Previously on Sins of the Fathers
--- Tiffany encouraged Hasting to speed up the drug bust
--- Luc asked Felix to kill Nick Rhodes
--- Felix's plan to leave Carmine Falls before the drug deal was derailed
CLICK-click. CLICK-click. CLICK-click.
"Will you just light one and quit playing with that thing!" Hasting said.
"I don't want to smoke," Tiffany answered.
"Then put the lighter down."
She dropped it in the console of the car. "Sorry."
"Anxious?"
"Are you?"
"No, I'm ready to do this."
"Me, too, Hasting, but..."
"What?" Hasting didn't take his eyes off the road, but she heard the impatience in his voice.
"Nothing," she said.
"Okay."
They were silent for a few minutes. Then Tiffany burst out, "Hasting, I keep feeling like we don't have all the info on this one."
"We never know everything, Tiff. But we know what we need to know. They're meeting at this warehouse at one A.M. to exchange a lot of dope for a lot of cash. We bust it up, and we get both, plus all those collars."
"Right."
"It's your first big bust, that's all." He flashed a confident smile. "Just wait till you're an old-timer like me."
"What if---"
"What if nothing. We've got cover. They'll be outside the warehouse. What could go wrong?"
"But..."
"Yes?"
Tiffany paused before she answered, "Nothing," with something less than the confidence in Hasting's voice.
**************** "As far as that's concerned, though, I could bite it right now," Felix thought as he observed Vincent's erratic driving, "This guy's a loose cannon. Maybe it would be better if I did bite it right now. Who knows what might go down at the warehouse."
"Hey, snap out of it," Vincent said gruffly.
"What?"
"What are you thinking about?"
"Going to bed, actually. Why do all nefarious activities have to take place in the middle of the night?"
"Boss doesn't want anybody to know," Vincent answered simply.
"Seems more obvious to me."
"Well, I guess that's why you're not the boss."
"Yet," Felix joked.
Vincent wasn't amused. "I wouldn't count on anything," he said.
"Meaning?"
"I'm saying you've been a big shot, but you didn't weasel me out of this deal."
"Right, Vincent, because I really wanted to deal with these gun-toting thugs on my own."
"You think you're too good to carry a gun?" Vincent challenged.
"Actually, yes, I do," Felix answered as he glanced at the bulge in Vincent's jacket for the thousandth time. "I'm an intellectual, not that I would expect you to understand."
Felix knew it was risky, provoking Vincent that way. After all, the guy's fuse was getting shorter by the minute. "But," he thought, "there's a fifty percent chance that Luc knows what I've been up to with Tiffany. And if he does, then there's an eighty percent chance this isn't a drug deal at all. And if that's not what's really going on, there's a ninety-five percent chance that this whole venture is actually about doing away with me." He looked at Vincent out of the corner of his eye. "He's trigger-happy," Felix thought, "and feeling threatened. He'd probably love doing it." The full moon lit the warehouse in the distance. Felix sighed. "Well," he thought, "I'll know for sure soon enough. And I'll deal with it then."
**************** Nick Rhodes spit his gum out and pounded the locked door of the old warehouse. "Where the hell are they?" he demanded.
"Keep it cool, man," Frances Baker said. "They'll be here."
"I don't know. Sidarus. I still can't believe he'd be willing to sell us his entire stash."
"It's a lotta smack," Frances agreed. "An' it's going to make us rich."
Nick grunted. "As long as we get Sidarus off our backs."
"No doubt. Free at last, free at last!" Frances accompanied this statement with an impromptu dance.
Nick frowned. "You high?"
Frances laughed.
"ARE YOU HIGH?"
"I had a hit."
"Frances!"
"What? I's no big deal."
"How are you going to cover me if you're coked up?"
"Don't worry, man."
"Did you even remember your gun?"
"Yeah." Frances pulled up his shirt to verify.
"Maybe I better take it."
"No, man, you hate to do the dirty work. I shoot better like this."
"Okay," Nick said doubtfully, "just remember. Don't use it unless you have to, but use it the second you think they might be out for me. Got it?"
"Covered. Damn." Frances squinted at the lights of an approaching car. They both started to hide but realized that whoever was in the car had already seen them. They held still and didn't speak until the car was very close.
"It's them," Nick said.
Felix and Vincent got out of the car.
Nick stared at them for a moment. Then he said, "Let's get this done."
**************** "It's them," Hasting said as he and Tiffany approached the warehouse, "their cars."
"We only know Nick's."
"Yeah, but it's obvious who the other one belongs to."
"I guess."
Hasting glared at her. "What is with you? You've been hot to bust this for months, and now you're acting like---"
"What?"
"Like, I don't know, Tiff, not like you."
She turned away from him and kicked a loose stone up from the dirt drive. "I feel," she said, "like I want to crawl out of my skin."
"Nerves."
"No. No, it's not, Hasting. I think we're missing something here."
"Why are you stuck on that?"
"Because I... forget it. Where's our backup?"
"They'll be here."
"I don't think we should go in till they get here."
"We won't, but you know, Princess, they're not going to hang out in there all night. It's now or---"
"Don't say it." She shook her head. "I'm an idiot, Hasting." She took a deep breath and said, "Okay. I'm ready when you are."
**************** Felix checked out the warehouse. Ugly, dark, and bare. Stacks of boxes (filled with the "merchandise" in question) sporadically broke the thick carpet of dust and God-knows-what-else that covered the concrete floor. The atmosphere was growing more ominous by the minute. He thought the car ride with Vincent had been weird, but this... Not that they should have high-fived Nick and Frances, or talked about the Mets game. But they could have at least made the exchange efficiently. No, there was something going on below the surface, a different agenda, or several different agendas. Vincent was definitely close to the breaking point. Frances was obviously high, and Nick, well, he just seemed suspicious. "You know," Felix thought, "maybe I should get out of here now. If I can sneak out, I can take the car. Vincent's so stupid he always leaves the keys in the ignition. Why don't they get it over with anyway?" Then, suddenly, it made sense. Vincent's terseness, the stalling. Luc had told Felix to get rid of Nick, but he couldn't really want that. If Nick died now, who would unload the drugs? And that was what Luc was really after, right? No, Luc knew Felix was above doing a hit, so the whole purpose of that inane request was just to distract Felix. After all, Luc hadn't even checked to see if Felix was actually carrying a gun. In a moment of total clarity Felix thought, "It's me. Vincent's going to kill me. That way, they take the drugs off the old man's hands, and if anyone ever finds out about the deal, I'll be the fall guy, the perfect kind, the kind who can't talk. Damn it, how could I have been so dense?" He looked at Vincent's thick hands and thought, "I've got a few lives left, but you're not taking one. There's gotta be a way out."
A way out, that was the crucial point. Felix had allowed Vincent to take the lead on the exchange, and Vincent had happily obliged. Unfortunately, Vincent had decided to conduct business right in front of the door. The back way led to a primitive loading dock, but the door to it was bolted, and Felix didn't think he'd be able to get it unlocked without attracting Vincent's (and his gun's) attention. But there was a particularly large stack of crates, and if Felix could inch his way there before the three stooges finished their haggling...
But at the luckiest possible moment, Frances became irritated and screamed, "Listen man, don't make me pull---"
"Whoa---" Nick said.
"I told you---" Vincent answered.
They were fighting, and that was good, because it decreased the likelihood that they'd notice what Felix was up to. "If only they would all sample some of that merchandise," Felix thought.
As their argument escalated, Felix crept behind the crates. From his position there, he was able to reach the bolts on the loading dock door. They obviously hadn't been turned any time in the past millenium or so. He needed a wrench, but made do with his hands. He recalled Zen sayings as he gripped the bolts. "One, two, three," he thought as he twisted and breathed in time to his efforts. "One, two, three..." So deep was his concentration that he failed to notice how heated the argument up front had become. In fact, he didn't notice anything until the fighting stopped completely. The warehouse was deadly silent. Then, footsteps.
"Felix," Vincent called.
Felix heard Vincent approaching, and then he heard the unmistakable, barely perceptible sound of a gun being pulled from its holster.
Then shouting up front again.
Nick said, "Frances, get---"
"Holy sh---"
"Frances, get---"
BANG!
Without thinking, Felix rose to see Frances, gun in hand, falling backwards. The blank look on Frances' face told Felix that the kid was already dead. Vincent was drawn and aiming at Nick. Neither of them looked at Felix. He forced himself back into action and returned to the bolts.
As he worked, the fighting resumed. "Okay," Nick said, "I don't know what you---"
"Shut up!" Vincent yelled. "I don't care---"
"Anything, Vincent. Okay? I'll do anything you say."
"Too late, Nicky-boy, you---"
His words were broken by a crash at the front of the warehouse, and at that exact moment, Felix's bolts gave way. Felix pushed the door to the loading dock open, thankful that the pandemonium at the front of the warehouse hid its loud creak. But just as he crawled out the door, Tiffany's voice stopped him.
"Weapons down!" she shouted.
"I'm unarmed!" Nick said.
Felix stood and saw Tiffany and Hasting at the front of the warehouse, guns drawn, backed up by several blue-clad officers. Nick raised his hands above his head, but Vincent pointed his gun from one cop to another.
"Shoot him!" Nick said. "For---"
BANG!
BANG!
BANG!
Nick collapsed.
Vincent reeled backwards.
And then Felix saw a jerky movement in the line of blue.
"Tiffany!" Felix yelled.
Hasting made eye contact with Felix and pointed his gun directly at him. "Oh, no," Felix thought, "if Vincent didn't take me down, no cop is." He dashed out the loading dock door and into the silvery black of night.
Tiffany fell to the ground as blood seeped out of a hole in her chest and soaked the dusty floor around her.
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