The Garden of Betrayal - Lee Vance [71]
“What’s unofficially?”
“Joe takes my badge and my car and holds down the front, so nobody bothers us. You and me go around back.”
“The front and back of what?”
Reggie smiled.
“Let’s go see.”
Joe drove, Reggie in the rear seat. He slowed as we cruised past a decrepit-looking gas station. It had an attendant’s booth the size of a garden shed and a single island of pumps. There was a discount beverage center to the left and a used-car lot to the right, both closed.
“That’s him,” Joe said, tipping his head toward the booth.
A shaggy-haired guy sat framed by a three-by-six glass window, racks of cigarettes surrounding him. It looked as though he was talking on a phone.
“What’s behind?” Reggie asked.
“Lot of weeds and a chain-link fence. Fence backs onto a sheet-metal outfit, also closed. It’s a good setup. There’s an alley runs behind the beverage center.”
I was starting to feel nervous, wondering whether I’d been smart to insist on coming. All the years I’d been watching Reggie break small rules, it had never occurred to me to wonder how far he really went.
“Relax,” Reggie said, reading my face. “I’m not in the business of breaking legs.”
Not breaking legs seemed like a small carveout in the grander category of kicking the shit out of people.
“I’m okay breaking legs if it’s going to help us learn the truth,” I said, hoping my bravado wasn’t too transparent. “But what if Vinny gives us the guy who kidnapped Kyle? What if he is the guy who kidnapped Kyle? What are we all going to say in court when some defense attorney asks us what we did tonight?”
Reggie shrugged.
“Whatever we have to say. That’s how the game’s played.”
Joe reached over to nudge my arm.
“Reggie and I worked a lot of cases together. Anything really bad was going to happen, I wouldn’t be here. Just be cool and back him up.”
I took a deep breath, realizing that I was in deep over my head.
“Fine,” I said. “Let’s do it.”
The alley behind the beverage center was strewn with trash and alive with mysterious rustlings. I stuck close to Reggie, who was carrying a miniature Maglite in one hand and a wooden baseball bat in the other. He’d given me a pole saw with an extendable handle to carry, the kind used for trimming trees. We were both wearing black mesh trucker’s caps pulled low. Reggie turned his light off when we got to the far end of the alley.
“Okay,” he said, peering cautiously around the corner of the building. “Just a nice easy stroll now. No running. And when we get there, remember not to touch anything with your bare hands.”
We crossed the open apron of pavement surrounding the gas station attendant’s booth, the side of Vinny’s face clearly visible through the wraparound window. He’d have seen us if he’d turned his head, but he was still absorbed on the phone. Thirty seconds later we were behind the booth and out of his sight line. A caged bulb shone overhead, making me feel exposed. Reggie took a black box the size of a paperback book from his coat pocket and touched a switch. An LED on the box glowed green.
“What’s that?” I whispered.
“Cell phone jammer,” he said, dropping the box back into his pocket. “Has an effective radius of about two hundred yards. Borrowed it from a SWAT guy.” He pointed upward. “Landline connection there. I’m going to count to three. When I get to three, you cut the line.”
“Got it.”
I extended the saw and raised it to touch the phone line. Reggie took a two-handed grip on his bat and planted himself in front of the electric meter.
“One, two, three.”
I jerked the saw downward as Reggie swung the bat overhead. The phone line parted and the electric meter crashed to the ground. Every light on the lot extinguished simultaneously. I was blind in the sudden darkness and could hear my heart thumping wildly.
“Now what?” I hissed.
“Shh. Now we wait.