Connections in Death (In Death 48)

“That’s amazing.” Peabody widened her eyes, turned to Eve. “Dallas, isn’t that amazing? He’s been looking into it, and so have we.”

“I’m almost speechless.”

“You think you’re smart?” Leaning forward, he spread his hands. “You ain’t nothing. You get me somebody in here who can make me a deal—in writing—and I’ll tell you what I know.”

“You want a deal?”

“I want those feds off my ass for that petty bullshit, and I’ll give them plenty on that mofo Cohen. You brush off the rest of this bullshit, mostly you can’t prove, and I’ll give you the murders. Simple as that.”

“‘Simple as that,’” Eve repeated, looked at Peabody. “He wants a deal.”

“Yeah, like we haven’t heard that one today.”

The two of them went into fits of laughter, until Peabody gasped for air and wiped her eyes.

“You think you can laugh at me.” His voice, dangerously low, shook with rage. “You think I won’t mess you up?”

“It’s not going to help you to threaten police officers, on the record, during Interview.” Eve let out a huge sigh. “Boy, that felt good. Anyway, I repeat, police officers. Investigators. Freaking murder cops, dumb-ass. And if you think your suggestion that we need some rat-fucking gangbanger to help us close murder cases isn’t hilarious, well, you need more humor in your life.”

“We’ve made those arrests already,” Peabody said helpfully. “But thanks for the offer.”

“You tried to say I did the murders.”

“See, we do stuff like that. Plus,” Eve added, “some of the individuals we charged did claim it was on you. So we like to clear all that up, make it tidy.”

“We know you didn’t kill Pickering, Duff, or Aimes. You’re not on the hook for those.”

“True,” Eve confirmed. “Three of your soldiers—well, I guess Aimes was a wannabe—and one of your lieutenants, they’re on the hook. And your lawyer—disbarred lawyer—as accessory before and after the fact. They did it right under your nose.”

“You’re lying, trying to mess us up. It’s Fan Ho and his did them. None of my people do nothing without my say.”

“Really? So nobody shakes down the locals, does illegals deals, runs the sex operation, and so on without your go?”

“I run the Bangers, bitch.” All derision, all defiance, Jones leaned forward again. “You get that?”

“Oh yeah. I get that, but it seems some haven’t been real happy with your brand of leadership.”

“They wanted to, you know, shake things up. Give you some incentive,” Peabody explained. “So you’d call for war.”

“You wouldn’t take any action against Pickering, and he’d turned his back on the gang, he was getting his tat removed, living the straight life. Somebody didn’t like how you handled that, and somebody got in a position to use Duff to set Pickering up.”

“Let him guess who,” Peabody urged, shoulders wiggling. “Let him guess, Dallas. I think I can see a glimmer.”

“If Bolt went against me, he’s a dead man.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Eve waved that away. “Lots of dead man threats with you guys. Bolt figures Snapper and Ticker are dead men for rolling on him—they did the actual murders, with Fist. Well, Fist didn’t have much choice in his own murder. They turned on you, Jones. Duff, too. Fist and Duff paid a hard price for it already. And Bolt’s hoping to make you a dead man—he’d hoped to take you out in the war he wanted. But now it’s more personal.”

“We might’ve let slip about you skimming from the gang pool, about hosing the gang for rent on the building.” Peabody looked at Eve, pressed her fingers to her grin. “Oops.”

“See, being investigators, we didn’t have any trouble finding your lame-ass secret rooms, and being the NYPS-fucking-D, we have a whole division who gets off on going through electronics, records.”

“That’s my personal shit. You can’t go into my personal shit. That’s against my civil rights.”

“Is that what your lawyer told you? Shows you what you get with one who’s been disbarred. And one who got a little irked when you cut his take, so he threw in with Bolt. They tried to set you up. We’re just smarter than they are.”

“Doesn’t take much. We’re not charging him for the skimming, are we?” Peabody wondered.

“We’ll leave some of that to the feds. We have a whole pile of statements and evidence, Jones, that—with recent exceptions due to dissent in your ranks—corroborates your claim that nothing goes down without your say-so. Like enlisting minors as runners, as recruits, and as bag boys by threatening their families. Beating and raping mothers. Forcing minor girls into the sex trade. Kidnapping the minor child of a previous victim to force her to recant, and lots more.”