"I'm sure you are. I still don't feel good about saying it that way, so." One shoulder arches up in a quick shrug. She's not afraid to admit when she's wrong.
His question takes her a little bit by surprise, and she gives him a few quick directions towards her apartment before she answers.
"I do. Brett Mahoney. He uh, grew up with Foggy, one of the lawyers in my firm. He's a good guy. He worked with us when we brought down Fisk. Cleared a bunch of dirty cops out of his department."
"I trust him. If he was going to sell me out, I wouldn't be here. Fisk had someone targeting me a few years ago. It went all the way up through the FBI. Brett helped keep me alive by making sure I didn't get in the FBI's hands."
Brett's definitely had plenty of opportunities to sell them out over the years. Her circle is small - really small - but Brett is absolutely a part of it.
"Oh, we will, huh?" she asks with a smile. The switch in phrasing hasn't escaped her attention. And she's glad to hear it.
"Yeah, we're almost at my apartment." Karen gives him the last few directions. As they get closer, she comments, "parking is shit around here, just pull in to the next available space."
He's silent the rest of the way, pulling up when she says stop and then finding a spot to wedge the car. He hesitates for a second and then moves to slide out.
Karen gets out on her side of the car, and clearly isn't planning to linger long herself. She gets the keys from her car as she walks and unlocks the front door.
Leading the way through the lobby, she bypasses the elevator to go up the stairs. The building is a little run down, but obviously well tended to by the tenants. "Christ, what a night," she mutters as she lets him into her apartment and locks the door behind her.
She leaves her shoes by the door, turning the lights on as she moves inside. It's a small apartment, but she has everything she needs. "Uh, do you mind waiting just a few minutes so I can take a quick shower? I'm covered in sea water." And she's distinctly aware of how much the bucket of water they threw on her smells like harbor. "There's beer in the fridge if you want one."
He walks in after her but feels like he shouldn't be here, like he's some kind of intruder. He resists the urge to prowl around and pace but he does stand just inside the doorway, stiff as a board.
He curls his fingers into fists and then tips his head from one side to the other before he sighs.
"Go ahead."
He doesn't think he'll loosen up enough to get a beer but he's not going to leave.
Karen watches him for a moment before she says, "okay, I'll be right back." But she only gets to the top of her hallway before she stops and turns back. The way he's holding himself reminds her so much of Frank, all sort of - used to looking over his shoulder and not sure what to do with himself when there's no clear next step.
"Um, you can look around if you want. I don't mind. Or that window by the couch goes out to a fire escape if you want to go up to the roof. And the remote for the TV is on the TV stand. Okay." Her hand pats against the wall and she offers him a quick smile before disappearing down the hallway.
Bucky does manage to say that before she disappears. He doesn't know what he should do here so he just takes a few steps inside the apartment and then settles himself on the edge of the couch. He rests his arms on his knees and bounces his legs a bit.
He doesn't want to go snooping around too much, doesn't think he'd find anything anyway so he waits for her to come back out.
True to her word, it's only about 20 minutes before Karen returns. Her wet hair is held up in a claw clip, and she's changed into an oversized t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. There's some vaseline on the cut on her lip, and a bandage over a scrape she found on her arm.
And she has her laptop and a stack of overfull file folders.
"Hey. Thanks for waiting," she says as she sits on the other end of the couch with he legs folded. "So. I have a lot of research here," she says, patting her hand against the pile. "Want to catch me up with what you've got so I know where to start?"
Karen's mouth twitches into a little smile. Even though it goes against her journalistic instincts to offload everything she has first, her gut instinct with people tells her that going first will help to build trust. What little she knows from her search through his public service record and what she's seen in the news tells her he's had a lot on his shoulders for a long time.
"So there's this real estate management group that started off in Hell's Kitchen...here," she rifles through her stacks of files and hands him one. "They were buying out run down properties and construction sites, but then nothing was happening at those locations. I went and checked out a few of them and they've all just been sitting there untouched - no change to commercial properties, cursory notifications to tenants in residential but nothing you'd expect happening like - like inspections, or changes to rent. So I went digging and found out that it was a shell company, and it's been snowballing from there...here, this is the chain of shell companies I've turned up so far."
She pulls one of the files from the middle of the stack and moves it to the top, flipping it open so he can see the typed list of companies and associated owner names when they've been available - a lot of them are just tied to other dummy companies. There's a column next to it tracking large payments that float from shell to shell. "Seeing this I thought it was money laundering, but when they picked me up earlier tonight I realized there has to be something more going on."
"And how does this gang fit in with what you've found out?"
Because, from all intents and purposes, they were a low level gang. A lot of them had felony convictions for assaults, robberies, that sort of thing but to be involved in something higher than that?
You wouldn't have thought it possible. But his own information has led him here and so has hers. He just has to figure out what they have in common.
"This wouldn't be the first time we've seen money launderers team up with local gangs. They fund the weapons and drugs for the gangs in exchange for protection. But I'm thinking..." She trails off for a moment, her fingertips tapping against her files.
"They didn't follow us out of the warehouse, which means that whatever they've got in there is more valuable than what they think I know. So this whole thing must be circling around a smuggling operation. What have you been seeing? Is there any - tech or anything missing that you know of?"
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
His question takes her a little bit by surprise, and she gives him a few quick directions towards her apartment before she answers.
"I do. Brett Mahoney. He uh, grew up with Foggy, one of the lawyers in my firm. He's a good guy. He worked with us when we brought down Fisk. Cleared a bunch of dirty cops out of his department."
no subject
He doesn't trust many people but he knows that he's an exception to a lot of rules because of what he's experienced.
"He won't sell you out?"
no subject
Brett's definitely had plenty of opportunities to sell them out over the years. Her circle is small - really small - but Brett is absolutely a part of it.
no subject
Not that he really trusts anyone but he'll trust that she trusts him. It's the most he can give. He keeps driving, silent for a few moments.
"Where am I going? Just driving around or do you want me to go somewhere specific?"
no subject
"Yeah, we're almost at my apartment." Karen gives him the last few directions. As they get closer, she comments, "parking is shit around here, just pull in to the next available space."
no subject
"Come on, get inside quick."
Never knew who was looking.
no subject
Leading the way through the lobby, she bypasses the elevator to go up the stairs. The building is a little run down, but obviously well tended to by the tenants. "Christ, what a night," she mutters as she lets him into her apartment and locks the door behind her.
She leaves her shoes by the door, turning the lights on as she moves inside. It's a small apartment, but she has everything she needs. "Uh, do you mind waiting just a few minutes so I can take a quick shower? I'm covered in sea water." And she's distinctly aware of how much the bucket of water they threw on her smells like harbor. "There's beer in the fridge if you want one."
no subject
He walks in after her but feels like he shouldn't be here, like he's some kind of intruder. He resists the urge to prowl around and pace but he does stand just inside the doorway, stiff as a board.
He curls his fingers into fists and then tips his head from one side to the other before he sighs.
"Go ahead."
He doesn't think he'll loosen up enough to get a beer but he's not going to leave.
no subject
"Um, you can look around if you want. I don't mind. Or that window by the couch goes out to a fire escape if you want to go up to the roof. And the remote for the TV is on the TV stand. Okay." Her hand pats against the wall and she offers him a quick smile before disappearing down the hallway.
no subject
Bucky does manage to say that before she disappears. He doesn't know what he should do here so he just takes a few steps inside the apartment and then settles himself on the edge of the couch. He rests his arms on his knees and bounces his legs a bit.
He doesn't want to go snooping around too much, doesn't think he'd find anything anyway so he waits for her to come back out.
no subject
And she has her laptop and a stack of overfull file folders.
"Hey. Thanks for waiting," she says as she sits on the other end of the couch with he legs folded. "So. I have a lot of research here," she says, patting her hand against the pile. "Want to catch me up with what you've got so I know where to start?"
no subject
Better her talking than him. He sits back a little, still stiff but trying to loosen up.
"What've you got on these guys?"
no subject
"So there's this real estate management group that started off in Hell's Kitchen...here," she rifles through her stacks of files and hands him one. "They were buying out run down properties and construction sites, but then nothing was happening at those locations. I went and checked out a few of them and they've all just been sitting there untouched - no change to commercial properties, cursory notifications to tenants in residential but nothing you'd expect happening like - like inspections, or changes to rent. So I went digging and found out that it was a shell company, and it's been snowballing from there...here, this is the chain of shell companies I've turned up so far."
She pulls one of the files from the middle of the stack and moves it to the top, flipping it open so he can see the typed list of companies and associated owner names when they've been available - a lot of them are just tied to other dummy companies. There's a column next to it tracking large payments that float from shell to shell. "Seeing this I thought it was money laundering, but when they picked me up earlier tonight I realized there has to be something more going on."
no subject
Because, from all intents and purposes, they were a low level gang. A lot of them had felony convictions for assaults, robberies, that sort of thing but to be involved in something higher than that?
You wouldn't have thought it possible. But his own information has led him here and so has hers. He just has to figure out what they have in common.
no subject
"They didn't follow us out of the warehouse, which means that whatever they've got in there is more valuable than what they think I know. So this whole thing must be circling around a smuggling operation. What have you been seeing? Is there any - tech or anything missing that you know of?"