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When he told Jane where he was going and who he was going to see, she said, “You still have friends in the department?”
“More than you, missy.”
Mickey Dunne is still working out of the 19th, same as he did when he and Jimmy came out of the Academy together. They partnered up early, before the brass separated them, thinking two cowboys working together was one too many. Jimmy believes in his heart that if Mickey were still his partner in the aftermath of Jimmy shooting a big-time dealer of heroin and coke named Angel Reyes, Jimmy would have beaten the rap, at least internally.
But Jimmy’s partner at the time—the one whose name must not be mentioned—sold him out. Internal Affairs believed his partner’s account of the shooting, not Jimmy’s. Jimmy got canned. He kept trying to tell himself that things worked out for the best, because he ended up with Jane.
Detective First Grade Michael (Mickey) Dunne wanted to meet at McSorley’s, on 7th in the East Village. Just the thought of the joint makes Jimmy happy. He’s always loved McSorley’s, with the green sign over the door saying they’d been in business since 1854, with the best dark beer in the city, and with the one sign in particular inside that Jimmy loved:
BE GOOD OR BE GONE.
Damn straight.
Mickey still isn’t close to putting in his papers. As much as he bitches, he still loves the life. The way Jimmy did. Mickey and Jimmy. In the day? They were some pair.
Mickey doesn’t look much older than the last time the two of them were together. Maybe a little heavier. The hair more white than gray now. His nose a shade more of drinker’s red. Mostly he is still Mickey. Foxhole loyal, the way Jimmy is. And every bit as tough.
They both order McSorley’s Dark, a glass of Jameson on the side. Old times.
They drink to each other.
Mickey says, “I hear your boss got her ass handed to her by a witness today.”
“Happens,” Jimmy says. “But it never lasts for long.”
“She’s a bad girl, that one.”
“Baddest girl on the planet.”
They’ve scored a corner table near the front window. The whole place looks to Jimmy the way he imagines it looked a hundred years ago.
It takes being inside to make Jimmy remember just how much he has missed this place. And being a partner to Mickey Dunne, who grew up in the shadow of the old Yankee Stadium, Grand Concourse, Bronx, New York.
“I hear you’ve been talking to Organized Crime about the Garden City thing,” Mickey says.
“You know I’m doing a lot more than making calls, right?”
“I’m old, partner. But not dead.”
They both raise their Irish whiskey and clink glasses and drink to that.
“The mob piece turned out to be a deadend,” Jimmy says. “The guy was in deep to Bobby Salvatore. But I don’t think this is about that, necessarily.”
“What, then?”
“Beats the hell out of me. But somebody wants me and Jane off this. Like, bad.”
Jimmy tells him all of it now, everything that’s happened, like he’s reading out of an old murder book. Artie Shore. McCall. The guy getting the drop on him. The needle. Jane’s dog. The fire.
“I heard about the fire,” Mickey says. “That shit is messed up.”
“Guy then informed me it was my last warning.Ourlast warning.”
“You believe he wore the uniform?”
“I do.”
“And you believe he wore it here?” Mickey says.
