The Drop by Dennis Lehane Read Free Book Online

the Second City is the body. That’s where they take the bets and sell the women and the dope and the kinda TVs and couches and things a working man can afford. Only time a working man hears from the First City is when it’s fucking him over. But the Second City is all around him every day his whole life.”
    Chovka Umarov was the Prince of the Second City.
    Chovka’s father, Papa Pytor Umarov, ran things these days, sharing power with the old Italian and Irish factions, working out subcontractor deals with the blacks and the Puerto Ricans, but it was accepted as stone cold truth in the streets that if Papa Pytor decided to be impolite and force any or all of his associates under his heel there wasn’t a fucking thing they could do to stop him.
    Anwar got out of the driver’s seat of the lead SUV, eyes as cold as gin as he scowled at the weather like Bob and Marv were the cause of it.
    Chovka exited the backseat of the same Escalade, pulling his gloves on and checking the ground for ice. Chovka’s hair and trim beard were the same black as the gloves. He wasn’t tall or short, wasn’t big or small, but even with his back turned, he radiated an energy that made something itch in the base of Bob’s skull. The closer you get to Caesar, one of Bob’s high school history teachers had been fond of saying, the greater the fear.
    Chovka stopped on the sidewalk by Bob and Marv, stood on a patch that Bob had already shoveled.
    Chovka said to the street, “Who needs a snowblower when you got Bob?” And then to Bob, “Maybe you come to my house later.”
    Bob said, “Uh, sure,” because he couldn’t think of anything else to say.
    The white van moved slightly from side to side. Bob was sure of it. The side closest to the curb dipped, and whatever weight caused the dip resettled in the middle and the van resettled with it.
    Chovka chucked Bob’s shoulder. “I’m kidding. This guy.” He smiled at Anwar, then at Bob, but when he looked at Marv, his small black eyes got smaller and blacker still. “You on the welfare?”
    A muffled thud emanated from the van. Could have been anything. The van rocked in place again.
    “What?” Marv asked.
    “What?” Chovka leaned back to get a better look at Marv.
    “I meant, sorry.”
    “What’re you sorry for?”
    “I didn’t understand your question.”
    “I asked if you on the welfare.”
    “No, no.”
    “No I didn’t ask you?”
    “No, I’m not on welfare.”
    Chovka pointed at the sidewalk and then their shovels. “Bob does all the work. You watch.”
    “No.” Marv shoveled some snow, chucked it to his right into the pile. “I’m shoveling.”
    “You shoveling all right.” Chovka lit a cigarette. “Come here.”
    Marv put a hand to his own chest, the question in his eyes.
    “Both of you,” Chovka said.
    He led them down the sidewalk, the ice melt and rock salt crunching under their feet like broken glass. They stepped off the curb behind the van and Bob saw what could have been transmission fluid leaking out of the underside of the van. Except it was in the wrong place for tranny fluid. And it was the wrong color and consistency.
    Chovka opened both van doors at once.
    Two Chechens built like Dumpsters with feet sat on either side of a sweaty, thin guy. The thin guy was dressed like a construction worker—blue plaid shirt over a thermal and tan denim pants. They’d gagged his mouth with a cotton scarf and drilled a six-inch metal bolt through the top of his right foot, which was bare, the boot tipped over just to the right of it, the sock sticking out of the boot. The guy’s head drooped, but one of the Chechens pulled back on his hair and shoved a small amber vial under his nose. The guy got a good whiff and his head snapped back, his eyes snapped open, and he was wide awake again while the other Chechen used a chuck key to tighten the bit in a power drill.
    “You know this guy?” Chovka asked.
    Bob shook his head.
    Marv said, “No.”
    Chovka said,