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| This meant stepping into another arena. |
The curfew had been
lifted and the rioters had pretty much burned everything down that they were
going to burn down. The sniping stopped, and we resumed our business in the
evenings. The Crew got busy making personal deliveries, pulling in some serious
cash, and making up for lost time. The success we found was easy for us at this
level because we had a niche that we filled. Stan felt we ought to move up out
of selling lids and put our money in kilos. This meant stepping up into another
arena that I wasn’t at all comfortable with. Teddy and his brothers were with
Stan on it. Even though The Crew wasn’t run exactly as a democracy we had a
casual feel for consensus among us on major decisions.
“So, look, we are just
risking prison time for petty cash, Max,” Stan argued. “Every time we leave the
house there’s a chance we’ll get pulled over by ‘the heat’ and we’ll be picking
up our mail at Dade County Jail.”
The money had been good
enough for me, but I had to agree, “Yeh, Stan, you got a point. You know that I
just wanted to make enough money to get back to New Mexico in the first place
and get the fuck out of here.”
The others treated me
like I was the one calling the shots most of the time, but Stan and I knew he
was the real work horse and that I was in no way driving the business in any
realistic manner. Maybe they were right, practically speaking, because he
always checked with me before doing anything important like this. I agreed,
“Let’s go for it.”
The Crew started moving
kilos. The money was coming in and I kept the lid business with the college
professors. It was fun, and it had a clean feel to it that was almost like not
dealing drugs. It seemed more like I was providing a quality service. Along
with some Blue Micro-dot acid, the business made a little money but nothing
like the rest of the Crew with selling kilos.
Stan came along with me
and I put six lids in the glove box to make a few deliveries to our original
customers. We hadn’t gotten a block away from the apartment when a squad car
slipped in behind us. Stan was driving, and I was riding shotgun. The glove box
had a separate key and I locked it, slipping the key under the dash. Roland had
explained to The Crew the evening before of an oversight in Florida Law, at
that time, having to do with unlawful search and seizures. The police couldn’t
open the glove box or trunk of a car without a warrant.
About a mile down the
road the cruiser finally lit up and pulled us over. I was more than a little
nervous when two other unmarked cars boxed us in at the same time. I was
nervous because I had about two hundred and fifty bucks in my pocket. They had
us leaned-up face-down against the car hood with our arms and legs spread to be
frisked.
The cop lifted a wad of
money from my pocket up to show the others and then laid it on the hood, “So,
what’s this?”
I answered in a monotone
of resignation, “It is money I have for school. I’m a Navy Vet… Cashed in my
separation checks. Enrolling at Miami Dade this week. GI Bill, ya know.”
He threw the wad on the
hood and turned his attention to Stan, “What’s in the glove box?”
Expressionless, Stan
answered, “I don’t know. It’s locked, and I lost the key.”
One of the plain clothes
cops walked over to me and gave me a once over with the steeliest eyes I had
ever seen. His drawl was unnerving as he said, “You might have heard of me from
the scum around Coconut Grove, I’m Corky.” He opened his wallet and flashed his
badge, “Now, I know, you may be going to college in the fall or you might not.”
He paused… lit a cigarette, blew smoke in my face, and continued, “I’m not
going to bother asking what it is you got in the glove box.”
He pulled a lid out of a,
above-his pay-grade-expensive, linen sportscoat pocket, “I could drop this lid
inside of your car and have probable cause to have our boys in blue tear your
mother-fuckin’ car apart from trunk to hood.”
Dangling the lid in my
face, he said cordially, “Do I have your attention Mr. McGee?”
“Yes sir,” I knew I
didn’t want to piss off this cop.
“The gig’s up. We’ve been
watching you boys for a month now, Max. You’ve been doing alright for
yourselves.” He offered me a smoke… lit it and waited ‘til I took a drag,
watching closely perhaps to see how steady my hand held it. He said in a
whisper so that no one else could hear him, “I think you ought to take a
vacation instead of going to school, Maxie.”
“A vacation? I need one
of those. Any suggestions where I might go?”
Corky got back in his
car, rolled down his window, and answered in passing, “Anywhere but here. You
understand?”
We drove off and, when we
had gotten only a block away, a hole smacked into the center of a spider web in
my window with the buzz of a bee above the side of my head simultaneously
ripping into the fabric of the backseat across from me.
I was already ducking
below the dash when Stan stepped on it, shouting, “Sniper! Get down.” And
burning rubber out of the neighborhood.
A few blocks away, Stan
sat up and continued the conversation as though nothing happened at all, “What
does he mean, the gig’s up. They got nothin’ on us.”
I was surprisingly
calm too, and explained, “Don’t you see what just happened? They don’t need to
have anything on us!”
Stan didn’t want to
believe what we’d just gone through, “There’s been snipers everywhere since the
riots began. That shot wasn’t Corky’s doin’s.”
“Oh yeah, the riots have
been over for a week. That was an invitation,” I answered and, after a moment
of stasis, saying, “We oughta cash-in and get out of Dodge?”
“What, those pigs ain’t
runnin’ me out of town,” Stan snorted. “They’re protecting their own interests,
or they would’ve just arrested us.”
We made our deliveries
and returned to Hollywood towards midnight. A conference was called between the
original five. Stan, Ted, Kenny, Danny and I sat around the kitchen table
smoking. The mood was glum. The pros and cons of what had happened were
bantered about. We weren’t arguing as much as we were simply stating facts
about our predicament.
I’d already decided and
said, “This was lots of fun but the heat’s on. I never wanted to make a career
of it anyway.”
“What, you want out?”
Stan was liking the business more than me, “I’m diggin’ this trip. We’re makin’
money. So much we gots’ta find places t’stash it. I don’t want to leave now.”
“Yeah, Stan,” Ted
interrupted, “you and Danny can have the professor’s wife and the teeny boppers
on campus too…”
“It ain’t just that,
Ted,” Stan took another hit and paused, when he finally spoke he was dead-on
serious, “I’ve worked hard to build up the business and I don’t like the idea
of fuckin’ Corky running us out of town. We might be able to make a deal with
him. We’re all in this together, ain’t we?”
I was burnt-out and said
so, “You can stay if you want but I don’t like Miami all that much and, hell,
to be honest, I’m not contributing much business-wise. Besides, dirty cops
don’t make me feel any better about it. They think I’m the ring-leader. I might
as well have a target pinned to my ass sayin’, put your dicks in here!”
Stan looked us over: maybe hoping we’d stick
together, “I know you ain’t in charge, but we fuckin’ need you.”
“Maybe you do, but what
do I really do. At least Ted has some muscle?”
Stan was grasping, “What’re you thinking, Ted?”
“I was thinking, he’s
right. I have the muscle, Max has the brains, but before we even started
dealing kilos, Kenny and I wanted to get back to Crestview. We could split the
cash five ways, Max, Kenny and I can put some of it into acid for traveling
money, and head up north.”
“How about you, Danny?”
Stan was beginning to look relieved that Ted volunteered to split-up the cash evenly.
“I like it here too.”
Danny had been doing most
of the footwork along with Stan. It made sense that he’d want to stay. “Maybe
we can keep it going a while longer… like you said, make a deal. Fuckin’ Corky
just wants to make money off us.”
“One more thing,” Ted
added as an afterthought, “I have a Marine bud that’s in town. I want to
check-in with him before we split.”
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