The Bricklayer

by Noah Boyd

“I’m going with you.”

  “Wait until somebody else gets here.”

  “You did hear yourself use the word ‘bait,’ didn’t you? I won’t allow you to go alone.”

  Vail stared at her for a second before a short burst of laughter escaped from his mouth. “Then you’d better make that call quick.” As she took extra magazines herself, he shoved a flashlight in his back pocket. They started walking toward the building. She dialed the office. In a low tone, she explained the situation and that every available agent should proceed to the West Seventh Avenue address immediately.

  They reached the door and Vail said, “When we get inside don’t say anything or move around. Just stand there and let your eyes adjust to the darkness. There should be enough light coming in off the street for us to be able to see. If you’re going to shoot, make sure of your target. A construction job this big should have a night watchman.”

  “You’re not going to use the flashlight?”

  “We’ll be enough of a target.” They stepped inside, and he eased the door shut as they both listened.

  Kate said, “What now?”

  “If that guy was an agent, we just have to listen. Are you familiar with the expression ‘Ride to the sound of gunfire’?”

  “Who said that?”

  “Custer.” He turned and walked toward two dots of white light across the darkness.

  “Very reassuring.”

  “Stay directly behind me.”

  As he suspected, the two tiny circles of light were the Up and Down buttons for an elevator. He pushed Up. “How do we know what floor?”

  Vail said, “They’ll find a way to let us know.”

  “Again, reassuring.”

  The elevator came and they got in. Vail pushed the buttons to all the floors and then drew his automatic. Reaching up, he used the muzzle to break the single lightbulb and the car went dark. Kate took her gun from the holster and wrapped both hands around it. He said, “Don’t hold it with both hands. It makes it too hard to maneuver. You’re probably going to be ducking a lot sooner than you’ll be shooting.”

  The car jolted to a stop and then swayed back and forth slightly as the doors to the second floor started to open. As soon as they were wide enough, a body in a gray uniform fell through the opening. It was tied to an eight-foot-long two-by-six to give the corpse enough rigidity to lean against the door. The handle of a large screwdriver was sticking out of the guard’s chest. Vail checked his throat for a pulse. “I’m going to guess they know we’re here.”

  Kate stared down at the body. The brutality with which he had been killed and displayed released a panicked surge of adrenaline through her bloodstream. In the dark, quiet surroundings, it seemed dreamlike, vivid but not real, something that would surely go away if she closed her eyes for just a second or two.

  Vail grabbed her roughly by the arm. “You’re going to need to focus, otherwise you’re a liability.” He picked up the body, carried it out of the elevator, and laid it down with a surprising gentleness.

  Kate shook her head as if trying to come out of a deep sleep. “I’m here, I’m here.”

  “Good,” Vail said, pressing the button to close the elevator doors.

  “You don’t think they’re on this floor?” Kate asked.

  “They’re going to be closer to the top.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because it’s their MO to wear us out before we get to…”

  “The Little Big Horn?”

  “Close enough.”

  As the doors opened at each floor, she caught herself holding her breath. With each stop, she understood the odds were increasing dramatically that the next time the doors opened, they would be waiting. Then she realized she was letting happen exactly what Vail had warned her against—the group psyching her out. But how was it possible not to be intimidated by this? She glanced over at Vail, who appeared as matter-of-fact as usual.

  Whether it was Vail’s composure or fear’s tendency to eventually diminish itself through logic, by the time the doors opened on the eleventh floor, the terror she felt was at a level only high enough to give her a combative edge. She stared into the darkness, ready. Again there was nothing. As the doors started to close, Vail grabbed one of them and pulled it open. “What!” she whispered.

  “Smell it?”

  She started to say no, but then she did recognize something. “Garlic?”

  “Overpowering garlic.”

  “So?”

  “That means someone had their dinner up here. Which means they’ve been here for a while.”

  “Waiting for us?”

  “Once Radek found that car gone, he knew that it would only be a matter of time until we worked our way here.”

  “Can you explain to me how you know that?”

  “Not now, dear.”

  She regripped her automatic. “Are we getting off?”

  “Let’s go up one more floor.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe the garlic isn’t intentional.” He let go of the door and it closed. “These people have played with our minds so much that logic has become a handicap. We just have to go with instinct and hope we can react quickly enough when the time comes.”

  “Wasn’t that Custer’s plan?”

  “And it worked every time but one.”

  The door opened on the twelfth floor. Vail and Kate could see an office straight ahead at the far end. A single light illuminated its half-glass walls. The man they had seen exiting the automobile with the flashing blue light and enter the building sat in a chair facing them. His mouth was gagged and his hands were pulled back behind him and immobile. He spotted them and started nodding his head furiously. Vail let the doors close without getting off. “What are you doing?” Kate asked.

  He took out his lock-back knife. Opening it, he handed it to her. “Be careful, it’s like a razor. You go to him slowly, and I mean slowly. I’m going to walk backward right behind you. Once you get to him, cut him loose.”

  “Do you think they’re here or down a floor?”

  “I wish I could tell you a floor down.” He pushed the button and the doors opened. Vail grabbed Kate by the arm, pulling her into the relative darkness. She felt his back against her. She tried to slip her finger onto the trigger but realized she was gripping her gun too tightly. She loosened her grip until it felt more familiar. With the knife in her left hand, she started toward the gagged man. Vail followed gently against her back.

  After a few steps, she remembered the garlic and tried to see if the odor was present, but she couldn’t smell it. In fact, she couldn’t smell anything, not the mustiness of the building or the distinct smells of construction and its crews. Apparently, her sense of smell had shut down. She hoped that the myth about the loss of one sense increasing the others was true. She turned her head to one side and then to the other trying to see into the darkness surrounding them.

  Now she was close enough to see the man’s eyes. Although his mouth was covered she tried to recognize him from around the office. He didn’t look familiar. She watched his eyes closely, thinking that if the others were around, he would signal her by shifting them in their direction, but they were locked on her.

  Once she got through the office door, she moved quickly to him. Vail stood in the doorway searching the black stillness behind them. She held the knife up to indicate to the man that she was going to free his hands when she noticed that his feet weren’t bound to the chair.

  He burst upright and she could now see his hands were free. In his right hand was a revolver. Instinctively she slashed at the hand with the knife in her left hand. The sharp blade tore through the tendons and muscles of his wrist, paralyzing his hand. She felt the sickening resistance as steel struck bone. The gun now hung precariously, dangling from his useless trigger finger, which was caught in the guard.

  He started to transfer it to his left hand, but Kate’s right hand was faster. She shoved her automatic against his c
hest and pulled the trigger twice. He fell to the floor dead.

  A burst of automatic-weapons fire raked the office, exploding the windows. Kate felt something slam into her. She spun to the floor and felt the coolness of blood escaping from her side. At the same time, Vail dove to the floor, firing a single shot over her head, putting out the desk lamp. Everything went black. She heard him crawling to her through the shattered glass.

  “Are you hit?” he asked in her ear.

  “I think so. My side,” she said a little louder than she wanted to.

  He slid a little closer and gently put his hand up under her blouse, his fingertips immediately finding the entry wound. Although it stung a great deal, she was reassured by Vail’s hand exploring it. She felt him reach back, identifying the exit hole. “It’s through and through. The bleeding isn’t bad. Looks like it may have bounced off a rib.” He took out his handkerchief and opened it. “Just keep this pressed against both holes.”

  She did as instructed, and as with any traumatic wound, her touch made it less threatening.

  Vail dragged the dead man over to the wall and leaned him against it on his side. He then pulled Kate over and had her lie next to the body. “That’s an assault rifle. It’ll shoot right through this wall, but I don’t think it’ll get through him too, so stay right here.” He handed her the flashlight and took a coin out of his pocket. “When you hear this quarter land out there, stick your arm straight up and snap the flashlight on and off over the top of the wall. Then pull your arm down even faster.”

  Silently Vail maneuvered back to the corner of the office and stood up invisibly in the deep shadows. Kate held her breath, not wanting to miss the sound of the quarter hitting the floor. She understood it was her job to draw fire. It seemed like it was taking Vail forever, and at the same time she hoped she’d never hear the coin land.

  But then the quarter struck something metallic. She held the light straight up, even rising from behind the corpse to ensure that the light went over the bottom half of the wall. She snapped it on and off and then pulled herself close behind the body. Immediately automatic fire raked the wall. She felt at least two rounds thud into the body in front of her. Then, illuminated by the flashes of his Glock as he fired three times, Kate saw Vail’s face, stoic, workmanlike, as if he were at the range. She heard a body fall, and then there was nothing but more of the black, horrid silence. She waited a few seconds before asking in a strained whisper, “Is that it?”

  “One more,” he answered.

  Had Vail seen another man during the exchange? Kate thought back. The door had been jimmied when they arrived, meaning someone was already inside. They had then watched two more arrive, including the “agent.” Two of them were now dead.

  Vail took a quick step out of the shadows and dove through the shattered office window. Three gunshots skidded after him. During the brief bursts of light, he was able to locate the gunman and the obstacles that lay between them. He still couldn’t tell whether it was Radek. The shooter was barricaded behind a large wheelbarrow used to haul cement. Vail doubted that one of his rounds would pierce it, especially because of its curved surfaces. But he had spotted something immediately off to the gunman’s left side, a steel beam exposed by the construction work. He needed to get another look at it to confirm the angles of its surfaces. He decided on a position to move to and fired another burst in the general direction of the last gunman to keep his head down.

  Once there, he fired again, moving behind a three-foot-high pile of drywall and at the same time noting the steel beam’s details. He was now in a better position for what he was going to attempt.

  In the vague blue light coming in the windows, he could see exactly where the beam was and the angle of its surfaces in relation to the final gunman. Quietly, he slid a full magazine into his Glock and stepped from behind the Sheetrock pile. Standing up tall, he took a two-handed grip on the Glock and sighted it on the beam. He started firing slowly, watching the sparking impact of each round on the steel beam, adjusting his aim slightly after each one. The slugs ricocheted closer and closer to the man’s position. Finally one hit him, causing him to grunt deeply. Somewhere in the torso or legs, Vail judged. He moved his point of aim higher on the beam, and the gunman, realizing he had nowhere to go, reached his hand up over the wheelbarrow and fired blindly, trying to get Vail to stop shooting. Vail took aim at his hand and fired one round, striking either the hand or the arm. He stepped back behind the drywall stack and shoved another magazine into his automatic. The sound of sirens racing toward them now penetrated the building. For once, the troops had arrived at the right time.

  He knew that with his quarry wounded, he could simply walk toward him and shoot intermittently until he was safely over him, then take him into custody if he chose to surrender. If not, killing him was not a disagreeable alternative. Vail took a single step and then heard a shotgun racking a shell into the chamber. He turned and dove back behind the drywall. The gunman fired three blasts and then Vail could hear him moving toward the elevator. He started to look over the stack of building material when another explosion of double-aught buck slammed into the front edge of Vail’s concealment.

  The elevator opened and Vail stood up to fire. He caught a glimpse of the man dragging his bleeding leg into it and fired one more shot into the car just before the doors closed. Vail didn’t know if he had hit him. He considered looking for the stairs, but by now the building was surrounded. And running around with a gun in his hand didn’t seem like a good idea. More important, Kate needed attention. Her wound hadn’t looked bad, but he had examined it in the dark. He hurried over to her. “He’s gone,” he told her.

  Kate stood up, still pressing Vail’s handkerchief to her side. He took the flashlight from her and checked the wound. “Will I live?” she said, forcing a smile.

  He dabbed at the wounds analytically and then had her again hold the handkerchief against them. “Unfortunately, deputy assistant directors are not that easy to kill.”

  Suddenly the floor shook with an explosion. Vail shined the light over at the elevator. Dust and debris billowed out from the crack between its doors. Kate said, “I guess that was meant for us. Good thing you never pressed the Down button.” She looked for a reaction from Vail, but his mind was once again racing ahead.

  TWENTY-TWO

  VAIL LEANED ON THE FENDER OF THEIR RENTED CAR AND WATCHED Kate come out of the hotel entrance. Her gait was measured and she listed a little to the left. He opened the passenger door for her. “Did you check your stitches?”

  “No more blood on the bandages. How did you make out with LAPD last night?”

  “They were pretty decent about it. I was there two, two and a half hours. They want to get your statement today.”

  Once she was in the car, Vail went around and got behind the wheel. “How’d you sleep?”

  “Off and on. I was pretty wired up,” she said.

  “I’m usually the same way when I knife and shoot a guy.”

  She tried not to laugh. “How’d you sleep?”

  “Fine, until the two a.m. messenger arrived.”

  “The two a.m. messenger?”

  “It’s when I go to bed with something on my mind. Sometimes my brain does the work and wakes me up, usually at two a.m.”

  “With the answer?”

  “Always with an answer; sometimes it’s even the right one.”

  “Can’t you make your mind do that during daylight hours?”

  “Usually not. It has this obstinacy. I know, I know—where could that possibly come from?”

  Kate held her side. “Please don’t make me laugh.” She straightened up. “And what problem did it resolve this time? Was it the same one that was bothering you when that elevator exploded last night?”

  “Actually, the elevator exploding was my problem.”

  “You don’t think that was meant for us?” she asked.

  “Only if we survived the shoot-out. I think there’s a high probability
it was meant to take out whoever survived. Otherwise, why didn’t it explode on the way up?”

  “I don’t understand. I thought it was Radek who was killed in the explosion.”

  “The legal agent met me over at LAPD last night so I could give both statements at once. He said that the body was so badly damaged that they might have to go to DNA to identify it. If they can even come up with Radek’s DNA from other sources. He wanted to know if I had any ideas, which I didn’t.”

  “So it’ll take a while, so what? It’s not like he’s going anywhere.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know what? You don’t think it’s him?”

  “We have to consider the possibility. You have to admit he’s no dummy. Why would he get in an elevator knowing once it started down, it was going to blow up?”

  “Maybe it was an accident. You shot him twice. Maybe he’s not as smart with a couple of bullets in him.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Do you ever get the feeling that the two a.m. messenger is just screwing with you?”

  “Almost always,” Vail said.

  “I got a call first thing this morning,” Kate said. “There’s a briefing in the major-case room at ten a.m. Maybe it’ll put some of your demons to rest.”

  “Who called you?” Vail asked.

  “Some clerk. It wasn’t Kaulcrick, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “I imagine your boss is not pleased with our lack of sharing.”

  “A deputy assistant director wounded in a shoot-out with murderers? He can’t land on me with both feet. Not today anyway.”

  “You know what your real sin is? When you guys go back to Washington, you’ll have the better stories at cocktail parties.”

  “And all I had to do was get shot.”

  “But do I get thanked?”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. And since you’re being gracious, what do you say I take you out to dinner tonight? Out out, not something that comes in cardboard containers.”

  “That depends.”

  “On?”

  “Do you want to take me to dinner, or is this something you do for all the women who get shot around you?”