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“It’s really good. Like a donut—”
“Stone?”
“Yeah?”
“Stop talking.”
Danny has taken off his suit coat and tie, and rolled up his sleeves, like me. He has his window down, the smells of the evening wafting in, everything from the dust on the street to the lingering deep-fried smells from the nearby market. Now I notice that he’s got an earpiece connected to a transceiver.
Whoops. But there’s another earpiece wound up in the cup holder, so I take it and plug it in and in a moment, the voices are in my ear, too.
The conversation is in English, all tinged with that sharp Somali accent. Probably on purpose, although it’s odd they’re not speaking Somali, or even Arabic. I’ve heard that even in Somalia, Arabic is the primary language.
But English is the primary language of Minnesota, so…
There are four distinct voices in the room. I wonder which one is Jamal’s until he says, “I just want to know where to meet, and then I will go.”
Jamal. Worried, a hurry-up in his voice.
“What’s your hurry, Jamal?”
The little hairs raise on the back of my neck because I recognize Hassan Abdilhali’s voice. Deep, resonant and he’s simply a younger version of the thug he will become.
He ran for city council last year and won. I remember watching the news wondering how many votes he paid for.
“No hurry. It’s just—”
“I thought you were arrested last night.” A different voice.
I cut a look at Danny.
“My sister posted bail. But I owe her. I need my money—”
“Where is Ari?” The voice has dropped, and this is again Hassan’s.
“I don’t know. Still inside, I think,” Jamal says. “I…I’ll go. I just…I just need my money, Hassan—”
“Where is my money, Jamal? The money you owe me for getting your family here, setting you up, taking care of you. I owe you nothing.” And it’s the lowering of his voice that has Danny—and me—taking a breath.
“He’s in trouble,” I say to Danny.
Danny cuts me a look. “He’s okay. We just need the location—”
A gunshot, and Jamal’s scream pierces through my brain. I yank out the earpiece—Danny does the same—and I’m out of the car. “You go around front!” I say to Danny, because if I were Hassan, I’d take the quickest exit out, and according to my mental blueprint, the laundromat is in the back.
I sprint for the back, past the ATM machines and into the building.
The place is still abuzz with activity, men and women shopping, a few merchants eying me as I slow to a walk and head straight for the Laundromax.
Hassan steps out into the aisle.
He doesn’t know me, yet. And maybe never will. I was undercover for years in our previous life, trying to get close to the core of his operations. We took down a number of his cohorts, in a combined effort with the Chicago police department.
It’s time for his rule to end, before it even gets started.
Now, in the shadows of the market, Hassan looks at me and I am angry enough to meet his eyes.
He takes off in a sprint. Because he’s young—still in his late twenties—and doesn’t have the clout to stand his ground.
