Chapter Six
Mike had been having similar thoughts as Molly did a basic induction with him. She’d set up a file for him, showed him how they did background checks through a credit reference agency and what they were looking for. Signs of debt or financial troubles, or someone with more money than you would expect for their position. She called a contact at the power company and verified the addresses supplied by Marcus. She made small talk with the person she spoke to there and asked about the family and the holiday.
‘I thought you’d do checks like that through the cops,’ Mike said when she rang off.
‘You can do but they’re so paranoid now about improper use of information that it’s getting harder and harder. We’ve got contacts in the power and phone companies. They have better info a lot of the time anyway.’ She smiled as she made notes on the file. ‘Dan gets rugby tickets or concert tickets for some people as a thank you.’
‘Not as dodgy as giving money?’
‘Exactly. You have to be very careful these days.’
‘So where do I go from here?’ He scanned through the file. ‘Surveillance on the depot? I can’t see them stealing loads during the day though.’
‘No,’ Molly agreed. ‘I would suggest doing physical checks on each of their houses. You can see if there’s anything obvious-’
‘Like a couple of pallet loads of microwaves on their front door step?’ he cut in.
She laughed.
‘Yeah, something like that. Looking at the stock list there’s a lot of stuff there in a fairly short space of time, so they must be storing it somewhere.’
‘Wouldn’t they be getting rid of it straight to a fence or whatever?’
‘I doubt they’d be driving it straight there though, there must be a halfway house somewhere, like a garage or something.’
‘So that means checking every single house of each of these guys?’ Mike groaned. ‘They’re scattered all over the show.’
Molly gave him a withering look.
‘It’s called investigating, Michael.’ She waved him away. ‘Now go investigate.’
Mike made a stop at the café and bought himself a roast beef filled roll, a banana and a large bottle of water. He sat in the car and started on the roll, compiling a suspect list of the staff. He put Hooch, Gabe and Luther at the top. There were a couple of others he hadn’t taken to who he put next. Nobody else really stood out to him, so they formed the last part in no particular order. He checked the addresses against his map book, finished the roll, and hit the motorway. He headed south first to start at Papakura and work his way back north, figuring it would take some time and he could avoid most of the rush hour that way.
The Subaru had some serious grunt and he made good time down the motorway, staying in the outside lane all the way and only using the brakes when a knucklehead got in the way-accompanied by flashing headlights and an angry glare. It felt good to be out and doing something worthwhile. Trucking had been okay as a stop-gap but it had never been a long term prospect for him. He’d needed something when he’d got out of the service and that had done the job, but now that it had come to an end it was time to look ahead.
Mike reached Papakura and checked out the addresses there, cruising past and looking for anything obvious. He moved on to Takanini and checked one there, then Manurewa. Some of the places were normal family homes with gardens and kids bikes out the front; some were dingy run down dives. Some had garages, some didn’t. None of them had a big sign on the front lawn with ‘Master Criminal Lives Here’ on it.
The ones with garages or sheds that he could see demanded closer attention. He cruised past and walked back for another look, and quickly learned just how much a six foot three blonde white guy stood out in some neighbourhoods. One little kid on a trike with a dirty face and scabby knees asked him if he was the Police. He said he wasn’t but the kid didn’t seem to believe him. He rode off down the road making siren noises and glancing back at Mike.
A group of hoodied teens strolled down the middle of one street giving him the hard eye. They moved slowly out of the way once he’d slowed down enough to show them some respect-his instinct was to keep going and let them get out of his way, but he figured that would mean either denting his car or his knuckles, and neither was a good option on his first day in a new job.
But it still made his blood boil and he returned their insolent stares to make sure they knew he wasn’t backing down. They nudged each other and laughed, and he felt his shoulder muscles tighten.
He continued and checked the next address, then turned round to come back the way he’d come. The group of teens were back in the street again, strung across it in a loose line, facing him. Watching him as he approached.
Nobody moved this time. They stood their ground and waited as he eased to a full stop in the street. It was a rough area, cars up on blocks on the overgrown front yards, paint peeling from the houses, dogs running loose. These kids were all in their mid teens, the apparent leader a bigger kid of about nineteen, solid and wide. They had wispy teen moustaches and baggy clothes and gang colours.
Mike undid his seatbelt and slipped into neutral. He buzzed the window down. The leader approached his window. He stared down at Mike from beneath his hoody.
‘Get these fullas to move mate,’ Mike told him firmly, ‘I wanna get through.’
‘What’re you doing here? This is our street.’
‘None of your business what I’m doing here, pal. Just move it and I’ll leave you to your street.’
‘You’re not Po-lice,’ the leader said, dragging the word out. ‘Po-lice don’t drive Rex’s’
‘That’s right. I’m not Police.’
‘So who are you? Bailiff? Or is you lost?’
‘I ain’t a bailiff and I ain’t lost. I’m just a man driving round looking at the beautiful city. Okay?’
‘You got a big mouth, mister.’ The leader’s eyes were dangerous beneath the hoody.
‘Mate, just clear outta the way and let me get past. Then I can get on with what I’m doing and you can do whatever it is you’re doing, alright?’
Mike’s low stock of patience was running even lower now, but he recognised the danger and figured he should keep it calm as long as possible. Didn’t seem like that would be too long though.
‘Where you at, man?’
The other kids laughed, egging him on.
‘Where you at wit’ dis car, brau? Some nice sled there. Where y’at?’
The leader leaned down to the driver’s window. Mike could see the glazed look in his eyes now. He was high on something, and it wasn’t love. This wasn’t going to end well.
‘Mate, I’m tryin’ to be nice here, okay. Just tell your little boys to move aside and I’ll be out of your face.’
‘You ain’t in my face, brau.’
The leader leaned in closer, intimidating, but Mike Manning had had worse from better. He flicked the door open three inches before the leader even realised his hand had moved, and the frame smacked the leader clean in the forehead, knocking him back and sending his hands to his head.
Mike was out the door in a flash and on him, slapping his hands away as they came out swinging. In seconds he had the leader in an arm lock with his left wrist twisted up behind his back, forcing him to stand on his tip-toes to try and ease the pain.
‘Tell your little boys to move aside,’ he hissed in the boy’s ear, as the others moved towards them. ‘Do it now.’
‘Brau, you’re breakin’ his arm!’ one of them protested, as if was all suddenly unfair.
‘Tell them,’ Mike repeated, tweaking the wrist for good measure.
The leader let out a yelp of pain.
‘Move,’ he cried out, ‘move it!’
They started slowly moving away from the car, and Mike turned with the leader in front of him so he could watch them. They backed it up slowly to the curb.
‘Further,’ he told them, ‘back it up.’
They didn’t m
ove, so he tweaked the wrist again and produced another yelp of pain.
‘Do it now or I’ll break his wrist.’
‘Do it, man!’ the leader cried, ‘do what he says, brau!’
They backed up further, but one stood his ground, eyeing Mike savagely.
‘We gonna get you for this, man.’
‘I’ll look forward to it. Back it up, sweetheart.’
The kid did so, his eyes never leaving Mike’s. Mike edged back to the car, opened the door and changed hands so he could maintain the lock on the leader’s wrist. He started it up again and put it in first. The leader turned his head to look at him, his face racked with pain and shame.
‘You try this again, son,’ Mike told him, ‘and I’ll get angry. Understand?’
‘You’re dead, man,’ the leader whimpered.
Mike gave his wrist a twist and pushed him away from the car, sending the gangster tumbling to the road as he gunned the engine. The Subaru leaped forward and outran the rocks the rest of the gang threw after him. He took the corner and disappeared from view.
The leader sat on the roadway and stared after the car.
‘Dead meat,’ he muttered.