spraying a layer of rain onto the seats. He was wearing
jeans and a brown coat, sneakers and a T-shirt. He looked
like a normal guy.
“If that’s your undercover look, I gotta say it works.”
Curt ignored me. “His name is Theodore Goggins.”
“How’d you get that info?”
“He stopped into a Starbucks. I waited outside, but
saw him pay with a credit card. After he left, I waited
a minute and went inside and told them I found his
ATM card. And I needed his name in case I couldn’t
catch up with him. He lives just down the block. Definitely not his building, because he had to buzz up. But
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the guy who lived there said ‘come on up, Theo’ as he
buzzed him in.”
“He worked in finance,” I said.
“How do you know?”
“All these guys do. Tens of thousands of young professionals out of work in this city, most of whom lived a
few miles beyond their means. Then they get laid off
when the economy goes in the crapper, and they’re left
with huge mortgages and bills on toys and apartments.
That’s where 718 comes in. They offer to pay these outof-work go-getters to go house to house. They make good
money. It’s a win-win. They can still afford the lifestyle
they’re accustomed to.”
Curt sat back, put his hand on his forehead. He
looked troubled.
“That’s why,” he said.
“Why what?”
“The narcotics division. They haven’t been able to
find out where this drug, Darkness, where it’s coming
from or who’s selling it. But they’re looking in the wrong
place. They’re so busy turning over logs and monitoring
alleys that they’re not noticing the business assholes.”
“Nobody looks at a guy in a suit and thinks he’s guilty
of anything more than white-collar stuff. Fraud and laundering, but these guys are much dirtier.”
“Ken Tsang,” Curt said. “That’s where we got a lead
on Morgan Isaacs. They worked at the same bank, both
got laid off on the same day and Ken’s coworkers said
they were friendly. We cross-checked his phone records
and found half a dozen calls a day to the same 718 number I found on a dead man’s cell phone. Ken was working
for these creeps. I’m willing to bet on it.”
“And you found him with less bone density than the
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Pillsbury Doughboy,” I said. “That probably doesn’t bode
well when it comes to finding Morgan Isaacs in one piece.”
Curt just sat there, rain dripping from his hair into his
lap as we watched cars zip down the street, the errant
noises of a night unaware of its own shadow. We could
see Theodore Goggin’s awning from the car, and we kept
the windshield on fast enough where we wouldn’t miss
any activity.
And so we waited. Sat in the car until the morning. When
Theodore Goggins would leave his apartment and head
toward wherever it was that the refills were being kept.
All we could do was keep each other awake through
our silences and the knowledge that something foul was
lurking just beneath the streets of our city. But it wasn’t
until the next day that we realized just how deep those
sewers ran.
46
Saturday
It was six-thirty in the morning, and we were both awake.
My brain was fogged over with that thick haze that comes
from a night spent ingesting too much coffee while thinking too much about terrible things that would keep you
up under normal circumstances.
Curt’s eyes were open, too, but they were more aware,
less troubled. He seemed less like someone running on
fumes, like I was, and more like a hawk poised to strike.
Waiting for that moment when his prey poked its head
from the shadows. And at six-thirty, that’s when our prey,
Theodore Goggins, poked his head out from his uptown
apartment.
“Right there,” I said.
“I see him.” Curt quickly combed his hair, opened the
mirror above the windshield to get rid of the whole “I
stayed up all night in a car” look. Whether that kind of
makeover could be done without trained professionals
and Heidi Klum, I wasn’t sure.
“Same drill,” Curt said. “I follow our man to his destination, then I call you. We’re not going to have a ton of
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331
time because I have no idea where this guy is headed. Just
be on alert.”
“I’m going to head over to the West Side Highway,” I
said. “Better to have access to a faster road. Just in case.”
“Good thinking, Parker. I’ll call you when Goggins
takes me…wherever,” Curt said. “And Henry?”
“Yeah, Curt?”
“Be careful. I don’t know how this day is going to
unwind.”
I nodded, didn’t need to say anything. Curt knew I was
game.
“Okay, let’s get this party started.”
“Some party. Six in the morning.”
“Can it, buddy. Stay focused.”
“Good luck, Curt.”
He exited the car, walked over to a sidewalk newspaper salesman and bought a copy of the Gazette. At least
he was supporting my paper.
Theodore Goggins left his apartment wearing a different suit, this one straight black, with shiny shoes and
another sparkling blue tie. He headed south on Columbus,
right toward where Curt was standing reading the paper.
When Goggins passed him, Curt waited thirty seconds
before starting his tail. After they’d both disappeared, I
started the car and headed west on 110th Street. The
morning sun was rising above the trees as I drove on the
south side of Morningside Park. The lush green foliage
was such a stark contrast to the brick and stone just south
across the street.
Suddenly I realized that the West Side Highway had just
two entrances near my location: one on 125th Street and
the other on Ninety-sixth. They were a mile and a half apart
from each other, and given Manhattan traffic it could be
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fifteen minutes easily from one exit to the other. If I chose
the wrong one, I could miss Curt and Goggins entirely.
I slowed down briefly approaching Riverside Drive,
then made a decision and turned south toward Ninetysixth. I figured Goggins went south; best guess was that
his pick-up point was south of our location.
I pulled the car over on Ninety-sixth and waited for
Curt to call.
Thankfully, I didn’t have to wait long.
My phone rang less than fifteen minutes later. It was
Curt. He was breathless, panting.
“I almost lost him,” Curt said. “Stupid MetroCard was
out of cash. Anyway, get your ass downtown to the meatpacking district.”
“On the way,” I said, putting the car into Drive and
easing onto the Henry Hudson Parkway. “Where to?”
“You know the Kitten Club?”
“Um…yeah. Unfortunately. Why?”
&nbs
p; “Our friend Theodore Goggins just walked inside.”
“You’re kidding me,” I said. “I knew Shawn Kensbrook was dirty, but he’s got his hands full in the mud.”
“You think this is the new depot where the lackeys get
their refills?”
“It would make sense,” I said. “I’ve been to the Kitten
Club and that place has more unexplored territory than
the Jonas Brothers. Plus it doesn’t fill up until late at
night, so nobody’s there during the day to watch it.”
“Given the history of this place,” Curt said, “it
wouldn’t surprise me in the least.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ll explain when you get down here. Meet me on the
southeast corner of Washington and Little West Twelfth
Street.”
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333
“Will do. I’ll be down there right away.”
I exited my spot and pulled Curt’s car onto the Hudson
River Drive south. The traffic wasn’t bad, rush hour still
an hour or so from reaching its apex. The sun cast a brilliant glow on the water, the shores of New Jersey visible,
the highway directly across from Port Imperial Marina.
I took the Fourteenth Street exit and made my way
south on Tenth Avenue toward the Kitten Club. There
were plenty of spots available, so I pulled up on the corner
of Washington and Twelfth and rang Curt’s cell phone.
He didn’t answer, but then I saw him walking toward me.
Hanging up the phone, I unlocked the passenger side
door. Curt slipped in and stretched out.
There were massive bags under his eyes, and his
clothes were rumpled. Plus he smelled kind of funky.
Not the Curt Sheffield I was used to hanging out with.
“How was your night?” I said. “I feel like we bonded
a bit.” I jokingly punched Curt in the arm.
“Let’s not go there. You know for a chunky guy,
Goggins has a motor that would make Jeff Gordon piss
his pants.”
Across the street, we could both see the entrance to the
Kitten Club. I’d been there twice. Once to cover a murder,
the second to rescue Amanda when I felt she might be in
danger. I was getting a little tired of this place.
“You said something about the club not surprising
you,” I said. “What did you mean by that?”
“You’re not a native New Yorker,” Curt said, “so you
wouldn’t remember. For about ten years during the midseventies and eighties, the space the Kitten Club currently occupies was a different club called Mineshaft.”
“Sounds hot.”
“You have no idea. While it was open, Mineshaft was
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one of the most popular gay bars in the city. They had
dungeons, cages, S and M, bondage, you name it. Then
the city shut the club down in eighty-five, claiming that
all the rampant sexual activity was helping to spread the
AIDS virus.”
“Holy crap, are you serious?”
“Yessir. Apparently Mineshaft—and a number of other
clubs—had back rooms and basements where club-goers
could partake in, let’s just say, activities that did not
require clothing. Rumors had it that the club was actually
Mafia owned and operated. The mob started losing
money hand over fist, and the lunkheads figured people
just weren’t spending money, but the sad truth is they
were losing a lot of their clientele to the virus. After it was
shut down, the club was a ghost lot for almost twenty
years and was basically nothing more than an abandoned
warehouse. It was supposed to be torn down until somebody—guess who—bought the lot.”
“Shawn Kensbrook.”
“Bingo. This place is all sorts of bad news. It wouldn’t
surprise me in the least if an entrepreneur like Kensbrook
was padding his wallet by giving some of those hidden
rooms to 718 Enterprises.”
As we watched the club, a young man wearing a suit
turned the corner and entered the front door.
“You saw that?” I said.
“Sure did.”
“So what do we do now?” I said. “You want to call
for backup?”
“Not yet. Right now we have no probable cause. I
didn’t see Goggins enter with any drugs and we haven’t
seen anybody leave with them. We go charging in now
without a warrant, the whole thing gets thrown out.”
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“Come on, Curt, we have to do someth—”
And then I stopped talking.
“There,” I said, pointing out the object of my curiosity
to Sheffield. “We follow that.”
Curt focused his eyes on what I was staring at. It was
a shipping truck, and it was parked around the back
entrance of the Kitten Club. On the side were written the
words Sam’s Fresh Fish! The slogan was accompanied
by a cute illustration of a live fish standing on a plate
smiling while holding a sign that read, I’m Fresh!
And standing behind the truck were two men, unloading boxes and carrying them inside the club.
“This place serves dinner,” Curt said. “And those little
hors d’oeuvres with salmon on toast points. It’s a fine
attempt, Parker, but you’re reaching.”
I turned to Curt. “Fish isn’t delivered on Sundays.”
He cocked his head. “What are you talking about?”
you order fish on a Sunday, you’re getting food that’s
been on ice over the weekend.”
“You’re kidding.”
“No, sir. I did a piece on the South Street Seaport a few
months ago. Took seven showers to wash that smell off
me. And one thing I learned is that there are no fish deliveries on Sundays in this city.”
“So if that truck isn’t delivering fish,” Curt said, “then…”
“Then we follow the truck.”
“The truck?”
“This place is a refilling station. My guess is they
don’t keep more than a few days’ supply in here. Wherever the Darkness is coming from, it’s not here. But I have
a feeling Sam the fisherman might have an idea.”
“Lead the way.”
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But I couldn’t lead the way. That was up to the employees of Sam’s, or whatever front the Sam’s truck was
used for, and they took their sweet time. The men
unloaded at least a dozen large boxes, which they carefully brought inside the Kitten Club. Curt and I sat there
and watched in silence, trying to figure out just how much
the merchandise inside those boxes was worth, where it
came from, and where it was being manufactured.
Finally, at about eight-thirty, just as the New York
streets were beginning to clog up, one of the men climbed
into the driver’s side and churned the ignition. He slowly
pulled away from the club, turning south onto Ninth
Avenue and then right on Fourteenth Street heading east.
Fourteenth was one of the major Manhattan arteries, so
going crosstown took some time. The driver of the truck
didn’t seem in a particular hurry, never honk
ing or making
any maneuvers that would have gotten him noticed.
When we got to Third Avenue, the truck headed north,
and then took a right at Thirty-sixth.
“Is he headed to the tunnel?” Curt said.
The truck seemed to answer that question for us as it
merged left on Thirty-sixth into the Midtown Tunnel,
heading out toward Queens.
“What the hell is in Queens?” Curt asked again.
“I hope you’re just thinking out loud and not expecting
me to answer,” I said, “because I’m as confused as you are.”
Once through the tunnel, the truck stayed on 495-East,
not going a single mile over the speed limit. After about
seven miles, the truck merged onto the Grand Central Expressway, then took the Van Wyck south. I was now thoroughly confused, and I could tell from Curt’s expression
he was, too.
As we neared the Briarwood section of Queens, the
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337
truck abruptly turned off of the Van Wyck, still keeping
legal speed, and continued south until it began to slow.
At this point I slowed the car as well; traffic was easing
up, making us more noticeable. We were still two cars
behind the truck, and I was hoping that driving a big rig
made it a little harder for the driver to spot us.
Then, a mile down the road, the truck made another
right and disappeared.
“This isn’t good,” I said, slowing down and pulling
over to the side of the road.
Running at least half a mile was a fence made of
chicken wire, the top lined with sharp barbs. We were a
good few miles from any sort of body of water. “My guess
is they don’t ship fish here,” I said. “What do we do now?”
Curt sat there, shaking his head. “We don’t have
PC,” he said.
“Screw probable cause, Curt. We go in there, I’ll bet
my father’s eyes we’ll find it within thirty seconds.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “We don’t even know what
we’d be walking into.”
“You’re a cop and I’m a reporter at one of the biggest
papers in the city,” I said. “They can’t just kill us.”
As I said that, suddenly we whipped around as something rapped at the passenger side door. There was a man
standing there leaning over, gently knocking his knuckles
against the window.
I felt a lump rise in my throat. What the hell was he
doing here?
Curt immediately lowered his window and said, “Detective Makhoulian, I… How did you get here?”