Sometimes at Night Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Also by Ben Sanders

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Also by Ben Sanders

  The Marshall Grade series

  AMERICAN BLOOD

  MARSHALL’S LAW

  The Sean Devereaux series

  THE FALLEN

  BY ANY MEANS

  ONLY THE DEAD

  Novels

  THE STAKES

  THE DEVILS YOU KNOW

  SOMETIMES AT NIGHT

  Ben Sanders

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  First world edition published in Great Britain and the USA in 2021

  by Severn House, an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd,

  14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE.

  Trade paperback edition first published in Great Britain and the USA in 2022

  by Severn House, an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd.

  This eBook edition first published in 2021 by Severn House,

  an imprint of Canongate Books Ltd.

  severnhouse.com

  Copyright © Ben Sanders, 2021

  All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. The right of Ben Sanders to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs & Patents Act 1988.

  British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7278-5053-9 (cased)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-78029-818-4 (trade paper)

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4483-0556-8 (e-book)

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Except where actual historical events and characters are being described for the storyline of this novel, all situations in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is purely coincidental.

  This eBook produced by

  Palimpsest Book Production Limited,

  Falkirk, Stirlingshire, Scotland

  ONE

  Marshall said, ‘So what’s the problem, Ray? Tell me a story.’

  Ray Vialoux drained his wine and picked up the bottle with his other hand before he’d even set the glass down. The place had only been open for two months, and Marshall thought that Vialoux might be setting an early precedent in terms of consumption. He watched Vialoux fill his glass to the rim and then lean forward to sup the first mouthful, like taking the foam off a pint of beer. Last time they’d seen each other was 2010, but Vialoux seemed to be aging in overdrive: bloodshot and pale, neck and jowls too stringy for a man not yet fifty. He looked like he’d eaten nothing for a week and then driven here at a hundred miles an hour with no windshield.

  Marshall said, ‘Going off body language, I have to assume it’s pretty bad.’

  Vialoux slid his glass aside, looked at his arms folded on the table. Shirtsleeves pushed back and a shabby bloom of cuff at his elbows. He scanned the room slowly, hunched and looking out from under his brow, like the burden of things going wrong was too much for normal posture.

  He said, ‘I didn’t know who else to talk to, so you’re it.’

  He gave Marshall half a smile, like his situation – whatever it was – still had a funny side. They were in an Italian restaurant down in Sunset Park. The dining room was the converted bottom floor of a two-story clapboard house on a corner site, fronting Fourth Avenue. Marshall hoped the place would survive. He and Vialoux were the only customers, and Marshall’s presence didn’t count for much as far as the check was concerned. He was still on his first beer, some kind of micro-brew label he’d never heard of, but no doubt a sensible offering in gentrified Brooklyn, where the local denizens would take a photo of the can and then put it on Twitter. They had a table near the back of the room, Marshall in the forward-facing chair so he could see the door, a row of windows on his right showing the cross street: quiet and dark, the blacktop shiny from late-evening rain. Every now and then a car went by with a hiss of groundwater.

  Vialoux looked at his arms some more, seeming embarrassed. ‘Anyway. Thanks. I know it’s been a while, so I appreciate it.’

  ‘I haven’t done anything yet.’

  ‘Yeah, well. You showed up. That’s a start. Where you been, anyway? You were UC, right?’

  NYPD, undercover.

  The worst years of his life.

  Marshall nodded.

  Vialoux said, ‘I heard … man, I heard all kinds of stories.’

  Marshall didn’t answer.

  ‘I mean … I heard your op went pretty bad. Everyone heard about your shootout, up by the park. And then you just seemed to disappear and … yeah. People said maybe witness protection, maybe you’d left the country or something.’

  ‘I was in New Mexico a few years, but I’ve been back up here since 2016.’

  ‘And no one’s murdered you.’ Vialoux managing a smile.

  ‘Yeah. Knock on wood. I do a fair bit of looking over my shoulder.’

  Marshall slid his can aside, like it might open up the conversation, get them to the heart of the matter. He’d had to wait ten minutes for the dew line to draw down below the rim, giving him space to get a thumb on there without disrupting the moisture pattern. He didn’t know why he had to do it that way but he did. Situations came at him with information, parameters for action. He didn’t know why. Some part of his head gave him rules and he followed them.

  He said, ‘All right. Lay it out for me.’

  Vialoux’s shirt was open two buttons. He jutted his chin and tugged some more slack out of his tie. Marshall saw his Adam’s apple dip and come back.

  Vialoux said, ‘I got in sorta deep with guys I shouldn’t have.’

  ‘All right.’

  He waited, but Vialoux was taking his time, rolling his wineglass stem between his thumb and forefinger, giving that small motion a lot of focus. Back in 2010, he’d been a narc detective at Brooklyn South, and always seeme
d sure of himself, the way people do when they’re on a path that means something to them. Right now, sitting hunched and thirty pounds lighter, missing that magic weight of a gold shield and a gun, he looked as if everything central to his happiness was being slowly crossed off a list.

  Marshall said, ‘I’m not going to see it any different, whether you say it fast or say it slow.’

  Vialoux looked up. ‘You probably figured this isn’t something I can take to the front desk of the precinct.’

  ‘There are other people you can call. Even if you’re not completely spotless on this. But I don’t even know what we’re talking about yet. There’s no point saying it in riddles. Just lay it out plain for me.’

  Vialoux didn’t seem to hear him. He said, ‘I just want to let you know before we get into it. So you know what kind of circus you’re showing up for.’

  Some guys were like this with bad news, edged up on it slow like a kid at a diving board. Marshall leaned to his left and looked past Vialoux’s shoulder to the maître d’ station and the front door. A clean break would be as easy as getting up and walking out. But being asked for help is a special kind of entrapment. To say no would be to forfeit moral fiber. Then again, to say yes would be to forfeit even more, potentially. There’d be a line somewhere. A point of optimal involvement.

  Marshall said, ‘What’s happened?’

  Vialoux’s foot was pumping under the table. He said, ‘Guys down Brighton Beach running a sports book I been into. Sixty-k deep. Sixty-seven, actually. I owe sixty-seven.’

  He glanced over his shoulder as the owner approached their table. He was a tall, beefy guy in his forties who had to walk sideways to get between the tables.

  ‘You guys good, Ray? You need anything? Another bottle?’

  Vialoux stroked an eyebrow with a thumbnail, looked at the tablecloth. ‘We’re good, Paulie. Appreciate it. Maybe just the check, when you got a minute.’

  The guy sidled off again, trailing hand raised, finger aimed at Vialoux. ‘Sure, you got it. Don’t you guys hurry, though – all the time in the world.’

  Marshall drank some beer. He said, ‘Who’s running the book?’

  Vialoux gave it a moment and then looked up again. ‘Mob guys. Italian mob guys. I thought … you know, I thought you might still have some phone numbers.’

  ‘I have some phone numbers. But I don’t have any seventy-thousand-dollar favors owing.’

  Vialoux didn’t answer.

  ‘Give me some names. Who’s running this thing?’

  Vialoux sighed, held his hands edgewise on the table, ten inches palm-to-palm. It seemed to Marshall he could see the whole dilemma framed there, overlapping wineglass stains like a Venn diagram of how life goes wrong.

  He said, ‘I talked to a guy. You ever meet D’Anton Lewis?’

  Marshall shook his head.

  ‘Finance guy, gets involved in various things … anyway, he got me in.’

  He was nodding slowly to himself, looking out the window, as if trying to sum up how things could start OK and then veer off the rails. He said, ‘I had a … I’d sorted it out with them, I was paying it down. But, yeah …’ He shrugged. ‘They called it in. They called in the whole debt.’

  Vialoux waited as Paulie put a pen and a wallet with the check on the table. The guy sidled off again, and Vialoux said quietly, ‘I’m maxed out. Man, you got no idea. I used to think … I never could understand how people could be poor, you know? It’s like: get a job, work your way out of it. But shit: I feel like … it’s like I’m walking a tightrope, and I got a bucket in this hand, and a bucket in this hand, and another fucking bucket on my head, and in a second I’m going to lose the whole lot.’

  He closed his eyes, massaged his temples.

  Marshall said, ‘Who’s running the book?’

  ‘Frank Cifaretti. He must be capo level, now. You know Frank?’

  Marshall nodded. He recognized the name. His undercover work had been with the Asaro family. They thought he was a bent-cop-cum-bodyguard. He’d sat in on a couple meetings between them and Frank Cifaretti.

  Marshall said, ‘I think we’ve met. You got a number for him?’

  ‘Yeah, I got a number, but it’s got to the point, he’s not even picking up the phone. I mean, he’s not even talking.’

  He looked away, pumped his leg some more. Marshall’s beer can rattled faintly with the vibration. He set it on a napkin. It was empty now, and the stalagmite dew pattern would draw down whichever way it pleased. Marshall didn’t have a role in it. He was off the hook.

  He watched Vialoux twist and reach in the pocket of the coat hanging on the back of his chair. He came out with a folded envelope, letter-size, flipped it on the table.

  Marshall waited a moment before touching it. He knew he had to see the contents, but then everything he learned posed a risk of trapping him. Data has a gravity. There’d be a point where he’d learned too much, and couldn’t just walk away from the problem. Something would chime with that inner current, that inner guide who says, You should fix this.

  Vialoux was leaning forward again, elbows on the table, the envelope’s fold easing slowly open.

  Marshall picked it up.

  Vialoux’s gaze was faraway and bright, his eyes starting to fill.

  Marshall opened the flap and slid out the contents.

  Two photographs. A shot of Vialoux’s wife, Hannah, side-on to the camera and opening a car door. And a headshot of his teenage daughter, Ella. Hair across her face, quarter-profile. Zoom-lens shots with foggy backgrounds.

  Marshall said, ‘When did you get these?’

  ‘Yesterday.’ Vialoux cleared his throat, blinked a few times. When he spoke again his voice was steadier. ‘They were taken out front of the house. There’s a note, too.’

  He didn’t see it at first, but then he moved apart the photos and found the strip of paper: MONEY BY TUESDAY. NO COPS.

  Today was Thursday.

  Five days to get him out of it.

  Marshall slid everything back in the envelope and closed the flap and placed the envelope in the center of the table. Like that small point of order was step one in bringing order to the bigger picture.

  Vialoux massaged the bridge of his nose, dragged his hand down his face. ‘I didn’t sleep last night. Kept hearing break-ins, you know? People showing up early to collect.’ He shook his head. ‘Jesus.’

  Marshall said, ‘If he’s not answering the phone, how do you tell him the money’s ready?’

  ‘He used to just call, I’d meet him in his car somewhere. It’s almost like a hobby for him, you know? Go for a drive, pick up a few k. Plus it’s harder for the law to keep an eye on him. Does business somewhere different every time. He used to have this bagel place, Neptune Ave, but I only ever dealt with him in the car.’

  ‘Who else have you told?’

  ‘No one. Just you.’

  ‘All right.’

  Marshall picked up the pen and tested it on a napkin, and then flipped the napkin over to the clean side. He could see it wasn’t quite square. He laid the pen neatly on the principal transverse axis of the napkin with an equal pen length projecting on each side and slid the napkin across the table to Vialoux.

  Vialoux said, ‘My writing’s not that small.’

  ‘I don’t need it in scenes with dialogue. Just give me the names.’

  Vialoux didn’t answer.

  Marshall said, ‘I’m not saying I’ll do anything. But I can’t make up my mind one way or the other until I know the players. So.’

  He nodded at the paper.

  Vialoux’s eyes dropped to the table. He fortified with some wine and then raised the pen. Up front, Paulie was fussing with the register, trying to be unobtrusive, making a stealth job of killing time. Beyond him on Fourth Avenue the nighttime traffic was just floating lights running back and forth, puddles picking up the tint, an electric mural with each passing. Marshall leaned to pull his billfold from his pocket, and as he moved he had a broadened
view of the window next to them, and on the sidewalk beyond the weak reflection of the tablecloth and its candle flame, he saw a man in black, face hidden by a ski mask, gloved hands bringing up a shotgun.

  The barrel swung to target Vialoux as Marshall rose from his chair, and as he came upright he grabbed the table by its edge and flipped it toward the window. The tabletop was vertical as it struck the glass, the pane dropping out as a curtain of white pebbles, and then the shotgun boomed.

  Quiet after that: splinters and blood exploding through the room in near-silence under the ringing in his ears. Marshall crouched and dived and caught Vialoux in a tackle chest-high, crashed him backward off his chair and onto the floor. The second shot blew out more glass and wood chips. Paulie was on his stomach beneath another table, hands crushed to his ears like a skull vise. Marshall risked a glance, saw the man with the gun cross the street to a car idling at the far curb, lights off, exhaust misting at its fender. The guy jumped in back and the car took off hard, cutting right onto Fourth through a red light.

  No chance of catching them.

  No chance of helping Vialoux, either: he lay on his back bleeding from the chest, eyes open in that distant stare the dead have, looking all the way to heaven.

  TWO

  Paulie had turned very white. Marshall kept him on his side under the table and called it in on the phone at the maître d’ station, told the operator what happened and gave a description of the car: silver Impala, maybe an oh-four model.

  Six minutes later, a couple of uniformed guys from the seven-two precinct showed up in a radio car, full lights and noise. They came in with guns drawn, one guy staying up by the door while his partner came down for a look at Vialoux and decided, yeah, they definitely needed detectives.

  Three more radio cars from the seven-two and an ambulance arrived. The paramedics took Paulie out on a stretcher and gave him oxygen, and twenty minutes after that, two detectives showed up.

  One guy was Hispanic, early thirties, looked to be something of a bench-press enthusiast. His partner was a black guy nearing sixty, tall and lean enough the act of getting out from behind the wheel of the unmarked looked mechatronic: joint and limb motion like the sequenced unfolding of some prototype robot. They took a look at the broken glass and the table out on the sidewalk and then came into the restaurant.