“Well…,” Jacobs started to say.
“Hold that thought, man. I mean, was this a trap by Mallette to bring you in? Or just Ames? Or was it for the both of you? Was I used in this conspiracy to try to trap you in there, sending you both to your impending doom?”
Jacobs and Thrower glanced at each other again, looking confused. “Impending doom?” Jacobs whispered.
Thrower put his hand over his mouth to make it seem like he wasn’t talking. “Maybe he watched a documentary before he came over?”
“And are we for sure assuming this was Mallette who did it?” Franks continued, though he wasn’t listening for a response.
Jacobs started to respond but was cut off before he was even able to utter a word.
Franks kept pacing. “But if it wasn’t Mallette, who else would it have been? Of course it was him, man. It had to be. Who else would it be?”
“Do you think he’s gonna let us get a word in at some point?” Thrower asked.
Jacobs sighed. “I wouldn’t bet on it.”
Franks continued rambling for another minute, then finally stopped walking and stood right in front of the others. He stared at each of them. “Well? Either of you got anything to say?”
Thrower put his hand up and opened his mouth, but never got a word out.
“You’re both just sitting there like stumps on a log,” Franks said. “You’re letting me do all the talking, and you’re both just sitting there like you got flies in your mouth or something.”
Jacobs and Thrower each made a face like they weren’t sure what that meant.
“I mean, I wasn’t there. So I can’t speak on what I saw, since I didn’t see anything. But you guys were. But you’re just letting me talk and talk and talk. I mean, I can’t do all the talking, can I?”
“You don’t think?” Jacobs asked.
“Well, I mean… maybe I could. But it really comes down to a question of…”
“What?”
“I dunno. Lost my train of thought, man. Talking too much.”
Tiffany walked over to Franks and grabbed him by the arm. “Let’s go into the kitchen and get you a drink.”
“Oh, thanks. You’re the best. You’re the only one who offers. These two slobs just let me talk and talk until my throat is parched.”
Jacobs and Thrower looked at each other and shook their heads. Franks was certainly one of a kind.
“You think it’s possible there might be someone else out there that’s just like him?” Thrower asked.
“I’d find it hard to believe that there might be.”
A minute later, Franks and Tiffany returned from the kitchen. Jacobs looked at Tiffany and mouthed the words “thank you” to her. Tiffany replied with a smile. She’d known both Jacobs and Franks long enough now that when Franks got a little long-winded, she intervened to stop him and move things along, as well as prevent Jacobs from getting irritated.
“So where were we?” Franks asked.
“We were talking about the tip you got,” Jacobs said. “How’d you get it?”
“Just one of my regular sources, man.”
“Think he could’ve been setting you up?”
“Nah, can’t see that happening. He’s an up-and-up guy. All he told me was… he heard Mallette had some type of big meeting with all his guys, and everyone was gonna be there. Didn’t know any more than that.”
“Just enough to draw Ames in,” Thrower said. “Honestly, I think Mallette put it out there for whoever came by. Ames, us, whoever. He was ready to drop the hammer on whoever showed up.”
Jacobs nodded. “Yeah, could be.”
“In any case, none of that really matters now, I suppose, does it?” Franks said. “Ames is gone, hallelujah, and now we just gotta worry about Mallette. Right?”
“I guess that’s what it boils down to.”
“We’re almost there, man, almost there. I can smell it, taste it, feel it, it’s pumping through my veins. The end is near.”
Jacobs was doing his best not to get too excited about that aspect of it. Though he was certainly closer to the end than the beginning, there was still a long way to go. Mallette was no pushover. And he wasn’t going to just lie down in front of them and surrender.
“Should probably let Bucky know,” Jacobs said.
“What?!” Franks asked. “Why?!”
“Uh, because there’s a bunch of dead bodies in a warehouse? That’s what the police do. Investigate things like that.”
“Man, he’s just gonna think that you did it.”
“No, he’s not.”
“Even if he don’t, what good’s telling him about it? What’s it gonna accomplish? Them guys are still dead, and nobody’s gonna miss them, so who cares?”
Jacobs gave him a face. “Because it’s the right thing to do? We’re not supposed to be like them. I know at times the lines get blurry, and maybe we’ve stepped over it a few times, but at the end of the day… we’re supposed to be better. And if the police get there in a week, then find out I was there, then what? Then they’ll wonder why I didn’t report it.”
“OK, OK, fine. Just tell him to keep it hush-hush, though, OK?”
“Fine.” Jacobs grabbed his phone and called Buchanan, who picked up after a couple rings. “You weren’t sleeping or anything, were you?”
“No, just relaxing here. What’s up?”
“Oh. Well, sorry. Your night’s about to pick up.”
Buchanan sighed into the phone. He already knew what that meant. “What happened?”
“There’s a bunch of dead bodies in a warehouse. Eight, ten, twelve, something like that.”
“Did you…?”
“I had nothing to do with it.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Went there and found them.”
“You just happened to stumble over a dozen dead bodies?”
“Wilson Ames is one of them,” Jacobs said.
“Excuse me?”
“I saw him myself. Ames is dead.”
“And you had nothing to do with it? You wanna start from the top on this?”
“I got word that Mallette had a big
