Parker 05 - The Darkness (36 page)

forgot that I hadn't come home alone.

Then Amanda saw him and shrieked.

"Mr. O'Donnell?" Amanda said, her arms still around

me, but her hand jerking away like she'd touched a hot

stove.

"Sorry to intrude, Ms. Davies," he said. "Your boyfriend and I have been through a lot today, and we unfortunately have to take up a little more of your time."

"Henry?" she said. "What's going on?"

"We found something at the scene," I said. "A document

that we hope will connect the guy who killed Hollinsworth

to 718 Enterprises. We just need to find out who he is."

"And then what?" she said. "You're going to call the

cops?"

I looked at Jack. He shrugged, as if to say this is all yours.

I turned back to Amanda. Her arms had slipped from

my shoulders. I took her hand, held it, but she was reluctant to hold on.

"Not yet," I said.

"Why not?"

"Somebody knew we were meeting Hollinsworth. I

don't know how they found out, but until we know who

did it we're going to play this pretty close to the vest."

She nodded, understanding it though it was clear she

wasn't happy about it.

Then she looked at Jack, said, "How are you? Feeling better?"

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301

Jack smiled. "I am. Thank you for asking."

"So get on with it," Amanda said. "If you don't mind,

I stopped reading in the middle of a really good sex scene.

Have you ever heard the term 'purple-headed warrior'?"

"Uh, no," I said, "but whatever floats your boat."

"I think the warrior in this book does float," she said, "at

least according to the narrator. His 'mast' sounds big

enough to sail down the Amazon. Anyway, good luck,

guys."

Amanda went back to the sofa, lay down, kicked her

feet up and dove back into the book.

"She's a pistol," Jack said.

"Sure is. Here, we can sit at the table."

Jack took a seat at our meager dining room table as I

hooked up my laptop. Once I powered it on, I accessed

LexisNexis and did a search for Leonard Reeves.

Half a dozen hits came up. I opened the first one.

It was from
The Daily Princetonian,
the student newspaper at Princeton University. We searched through the

highlighted article and finally came across the name

Leonard Reeves. The passage read:

The Princeton economics department, spearheaded by

Professor Sheila DeWitt, has seen its fair number of notable

professionals in the fields of finance and economics.

The article was accompanied by a photo of a middleaged black woman who must have been Professor DeWitt.

She was standing at the front of a small classroom. Two

students were visible in the front row. One was a girl, early

twenties, with a ponytail and wearing a skirt and blouse.

The man was dressed in slacks and a button-down shirt,

his hair short, and he wore glasses. The caption read:

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Rachel Vine '93 and Leonard Reeves '94 are capti-

vated by the renowned professor.

"Is that him?" Jack said.

"I don't know. Let's see the next article."

I pulled up the next search result. It was from
Crain's

business daily. The article was from 1998, and the headline

was: Economic Boom Sees Rise in Dot Com Investors.

We found Leonard Reeves's name halfway through the

piece. It read:

Flush with cash, many young men and women who

have prospered during unparalleled growth are putting their money into what many consider to be

risky investments--namely Web sites and Internet

domains. Leonard Reeves, a graduate of the Princeton economics department and executive at Morgan

Stanley, admits to finding thrill in such a venture.

"You don't get into this industry to watch from

the sidelines," said Reeves. "The people who take

the biggest risks reap the biggest rewards."

Reeves, who already owns three apartments in

New York City, says he plans to take his earnings

from Internet ventures and invest even further in the

housing market.

"Man, that can't have worked out too well for him,"

Jack said.

"Holy crap," I said.

"What?"

"Look, there." I pointed to the next article. The headline said it all.

The piece was from 2001, and was published in the

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303

Wall Street Journal.
It read: Reeves Named as Liaison to

New York City Department of Finance.

The article was also accompanied by a photograph. It

was definitely the same guy from the
Princetonian
article.

"He worked for the government?" Jack said. "You've

got to be kidding me."

I sat there, stunned. How was that possible? Could this

have been the same guy?

The other articles were not dated any later than 2004,

and all were references to Reeves's job with the DoF. There

were no other hits for the name, nothing else came up.

"It has to be him," I said. "But I don't get it. If this is

the same Reeves as on the order made out to Morgan

Isaacs, what the hell is someone who worked for the government and who worked for one of the biggest brokerage

firms in the world doing associated with 718 Enterprises?

I mean, these people are drug dealers, plain and simple,

and the crap they're producing is killing people. How did

someone like Reeves get connected to that?"

Jack sat there, thinking. Not listening to me, but lost

in his own thoughts. Then I heard Amanda's voice from

the couch.

"What if Reeves didn't just
use
to work for the government?" she said. "I mean, what if he still does?"

"That's crazy," I said. "Obviously Reeves fell on hard

times somehow and ended up selling his soul for a pile

of black rocks."

"Not necessarily," Jack said.

"What do you mean?"

"Have you ever heard of the name Gary Webb?"

"It rings a bell, but I'm not sure why."

"Okay, well, have you heard of the Dark Alliance?"

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"That's a little more familiar," I replied. "Something

about Nicaragua, right?"

"Something like that," Jack said. "In the eighties, Gary

Webb was a reporter for the
San Jose Mercury News.
"

"Now it rings a bell," I said.

"What does he have to do with this?" Amanda said.

"In nineteen ninety-six, Webb published a three-part

series of articles in the
Mercury News
called 'Dark Alliance.' See, in the eighties, President Reagan was embroiled

in the Iran-Contra affair where it was determined that the

U.S. government had supplied a group of Nicaraguan

Contras with financial aid through the sale of weapons to

Iran, in part thanks to our buddy Oliver North. Our government was supporting the Contras as part of the Reagan

doctrine, which supported organizations that opposed communistic and socialistic regimes. The Nicaraguan government in the eighties, let's just say, fit the bill.

"Webb claimed in his articles," Jack continued, "that

not only did we supply the Contras with funds through the

sale of weapons, but through the sale of drugs as well."

"That's ridiculous. We weren't selling drugs," Amanda

said.

"
We
weren't," Jack said. "But the Contras were reaping

millions of dollars through the sale of drugs within the

United States. Crack cocaine spread like wildfire through

urban areas in the eighties, and much of the money from

those sales went directly into funding the Contras. Webb

claimed that members of the NSC, or National Security

Council, were aware that money from drug sales in the

U.S. was being funneled to the Contras. Webb found out

that not only was our government aware of this, but

members of the NSC purposefully withheld that information from the Drug Enforcement Agency. They felt that

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305

by curtailing drug sales and cracking down on shipments,

we would effectively stem the flow of money to the

Contras and in turn hurt their efforts to overthrow Nicaragua's communist FSLN government."

"So in essence," I said, "they were selling drugs in our

cities, killing our citizens and choking the national crime

rates. And we turned a blind eye because we felt it pushed

our agenda in another country."

"Pretty much," Jack said. "When Webb published

these articles, he caused a firestorm unlike many seen in

journalism. It was without a doubt one of the most controversial articles of the past twenty-five years. So what

happened to Webb? Well, he was completely discredited

by the government which issued denials faster than meter

maids issue parking tickets. He was eventually pushed out

of the
Mercury News,
and after years in which he failed

to get another job at a major newspaper, Webb put a gun

to his head and pulled the trigger."

"Damn," Amanda said.

"Twice," Jack added.

"Twice? How does someone shoot themselves in the

head twice?"

"Don't get your panties in a bunch," Jack said. I glared

at him. "Apologies, Ms. Davies. Sometimes I forget that

I'm around a lady."

"This lady thinks she could kick your old ass," Amanda

said.

"Now that's my kind of lady," Jack said. "Hold on to

this firebrand, Henry. Anyway, common thought was that

Webb had been bumped off. But it turns out Webb was

genuinely depressed and had written despondent letters

to his family. And an autopsy and gun residue test proved

that the man really did shoot himself twice. It doesn't

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happen often, but it does happen if the suicidal person

happens to have lousy aim."

"So, what, you think the sale of drugs in New York

City is being funneled to, who, some shady overseas organization? Some anti-Taliban fighting squad?"

"Not at all," Jack said. "If what I'm thinking is correct

at all, and if this guy Reeves is connected the way I

suspect he is, then the sale of drugs in this city isn't going

abroad. It isn't being diverted to an anti-terrorism foreign

legion. What I'm saying is that money gained through the

sale of drugs like the Darkness is going directly to the city

itself. I'm saying that not only is our government turning

a blind eye, but it's taking a cut of the profits."

"The layoffs, the deficits," I said. "You're saying

they're trying to make up for budget shortfalls by taking

a cut of drug payoffs?"

"Words to live by, especially in politics. If something

worked twenty years ago, it'll probably work again now."

Just then I heard my cell phone ring. I went over to pick

it up, but when I saw the caller ID I stopped. Looked at Jack.

"Who is it?" he said.

I shook my head, confused.

"It's Curt Sheffield," I said.

"Curt," Jack said, taken aback. "Well, pick it up!"

I answered the phone. Tried to play it cool.

"Hey, man, what's up?"

Then I listened as Curt explained to me what was

going to happen in just a few minutes.

When I hung up, I looked at Jack and said, "You

need to leave."

Needless to say this was not exactly what he was expecting to hear.

"What the hell are you talking about, Henry?"

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307

"In less than half an hour, somebody is going to come

here to sell me drugs. And unless you want to try and pass

off as my pot-addicted uncle or something, we can't have

any trace of you in this apartment."

43

Curt Sheffield had only been working for the NYPD for

five years, but the past two days made it feel like a lifetime.

Two days. Twelve dead. All deaths related to this new

drug, the Darkness.

For years, New York was considered one of the safest

big cities in the world. The crime that existed was relegated to back alleys and dingy apartments. Upstanding

citizens had little to fear as long as they used common

sense.

The drug dealers were easy to smoke out. They were

usually junkies themselves. They sold because that's all

they had, all they knew. They were uneducated, unloved,

and an honest day's work for an honest day's pay was a

foreign concept.

And that's why dealers were so easy to break.

In real life, those dealers in their teens and twenties

didn't have any sort of real loyalty to the drug lords. It

wasn't like television. There was no "game" and no

loyalty beyond a wad of cash. Your employer was simply

whoever could pay that day.

When a man making seventeen thousand dollars a year

selling crack is forced to choose between turning in a man

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309

he barely knows or spending five years behind bars, the

decision was always easy.

That's why people on the top never lasted long. They

could never offer the people below them a life worth risking on the streets. Every moment was fleeting, but when

push came to shove a fistful of crumpled twenties wasn't