Page 138 of Two Marlboros

“You’re not the one asking questions here, Michael.”

He raised his hands and immediately put them back again in his pocket. “I get it, I get it. I have no idea who Waitch is. He’s a big shot, someone who coordinates activities and makes others do the dirty work, but I’ve never seen him. Maybe someone in the business knows him.”

Michael’s face relaxed, as if talking to the police about Waitch made him feel a little safer, although I was sure that feeling wouldn’t stay with him for too long.

“Who would know him?”

Michael shrugged and shook his head. “I don’t know, maybe Ryan. Ryan Goldwin, I mean.”

“What’s the relationship between you and Ryan?” I asked with an edge of excitement, which I tried to hide.

“Well,” and he began to rub his hands together, “it all started with him. I was looking for drugs and he just happened to be there at the right time. Only then he wanted money, and I didn’t have any, so he offered me to start dealing, but I refused. That’s why I went into hiding. But he wanted that money back at all costs, so he made that shot at the post office hoping to scare me.”

Ashton merely nodded, but I could no longer contain the tremor that shook me inside. Michael, Ryan, the robbery - it was all starting to come together.

“Could you give us a better description of the circumstances under which you met?” I asked. Ash turned to me, and I returned his glance for a moment.

“It was about a month before the robbery. It was on the 13th, together with a guy. I knew right away they were dealing.”

“And what did you figure that out from?” I asked.

Michael gave a shrug. “You see them. They talk to each other and look around all the time. They look like they are waiting for someone, but they are actually checking to make sure the police are not coming. When you get close, though, you just see the faces they have.”

I nodded and waited a moment before resuming, to give Ashton time to intervene, but he continued to keep quiet.

“Why did you start taking cocaine?” I asked.

Michael huffed and rolled his eyes. “What can I say? I wanted to try it. Haven’t you ever given in to temptation?”

I was reminded ofhislips blowing smoke, those lips I had longed for, for a moment, and there was his hand reaching for me with a cigarette and asking me if I wanted to try. Finally, there was me, with that unlit cigarette in my mouth and dusk still far away, so that no one could witness that scene.

“No,” I answered dryly, “resisting temptation is a quality of being a good policeman. Your family is wealthy, isn’t it? Why couldn’t you repay the debt you incurred with the drug dealers?”

“My parents are wealthy, but I certainly didn’t want to use their money for this. It was my thing, you know? It took my own money, and I didn’t have it - and I don’t have it now either.”

“So, the threats started. Could you describe what happened after you refused?”

“Well, phone calls started coming in. At first, they were silent, then the voice on the phone started telling me that he was watching me, and after a while they targeted the car. Every week I would find it rifled.”

“Who was it that was threatening you over the phone? Was it always the same person or different people?”

He smacked his lips and let go once again of that second of reflection in which he rearranged his thoughts.

“I think it was Ryan every time. He always had the same voice, the same way of talking.”

“And after that, notes started coming in, right? Could you describe them to us?”

“Yes, they are sort of reminders sent by Waitch and his people, let’s say so. On them there are written the doses and how much money you have to give those guys there, as well as the day and time of the meetings. They write random words on them, but it’s always about that stuff anyway.”

Out of nowhere, in my mind’s eye, two more puzzle pieces fitted together before my eyes, but they did not match to the millimeter like the ones I had already put in. Michael had indeed received notes because he had incurred drug debts; it made sense, because those notes were a threat, a way to remind him that he had a score to settle. But Nathan had also received one, I remembered clearly. A single question arose for me: why?

“Where does the group usually hang out?” Ash asked, taking advantage of the silence that had fallen.

“Well, they don’t have a fixed base. For security issues, you know. They do go to that McDonald’s on 34th Street a lot, though, to pinch a few bucks off some poorschmuck.”

It was the same place where Nathan had been to investigate the note he had found, but I couldn’t find a connection between the two, at least not at that moment.

“Are you sure the perpetrator is Ryan?” my colleague continued.

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