and holsters, patching up their FBI signs and unstrapping the armor vests, stripping off their masks and piling everything into the suitcase, which they then brought back out to the main room. The dealers remained on the floor, music pounding in their ears. The others were all unmasked now too, packing up. Maven was handed the white paper bag full of pistol magazines, coke wrappers, and unpowered mobile phones. Royce grabbed a suitcase roughly the same size as the Venezuelan’s, but softer.
B ACK INTO THE STAIRWELL, DOWN TWO FLIGHTS TO TWENTY-SEVEN , then along the L-shaped hallway to the elevators and down. They exited at the second floor, the mall level, Royce wheeling his travel bag behind him past the kiosks and upscale stores.
At the edge of the food court, Royce nodded toward a trash container, and Maven dumped the white bag with evident relief.
Past Legal Sea Foods, they rode the long escalator down to revolving doors, exiting onto Boylston Street, where a cold, canyonlike wind cuffed them, street grit spraying their skin as they crossed three lanes of traffic to the shelter of a side street.
“And that,” said Royce, “is that.”
“Christ,” said Maven, running off a string of expletives, the by-product of adrenaline-induced elation.
“Take it easy,” said Royce, keeping an even pace.
Maven reined in his manic exhilaration, moving past a mother walking a blanketed newborn. What he was feeling could almost have been a contact high from flushing all that coke. “Now what?”
“Now we walk.”
They were already walking. Maven wanted to sprint. “What about them back there?”
Royce crossed Newbury Street, not waiting, traffic stopping for him. “They’ll get themselves free eventually. By now they know they got ripped off. I want them to think we took the product too. Double the pain, double the blame.”
As they approached Commonwealth Avenue, Maven shoved his hands into his pockets to keep them from flying away. “FBI? Fucking hell.”
Royce nodded. “We’re breaking all kinds of laws here. Point is to settle them down immediately. Especially in a public place like that, a hotel. Get them under control fast. Thinking it’s an orderly raid, something their lawyers can beat. Getting arrested to them is like a dentist appointment. Getting ripped off—that’s another thing entirely.”
Maven eyed the suitcase, rolling at Royce’s heels like a puppy. “How much is in there?”
Royce shrugged, though Maven could tell he knew already. “Dealers can’t exactly run to the cops to make up their loss. That’s why getting out clean is imperative. No gunplay, no going off and capping anybody if we can help it. Because gunshots bring heat, and dragging the law into this thing defeats our advantage.”
Royce slowed to a stop, turning to Maven on the sidewalk in the median pedestrian mall of Commonwealth Avenue.
“I want you to never, ever forget how stupendously fucking dangerous this is, what we just did. Taking big money away from well-funded sadists. We made it look easy back there only becausewe’ve been working this thing for weeks, planning it out, training to get it right. One little mistake, one slipup—and we’re smoked. Done for. Not that it would end fast. These fuckers would want to get their pound of flesh, you can believe it. Getting jacked makes them punk. Street cred is everything out here. Why retaliation is a motherfucking guarantee— if we screw up. Which we will not.”
Royce’s stare was intense, but nothing at that point, not even the fear of death, could have doused Maven’s flame. He nodded, hands squirming in his pockets, anxious to get wherever they were going.
G RIDLEY
T HEY TURNED ONTO M ARLBOROUGH S TREET, NARROWER THAN THE other avenues in the Back Bay, quieter, lined with trees and gas lamps. The formerly Brahmin, currently swanky side of town.
The clicking of the suitcase wheels over the brick sidewalk stopped at a low, black, wrought-iron gate outside
B ACK INTO THE STAIRWELL, DOWN TWO FLIGHTS TO TWENTY-SEVEN , then along the L-shaped hallway to the elevators and down. They exited at the second floor, the mall level, Royce wheeling his travel bag behind him past the kiosks and upscale stores.
At the edge of the food court, Royce nodded toward a trash container, and Maven dumped the white bag with evident relief.
Past Legal Sea Foods, they rode the long escalator down to revolving doors, exiting onto Boylston Street, where a cold, canyonlike wind cuffed them, street grit spraying their skin as they crossed three lanes of traffic to the shelter of a side street.
“And that,” said Royce, “is that.”
“Christ,” said Maven, running off a string of expletives, the by-product of adrenaline-induced elation.
“Take it easy,” said Royce, keeping an even pace.
Maven reined in his manic exhilaration, moving past a mother walking a blanketed newborn. What he was feeling could almost have been a contact high from flushing all that coke. “Now what?”
“Now we walk.”
They were already walking. Maven wanted to sprint. “What about them back there?”
Royce crossed Newbury Street, not waiting, traffic stopping for him. “They’ll get themselves free eventually. By now they know they got ripped off. I want them to think we took the product too. Double the pain, double the blame.”
As they approached Commonwealth Avenue, Maven shoved his hands into his pockets to keep them from flying away. “FBI? Fucking hell.”
Royce nodded. “We’re breaking all kinds of laws here. Point is to settle them down immediately. Especially in a public place like that, a hotel. Get them under control fast. Thinking it’s an orderly raid, something their lawyers can beat. Getting arrested to them is like a dentist appointment. Getting ripped off—that’s another thing entirely.”
Maven eyed the suitcase, rolling at Royce’s heels like a puppy. “How much is in there?”
Royce shrugged, though Maven could tell he knew already. “Dealers can’t exactly run to the cops to make up their loss. That’s why getting out clean is imperative. No gunplay, no going off and capping anybody if we can help it. Because gunshots bring heat, and dragging the law into this thing defeats our advantage.”
Royce slowed to a stop, turning to Maven on the sidewalk in the median pedestrian mall of Commonwealth Avenue.
“I want you to never, ever forget how stupendously fucking dangerous this is, what we just did. Taking big money away from well-funded sadists. We made it look easy back there only becausewe’ve been working this thing for weeks, planning it out, training to get it right. One little mistake, one slipup—and we’re smoked. Done for. Not that it would end fast. These fuckers would want to get their pound of flesh, you can believe it. Getting jacked makes them punk. Street cred is everything out here. Why retaliation is a motherfucking guarantee— if we screw up. Which we will not.”
Royce’s stare was intense, but nothing at that point, not even the fear of death, could have doused Maven’s flame. He nodded, hands squirming in his pockets, anxious to get wherever they were going.
G RIDLEY
T HEY TURNED ONTO M ARLBOROUGH S TREET, NARROWER THAN THE other avenues in the Back Bay, quieter, lined with trees and gas lamps. The formerly Brahmin, currently swanky side of town.
The clicking of the suitcase wheels over the brick sidewalk stopped at a low, black, wrought-iron gate outside
Similar Books
