Smoke

by Lisa Unger

  The hallway outside was deserted and he ran as fast as he could with the kid on his back through the foyer. He saw that the front door was barred with security shutters now, likewise the glass walls of the breezeway. They weren’t just trying to keep people out, he understood now. They were trying to keep people in.

  They were waiting for him on the other side, the two large men he’d seen escort Lydia from the building. He pulled the gun from the holster and stuck it into Charley’s side.

  “I’ll kill him,” he said as the two men approached. “I’ve got Black Talon bullets in this gun, they’ll rip him apart inside like a circular saw blade.”

  The men came to a stop. “The bullet goes in, spins around like a Tasmanian Devil, shredding whatever it comes in contact with until it bounces off a bone and exits like a cannonball. You never know where it’s going to come out.”

  They didn’t know if he was telling the truth or not. He widened his eyes to make himself look a little unstable, and started shifting from foot to foot. People didn’t like when someone holding a big semiautomatic seemed jittery. They usually wanted him to go away. But these guys were different; they weren’t reacting to him. They stood stone-faced, vacant, like they were robots waiting for orders. They weren’t afraid for themselves or their friend; they weren’t angry. They stood apart to watch him pass, their arms at their sides. Jeffrey passed between them quickly and turned back to face them, backing away. They hadn’t moved.

  “Leave the boy,” one of them said. “And you can leave here without interference.”

  Jeffrey kept backing away; now he held the gun in their general direction. No reaction whatsoever. He heard footsteps behind him, big people moving quickly. When he turned he saw the man from the abandoned building and his ugly twin, the one Lydia must have seen at the convenience store. They were both bald, clad in leather. They didn’t look vacant; they looked disturbed, both of them with these weird half smiles and staring eyes.

  “Stop right there, or the kid dies,” he said. But they kept coming. So Jeff turned and ran down an empty hallway behind him; all four of the men gave chase. He was heading toward the kitchen, praying that the door was as they had left it, open and waiting for a quick exit. He stopped and fired behind him, the sound exploding off the walls. He heard one round hit flesh and a man started to scream; one of the tunic-clad goons fell to his knees and clutched his arm. The other men took cover but they didn’t return fire. Jeffrey kept running, his heart and his lungs on fire. The kid seemed to get heavier and he still hadn’t stirred at all.

  He saw the double doors of the kitchen ahead of him and heard the pounding feet of the men behind him. He heard an explosion of gunfire in front of him-the hallways reverberated with it. He could see a muzzle flash through the windows in the double doors. Only one gun in the world sounded like that, and he only knew one person who carried it.

  The door opened slowly and Dax stepped out, the gun in his hand as big as his forearm. Jeffrey moved to the side as Dax aimed his weapon and started to fire. Boom. Boom. Boom. It was deafening and Jeffrey’s ears were ringing as he made his way through the maze of industrial-sized appliances. He saw Lydia ahead of him, holding open the door that looked as though they’d blasted through it. He put the kid on the floor and together they dragged him under the half-closed security shutter.

  “Go, go, go,” yelled Dax, backing toward them quickly, still firing. They were firing back now but badly, like their hearts weren’t in it. They were missing Dax though he was a damn big target.

  Outside, Jeffrey hoisted the kid back onto his shoulders as Dax slid out the door with less grace than he once might have. He got up stiffly and took what looked like a grenade out of his pocket.

  “What are you going to do with that?” Lydia asked as he pulled the pin. He let it go and rolled it through the door.

  “Holy shit,” she said, and they all started to move quickly toward the Rover, Lydia taking up the rear with her gun drawn. Dax was limping badly; Jeffrey was carrying a body. Someone had to keep an eye on what was coming up behind them. And then the blast rang out. Lydia felt the vibration in her chest, in her bones.

  “Don’t worry,” said Dax. “It wasn’t a grenade, exactly. Not exactly. More like a flash bomb. More sound than fury, if you know what I mean.”

  Nobody came out the door after them. And they made their way back to the car with no one behind them. Dax unlocked the hatch and they put Charley in the back of the Rover.

  “Who the hell’s this?” asked Dax.

  “I don’t know. His name’s Charley. I couldn’t leave him there. I think he’s just a kid.” They all looked at him for a second; he was still out but starting to stir.

  “Looks like you hit him pretty hard,” observed Lydia.

  The blood had traveled from his nose and soaked the front of his white tunic. It looked like spilt tar in the darkness.

  “Yeah, I guess I don’t know my own strength.”

  Dax shrugged. “Maybe he knows something.”

  They got in the car, Lydia and Dax up front, Jeffrey in back with his gun on the kid. Who knew how he’d behave once he came around; he was already shifting and groaning softly in pain. Dax gunned the engine and spun the car around, driving fast up the empty street. They heard the wail of approaching sirens.

  “I think we have to call the police,” said Jeffrey after a second.

  “The people who do the breaking in, shooting, and bombing aren’t usually the ones to call the police, Jeff,” said Dax sensibly.

  “What did you see in there, Jeffrey?” asked Lydia, looking back at him.

  “On the video monitors, I saw people with shaved heads lying in hospital beds. They were connected to feeding tubes, heart monitors. They were in five-point restraints. They were conscious, Lydia. Wide awake.”

  For a second they all flashed on the image of the emaciated woman with the shaved head, running for her life through a gathering of witches, dinosaurs, and clowns. Lydia’s heart started to race as she imagined the girl’s terror, knowing what awaited her if she was caught.

  “Did you see Lily?” asked Lydia.

  He shook his head. “No.”

  Lydia took the cell phone out of her pocket and called Matt Stenopolis.

  ***

  Stenopolis, I know you didn’t just call me at home at nearly eleven o’clock at night to tell me about a conversation you had with some old freak in a nursing home.”

  Kepler had something in his mouth and he was crunching on it loudly.

  “Sir, he says that people are going into that place and not coming out.”

  “Has it occurred to you, Detective, that they are exiting another door, one the old man can’t see from the porch?”

  Here’s where it got tough. He couldn’t tell Kepler what Jeffrey Mark had found while breaking and entering, then shooting his way out of The New Day. That was fruit from a poisonous tree. He couldn’t admit to involving them in the case he had been told to walk away from. He had to stick with the Randall Holmes tip, which on its own was pretty weak.

  Matt sighed. “It’s enough to call in for a warrant, isn’t it?”

  “Hell, no, it’s not enough,” said Kepler. “The statement of an old man who, by your admission, is one hammer short of a toolbox is not enough to call a judge at midnight and ask for a warrant.”

  “Is it enough to call him at nine in the morning?”

  “Good-night, Detective.”

  “Sir, let me ask you, if it turns out that Lily Samuels is in there and we knew that The New Day was already under investigation by the FBI for various other allegations and did nothing to follow up on this lead, do you want to be the one responsible? Because I’m not going to twist for it, Captain.”

  He could see Kepler turning that shade of red he turned whenever anyone dared to step up to him. Generally a tiny, almost imperceptible twitch would develop just under the lashes of his right lower eyelid.

  “And are you prepared to turn in your shield if she
’s not in there?” he asked, his voice quiet but white hot with anger.

  Matt let out a long breath; it was so unfair and stupid. “No, I’m not. It shouldn’t come down to that. I’m just trying to do my job, sir.”

  There was silence on the other line. Matt put his head in his hand. This conversation was not good for his career.

  “Go get your warrant, Stenopolis. And you know what? If she’s not in there, you’re going to be in uniform doing the shittiest, most demeaning details I can find in this city until you die or I do.”

  Matt felt something loosen inside. “Thank you, sir.”

  The line went dead.

  He just didn’t get Kepler sometimes. It seemed to annoy him when people were trying to do their jobs; he always seemed to be hindering rather than facilitating. Unless it was a big, high-profile case that brought positive attention to the precinct. But the Lily Samuels case had been that, two weeks ago. Then everyone started getting the vibe that she had taken off on her own, and Kepler had put it on the back burner. Maybe he just didn’t like admitting through his actions that he might have been wrong to give up so fast. Whatever. Matt speed-dialed Jez.

  “What’s up,” she answered. That’s all it took. He could tell in her tone, strained and tired, that she was upset. That didn’t take long, he thought. When she was on her own, she was very even tempered most of the time. When Dylan was back in the picture, she was up and down… always elated or depressive.

  “Hey, I think we have a lead on where Lily Samuels might be,” he said.

  “You’re kidding,” she answered, her tone brightening.

  “No, can you get your mother to stay with Ben? Meet me at the Fiftieth Precinct.”

  He could hear the covers rustling as she got out of bed. “It might take me an hour or so.”

  “No problem. I gotta call in for a warrant.”

  “What happened?”

  “I’ll tell you all about it.”

  Fourteen

  This is a direct violation of my client’s first amendment rights,” said Jude Templar. He was a tall, svelte young man with a drawn, pale face and an unsettling pair of jet-black eyes. Matt was used to seeing him in thousand-dollar suits but tonight he wore baggy jeans with calfskin loafers and a soft fleece jersey, zipped at the neck. Even so he had that easy air, the polished and pressed look of the very rich. A pair of wire-rimmed glasses made him look older, more intellectual than maybe he was. He wore them low on his long, thin nose and looked at Matt over their edge.

  “Tonight, three people broke into this facility. They damaged property, shot at security guards. And now you have the nerve to show up here with a warrant as if these people are the criminals.”

  He’d arrived with two squad cars from the Fiftieth Precinct. Two of the cops who accompanied him had been there an hour earlier investigating a report of a break-in and shooting. But since The New Day had a reputation in the neighborhood as being freaks and weirdos, it had been kind of a half-assed visit. They basically just took a report and returned to the precinct to make fun of the Moonies. What interested Matt the most was that there was no mention made of the kid Jeffrey Mark had carried from the church.

  “Mr. Templar, we have information that leads us to believe that Lily Samuels is being held here against her will. And that she’s not the only one.”

  “That’s preposterous,” Templar said with a disdainful laugh. “Detective, I’d like your shield number.”

  “Mr. Templar, I’m not a rookie,” he said slowly. “Please do not try to intimidate me.”

  Jude Templar was a well-known New York lawyer, famed for his associations with the dregs of high society. Basketball player accused of rape? Rock star with a gun shooting up a downtown club? Supermodel caught with crack? Jude Templar was your man. As long as you were rich, he could get you off. Question was, what was he doing representing Trevor Rhames?

  Matt had been standing on the walkway leading up to the church, Templar three steps above him on the stoop. Matt walked up the stairs and towered over the lawyer.

  “Now who’s using intimidation tactics?” he asked, taking a step back to look up at Matt.

  “Mr. Templar, I don’t need to use intimidation tactics. I have a legal right to be here and if you get in my way, I’ll be arresting you for interfering with an investigation.”

  Templar turned a steely gaze on Matt, then stepped away from the door he’d been blocking with his body. Matt walked inside and found an empty foyer.

  “I’d like to speak with Trevor Rhames,” he said.

  “I am afraid that’s not possible. My client is out of town.”

  “Since when?”

  Templar looked at his watch, a platinum job blinding Matt with diamonds. “Since about an hour ago. After the break-in, which the police seemed to care very little about, he felt that his personal security was in jeopardy.”

  “Where did he go?”

  “My client is a citizen of the United States. He is entitled to go where he wishes and he is entitled to his privacy. In other words, Detective, it’s none of your goddamned business.”

  “Interesting choice of words,” said Matt. He could find out where Rhames was later. He heard a car pull up, a door slam, and the quick, important stride of his partner on the walkway.

  “Oh, lookie here,” she said as she entered. Jesamyn had had run-ins with Templar in the past. Ugly ones. She hated his guts.

  “Detective Breslow,” he said with a solemn nod.

  “Hey, Templar. Why are pharmaceutical companies using lawyers now instead of rats in their laboratories?”

  He gave her a look.

  “Because some people actually like rats.”

  Jude Templar rolled his eyes. He pulled his face into a mask of disdain and annoyance and kept it that way as he sat in a chair behind the reception desk and made himself comfortable. He held out his hand and Matt handed him the warrant to search the premises. He glanced at it and put it down on the desk, gave Matt a small nod.

  “Let’s do this,” said Matt. He motioned for the uniformed officers and the two other detectives who had driven up with Jesamyn to enter the building.

  Templar pulled a pack of Dunhill cigarettes from the pocket of his jeans, extracted one and lit it with a lighter.

  “That’ll kill you,” said Matt.

  “Not fast enough,” said Jesamyn sweetly.

  “Well, we all seem hell-bent on behavior that’s going to hurt us tonight, don’t we?” said Templar.

  An hour later, his smile had widened as the search turned up nothing. The computers had been wiped clean. File cabinets had been emptied. There was no garbage in the wastebaskets or in the Dumpsters outside. The security nerve center Jeffrey Mark had described seemed to consist of only a few outdoor cameras broadcasting on four of the twenty monitors. The other monitors seemed not to be in operation. The computer that controlled them had no operating system. When it was turned on, there was just a black screen with a thin cursor blinking on the upper left-hand side, waiting for a prompt no one on the premises knew how to give.

  Matt called in for some computer experts but he wasn’t all that interested in The New Day. He was interested in finding Lily. And he didn’t think what they had found on those systems would bring them any closer to her. But he could be wrong. He hoped he was.

  Templar identified the building across the breezeway as a dormitory for church members and employees, where members could choose to live with a small stipend in exchange for work on behalf of The New Day but were certainly not forced to live. Only about 20 percent of the rooms were occupied. The rest of the rooms were clean and empty, beds and desks awaiting tenants.

  Most of the members on the premises were young, in their twenties and thirties. Some were disturbed from their sleep, others were playing cards in a rec center. None of them seemed under duress. Jesamyn and one of the other detectives set about rounding them up in a single room and one by one taking them into another space to ask questions. Who were they?
How did they come to be living there? Where were the rest of the New Day members? Had anyone seen Lily Samuels?

  “What exactly did you expect to find here, Detective?” said Templar with flat eyes and a mirthless smile. Matt had returned to the foyer, frustration and disappointment lodged in his throat like a chicken bone.

  He turned on Templar quickly. “We have computer experts on their way. They have ways of retrieving deleted data.”

  It sounded weak and desperate even to his own ears.

  “This is an organization that helps people, Detective. You’ll find no evidence to the contrary.”

  Matt was just barely holding onto his temper. He looked the lawyer over and figured he could lift the little ferret off the ground by the collar of his shirt, shake him until all the money fell out of his pockets.

  “Really,” he said instead. “Helps people by keeping them in five-point restraints, hooked up to feeding tubes and stealing all their money.”

  Templar’s smile turned to granite. “Is that what Randall Holmes told you, Detective Stenopolis?”

  Matt didn’t say anything.

  “It wasn’t his tip that led you to come here in the middle of the night, was it?”

  Matt took a long, slow breath. “Listen to me,” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. “You tell Trevor Rhames that I want Lily Samuels back or I’m going to tear the roof off of The New Day. I’ll use every resource I have at my disposal.”

  Templar rose from his seat and leaned on the desk in front of him.

  “I wouldn’t advise you to start issuing threats to Trevor Rhames. It’s not healthy.”

  “I know that I didn’t just hear you threaten a New York City police officer,” said Jesamyn, coming up behind them. “I know you’re not that stupid. Are you, Templar?”

  He gave her a cold, assessing look and Jesamyn squared off, stuck her chin out at him in a dare.

  “The New Day has no knowledge of Lily Samuels or her whereabouts,” he said. “You have no evidence otherwise. So, you’ll desist from harassing my client.”