A Bomb Built in Hell by Andrew Vachss Page A

cab downtown on Fifth. He told the driver to take him to the Village, not knowing how far The Prince’s network went. He entered the hotel on Bleecker between Sullivan and West Broadway and walked to a room he had registered the day before.
    H e telephoned Pet. The cab took him back to the Sheraton and dropped him off. He checked out the next morning, paying his bill in cash.
    Pet was waiting in the garage. Neither of them liked to return in the daytime and avoided it whenever possible.
    â€œYou see him?” the old man asked.
    â€œYeah. How does he make a living? If he’s dealing, he must have every cop in the precinct greased—you can’t miss him.”
    â€œHe does the same work you do.”
    â€œYou know anything about a black guy, his boyfriend?”
    â€œNo. But I know he always marks his boyfriends with one of his diamonds. They get to wear the diamond so long as they’re in with him. When they show on the street without the diamond, it means he’s done with them. After that, they’re nothing but a fucking piece of meat. He’s got a new one every couple months or so.”
    â€œCould the kid live down there a couple a weeks and watch the black guy?”
    â€œI don’t think so, Wes. That’s a real freak show, and the kid might panic if one of them made a move on him.”
    â€œYou’re right. One of them moved on me last night.”
    â€œWhat happened?”
    â€œThis was on my way back to the Sheraton. I was waiting for the light to change, and this freak comes up and asks me if the CT on the ID bracelet stands for ‘cock-teaser,’ right?”
    â€œJesus! I told you you shouldn’ta worn that.…”
    â€œHey, look, Pet, he just wanted to hit on me, period. No matter what fucking initials I’d’ve had, he would’ve said
something
.”
    â€œYou have to hurt him?”
    â€œOn the street? I told him I’d meet him in the last row of the Tom Kat at midnight.”
    â€œThe Tom Kat?”
    â€œSome sleazo movie joint I saw on the way down.”
    The old man laughed. “I can’t see the kid doing that. Where he was raised, he’d’ve opened up that freak for sure.”
    â€œYou got to forget your image if you want to move out there. That’s something you have to be taught, and Carmine taught me. Now … what happens if you lay up for a couple a weeks without doing anything? Will they think you lost your nerve?”
    â€œNah, they’ll think I’m getting ready to go on in.”
    â€œWould The Prince want to make it personal?”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œWould he have to hit you himself? Or could any of his freaks do it?”
    â€œHe’d want to hit me himself. It’d mean a lot if he did. You take a man out, you take his rep for yours.”
    â€œWhat’s he use?”
    â€œMostly his hands. He’s one of those karate experts. He never carries himself, but some of his freaks are always around, and they all shoot or stab. But The Prince, he works small. They say he can kill you with anything: a rolled-up newspaper, a dog chain, you know what I mean.”
    â€œSo he’d have to be close. And we don’t.”
    â€œYou could never pop him from one of the buildings. He’d know you was inside before you even got set up. Did he see your face last night?”
    â€œSo what? He didn’t know who I was.”
    â€œHe will if he ever sees it again,” Pet said solemnly. “You can forget about getting close, Wes.”
    â€œAll right. Stay here for a few days—I’m going out to look at him good this time.”
    W esley spent the next six nights driving the cab in Times Square, catching only occasional glimpses of The Prince, and always at a distance. But he did locate the black man with the diamond earring, and the black man had a pattern. Too much of a pattern—whatever else he was, Wesley knew he