I returned to Brooklyn knowing I’d broached yet another crossroads.
As soon as I hit Nostrand Avenue, I surveyed PanStar from front to back. It was time to take stock of what was left and prepare to re-imagine its future.
With or without Bolo.
But before I could even get to that point, Pierre blew it all to hell with one panicked confession.
Cabrón showed up in the PanStar back room late one afternoon, unannounced and unexpected. I could tell he was about to drop something serious on me.
“Alright, Hopeton. I gotta tell you something that I know I should’ve told you about months ago,” he said, his voice strangled and his eyes wild.
I looked Pierre up and down- both fists were clenched and one of his legs was shaking.
I told him to hold on and forced a cold Guinness into his hand.
Whatever this was about, Pierre needed a minute to gather himself before the big reveal. And I must say, it was a BIG reveal.
A big, idiotic, stupid reveal that I did not see coming at all.
In a way I was almost impressed.
These soft, spoiled kids pulled off something I’d never have figured they’d have the nerve to even dream about.
And I had to give Mundo credit. The one thing I’d been subtly spending years pushing Bolo towards merely considering, this kid did, successfully, behind everyone’s backs.
“Am I understanding you correctly?” I asked. “You’re telling me that you and Mundo have been dealing guns out of a garage he owns in Brownsville for the past year?”
Pierre immediately started repackaging the enterprise.
The whole thing was a grand scheme orchestrated by Mundo, fueled by his need to “carve out his own lane,” something separate from the adults. Cabrón was just collateral damage, the one left holding the bag.
“But I thought that’s what your little clubhouse was for… all your little schemes,” I said, unable to hide my displeasure.
Pierre rushed to give me a convoluted explanation of how the Brownsville garage was Mundo’s personal asset and HQ was being underwritten by Bolo, so when Mundo wanted to “have his own,” even as he was being hustled out of Brooklyn, he directed Pierre to keep the whole thing going in his absence.
“And once Bolo stopped needing me to take care of the Port, I figured I may as well stick it out,” Pierre concluded.
“Wait until Bolo hears about this,” I said.
There was no way Rafael could deny our pivot now.
Cabrón shrugged.
As far as he was concerned, Bolo’s reaction to Mundo’s recklessness and stupidity was not his problem.
He’d done enough, simply confessing to me his role in this foolishness.
Pierre and I spent a considerable time talking through this scenario and life in general- what it meant for him to be Mundo’s best friend and errand boy.
By the end of the discussion, it was apparent to me that Cabrón had potential, and that Olmando’s future in New York was dead.
The two had to remain separated.
“Alright,” I said, once Pierre had talked himself out. “Stop chat. I’m going to have a talk with Mundo’s father about the garage. In the meantime, put those guns in a shoe box and move them to that likkle gyaal’s house and stick them in the back of her closet. Sell them off five at a time, and then be done with it.”
“Eula?” Pierre asked. He looked surprised that I’d want to bring her into this mess.
I nodded.
Dealing with the guns in this way was a slightly sloppy efficiency that probably should've been thought out a little better.
But we were moving so quickly.
At the time it made sense.
Had Pierre come to tell me about something similar like this happening at HQ, it wouldn't have been a major crisis point. HQ was a known entity and I would have shut it down with a quickness at the first sign of trouble.
But, because Olmando had used his powers of persuasion to convince Cabrón not to tell me about their off-market dealings, the only thing I could do with this particular problem was to turn lemons into lemonade.
And my first stop would be to Téo’s mansion in Clinton Hill.
