Chapter 67

Jason Ritchie eats lunch at the former Black Bridge, now the polished gastropub Le Pont Noir, and feels unsettled by how much Fairhaven has changed. The old criminal networks he once knew have disappeared, leaving Jason unsure how to protect himself after seeing the photograph connected to Tony Curran’s murder.

The photograph on Jason’s table brings back the old gang and the violence surrounding them. Jason thinks Tony Curran was shot in connection with the past and wonders whether Turkish Johnny, who often carried a camera, took the photograph that was left by Tony’s body. Jason also worries that Turkish Johnny or Bobby Tanner may have returned and that Jason could be next.

Jason remembers Tony shooting a young London drug dealer in the Black Bridge around 2000 after Steve Ercan lured the boy there. The wounded teenager was put into Bobby Tanner’s old van and dumped near the Fairhaven sign, where the teenager later died. Tony then had the cab driver killed as well, because Tony did not want witnesses.

That double killing marked the end of Jason’s involvement with the gang. Bobby Tanner left after his brother Troy died on a boat in the Channel, and Turkish Johnny disappeared after the cab driver was shot. Jason recognizes that the old days were not harmless fun but bullets, bodies, police, and grieving parents.

Jason finds the likely spot where Tony’s bullet passed through the wall and reflects that the old Black Bridge and the old gang are gone. Still frightened by the photograph and by the possibility that old associates have returned, Jason concludes he already knows what to do and calls his dad.