It’s 11:00 that same night. Mikey and Angelo are parked outside of Manny’s apartment with a view of the alleyway and Manny’s car. The lights in the apartment go out, and they watch Manny exit the building, a large, heavy duffel bag in each hand.
“Here we go,” Angelo says.
Just then, two guys come out of the alley and grab Manny by the shoulders. One punches him in the head while the other starts yelling at him. Manny manages to reach into his pocket and brandishes a wad of bills. The larger of the two men counts the bills and then slaps Manny across the face with the wad. The first guy knees Manny in the stomach, and they leave him shaken, leaning against the car. A few moments later, he pulls himself together enough to open the car door and drive off.
Angelo looks at Mikey. “Shoes.”
“Yeah,” says Mikey. “Good timing for us, though. He hasn’t done the job yet.”
Mikey and Angelo smile as they drive off. They know exactly where Manny is headed.
At the job, they see Manny pick the lock on the warehouse door, grab his two sacks, look around, and then enter the building.
Angelo and Mikey wait. After about an hour, Manny peeks his head out the door to see if anyone’s there. Then he disappears back inside. This is their cue. Mikey and Angelo cross over to the doorway, one to the right, the other to the left. Manny comes out, a sack in each of his hands.
Mikey swoops in from behind, striking Manny hard with a leather sap on the back of his head. The safecracker crumples to the ground, unconscious. Angelo rifles through his pockets and finds nothing but his wallet and tosses it into the weeds. Then they open one of the sacks. There it is. Fucking stacks of banded cash. Quickly, they transfer the cash into a bag they brought with them and run to the car. They leave Manny his tools. No one sees a thing.
As they drive away, Mikey turns to Angelo, “Should we call the cops? I hit him pretty hard.”
Angelo looks at him as if he is insane.
“No fucking way. Let him wake up and try to figure out what happened. I think he’ll leave town and not be seen again for a while. At least that’s what I would do. He probably thinks Shoes’ guys tailed him.”
“Works for me.”
Neither of them can suppress a big grin.
The next day, Vincent comes upon Mikey and Angelo chatting with some guys outside of Baba’s.
“You guys got a minute?” Vincent says, as he gestures to Angelo and Mikey.
They follow him down the block. Vincent can almost sense the shit-eating grins on their faces.
“You want to tell me what the take was or what?” Vincent says.
“Around $58,000, give or take,” Mikey says. “Whydya wanna know?
“Numb nuts. You’re gonna have to pay a tax, you know that, right? The sooner the better.”
“Is that necessary?” Angelo asks.
“Yeah, it is. I’ll go talk to the boss and let you know what he says. But whatever he decides, you guys are going to give it up. You understand me?”
They both nod their heads. They really don’t want to comply, but they know better. This is the Neighborhood, after all. And this is Vincent.