Hoffa belched. “What do you mean, ‘lease’ ?”
“I mean you get a guaranteed $5,000 a month, in cash, plus half the gross profits, plus an Agency freeze with the IRS, just in case. My 5% comes off the top, you’ll still have Chuck Rogers and Fulo running the stand, and I’ll be coming by to check in regularly, once I start my contract job down in Blessington.”
Jimmy’s eyes flashed–$$$$$. “I like it. But Fulo said Kemper Boyd’s tight with the Kennedys, which I do not like one iota.”
Pete shrugged. “Fulo’s right.”
“Could Boyd get me off the hook with Bobby?”
“I’d say his loyalties are stretched too thin to try it. With Boyd, you take the bitter with the sweet.”
Hoffa dabbed a stain off his necktie. “The bitter is those Cornmie humps who shot up my cabstand. The sweet is that if you took care of them, I’d be inclined to accept that offer.”
o o o
Pete huddled up a crew at the dispatch hut. Solid guys: Chuck, Fulo, Boyd’s man Teo Paez.
They pulled chairs up in front of the air conditioner. Chuck passed a bottle around.
Fulo sharpened his machete on a rock. “I understand that all six of the traitors have vacated their apartments. I have been told that they have moved into a place called a ‘safe house.’ It is near here, and I believe it is Communisto-financed.”
Chuck wiped spit off the bottle. “I saw Rolando Cruz checking out the stand yesterday, so I think it’s safe to say we’re under surveillance. A cop friend of mine got me their license numbers, so if you say we go trawling, that’ll help.”
Paez said, “Death to traitors.”
Pete ripped the air conditioner off the wall. Steam billowed out.
Chuck said, “I get it You want to give them a target.”
o o o
Pete closed down the stand–in full public view. Fulo called an air-conditioner repairman. Chuck radioed his drivers and told them to return their cabs now.
The repairman came and removed the wall unit. The drivers dropped off their taxis and went home. Fulo put a sign on the door: Tiger Kab Temporarily Closed.
Teo, Chuck and Fulo went trawling. They drove their radiorigged off-duty cars, devoid of tiger stripes and Tiger Kab regalia.
Pete snuck back to the hut. He kept the lights off and the windows locked. The dump was brutal hot.
A four-way link hooked in: the three cars to the Tiger Kab switchboard. Fulo prowled Coral Gables; Chuck and leo prowled Miami. Pete connected in to them via headset and hand microphone.
It was ass-scratching, sit-still duty. Chuck hogged the airwaves with a long rant on the Jew-Nigger Pantheon.
Three hours slogged by. The trawl cars kept a line of chatter up. They did not see hide-nor-fucking-hair of the pro-Castro guys.
Pete dozed with his headset on. The thick air had him wheezing. Crosstalk gibberish sparked these little two-second nightmares.
His standard nightmares: charging Jap infantry and Ruth Mildred Cressmeyer’s face.
Pete dozed to radio fuzz and wah-wah feedback. He thought he heard Fulo’s voice: “Two Car to base, urgent, over.”
He jerked awake and snapped his mike on. “Yeah, Fulo.”
Fulo clicked on. Traffic noise filtered in behind his voice.
“I have Rolando Cruz and César Salcido in sight. They stopped at a Texaco station and filled up two Coca-Cola bottles with gasoline. They are driving toward the stand rapidly.”
“Flagler or 46th?”
“46th Street. Pete, I think they–”
“They’re going to torch the cabs. Fulo, you stay behind them, and when they turn into the lot, you box them in. And no shooting, do you understand?”
“Sí, I comprende. Ten-four, over.”
Pete dumped his headset. He saw Jimmy’s nail-topped baseball bat on a shelf above the switchboard.
He grabbed it and ran out to the parking lot. The sky was pitch black and the air oooozed moisture.
Pete swung the bat and worked out some kinks. Headlights bounced down 46th–low, like your classic Cubano hot rod.
Pete crouched by a tiger-striped Merc.
The taco wagon swung into the lot.
Fulo’s Chevy glided in sans lights and engine, right behind it.
Rolando Cruz got out. He was packing a Molotov cocktail and matches. He didn’t notice Fulo’s car–