Angel Face

by Stephen Solomita

  Carter breaks down the shotgun shells, extracts the gunpowder and wraps it loosely in newspaper. He lays the packet on top of the matches in one of the cups, then closes the ping-pong ball.

  ‘I want you to glue the edges together,’ he tells Angel. ‘Nice and even now. Let the glue drip slowly.’ Carter rolls the ball against the tip of the glue tube, describing a neat circle. He blows on the glue, a long slow breath, again turning the ball. Finally, while the glue is still tacky, he covers the seam with a strip of tape and lays what now looks like an ordinary ping-pong ball on the table.

  ‘If you throw this against a hard surface, the sandpaper will ignite the matches and the matches will ignite the gunpowder. There won’t be an explosion because the gunpowder isn’t packed down. What there will be is a flash of light intense enough to blind someone for about five seconds.’ Carter smiles, remembering Gentleman Jerry Miculek. Gentleman Jerry could take out an entire platoon in five seconds. ‘That should be enough time.’

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Whereas before Angel felt both thrilled and frightened, now she’s just frightened. They’re in Red Hook, she and Carter, cruising past a long-abandoned factory, its peeling stucco façade reminding her of an elderly aunt whose incurable skin disease kept her indoors for the last several years of her life. Above the van, a bone-white moon edges from the shadow of a raggedy cloud to stare, accusingly, through the van’s windshield.

  Carter’s behind her, in the rear of the van, strapping the Glock to his thigh, donning the vest, checking and rechecking his gear. His expression remains neutral, almost casual, throughout. Angel feels like she’s seeing him for the first time, what he is, what she can never be. She’s thinking this is a good lesson, though it’s a bit late in the game to be learning that you’re not cut out for robbery and murder. But, of course, Carter would never use the word murder to describe his plans for the gangsters in Bobby Ditto’s basement. No, he’d probably say something like ‘Combat related deaths, by definition, are not murders.’

  ‘You having buyer’s remorse, Angel?’ Carter’s tone reveals a hint of amusement that Angel instantly resents.

  ‘Is it that obvious?’

  ‘You do seem a bit nervous.’

  Angel shakes her head. They’re passing through a narrow park that extends along either side of the road. Baseball fields, a makeshift soccer field with sagging nets at either end, an expanse of greening grass that runs the length of a block and appears silver in the moonlight. A cigarette lighter flares on the edge of the park closest to the Red Hook Houses, illuminating a dozen men gathered together in spite of the hour. It’s now three o’clock in the morning.

  ‘Nothing’s happened yet,’ Carter adds. ‘We can still call it off.’

  ‘Is that what you want?’

  ‘I need you steady, Angel.’

  Carter lays the coil of rope and the grappling hook on the bag containing his equipment. He slides both toward the door, then pulls on the teadyed gloves he’d worn on the day they met. ‘Look, you’re going to sit in back of the van, in the dark, until I call for you to pick me up. That could take a lot of time, since I’m not sure what problems I’ll encounter once I get inside. At some point as you sit there in the dark, your imagination will kick into overdrive. Did Carter’s luck finally run out? Is he wounded, helpless, even dead? Is he coming back? How long do I wait?’

  ‘You said an hour.’

  ‘That’s only an estimate.’ Carter leans forward to kiss the back of Angel’s neck. ‘I need you steady,’ he repeats.

  ‘Are you worried about something?’

  ‘The inner door, the one to Bobby’s office. It’s a thick slab of wood protected by a deadbolt, keycard lock. Eventually, I’ll get through it, but I can’t be sure how long that will take. I have to know you’ll be here when I come out. Taxis are hard to find in this neighborhood.’

  Angel takes a left. Two blocks ahead, she can see the fence surrounding Benedetti Wholesale Carpeting’s truck yard. ‘How do you plan to get through the door?’

  ‘I’m going to burn it down … with a very small flame.’

  ‘Are you joking?’

  Carter’s not joking, but there’s no time to explain. ‘If you want to take a pass, just keep driving. I won’t be upset, not at all. But once the operation begins, once I’m in the field, I need to know you’ll be waiting for me.’

  Angel makes a right turn on to the cobblestone street running along the back of the warehouse. ‘Tell me where to stop.’

  ‘Up ahead, just in front of the fire hydrant.’

  ‘An hour, you said?’

  ‘If it’s going to be more, I’ll try to call you on the walkie-talkie.’

  ‘I’ll be there.’

  Carter waits until the van comes to a stop against the curb, then slides the rear door open and hops out. He reaches back into the interior to lift the bag and the rope, and closes the door. He offers no memorable goodbye, no parting comment, but merely crosses the sidewalk to the chain-link fence, the first barrier, and goes to work.

  Chain-link fencing is delivered in rolls, then wired to vertical fence posts and horizontal rails. Carter begins at one of the posts, using the bolt cutters to slice through the links wired to the post. Made of soft, galvanized metal, the fencing offers minimal resistance, and Carter’s able to force it back and slide underneath twenty seconds after leaving the van. He returns the bolt cutter to the bag, ties the loose end of the rope to the bag’s handles and tosses the grappling hook over the parapet edging the roof. When the hook pulls tight on the first toss, he shows a bit of emotion, a tiny smile that just touches the corners of his mouth. Meticulous preparation has always been his strong point.

  The rapid fire, hand-over-hand climb to the top leaves him breathless, but Carter doesn’t pause to recover. He pulls the bag up behind him and steps back into the shadows. Carter fears most what he can’t control, like the remote possibility that a police cruiser would turn on to the block while he was halfway up the rope. Hanging there, he’d be entirely helpless, escape impossible. He couldn’t even shoot his way out. Now he’s invisible from the street. He can take his time.

  He walks first to the skylight, the means of his initial entry, only to find it secured with a high-end padlock. The padlock’s shackle is made of hardened steel and more than a match for the bolt cutters, which comes as no surprise to Carter. If he didn’t have a back-up plan, he wouldn’t be here.

  Carter walks directly to the south-western corner of the building where the tarnished, sheet-metal chimney of a defunct ventilation system rises a few feet above the tarred roof. The ductwork, along with a cap to protect the system from rain and snow, is joined by sheet-metal screws. Carter finds a slot head screwdriver inside the bag and fits it into the nearest screw. Rusted in, the screw gives off a little screech of protest before it begins to turn. Carter’s not particularly worried about making noise. Even assuming the guards below aren’t asleep, the basement has no windows and the floor of the warehouse is thick enough to support the weight of loaded trucks. Still, once the cap pulls free, Carter leans into the opening and listens for a moment, his eyes closed, his expression serene despite the intense drumming of his heart.

  Bobby Ditto’s freezing his ass off as he pilots the SunDancer beneath the Cross Bay Bridge after a two hour trip. Not the Blade. No, the Blade’s wearing a sweater so thick it might still be on the fucking sheep, which makes good sense because it’s early May and the water temperature’s only fifty degrees. The air temperature isn’t much to write home about, either, not at three o’clock in the morning. The air temperature’s maybe fifty-two.

  The good news is that there’s no wind and no chop to the water. The bad news is that a moving boat makes its own wind. Bobby had pulled a life jacket over his T-shirt a few moments after they dumped the freak’s body over the side, an XL jacket so tight it might have passed for a corset. The Blade had the good manners, and the good sense, not to comment, but the facts were on the table. He’d looke
d stupid, not to mention ridiculous, not to mention pitiful. Plus the jacket was coated with dried salt spray and it’s irritating his skin.

  The SunDancer emerges from the shadows beneath the bridge into the moonlit waters of Jamaica Bay, traveling east toward the vast expanse of Kennedy Airport. If New York is the city that never sleeps, JFK is the airport that never sleeps. Bobby first hears the swelling whine of jet engines, then watches a 747 lift off the runway, headed straight out to sea as it gains altitude.

  ‘Ya know what?’ he asks the Blade.

  ‘No, Bobby, what?’

  ‘I’m wishin’ I was somewhere else. I’m wishin’ I was on that plane. For the first time in my fuckin’ life.’ Bobby turns to port and eases back on the throttles as he guides the SunDancer toward Hawtree Basin, a narrow canal flanked on both sides by equally narrow houses. ‘But I got a question, pal, and it’s this: What does the prick already know?’

  ‘You talkin’ about Carter?’

  ‘No, I’m talkin’ about the man in the moon.’ Bobby points to the silver disc above them. ‘Right up there.’

  ‘C’mon, boss.’

  ‘Just answer the question. What does he know?’

  ‘That we’re doin’ a deal?’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Bobby, I’m not a mind reader.’

  ‘Then explain how he knew about the freak? Tell me how he knew to bug the Ford? Tell me what he was doin’ inside the warehouse?’

  At last, an easy question. ‘He was after the money.’

  ‘Yeah, right.’ Bobby slows to a crawl as he enters the canal. ‘So, how did he know the money was there?’

  ‘He didn’t, at first. He knew the money was in the Bronx because your brother told the whore.’

  ‘So why didn’t he grab it right then? Bein’ as he’s fucking Superman and Vinny’s seventy years old?’

  ‘Actually, I been thinkin’ about that.’ The Blade pauses to let Bobby ease the SunDancer into a slot alongside his dock. Then he hops on to the wooden planks, ties off the bow rope and straightens.

  ‘So, what did you think?’ Bobby asks. ‘When you were thinking?’

  ‘First, that we got a rat in the crew. That would be the worst. But then I thought that maybe Carter was outside when you decided to move the money. Maybe he followed it to the warehouse. Maybe he just got lucky.’

  Bobby cuts the engines, strips off the life jacket and steps on to the dock. ‘But there could be a rat, Marco. And if there is, it’s gotta be one of those assholes I put in the basement. One of the jerks who’s supposed to be protectin’ our interests.’

  ‘That was my thought, too. But there’s a problem. Carter connects with the whore and the whore connects with Ricky, who’s dead and gone. There’s no connection between the whore and anyone else in the crew.’

  ‘That we know about.’

  ‘That we know about,’ the Blade quickly agrees.

  ‘Look, Carter’s been one step ahead of us, right?’

  ‘I can’t deny it.’

  ‘So let’s get one step ahead of Carter. We’re gonna go get that money, right the fuck now, and bring it back here.’

  The Blade hesitates – Bobby’s home is lot more exposed than the warehouse – but the look on his boss’s face is plain enough. As far as Bobby’s concerned, the deed’s as good as done. ‘Yeah, fine,’ he says. ‘You want me to call ahead, make sure the boys are awake and ready?’

  ‘No, Marco, you’re missin’ the whole point, which is security. That’s why I’m not gonna call until I’m comin’ through the door, and why I’m gonna take away their cellphones. No more leaks, no more bullshit.’

  Message delivered, Bobby heads for the house and a fleece-lined jacket in the hall closet. He pushes a key into the lock on the back door, but then hesitates. ‘I swear, Marco, I feel better already. Now, even if Carter’s a goddamned psychic, he still has to come through me. I can’t tell ya how much I want a shot at that guy. There’s no way even to measure it.’

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  There’s no ductwork beneath the sleeve Carter disassembles. Removed long ago, the metal was undoubtedly sold for salvage. The sleeve and cap might have been pulled at the same time, pulled and sold, but that would have necessitated patching the hole in the roof, an expense apparently foregone.

  As Carter anticipated, the resulting hole is just big enough to accommodate his shoulders and the equipment bag. He lowers the bag twenty feet to the concrete floor, repositions the grappling hook and slides down the rope to land in a corner behind stacked rolls of carpeting. Briefly, and not for the first time, he considers pulling the M89 tucked inside the bag, only to decide that the weapon’s more likely to hinder than to help. Handguns, like the Glock with its fifteen-round magazine, offer a distinct advantage in close range battles, increased mobility more than compensating for the loss in firepower. It would be a different story if the M89 was a fully automatic weapon, but unlike assault rifles, it has to be fired one shot at a time, the same as the Glock.

  Carter unties the rope, opens the bag and removes the little flash bomb and the ski mask. He tucks the bomb into his shirt pocket, pulls the ski mask over his head, then hefts the bag and carries it to the stairway leading to the basement. The bag’s going to remain behind, at least for the present, and he lays it on the floor before descending. His tread is light, a matter of habit, not necessity. The stairway is made of poured concrete, virtually eliminating the possibility of his footfalls making any sound at all.

  At the bottom, Carter takes the flash bomb from his pocket and cradles it in his palm. Then he shuts his eyes for a moment, the better to visualize the sequence to follow, the better to find his own center. He can die here and he knows it. The trick is to replace fear with acceptance, to reach a state of pure purpose, to become a machine designed for battle, a machine indifferent to outcome.

  Carter opens his eyes, committed now. He feels nothing inside, not even excitement, his focus too intense to allow for emotion of any kind. A yard away, the flimsy, ill-fitting door between himself and his objective beckons. Carter swivels his right hip back and bends his knee slightly. When his balance is perfect, he comes forward, running the energy from his hip, through his thigh, his calf, his ankle, and into the lock itself.

  The door crashes open, the wood around the lock splintering, as Carter knew it would. He slams the flash bomb on to the concrete floor inside, then covers his eyes with his left hand and draws the Glock with his right.

  The flash, when the gunpowder ignites, is so intense that it bleeds through his fingers. Darkness follows a split second later and Carter leaps through the doorway. Before coming to an abrupt stop, he takes four running steps into the room, his head swiveling left and right. He first registers a man directly in front of him. The man wears brown boxers and a wife-beater T-shirt and his unseeing eyes stare up at the ceiling. To his right, a second man lies sprawled on a half-inflated air mattress. His hands cover his eyes and he’s muttering the word ‘motherfucker’ over and over again. Behind him, a third man reaches for a semi-automatic handgun lying on a table. Carter shoots this man first, pulling the trigger twice, a classic, center of mass double-tap. The rounds impact the man’s chest within an inch of each other and he drops to the floor, leaving his weapon behind.

  The man on the mattress comes next. He’s lowered his hands at the crash of the gunshots, but his eyes are looking off to Carter’s left when Carter again pulls the trigger twice. The man raises a hand to the wounds on his chest, catching the first few drops of blood. Then his eyes roll up into his head and he falls back.

  The third man, the man standing directly in front of Carter, has recovered his sight. He appears to be in his early twenties, a tall skinny kid with a mop of black hair that’s standing straight up. The crash of gunfire still echoes in the confined space and the sharp odor of cordite is thick enough to sting his rapidly blinking eyes.

  ‘Hey, I’m not fuckin’ armed. Take what the fuck you want. Take the fuckin’ building.
I don’t give a fuck.’

  Carter’s impressed. Four fucks in four sentences. Meanwhile, the kid’s staring at his friends. They’re not moving, not even groaning.

  ‘Anybody else here?’ Carter asks.

  ‘Nobody, I swear.’

  A door on the far side of the basement flies open before Carter registers the lie. The man who steps out has a gun in his hand and he’s pulling the trigger as fast as he can, Gentleman Jerry minus the part about aiming. As Carter spins to face the threat, a bullet slams into his body armor on the left side, a matter of pure chance. The round doesn’t penetrate the Kevlar fabric, but the pain is ferocious. Carter ignores it, as he’d once ignored the roundhouse kicks delivered to his lower ribcage by a mixed martial artist named Chappy Jorgenson. He raises the Glock, sights in on the man’s chest and fires twice. Both shots strike home and the man sags into the door frame, still holding on to his weapon, an unacceptable result. Carter fires for a third time and the bullet punches a hole in the man’s face just below his right eye. Game over.

  Carter spins on his heel to face the last man standing. Or the next to last, if he includes himself. The kid’s eyes are wide enough to pass for headlights. Though his lips tremble and his jaw hangs open, he doesn’t make a sound.

  Carter lets the silence build for a moment, then wags a finger and says, ‘Liar, liar, pants on fire.’

  ‘What, what?’

  Out in the field, on capture or kill missions, prisoners were never taken, nor witnesses left behind. But Carter’s got work ahead of him, physical labor, and he’s pretty sure at least one of his ribs is cracked, if not broken. Every breath produces a jet of pain that he’s struggling to mask.

  ‘Cat got your tongue?’ he says.

  ‘Don’t kill me.’

  Carter likes that, a simple plea, with no excuse offered for the lie. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Al.’

  ‘OK, Al. Walk to the foot of the stairs, sit down, put your hands under your ass and cross your legs. Don’t make me ask you twice. Do it now.’