Abuse of Power (12 page)

As the door swung outward Haddad lunged, grabbing the Turk by the collar. Spinning the smaller man around, he shoved him to the left so that he crashed through the men’s room doorway. The Turk’s eyes went wide in the grimy white light as he stumbled back and slammed against a stall door. Haddad pinned him there with a forearm pressed hard across his exposed throat.

“Who are you?” Haddad demanded in Turkish. “Why are you following me?”

The Turk made a sound in his throat but nothing came out. Haddad released the pressure and the man spat at him. Haddad spun him around again and shoved him hard against the door. The Turk couldn’t get out and now no one—including his partner—could come in. With one fluid motion, Haddad pulled a butterfly knife from his back pocket and flicked it open. The two metal pieces that sheathed the double-edged blade rotated around their pivot pins and snapped together, forming the hilt.

He pressed it to the Turk’s Adam’s apple. “Answer me or you’ll bleed out on a dirty bathroom floor.
Who
are you working for?”

“N-no one,” the Turk sputtered. “I—I wasn’t following you, I only came here to use the—”

Haddad pushed the knife into the soft flesh of the man’s throat. Blood began to trickle around the steel blade.

“You think I’m a fool?” Haddad hissed. “I saw you in Sofia, sitting in the hotel lobby. And on the train before that. How do you think your whore wound up with a plastic bag over her head?”

“I—I don’t know what you’re
talking
about!”

“Stop insulting me with
lies
!”

Haddad withdrew the knife, grabbed him by the collar again, and jerked him onto his knees. The Turk cried in pain as his kneecaps slammed into the bathroom tile. Haddad again put the knife to his throat.

“I won’t ask again,” Haddad said. “Who are you and why are you following me?”

But the Turk said nothing and that was the wrong strategy to employ. Haddad had no qualms about making good on his threat. The only question was how much of his head would still be attached to his body when Haddad was done.

“You’ve made your choice,” Haddad said under his breath. He put a thumb and index finger into the man’s eyes, pressed back so his head was against the door and his throat was exposed, then pressed the blade to flesh.

The Turk stiffened. “Wait!
Wait!
”

Haddad stopped. Waited.

The Turk’s voice trembled. “I was telling the truth. I … I don’t work for anyone. I was following you because I want to join you.”

That surprised Haddad. “What are you talking about?”

“I want to join your cause.”

“Why didn’t you say so back in the hotel? Why did you hesitate with a knife to your throat?”

“I wanted to be sure in Sofia. Here, I wanted you to see I had courage.”

Haddad laughed. “And what about the woman in Sofia? Did she want to join me, as well?”

“She was no one. A simple whore. I saw her go to your room so I hired her to follow you from the hotel.”

“More lies,” Haddad said.

“No …
no,
I’m telling the
truth
! I know all about the Hand of Allah. I know all about your operation.”

Haddad hesitated. “And what operation would that be?”

The Turk paused a moment, lowering his voice almost reverentially as he suddenly spoke English. “Roadshow.”

Haddad stared at him for a long moment. He had no idea what the Turk was talking about. He had his orders, but he knew of no operation by that name.

But what startled him was that he’d heard the word before. Spoken by Imam Zuabi during a telephone conversation several weeks ago as Haddad had waited outside his doorway. He could remember nothing else about what had been said; it hadn’t seemed important. But that word—now that he’d heard it again—came back to him with clarity. And it troubled him.

Was this something else Zuabi was keeping from him?

He looked at the Turk. “This is nonsense. There is no Operation Roadshow.”

“Why would I lie? You have my life in your hands.”

Haddad pressed the knife against the Turk’s throat again as if to prove that point. “Then where did you hear about it?”

“I … I don’t remember. On the street. People talk…”

“What people?”

“I told you, I don’t remember.”

“And I don’t believe you,” Haddad said. “Tell me now or I swear to Allah—”

Suddenly, the Turk brought his left elbow up hard, digging it into Haddad’s chin. Pain tunneled through Haddad as he stumbled back, loosening his grip on the knife. Before he could recover, the Turk jumped to his feet and shot a hand out, grabbing hold of the bigger man’s wrist, twisting so that the joint was bent with the force of the Turk on one side, the weight of Haddad’s body on the other. It was a basic combat technique, simple and debilitating.

The nerves inside Haddad’s arm caught fire and the knife fell free, clattering on the floor.

The Turk may have been small, but that was an advantage in the confined space. Throwing another elbow, he connected with Haddad’s temple, causing both ears to ring. Then he squirmed around him, kicked Haddad from behind—sending him belly-down on the floor—and made a mistake. Instead of running out the door, the Turk looked for the knife.

It was under Haddad.

Scooping it up and scrambling to his feet, Haddad spun and tackled the Turk by the legs, taking him down just short of the door. Rolling the Turk over, he straddled the man, pinning his arms with his knees as he pressed the knife against the smaller man’s jugular.

“
Why
were you following me?”

“Die in hell!” the Turk spat, struggling beneath him.

Haddad smacked him across the face.
“You first! Tell me who you work for!”

Suddenly, to Haddad’s surprise, the Turk stopped fighting. There was a quiet rage in his eyes and Haddad knew he would get nothing from him.

Nothing at all.

The Turk said softly, “May Allah condemn you for what you are about to—”

Haddad didn’t let him finish the sentence.

He uttered a prayer as he thrust the knife into the man’s throat, dragging it deeply along the jawline.

10

San Francisco, California

“So what is this, Jack? Some kind of black thing?”

Maxine no longer had stitches in the side of her face, but the mark they’d left behind still looked raw and painful. She was driving at a fairly good clip, headed south on Van Ness, Jack in the passenger seat.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“You think because I look like everyone else in the hood, I’ve got the key to the kingdom?”

Jack could tell by the tone of her voice that she was only half serious, but now that she’d put it out there he had to respond.

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” he said, “but you
did
grow up in the Dale, right?”

Max stopped at a red light. “Fourteen years of hell before my mom got a job that paid her enough money to move us out of that dung heap.”

“So what’s the problem? This is more about knowing the territory than anything else. Although you have to admit this Jamal kid is more likely to talk to you than me.”

She gestured to the side of her face. “You almost got me killed once. Isn’t that enough?”

Jack smiled. “We run into any trouble, I figure they’ll be too mesmerized by your beauty to do anything stupid.”

“They call that a bulletproof marshmallow,” she said.

“Say again?”

“Someone soft and tasty that they’re not going to hurt.”

“I like that,” Jack said. “Besides, you know how to handle yourself.”

Max had proven that more than once. Most recently, when she was shooting footage of the dock workers’ strike, one of the union apes had threatened to hurt her and break her camera. The moment the goon made his move, Max sidestepped him and drove the ridge side of her hand into his exposed Adam’s apple without skipping a beat—or losing a frame.

She shot Jack a look. “You’re on crack, you know that? Have you ever even
been
to Sunnydale?”

“It’s not part of my usual routine, no.”

“So you really have no idea what you’re asking me to do here.”

Jack had to admit he didn’t. He’d heard stories about the place. But he’d also spent time on the streets of Baghdad so how bad could it really be?

“Besides, what makes you think the kid will be up and about?” she asked. “Hasn’t he got a couple of busted limbs?”

“Yes, and that’s why he’ll be out struttin’.”

“I’ll bite. How do you figure that?”

“The kid was obviously trying to impress a gang,” Jack said. “He blew it, totaled the jacked car and didn’t waste the owner. Two strikes. So how does he save face?”

“By sucking up the pain and showing off his injuries.”

“Exactly,” Jack said.

Max shook her head. Jack didn’t know if she admired his thinking or just thought he was crazy.

“You didn’t have to come along, you know,” he reminded her. “You could’ve stayed home.”

Max sighed. “
Somebody’s
gotta protect you from yourself. And when have I ever told you no?”

“I can think of a couple times.”

The light turned green and Jack saw a flicker of a smile on Max’s lips as she rolled her eyes, then faced forward and hit the gas. “You’re lucky I did, Casanova. You wouldn’t know how to handle me.”

Jack grinned. “Neither will the gangstas in Sunnydale.”

*   *   *

It was less than half an hour before sunset when Max turned onto Sunnydale Avenue. Jack immediately understood her trepidation and started having second thoughts about asking her to come along.

The place was a lot worse than he had expected.

The Sunnydale Projects were built during the Second World War as military housing—a square mile of sturdy new cinder-block buildings sandwiched between the McLaren Park golf course and the Cow Palace, home to the Grand National Rodeo.

The place was turned into low-income housing in the 1970s, but the buildings were never renovated. By the time Max was born, what was left were several blocks full of decrepit, tumbledown hovels with peeling paint, bad plumbing, worse electricity, and enough rats and roaches to keep a fleet of exterminators busy for a dozen years.

Now, despite promises by government officials to clean the place up, the Dale was considered one of the top ten areas to avoid in the city, where murders were frequent and muggings were an everyday occurrence. Over sixteen hundred people were crammed into these neighborhoods, many of them for generations. And most of them wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon.

By day the place was pretty much a typical ghetto, with mothers or grandparents watching young children who amused themselves with whatever was handy, younger teens hanging out against cars or on stoops after school; by night it was hell on earth. Bus drivers and cabbies routinely avoided it, and even the cops were scarce.

Jack suddenly understood why.

The moment they made the turn he felt tension in the air—a lot of it coming from Max herself, whose body seemed to have stiffened as she gripped the wheel.

He knew her mind was flooding with bad memories.

“I must be outta my head,” she muttered, her tone different now. The reality of the place weighed her down.

Jack looked out at the rows of dilapidated buildings, the graffiti, the bars on the windows, the laundry hanging in the yards, the sidewalks and streets eerily empty.

No kids. No couples out for an evening stroll. Even the dogs had stayed inside.

The only sign of life was a handful of teens clustered around a muscle car in a distant parking lot, their gazes on the street, as if keeping watch over their territory. This was a neighborhood under siege.

“You’re right,” Jack said. “I never should’ve asked you to come along. If you want to turn around I won’t hold it against you.”

“How magnanimous of you.”

“I mean it, Max. Turn the car around. I’ll do this alone.”

“You really
are
on crack. You go in by yourself, you might not walk out.”

“It’s gotta be done,” he said.

“Why? Is talking to this kid really that important?”

“I told you, I need to know exactly what he saw.” He gestured. “If I can’t get you to turn around, at least pull over and I’ll walk from here. And if I’m not back in twenty minutes, or you run into any trouble, get to safer ground and call the cavalry.”

“You’re assuming they’d come,” Max said.

She pulled to the curb across from the Little Village Market and let the engine idle, glancing at that cluster of gangbangers, who were now less than a block away.

“I can’t let you do this, Jack. It’s not worth it.”

“Don’t worry,” he said, “I brought protection.”

Lifting his shirt, he reached to the holster resting against his right hip and pulled out a Smith & Wesson Magnum .357 AirLite. Because he was a celebrity who was known to have fielded a substantial number of death threats, he’d long ago been granted a conceal and carry permit by the Marin County sheriff.

The AirLite was compact yet deadly.

Max’s eyes widened slightly at the sight of it. “Just because you spend time at a shooting range, doesn’t mean you’re a badass. You pull that thing, you better be ready to use it or you’re likely to get five more stuck in your face. These boys don’t fool around.”

“Neither do I,” Jack said, then tucked the gun back into its holster and popped open his door.

*   *   *

Jamal Thomas lived with his mother and brother in a small apartment on Sawyer Street.

Jack consulted the GPS map on his cell phone and saw that he had two blocks to travel from where Max had parked her car. Unfortunately, the only way to get there was to go straight past the kids in the parking lot, and he had a feeling that the moment Max pulled to the curb they’d noted the intrusion on their turf.

Max is right. You
are
on crack,
he thought.

But Tom Drabinksy’s face kept drifting through his mind, and Jack knew the only way he’d make any headway with this story was to talk to Jamal. He might come away from the encounter with nothing to show for it, but at least he had to try.