City on Fire (Danny Ryan, #1)(94)

Sell the dope in Baltimore or Washington and then turn right.

Keep going until he hits the ocean.

California.

Use the money to put the whole crew on ice, wait a few years, and then start again, with something legitimate.

Danny drives.

Pulls off at a gas station and gets on the phone.

“What do you know?” he asks Bernie.

“They got Liam.”

“Who did?” Danny asks.

“That fed, Jardine,” Bernie says. “Pam called me, sobbing. Said that Jardine came to their motel room and took him away. I called our lawyers, but the feds say they can’t find him in the system, the lying bastards.”

Danny hangs up.

It’s over, he thinks.

Liam will give the location of the heroin up to Jardine to try to strike a plea bargain. Jardine and a crew of feds are probably already there.

But he has to take the chance, has to find out for sure.

He keeps driving south, turns onto the beach road and sees a pair of headlights blink at him.

Jimmy Mac.

Danny pulls over and gets out.

“Liam’s dead,” Jimmy says. “I just heard it on the radio. They found him in his car up in Lowell. They say it was suicide.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Danny says. He tells Jimmy what Bernie told him about Liam being arrested.

And Liam killing himself? No way.

Liam was the only person Liam ever loved.

Danny’s head is freakin’ reeling, trying to put it together. Jardine arrests Liam, now Liam is dead? What was it Pam told Bernie—Jardine came to their motel room . . .

That doesn’t make any sense, either.

When the feds make a bust, they come in battalions, lights flashing, making a Mongolian opera of it for show.

No fed comes alone.

But Jardine came by himself, took Liam out, and . . .

Killed him.

Jesus Christ.

Think, Danny tells himself. Think like a leader.

Use your head for once.

You thought Moretti staged all this to take you out, but Peter Moretti can’t afford a six-million-dollar loss, even to win the fucking war. It would cripple him. That amount of money would mean he lost the war even if he “won” it.

So why . . .

Think, Danny tells himself again. Why would Peter spend money he can’t afford to lose?

Because he’s expecting to get it back. Peter brings in forty kilos of heroin, he manipulates you into hijacking it, then sends Vecchio to rat you to the feds. So the heroin ends up in federal custody and . . .

Jesus Christ.

How many keys did Jardine say on television they seized?

Twelve?

You gave Vecchio five keys, you kept ten. Liam took twenty-five kilos with him to the Gloc, but then took three to sell. So there were twenty-two kilos in the Gloc when it was raided. Twenty-two, not twelve like Jardine said in the press conference.

So he took ten for himself.

He’s probably got Vecchio’s five, too.

Fifteen freakin’ keys of dope. Say he splits it with Peter. It gets the Morettis halfway to making their investment back once they cut it up and step on it.

No, Danny thinks.

Peter isn’t going to take a three-mil hit, either.

He knows there’s ten more kilos out there. Jardine turned in twelve keys. If they take twenty-eight kilos for themselves, it all works for them. Even splitting with Jardine, they’ll make a small profit.

Jardine and the Morettis are partners.

And one or both are coming for the other ten keys.



The old man is asleep in his chair, a ratty old red blanket wrapped around him. The television is on, casting a dull glow on his face.

Vic Scalese, one of Peter Moretti’s soldiers, looks at his partner, Dave Cousineau. “Marty fucking Ryan. Look at him.”

Cousineau steps over and slaps Marty across the face.

Marty wakes up and blinks at him.

“Where’s Danny?” Scalese says. “Where’s your son?”

“I know who my son is.”

“Where is he?” Scalese asks. He lights a cigarette.

“Fuck if I know,” Marty says. “Why?”

“He has ten kilos of my boss’s dope,” Scalese says. “That’s why.”

“Ask Liam Murphy.”

“Yeah, we would, except he’s dead,” Scalese says. “That leaves Danny and you, and Danny ain’t here. So tell us where he is, or where the dope is.”

“I don’t know nothin’ about it,” Marty says. He wonders where Ned is.

“You better know something about it,” Scalese says. “Or we’re going to have to hurt you.”

He takes the cigarette from his mouth, steps over, and jabs it at Marty’s cheek.

Marty fires from under the blanket.

The bullet hits Scalese in the gut and he staggers back. The flash sets the blanket on fire. Marty tries to snuff it out and turn the gun toward Cousineau at the same time, but the fabric gets caught in the trigger guard and he can’t do it.

So Marty freakin’ Ryan lunges up from the chair and goes for Cousineau’s throat. The bigger, younger man swats him away easily, knocking him to the floor. Then he points the gun down at Marty’s face. “Last chance, you old fuck. Where’s the dope?”