by Tom Straw
“There are laws and ethical obligations I have to abide by. They say, unequivocally, I am required to return you to custody and to deliver material evidence to the district attorney.”
“Fuck that. I’m safer out here than in there.”
“I get it, but I don’t see an alternative.”
They rode in silence a few moments then Gunnar asked, “Did Rúben Pinto say anything to you about what the stuff in this pouch was?” he asked.
“Nada. He just wanted it out of his life till things cooled.”
“Cause I’m thinking, counselor,” he said, leaning forward to see her around Hall.
“About?”
“About the burglary of a foreign national, that would be Trifonov. The accused, your client, spotting cash and stacks of passports. Our material evidence in hand is some kind of official-looking shit. I wonder if this could be part of some sort of ID forgery operation. Which, to me, kicks this up from city to federal.”
She twisted in the seat to face him, clearly sparking to this. “Plus we have reason to believe that Stamitz was a confidential informer to the FBI.”
“What the fuck?!” shouted Hall.
“Which is two-way street,” said Gunnar. “How do you think Stamitz got his inside info on places to hit? Maybe not all of them—he had his own sources too—but I guarantee you his deal was to do occasional à la carte break-ins for the feds. The Ajax has that smell all over it.” He leaned around Hall to address Macie. “So what I’m suggesting is, if you feel bound by your so-called ethical obligations, why don’t we call our new friends at the bureau and deliver both Mr. Hall and the evidence into arguably safer custody with the FBI?”
While Macie opened her wallet to find the card they had given her, a pair of street bikes—New York’s latest quality-of-life scourge—roared by her window full throttle, racing through traffic. Instinctively Gunnar checked his mirrors; they seldom traveled small. Sure enough, two more single headlights roared up, but instead of passing, they paced him on either side of his taillights. His windshield filled with red as the two bikes in front of him eased brakes to slow him down. “You buckled up?” he asked her.
“Yeah, why?”
He turned to Hall and said, “Press your palms on the roof and lock yourself down. Do it.”
The instant Jackson Hall placed his hands on the ceiling the front bikers made a hard brake check on Cody. He swerved his wheel right and punched it, passing them. Immediately all four motorcycles sped after him in pursuit.
C H A P T E R • 34
* * *
That time of night, traffic toward downtown flowed fast, but Gunnar booked it faster, overcoming a Subaru SUV that was clogging the slow lane. When he was sure the four performance cycles were overmatching his speed, he jerked a suicide right in front of the Forester and worked a last-chance exit onto Houston. Both his passengers muttered expletives as he sidescraped the guardrail that divided the exit ramp from the FDR. Gunnar cast a side window look, hoping his maneuver had forced the motorcycles on the wrong side of the Jersey barrier. But with whining downshifts, they wove slaloms through the no-return gap between the highway and the K-rail. “They’re still on us,” said Wild, eyeing her side mirror.
Gunnar floored his accelerator and clicked on his high beams in case some kid or meth head wandered out of the Wald projects, then he mashed his brake, ignoring the stop sign for a rolling right onto Houston. Jackson Hall lost his balance on the sharp turn and toppled, landing against Gunnar’s neck. “You got to hold on, bud.”
“Shit, nothing to hold,” he said, hoisting himself upright and wedging his left arm behind Gunnar’s headrest for support. The small man rocked side to side as Gunnar zigzagged around westbound traffic. The four motorcycles stayed close and unshakable.
“Do you have a plan?” asked Macie.
“You mean besides trying not to find out what these gentlemen have in mind for us?” He was passing Avenue D. Taillights started popping red in front of them. Gunnar voiced a warning this time before he wrenched the van into another sudden right where Second Street made a dogleg split off Houston and ran parallel to it. Nobody followed. The four bikers blew by on the other side of the divider. Their headlights created flickers as they got eclipsed by the succession of slim tree trunks in the block-long planter between them and the speeding van. “To answer your question, the Ninth Precinct is up and over a few blocks. I’m going to try to make that.”
Hall didn’t like the sound of that. “You said no NYPD.”
“Sue me,” said Cody. “Your lawyer’s right there.”
“Gunnar . . .” a warning from Macie, peering ahead. One of the bikers had accelerated and split off from the pack and was pulling to a stop ahead of them in the middle of the intersection.
“Got him.” Gunnar calculated just enough squeeze space between the Kawasaki and an MTA bus idling at the corner. But when the biker raised both hands up in a classic aiming stance, Gunnar steered straight for him. “Shooter. Duck down, best you can,” he said calmly, then floored it. There was a muzzle flash and a crack but the shot went high as the man jumped back out of Cody’s path. As he raced by, Gunnar shoved his door open. It walloped the biker with a metallic thud. His helmet smacked the window and blew it out just before the door slammed shut from the impact. The side mirror got knocked off-kilter but Gunnar could see the biker back there, flattened in the middle of Avenue C.
“Sweet,” said Jackson Hall.
But Gunnar was too busy scanning for the others to respond. It didn’t take him long to eyeball them. A pair had raced ahead to cut up onto Avenue B and were tearing ass toward them, roaring the wrong way on the one-way Second. They rode up off their seats, ghostly forms illuminated by each set of headlights they dodged, legs bent, shifting weight from peg to peg as they wove around traffic. Gunnar took one hand off the wheel, fished his Sig Sauer P220 Elite out of his messenger bag, and wedged it between his seat belt and his hip. He might take out one, but two of them at once, especially if they flanked him, would be a definite challenge. He quickly ran options. They all sucked. The street offered no turnoffs and the block of flat storefronts and fenced apartments gave zero cover if he stopped to take a stand or to run—all shitty options because he had companions in tow, one of whom was still frail from his coma. He drew the Beretta Jetfire from his ankle holster and held it out to Hall. “You’ve got one in the chamber and eight in the mag. On my command only, send them all at the dude on your right. Macie, keep your head back.” Bearing down to close their fifty-yard gap, one of the bikers made a frantic swerve to avoid a cart of knockoff purses a vendor was pushing from the curb. His knee clipped the trolley’s corner, bumping the wagon sideways and caroming the Husqvarna laterally across the road, sweeping the wheels from under the other bike, and launching both riders through the plate glass window of an adult day care center. Macie and Hall both cried out with noises you only hear on carnival rides. Cody gave it the gas.
At B, he took another hard turn northbound. When the van settled, Hall gave him a nudge and held out the pocket pistol. “Hang on to it for now,” Gunnar said. “You never know.”
Macie said, “Police station’s on Fifth Street,” as they passed Third.
“Yeah, but way over past First Ave.,” added Hall. It wasn’t lost on Wild that, for different reasons, everybody in that van knew where the cop shops were.
The zigzag of a single headlight in the side mirrors caught Gunnar’s eye. “I wondered what happened to our Ducati.”
“How close?” she asked.
“Intimate,” he said. The motorcycle pulled up on Gunnar’s side. When it came even with the van’s rear tire, Gunnar swerved to see if he could thump it. The biker had quick reflexes and adjusted, dropping back and coming up on Macie’s side. Gunnar tried the same maneuver, but this time, the Ducati accelerated after its dodge, coming up on her side window. “Mace, lean over onto him. Now.” Wild immediately complied, folding herself across Hall’s lap. Gunnar floored it. The bike
matched his speed, but then Gunnar stood on the brake. The Diavel flew past. In a squeal of rubber, the van skidded into a rocking turn onto Fifth Street and charged west with no sign of the motorcycle behind them. Their relief was short-lived.
“Crap, this doesn’t go through.” Their block of East Fifth terminated at the Village View towers and resumed on the other side of the housing complex. Gunnar cranked a right. “We’ll have to go around. Shit.” Sixth ran one-way the wrong way, so he tore up to East Seventh. Just as he was making his turn, a single headlight switched on across the intersection at the far corner of Tomkins Square Park. They all saw it.
“Son of a bitch was waiting,” muttered Hall.
Gunnar drove fast but the Ducati Diavel was, after all, a Ducati Diavel. And whoever was riding it had balls, driving it right up on the sidewalk. The motorcyclist paced them, even ducking under some scaffolding, then passing to get half a block ahead. The rider downshifted into a hard brake, ending in a fishtail, but expertly stopped upright. Gunnar saw the biker’s hand reach inside his jacket as they went by and he punched the gas.
When the shot rang out, it was not a crack. It was a thundering boom. As Gunnar’s rear tire exploded and he struggled to maintain control of the speeding van, Wild’s sinking thought as she grabbed for the dashboard was that she knew the sound of that gun. It sounded like only one she had ever heard. It was imprinted on Macie after its blast filled the Low Line underground—the night she and Gunnar were chasing Luka Borodin.
The van shuddered as the rear tire shredded and slapped the wheel well with every revolution until it flew off and the rim started plowing asphalt. Forward motion gave way to lurching slippage and the vehicle lost steering but not speed. “Hang on, hang on, hang on,” muttered Gunnar, sounding tight yet even. Macie braced against the dash. Gunnar poled his right arm across Hall hoping to check his forward pitch. They collided with a portable steam boiler that had been set up in a parking spot outside an apartment building, crashing into the steel housing hard enough to send everything in the passenger cab flying, including Hall, who ended up sideways on the floor at Macie’s knees as the van rebounded off the structure. It hinged forty-five degrees back out into the street before they bucked to a stop.
The next blast from the Colt Anaconda came immediately, and sent a .44 magnum through the wall of the cargo hold behind them and out through the windshield, leaving a spider web of cracked glass around the exit hole. Gunnar reached for his Sig Sauer but it wasn’t there. It had flown loose with everything else on impact. He made a quick scan of the floor of the cab but didn’t see it. “Everybody out. Your side. Hurry. Stay against the boiler for cover. Go, go!”
But the crash had stuck Wild’s door closed. “It won’t budge.” After two tries at pushing, she threw her body into the side and it groaned open. Macie unbuckled and slid out. Jackson Hall, still on the floor mat, had to crawl, but he made it. The driver side left Gunnar exposed to the street, so he swung his feet over the center console and ass-scooted into the passenger seat. In that instant, another round shot clean through the headrest where he had been sitting and put another hole in the windshield above the steering wheel.
He rolled out with the others, herding them to the protected end of the steel box covering the boiler. “BRB,” he said, then wormed low into the van again to retrieve his backpack, which held the courier pouch from Hall’s stash. Gunnar also made one last sweep for his P220, gave it up, and hurried to join Macie and Hall, who, hopefully, still had his backup pistol. “What the fuck?” said Gunnar when he got there. Macie didn’t get his question until she turned and saw what he saw.
Jackson Hall was gone.
“Any chance he gave you my gun?” She shook no. On the far end of the boiler, the Ducati revved. “Run,” said Gunnar, giving her a nudge west on the sidewalk. Macie was fast and he let her lead so he could keep tabs on their rear flank. Behind them, he saw the headlight of the motorcycle ease up to the driver’s side of the van. Borodin took off his helmet and dismounted to open the door, either checking for bodies or the courier pouch. It bought them time, but not much.
Ahead some hipsters had braved the light drizzle and were vaping over some espressos at a sidewalk table. “Call 911,” shouted Gunnar as they ran by. “Tell them officer needs help.” They ran onward, Macie not feeling confident in getting an assist, judging from the couple’s blank stares. Macie and Gunnar were thirty yards from First Avenue when the Ducati engine sparked to life. Borodin was on the move.
They had just passed Saint Stanislaus when Gunnar hooked a hand on Macie’s elbow and drew her into a service alley, between two buildings. It was barely wide enough for them to stand side by side, a coffin-shaped plug that dead-ended, which was far from optimal, but it was unlit. She took his lead and they crouched on top of a bulkhead door in the shadows against the back wall. Heads bowed to look as formless as possible, they side glanced the mouth of their alcove and waited.
All the night noise of New York City filled their brick recess. The hiss of truck brakes, car horns, distant sirens—fading and too far away to be coming for them—the oonce-oonce-oonce of dance music. Then came the sound that made Wild’s soul grow icicles: the low rumble of a slowly approaching motorcycle. The patient hum of the Testastretta engine spooked her because it signaled a hunt. And she and Gunnar were not only defenseless, they were cornered. The reflection of the approaching single headlight off the rear window of a parked car gradually grew brighter. “Head down,” whispered Gunnar. Tempted as she was to look, Macie pointed her face at the blistered paint of the cellar door under her knees, knowing that the glint of an eye would give them away.
The motorcycle lingered a few eternal seconds, then the thrum of the engine began to fade. Gunnar jogged to the corner of the alcove for a peek. She joined him. There he was. Borodin sat in the saddle with his back to them, duckwalking his Ducati up the block. He stopped at First Avenue to look north then south. She felt Gunnar lean against her, getting set to run the opposite direction, but the killer heeled his Diavel backward and turned their way for another search of East Seventh. Macie stuck with Gunnar as he bolted back to their hide, fishing through his bag on the way.
Every responder carries personal duty gear, stuff not issued by the department. For firefighters, it’s anything from dry socks to eight-penny nails for chocking doors. For cops—and, yes, ex-cops—the essential is a Swiss Army Knife on steroids called the Multi-tool, containing a strap cutter, spring action needle-nose, a Phillips screwdriver, even an oxygen tank wrench, all fitting in the palm of your hand. Gunnar brought out his Leatherman Multi, dropped to his knees, jammed the point end of the pliers between the hasp plate and the bulkhead door and started prying for their lives. He didn’t bother with the padlock, too formidable, but the cellar door was of old plywood, years past needing paint, and soggy from the recent rain. The point of the pliers was digging wood, but not budging the hasp. “Check the street,” he said in a low voice.
Macie darted to the corner for a spy and rushed back. “Three doors up. He’s looking behind trash cans.”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he whispered. Unable to lift the hasp and bust the lock, Gunnar returned to his backpack for his Mini Maglite. Laying the barrel flat under his pliers, he used it to create a fulcrum to lever against the stubborn hardware. The deep growl of the engine drew closer. Then another sound: The groaning protest of screws getting pried up. Gunnar jammed his weight down onto the lever and the latch popped, sending zinc-plated steel tinging across the concrete. He yanked the double doors wide. “You first.” Macie scrambled below. The opening was dark but her feet found a metal staircase. Gunnar was in right after her, pulling both sides of the hatch closed. He didn’t light his flashlight.
They waited under the steps in silence.
Then the worst. The drone of the Ducati engine filled the alcove above them and bright light sliced through the crack between the bulkhead doors. They both retreated off the stairs but Gunnar grabbed a string mop he found le
aning against a water heater and climbed back up, jamming the handle through the door pulls just as Borodin tried to lift it. The mop danced in the brass grips as their pursuer gave the bulkhead a more violent try. “Go,” hissed Gunnar. He gave Wild a shove just as four slugs pierced the wood above where they had been standing, projecting an LED constellation on the cellar floor.
Macie and Gunnar didn’t know which way to go, except away. Macie’s ears rang from the thunderous gunfire, which made her feel even more disoriented than she already was. Gunnar lit the Mag and swept the basement. His light settled on a wooden stairway in the far corner. He traced a circle with the beam for her reference and they hustled up the steps. The door was unlocked. As they raced through it, one more gunshot, then they heard the mop handle clatter onto the basement floor and the bulkhead hatch whack open. Once Macie was through the door, Gunnar locked it, both knowing it would be a delaying tactic at best.
They found themselves in a kitchen supply store. It was well after hours, and the lights were off, but there was sufficient illumination seeping through the storefront to make out the gleaming pots and pans and gourmet gadgets on the aisles of shelving. They sprinted along a line of coffeemakers and fondue pots to the front door to make their escape. It was locked. Not just locked—it was also sealed off by an accordion security gate that enclosed the front door and both display windows. The cage was padlocked to a steel bar on the floor. “Maybe a back exit,” he said, and beckoned her to the rear of the shop. On the way there, they passed the basement door and heard the telltale sound of ejected brass jingling on the concrete. The back door was dead-bolted with a lock that required a key. As they heard slow footfalls creaking on the cellar stairs, Gunnar turned a quick circle. His light fell on a sign: “Professional Cutlery.” They raced over and found every knife imaginable—all locked behind glass. The cellar doorknob jiggled, followed by the thump of muscle and bone against wood.
