“It’s a starting point.”
“Well, he’s not there under that name now.”
“Start your search in a one-block radius around the Hyatt,” McGarvey said. “Hotel reservations, security cameras, credit cards under the identities he’s used before. Anything you can think of.”
A man in his midforties wearing dark slacks and a white shirt with the hotel’s logo was working behind the bar and he caught their reflection in the mirror. He turned around. “Sorry, folks, we’re not open till two.”
“We’re looking for someone, maybe you’ve seen him,” McGarvey said. He showed his temporary CIA ID.
Pete brought up several photos of Kamal on her cell phone. “We think he might have stopped by in the last day or two.”
“I can’t say anything about one of our guests,” the man said.
“But he’s not a guest here,” said Pete.
“He works with us, but he’s dropped out of sight,” McGarvey said. “We’re here to warn him that he could be in some danger. It’s ISIS.”
The barman was alarmed. “Here in New York?”
“We think so. The name he’s going under is Paul O’Neal.”
The barman lowered his voice. “He was here yesterday, but just for a couple of drinks. You think we have another nine/eleven coming our way?”
McGarvey and Pete exchanged a glance. “Did you talk to him?” Pete asked.
“Just welcomed him back. Nice man.”
“Did he tip well?”
“He did the last time he was here,” the barman said, but his expression suddenly changed. “My God, he was here when AtEighth was brought down. He was working for you guys trying to stop it?”
“Something like that,” Pete said. She handed him a business card with her cell number. “If you see him again have him give us a call.”
“I hope he has better luck this time,” the barman said.
“We’re here to make sure that his luck changes,” Pete said.
They walked back down to the lobby, when Otto called, linked to both of their phones so they wouldn’t have to put one of them in speaker mode.
“The Bureau has the Golden Gate Bridge staked out, and they have a bunch of Louisiana National Guardsmen in Army Corps of Engineers uniforms all over the most vulnerable spots in the New Orleans dike system.”
“Don’t forget the lift stations.”
“They’re on them. But we caught a break. Two workmen were arrested at the church in Colby. They’d already wired enough C3 throughout the main hall to reduce it to rubble. Would have been a miracle if anyone survived. But Pastor Buddy, who won’t talk until his lawyers show up, did admit that the photographs of al-Daran he was shown was the man he knew as Brother Watson. Had him flown up to Teterboro Airport aboard the ministry’s Gulfstream.”
“Did the crew wait?”
“No, they just dropped him off. A limo service picked him up and took him to an address on Lexington a half a block up from Forty-seventh. Not too far from where you are now.”
“Is it a hotel?”
“A high-end bordello,” Otto said. “It’s probably where he went to ground last year. Are you going over to check it out, or do you want me to give the Bureau the heads-up?”
“The Bureau can interview the madam and see if he left anything behind,” McGarvey said. “But there’s no need for us to go over there, he’s already gone by now.”
“If he’s going to strike something in New York, something he wants you to figure out, it’ll be close to the hotel and the bordello.”
“Anything going on at the UN?” Pete asked.
“Just a mo,” Otto said. He was back in ten seconds. “Business as usual. But you guys have to be right on top of him.”
* * *
Kamal got lucky with a parking spot on Lexington just a few steps from the corner of 44th Street. Grand Central Station was less than two blocks away.
He took the carriage out of the backseat and set it up on the sidewalk, then got the baby and strapped it in on top of the Semtex bundle.
Only a couple passersby paid any attention, but one woman who’d smiled at the child frowned when she looked up at Kamal. She’d sensed something wasn’t right, but wasn’t quite sure what it could be.
Kamal smiled and nodded, then headed away.
By now he was reasonably certain that McGarvey and his friends, especially Rencke, had figured out that he would be somewhere in the vicinity of the Grand Hyatt. Signing his email with the O’Neal name would have led them there.
The only real sticking point was if they’d somehow managed to find out when whatever he was going to do, was going to happen.
It was well after eleven, and by now, if Baz had gotten the message to strike earlier than planned, and if nothing had gone wrong, the three attacks would already be in progress.
He stopped at the light at the corner of 43rd Street and used his cell phone to go to a news app. When it came up, there was nothing, except for a rare spring storm that dumped seven inches of rain and hail on downtown Phoenix, causing widespread flooding, and a gang shooting spree in Chicago that left sixteen young black men dead or seriously wounded. It was the worst violence in the city in several years.
But nothing about San Francisco, New Orleans or Colby, and he was having his first glimmerings of doubt. He’d never worked with a group. He had come to learn early in his freelance career that the only person he could trust was himself. And if something was worth doing, it was worth doing right the first time, because very often there were no second chances.
He’d originally planned on using the entrance into Grand Central just off Lexington Avenue. From there he would go into Cipriani, where he would get a seat at the railing that looked down on the main concourse.
He didn’t think he’d have any trouble finding the right table this early.
But he wanted McGarvey to be there. And maybe the woman with him. He could kill them both.
It would have to be foxes and hounds. With him the fox. Dangerous, but if all the other attacks had failed, he especially didn’t want this one to go bad.
More than anything on earth he wanted a shot at McGarvey.
He continued down Lexington to 42nd Street where he turned right toward the Grand Hyatt’s main entrance.
If McGarvey had figured out that the hotel was Kamal’s center of operations, he would be there now. Waiting.
“The fox is coming,” Kamal muttered, and the baby woke up and looked at him.
SEVENTY-ONE
McGarvey tried to calm down, but it wasn’t helping. He and Pete had taken the escalator up to the mezzanine level from where they could watch the comings and goings below in the busy lobby.
“He’s here, goddamnit,” McGarvey said.
Otto called. “Looks like two kids in an RV with enough explosives to do some real damage to the Golden Gate, and three teams on the dikes in New Orleans. Stopped them all.”
“Any casualties?” Pete asked.
“The SF cops and the Bureau set up roadblocks at the bridge welcome center. The van blew about thirty yards out, a couple of cops were seriously hurt, but no one was killed. Traffic was backed up, but whoever was in the RV took the empty oncoming lane and tried to bull their way through.”
“We got lucky,” McGarvey said.
“So far.”
“Jesus, Mac,” Pete said. “There.” She pointed at a man down in the lobby in jeans and a dark coat, pushing a baby carriage, as he disappeared to the left.
* * *
Kamal went down the same corridor he’d used the last time, through an unmarked glass door and down a tunnel to the Grand Central Market, many of the thirty-plus shops busy at this hour. Some people came to the train terminal not to take a trip, but to visit the shops, or eat at one of the restaurants such as the Oyster Bar in the lower level, and Cipriani Dolci on the level above the main concourse.
He went straight through into the main concourse, traffic picking up, though the busiest times
were when the morning commuters came into the city and the afternoon when they headed home.
He’d gotten a few looks in the market because the many women shopping there noticed the baby, but in the concourse people were mostly intent on getting somewhere, and another child in a carriage was nothing out of the ordinary.
For now.
Halfway across he stopped just beyond the information booth and looked behind him. He’d half hoped to see McGarvey coming his way. But the man wasn’t there. Yet.
He went directly across to the west elevator, which he took up to the balcony level. The maître d’ at Cipriani looked up. “Good morning, sir.”
It was before noon and the restaurant was less than half-full.
“Could I have a table at the railing?”
“Of course. Will it be just you and your child, or will someone be joining you?”
“My wife should be here any minute, but then, she’s always late.”
The maître d’ smiled. “Yes, sir.” He led Kamal to a table at the balcony, and laid out two menus.
Kamal parked the baby carriage right at the rail. To this point the child hadn’t seemed to miss its mother, nor was it fussing. It seemed more curious about what was going on than frightened.
A waiter came and Kamal ordered a glass of merlot.
“Something for your child? Perhaps milk?”
“It’s not his feeding time.”
The waiter’s eyes narrowed slightly, and Kamal realized the stupid mistake. The baby’s clothes were pink, which was almost universal as a girl’s color.
But that didn’t matter.
McGarvey and his woman appeared from the market.
* * *
McGarvey and Pete stopped just past the Hudson News shop, the information booth ahead of them in the middle of the concourse, and the ticket windows off to the left just beyond the broad corridor from Vanderbilt Hall, which led up to the 42nd Street entrance.
A fair amount of people were coming and going, many of them carrying bags or pulling suitcases.
But Kamal was nowhere in sight. It was possible he’d gone down trackside to take a train, or perhaps he’d doubled back to 42nd Street.
“If it was him, what the hell was he doing pushing a baby carriage?” Pete asked.
Something was just at the edge of Mac’s ken. He was missing something.
It came to him at the same moment he glanced up and caught Kamal standing by a railing above and to the right.
“A bomb in the baby carriage,” McGarvey said. He headed in a dead run directly across the concourse.
“My God,” Pete shouted, right behind him. “Get down! Everybody get down, now! It’s a bomb!”
* * *
It was almost exactly the scenario Kamal had envisioned. McGarvey had shown up as he knew the son of a bitch would. Sir Lancelot come on a mission of rescue.
There weren’t as many passengers and shoppers crossing the concourse as he’d hoped for, maybe a hundred at the most. But despite what the Boylan bitch was screaming, most people were slow to react, even though these sorts of events had become commonplace around the world over the past few years.
The waiter had just brought the wine and was leaving when Kamal stood up, lifted the baby in its carriage and tossed it over the railing.
His timing was perfect.
McGarvey reached the carriage in time to break its fall, and roll over on his back to cushion the blow as he fell to the floor.
Kamal took out his cell phone.
* * *
The baby was screaming, and so were a lot of people in the concourse, who were finally starting to run.
Pete was twenty feet away, still shouting her warning.
No time now.
McGarvey got on his knees and felt at the baby’s back and then it’s bottom finding a package wrapped in plastic.
Shoving the child to the side, he yanked the heavy package out.
It was two blocks of Semtex, at least four kilos, enough to wipe out just about every living thing in the concourse. A cell phone was wired to the detonators in both bricks.
McGarvey ripped open the package and pulled out both detonators.
He tossed them as far away as he could at the same instant the cell phone chirped.
* * *
Nothing mattered to Kamal now, except McGarvey.
Tossing down the phone, he pulled out his pistol and shoved the waiter aside as he raced out of the restaurant to the Vanderbilt Avenue exit.
But then he stopped just at the doors and half turned back so he could watch the stairs from the concourse level.
People were scattering but a cop, speaking on his lapel mic, came in from the street.
Kamal turned and almost casually shot the cop in the face just above the mouth, and then the top of man’s head as he crumpled.
Two other cops were now at the glass doors.
Kamal pulled off four shots in rapid succession, and the gun went dry. All of a sudden he realized that in his haste he had forgotten to count down the rounds he’d fired. Four in the cab at the driver and woman. Two at the cop talking into his mic. And four at the cops outside.
He ejected the empty magazine but before he could take a spare out of his pocket and charge the weapon, McGarvey appeared at the head of the stairs and fired one shot, catching him in the left arm just above his wrist.
* * *
“It’s over,” McGarvey said. Kamal’s pistol was dry; he hadn’t reloaded it.
“Haven’t you learned by now that for people like us nothing is ever really final,” Kamal said.
“Death.”
Kamal shrugged, and it was clear from his expression that he didn’t seem to care. “Do you mean to shoot an unarmed man?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so. The American sense of fair play.”
“You’ll be questioned, of course, and fair play or not, it won’t be pleasant. Afterwards I’ll do my best to see that you don’t get the death penalty. I think a lifetime in one of our supermax prisons might suit you, especially when word gets out to the prisoners and staff just who you are.”
“Not one chance in hell,” Kamal said.
He started to turn toward the door when Pete came up the stairs, her pistol in hand.
Kamal turned back and pointed his gun at her.
“He’s dry!” McGarvey shouted.
But Pete fired five times center mass as she walked directly toward him, not one shot missing.
He went down on his back, his eyes open, a smirk on his dead lips.
Pete stood over him. “If it wasn’t so unlady-like, you bastard, I’d drop my drawers right now and piss on you.”
SEVENTY-TWO
McGarvey and Pete had stayed at the Renckes’ safe house in McLean for the past two days since Grand Central, mostly on Louise’s insistence. They had the upstairs bedroom and en suite bathroom to themselves, and it had taken the first thirty-six hours for Pete to finally come down from what she had done.
It was eight in the morning when she got out of the shower. Mac had gone downstairs to get them coffee and he was in bed waiting for her.
“Insanity cured,” she said, leaning over and kissing him.
“That’s good, because Louise will be here in a couple of hours with Audie.”
“Your granddaughter.”
“Our granddaughter,” Mac said.
Pete didn’t catch it at first, but when she did she smiled for the first time in what might have been weeks. “Careful what you’re saying, Kirk, because I’ll hold you to it.”
“I don’t like to travel alone. I was thinking Paris.”
“Just not Monaco.”
“Lovely there this time of year. Quiet. The French haven’t started their vacations yet, so everything will be open. Sailing, swimming, lying around doing nothing.”
“Drive you nuts.”
“The casino, maybe I could win enough to buy you a big ring.”
“I don’t want a ring,
” she said. “I never had much use for one. I just want the man.”
She was sitting on the side of the bed next to him, and he pulled her down. “You have him.”
* * *
They got dressed and went downstairs two hours later. Louise and Otto were in the kitchen with Audie, and when the little girl saw her grandfather and Pete, her face lit up and she came running.
“Grampyfather, grampymother,” she squealed.
“By the way, the president wants you to come to the White House this afternoon,” Otto said. “Page just called.”
“For what?” McGarvey asked.
“He wants to thank you.”
“Tell him I’m busy.”
AUTHOR’S NOTE
I always like hearing from my readers, even from the occasional disgruntled soul who wants to pick a bone with me, or point out a mistake I’ve made.
You may contact me, McGarvey, Pete, Otto, and Louise by sending a message to [email protected]. But please understand that because I’m extremely busy, quite often I won’t be able to get back to you as soon as I’d like. But I will make every effort to answer your queries.
For a complete list of my books and reviews please visit Barnes & Noble, Amazon, or any other fine bookseller.
If you would like me to do a book signing at your favorite store, something I have absolutely no control over, or if you would like me to attend an event as a guest speaker or panelist, please contact:
Tor/Forge Publicity
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, N.Y. 10010
Email: [email protected]
If you wish to discuss contracts, movie or reprint rights, or e-business concerning my writing, contact my literary agent:
Susan Gleason Literary Agency
Email: [email protected]
BY DAVID HAGBERG
Twister
The Capsule
Last Come the Children
Heartland
Heroes
Without Honor*
Countdown*
Crossfire*
Critical Mass*
Desert Fire
High Flight*
Assassin*
White House*
Joshua’s Hammer*
Eden’s Gate
Flash Points: A Kirk McGarvey Novel Page 29
