Shadow Prey

Finished. Job done. I got to our apartment,opened the door, and the phone was ringing. David was in the shower, so I picked it up. It was a deputy commissioner. He said, ‘What the fuck are you doing here?’ ”
    “Nice guy,” Lucas said.
    “If there were honorary degrees for assholes, he’d be a doctor of everything,” Lily said.
    “How’s David?” Lucas asked, as though he knew her husband.
    “Not so good the first time, ’cause he was a little overexcited. After that, he was great,” she said. She looked up at him and suddenly blushed.
    “Women are no good at that kind of talk,” Lucas remarked. “But it wasn’t a bad try.”
    They stopped at the gray Ford and Lily lifted an eyebrow.
    “We got something going,” Lucas said. “In fact, we’re in kind of a hurry. I’ll tell you about it as we go along.”
     
    Hart was worse. He’d tried to talk money with some of his acquaintances, and everything, he said, had changed. He’d be a pariah. The Indian man who bought people. And he worried about Harold Richard Liss.
    “Man, I don’t like this, I don’t like this.” He sat in the backseat, twisting his hands. Tears ran down his face. He wiped them away with the sleeve of his tweed jacket.
    “He’s a fuckin’ criminal, Larry,” said Lucas, annoyed. “Jesus Christ, quit whining.”
    “I’m not whining, man, I’m . . .”
    Lucas let the Ford idle along. A hundred yards ahead, Harold Richard Liss ambled down Lake Street looking in the store windows. “He was making money selling chloroform to little kids. And glue,” Lucas said, interrupting.
    “This still isn’t right, man. He’s a fuckin’ teenager.” Hart shivered.
    “It’s only for a couple of days,” Lucas said.
    “It still isn’t right.”
    “Larry . . .” Lucas started in exasperation. Lily touched his shoulder to stop him and turned and looked over the seat.
    “There’s a big difference between Welfare work and police work,” she said to Hart, keeping her face and voice softand sympathetic. “In a lot of ways, we’re on different sides. I think you’d be more comfortable if we just dropped you off.”
    “We might need his help,” Lucas objected, glancing sideways at Lily.
    “I won’t be much help, man,” Hart said. There was a new note in his voice, the sound of a trapped man who sensed an opening. “I mean, I spotted him for you. I don’t know shit about surveillance. It’s not like you need to interrogate him.”
    Lucas thought about it, sighed and picked up the radio. “Hey, Sloan, this is Davenport. You still got him?”
    Sloan came back: “Yeah, no sweat. What’s happening?”
    “I’m dropping Larry. Don’t worry when you see us stop.”
    “Sure. I’ll hang with Harry.”
    Lucas pulled over to the side and Hart scrambled to get out. “Thanks, man,” he said, leaning over the driver’s side window. “I mean, I’m sorry . . . .”
    “That’s okay, Larry. We’ll see you back downtown,” Lucas said.
    “Sure, man. And thanks, Lily.”
    They pulled away from the curb and Lucas turned to Lily. “I hope we don’t need him to talk to the guy.”
    “We won’t. Like he said, you’re not planning to interrogate him.”
    “Hmph.”
    Lucas watched Hart in his rearview mirror. Hart was peering after them as they continued down the street after Harry. Then Hart turned and walked away, around a corner. Up ahead, Harry stopped on the street corner to talk to a fat white man in a black parka. The parka was a full season too big, the kind you wore in January when the temperature went down to minus thirty. Harry and the white man exchanged a few words, the white man shook his head and Harry started pleading. The white man shook his head again and stepped away. Harry said something else and then turned, despondent, and started down the street again.
    “Dealer,” said Lily.
    “Yeah. Donny Ellis. He wears that parka ’til June, putsit back on in September. He pisses in it, never washes. You don’t want to get downwind of him.”
    “This is going to be stupid, Lucas . . . . Nobody ever sold anybody that much crack on credit. Especially not . . .”
    “Hey, we don’t have to convince anybody. It’s just . . . Okay, there’s Stone . . . .” Lucas picked up the radio and said, “Stone just came around the corner.”
    “I got him,” Sloan said.
    Lucas looked at Lily. “You know what? We should have gotten rid of Larry sooner than we did. He’s the kind of guy who