The Clean-Up Crew - The Wheelman
By Duane Swierczynski
DOWN BY THE RIVER, THEY FOUND MIKAL’S TRUCK, TWO open body bags with no bodies inside of them, and a spray of blood. They were forced to report back to Mikal’s father, by cell phone. It was supposed to be just a routine checkup, to see what the kid was up to tonight. He hadn’t shown up for his gig down in Wildwood—a buddy had called it in.
“He’s nowhere in sight?” Mikal’s father asked.
No, they said.
“Is there blood inside his truck?”
No. Just around the construction site. Some tarp and concrete and pipes sticking out of the ground.
“There anything inside these pipes?”
Not that they could tell. Not without flashlights or anything. Probably not. But they could check. They hung up, promising to call back soon.
“Fuck.”
“What do we do now?”
“Chill. Just chill the fuck out, that’s what we do.”
“I don’t want to do that. Gotta think, gotta think.”
Fifteen minutes later, they called Mikal’s father back.
Mikal’s appointment book was still in the truck, they said, and on today’s page they saw a note for a meeting. The names: Patrick Lennon, Harrison Crosby, and Holden. The exact details of the meeting were not known, but these three names happened to be the names of three bank robbers who were suspected of stealing $650,000 from a Wachovia branch in Center City that morning. It was in the paper today. Didn’t he see it?
This was bullshit. No such news story had made the papers. But Mikal’s father didn’t know that.
Mikal’s father didn’t know about any of this. This had been Mikal’s deal.
“Bank rob-bers?” said the father, through clenched teeth.
They didn’t have to see the man’s face to know his teeth were clenched.
The first matter of business was to find Mikal. (Yeah, right.) They were instructed to split up: one guy to Mikal’s townhouse in Voorhees, New Jersey and the other to his friend, this piano player named Andrew, to his house. He lived in the northeast, not far from where some of the crew made their homes.
“Let’s go, then.”
“You know we’re not going to find shit.”
“That’s not our problem. The man speaks, we go. Let’s go.”