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Manhattan keep on making it, Brooklyn keep on takin' it

      She didn't look like a hooker, Dominic thought dimly as he sat, handcuffed in the chair in the dark  basement. He'd been blindfolded when they'd brought him to the house. He'd still been half-asleep from whatever drug that woman had slipped in his drink then, when they'd led him down the narrow stairs into the basement where they'd taken off the blindfold.     That was when the beatings started, the two men who'd led him down there, taking turns raining blows on his face, chest and legs, screaming, cursing him in Spanish. Dominic wasn't fluent, but he knew  enough to know they were calling him a rat.     That had been the first day. On the second day a man in sunglasses and a leather jacket who spoke  English had come down to talk to him. What had he told the FBI about them, the cartel? Had he said  anything about Matteo, anything that could lead back to the Cartel.     Dominic had denied everything. He wasn't entire...

God help us, help us lose our minds

  1 month earlier     The bell above the door at Sam's quick stop corner store chimed as Eugene came in from the 90 degree heat  outside in search of a cold beverage, lottery tickets and some rolling papers. It was just after 1:30 in the afternoon and he'd told Jamal to meet him at the war memorial in Fullman Park at 2, he had a job for him.     He walked around to the beer cooler where Sam sold singles and extracted an ice cold 22 ounce bottle  of malt liquor from it and headed to the register, where the owner, Sam himself was working it. 'My lord, look what the cat dragged in!' Sam said as Eugene put the cold 22 on the counter. Eugene smiled, he liked Sam, he'd known him since he'd had his own corner store a decade earlier.     'Yup, I'm still alive, Sam, if you can believe it. Man, I can't believe you still running this fucking place, it always gave me a headache, trying to get any good workers who won't steal for you, dealing with the...