Devils in Exile (15 page)

Two Samsung phones labeled
CL-1
and
CL-2
were exact clones of the bikers’ own mobile phones, handy for checking voice mail and text messages, as well as accessing their contact lists. The chapter head’s clone held photos from bike week in Laconia, New Hampshire, grinning biker babes flashing tats and tits.

The phone labeled
W
was another work phone. The bikers’ phones had not only been cloned, but “ghosted” as well. A clone was an exact copy of the unit’s microchip, whereas a ghost modified a phone’s chipset with an embedded implant. When dialed from this
W
phone, the bikers’ phones answered without ringing or vibrating, automatically switching on its microphone. Any ambient conversations were then narrowcasted back to the
W
phone. No need to risk infiltrating the motorcycle club itself, which was a near impossibility anyway: bikers’ paranoia topped even drug dealers’ paranoia. Modern mobile-phone technology made anyone a potential walking wiretap.

The fifth phone was one of a separate pair of ghost phones, thin, high-end Razr models. These units they kept swapping in and out of the store, stashing them behind the lottery station next to the front counter like a dropped phone. They rotated them out twice a day because ghost phones burned through batteries. If not for this, they could have monitored their marks from the comfort of home, or even a beach two thousand miles away. But burning
out the bikers’ batteries would raise red flags, so they had to coop out in the van to eyeball their marks so as to know when to call and listen.

The
W
phone was hooked up to a laptop, recording now. Transmission from the ghosts inside the bikers’ leather jackets were too muffled, but the keno plant eavesdropped clear. Three men, the two bikers and the store owner, a Crossbone prospect, were discussing a shipment of “pellets,” code for ecstasy pills.

Royce had presented them with all this, the cloned phones, the ghosts, the bikers’ mobile numbers, along with photographs and RMV printouts. A bounty of inside information.

“How does he get this stuff ?” asked Maven.

They talked about Royce, talked about him a lot, especially on long surveillances, either speculating about his past or cracking on his legend—but tradecraft discussions were for some reason taboo.

“I heard him and Termino talking a couple of days ago,” said Glade, pulling one headphone away from his ear. “I think Royce owns a piece of a couple of Verizon store franchises.”

Suarez marveled. “The man is a genius.”

“Agreed,” said Maven. “But how does he get close enough to the marks to get their phones for cloning in the first place?”

The other two shook their heads, shrugging, the question beyond their pay grade.

“You know what I heard?” said Suarez. “I heard that Brad Royce lists his occupation on his tax return as ‘Brad Fucking Royce.’”

Glade smiled. Using Royce’s full name was the tip-off to the joke. “Yeah?” said Glade. “Know what I heard?”

Suarez said, “What?”

“I heard that the pope once found a potato chip? Looked
exactly
like Brad Royce.”

Maven said, “You know that statue,
The Thinker,
the guy sitting like this?” He put his chin on the back of his hand and got pensive. “That guy’s thinking about the size of Brad Royce’s cock.”

Some were old, some were new. Some Glade had stolen off the
Internet. But it was enough to pass the afternoon in the back of the work van.

S
TARVING WHEN THEY GOT BACK INTO TOWN
, M
AVEN LANDED A LATE
-day space down the block from J. J. Foley’s. He went to the bar to order them a couple of pops, and a guy in a patrol cap turned at his voice.

“Neal.”

Ricky. Maven was a few full seconds recognizing him. Not because he’d changed, but because it had been so long. The old cap was cocked over his dented head as usual, a long-sleeved henley covering his bad arm. Razor burn reddened his neck, his hair too long over his ears.

“Rick,” said Maven.

He had never called him Rick before. Always Ricky. This threw everything off.

Ricky looked at Suarez and Glade on the other side of Maven. Maven did the introductions, and Ricky’s buddy, a small guy next to him, nodded with a quick tip of his chin, then looked back at his beer. Maven felt the contrast between them, him and Glade and Suarez, big guys, vital, energized, and Ricky and his friend, slump-shouldered, nearly invisible.

“Long time no see,” said Ricky, a Sam Adams tangled in the fingers of his good hand.

“Been busy,” said Maven, uncomfortable and showing it, nodding too much. “I’m working real estate now. With these guys.”

Ricky looked them over again. “Real estate. Wow.”

“Yeah,” said Maven. “Funny how things go.” Ricky was still sizing up Suarez and Glade, who were paying for the beers. “City Oasis?”

“Still there.”

To the others, Maven explained, “We used to work together at this convenience store in Quincy.” In this way, he was bringing
Ricky into the fold and at the same time distancing himself from him:
some guy I used to work with
. “That dickhead cop still come in?”

“Still comes in.”

“Holy shit. Crank mags?”

Ricky was flat. “And a protein drink.”

“Right, crank mag and a protein drink. Christ.”

Then came the nodding pause they had both been waiting for.

“So, you guys, uh, eating?” asked Maven.

“No,” said Ricky. “Just hanging.”

“We’re gonna …” Maven pointed to the rear of the pub, the tables. “You wanna join us?”

“No,” said Ricky. “We’re cool here.”

Both of them going through the motions. “You’re sure?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

This was his exit slot, but he couldn’t leave Ricky like this. Suarez handed Maven his beer, and Maven told him and Glade to go on ahead, he’d catch up.

“Man,” said Ricky, once they stepped away, “you really dropped out of sight. Like a stone.”

“I know, things happened pretty fast. I’m working a ton. I … I should have come by.”

“Yeah …”

“Said good-bye. I just got really caught up.”

Ricky nodded, letting Maven twist.

“What nights you at the Oasis?”

Ricky told him.

“I’ll come by. We’ll hang out. Still get free Sour Patch Kids?”

“All you can eat.”

“You work with anyone else?”

“He didn’t hire anybody after you left. Not enough business. On my own now.”

“Just you and Tyra.”

“Right.” Ricky showed the tiniest of smiles. Just enough for Maven to break free.

“I’ll come by then.”

“You should,” said Ricky, lifted. “Definitely.”

Maven glanced at Ricky’s buddy’s back at the bar, getting a weird low-level vibe from him, then walked back to join the other two. He took a chair facing away from the bar so there wouldn’t be any awkward cross-glances after the fact. Another ten minutes or so passed before the blushlike heat of the encounter wore off. When Maven got up a little while later to hit the john, Ricky and his buddy were gone.

As their burgers arrived, Suarez’s phone rang. It was Termino, letting them know that Royce had made a reservation at the Berkeley Grill for nine o’clock. They looked at each other, each taking a quick bite or two out of his burger, then downing the rest of his beer before heading back home to get cleaned up.

O
N FEAST NIGHTS
, R
OYCE HIRED A
T
OWN
C
AR TO DRIVE THEM, INSIST
ing on traveling in style, even when the restaurant was only a couple of blocks away. The street-level dining room of the Berkeley Grill was once the commodities trading floor of a famous tea company, a room with massive Corinthian columns and mahogany paneling with green marble accents, and Royce favored a round table in the rear corner. They sat there in dress jackets, like gentlemen, even Termino, shoe heels sharp on the polished oak floor, drinking Budweisers and feasting on starters from the raw bar. The headwaiter, Sebastian, knew Royce by name and always sent over some new appetizer for a taste, and the chef emerged from the kitchen for a handshake and a laugh. Royce placed five identical orders—ten-ounce Kobe cap steak, medium rare—then everyone and everything else went away, the entire city retreating as all the energy in the room was sucked toward their round table. For the remainder of the meal, their round table
became
the city, the only place in it that mattered.

Before the steak arrived, Royce slipped off his new wristwatch and passed it around. Not a wristwatch, he informed them, but a
“Big Crown Telemeter Chronograph.” Maven took it in his hands and felt the new leather of the strap, the fluted top telemeter ring of the oversize face, then turned it over and viewed the Swiss gears working inside the see-through crystal back. He passed it on to Glade, and it found its way around to Termino, who barely looked it over, returning it to Royce.

“Got one just like it,” Termino grumbled, the others laughing at him.

Then Termino pulled back his sleeve. He did have one just like it.

Royce passed out three black boxes labeled
ORIS.
Three identical timepieces. “I hear any of you call it a
watch,
I’m taking it back.”

Maven buckled his, admiring the oversize stainless-steel casing, the solid feel of it on his wrist.

“Retails for two grand, in case you’re wondering,” said Royce. “I did better than that, of course, but it’s the thought that counts. And here is the thought. We are at the top of our game right now. A game no one else could play—not at this level. Look around at these people here. These civilians. They call us heroes, right? But they’re afraid of us. You can feel it. They were much more comfortable with us over there, protecting them and their wealth. Not back here looking to get some of that for ourselves. The country-club door is closed. But—we’ve been to the other side. We’ve seen it. We know, and they know, that all this civility is a construct. A fantasy, and a pretty thin one at that. Our presence here is a reminder they don’t want to get. Because if it all started to go south stateside, who would be running things? We would. This round table right here. Be running
everything
. And I happen to believe that day will come. That the pendulum will swing back, and all the warriors who got civilized out of the power structure will reclaim their glory. But, for now, we have to dwell in the shadows. Like kings in exile. Waiting for the day.”

Maven had heard variations on this theme from Royce before, but never so bold a call for revolution. Glade said, “To the exiled kings,” and everyone drank.

“They say, ‘Work hard,’” continued Royce, “but what they
mean is ‘Obey.’ They got from us what they needed and now have to find ways of keeping us out. They want us to come back and be good little checkers on their board, plodding along one space at a time. But they forget that the warrior in us got activated. We come in like bona fide chessmen, badass rooks and bishops and knights, breaking all the rules, jumping their kings, and they’re like, ‘Fuck was that?’”

Maven grinned at Royce miming someone getting ripped off. But Royce wasn’t looking for laughs.

“They want us tamed. They want us happy and distracted. To keep us in line. But look at us here. We
defy
.” He raised his bottle. “Tomorrow? Who knows what it will bring. But right now—tonight—we are the shit. Far as I’m concerned, this round table right here is running this city.
Salud.
”

T
HEY LEFT THE STEAK HOUSE WITH BELLIES FULL OF MEAT AND BLOOD
full of Bud. Royce wanted to go someplace to get a decent cocktail, but he allowed himself to be outvoted and the Town Car took them up to Bukowski Tavern, a narrow bar on Dalton Street dangling over the Massachusetts Turnpike. A no-pretensions, cash-only bar to balance out the clubby steak house.

“Grunts with money,” said Royce. “Dangerous fucking combination.”

Glade and Suarez cornered up with Termino, making enough noise to clear out a pocket of space at the kitchen end of the bar. Maven settled in at a window overlooking the cars speeding below them. The collar of the bartender’s vintage
RATT
concert T-shirt was cut straight down to the midpoint of her cleavage, and it was worth the price of a draft just to watch her pour it. Royce let the “Wheel o’ Beer” spin and ordered a round of whatever came up.

“Glade tells me you’re all getting street bikes,” he said, sitting alone with Maven.

Maven nodded, swiping the foam off his upper lip. “We all caught the bug, watching these Harleys all day.”

“We’ll go up to New Hampshire, get them there. No sales tax, and they’re used to seeing cash.”

Maven nodded again, the matter decided with inebriated certainty. “No Danny tonight?”

Royce threw Maven a close stare that made Maven wonder if his voice had said something other than those three words. Maven didn’t know why he had asked in the first place.

“She calls you Gridley.”

Maven nodded, eager to elaborate. “Turns out we’re from the same town. Couple of years apart.”

“I know why she never went back. What about you?”

Maven shrugged. “I did go back, once. My sister’s funeral.
Half
sister.” His grip on the bottle grew tighter. “Nothing for me there.”

Royce saw something in Maven’s expression that pulled him closer. A darkness that intrigued him. “What’d you think about that, back at the restaurant?”

“Yeah, it was great, the meal—”

“No, I meant, what we talked about. What I was saying.”

“Oh. Yeah, it was interesting.”

“I’m not looking for fucking feedback, Maven. I want to know what you
think
.”

“About what you were saying?” Maven shrugged, not knowing how to say this. “It’s kind of dangerous, I guess.”

“Dangerous.”

“… Unless I missed something.”

Royce backed up, ready to take another run at it. “Look, the other guys, Glade and Suarez—I know my rap is wasted on them. You’re different.”

Maven shook his head.