A Friend in the Dark - Gregory Ashe Page 0,65

sir,” Ophelia said into the phone. “Nothing but the weapon.”

Rufus turned around. “The weapon that saved you,” he added, loud enough that Lampo might have heard his voice in the background.

Ophelia ignored him. She was still talking into the phone—well, doing more listening than talking. “If you say so, sir. Yes, sir.” Then, once more, biting the words off savagely, “Yes, sir.” She disconnected and shoved the phone in a pocket. “You two dumb fucks have the first get-out-of-jail-free card I’ve ever seen actually work.”

Grinning triumphantly, Rufus raised his hands and clapped them together. “Lampo smacked your butt, didn’t he?”

With a grimace, Ophelia passed the pistol back to Sam. “Both of you are supposed to clear out. Right now.” She hesitated, and then she said, “Are you here about the kids too? Lampo said you were doing something for him and that I shouldn’t jam you up.”

Rufus’s smile waned, and he glanced at Sam before asking, “How do you know about that?”

“CI,” Ophelia said. “I think you might know her. She seemed to have some second thoughts about sending ‘such a sweet little boy’ into the jaws of hell.”

Sam snorted.

“Juliana’s a CI?” Rufus asked, surprised. “Fuck. All right…. Lampo’s coming, then? We’ll bail.” He turned to Sam and pointed toward the carport.

Nodding, Ophelia said, “Rufus, this isn’t stealing Pop Rocks out of a bodega, ok? Juliana said—well, there’s bad people on the other end of this. Dangerous people. Whatever you think you’re helping with, you might want to lie low for a while.” She held out a business card. “If you think you’ve got something, get in touch. Otherwise, let us clean house.”

Rufus hesitated a beat but then took Ophelia’s card. He gave Sam’s T-shirt sleeve another tug and led the way to the side door he’d previously broken in through. Rufus quietly shut it behind them and glanced at Sam. “Let’s get the fuck out of here before someone else pulls a gun.”

Sam just nodded and let Rufus drag him to the sidewalk. When they were clear of the house, he asked, “What was that about?”

Rufus put his sunglasses on and shot Sam a sideways glance. “What, Ophelia? She caught me stealing a package of pomegranate seeds from a bodega years ago. The owner didn’t catch me, but I guess she thought I was cute and was watching me.” He smirked and waggled his eyebrows above the rims of his sunglasses.

“It’s the air,” Sam said.

“I think I’m cute,” Rufus continued.

“No, it’s the air in this fucking city. Car exhaust. Pollution. Too many rats and not enough trees. Nobody’s getting enough oxygen. That’s why you’re all fucking batshit.” Sam pointed a finger. “I’m talking about the pat down in there. What was that about?”

Rufus shrugged and stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets. “Well, Rambo… you were armed and she’s a cop.”

“Yeah, but she did it because Lampo asked her something. That was part of her little report back before she let us go.”

Rufus considered Sam’s comment as he jumped over a few cracks—not that his mother was in danger of breaking her back. “I don’t know why Lampo would ask her to pat me, and you by proxy, down.”

“I don’t either,” Sam said. “But I don’t like it.”

Stopping abruptly, Rufus cut Sam off and turned to face him. “You think Lampo wants the pickup Jake meant for me?”

With a frown, Sam shrugged. “It makes sense, right? Jake contacts you for a pickup. Jake gets killed. You’re supposed to get killed, but you Rufus things up and get away. If I were Lampo and my partner had just gotten murdered, half the cops wanting to pretend it was a suicide, then yeah, I’d want to know what you were supposed to pick up.”

Rufus thumbed his bottom lip thoughtfully. “Except I was given jack-all and it’s like he doesn’t believe me. I wasn’t in the room very long with… Jake… but I didn’t see anything. I mean, nothing that’d make me think it was a tangible object for me, at least.” He began ticking points off on his fingers. “Marcus stole Jake’s phone. It was clearly hot. Heckler took Marcus out. Heckler stole Jake’s phone.” Rufus looked at Sam again. “Maybe we should scope out Marcus a bit more. I mean, I know he’s dead, but he lived somewhere, yeah? Who knows what sort of shit he was involved with?”

“That makes sense,” Sam said. “If Jake had the pickup with him, Marcus must have grabbed it. Maybe he stashed it as