Angel Face by Stephen Solomita Page B

drag queens, they have a hard time coping with people who aren’t afraid of them.
    â€˜Yeah, that’s all well and good,’ Bobby says, ‘but I gotta know what you can do for me before I tell you my business. And I don’t think I need to explain why.’
    Chin steeples his fingers. ‘Two basic facts. First, there are nineteen hundred private companies under contract to one or another of the federal government’s intelligence arms. Second, more than two hundred and sixty-five thousand individuals working for these companies have a Top Secret clearance, which allows them access to sensitive data. Most of these individuals are honest and hard-working, but not all. For a fee, some are willing to pass along information. A smaller number will actually conduct investigations.’
    â€˜So, these guys, they’re like traitors? They sell information to terrorists?’
    â€˜If that’s going on, which I very much doubt, it’s news to me. What my contacts do is more like what happens at the Motor Vehicle Bureau or the IRS or the various credit agencies. For a fee, they pass data to private investigators.’
    Lou Chin recites the pitch more or less from memory. He’s a year out of the Marine Corps where he led a company operating in southern Afghanistan and Pakistan. Chin had loved his job and fully expected to make the Marine Corps his permanent home. But then, one cold, moonless night, a mortar round landed two yards from where he crouched on a roof in Kandahar. His three comrades were killed instantly, while he, himself (except for a minor flesh wound tended by a company medic) was uninjured. Four months later, he accepted an honorable discharge and came home, figuring that some higher power had sent him a strongly worded message.
    â€˜Why don’t you describe your needs,’ he concludes, ‘and I’ll tell you whether or not we can meet them.’
    â€˜And you’ll guarantee confidentiality, right?’
    â€˜Absolutely. We never compromise a client.’
    â€˜No, you just sell government secrets.’
    Chin spreads his hands and shrugs. Someone’s got his fingers wrapped around Bobby Ditto’s balls and the gangster lacks the capacity to unwrap those fingers on his own. That’s why he’s called on Xao Investigations.
    â€˜What about money? What about your . . . your fee?’
    â€˜One thousand dollars for this consultation, which you’ve already paid. The rest depends on what you need.’ Chin smiles for the first time, a thin smile that’s gone in an instant. ‘Which, I suppose, brings us back to square one. I can’t very well price our services without knowing what they’ll be.’
    Louis Chin’s wearing tan slacks, an off-white linen jacket and a copper-colored golf shirt. To Bobby Ditto, the clothing looks expensive and sophisticated, which annoys him all the more. He’s thinking Chin (whose forebears in America reach back to the California gold rush) should be serving him wonton soup and egg rolls.
    â€˜I need a minute to talk it over.’ Bobby stands up and motions for the Blade to follow as he walks out of the bunker and closes the door behind him. They’re now standing in the warehouse’s storage area, surrounded by rolls of substandard carpet that Bobby expects to unload on the New York Housing Authority. ‘Whatta ya think, Marco? Is the asshole legit?’
    The Blade rubs his nose, an annoying habit that he simply can’t break, no matter how much it pisses off his boss. ‘What I’m thinkin’, Bobby, is that we gotta do somethin’. We can’t afford to have this Carter gunnin’ for us, not right now.’
    The Blade’s referring to an upcoming deal, the biggest in the short history of Bobby Ditto’s crew, seven kilos of pure heroin at $71,000 per kilo. Bobby’s in the process of putting the $497,000 together and he’s still