“Take these two in,” I said to the cops standing closest to me. I handed the Pincus brothers over, and as they were escorted to the van, the crowd surged forward again.
Neil Pincus turned his head as the officer was folding him into the back of the van. He said, “One second, Officer. Sergeant Boxer?” he shouted. “Don’t you see? Either all of us did it or none of us did.
“And even if you get anyone to trial, you’ll never get a conviction. Rodney Booker’s killer is a frickin’ hero.”
Chapter 110
WITH THE HELP of the mob squad, Conklin and I flattened six people against the wall and frisked them. We made sure we had their names, then we had them loaded into cars and vans so they could come to the Hall for questioning.
I wanted to hear all eight of them tell us the story of killing Bagman, how they did it, and why.
I was behind the wheel, still sweating as Conklin and I drove back to the Hall of Justice. That mob scene had shot my heart rate into the stratosphere, and it was still well above my normal sixty-eight beats per minute. But I was happy. Make that exhilarated.
I glanced into the rearview mirror and saw Franklin Morris and “Mercy” behind the grille at my back, chatting as if we were driving them to lunch.
Why should they worry?
The Pincus brothers might be disbarred for confessing to homicide, but someone else would step in to defend this group of conspirators, one or all of whom were guilty of Rodney Booker’s murder. But I thought Neil Pincus’s prediction was right.
If these people stuck to their stories, no jury would convict. Eight confessions were eight times worse than one, each contradicting the other, so reasonable doubt would rule. I wondered if there’d even be a trial.
I said to Conklin, “Cindy’s going to get a movie deal out of this one. ‘From folk hero to mass killer, a drug dealer is brought down by a conspiracy of street vigilantes.’ You should call her.”
“No, you do it. I don’t want to mess with the chain of command.”
I smiled, said, “Okay. After we take care of business, I’ll give her the exclusive.”
I was quiet after that.
As I turned the car onto Bryant Street, I thought about Bagman Jesus, a charming and handsome lowlife who’d sold crack to kids, turned girls into meth addicts, a man who had commissioned a mobile meth lab that had blown up, killing ten people, most of them ordinary citizens on their way to work.
I don’t condone street justice.
If we could nail Booker’s killer, we would. But maybe this time, law enforcement would bow to a different kind of law. Bagman Jesus, the street saint who wasn’t, had been taken out faster and smarter than we could have done it — and without giving him the possibility of parole.
It was indisputable that our city was better off now that he was gone.
“Whatcha thinking, Lindsay?” Conklin asked me.
I turned to look at him, saw that he, too, was feeling fine. I said, “I was thinking that in a funny way, this is a good day to be a cop.”
Epilogue
HAPPY AT LAST
Chapter 111
AS JOE PILOTED his nice black Mercedes S-Class, I relaxed in the seat beside him. It was great to look to my left and see his gorgeous face, his strong hands on the wheel. Every time he caught me looking at him, he turned to look at me.
We grinned at each other like high-school kids with a first crush. “Keep your eyes on the road, buster,” I said to him.
“I want to take that dress off you,” he said.
“I just put it on!”
“I remember,” he said, leering. “Now what was it you were telling me?”
“Yuki.”