The fluster of T-Money’s truck engine turning and turning but never catching, stalled out in a church parking lot in the middle of the day, was an inauspicious start to his minor role in what the Justice Department considers the most significant drug trafficking investigation in Chicago history.
The last thing T-Money needed was to disappoint the Twin. His car trouble had come at a delicate time. T-Money was behind on payments. And though he’d always made an effort at fellowship with the Twin, calling his dealer “baby boy” wasn’t going to erase the debt he owed. One load pays for the next. The Twin, in a seeming gesture of good faith, had offered to advance him ten more kilos on consignment—buy now, pay later—with the expectation that T-Money and Crooked would hand back the proceeds as payment for what they already owed. All they had to do was cough up 20 grand in cash and bring it with them to the meet-up.
Twenty minutes later, he answered a call from the Twin. The guy was outside. Old Man made his way from the table to the door.
The guy stepped out of the car and retrieved a black duffel bag from behind his seat. He walked it briskly to the rear of Old Man’s Pontiac, raised the lid, and dropped the bag with a thud.
He gripped the steering wheel of his Porsche Cayenne, watching the ebb and flow of traffic on the corner of Roosevelt and Kedzie and wondering what he should do.
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For one thing, he should never have answered his phone when the Twin started calling again. And at first he hadn’t. But 40 grand is a lot to owe to someone with cartel connections in Mexico. The twins had cut him off for nonpayment four months earlier, and the special Nextel phone they’d given him hadn’t rung once since then. But on the first of December, the small plastic screen lit up in his hand once again.
Right on schedule, another phone call from the Twin: My guy is in a silver minivan at the McDonald’s. Where are you?
