The streets were already crammed with cars as I arrived, and women tottered between them on absurdly high heels, most of them wearing little more than lingerie. There were all shapes, all ages, all colors. In its way, the Point was the most egalitarian of places. Some of the women shuffled like they were in the final stages of Parkinson’s, jerking and shifting from one foot to the other while trying to keep their spines straight in what was known locally as the “crack dance,” their pipes tucked into their bras or the waistbands of their skirts. Two girls on Lafayette were eating sandwiches provided by the Nightworks outreach initiative, which tried to provide the working girls with health care, condoms, clean needles, even food when necessary. The women’s heads moved constantly, watching for pimps, johns, cops. The cops liked to swoop occasionally, backing up the paddy wagons to street corners and simply sweeping any hookers within reach into the back, or pink-slipping them for disorderly conduct or obstructing traffic, even loitering, anything to break up their business. A $250 fine was a lot for these women to pay if they didn’t have a pimp to back them up, and many routinely spent thirty to sixty days in the can for nonpayment rather than hand over to the courts money that they could ill afford to lose, if the poorer ones had $250 to begin with.

I went into the Green Mill to wait for the others. The Green Mill was a legendary Hunts Point diner. It had been around for decades, and was now the main resting place for cold pimps and tired whores. It was relatively quiet when I got there, since business was good on the streets. A couple of pimps wearing Philadelphia Phillies shirts sat at one of the windows, flicking through a copy of Rides magazine and arguing the relative merits of assorted hookups. I took a seat near the door and waited. There was a young girl seated at one of the booths. Her hair was dark, and she was dressed in a short black dress that was little more than a slip. Three times I saw older women enter the diner, give her money, then leave again. After the third had departed, the girl closed the little purse containing the money and left the diner. She was back again maybe five minutes later, and the cycle resumed again.

Angel joined me shortly after the girl had returned. He had dressed down for the occasion, if such a thing were actually possible. His jeans were even more worn than usual, and his denim jacket looked like it had been stolen from the corpse of a particularly unhygienic biker.

“We have him,” he said.

“Where?”

“An alley, two blocks away. He’s sitting in a Dodge, listening to the radio.”

“He alone?”

“Looks like it. The girl over at the window seems to be bringing him his money a couple of times an hour, but she’s the only one who’s been near him since ten.”

“You figure he’s armed?”

“I would be if I was him.”

“He doesn’t know we’re coming.”

“He knows somebody’s coming. Louis talked to Jackie O.”

“The old-timer?”

“Right. He just gave us the lead. He figures G-Mack made a big mistake, and he’s known it since the night Martha confronted him. He’s edgy.”

“I’m surprised he’s stayed around this long.”

“Jackie O thinks he’d run if he could. He’s low on funds, seeing as how he spent all his money on a fancy ride, and he has no friends.”

“That’s heartbreaking.”

“I thought you might see it that way. Pay at the register. You leave it on the table, and someone will steal it.”

I paid for my coffee and followed Angel from the diner.

We intercepted the girl just as she entered the alley. The pimp’s Dodge was parked around a corner in a lot behind a big brown-stone, with an exit behind him onto the street and one before him that connected perpendicularly with an alley. For the moment, we were out of his sight.

“Hi,” I said.

“I’m not interested tonight,” she replied.

She tried to walk around me. I gripped her arm. My hand entirely enclosed it, with so much room to spare that I had to tighten my fist considerably just to hold on to her. She opened her mouth to scream, and Louis’s hand closed around it as we moved her into the shadows.

“Take it easy,” I said. “We’re not going to hurt you.”

I showed her my license, but didn’t give her enough time to take in the details.

“I’m an investigator,” I said. “Understand? I just need a few words.”

I nodded to Louis, and he carefully removed his hand from her mouth. She didn’t try to scream again, but he kept his hand close just in case.

“What’s your name?”

“Ellen.”

“You’re one of G-Mack’s girls.”

“So?”

“Where are you from?”

“Aberdeen.”

“You and a million other Kurt Cobain fans. Seriously, where are you from?”

“Detroit,” she said, her shoulders sagging. She was probably still lying.

“How old are you?”

“I don’t have to answer any of your questions.”

“I know you don’t. I’m just asking. You don’t want to tell me, you don’t have to.”

“I’m nineteen.”

“Bullshit,” said Louis. “That’s how old you’ll be in 2007.”

“Fuck you.”

“Okay, listen to me, Ellen. G-Mack is in a lot of trouble. After tonight, he’s not going to be in business anymore. I want you to take whatever money is in that purse and walk away. Go back to the Green Mill first. Our friend will stay with you to make sure you don’t talk to anyone.”

Ellen looked torn. I saw her tense, but Louis immediately brought his hand closer to her mouth.

“Ellen, just do it.”

Walter Cole appeared beside us.

“It’s okay, honey,” he said. “Come on, I’ll walk back with you, buy you a cup of coffee, whatever you want.”

Ellen had no choice. Walter wrapped an arm around her shoulder. It looked almost protective, but he kept a tight grip on her in case she tried to run. She looked back at us.

“Don’t hurt him,” she said. “I got nobody else.”

Walter walked her across the road. She took her old seat, and he sat beside her, so that he could hear all that she said to the other women, and could stop her if she made a break for the door.

“She’s just a child,” I said to Louis.

“Yeah,” he said. “Save her later.”

G-Mack had promised to slip Ellen 10 percent of whatever the other women made if she acted as his go-between for the night, a deal to which Ellen was happy to agree because it meant that she got to spend a few hours drinking coffee and reading magazines instead of freezing her ass off in her underwear while she tried to entice sleazebags into vacant lots. But it didn’t do for G-Mack to be away from his women for too long. The bitches were already ripping him off. Without his physical presence to keep them in line, he’d be lucky to come out with nickels and dimes by close of business. He knew that Ellen would also take a little extra before she handed over the cash to him, so all things considered, this wasn’t going to be a profitable night for him. He didn’t know how much longer he could stay in the shadows, trying to avoid a confrontation that must inevitably come unless he got together enough cash to run. He had considered selling the Cutlass, but only for about five seconds. He loved that car. Buying it had been his dream, and disposing of it would be like admitting that he was a failure.

A figure moved in his rearview mirror. The Hi-Point was back in the waistband of his jeans, but the Glock was warm in his right hand, held low, down by his thigh. He tightened his grip on it. It felt slick upon the sweat of his palm. A man stood, wavering, close to the wall. G-Mack could see that he was a no-count, dressed in tattered denims and anonymous sneakers that looked like they came from a thrift store. The man fumbled in his pants, then turned to one side and leaned his forehead against the wall, waiting for the flow to start. G-Mack relaxed his grip on the Glock.