Precious Gems - Sierra Hill Page 0,47

had his hiding places that I’d found by accident over the years as a kid, playing hide-and-seek games or trying to hide my candy or piggy bank money from my brother’s greedy hands.

The Customs process this time around is less complicated then my experience in Antwerp, with nothing to declare and just my carry-on, so we head out to the taxi line to grab a car. As we wait in line, Dempsey texts Faron to let him we’ve arrived, and I get an odd sense that I’m being watched. The back of my neck tingles with the weight of someone’s stare, which is ridiculous, I know, but I can’t shake the feeling.

Twisting my head from side-to-side, I bend over, pretending I’m searching for something in my bag as I subtly look around as inconspicuously as possible. Noticing nothing or anyone out of the ordinary or equally nefarious, I shake off the strange vibe and step inside the taxi that’s pulled up.

“Everything okay?” Dempsey inquires, slipping his phone back in pants pocket.

“Oh, yeah. How about with Faron? What did he have to say?”

Dempsey glances out the window, avoiding my eyes. “Nothing much. Just that I was to keep an eye out for anything out of the ordinary.”

He whips his head back around. “So, if you see anything, you’ll let me know.”

I nod in agreement and give the driver my home address, as he takes off toward I-9 North toward Jersey City and Hoboken.

The weather is gray and dreary, a light mist of rain coating the filthy streets and highways. We pass brick and cement buildings a century old and over the Passaic and Hackensack Rivers cluttered with barges of containers, sewage seeping through the embankments littered with trash. Ah, to be home again. Although it’s an ugly city and a world away from the beauty of Antwerp and Paris, I still feel the connection with my hometown.

The ride takes less than thirty minutes, as the taxi turns down Washington Street and parks along the tree-lined street. For all the shit Mudd put me through as a kid, he did a pretty good job picking out a decent neighborhood for me to grow up in. It’s not the nicest part of town and certainly not the white picket fenced home of story books, but it’s a quiet neighborhood with kids running around, a well-maintained park and a bodega on the corner.

Granted, there are drug dealers, pimps and gang members still winding through the streets, but they never bothered me and were just a fact of life growing up in this area.

I walk to the front gate, warped and turning a weird shade of green from the elements, and open it up, heading to the front door that has been barricaded with yellow police tape, warning violators of no entry. I swallow hard, as this makes my father’s death all too real.

Until now, it was only words. Hearsay. But seeing this brings it all home. This is where my father was killed. And while he may no longer be inside, death has visited only recently.

Dempsey stops me with a gigantic arm across my chest, cross-guard style.

“Whoa, there. Hang on.” His tone is a warning. He pushes in front of me, holding out his hand for me to relinquish the keys, which I drop in his palm for him to open it up.

I think Faron is being overly cautious for no reason. With my dad out of the picture, there’s no purpose anyone would have to come looking for me. I can offer them nothing. I’m not the head of the family and don’t have the network to run the business. I’m just a two-bit punk with a skill in thievery.

The same feeling I experienced while leaving the airport has returned, the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end with the sense that someone is watching me. Dempsey peels back the tape but struggles with the door, which always had a way of sticking and never seemed to get fixed. As he gives the key a turn and a nudge with his shoulder, I look behind my shoulder, scanning the cars lined up down the street.

The door creaks open, the room shrouded in darkness, but the door gets stuck on something in its way. He pushes harder with an exhaustive grunt.

And then his alarmed voice cuts through the blaring street noises. “What the fuck is this?”

I try to peer around him but can’t see past his big bulkiness, so I step