookie-stupid. He spilled, quick.

Lettner’s arrest had come off a tip to Walsh’s partner, Frank Locasio. Walsh claimed Locasio never shared his source. Ben believed him. Strange: Locasio got antsy when Walsh pulled Lettner from the car. Stranger still: Locasio was a uniform clock-puncher, a career do-nothing who suddenly had a line on ounces of powder. Stranger still: Locasio’s source never produced again. Their relationship was one-and-done.

Ben’s suspicion was confirmed: Someone gave Lettner up. That meant he had enemies. Ben’s plan: Find the source, exploit him again.

Valero stopped the car. “Here it is.”

The small ranch sat on a poorly tended half acre. Light blue siding darkened by dirt and neglect. A two-tone Chevy 1500 sat in the drive, cream on chrome. It gleamed showroom new. Frank Locasio had just left the job. A line-of-duty injury would pay him 75 percent of his salary, tax-free for life. He’d hit the NYPD lottery.

They climbed out of Valero’s ride. Mastic lay sixty-five miles east of Locasio’s former precinct. On a good day he lost three and a half hours to traffic. Cops who lived out here gave up a month of their lives every year to sleep far from the city they policed. A city they hated. A city that, lately, hated them right back.

The curtains in the bay window shifted. The front door swung wide. Frank Locasio filled the opening. His gray hair was buzzed Marine-short and a mustache ran down his mouth to his chin. A big man growing old.

“You Hopkins?”

Walsh had given Locasio the heads-up.

“Yeah. This is my part—”

“Special Agent Amy Valero, Drug Enforcement Administration. We’d like to talk to you.” Valero held her billfold credentials at eye level, the federal Heisman straight-arm. Valero didn’t consider Locasio might grab her wrist, drag her to the ground and bury a bullet in her skull. Veteran cops convinced rookies every civilian wanted to kill them. Both mindsets had their drawbacks.

“Sure.”

Locasio stepped into his house. Ben and Valero followed. The fit was tight. Cardboard boxes were stacked everywhere. Hangered clothes lay across a sofa, columns of VHS tapes bracketed the television. Frank Locasio was on the move.

“You selling the place?” Ben asked.

“Gonna rent it out. My accountant calls it passive income.” Locasio stopped at the far end of a glossy orange dining table. “I’d offer you guys coffee, but I packed the machine up yesterday.”

“Not a problem,” Ben said.

Locasio gave him the slow once-over. Ben had grown used to the side-eyes and elbow nudges: He looked like a junkie fiend on the hunt. Cops’ opinion of Ben didn’t matter. Hannah’s friends didn’t care what Ben looked like, how he dressed, what color his hair was, or that he wore makeup. Ben felt himself around them. Even though he was someone else.

“Seanie was right, you must be a hell of an undercover.” Locasio swung to Valero. “He never mentioned a fed, though.”

“This is a joint investigation,” Valero said.

“Fancy.” Locasio’s home indicated he and fanciness were not acquainted.

“Where are you moving?” Valero asked.

“The South.”

Valero nodded. Locasio stared at her. The house was dim and smelled musty. Ben scanned Locasio’s life, prepped for packing. Record albums by the dozens—mostly Springsteen and Zeppelin, fishing poles in a corner, Islanders gear from their Cup-winning glory days, a slew of framed and fading photos. One showed a young Frank Locasio, helmet tucked under an arm, the word Schreiber across his jersey.

Ben pointed to it. “What position?”

“Weak side guard. Sometimes tackle.”

“You play in college?”

“Didn’t go. Never saw the purpose in it.”

Ben almost agreed with him. “How’d you get three-quarters?”

“Tore my labrum.” Locasio rotated his right arm, as if to prove the injury’s legitimacy.

“You got in a fight with a suspect?” Valero asked.

“A candy machine, if you can believe it. I ran the precinct club and was helping the vendor haul a new one up the steps. Damned thing fell off the hand truck. On duty, in a Department facility.” Locasio shrugged. “Contract says they gotta pay.”

The city faced a $2 billion shortfall. Giuliani was threatening layoffs in the tens of thousands. Nurses. School aides. Librarians. Teachers. Garbagemen. But Frank Locasio would be cashed up for life because he was bested by a snack dispenser.

“What a country,” Valero said.

“Ain’t it?” Locasio smiled wide.

Ben realized he knew this man. The Department employed countless Locasios. Zeros who cashed a check and hid behind the union. Frank Locasio would never talk, because talking about work was almost work. And cops like Locasio hated work above all.

“We wanted to—” Valero began.

“Seanie told me what you were after. Couple of guys on the BQE. Wish I could help, but it doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Officer Walsh indicated the arrest came as a result of a tip you’d received. Lettner and Thanakis are targets of our current investigation. Any information would be welcome.”

“I don’t know what to tell ya.”

Valero’s frustration grew. “We’d like to know who tipped you about the cocaine.”

Locasio began loading newspaper-wrapped dishes into a cardboard box. “According to Seanie, one of them pled. That tells me the case is over. But here you are, in my house, asking questions.”

“Do you have a problem with answering?” Valero said.

“Depends.”

“On what?”

“Who’s doing the asking.”

City cops were bred from birth to distrust feds.

“Frank,” Ben said, “we’re not interested in you. We need to know who your source was.”

“I don’t remember.”

“He won’t know you gave him up.”

“I don’t remember.”

“Frank, please. This—”

“I. Don’t. Remember.”

Locasio was protecting his source. Ben and Valero lacked leverage, criminal or administrative. Locasio wasn’t a suspect, wasn’t a cop. There was nothing they could do.

“We’ll see ourselves out.”

“You do that.”

Ben turned to leave, but Valero lingered.

“All I hear from cops is how you care about loyalty and take care of your own. But it’s all bullshit. We’re giving you a chance to do good, and you’re claiming amnesia.” Valero flicked her head toward Ben. “He’s done more work in two months than you did in a career. How’s that make you feel? Are you embarrassed? ’Cause you ought to be.”

Locasio ran a thumb and forefinger down his mustache. “You wanna know what I feel? How I really feel? I don’t give a shit about your big investigation. I don’t give a shit about that city. And I don’t give a shit about you. I gave the Department eighteen years of my life. It cost me a marriage.”

“I’m sure that’s the reason.”

Valero walked out. Ben followed. They left an angry, broken cop to box up his life. They chased the setting sun back to the city. Cobb paged Valero as they approached exit 65 on the LIE. She found a working pay phone at a 7–11. Ben stayed in the Chrysler, wondering if Valero meant what she’d said about his work, or if it had been a guilt shiv to Locasio’s kidney. Outside, Valero hung up and sprinted back to the car. She peeled out of the lot. The Chrysler’s speedo touched triple digits, city-bound.

Pete Cobb had gotten lucky.

Ben

“Tell me again how you got this?”

“Call comes into the Seventh. Guy asks for me by name. Says his buddy’s got a half ounce of blow in a drawer in his living room and imports ecstasy by the pallet. Gives me the numericals and hangs up.”

“And you go over there,” Valero said.

“And I go over there,” Cobb said.

“Without contacting me.”

“And I go over there,” Cobb repeated, “do my thing, and here we are. He says he’ll talk, but only to a fed. You’re welcome, by the way.”

Cobb beamed as he tossed a bag of cocaine on the desk. Ben felt a rush—the junkie’s burning, not a street cop’s I got you supremacy. Valero just crossed her arms.

They were in the First Precinct Squad room on Ericsson Place in Lower Manhattan. Ben, Valero, and Cobb crowded the small two-way mirror. In the Box sat Avi Brenner: twenty-five, greasy-cool, designer track suit, pricey sneakers. He’d filled an ashtray with filters, kept looking at the door.

“Why didn’t you get a warrant?” Valero asked.

“He consented to a search.” Cobb presented a rumpled boilerplate form with a child’s scrawl along its bottom.

“Lucky you,” Valero said. “Him waiving his rights like that.”

“You wanted me to pitch in,” Cobb said. “This guy’s a hanging curve.”

The coke on the desk called to Ben. He could taste it.

“Let’s see what he’s got,” Valero said.

She and Cobb entered the Box. Ben stayed in the CO’s office. Undercover, and all. An intercom speaker was bolted into the wall. Ben flicked its switch.

“Mr. Brenner,” Valero said in the interview room. “My name is Special Agent Valero. I’m with the Drug Enforcement Administration. Detective Cobb tells me you have information you want to share.”

Valero sat across a tiny table from Brenner. Cobb posted up against the wall. In the CO’s office, the cocaine sang to Ben. Come on, just a taste.

“Yeah, I do.” Brenner screwed his cigarette into the tray like he wanted to drill through the table. “But before I talk, I need assurances. The people I give you, they’re the real thing. I need promises from the Justice Department. Documented on paper. I’m talking full immunity. From everything and everyone.”

“I need to know what I’m protecting you from,” Valero said.

Brenner looked to his left, at nothing. At discolored gray wall. Calculating odds and weighing betrayal. Ben knew the signs. He had experience.

“Mr. Brenner,” Valero said, a little harder, “this is not a negotiation. You’re charged with possessing enough cocaine for New York State to send you away for”—she turned to Cobb—“what, seven years? Do I have that right?”

“You’re in the ballpark,” Cobb said.

Back to Brenner. “If what you know has value, and can be corroborated, the United States Attorney’s Office may take over your case and could offer leniency.”

“Oh, I got value. I got motherfucking gold. But I need to be protected. The people I know are big-time. International power players.”

Every snitch claimed they knew Pablo Escobar. But Brenner’s fear felt legit. Ben felt it through the two-way. He felt something else and stuffed Brenner’s coke in a drawer, where it couldn’t call to him.

“I understand,” Valero said. “But I need to know what I’m dealing with.”

Brenner took a deep breath, tried to steady himself. “I read the papers, how you guys are after the nightclubs. You know about ecstasy?”

“A bit,” Valero said.

“I work for the biggest trafficker on the planet. And every pill they bring into this city goes to Abattoir.”

Ben sat up. In the Box, Cobb grew a few inches. Only Valero kept her cool. “Are the club’s owners aware of this?”

“Aware? They’re the ones running it.”

Ben jolted hard. He almost forgot about the drawered coke. If Brenner was real, he could close their case. Lettner and Thanakis indicted. Abattoir shuttered. Ben’s gold shield, minted. His old man proved wrong.

“Give us a minute.”

Valero and Cobb left the Box and rejoined Ben.

“Told you he was the real deal,” Cobb said. “He can give us both ends.”

“So he claims,” Valero said.

“What’s next?” Ben asked Valero.

“I call Donna, see if we can take Cobb’s case federal.”

“Where’s the blow?” Cobb asked.

Ben pulled it from the drawer. Valero weighed it in her hand.

“Is it enough?” Ben asked. Fed scales craved pounds, not ounces.

“Let’s find out.” Valero paged Donna Lockwood from the lieutenant’s desk.

“I gotta let my wife know I’m not coming home.” Cobb found an idle phone in the bullpen.

Brenner vibed antsy in the Box.

“You like him?” Ben asked Valero.

“I don’t hate him.”

Minutes passed. The phone rang. Valero answered up. Valero told Donna about Brenner, then listened.

“Right,” she said into the phone. “Uh huh. Okay. Okay. Will do.” She hung up.

Cobb returned. “Well?”

“Donna’s on Nantucket and won’t be back until late Monday. She wants you to put Brenner through on the state charge. She’ll draw up a federal complaint next week. We’ll assume his case, rearrest him, get him a lawyer, and get him talking.”

Cobb and Ben exchanged a look. Shared cop experience, shared cop reaction.

“This’s less than an eighth of an ounce,” Ben said. “With his record, he’s going to get released.”

“There’s no one at Saint Andrew’s who can write this up now?” Cobb asked.

“If this was a murder, sure.” Valero thought for a few moments. To Cobb: “If Brenner gets cut after arraignment, can you sit on him?”

Cobb laughed. “My boss won’t approve that kind of overtime.”

Valero got quiet again, thinking about how best to work Brenner. Ben was consumed by his onrushing night of Hannah and pills and ketamine.

“Do you have a connect at DANY?” Valero asked Cobb.

“I might. What’re you thinking?”

“Ask the arraignment ADA to consent to Brenner’s release. Talk up how he’s got no prior arrests, this is personal use weight, his ties to the community. Say whatever you’ve got to say. We tell Brenner we saved him from a weekend in the Tombs.”

“Even though he would’ve been ROR’d anyway,” Cobb said.

“He’ll think we’re on his side. Once Donna’s back we’ll pick him up at his apartment, have him give us Abattoir’s entire operation.”

“It could work.”

“What if he runs?” Ben asked.

“Then I’ll chase him,” Valero said.

Cobb dropped his filter to the floor, kicked it under the lieutenant’s desk. “I’ll make some calls.”

“The guy who gave you Brenner,” Valero asked Cobb. “What was his name?”

Cobb hesitated a second too long. “He didn’t say.”

The DEA offices, midnight-dark and weekend-empty. No more plainclothes field teams; Ben worked the scene solo. Sixty minutes to showtime. Freddie McGee’s cooperation sat in Ben’s pocket. Its dissemination meant Freddie’s death and Ben’s freedom.

Valero and Ben read and reread files. Lettner. Thanakis. Avi Brenner. They trolled arrests, credit reports, business documents, phone logs, and property transactions. They sought connections. The files ran fat and encompassed lives. Ben stopped to rub his eyes; overhead fluorescents burned bright. He’d grown accustomed to the dark.

“I got nothing.” Ben pushed Thanakis’s Triple-I away.

“Read it again.”

Valero ran a yellow highlighter over a printout detailing Avi Brenner’s life. Ben stretched his back. He was shot and his night hadn’t even begun. He picked up Michelle Lettner’s slim file. She was clean in an industry where most weren’t. Like Valero said, that made her the perfect front woman.

“You think maybe Brenner’s connected to Lettner’s wife?” Ben said.

“Anything’s possible.”

Ben started digging. He flipped through car registrations and credit card statements and IRS forms. Civilian paper, exclusive. Valero had pulled records back to high school. Michelle had attended Paul D. Schreiber in Port Washington, back when her last name was Navarro.

Ben pushed on.

His head went light. His fingers buzzed.

Ben flipped back.

Paul D. Schreiber High School. Frank Locasio’s football photo, Schreiber across his chest. Ben found Michelle Lettner’s date of birth. He shot up, crossed the room, pulled the Frank Locasio folder. Valero clocked his energy and put down her highlighter.

“You got something?”

Ben found the fax copy of Locasio’s Ten-Card. The date of birth jibed. Michelle Lettner and Frank Locasio had gone to the same school, at the same time.

Locasio was a Brooklyn cop but didn’t stop Thanakis’s Mustang until they were in Queens. Why? Charles Hynes was soft. Thanakis was likely to do more time from a Queens case than a Kings County one.

Locasio had Walsh process Lettner’s collar. Why? To keep himself off the paperwork.

Locasio refused to share his source. Why? To protect Michelle.

Thanakis was supposed to be alone. Locasio got nervous about Lettner’s presence. Why? Lettner wasn’t supposed to be there.

Frank Locasio and Michelle Lettner knew each other.

Valero came over. Ben handed her the files, pointed at school names and birth dates. Valero read them and reread them. She clocked the connection, looked at Ben, arrived at the same conclusion.

Michelle Lettner was Locasio’s source.

Serge Thanakis was her target.

But her husband was in the car and took the fall.

PART IV

Michelle

Castle Abattoir’s basement dungeon. Brickwork glistened. Cross-breezes kicked up from nowhere. Wall-mounted fixtures threw off dim light from bare bulbs. Some ancient tomb in a faraway land.

Harvey and Jimmy were talking. Michelle Lettner’s head spun. Frank Locasio had paged her, their first contact since Michelle had paid him ten grand to get Serge Thanakis out of Jimmy’s life. Out of her life.

A fed and a cop had pressed Frank. Asked questions about Jimmy’s arrest. Frank’s partner had revealed it came off a tip. The law wanted to know who provided it.

“Michelle?”

Jimmy eyed her funny. Serge chain-smoked next to him. Harvey next to him in a purple ascot and matching velour smoking jacket. The men unmaking her life.

She couldn’t help thinking she deserved it.

“You okay?” Jimmy asked.

Michelle twisted her wedding band around her finger. “What were you saying?”

Jimmy’s lips tightened; he knew she wasn’t right. “Every exit will have extra men posted. T-Roc’s laid down the rules. Face-to-face relief, only.”

Four hours to reopening. Upstairs Tina and Diamond and Elise sorted guest lists. Names ran off the page. Everybody in the city wanted in. Including—maybe—Luc Delacroix. Jimmy expected violence.

“I hate to bring him up,” Harvey said, “but where’s Renzo?”

“His flight was delayed.”

“That guy’s in Miami more than I’m in the shitter.”

“He’s got a condo,” Jimmy said.

“Shame his plane didn’t go down.”

Michelle couldn’t care less about Renzo; she was debating on how to handle Locasio’s call. If she shared his info about the cops, Jimmy would want her source. Serge had cops on his payroll. If Michelle gave up Locasio, Jimmy would learn Michelle had inadvertently put him in Green Haven.

Stupid now, but at the time her plan had seemed sound. A coked-up Jimmy mentioned the delivery during a phone call. Serge was running it solo. Michelle overheard the exchange, dialed up Frank. Jimmy wasn’t supposed to be in the car.

Jimmy and Harvey kept talking, godfather and consigliere. Serge stood there, smoking, present but also not. He was the reason. He had always been the reason.

They were good in the beginning. The three of them were young and stupid and nothing mattered. Michelle flashed on Jimmy at Kelly O’Shea’s house. Senior year and pre-Serge. How Jimmy stood in the corner while Frank downed PBR from a plastic cup as someone set off Roman candles. Jimmy was alone, seemed to be counting. Michelle asked what he was doing. Jimmy said if Kelly had charged five bucks a cup, she’d’ve covered the cost of liquor and made a profit. Michelle thought he was cute, but not in the way seventeen-year-olds want.

They lost touch. Michelle landed a gig at a Garden City art gallery. She apprenticed ten hours a day but had a SoHo eye in a Stepford Wives world. The pieces her boss sold were more imitation Seurat than authentic Schnabel. Michelle hit Manhattan every weekend. Eventually, she landed an internship at a gallery on White Street.

The next time Michelle saw Jimmy, he was seconding the door at Michael Brody’s Paradise Garage. He stood out in his off-white polyester suit and too-wide lapels. Jimmy was yardstick-straight in a scene that was anything but. But Jimmy had matured. He exuded class and discipline and Michelle found herself intrigued.

They began that night.

But somewhere between Kelly’s house party and Paradise Garage, Jimmy had met Serge. They were inseparable. But so were Jimmy and Michelle. Two couples merged into one threesome. They cruised Manhattan’s late-seventies party scene, river to river. Jimmy and Michelle rented a Lower East Side studio. Its lacked gas. Jimmy brewed coffee on an electric hotplate that kept blowing the fuse. None of that mattered. They were together.

It was a glorious time, after the pill and before AIDS. Michelle experimented and imbibed. LSD, ludes, Valium, and bennies, but kept mostly to marijuana. Serge was ahead of the drug curve. He had blow on him at all times. Jimmy scouted the hottest clubs. He made notes. Formulated plans. Cocaine went supernova. Serge’s side hustle exploded.

Michelle got pregnant and married Jimmy, in that order. She stopped going to Studio and the Copa. The LES in 1977 was no place for a newborn. They moved back east. Without Michelle, Serge drew Jimmy into the life. Their cash flow became a deluge. Drug money seeded start-up capital. Coke funded Covet, and later Imprimatur. Michelle knew where the money came from, but did nothing. She liked the jewelry, the cars, the furs.

Years passed and Jimmy grew erratic. He inhaled coke like Michelle drank water. Jimmy didn’t come home, started sleeping around. Michelle ignored Jimmy’s wanderings for the sake of the kids. But Michelle foresaw a crash. She blamed Serge and wanted him gone. She called Frank. Her mistake put Samantha in the ground. Jimmy could never know.

“I still don’t think you should be here.”

This basement. Abattoir. Jimmy’s life.

“If tonight goes sideways,” Jimmy continued, “it’d be best if you were with Christi.”

“Christi’s at Heather’s tonight.”

“Who’s Heather?”

Serge’s pager buzzed. He checked the screen. His eyes shot wide. “I gotta make a call.”

“Hang on a second,” Michelle said. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

She was part of them now. Or they were part of her. Either way, Abattoir was Michelle’s by law. Owning a thing meant defending it.

The walls were wet. Why were they wet?

“I know the name of the undercover cop working Abattoir.”

Serge’s smoke fell from his lips. Harvey downed an entire box of Luden’s.

“Who told you?” Jimmy said.

“What’s the cop’s name?” Serge said.

“How’d you learn this?” Harvey said.

They closed in on her. Talking over one another, firing questions. Michelle backed up until she hit shelves stocked with backup glassware. A highball glass fell. It missed her skull by inches and shattered on the floor.

“It doesn’t matter who told me.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Serge walked a tiny, angry circle. “Doesn’t matter, you hearing this?”

He was angry all the time. He had changed so much. They all had. The distance between then and now saddened her.

“Michelle,” Harvey said, counselor-calm, “if you have a source, you should share him. We know how to exploit information.”

The condescension. Michelle’s sadness became rage. At Sam’s death, her funeral, Jimmy spending it a hundred miles upstate, the role she’d played. She had made mistakes. But they were her mistakes. Owning a thing meant defending it.

They were all talking now.

“If you want to hear me, you have to listen.”

The three of them shut up.

“I can’t tell you how I know. But I trust my source. The cops are digging into your pasts. Specifically, your arrest. They’re convinced the club’s a front and want to use the old case against you.”

“They can’t do that.” Jimmy turned to Harvey. “Can they do that?”

“If they’re building a RICO? Your prior state convictions can be included in a new federal indictment. But they would have to prove you’ve been a participant in one long, ongoing criminal conspiracy. For that, they would need corroboration.”

“How do they get that?” Jimmy asked.

“They need someone to flip,” Serge said.

Harvey pointed at Serge and nodded.

“This is all Luc’s doing,” Jimmy said.

The dungeon became silent. Somewhere, water dripped.

“The cop,” Serge said after a long time.

“I would advise against what you’re thinking,” Harvey said.

“Remove him and it weakens the case,” Serge said.

“Remove?” Jimmy said.

“You cross this line,” Harvey said, “and they’ll never leave you alone.”

“Hang on,” Jimmy said. “What’re we talking about here?”

Serge looked like he hadn’t slept in a month. Michelle hated him for what he had done to her family. How he had changed her. But he was part of her life. And before Michelle could deal with him, she had to save Abattoir.

She had avoided direct action once. Never again.

“What’s this cop’s name?” Serge asked.

“Are you going to kill him?” Michelle asked.

“Only if I have to.”

“Ben Hopkins.”

Serge

The phone booth stunk of fried chicken. Serge fed the coin slot with a shaking hand. He never pictured Michelle dealing in information. She was more formidable than he’d thought.

Cobb answered on the first ring. “You’ve got a problem.”

“Ben Hopkins.”

“Who’s that?”

“Don’t fuck with me. How is it I know his name and you don’t?”

“I told you, they keep me walled off.”

A junkie wielding a change-filled paper cup approached the phone booth. Serge sent him away with a don’t fuck with me look. “I need everything you can get on Hopkins, and I need it yesterday. His face above all.”

A pause. “What’re you gonna do with his picture?”

“Give it to my door staff. He’s never stepping foot in here again.”

No moon tonight, the street was dark. Corner boys loitered close. Hunters, the hunted. Serge braced a foot against the booth door.

“I’ll do what I can. But you got bigger problems. Ever hear the name Avi Brenner?”

Serge’s turn to play dumb. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Uh huh. Well, I locked him up. Got a tip and found some coke. Brenner claims he works for the biggest ecstasy trafficker in the country, and every pill he imports goes to straight to Abattoir.”

“He give you the details?”

“Not yet. Wants the feds to grant him immunity.”

Serge exhaled. Having David tip Cobb to Avi’s stash was a gamble, but Serge had figured Avi was sharp enough to know his only leverage lay in withholding what he knew.

“Once they take over his case,” Cobb continued, “he’ll flip on the entire operation.”

“How long will that take?”

“Late Monday at the earliest. These feds work bankers’ hours.”

Thirty-six hours to close the loop.

“What happens till then?”

“Brenner’s got to get arraigned. If the judge sets bail, he’s looking at Rikers.”

Another hurdle. Serge needed Avi on the street so he could kill him. Time for step two.

“It would be better for us all,” Serge said very slowly, “if that did not happen.”

Cobb didn’t talk for a long time. Serge wondered if this conversation had him conflicted. He wondered if Cobb had a soul. He had long ago given up the search in himself.

“I don’t hold that kinda sway.”

Cue step three. “Get him out tonight, and I’ll give you Wheat’s killer.”

Serge held down the switch hook and pulled Rivka’s card from his pocket. He fed the phone and dialed the number.

“Yes.” A man’s voice.

“Our friend got himself arrested. We need to talk.”

“Tonight. Abattoir. Put her on the list.”

Ben

“You’re gonna have to come clean.”

Ben ignored Freddie and scoped the line for Hannah. Freddie stuck to his heels like dogshit.

“She’s gonna find out.”

“I’m working her. That’s all this is.”

Freddie howled. “You’re lost, man. So fucking lost. I know when someone’s being worked. What you’re doing? It’s real.”

“Shut up,” Ben said.

“Or what? Don’t forget, you junkie cop fuck, me and Amy own you.” Freddie sneered. He was missing a molar.

In Ben’s pocket sat Freddie’s cooperation agreement. If it hit the scene, Freddie was dead. On the flip, Freddie could blow Ben up as the law. The two of them could lob dance floor nukes at will.

To save Hannah, Ben might make that trade.

Six months ago, Ben was in Public Morals. He bought booze and logged fire exits, enticed massage parlor girls into halfhearted hand jobs. Now he was plotting an informant’s murder. What had happened to him? Disasters filled his mind. Imaginings of his impending downfall.

Ben needed music and a hit. Ecstasy to start, coke for the amp, K for the come down. Valero had given Ben three thousand DEA dollars. His orders were simple: clean Abattoir out; buy it all.

Not a problem.

Abattoir’s queue ran the block. Partiers filled sidewalk and street. Cabs navigated go-go girls, boys in belly shirts, leathermen, skaterboarders, gym-swollen drag queens, naked hardbodies slathered in paint, arthouse types, stilt-walkers and supermodels and straights and queers and gays and users and straight edgers. They marched in droves. They clogged intersections. They shut down traffic.

The biggest club crowd Ben had ever seen. Its vibe was rapture.

In the distance, Abattoir hummed. It called to them. A dark brick box looming over the West Side Highway. For three weeks, the mayor had denied them communion. Tonight they would come together. Tonight they would blow the roof off their church. Tonight would never be forgotten.

Freddie stuck tight to Ben. The crowd thickened and Ben felt his world shrinking. He couldn’t find Hannah. Music pumped from a boombox. C&C Music Factory. Freedom Williams and Martha Wash commanded the crowd to dance. The crowd obeyed.

The street became a club. The show before the show. Gridlocked cabbies leaned on their horns. Clivillés and Cole outmatched them.

The scene took over. The scene staked ownership. It proclaimed rights. This city is ours.

Ben moved. Ben swayed. Bodies touched and merged. Many became one. Hands raised to the heavens. A single voice, reaching high. The city was their club. The sky was its roof, the stars its lighting rig.

Ben spun and spun. He was surrounded but alone.

From the crowd came a hand. Ben felt it through his shirt. It steadied him. He turned to it and Hannah pulled him in and she kissed him, slow and deep. Ben kissed her back. Around them the crowd swirled like a storm. They held each other, eyes shut tight.

Word filtered down, a shouted relay of joy.

Abattoir’s doors had opened.

A tear ran down Ben’s cheek.

Jimmy

Jimmy Lettner was ready. The shy bookkeeper’s son from Long Island’s North Shore had gone from bar back to street teamer to doorman to co-promoter to promoter to assistant manager to GM to owner/proprietor. Three nightclubs bore his thumbprint; one would cement his legend.

Abattoir’s staff stood waiting. Elise, Chloe, Angel, Tina, Diamond, T-Roc, DJ Frankie Dubbs, sound techs, electricians, bartenders, hosts, servers, bar backs, bussers, bouncers. Slim Rickie and her crew were still out there, working the pavement until the very last.

Michelle and Harvey stood to Jimmy’s right, Renzo Scalesi on his left—he’d made it from LaGuardia to Abattoir in twenty minutes flat. Serge was off-site. Plans inside plans.

Jimmy wasn’t one for speeches. His success came from professionalism, the bringing of order to chaos. But tonight Jimmy had to lead. Rumors flew about Randy. Michelle had inquired, Jimmy had responded. Randy had gone home. Club kids flaked all the time. Michelle had tried to believe him. Jimmy caught the effort on her face.

The DJ booth rose a dozen feet above Abattoir’s floor. Tonight it felt like a hundred. Jimmy set his hands on its railing.

“You all know me. I don’t like being the center of attention. Those people out there, the ones waiting at our doors, they’re not here for Jimmy Lettner. They’re here for you. They’re here for Abattoir.”

C&C filtered through the club’s walls. Doors rattled. Windows throbbed. The crowd’s energy swelled. Voices chanted. People begged.

Jimmy felt a switch thrown deep inside him. In a desolate corner of a bleak city left to rot, thousands stood hoping to get into the hottest party on the planet. Jimmy Lettner made it happen.

They did not come for Abattoir.

They came for him.

The realization hit like a line of Colombia’s purest white: Jimmy had been the draw all along.

“You hear that?” He cupped an ear. “That’s the sound of people announcing to the universe that they are alive. That they are here. And here is their home. We all want a place where we are loved.” Samantha appeared, and Jimmy nearly cracked. “Those people out there love us, what we’ve created. They show their love by paying our bills. They keep us from working shitty nine-to-fives, they make our fantasy real. They are our patrons. And for that, we are thankful.

“There’s been a lot of talk lately about Abattoir’s future. I’m here to tell you that we are a family. And I stand against anyone who rises against my blood. They will not buy us out. They will not shut us down.”

Frankie Dubbs brought the faders up slow. “Rhythm of the Night” by Corona built.

“Give me tonight,” Jimmy said over the rising bass. “Because tonight is all we have.”

Abattoir’s staff erupted. They raised fists and shouted love. Jimmy had tried to outsource murder because he believed he was alone. He was wrong. Abattoir held his people. Jimmy would die for them.

Harvey came close. “I should’ve been putting you on TV.”

“That’s why Jimmy’s a legend.” Renzo slapped Jimmy on the shoulder.

Stoney was still in Florida, a short-stay guest of the Miami Beach PD. Him and Renzo had gotten into something. Details were withheld in both directions. Renzo didn’t know about Randy’s killing, Luc and Mike’s sell-or-die ultimatum.

“Let’s just get through tonight,” Jimmy said.

Renzo clocked Chloe Martin, headed to her. Chloe locked onto Jimmy. Fix this.

Jimmy would. He just didn’t know how.

The house lights came down. The lighting rig fired bright. Frankie Dubbs went to max volume. Bass boomed across the floor. It rolled in waves. Jimmy’s ears pitched high and he shoved the plugs into them.

The first customers broke through the curtains. They twirled and squealed and danced. Their faces were bliss.

Michelle came to Jimmy. Her hand brushed his. She said something lost to the thumping track. Jimmy read her lips.

I’m sorry.

Jimmy didn’t ask what for. He didn’t want to know.

Michelle

Abattoir pulsed. It hit capacity an hour after opening. Twenty-Eighth Street was packed, a no-go for cars. Cabs dropped off patrons blocks out. The entire city had come.

“Thirty-five on the counter,” T-Roc said. “What do you want to do?”

Michelle didn’t even think. “Go for four.”

T-Roc nodded to Tina. Tina elbowed Diamond, gave her a thumbs-up. They scanned the crowd. They pointed and summoned. Selection brought elation. The chosen threw cash at the Toll Booths uncounted. Money held no meaning. Only the party mattered.

Angel on the radio. “We need help at the main bar.”

Michelle headed inside. Patrons stood ten deep. They waved hundreds and took whatever they were given. The scene reminded Michelle of the Studio days, when all anyone cared about was the night.

Before Jimmy got in Serge’s car.

“We’re low,” Angel yelled.

“What?” The music was so loud.

“I said, we’re low.”

“On what?”

“Everything.”

Jimmy was in the Keep on a cash count. The Toll Booths and bar tills had filled quick.

“How can I help?” Michelle had poured drinks. Bacardi and Cokes didn’t demand a PhD.

“Could you run restock? I don’t have enough bodies.”

“You got it.”

Michelle pushed herself onto the floor. The crowd had become a single being; every body touched another. People gave themselves away freely. They kissed, danced, loved.

The high wasn’t entirely organic.

Michelle saw rampant drug use. Pills changed hands, were swallowed dry. Bathrooms overflowed, noses inhaled coke. Club kids in K-holes lined the walls. Michelle reminded herself this was the scene. Always had been.

Samantha.

Michelle hit the dungeon. She reached the alcove lockups, their cast-iron doors. She flipped through Jimmy’s keys. The stone vault filled with liquor. Michelle loaded a pushcart full of bottles, heaved the door shut.

Deeper in the basement, along the back wall, Michelle noticed a shelving unit at an odd angle. Like it had tipped over.

The floor, walls, and ceiling shook from Frankie Dubbs’s set. The shelf must have tumbled. Linens lay unmade on the floor, the fancy ones used for private events. Michelle went from the napkins to the toppled shelf to …

Behind the shelf hung a curtain.

Behind the curtain was a metal fire door. A modern job with a push bar release.

And it was open.

Michelle edged through the doorway. An icy wind chilled her. The darkness on the other side was unnatural. Michelle’s pupils opened. Cobblestone floors, ancient brick, ceilings barely higher than Michelle was tall. Narrow and long. A tunnel.

Michelle tested the door’s out-swing. The lock face was shiny brass. New. This wasn’t here when she was overseeing construction. And why was it open? Had someone gone out this way? Or—

Michelle ran for the stairs.

Jimmy

The Keep’s red emergency light flashed.

“Cops,” Chloe said.

Jimmy killed the money counters and turned up his radio. Renzo hovered close to Chloe. He’d been on her all night. Jimmy felt terrible.

“I got the Tenth Precinct out here,” T-Roc said over the radio.

Chloe began collecting her ledgers. Standard procedure on the law’s arrival. The counting table was papered in loose bills. The Keep was overmatched. They’d be in better shape if Randy were here.

The cash box Jimmy held tumbled to the floor.

“You okay?” Chloe asked.

“It’s nothing.” Fifty grand lay at Jimmy’s feet.

Renzo pulled his pistol from his back, hid it in the open Mosler. Gangsters secreting guns in Jimmy’s safe, washing cash through his books. All he had wanted was to run a clean club.

“What if they have a warrant?” Jimmy asked.

“If they had a warrant,” Renzo said, “they wouldn’t be waiting at the door.”

Renzo threw the deadbolts and stepped onto the wraparound balcony. Music crashed into the Keep, ear bleed-loud. Chloe knelt and policed up the scattered cash. Jimmy helped. They locked the full box in the Mosler.

“This has gotten out of hand,” Chloe said.

“How bad’s he been?”

“Persistent. But that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s the work. He’s made my books meaningless. He’s made me meaningless.”

“We did some creative writing before he got here.”

“Not like this.” Chloe rapped a green ledger with her knuckles. “These are a fiction now, Jimmy. A story. And every story has an end.”

Chloe was barely twenty-three. The scene drew idealists and Jimmy leveraged their passion. His people worked long, hard hours. Jimmy was a motivator; his people would do anything for him. That had brought him success, but not only success.

Wheat. Rene. Randy.

Samantha in fading monochrome.

Jimmy had lost control. Of himself, the scene. Of Abattoir.

“I’ll get him out.” Meaning Renzo. “I swear.”

Jimmy stepped onto the balcony overhang. Thirty feet below, the party raged. Flesh, wall to wall to wall to wall. The crowd obliterated his occupancy cert. Jimmy didn’t care. Their presence was his statement: Abattoir would not go quietly into this good night.

Jimmy found Harvey in his usual spot. A boy and a girl made out inches from his face.

“I need you.”

“Five minutes.”

“We got cops at the door.”

Harvey’s O-face melted away. He peeled hundreds off a fat roll, threw them on the booze-soaked floor. The boy and girl dove after them. Harvey got up, followed Jimmy.

The street. Chill spring air. The scene outside stopped Jimmy cold. Bodies, from the Hudson to the Avenue and beyond. They clocked Jimmy and exploded. Their roar touched the heavens. Jimmy put the number outside his club at three times Abattoir’s cert. They’d never all get in. They did not care.

Tina and Diamond stood barricaded behind their ropes.

“You guys okay?”

“Six years in the industry,” Tina said, “I have never seen anything like this.”

“Are the lists maxed?”

“We’re still letting names in,” Diamond said.

“They just gotta get to us,” Tina said.

Cop flashers pierced the night. Jimmy collected Harvey and headed down the ramp. Michelle grabbed his shoulder. Her face read frantic.

“We’ve got a problem.”

“The cops, I know. Me and Harvey are on it.”

“Not that. Someone’s in the club. Maybe more than one. I don’t know.” Michelle was scared. Michelle never got scared.

“Tell me.”

“The basement door was open. The one leading to the tunnel.”

“There’s a tunnel?” Harvey asked.

Luc’s endgame realized. Jimmy’s enemies in Abattoir. No way of knowing who they were. Where they were. Michelle’s expression reflected Jimmy’s. She knew he was scared.

Jimmy needed a plan. Coke lubricated his mind, but he’d run out. Under attack and stone sober, Jimmy fumbled. He had no plan.

“First we get rid of the cops,” Michelle said, “then we handle whoever’s inside.”

Jimmy nodded. He and Michelle met T-Roc and the NYPD at the bottom of the ramp.

Two uniforms stood with their backs to the building. One white, the other Puerto Rican or maybe Dominican. Their name tags read Blecher and Reyes. Neither could’ve been older than twenty-five. The white cop bopped his head to the music. His black hair was heavily gelled.

“Officers,” Jimmy said. “What can I do for you?”

“We’re getting calls about the traffic,” Reyes said.

“I can imagine,” Jimmy said.

“You got a permit for a block party?”

“I didn’t throw a block party,” Jimmy said.

Two party boys wearing Calvin Kleins grinded close to Blecher. Their tongues probed each other’s mouths. The young cop shook his head and laughed.

“Coulda fooled me,” Reyes said.

Harvey activated attack-lawyer mode. “My name’s Harvey Cohen, legal counsel for Mr. Lettner. My client neither advertised nor supported this alleged block party. He cannot be held responsible for a spontaneous display of joy by the citizens of this city, and you should be ashamed of your needless and wanton harassment.”

Wrong play. Reyes’s eyes hardened. He pushed himself off the wall. Blecher stopped ogling topless girls. Harvey had pissed off the law.

“If you don’t clear this street,” Reyes said, “we will.”

“Officers, please,” Jimmy said.

Reyes unclipped his radio from his belt. Jimmy envisioned riot cops, thrown bottles, fire hoses on full. Stonewall redux. His night slipping away.

Michelle stepped in, butter-smooth. “Officer Reyes, Officer Blecher, you’re right. This crowd is, in a way, our fault. These people are here because of Abattoir. It’s pretty wild inside. Have you been?”

“No.”

“But we’ve heard stories,” Blecher said.

Reyes shot his partner shut up side-eye.

“We should fix that. What time do you get off work?”

Blecher again, eager. “Two. But we can take lost time at one.”

“Tell you what. Come back in different outfits and we can get you in. And not just tonight. I’m thinking the two of you comped through the end of the year?”

“We’re not supposed to patronize nightclubs in our precinct,” Reyes said.

“Then I guess you shouldn’t tell anyone.” Michelle winked.

Blecher whispered something to his partner. Reyes brought the radio to his mouth.

“Ten Eddie. Ninety-one on that traffic condition on Two-Eight and Twelve.”

“You just made the list, officers,” Michelle said.

The cops headed back to their ride. Jimmy found Michelle’s hand, brought her to T-Roc. “We might have uninvited guests.”

“Impossible. Every door’s secure.”

“It’s possible, Terrance,” Michelle said.

T-Roc headed inside double-quick.

“This tunnel,” Harvey said, “where’s it go?”

At the top of the ramp, Jimmy paused. A cop siren blasted; Reyes and Blecher forcing their way out. Party boys in dayglo short-shorts danced on the Crown Vic’s hood. The crowd registered the NYPD’s withdrawal and exploded. The law had come for Abattoir.

And Abattoir had said no.

Ben

Every touch rocked Ben. Hannah ran her hands across his back, down his arms, up his chest. Her fingertips sparked. They drove color into Ben’s head, circulated it. He danced. He didn’t care what he looked like.

Hannah kissed Brett. Ben kissed her back. Abattoir was beyond packed. Drag queens pulled circus acts over the floor. They hung upside down from cables. The crowd ate it up. Ben felt their joy. He could see it.

He was so high.

Ben left Hannah and circulated. He found case targets and bought in bulk. He filled his pockets with ecstasy, ketamine, and coke. Freddie tagged along. Freddie talked nonstop. Freddie pretended to matter.

“You write me into those buys. I need that federal credit.”

“You don’t deserve it.”

Freddie’s glare said, I know you. Ben’s chemically altered mind ran wild. It suggested atrocities. Plant the letter. Eliminate Freddie. Wash Hannah from the case.

I know you.

They circled back around. Hannah and Slim Rickie and Billie Love had staked ownership of a sofa recessed under a stone arch. Box seats to Abattoir’s all-night freak show.

Hannah kissed Ben hard. Stars fired in the darkness of his tight-shut eyes. Hannah’s real-world furlough was almost over. They hadn’t discussed what came next. Ben knew the future. Hannah didn’t.

“You get any blow?” Hannah asked.

“Yeah.”

Music poured from the sound rig. Streams of color pooled at Ben’s feet.

Hannah pulled Ben to Slim Rickie. “He’s holding.”

“Thank the lord.” Billie wore an iridescent belly shirt and fanned himself with a Japanese sensu.

Rickie ditched her Blow Pop and started jumping on the sofa. “Gimme gimme gimme gimme.” Her jean legs were wide as a Buick.

“Dee didn’t show?” Ben asked. Valero’s orders: Score from Dreamy Dee in Abattoir. Ben’s outlaw party buys didn’t link Abattoir to the drug trade. But Avi Brenner would solve that problem.

“That boy’s never coming here,” Billie said, meaning Dee.

“Gimme the stuff, man.” Rickie was itching, bad.

Ben reached into his pocket. Rickie saw something over his shoulder and pushed his hands down.

Ben spun around and saw Serge Thanakis inbound. Even tweaked, Ben made his face. It had been on Valero’s wall for weeks.

Rickie threw her arms around Serge, kissed him on the cheek. Serge’s face read determined. He and Ben locked eyes. Ben’s prisoner in the future, uncuffed in the present. Fucking wild.

Serge pulled Rickie away and they huddled against the wall.

“Who’s that?” Ben asked, faux-stupid.

“That’s Serge,” Hannah said. “He works for Jimmy.”

“Rickie’s got a thing for older men,” Billie said.

“Only when they run the club,” Hannah said.

“Honey,” Billie said, “you don’t wanna know what I’d be willing to do to stay in Jimmy’s good graces.”

“Jimmy?” Ben asked.

“Jimmy, baby.” Billie swept the dance floor with his fluttering fan. “All this is him.”

“Jimmy runs Abattoir,” Hannah said. “I told you that.”

Ben was laying it on too thick. His mind was a mess.

“How can you not know who owns this place, Brett?” Freddie asked.

His grin. That fucking face. Freddie was a federal felon working off prison time. Ben was the law, faithful and driven for the cause. Witness his boundless lies, his chemical intoxication. The felonies he’d committed.

Circulate the letter. Blow Freddie up large.

Kill him.

Rickie reposted on the sofa. “Hoe. Lee. Shit. There’s a cop in Abattoir.”

Ben’s throat went Sahara-dry. Abattoir froze. Bodies stood locked mid-dance: arms up, backs arched.

“What?” Hannah said.

“An undercover cop’s been buying drugs in Abattoir,” Rickie said. “Like in the movies.”

Ben nearly retched. Freddie’s fuck you grin dropped from his face. He shook his head at Ben. A panicked plea of innocence. It wasn’t me. Conspiracies took off in Ben’s brain. Did Freddie know Ben’s government name? Had he ratted Ben out before Ben ratted him? Did Valero tip Freddie to Ben’s real-world pedigree? Did she want Ben dead?

“The law on our floor.” Billie fanned himself at light speed.

“The city wants to shut Abattoir down,” Rickie said.

“How’s Serge know that?” Hannah asked.

“Dunno. But he’s got the cop’s name.”

Billie and Hannah and Rickie leaned close. Ben’s dinner started coming up.

“Dish, girlfriend,” Billie said.

Rickie lodged her Blow Pop against a cheek. “Ben Hopkins.”

The DJ dropped the bass. Ben nearly collapsed.

“I don’t know a Ben,” Billie said. “Do you?”

Hannah shook her head. Ben shrugged. It was all he could do.

“The name’s probably fake,” Rickie said. “But Serge is getting his picture.”

Ben’s photo, circulating Abattoir. Valero’s personal policy proven. The Department was corrupt. The Dirty 30. Michael Dowd. The Mollen Commission. Ben had been ratted out from the inside.

“We’re gonna show it around,” Rickie said. “See if anyone knows him.”

“If someone does, what’s Serge going to do?” Hannah asked.

“Probably kill him.” Rickie bit into her Blow Pop.

“Fuck the poe-leece,” Billie said.

Freddie went oh shit frantic. Ben felt himself drowning. He would be made before the night was out. From a pocket he pulled a quad-dose of K.

He did the whole bag.

Serge

“But they’d need a key,” Michelle said.

“Contractors can be bought like anyone else,” Serge said, angry at himself. The tunnel had been an escape plan. He never considered enemies might use it to get in.

Serge, Jimmy, and Michelle stood around the open door. A cold draft blew and Serge shivered.

“We’re assuming someone’s inside,” Michelle said.

“Or multiple someones,” Serge said.

For a few moments no one spoke.

“So we’re just going to wait for Luc to do to us what you did to him?” Michelle said.

Jimmy stared into the black. He handled strategy, Serge execution. Problem was, Serge had dragged Abattoir into a war Jimmy wasn’t equipped to win. Serge had started it with Wheat. Serge had to bring it to an end.

“I may have a way out of this,” Serge said to Jimmy. “But she can’t be involved.”

“This is my club,” Michelle said.

“It’s better you don’t know what I’m going to do.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t trust you.”

Serge lit a smoke while Michelle seethed. Her showy rage never baited him because he had accepted what she couldn’t. Without Jimmy, Michelle would be one more out-of-date party girl. Jimmy couldn’t own a club without Michelle. Jimmy couldn’t have opened his own spot without Serge’s drug cash. And Serge needed Abattoir to move his product.

They were all linked for life. Even if they hated one another.

“I can fix it,” Serge said. “All of it.”

Jimmy blinked. “Renzo?”

“And Luc and Mike.”

“When?”

“By Monday, if everything works out. All I need’s the word.”

Bring Jimmy in. Make him complicit. If plans went sideways and Serge got pinched, he could offer Jimmy up in trade. The thought of flipping disgusted him, but Serge was a two-time felon. If he got locked up now, he might never get out.

Jimmy turned to Michelle, asking without asking.

“They threatened our girl.” She headed up to the dance floor.

Serge and Jimmy, alone. The way it should have always been.

“I need twenty grand out of the Mosler,” Serge said.

Jimmy stared into the tunnel. “You’ll kill them all?”

“I promise.”

“Take thirty.”

Jimmy headed back upstairs. Serge pulled a flashlight from his belt and stepped into the tunnel. He heard scratching in the darkness. Serge found the stone, pulled it up. Underneath was Wheat’s death gun. Using a handkerchief, Serge popped the cylinder. Four live rounds, one spent. Serge shoved the revolver in his pants.

Cop car meeting two blocks from Abattoir, a murder weapon on Serge’s person. And he thought Avi was complacent. Speaking of Avi. “Is Brenner getting out tonight?”

“I pulled a favor. The ADA’s gonna consent to his release.”

Good for Serge, bad for Avi.

“What about the cop? You get his picture?”

“You think this is high school? That we got a yearbook or something? No. I don’t have his photo.”

Serge didn’t push. Tonight Cobb had a larger purpose.

“You still want Wheat’s killer?”

“You know I do.”

“I can give him to you. Stop him tonight, you’ll find the murder weapon in his car.”

A zombie junkie stumbled near. Cobb thumbed the Crown Vic’s door locks.

“Guns travel. ’Cause he has it don’t mean he did it.”

Standard cop-think. Serge’s next play was dicey. Cobb might read Serge spilling on Wheat’s postmortem pages as a confession. Serge needed Cobb to fear being outed as a kid-toucher more than he wanted to arrest Serge for Wheat’s murder.

“You find a pager on Wheat’s body?”

Cobb shook his head.

“That’s ’cause the killer took it. He’s got a list of pages that came in after Wheat’s death. Only the killer would have that. The list plus the gun plus this should be enough.”

Serge tossed the envelope onto Cobb’s lap. It was brick-thick with twenty-eight large.

Cobb eyed the cash like it was radioactive.

“He can’t live to see a trial.”

“Fuck, man. Come on.”

Up ahead, partiers danced unabated down Eleventh Avenue. The NYPD had abandoned West Chelsea.

“How’m I supposed to do this?”

“You stop his car, he reaches when he shouldn’t, you defend yourself. Giuliani’ll pin a medal to your chest.”

A break while Cobb thought. “What you’re asking’s too much.”

This wasn’t a question of morality; Cobb was scared. The hard sell, then.

“You can either be a rich hero or a disgraced pedophile. Your pick.”

Another silence.

“How do you know the gun’ll be there?” Cobb’s voice was very small.

Serge set the revolver on the seat next to the cash.

“Jesus Christ.”

Using his handkerchief, Serge pulled out the list of Wheat’s postmortem pages. He had rewritten them while wearing gloves. Rikers had taught him cops could pull prints off paper.

“He keeps a white Mark VIII in a lot on Twenty-Eighth east of Eleventh. I’ll beep you when he’s leaving the club. You can’t miss him, the guy’s a monster.”

“What’s his name?”

“Renzo Scalesi.”

Cobb’s face went death-mask white. “He’s a made man.”

“Like I said, you’re gonna be a hero.”

Serge fought his way across the floor. He quickly became drenched. Foam guns shot streams of soapy bubbles onto the crowd. He found Rivka at the far end of the main bar. She wore a short, tight skirt and nursed a Zima. That worried Serge. Killers drank brown liquor.

“I put you down for a plus-two.”

“I can handle myself.” A shirtless gym rat walked by. “Or maybe I’ll let him.” A sculpted goddess in a bra and stilettos came next. “Or maybe her.”

The music shifted upbeat. Strobes flashed at 130 bpm.

“Why’d you call?”

“You know Avi got locked up. If he talks, he can bring us both down.”

“I’m an Israeli citizen. My government won’t extradite me. Not for dabbling in party drugs.” Rivka grooved and scoped potential mates.

“Maybe not. But you’ll be indicted just the same, and the indictment will make the news. I doubt your father will appreciate the attention.”

Rivka finished her drink, set it on a shelf lined with empties. Abattoir’s bussers were in the weeds.

“What do you suggest?”

“A trade. I make sure Avi can’t hurt us and step into his role. You import and distribute through me, exclusively.”

“You proposed this before. When I held a gun to your head.”

“Circumstances have changed.”

“In your favor. Funny how that happens.”

Rivka knew Serge gave Avi up. No sense holding back now.

“The deal’s changed, too. Abattoir’s fighting a hostile takeover.”

“Who from?”

“Luc Delacroix.”

Rivka made a face. Not a fan.

Serge continued. “Luc moves Dutch ecstasy. If he controls Abattoir, you’ll be locked out of the scene’s biggest market. But if you work with me, your business in this city’s guaranteed.”

A jacked Black man in a leather vest smiled at Rivka.

“Get to the point.”

“Luc’s backed by a Russian by the name of Mike. He’s holed up in Brighton Beach. I know where but can’t get to him. Your men could.”

Air horns blared. Abattoir’s lighting rig flashed blood red. Serge and Rivka, frozen in conspiracy.

“I kill the Russian, you kill Avi, and we pump this crowd for every dollar they have. Is that your pitch?”

“That’s my pitch.”

Bodies for bodies, murder as business. Serge blamed Jimmy. If he had made Serge a proper partner, Serge wouldn’t have to hustle. Protecting the hustle meant killing Wheat. Wheat’s death sparked the war. The spiral led down, down, down. Serge wondered if it had a bottom. When he would hit it.

“Avi goes first.”

Two men slated to die on Serge’s orders. Jimmy ran the show, but Serge kept the lights on.

“We should drink,” Rivka said. “You like Zima?”

Killers drank brown liquor.

Serge said, “I love the stuff.”

Jimmy

Jimmy circulated, gauged faces for homicidal intent. He saw only joy. The mix thumped unending. Bodies danced, moved, merged. Jimmy beheld it at a remove.

A fight broke out. Bouncers moved in quick. Jimmy scoped suspects; B&T trash pushing outer-borough aggro. T-Roc took charge, oversaw ejections. Jimmy moved on.

Renzo found him. “You have any idea how much we’re bringing in tonight?”

Jimmy knew exactly. Jimmy kept the count. “I gotta check on something,” he said.

Renzo blocked him with a tree-trunk arm. “You cancel Destination yet?”

The audacity. This was Jimmy’s club. He trembled with rage. “Harvey’s working on the particulars.”

“Good, good. There’s something else. I been thinking.” Renzo paused. “About Chloe.”

“What about her?”

“What’s she do here? Really.”

“Chloe handles the books.”

“She used to handle the books. That’s my job now.”

Jimmy took a long drag and stalled for time. He’d expected Renzo to give up on Chloe. He should have known better. Men like Renzo do not move on. They must be moved.

“What you do we can’t show to the IRS. Chloe’s numbers keep the law off our back.”

“She’s redundant.”

“This is my club.”

Renzo’s expression hardened. “You pay her $34,700 annually. Frank would love if that money were saved.”

Anger swelled in Jimmy. The mix became a high-pitched whine. Jimmy had had enough of the world’s Renzos and Lucs and Mikes and high school Vinces. They’d tried getting over on Jimmy his whole life. No more. This was Jimmy’s club. This was Jimmy’s life.

His prison radar was pinging loud. Jimmy ignored it. “She was here before you, she’ll be here after you.”

Renzo laid a hand on Jimmy’s shoulder and Jimmy’s knees nearly buckled. “There is no after me. Fire the bitch.”

The music pumped loud. The crowd was electric. If Jimmy had his gun, he could shoot Renzo dead and melt onto the dance floor. No one would notice. Jimmy had never pulled a trigger, but killing was in him. He knew that now.

Renzo lingered, hulking and aggrieved. Pragmatism reasserted itself in Jimmy. He sorted scenarios. Serge had pulled thirty large from the safe to buy Abattoir’s freedom. Come Monday, Jimmy’s club would be his again and Renzo would be dead. The smart right-now play? Accede.

“Sure, Renz. Whatever you want.”

The opening bars of Crystal Waters’s “100% Pure Love” hit.

Jimmy wished he could shut the world out and in those moments of darkness find himself, the man he used to be, and that when he opened them, the world would be as he remembered it and Abattoir would be facing no threats and Michelle would love him again and Sam would be alive.

Would, would, would.

“I fucking love this song!”

Renzo threw his massive arms up and crashed the dance floor. Jimmy dropped his Camel, crushed the filter underfoot. Serge had better come through. Renzo had to go.

Jimmy headed for the Keep. The balcony stairs stood unguarded. The assigned bouncer must be sorting out the cross-club throwdown.

Thirty feet up. The wraparound balcony. That view. Jimmy slowed, one hand on the railing, and took in what he’d built. The crowd. The room. The vibe. All him.

He tested one of the trapeze cables secured to the railing. Lorraine and his girls were done for the night. Elise and Chloe’s office came next, closed and locked. The Keep, now. Jimmy’s lair. Its door open. Chloe was always on him about locking it. Jimmy had too much on his mind. He crossed the transom, clocked his desk. Found it occupied. By Christi.

His girl, dressed for the party. Her face pure panic.

Someone threw Jimmy to the floor. A kick to the gut emptied his lungs.

“Stop!” Christi’s voice.

Jimmy reached for the radio on his belt. A hand ripped it from him. Blows came quick. Multiple fists indicated two men. Jimmy turtled. He’d taken beatings before. He needed distance. Distance and time.

Jimmy scurried along the hardwood. Got a handle on his situation.

A tall, balding man with a bent nose. A gun in his hand. The second: thicker, younger. Greasier.

“Why is she here?” The accent rang Eastern European. Mike’s men. The tunnel door. The dance floor fight staged to pull security? Jimmy had forgotten to lock the Keep. Now Jimmy had to save his girl.

“Let her go. This is between you and me.”

A shut up kick to the gut. Christi began sobbing. The sound tore Jimmy up. Bent Nose and the Greaser argued in clipped Russian. They were jumpy, unprofessional. Was Mike running low on reliables? Or were they two expendables dispatched on a job they might not survive?

“It’ll be okay, baby.”

The Greaser stood waiting. Bent Nose paced, nervous. Not a pro. Most felons weren’t. Jimmy had learned in Green Haven the professional criminal was a Hollywood creation.

Bent Nose closed on Jimmy. His eyes were junkie-wide, his movements jerky. Maybe coke, maybe bennies. A little extra to get him through. Jimmy wasn’t the only one who needed armor. That played in his favor.

“There’s $165,000 in the safe.”

Bent Nose turned to the Greaser. Decision time. Kill Jimmy or take the cash? Why not both?

“Show me.”

Both, then.

“Just don’t hurt her.”

“Move.”

Jimmy slowly got to his feet. He ached to the bones. He approached the Mosler at a limp, his hands open and up. The Greaser kept glancing at his partner. The number two to Bent Nose’s lead. Christi was shaking, her fear filling the Keep.

“Let her go. You’re here for me.”

Bent Nose thought a moment. “Over there.” Meaning Christi. He waved the gun at the sofa.

A quaking Christi sprinted across the Keep.

“Open it.”

Jimmy worked the safe’s dial. His hand was on fire. The spinner hit the fourth number and the old safe clicked. Jimmy stepped back. He had one play, one chance.

“I keep a gun in there. Better if you open it.”

Bent Nose ran revised calculations. Was there a gun? Was the safe rigged? This was the life. Trust no one, ever.

He said something to the Greaser. The kid shrugged.

“Move.”

Jimmy repositioned near the drawer holding the gun Serge had gotten him. Bent Nose pushed down on the handle and started to heave the door open. Then he stopped. So did Jimmy’s heart. Jimmy tracked Bent Nose’s jittery eyes from Jimmy to the drawer he stood near. Bent Nose stepped back from the safe.

More Russian. The Greaser shoved Jimmy aside. He threw open the drawer, pulled out Jimmy’s gun. He held it up and the two goons laughed.

The American is not as smart as us.

“Nice try.” Bent Nose’s shoulders slackened. The Greaser’s gun hand fell. They’d found Jimmy’s piece. The danger had passed. “Open the safe. Pack the money.”

Jimmy did as he was told. The safe was deep and its wide door hinged right. Jimmy reached in, unlatched a cash box. He pulled two stacks out, tossed one to Bent Nose, the other to the Greaser.

Both their guns pointed at the floor now. They fanned the cash. Bent Nose must have made a joke because the Greaser started to laugh.

Jimmy shot him first.

The Greaser went down. Bent Nose looked puzzled, like he didn’t know what had happened. The DJ’s mix drowned out the gunshot. Jimmy shifted his aim, fired Renzo’s gun a second time.

Bent Nose seized. He got a wild shot off. Jimmy twitched but felt nothing. A miss. Bent Nose’s face contorted. He dropped his piece.

Another trigger pull from Jimmy. Click.

Bent Nose registered the jam. For a second neither man moved. Then Jimmy hurled himself at Bent Nose. Their bodies crashed hard. They locked arms and grappled and shoved and bit. Jimmy swung his paperweight pistol, found skull. The gun tumbled to the floor. Warm blood hit his face. Bent Nose’s. Jimmy fought like an animal because Christi was still in the Keep.

Oh God, had she been hit?

Bent Nose spun Jimmy round. Jimmy held tight. They crashed into the conference table. Cash counters tumbled to the floor. Twenty-dollar bills swirled as if caught in a storm. Jimmy’s world was a blur: walls, ceiling, sofa, floor.

Let go and Jimmy was dead.

Let go and Christi was dead.

Jimmy felt an arm on his windpipe. He bit the hand attached to it. That got him a forehead to his nose. His world flashed white. His lips became wet. His tongue tasted metal. More blood. Jimmy’s this time.

Don’t go down. Don’t go down.

A sledgehammer left found Jimmy’s gut. Air whooshed from his lungs. He backed into something hard at waist height. The railing. They were on the wraparound balcony.

Bent Nose lodged a palm under Jimmy’s chin. His back bent the wrong way. Jimmy’s feet broke contact with the floor. He was being forced over. Below him thousands of partiers danced. Jimmy groped the railing for leverage, felt a steel rope. The cable harness.

Don’t go over. Don’t go over.

Jimmy was born small. He learned to fight dirty. He drove a knee up; ball shot bullseye. Bent Nose folded in on himself. Jimmy unclipped the trapeze cable from the railing, looped it around Bent Nose’s neck. Bent Nose struggled against the makeshift noose. He threw a weak, wild punch.

Jimmy spun around, forced him to the railing. Bent Nose struggled, but the gunshot wound was taking its toll. The fight was leaking out of him.

Jimmy heaved and pushed and found the strength. Bent Nose went up and over. The harness system did its job. The cable snapped taut. Jimmy’s would-be killer swung high across Abattoir’s dance floor. A murderous, bloody pendulum.

The lighting rig flashed bright. The bass thumped hard. The crowd kept moving. The mix creeped into the 120 db range.

Over their heads a dying man hung by the neck.

Nobody noticed. Nobody cared.

Bent Nose hit the arc’s end, started drifting back toward Jimmy. When he neared the railing, an arm reached out and grabbed him.

Serge.

“I don’t know what to do,” Jimmy said.

“Help me.”

Jimmy stumbled forward. He and Serge hoisted him over the railing and onto the balcony. Bent Nose hit the floor heavy. He wasn’t blinking. Or moving.

“Is he …?”

Serge nodded. “We gotta hide him.”

Serge unlooped the cable. Rig lights illuminated Jimmy’s deathwork: dark red lines across Bent Nose’s throat. He and Serge dragged the body into the Keep, Jimmy at the ankles. He caught Randy flashbacks and nearly vomited. Serge kicked the Keep’s door closed. Jimmy looked up and dropped the corpse to the floor.

Christi, standing there. She’d seen it all.

“They wanted to kill you.” She wasn’t crying and that bothered Jimmy.

“They didn’t want to kill me,” Jimmy lied. “They wanted to rob Abattoir.”

“Your nose,” Christi said.

Jimmy touched it and lightning crashed his body. Serge stood over the Greaser. The body was still. Before tonight, Jimmy had never fired a gun. Now he was a killer twice over. The doorbell light flashed white. Not red, thank God. Small favors.

Jimmy cracked the door and Michelle entered the hellish scene. Jimmy, his nose cracked and bleeding, Christi’s nightwalker makeup running down her face, a stranger dead at Jimmy’s feet, another at Serge’s.

Abattoir had become the killing floor. This is where Jimmy had taken his family.

“They tried to rob us,” Jimmy said.

“They were going to kill Dad,” Christi said.

Michelle crossed the Keep and took her daughter by the wrist. She guided Christi onto the balcony.

She never said a word.

Ben

The K-hole consumed Ben and spit him back out. He breached reality near-sober, found himself surrounded. The floor was stampede-packed. The party raged. The mix crashed his skull.

Abattoir. He was still in Abattoir.

Hannah’s hand squeezed Ben’s. Her eyes were clear and level. She’d ridden the hole like a pro. Ben rebooted his memory. He tracked buys, noted faces and names. He added times and locations. He backed up the backup.

A fact crashed his door: Ben was made. Freddie had done him in. Or maybe not? Even if Freddie had learned Ben’s real name, outing him made no sense. If Valero cut Freddie loose, he was federally fucked. But the kid was a junkie and a perp and a liar. They made poor decisions.

Ben’s Neanderthal brain screamed, Get him before he gets you.

Before they get you.

Serge had dished to Slim Rickie, the Promotor Who Knows the World. Rickie tasked her lieutenants: Find the cop bring and me his head. Ben’s drug use buried him deep. Ben was beyond suspicion.

And yet.

Sweat poured down Hannah’s cheeks, dropped off the points of her elbows.

“Where’s Freddie?” Ben asked.

Out him. Kill him. Save Hannah.

“Somewhere.”

Sweat-soaked bodies throbbed around them. Lights cycled. The mix bumped to max bpm. No lyrics. The night’s crescendo came on.

“We don’t have much time,” Hannah said. “Dance with me.”

“Wanna drop?” Ben was loaded heavy with E.

“No. I want to remember.”

She pulled him with her. The crowd made way. They hit the floor’s center. Speakers hoisted high in every corner. Bass compelled movement. The beat eternal. Hannah threw her hands up and closed her eyes.

We don’t have much time.

This was Ben’s last night in the scene. Let Rickie find the Freddie letter, bump it up to Serge. Get Freddie apprehended, interrogated, killed. The scenario’s likely conclusion.

Freddie’s death meant Ben’s dirty urine lacked corroboration. Freddie’s death wiped Red Hook from the record. Valero had directed Ben’s subsequent drug use. Valero had ordered Ben’s prior drug use. He said/she said. Stalemate.

Ben would issue a peace offering: Hannah escapes prosecution, Ben stays quiet on Valero’s illegal orders. Defendants would read the indictment, connect Task Force Officer 7518 to Ben. They would claim he used. Their allegations would be ignored. They would not be believed. Ben was a cop. He sat at the right hand of God.

Hannah pulled Ben close. She kissed him hard. Ben melted. Ben became steel. The lights cycled. The music hit its peak. The crowd surged. Ben cracked his eyes.

A man swung from his neck above the dance floor.

Ben wrote the vision off to the ketamine.

Michelle

Michelle dragged Christi through the crowd. She knocked bodies back. She forged a path. One mission: Keep Christi from the cops.

Open air: Twenty-Eighth Street. Music came from somewhere. Multiple somewheres. Different songs from different boom boxes blasting different mixes from different DJs.

They passed a construction site. A vacant warehouse, gutted. The Sherman Group logo hung on the construction fence. Michelle walked faster.

Ninth Avenue. The crowd finally thinned. Traffic flowed. Michelle swung her daughter around. Christi’s eyes were wet with tears.

“I’m sorry, Mom. Heather wanted to come and I—”

“I’m not angry.”

“They had guns. They wanted to kill Dad.” Christi sounded like she was talking to herself. Repeating what she’d seen because what she’d seen could not be believed.

“I’m just glad you’re okay.”

Christi stared into the middle distance. A raggedy woman pushed an overstuffed shopping cart. Broom handles rose from it like a ship’s masts. Voyage of the damned.

“Dad had a gun. He killed them both.”

Christi Lettner, dressed in a girl’s fantasy of womanhood: too-tight skirt, a barely there top, heels she struggled to walk in. Too young yet, she wasn’t ready. But tonight Michelle’s girl had seen death up close. She’d left childhood at Abattoir’s door.

“Your father was protecting you.”

“I just … I wanted to see the club. The girls at school go. They talk about it all the time and kept asking me about Dad and I just wanted to see it for myself.”

Everybody wanted to party in Abattoir.

Michelle drew Christi in tight. She had set this in motion. Four years ago, when she asked Frank Locasio to fix her Serge problem. She had avoided direct action.

Never again.

Christi buried her head in Michelle’s chest. Perfume and sweat filled Michelle’s nose; Christi was doused in Michelle’s Chanel Egoiste.

Suddenly Christi pulled back. “We have to go back. I have to be there for Dad when the cops show.”

“What you need to do is go home.”

“Mom, Dad needs me. I can prove it was self-defense.”

“Your father can prove that on his own.”

The avenue was blackout-dark. Not a cab in sight.

“What are you saying?”

“You’re underage and were in a nightclub your father and I own. If you admitted that to the cops, the mayor could shut us down for good.”

“But Dad saved me. The police will understand.”

“No, honey. They’ll turn you against us. Twist your words and make you doubt your memory. They’ve done it to me. I won’t let them do it to you.”

Christi’s eyebrows came together. She was confused. This sheltered suburban girl had never considered that the police might not exist solely for her protection. Laws were tools used by those with agendas. Michelle knew this firsthand.

She’d failed Sam. She would not fail Christi.

“I was there.”

Christi stared at her. “Mom, no. You can’t—”

“I was in the Keep when the robbers came. Jimmy saved me, not you. You can never talk about tonight. Not to Heather, not to anyone. If you do, we lose everything.”

“Mom …”

“We don’t have the time. Do this for me. For your father. Promise me. Please.”

Christi had been held at gunpoint. She’d seen her father kill a man. Now Michelle added more weight to her girl. Lie for us. Lie for life. This is the world. Someday you’ll understand.

A yellow cab inbound and unoccupied. Michelle threw up a hand and the driver pulled over.

“Promise me you won’t talk about this.”

Christi shook her head. She didn’t understand why Michelle was doing this. The cabbie honked. Michelle threw him a fifty.

“If you mention this to anyone, your father goes to prison for the rest of his life. You don’t want that on your conscience.” Michelle had doomed Sam. The weight was with her always.

Christi—overwhelmed, numb, maybe in shock—just nodded.

Michelle held Christi by the shoulders. “Swear it.”

Christi’s eyes popped wide. Tears wet her cheeks. Her face was makeup stained. The crazed mom dragging her daughter into conspiracy. The scene they must have made.

“I swear, Mom.”

Michelle hugged Christi tight. She kissed her on the forehead. It tasted salty from sweat. She shoved Christi into the cab, handed the driver another fifty.

“Don’t stop for anyone.”

Serge

Money counters whirred. Business before bodies, always. Michelle and Jimmy banded cash and called out numbers. Renzo scratched numbers in the books while Serge manned the door. Dark wood floors masked the blood. The Keep was a no-go for staff. Jimmy’s restroom had a plumbing problem: the leaking corpses in its tub.

The night had ended. The crowd went home. Nobody mentioned the dead man that had hung above Abattoir’s dance floor. They either hadn’t seen or didn’t care.

Michelle counted too fast. Sweat poured off Jimmy’s face. Neither could handle their situation. A realization hit Serge: Abattoir had a leadership vacuum.

Renzo pushed his glasses onto his forehead and yawned. “I’ll finish up Monday.” He got up, wobbled, sat back down. He’d drank all night. “Remember what I said about Chloe.”

Serge held his breath. If Renzo retrieved his gun from the Mosler, Pete Cobb might find himself in a fair fight. But Renzo was drunk and arrogant and staggered to the door unarmed. Once he was down the stairs, Jimmy set his fists on the conference table. His shoulders sagged. He looked like he might pass out.

Michelle, on the other hand …

“How long till you’re back?” she asked Serge.

“I’m not sure.”

“You’ve got three hours,” Michelle said. “Then we’ll move them ourselves.”

Meet the new boss.

Serge headed out of the Keep. He crossed a floor covered in empty bottles and lime wedges and cocktail napkins. The employee locker room stunk of sweat. Three bleary-eyed bartenders sat at a table, smoking and counting their tips. Serge grabbed the wall-mounted phone and dialed Cobb’s pager. His heart thumped heavy. A tone hit Serge’s ear. He punched the one key four times and hung up.

Serge checked his watch. Avi Brenner should be home by now.

Serge carried a Champion duffel in one hand. The building had no cameras. The downtown rich didn’t want their comings and goings recorded. An older Spanish man in a wrinkled suit sat behind the doorman’s desk. Serge’s plan was brazen bordering on stupid. But he had no choice.

Serge set an envelope holding two grand in sweat-soaked bills on the desk. The doorman looked at the envelope, then at Serge. Luxury high-rises. All visitors must be announced.

Avi blasted music day and night. Serge gambled that the building’s staff hated him.

“18C,” Serge said.

The doorman collected the envelope and snapped open his Daily News.

Serge pressed the floor button with the point of his elbow. The elevator opened on an empty hallway. Serge put his ear to Avi’s door. Heard movement inside. He stepped back and steeled himself. Avi knew the game. He was going to rat Serge out. This was nothing like Wheat. Or Daro. Or Renzo.

He’d killed so many. Avi was just one more.

Serge knocked.

The footsteps stopped. “Who?”

“I got something for you.” Serge raised the bag so Avi could see it through the peephole.

A bolt was thrown, then another. The door cracked. Avi’s face appeared in the gap protected by a chain Serge could defeat with a kick.

“You alone?”

“No, I brought the day shift from Scores. Open up, malaka.”

The door shut. Avi threw off the chain and reopened it. Serge stepped inside. Avi reshut and relocked the door.

Avi’s hair was chaos. Dark shadows hung under his eyes. His cool unshaved look had crossed into street-preacher homeless. He stunk of cigarettes and sweat. The system did awful things to people.

“The fuck happened to you?”

“I had a long night.”

Serge set his duffel on the coffee table.

“How much you bring?” Avi reeked of nerves. Serge was anxious, too, but for a very different reason.

“All of it.” Serge stepped to the hi-fi system along the living room’s long wall. “What’d this cost you?”

“All of it?”

“The sound guy at Abattoir says Icon makes solid gear but they’re overpriced.” Serge pointed at the tower speakers. “How much for the pair?”

“I don’t remember. There’s a hundred grand in here?”

“I pay what I owe.”

Avi hesitated. Sweat shone on his forehead. This had to feel wrong, Serge showing up unannounced after Avi’s arraignment. Serge never would have opened the door, but Avi needed the cash. Avi made a bad call.

“Where’s David?” Serge had beeped his co-conspirator/Avi’s partner, but got only silence.

“Out.”

Serge pressed the stereo’s power button with a knuckle. “C.R.E.A.M.” by the Wu-Tang Clan boomed loud.

Avi unzipped the duffel.

Serge slipped the gun from the small of his back.

Avi tore napkins from the bag. More napkins. Only napkins. “Serge, the fuck is this?”

Serge pumped three rounds into Avi’s chest. The Wu drowned out the shots. Avi crumpled onto his sofa. His head hung forward, chin to chest. Serge killed the music and collected his shell casings. He repacked the napkins and zipped up the bag. Serge opened the door with his jacket sleeve and left.

The stairs this time. Eighteen floors at a steady pace. Serge didn’t have to stop, felt no nausea. That old operator was right: The more you killed, the easier it got.

Out the service door. Wind off the Hudson slapped Serge in the face. He headed toward the river. He walked slow. Casual. He heard no sirens, saw no cops. He never looked back.

The Esplanade. The Hudson lapped at the retaining wall. Scattered early-morning joggers ran along the water. After they’d passed, Serge dropped the gun and shell casings in the Hudson. He headed back to his car. He dumped the duffel in a trash can.

On Greenwich Street, Serge found a pay phone. He paged Rivka and waited. The call was returned in thirty seconds.

“Talk.”

“It’s done.”

Serge hung up and headed toward his Lexus. A block out, his pager buzzed. Four ones.

Renzo Scalesi was dead.

Ben

The room was midnight-dark save for a hazy yellow bordering the blinded window. It took a few moments for Hannah to slow her breathing.

“You got any sticks?”

“Check my pants.”

Hannah dismounted. She worked herself into a Yankees T-shirt and gym shorts, walked out. Ben lay naked on her bed, sticky from sweat and sex. His head spun. He heard his blood pumping in his ears. The rush lingered with Hannah.

Ben hoped she was worth it.

The night had been a disaster. Ben had dodged Valero’s post-op debrief and brought evidence across the river. Worse, he was made to the scene. Thanakis had Ben’s name, was working on getting his face. And Freddie McGee had vanished. His Abattoir bug-out implied guilt. Or fear. Or something worse.

Ben sat up. His world went diagonal. He touched his head, tried to level the horizon. He found his underwear and slid them on. He stumbled out of the bedroom. Hannah sat cross-legged on the floor surrounded by a hardcore drug buffet.

She had emptied his pockets.

In her hands was a letter creased in quarters. Freddie’s cooperation agreement. He’d forgotten all about it. A terrible, twisting sensation hit his gut.

Hannah looked from the letter to Ben. “You couldn’t come up with a better name than Brett Heller?”

In rare, lucid moments Ben had envisioned this scene, wondered how he’d react. He didn’t know when it would come. Only that his betrayal of Hannah was inevitable, and would arrive, one terrible day in the unstoppable future. Drugs had kept reality from his door, invited self-delusion.

Ben told himself this was his job, and Hannah trafficked in vice and traveled with felons. She was a target. He felt nothing for her.

All lies. The expression on Hannah’s face crushed him.

“Nothing you told me was real.”

His jaw quivered, and not from the MDMA still coursing through his system. Trembling, stumbling, Ben found his jeans and shirt. He put them on. Hannah watched him dress. She was calm and her calmness tweaked him. Maybe he wanted her to scream, to throw things. To become hysterical and beat her fists on his chest. He wanted her to hate him because hate made all things possible. Instead, she maintained the same cool detachment she’d displayed in Abattoir.

Hannah was authentic. Ben was a fraud.

The pager on Ben’s belt buzzed. Valero’s desk line. She’d been beeping him all morning.

“Are you going to say anything?” Hannah asked in an even voice.

I love you. I used you. I am a liar. I hate myself and my work and what it’s turned me into. A better man could have saved you. I am not that man.

But he had done his job. Seven weeks under. Fifty-four buys: 8,735 federal dollars spent. Eighteen suspects identified, backgrounded, memorialized, indictable. Freddie missing and possibly dead. Ben blown sky-fucking-high. Valero panicking. Operation Closing Time was over. Brett Heller’s time had ended. Ben Hopkins could resurface. Provided he still existed.

Ben felt himself wavering. If he didn’t act now, he never would. Ben picked up Hannah’s cordless, dialed Valero. He felt Hannah watching and turned away.

Three rings, an eternity for Amy. “Agent Valero.”

“It’s me.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, Hopkins. Where have you been?”

“Working.”

Muffled voices in the background, phones ringing unanswered. Busy for a federal Sunday.

“Has Freddie checked in?” he asked.

“No. But neither have you. Listen,” Valero softened her voice, “whatever nonsense you’re pulling, today’s not the day. I’m drowning in FBI agents. Pete Cobb got into a shooting.”

“What happened?” Ben asked, grateful for a chance to think about anything but the woman whose world he was destroying.

“Details are sketchy. Cobb was alone, he stopped a car, the driver went for a gun. Cobb got to his first. Killed the guy dead.”

“Is it a clean shoot?”

“Seems that way.”

“Then why all the agents?”

“The DOA’s Renzo Scalesi, nephew of Frank Bates. The acting Genovese boss. Cobb’s gonna get himself decorated for this.”

Detective Peter Cobb. Gunfighter. Hero. On the case because of Ben. Some prehistoric part of him was jealous.

Hannah still sat on the floor, her face an unmoving mask.

“Thanakis knows my name and is trying to get my photo. And Freddie might be blown. You need to pull him into protective, forthwith.”

Valero shouted at someone to find McGee. To Ben: “What a mess.”

He drew a deep breath. Next came the hard part. “I need a car and agents to Hannah Kim’s residence.”

A long beat. “You’re there now, aren’t you?”

Ben said nothing.

“You fucking idiot.” Valero hung up.

Ben recradled the handset. He felt his legs going weak and nearly fell into the sofa. For a long time neither of them spoke.

Then, finally: “You don’t look like a Ben.”

“Bennett, actually. My father hates that I shortened it.”

“Is he a cop, too?”

Ben couldn’t help but laugh at the image.

“What happens now?”

“You’re going to get arrested,” Ben heard himself say.

Hannah’s head fell into her hands. Her reaction nearly broke Ben. She’d promised her parents she’d never embarrass them. Ben did it for her. He’d wanted too much. He had never intended to fall for Hannah. But he had used her.

Ben sniffed through coke-burned nostrils. Only dehydration kept tears from his eyes. The urge to weep revealed weakness. Ben straddled two worlds, but didn’t fit either. He was too soft for a cop, too dishonest for a lover.

“How do you live with yourself?” Hannah asked.

Ben almost admitted that he didn’t know. He moved to the window. Outside, the sun shone bright in a cloudless sky. Ben felt its warmth through the glass. Spring had arrived. The time of rebirth. A cosmic joke.

“They’ll be here soon,” he said.

Ben and Hannah waited in silence. She didn’t crack, didn’t rage. Hannah was reconciled to her fate, and that resolve made her stronger than him. Better than him. Maybe she always had been.

Because she was fearless.

Time moved slow and visions filled Ben’s head. His work, validated. His talent affirmed. A sprawling indictment built on his buys. Headlines across three papers. Mayoral press conferences lauding police initiative. Ben’s career made. All he’d ever wanted.

But he’d never considered the cost.

Michelle

Abattoir, locked down and silent. The floor had been swept; the staff had punched out. Morning sunlight slanted through high-set windows. Michelle, Jimmy, and Serge stood drinking at the bar. Stoli for Jimmy and Michelle, Canadian Club for Serge. He and Jimmy had dumped the bodies while Michelle scrubbed the Keep. They had used the tunnel. The dead men left the same way they came in.

“Never thought I’d be thanking the NYPD,” Jimmy said.

The law had killed Renzo Scalesi. Serge arranged the meeting, Michelle was certain. WCBS news reported that Renzo went for a gun and a hero cop put him down. One problem with their account: Renzo had left his gun in the Mosler. Jimmy had used it to kill two men. Serge had broken it down, dropped it piecemeal through sewer grates.

Which got Michelle thinking: What did Renzo pull on the cop?

A good question. But other concerns pressed Michelle. “Who does Bates send next?”

“Whoever it is,” Jimmy said, “I’ll handle.”

Jimmy had become a killer in front of their daughter. He pretended this made him strong. Michelle knew the opposite was true. Jimmy’s gaze was remote, his body hollow. He stood hunched and heavy. They ran through this city, once, him and Michelle. Young and free and not yet weighed down by a lifetime of hard choices. The memories felt like a movie she’d seen once and remembered now only in parts.

Michelle touched Jimmy’s hand. He pulled it away. “You have to go to him. Find us a way out.”

“Bates can’t be reasoned with.” Serge poured himself a refill.

“Everything can be negotiated,” Jimmy said.

Michelle wasn’t so sure. After their failed hit on Jimmy, Luc and Mike might kill one of Abattoir’s workers. An easier target, a bartender or maybe a dancer. Then Jimmy would take one of theirs. It would go on and on like that. But trading bodies did not advance Abattoir’s security. Workers could be replaced. Ending the war meant beheading the beast.

Luc had to go.

Michelle took another sip of vodka. Serge’s pager buzzed. He checked the number, hustled for the employees’ locker room.

“You need to keep an eye on him,” Michelle said to Jimmy.

Unsaid: Serge had cops willing to kill on his payroll. Do not underestimate him.

Jimmy set down his glass. He glanced past Michelle at the closed locker room door, at her again.

“Serge has taken care of a lot of problems over the years.” Jimmy turned his glass in his hands.

“And what happens if he decides to take care of you?”

Jimmy didn’t respond. He hadn’t considered that Serge might try to make Abattoir his own. But Michelle had. She gamed angles and saw disaster. Abattoir was hers. She would protect it even if Jimmy couldn’t.

Serge came sprinting across the dance floor.

“What’s going on?” Jimmy asked.

Serge leaped over the bar. He found Angel’s boom box, plugged it in. He spun the dial to 1010 WINS, turned the news station up loud.

A female announcer, mid-report. “—en route to the scene. A heavy police and fire department presence will likely keep the area shut down for some time. Again, initial reports indicate a major explosion on a busy stretch of Brighton Beach Avenue. Witnesses say the blast originated at the Little Odessa Car Service. The explosion was said to rattle windows three blocks away. Authorities have not yet made a statement as to the cause.”

Little Odessa. Mike’s Fortress Brooklyn. Serge had struck twice in one night. He leveraged cops into murdering made men, planted bombs on the other side of the city. Serge was beyond dangerous. Serge was a problem in need of a solution.

Jimmy slapped a hand on Serge’s shoulder. Serge leaned on the bar, fist to his mouth. His eyes gleamed; he was proud. The announcer kept talking. The news watch never stops.

Jimmy refilled glasses. His pours were joyous and sloppy. Abattoir had gotten good at murdering its enemies. Michelle tried to fake her husband’s joy, failed.

“We have now received reports of at least two deaths as a result of the explosion in Brighton Beach. A mother and daughter rushed by paramedics to Coney Island Hospital have died. Authorities have not identified the victims. A fire department representative has told 1010 WINS that the death toll is expected to rise. We go live to the scene now, with—”

Serge shut the radio off. A long time passed before any of them spoke.

“There wasn’t another way?” Michelle asked.

Serge stared into nothing.

Jimmy rubbed his shoulder. “It’s not your fault.”

Except that it was.

It was all their fault.

A mother and daughter, dead because Serge outsourced what he should have done himself. Samantha, dead because Michelle did the same. Jared Dodson. Wheat. Even Renzo Scalesi and Jimmy’s almost-assassins. The boy Renzo had set on fire would be added to that list, once the hospital pulled the plug. All dead because of them.

Because of Abattoir.

Michelle would have no more of it. Kill the general, end the war.

“I want you to set a meeting,” she said to Jimmy. “Luc and I need to talk.”

Jimmy and Serge eyed her like she’d lost her mind.

“About what?” Serge asked.

“Abattoir’s surrender and sale. At least that’s what you’ll tell him.”

Jimmy eyed Michelle like he didn’t know her. And he didn’t. Not what she’d become. What Abattoir had made her.

Owning a thing meant defending it.

“What’re you going to do?”

“What you should have weeks ago. I’m going to kill him.”

Jimmy nearly laughed. Serge didn’t. He thought her capable. The knowledge warmed her.

“Don’t even joke,” Jimmy said.

“After this morning, Luc won’t let you two near him. But nobody sees me as a threat. And I have the perfect cover. I’m Abattoir’s signature. Tell Luc I’m willing to sign a letter of intent. Tell him Abattoir’s surrendered.”

It took Jimmy a few moments to realize Michelle was serious. It took Serge no time at all.

“You really think you can kill a man?” he asked.

Michelle said nothing.

“I ask ’cause he’s going to look at you,” Serge continued. “And he’ll know. Maybe you’ll be lucky, and it’ll only last a split second. Right before you do it. Or maybe he’ll realize early, and he’ll beg. Plead. Might even cry. No telling what a man’ll resort to when you threaten to take it all. Do you think, sitting here, that you can handle that? Maybe you can, I don’t know. But I’m telling you this: You’ll carry that weight till you die.”

“I expect I will.”

Sam. Her girl.

“Hang on.” Jimmy went back and forth between her and Serge. “We’re not really considering this, are we?”

Serge pulled out his cigarettes. Michelle felt her nerves bubbling and copped one off him. She’d finished her Virginia Slims hours ago. Serge reached across Jimmy and lit her up.

“She’s the only one who might get close to Luc.”

“No. No fucking way. This is crazy. Michelle’s my wife, she’s not killing anyone.”

“Why not?” Michelle said. “You have. So’s Serge. Right now I’m the only one not defending this club.”

Jimmy realized she was serious. “We don’t have to kill Luc. He won’t keep fighting us without Mike, and Sanctuary can’t afford another partner. I’ve made some projections. I’m pretty sure Sanctuary’s hemorrhaging cash. We can wait Luc out.”

Jimmy had always been good with numbers. Jimmy kept the count.

And yet.

“Jimmy, you’re my husband and I love you. But what if you’re wrong?”

Jimmy turned to Serge. “Give us a minute?”

Serge headed upstairs to the Keep.

Now Jimmy laid his hand over Michelle’s. Now he needed her. Their fingers entwined. The sensation felt familiar and right. It evoked memories. They had been young, once.

“You can’t do this.”

“If you’ve got a better plan, I’d love to hear it.”

Silence.

“All I wanted was to run a clean club.”

“I know.”

A longer silence.

“If it doesn’t feel right, sign the papers. Sell the club.”

“Of course.”

“I’ve lost so much. I can’t lose you, too.”

“You won’t.”

Michelle squeezed Jimmy’s hand. He wasn’t built for what came next.

But Michelle was.

Ben

In a DEA shower, Ben drifted into a standing sleep. He’d logged three down hours in the last forty-eight. Hannah Kim had lawyered up straight away. Smart girl. Ben doubted they’d ever speak again.

DEA agents reported Freddie’s Staten Island SRO was empty. The room’s condition implied a quick exit.

Ben killed the water and clocked a skeleton in the mirror. He climbed back into his stinking club gear, relaced his Doc Marten’s.

Operation Closing Time was in full effect. Valero juggled phone calls and dictated orders. Come dawn agents would swarm the city, knock doors from their frames. They would haul Ben’s subjects from their beds, cuffed and shackled. The entire case built on evidence Ben had collected. And ingested. And inhaled.

Ben had lied and bought and sold himself cheap. And turned on the woman he loved. Still he had failed. None of his subjects worked for Abattoir. Except for last night, Ben had made his buys at outlaw parties during Abattoir’s state-mandated siesta. Valero said not to worry. Post-arrest interviews would broaden the scope. And they still had Avi Brenner. Son of a dual-passport-holding, movie-producing father, cashed up and afraid to tarnish his family name, and above all, soft. Valero swore he would roll.

Ben wasn’t so sure. Hannah had a family, a reputation, a future. She did not break. She broke Ben.

Cobb walked in, suited and shaved. He gestured for Ben and Valero to follow. Another windowless office in a building of windowless offices. Cobb closed and locked the door. He grinned wide: Ask me what I know.

“Pete,” Valero said, “I don’t have the time.”

“Renzo Scalesi killed Wheat.”

Stunned silence.

“Ballistics matched his gun to the slug recovered from Wheat’s body. Courtroom-solid.”

Cobb beamed. Ben hated him.

“Just cause he had the gun,” Ben said, “doesn’t mean he killed the kid.”

“Scalesi had to know better than to hang on to a murder weapon,” Valero said.

“And I’d agree with you, if he didn’t also have this.”

Cobb handed Valero a photocopied paper. Handwritten phone numbers labeled with dates and times.

“Crime Scene pulled the original off Scalesi’s body. I couldn’t figure out what it was, but then I started thinking on what Ben told us about Dreamy Dee. How he stopped going to Abattoir after Wheat vanished ’cause he thought he was next. Wheat’s body was found on a Tuesday. This list starts the previous Saturday.

“These kids work off the beeper. We know Wheat was selling, and that he was associated with Dreamy Dee. Dee ditched his pager after Wheat turned up dead. Which got me thinking. I went back through the case file, and—”

“Wheat didn’t have a beeper,” Valero said.

Cobb pointed at her. “Bingo.”

Ben processed timelines. Set the known against the unknown. His memory unspooled. Cobb’s theory fit.

“Wheat vanishes,” Valero said, “Dee panics, dumps his pager, and stops going to Abattoir.”

“Scalesi got collared for coke in Miami two years ago,” Cobb said. “I’m thinking he was selling in Abattoir and found out Wheat worked for the competition.”

“Scalesi was logging incoming numbers,” Valero said. “He was trying to work his way up the chain.”

“Same as Ben was trying to do.”

Valero and Ben traded looks. He might be right.

“And what we think don’t matter,” Cobb said. “McManus just ordered me to close Wheat’s homicide to Scalesi.”

“You’re closing the case?” Valero said.

“You were with the chief?” Ben asked.

“Came straight from the Palace.” Cobb shot his cuffs, touched his tie knot.

Ben coughed. He was drowning in Cobb’s Drakkar Noir.

Valero flicked the phone list with a fingernail. “The FBI was looking at Frank Bates. Have you given this to them?”

“Those pricks? The feebs can subpoena me.”

Over the weekend the FBI had arrested two more cops. No more Internal Affairs; the Dirty 30 prosecutions had gone federal. The public pinch went down during roll call. Commissioner Bratton was present. Photogs from the News, the Post, and the Times had ringside seats. City cops paraded before the press in steel bracelets. The Mollen noose tightening.

“These numbers could help their case,” Valero said. “I’ll make sure they know it came from you.”

Cobb saw glory and bit. “Why not, we’re all on the same side.”

“Brenner’s complaint is almost done. You wanna pick him up with me?”

“Can’t.” Cobb swept his jacket. An empty holster was belted to his hip. “I’m on light duty till I’m cleared.” To Ben: “McManus says I’m a lock for the Combat Cross.”

Ben tried to smile, couldn’t. He had gifted his career case to a stranger and sold out the woman he loved.

“You’re on a helluva hot streak,” Valero said.

“I’d rather be lucky than good.”

“I would have loved to interview Scalesi,” Valero said. “Hear what he had to say.”

“Shame he tried to kill me.”

Valero studied Cobb a long time.

“I gotta get back,” Cobb said. “You’ll keep me posted on Brenner?”

“Of course.”

Cobb stepped out. Valero folded her arms.

“What’re you thinking?” Ben asked.

“You don’t want to know.”

“Try me.”

“First Brenner, now Scalesi. Cobb’s either a real deal super cop, or …”

Valero didn’t have to say it. Ben had been thinking the same.

Pete Cobb was dirty.

Pre-takedown prep swirled. Ben floated, purposeless. Federal agents avoided him. Understandable. Ben was NYPD. A member of a chronically corrupt organization. He was lucky to be in the building.

A humorless female fed led Hannah Kim from the office where she’d spent Sunday and most of Monday. Front-cuffed and chained at the ankles. The agent directed her forward. Hannah shuffled slow, bound for an overnight stay at Metropolitan Correctional Center. Tomorrow she would be arraigned with Ben’s other buy subjects.

Hannah passed Ben close but ignored him. She stared straight ahead. Her face was a rock. Like he was a stranger to her.

Which he was.

The agent guided Hannah into an elevator. The doors shut. Ben wondered if he’d ever see her again. Shame hit again. Ben ducked into Closing Time’s command center.

Boxes were piled high. The fluorescents hurt Ben’s eyes. A phone rang. A DEA agent spoke into the receiver, handed it to Ben.

“What’s up?”

Valero said, “Avi Brenner’s dead.”

Ben’s vision pinholed. He shot up, spun around, almost fell over. The phone cord had entangled him. He felt like he should do something, didn’t know what.

Valero went on in a whisper. Ben tracked her account in pieces. Brenner had been shot. Probably someone he knew, the door was intact, the apartment untouched. He might’ve been considering making a run. He’d packed some bags. The Squad was en route, Crime Scene close behind.

Valero kept talking. Her words became noise. Ben let the phone fall to the floor. He felt the case crumbling under him.

Avi Brenner dead. Freddie McGee missing. Hannah Kim indicted. Ben Hopkins revealed.

Serge

The Deuce in daylight. An exhausted Serge dodged day-tour streetwalkers and perved-out businessmen. Porn shop signage screamed loud: LIVE GIRLS! ALL NUDE REVIEW! GIFTS, NOVELTIES, SOUVENIRS! The gutter stunk of trash and piss. Pimps and stick-up kids scoped walkers for the weakest in the herd. Serge moved fearlessly among them. He was a killer of guilty and innocent alike.

Mike was dead. The news reported his legal name: Yuri Kuzmet. Also named were Oksana Zakharovna and her five-year-old daughter, Irina. They were walking by when the blast blew them halfway across Brighton Beach Avenue. The News and Post ran a picture. Smiles, mother hugging her daughter. Serge added their faces to his nightmares.

Northbound. Serge hit the Port Authority and found another gear. Panhandlers and pederasts trolled. Serge crossed Forty-Second Street and Show World Center came into view. The facade suggested a theater for the uninhibited. A sidewalk hustler in a leather vest barked at pedestrians.

“All nude, all the time! Watch these girls fuck, suck, and run amok! You’ll never look at your wife the same!”

Across the street, workmen in cherry pickers were pulling down Peep World 24/7’s signage.

“What happened?” Serge asked the Vest.

“Landlord quadrupled their rent. I’m hearing the Playpen’s in trouble, too. Good for me, right? Less fucking competition.” The Vest caught his pun and laughed. “Fucking competition! Shit, man, I am in the wrong line of work.”

Halfway down Forty-Second Street, Disney dollars were rehabbing the New Amsterdam theater. A Duane Reade had sprung up on Forty-Third. Across the avenue a uniformed cop patrolled unafraid. The Deuce in transition.

“Ain’t we all,” Serge said to the Vest.

Into Show World. A poor man’s Moulin Rouge-on-the-Hudson. Glossy black walls, garish red trim, mirrored finishes floor to ceiling. Serge kept his hands in his pockets. Men lingered in tight hallways, heads hung. They wore jackets and ties and held pricey briefcases in sticky hands. Eye contact was avoided. Eye contact was prohibited.

Stripper rock blared from corner-mounted speakers. Fighter-lean Puerto Rican kids with cauliflower ears and angry glares hovered. Owner Richard Basciano’s private army. Basciano lived alone on the building’s top floor. Rumor held he maintained an in-house boxing ring and mini-gym. His peepshow bouncers worked out there for free.

Serge suspected they paid in other ways. Everyone does.

He bought a roll of tokens, found Pete Cobb on the second floor.

“Step into my office.”

Cobb pushed the door open ungloved. Serge made a note never to shake his hand again. A dark, closet-sized space. Serge’s shoes stuck to the floor. A stool was bolted into it. Serge stayed standing.

“Your boy Brenner’s DOA,” Cobb said. “Three to the chest.”

Cobb studied Serge. As if he’d volunteer information.

“They got any leads?”

“Nope. I’ll let you know if that changes.”

Cobb fed the slot a token. Flimsy metal shutters rolled up. On the other side of the cloudy glass lounged an emaciated naked woman in eight-inch heels. Her forearms were lined with needle marks and her lips were crack-pipe chapped. A junkie outfitted with store-bought tits. She got off her chair, started thrusting aimlessly. The shutters fell and Cobb moved to reload.

“Can you not?” Serge said.

Cobb repocketed his token. “The DEA’s taking their case down at dawn.”

Blood rushed to Serge’s head. Show World started spinning.

“How bad?”

“They got eighteen targets. You’re not among them.”

“Jimmy? Michelle?”

Cobb shook his head. “Strictly low-level types. But if this DEA broad pushes, someone’s gonna talk.”

Cobb handed Serge a paper. Serge unfolded it, held it high. He couldn’t make out Cobb’s handwriting in the darkness. Cobb fed the slot a token. The shutters opened. Showgirl fluorescents flooded the booth.

Serge scanned government names and a.k.a.’s. Only Dreamy Dee was familiar, and he worked for Luc and Mike. Serge would run the others by Spoons. Check for exposure. But there was a decent chance Serge might skate.

Still, Dee’s name flashed bright. Luc had claimed someone saw Serge pull Wheat off Abattoir’s floor. Slim Rickie had said Dee flaked after Wheat’s killing. Feared he was next. Was Dee Luc’s witness? If Dee talked …

Serge pocketed the list. The shutters fell. Cobb frowned.

“How’d it go with Scalesi?”

“Aces. I’m getting the Combat Cross.”

“I meant what do your bosses think about him killing Wheat.”

“Oh. That. As far as the NYPD’s concerned, Scalesi capped the kid.”

Serge’s spine straightened.

“It gets better,” Cobb continued. “I had to turn that list over to the FBI. One of those numbers came back to a pay phone outside the Little Odessa Car Service.”

Serge kept very still. Cobb studied him. His face revealed he knew.

“One of the DOAs from the explosion was this Russian gangster. Kuzmet. Was into drugs, pimping, racketeering. The FBI thinks Scalesi and the Russian had beef, and Renzo ordered the Brooklyn bombing.”

This was an Abattoir windfall. Renzo’s NYPD-contracted execution had yielded a full-on federal misdirection.

Pounding on the booth door. “Feed the slot or get out!”

“Brasciano runs a tight ship,” Cobb said.

“Last question. Brenner had a roommate. This kid, David something. Have they found him?”

“Not that I’ve heard. He involved?”

Serge shot Cobb a look. Don’t ask me that.

“I’ll keep an ear out.”

Serge had beeped David a dozen times since killing Brenner. The kid still hadn’t answered. Serge was starting to worry.

“Here.”

Serge handed Cobb the roll of tokens. Cobb eyed the gift like a kid on Christmas morning. He settled onto the stool, unwrapped the paper, and fed the slot. The shutters rolled up. The girl in the booth got to work.

Serge left as fast as he could.

Michelle

Michelle drove Christi to Ashford-Rand in silence. She had been up since three AM, had roamed the condo predawn. No matter how hard she tried, sleep would not come. Michelle knew why. She was slated to kill a man.

“When’s Dad coming home?”

“Soon.”

Three streets passed.

“It’s not in the papers,” Christi said. “What happened at the club.”

Red light. Michelle stopped the Bimmer. An eternity before Christi said it. “You were never going to tell the police what happened, were you?”

Endless traffic flowed crosstown. The longest streetlight in history.

“You’ll understand when you’re older.”

The light went green. Michelle floored the gas.

“Is Dad going to be okay?”

“Yes.” Michelle would make sure of it.

At Eightieth Street, Michelle squared the block. She pulled the Bimmer to a hydrant opposite Ashford-Rand. She kept her hands on the wheel. Holding something calmed her.

“Are you going to be okay?” Christi asked Michelle.

Michelle didn’t know. She was supposed to kill a man today. Ashford-Rand students passed the idling BMW. They talked and laughed, moved with the lightness of youth. Michelle wondered when Christi had last felt that. If ever.

Her daughter, the rock. This wasn’t how it’s supposed to be.

“You should go, you’re gonna be late.”

“Yeah.” Christi reached for the door handle, stopped. “Mom?”

“Yes?”

“Did you hide the bodies good?”

Michelle’s heart stopped. What had she done?

Sanctuary. Jimmy had prepped Michelle on what to expect. Caged dancers, an underage harem, deafening music, inked muscle secreting holstered handguns. Jimmy had asked her a dozen times if she really wanted to do this. His eyes grew wet. He said she’d never killed anyone. He was wrong.

Sam.

“It’s the only way,” Michelle had said.

“If you don’t think you can do it,” Jimmy had said, “sign the papers. I’d rather lose the club than you.”

Neither of them believed that.

But now, across a shaky collapsible table from Luc Delacroix, Jimmy’s intel read overblown. The rig was dark, the floor silent. Luc looked thin and sickly. No thick-necked gangsters standing watch, just Trini Day and Riley Sloan. Neither had searched Michelle. She was a woman. She was not a threat.

“I am sad James could not make the trip.”

“Legally speaking, he’s unnecessary. I’m the company.”

“Still. I would have liked to see his face.”

“I’m sure.”

“Some tea?”

“No. Thank you.”

“Very well.”

Michelle hadn’t seen Luc in years. His skin was ghost white, and the blousy shirt he wore sagged at the neck and had yellowed at the armpits. His nails were long. They curled in on themselves. His hair was greasy and he smelled of urine. Sanctuary’s overhead dance cages hung empty. The DJ booth was empty, Luc’s outsourced bodyguards nonexistent. Because they were dead.

Michelle totaled her observations. Her conclusions aligned with Jimmy’s. The war had drained Sanctuary and Luc was low on cash. The Brooklyn bombing had wiped out his hired muscle. Michelle theorized further: The war was nearly over. Abattoir was winning.

“A shame Jimmy required so much convincing to capitulate to the inevitable.”

“He doesn’t want to sell. Neither do I.”

“But here we are.”

“May I smoke?” she asked.

“Please.”

Michelle pulled her Virginia Slims from her purse. She lit up, took a long draw. The nicotine soothed some. But not enough.

For the hundredth time she considered Jimmy and Serge’s reactions to the plan she’d pitched. Their reactions framed her actions. Michelle had offered to kill Luc but had never fired a gun. Jimmy protested, but Serge convinced him. Michelle was capable, the only one who could do it. Serge had provided a weapon, showed her how it worked. Michelle asked about practice. Not needed, Serge had claimed. When the time came, she would know what to do.

Her takeaway? Serge expected failure. Encouraged it.

Michelle extrapolated: Serge wanted her dead.

Jimmy was worse. He and Michelle were married. Had been lovers, once. The mother of his children—child—fumbled to load a gun while he did nothing. Jimmy was willing to sell what remained of Michelle’s innocence in exchange for Abattoir. His silence said, No, don’t, but also, Please kill Luc.

Fact: Jimmy loved Abattoir more than Michelle.

Michelle rewrote the plan. She dumped the gun in a trash can predawn.

Trini hadn’t searched Michelle because she wasn’t a threat. Not in the way Luc expected.

“We should get this over with, yes?” Luc threw a hand over his shoulder. Riley filled it with a folder. Luc unwound the clasp, drew from it a lawyer-prepped document. “I believe this will satisfy all parties. You should note the breakup fee is ten percent. Consider it incentive.”

Luc slid the paperwork across the table, crossed his legs. He wore boot-cut slacks and five-inch platforms. He touched his nose. He played strong and feigned indifference. As if Abattoir’s surrender was inevitable.

Michelle had rewritten the plan. No. This had always been the plan.

“Where’s Mike?”

“Occupied.”

Trini Day’s intuition pinged. She slid a step closer. Michelle screwed her cigarette into the table. Luc had threatened Christi. He deserved to die.

This had always been the plan.

Michelle had seen what killing did to men. How it twisted them. Michelle was a wife and a mother. She owned the city’s hottest nightclub. Owning a thing meant defending it, but she would not add murderer to her résumé.

“Mike’s name isn’t Mike,” Michelle said. “It’s Yuri Kuzmet. And he’s not here because he isn’t anywhere. He’s dead, Luc. I know because I had him killed. I killed Renzo Scalesi, too. He’s the one set fire to your boy. Jimmy killed the men you sent, and I came here today to kill you.”

Panicked glances from Trini to Riley and back. Michelle took a long draw off her smoke.

“But you’re not worth the effort.”

Keep Luc close. Enslave him.

This had always been the plan.

Luc’s coke-strained nostrils flared wide. Trini rolled her bowling-ball shoulders.

A pressure built in Michelle’s chest. Her heart rate bumped. “I know what you’re thinking. Kill me now, send Jimmy my head. Serge is camped outside with the crew responsible for Mike. If I don’t leave Sanctuary alive, no one will.”

A lie: Serge and Jimmy had sent Michelle alone. Serge expected failure, Jimmy was scared. Michelle had ditched the gun. All she had was her resolve. What more did she need?

This had always been the plan.

A silent conversation between Trini and Riley. Kill her or save ourselves? Easy choice, that. Luc stared Michelle down, but she felt weakness in his silence. She waited and waited but nothing happened.

Luc had taken his shot. And he had missed.

Abattoir had won.

Michelle had won.

Luc summoned Riley close. The little man whispered in Luc’s ear. Luc said something back. Trini’s opinion was not sought.

Luc flashed Michelle a mouthful of sharpened yellow teeth. “I am prepared to call a truce.”

Luc knew he was losing. Michelle wanted peace but had terms. The real plan, now. Ted Holland had stolen Expanse from Michelle. She would steal Sanctuary from Luc. The city was a hard place. Not everyone made it.

But Michelle would.

“I’m not here for a truce. Only unconditional surrender. And not mine, Luc. Yours.”

Luc’s creep show grin vanished.

“My offer is this,” Michelle said. “You sell Sanctuary to me, and I let you stay on as nominal general manager. You answer to Jimmy direct, make no decisions without his okay. For this I’m willing to offer market value minus … fifty percent. That’s my best and final.”

Luc sat frozen. Then he began blinking. Next came laughter. Overwrought, showy. False. “You want to buy me?” He gestured to Riley, then Michelle: The bitch, isn’t she hilarious?

Riley and Trini didn’t share their boss’s reaction. They had bills to pay. Lives to lead.

“Sanctuary’s a fifth Abattoir’s size. You barely hit half capacity this past Saturday. This war has crushed your cash reserves, and Abattoir’s stealing your crowd.” To Riley, she said, “How much runway do you have until payroll checks start bouncing? A week? Two?”

Riley said nothing. His nonreaction confirmed Jimmy’s insolvency theory; Sanctuary was broke. Jimmy kept the count. Even when he didn’t own the numbers.

“You know how it goes. DJs break dates, bartenders quit, promoters walk. The buzz dies and the crowd moves on. That’s the nature of our business. We’ve all been there.”

Luc wiped his shiny lips with a trembling hand. “And you’re offering to save me.”

“I’m giving you a choice. The scene or death.”

Riley stepped up, whispered in Luc’s ear. Luc muttered something in French. It reeked of capitulation.

Michelle rose. She slung her bag over a shoulder. At the day’s start it had weighed heavy. It had carried Jimmy’s gun. Michelle had since lightened her load.

“Harvey will draw up the papers. I’ll have your answer by sundown.”

Manhattan daylight hit her face. Michelle had never felt more alive.

Ben

The takedown netted all eighteen targets. Agents rolled ink prints, took booking photos. Cobb helped, Ben didn’t. Valero barred him from participating. Ben spent his case’s climax confined to a disused office.

A US Marshals bus transported the prisoners to Southern District. Ben was set free. He found Valero, inquired about her debriefs. He’d set out to solve Wheat’s murder, had given Hannah in trade.

Ben asked the only question that mattered: What’d Dreamy Dee have to say?

“Our defendants will be interviewed at a later date.” Valero sat behind her desk, filling out paperwork.

Ben was stunned. “You didn’t talk to them?”

“They’ll be spoken to when the time’s right.” Valero would not look at him. Why wouldn’t she look at him?

“You didn’t talk to Dee.”

Cobb toyed with his cuffs. He wouldn’t look at Ben.

“They got a system,” he said.

Cobb’s self-righteousness was gone. He vibed borderline Zen. Cobb had killed a man. Cobb had found peace. He was only here because of Ben.

“I don’t understand.”

Valero put her pen down, rubbed her eyes. “Once the defendants have attorneys, Donna will contact them. See who’s interested in cooperating and who isn’t. This may be hard for you to believe, but we’ve done this a time or two.”

Neither of them would look at him. Something was wrong. Valero had eighteen dealers in her cuffs. In her office, charged federally and awaiting arraignment. Scared. Terrified.

And she hadn’t asked them a thing.

Valero collected her folders. “We need to get going.”

Cobb squared his tie. “Gotta look smart for the cameras.”

Ben watched the press conference on a television in the chief of detectives’ office. Commissioner Bratton, Chief McManus, Tyler Easton, Amy Valero, Assistant US Attorney Donna Lockwood, Pete Cobb, and a dozen Palace chiefs bracketed the podium somber faced. Serious people engaged in serious work.

Mayor Giuliani owned the stage. He railed about the scourge of drugs corrupting the city’s youth. He lamented Dinkins’s inaction, heaped adoration on the cops who’d won him the election, vowed his administration would not stand by while good kids like Jared Dodson died young. He praised the city’s federal partners and marked the case as an example of the good that could be accomplished through interagency cooperation.

This investigation held great symbolism and came at a difficult time, the mayor said. Despite the Mollen Commission’s ongoing investigation and recent arrests of corrupt police officers, Operation Closing Time proved that the vast majority of the city’s law enforcement were honest, righteous, and just. Citizens could rest easy knowing detectives like Pete Cobb wore the NYPD’s gold shield. The mayor also praised the many faceless undercover officers who risked their lives embedding themselves in a vile drug dealing organization.

Ben shut the TV off. He roamed the Palace’s thirteenth floor. His clothes hung off him. Headquarters cops side-eyed the bleached blond pseudo-junkie. A pass dangling from Ben’s neck claimed he was a cop. He hadn’t worn his shield since Gray’s Papaya. The night he met Hannah.

Chief McManus and Tyler Easton came back after the show. They asked Ben to sit with them. The chief bolted his door.

McManus sat behind his massive desk and gave Ben a once-over. He read shocked, as if seeing Ben for the first time. This Ben was new to him. This Ben was old to Ben.

“Christ, you really got into the role.”

“Officer Hopkins is committed to his work,” Easton said.

From a drawer, McManus pulled a bottle of Macallan 12 and two tumblers. He filled them, handed one to Easton, kept the other for himself. McManus swirled his whiskey slow. He’d aged a decade in months. The Dirty 30 and Milton Mollen were grinding him down.

“You did good,” McManus said. “I mean that.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Easton studied his single malt, then gave McManus a look: Get on with it. Ben wondered who was in charge.

“I know you’ve sacrificed for this case. We asked a hell of lot of you. And you delivered. I also know, back when this started, that promises were made. I’m a man who honors my word. Unfortunately, the situation has changed. And will continue to change over the next few weeks. I appreciate your dedication and value all you’ve done. You’ll return to Patrol next week.”

Patrol. The uniform. Vehicle accidents and streetside overdoses. Domestics and parking summonses. No shield.

To sell himself to the scene, Ben had done every drug he got his hands on. He had committed felonies in service of the city. He broke oaths, professional and personal. And now this. Ben had abandoned his ideals for a thank you.

He turned to Easton. “You’re not going to say something?”

“You work for the NYPD. My influence here is limited.”

“I can’t believe this.” A heat rose in Ben. The wise cop would push it down. Eat it. But today, Ben was dumb. Maybe he always had been. “I spent months on this case. Dirty cops are getting collared right and left. I’m the reason the mayor finally had a good news day. Valero’s getting the goddamned FBI, but I’m going back to Patrol? Do you know what I’ve done for this department?”

McManus slammed his tumbler down. His volcano nearly blew, but the old cop collected himself and spoke with barely contained rage. “I know exactly what you’ve done. Which is why you should shut your mouth. You have the sand to tell a bureau chief you’re the reason I held a press conference? The only reason you’re still a cop is because of Tyler Easton. You don’t have a clue what the Department’s facing. I should terminate you, Hopkins. With prejudice. No, I should collar you.”

McManus downed a long swig. “Don’t preach your sanctimonious bullshit in my office. You set yourself down this path and were all too willing to bring the department along for the ride.”

McManus was right. Ben’s trip to Red Hook had violated departmental guidelines and broken state law. He had gotten high and dodged uniforms, lied to Hannah in pursuit of the detective’s shield. He was a careerist. He pushed. Now the world was pushing back.

“You’re dismissed.”

Valero was waiting for Ben in the bullpen.

“Freddie McGee is dead.”

Serge

Serge crossed Union Square Park. He carried sixty-eight large in a Ted Baker soft-sided briefcase. Counted and packed in Spoons’s Bay Ridge crash pad. Cobb had given Serge the heads-up. The investigation was over, the feds were moving on.

Locals downed dirty water dogs slathered in mustard. Tourists strolled and snapped photos. Junkies and bums were nonexistent. Trees made bare by winter were greening again. The sun shone on Serge’s face. Not all the news was good, though.

Michelle let Luc live. She hadn’t even tried. Instead, she pitched him on selling her Sanctuary. The outcome wasn’t totally unexpected. Killing wasn’t in Michelle, but Serge credited her for walking into the old church and coming out alive.

Union Square Cafe on Sixteenth Street. Danny Meyer’s joint. The chicest of the chic. Elite New York’s lunch crowd dined. Martinis splashed over glass rims. Backs were slapped and stabbed, deals made and unmade and remade over risotto with escargot, smoked pancetta, and leeks.

Serge found Rivka at a downstairs two-top. Her operators sat at a table in the back, along the wall. A server refilled Rivka’s wine glass. Serge approached her and sat.

He slid the bag to her. “I’m short, but our numbers will climb.”

One of Rivka’s men came over, picked up the bag, returned to his salad. Rivka studied her burgundy-filled glass. A bomb she’d ordered had killed seven people, but Rivka put off the insulated tranquility of the wealthy.

“Domaine de la Romanee-Conti Richebourg,” she said. “Have you had the pleasure?”

“I’m not a wine guy.” Killers drank brown liquor.

“Pinot noir is an extremely difficult grape to cultivate. It is …” Rivka searched for the word, “finicky? Demands absolutely perfect conditions. If they are not met, the wine suffers. The novice won’t taste the difference, but the connoisseur knows. Four thousand, two hundred dollars per bottle.”

She poured the wine into the ice bucket. Showy, but effective. Rivka was cashed up, carefree, and batshit crazy. And Serge was in bed with her.

“Your money means nothing to me. Do you understand?”

Serge did.

“But as a potential partner, I find you intriguing. You displayed vision. Avi was myopic and unwise. Were I him, I never would have let you in. But he did, and now he’s dead, and here we are. I would toast, but …” She flicked her eyes at the wine-filled ice bucket.

“What comes next?”

“Zane will be in touch.” The man who’d held a gun to Serge’s head. “Needless to say, you will have to scale up your organization.”

“How big are you thinking?”

“You have been selling to a club. You pitched me the city. I want the country. I want it all.”

A glass of water sat in front of Serge. He downed the whole thing.

“Smile, Serge. You’re going to be rich.”

Possible. But what had Serge given away in exchange?

“Brooklyn didn’t have to go like that.”

“You wanted a man dead but could not make it so. You don’t have the right to question my methods.” Rivka grabbed a passing waiter. “Another bottle of the Richebourg.”

The waiter nodded and headed off. Rivka stared Serge down. Her words were heinous but true. Serge had contracted murder and received carnage. Oksana and Irina Zakharovna joined Daro Xhaxhka, Wheat, Randy Watkins, Renzo Scalesi, and Avi Brenner.

Serge had put them all in the ground, directly or otherwise. They would stay with him until he died. Maybe longer. When the music stopped, the best Serge could hope for was full black and silence. He should be so lucky.

The matter of David lingered. Thirty pages sent, zero calls returned.

“Avi had a roommate.”

“The one you had phone the police about Avi.”

Serge downed Rivka’s water. Thirty pages, zero calls, one psychopathic ecstasy importer.

“I won’t have men so easily turned corrupt in our organization.” Rivka sawed a hunk of filet off, put it in her mouth. She spoke as she chewed. “What was it you said in Avi’s apartment? Full measures, always?”

Serge’s chest went hollow. He did not know David. Not well. But Serge had used him, and for that David had been tortured, killed, buried, chopped up, dumped, sunk, burned, never to be found. David had parents. Maybe a brother, or a sister. Serge thought about the families he had broken but never met. The guilt threatened to overwhelm him.

“I have to go.”

“Put me on the list for Saturday.” Bits of steak flew from her mouth. “Plus three, I’m bringing the girls. And I don’t pay for drinks. I swear, Serge, a bartender asks me for money, I will lose my shit.”

Serge thought he nodded. He couldn’t be sure.

He found himself on the sidewalk. Then Union Square Park. An empty bench. Serge fell onto it. People passed. Legs, torsos, swinging arms. The occasional dog. He heard laughter. Faces brightened by spring’s rebirth. Street drummers beat on buckets. Hands dropped singles into an upturned Yankees hat. Mothers pushed toddlers in pricey strollers. An old woman stood at an easel, brushing watercolors onto canvas.

Among them sat a killer.

How long before the city learned what Serge really was?

Ben

Freddie McGee sprawled arm-spiked on a stained mattress in a sketchy motel a block west of Atlantic City’s neon-filled casinos. His eyes and mouth were open. Dried vomit splattered Freddie’s neck and T-shirt. The stench was overwhelming. In his final moments Freddie had shit himself. Ben had learned this wasn’t uncommon.

Freddie had overstayed his prepaid stay, was to vacate immediately. A desk clerk discovered that Freddie had instead left the planet. Local law ran his license, discovered Valero’s BOLO. They held the scene out of courtesy.

Valero snapped a photo. The SLR’s flash sent the room nuclear for an instant.

“Our people took Polaroids,” the Atlantic City sergeant said.

“That’s good.” Valero advanced the film. She squatted low and focused on the bent spoon, the lighter.

Ben felt nothing. The work had stolen his emotions.

“Did he check in with anyone?” Valero asked.

“This ain’t the kinda place employees record those observations.”

Another photo. The flash shone bright. Ben stared into it unblinking. Numb.

“The door hasn’t been tampered with. If you’re theorizing an invasion.”

Valero tossed Ben Freddie’s car keys. “Find his ride.”

Rain-slicked parking lot tarmac. Two ACPD cops drank coffee near their cruiser. Ben tossed Freddie’s battered Civic, came up empty for contraband. He tested the ignition. The four-banger sputtered, fired. The fuel light flashed yellow. The needle hung below E. Freddie had run as far as he could.

Ben returned to the room. Valero and the sergeant were mid-conversation.

“—just the spike, the dope, his bag—underwear, socks—and the car keys.”

“No cash?”

“Not a dime,” the sergeant said. “Figure he shot what he had up his arm. The ME’ll know more after the tox.”

“How long will that take?” Valero asked.

“They’re moving pretty quick now. Figure two months, tops.”

Valero wrote something down.

“We get this a lot,” the sergeant said. “Folks on the run from this or that. They get lucky playing craps, maybe roulette. Win more than they can handle, but spend it the same. Your friend here marks overdose number thirteen, year to date. This’s a city of last chances.”

Ben realized he was listing. He set a hand on a pressboard dresser. He swallowed hard and touched his head. Valero clocked his situation.

“Sergeant,” she said, “can I have the room?”

“Suit yourself.” He walked out, shut the door.

Valero locked it. “You okay?”

“Yeah.”

“What do you think?” She raised her chin at Freddie’s cooling corpse.

“I think Freddie got scared.”

Valero went quiet for a few moments. “I need to tell you something. You’re not gonna like it.”

There was a chair. Ben sat in it. Freddie wore stained briefs and one sock. A leather belt hung loose around what passed for his biceps, just above the needle. Ben was disgusted with himself. He had hit this man. This boy. This dead boy.

“Donna’s going to offer our defendants generous plea deals. She will not seek their cooperation or investigate Abattoir any further.”

“Because of Freddie?”

“She doesn’t know about Freddie.”

Ben made a small gesture with his hands: What, then?

“Southern District’s been investigating the Thirtieth Precinct. Going on a year now, very hush-hush. Donna’s boss gave her a preview, along with a draft of the Mollen Commission report. It’s bad, Ben. Home invasions, cops wholesaling kilos, racketeering. Things for you are going to get very ugly. In light of that, Southern’s not comfortable prosecuting a case built on NYPD-generated evidence. If a defense attorney finds out our undercover’s a city cop, they’ll try to put you on the stand. No matter what you say, you won’t be trusted.”

Probably for the best. Still.

“Jared Dodson’s suicide. Avi Brenner’s murder. Freddie’s overdose. All of it linked to Abattoir. And you’re just going to let it go.”

I gave you Hannah. Convince me it was worth it.

“I don’t have a choice.”

For a split second Ben thought he saw Freddie’s chest rise.

“We all have a choice.”

“This could have been worse. Freddie could’ve been murdered.”

“He was. And if you think otherwise, you’re a better liar than me.”

Ben walked out. The ACPD sergeant grabbed him in the lot. “Almost forgot. He had this, too.”

The uniform handed Ben a ratty copy of Incubator, the scene zine Slim Rickie had mentioned back in Red Hook.

Hours later, in the DEA offices, Ben flipped through it. The paper felt cheap and the layouts amateur. Party reports, event flyers, pencil sketches, candid photos. But also real. It vibed homemade and felt loved. Ben grew jealous.

A graffiti bubble headline caught his eye: NYPD Invades Red Hook Blowout. Pre-invasion snapshots memorialized the night Ben crossed over.

Three pages in, Ben found her. Found them. Ben and Hannah on the floor, her leaning on him, him loving on her. Stupid smiles on their faces. A feeling Ben knew he’d never feel again.

He tore the picture from the mag and threw the rest in the trash.

Jimmy

The phone on Jimmy’s desk rang.

“Yeah?”

“I just got a call from Luc Delacroix’s attorney,” Harvey said. “He’s agreed to sell you Sanctuary.”

Adrenaline flooded Jimmy’s bloodstream. The industry was his favorite drug. Jimmy settled into his chair. His desk felt larger. Four cash counters rested on the conference table. Jimmy would have to buy more.

“When?”

“Michelle wants me to messenger Luc a letter of intent first thing tomorrow. I think that’s unwise.”

“What’s the problem?”

“Jimmy, seriously? You need to see his books. I’ll NDA him, you review the club’s numbers. This is basic due diligence.”

“I know his numbers, Harvey. I want the LOI signed immediately.”

“Jimmy.”

“And a thirty-day close.”

“Jimmy.”

“Harvey.”

Harvey clicked his cough drop against his teeth. “I live to serve.”

“Thank you.”

Michelle had returned alive. When she stepped into the Keep, Jimmy feared she’d join the ranks of those who’d killed in Abattoir’s defense. Or be killed herself. But she flipped Luc’s script. You sell or die. Luc caved. Nobody wanted their party to end. At first Jimmy questioned the move, but Michelle’s explanation proved compelling.

Keep him close. Enslave him for life.

Punish him.

Sold.

“I know this has been hard on you.”

Harvey had no idea. On the rooftop of an abandoned building across the street, two nameless dead men lay rotting. The Christi-witnessed death-brawl dominated Jimmy’s nightmares. His girl had watched him kill. He hoped she slept better than him.

“What’ve you heard about those DEA arrests?” Jimmy asked Harvey.

“I got a hold of the complaint. Dull reading. A bunch of club kids slinging party drugs, mostly at outer-borough warehouse parties. Which contradicts Southern District’s Abattoir-as-drug-den hypothesis. Unless Donna’s holding back—and she’s not the type—I don’t see this touching you.”

“Giuliani ranted at the press conference.”

“Giuliani just became the first mayor since Abe Beame to contract city services. Mollen and the feds are about to roast the NYPD worse than Frank Serpico. Shutting you down was the flavor of the day, Jimmy. That day has passed.”

A lightness overcame Jimmy, a sensation he hadn’t felt since that night on the BQE.

“And you’re gonna need a new liquor dealer.”

Bates. Jimmy still hadn’t reached out, but Harvey’s tone was hopeful.

“What’s going on?”

“I ran into Bruce Cutler at Eastern District. The FBI arrested Frank Bates this morning, along with twenty-two of his associates. They seized Empire Wholesalers, lock, stock, and whiskey-soaked barrel.”

“Holy … how’d they get him?”

“Bruce thinks the feds flipped Frank’s driver.”

Mario with the bum wing. Claimed the cops pounded on him, something about his Cadillac’s VIN.

Two sets of ledgers lay stacked on Jimmy’s desk. “Renzo was intimate with my numbers. What if Bates talks?”

“Frank’s from another generation. He’d rather die than cooperate with the government.”

“You think?”

“I know. It’s over, Jimmy. Go home.”

Jimmy hung up. Renzo Scalesi dead. Frank Bates indicted. Mike/Yuri Kuzmet killed. Luc Delacroix selling out. The fed investigation done. Giuliani defeated.

They all challenged Jimmy. They all lost.

The numbers would only grow. Jimmy hadn’t canceled Destination. Its premiere this Sunday was tracking massive. The city was buzzing about Jimmy’s next creation. He was about to redefine the scene. Again. Jimmy thought of Ian and Steve. Abattoir would outlast Studio. Eclipse them. Jimmy had supplanted legends.

Jimmy Lettner had become New York.

He shut the Mosler, spun its dial. He unbolted the Keep’s door and headed downstairs. Jimmy crossed the floor. He stopped, faced the DJ booth. Jimmy pulled his smokes from his pocket and lit up. He inhaled nicotine and enjoyed the silence.

Jimmy remembered when Michelle first showed him the Polaroids in Green Haven’s visiting room. She found the space. Jimmy had filled it.

He had given this city a place to forget its troubles. They crossed bridges, traveled through tunnels, braved subways. They were drawn to Abattoir, arrived as themselves and left reborn.

They came to dance.

They came to live.

They came for Jimmy.

The old pain hit and Samantha appeared. Her face blurring, Jimmy’s memory decaying. She’d still be alive had he not gone to prison. The one debt he could never repay.

“I love you, Sam.”

Jimmy hit the lights, threw the locks, and stepped out of Abattoir. Horns honked. Traffic rumbled up the avenue. Jimmy’s nose registered memories. Stale trash, low tide, diesel fumes. The smells invigorated him. The city in his lungs. For weeks he’d breathed only Abattoir’s air.

Jimmy headed east. He noticed fresh activity. A road crew worked a deep hole. They laid fresh pipe and re-asphalted the road. A demo team hauled debris from a gutted stretch of row houses. A box truck stood double-parked. Jumpsuited movers brought furniture into a three-story walk up. A new tower crane climbed into the sky.

West Chelsea changing under him.

The corner bodega. Jimmy bought the News and the Post. Late edition headlines screamed, FEDS BUST GENOVESE BOSS. Photos showed windbreakered agents padlocking Empire Wholesalers. With two clubs in his name, Jimmy could negotiate liquor rates down. His numbers would go up. Jimmy kept the count.

Jimmy tucked the papers under his arm. The street again. Children played tag. An old woman watched. Leaves were filling the trees. Jimmy decided he’d pick up dinner on his way home. Chinese. Maybe pizza. Or maybe they’d go out, all of them. A family.

He caught a flash of movement. A blur.

Heat across his neck. A zipper, undone. Something warm and wet poured from him.

Jimmy’s hands went to his throat. Blood gushed through his fingers. His knees hit concrete. He clawed at himself. He gurgled and choked. Jimmy fell onto his side. He was losing himself by the gallon.

A face appeared. It had no nose, no lips. An ugly, scarred mess.

A red bubble formed under Jimmy’s chin, popped.

The face came close. Deformed and hideous. It spoke. It hissed.

“For Wheat.”

The face vanished.

Jimmy rolled onto his back. His hands fell to his sides. His world darkened at the edges.

The sky was blue, the clouds still. Samantha on the beach. A beautiful summer’s day. She was far ahead of him, dancing into and out of the gentle surf.

Jimmy called her name. He couldn’t hear himself but Samantha turned anyway. She was ten years old. She spotted Jimmy and smiled wide and ran toward him.

Because he was there, too. Pants rolled up, bare feet sinking into the soft, damp sand. Birds hung unmoving in the sky, forever flying into the wind.

Samantha drew closer. Jimmy saw her bright and clear. He was there. She was there. Her face beamed. She was close now. She was laughing. Jimmy stretched his arms out. The world went white, then black.

And Jimmy Lettner felt nothing at all.

Michelle

The detectives who’d knocked on Michelle’s door were somber and brusque. A man and woman. The man talked, the woman listened. Like always. They offered condolences and fired questions. Did Michelle have any idea who might have done this? Did Jimmy have any enemies?

Yes and plenty.

But Michelle kept that to herself.

She identified Jimmy’s body the next day. A woman in a white coat showed her a Polaroid, Jimmy’s face poking through a hole in a sheet. His eyes were closed. He might have been sleeping. Michelle had expected her husband to be pulled from a refrigerator. Like in the movies.

“We don’t do that anymore,” the medical examiner had said. “It’s inhumane.”

Luc called Harvey, apologetic and frantic. He pleaded innocence in two languages. He wasn’t involved. He didn’t know Rene was still alive. The boy’s hate was personal, a lover’s revenge for Wheat. Luc had not ordered Jimmy’s killing. Please believe me.

Michelle did. Luc’s position was understandable. Everyone in the scene thought Jimmy called every shot. Michelle knew better, because she knew Serge. But either way, Jimmy was still dead.

Christi took the news hard. The poor girl. First Samantha, then her father. She wailed and howled and bawled until she was empty and then fell asleep.

Christi’s last words before exhaustion took her: “You should have killed them all.”

Time blurred. Michelle worked night and day. She photocopied Jimmy’s death certificate. She filed insurance papers. The condo title needed amending. The club’s paperwork did not. Michelle was The Signature.

Michelle was Abattoir.

On Friday she went to the club. Destination’s opening was slated for Sunday night. Tens of thousands of dollars had been spent. Contracts had been signed. The staff had one question: Go or no-go?

The Keep was full. Serge, Harvey, Elise, Chloe, Angel, Tina, Diamond, and T-Roc. Eva was there with Trey D. All quiet. Waiting.

Waiting on her.

Jimmy’s chair sat empty. His presence was his absence. Abattoir had been Jimmy’s one, true love. Michelle knew this, and it did not upset her.

She walked behind Jimmy’s desk. No, her desk. She brushed its ebony wood with her fingertips. She loved the piece from the moment she saw it. Jimmy’s reaction to it thrilled Michelle. The day it was delivered, he pulled her close and kissed her deep. They made love on it that night. The Keep’s baptism.

They had been young, once.

“I know what you’re all feeling, because I’m feeling it a thousand times worse. Jimmy wasn’t perfect, but he was the father of my children and the love of my life. I will miss him forever.”

Years came at her in a rush. A tear dropped onto the desk.

“Jimmy liked to say if he didn’t own Abattoir he’d never get in. He was right. But he knew the business and built the hottest spot in the city. Abattoir is his legacy. Jimmy may be gone, but the party will go on.”

Subdued exhalation. They had feared Abattoir’s closure, missed rent payments, substandard unemployment checks, nightlife job hunting. Abattoir flaming out young, like so many before it. Michelle hadn’t considered closing for a second.

Owning a thing meant defending it.

“And Destination will go forward as planned.”

Eva inclined her head. A bow to the queen.

“There’s a lot—” Michelle’s throat caught.

In less than a year, she’d gone from a wife and mother of two to a widow raising her only child. She ran New York’s hottest nightclub but had never worked in the industry. What she didn’t know could fill a book. But right now Abattoir needed a rock. It needed stability. Michelle could fill that role. She’d done it before.

“Doors open at ten. I’ll see you on the floor.”

The crew started filing out. Harvey lingered. Michelle shook her head: Not now. Serge was last in the exit line. Michelle waved him over.

Just the two of them. So much history, so little honesty. The time for that would come. But first, business.

“Wait until after the Sanctuary sale goes through,” Michelle said. “A month or two. Maybe more. I’ll let you pick the when. But Luc doesn’t live to see the new year.”

Serge lit a smoke. “Anything else?”

He had sent Michelle to Sanctuary unprepared. He had expected failure. He wanted her dead. Michelle had survived. How long would Serge?

“That’s all.”

Serge dropped his cigarette on Michelle’s floor and left. Jimmy had thought Luc was Abattoir’s last living enemy. Michelle knew otherwise.

She pulled a ledger from the stack. She scanned pages. She viewed and reviewed figures. She grabbed a pencil and scratched notes. Numbers flew at her, past her. She caught them, interrogated them. Rearranged them. The numbers ran high and long. The picture came into focus. Abattoir printed money.

Michelle kept the count.

THE END

Acknowledgments

A lot of friends contributed to The Killing Yards. Some read early versions, others have guided me through publishing, a business for which there’s no manual. My crew of reliables includes I.S. Berry, Scott Blackburn, William Boyle, Wes Browne, Marc Cameron, Sara DiVello, Ted Flanagan, Michelle Maryk, Adrian McKinty, Taylor Moore, Adam Plantinga, Steven Powell, Kevin Rosati, J. Todd Scott, J.B. Stevens, Chris Harding Thornton, and John Woods. I owe you all.

Massive thanks to my agent, Alec Shane, who thought a gritty period piece deserved a home and found it one. Likewise to Tom Wickersham and Sara J. Henry, for championing and improving the novel, along with the entire team at Crooked Lane Books, who turned a manuscript into a book. I’m sorry I ask so many questions.

Countless NYPD and federal colleagues taught me that policing New York meant caring about the work and the people. And I’m hugely indebted to unnamed players in the nightclub industry who showed me the business from the inside, even though I was the least cool guy in the room.

My grandmother, Stella Drebot, made me a reader, which also made me a writer. Most of all, thank you to my wife Nicole, who let me pound on my keyboard for years without ever once doubting me—even when I doubted myself. Which was often. You’re my world and my love.

Author Biography

A native New Yorker, Jason Allison spent two decades with the NYPD, mostly as a detective. He now resides in Massachusetts with his wife and their Golden Retriever. The Killing Yards is his first novel.

Books should be disposed of and recycled according to local requirements. All paper materials used are FSC compliant.

This is a work of fiction. All of the names, characters, organizations, places and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real or actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2026 by Jason Allison

All rights reserved.

Without limiting the exclusive rights of any author, contributor or the publisher of this publication, any unauthorized use of this publication to train generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies is expressly prohibited.

Published in the United States by Crooked Lane Books, an imprint of The Quick Brown Fox & Company LLC.

Crooked Lane Books and its logo are trademarks of The Quick Brown Fox & Company LLC.

Library of Congress Catalog-in-Publication data available upon request.

ISBN (hardcover): 979-8-89242-780-7

ISBN (paperback): 979-8-89242-781-4

ISBN (ebook): 979-8-89242-782-1

Cover design by Ashton Smith

Printed in the United States.

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First Edition: September 2026

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