by Greg Rucka
Step 28 had me parking by a marble mausoleum on a slope, in the shade of several trees. I was at least half a mile from the entrance, and the buildings, the pond, all of it was hidden behind the foliage and monuments spread along the grounds. I killed the engine and set the emergency brake. A breeze had started up, making the leaves around me shiver. Through the open window, that was the only sound. There was no sign of anyone else, no mourners, no attendants, no one.
I got out of the car, and the pager started beeping.
BENCHBEHINDMAUSOLEUM… HAVEASEAT… HURRY…
"I'm out of the car," I radioed. "Moving around the back of a mausoleum marked Griffith."
"Wait!" Bridgett snapped. "I'm not there yet, get back in the fucking car! Damn you, wait for me! I'm almost there!"
"She knows I'm here," I said. "I don't have a choice."
"I'm coming up on the entrance, I'll be there in a minute, less, just wait for me, dammit!"
"Can't," I said.
A short stone bench, its back to the mausoleum, was positioned to look over a row of headstones running along the slope. As I was sitting down another page came through.
2NDONTHERIGHT
It took half a second before the letters carved in the granite made sense to me, and the fear burst so hard and intense it tried to steal my breath, tried to double me over. In my ear, Bridgett was snarling at me to stop, to wait, saying that she was past the gate, she was parking, she was getting out.
The name on the headstone was Logan.
I pressed my transmit button. "Get out of here."
"Fuck you, I'm coming to…" and then she shrieked, a noise I'd never heard her make, part fear and part surprise and so loud and so unexpected that I jerked my head instinctively to get away from the sound. She had kept her line open, and in my ear I heard the sound of breaking glass, a distant noise like the popping of a paper bag, and I was on my feet, turning to run, to try and reach her and in my hand the pager was shrieking, too.
"…shot at and took out the window. I don't know where it came from."
"Just stay in the car, stay down!"
"Like I have a fucking choice."
I silenced the pager, read the message. My hands were shaking as I pressed the button to scroll the LCD.
NEXT1INHERHEAD… MAKEHERGOAWAY… 60 SECONDS
"Bridget!:."
"I can't see her, Atticus. "
"You've got to go."
There was a pause, and then she asked, softly, "What'd she say?"
45 SECONDS
"She's got a headshot. You've got under a minute."
"Oh. " She said it as if I'd told her something of only minor interest.
"You've got to go," I repeated.
"Corry and Dale and Moore, they're not here yet, they're not responding to the radios, if I leave you alone… "
"She'll kill you."
"Atticus."
"Go. There's no time."
Seconds passed, marking her life.
I repeated myself, I shouted, I said, "Go!"
And she said, "I'm going. "
Through the trees, I heard the growl of the Porsche starting again. I closed my eyes, listening for the gunshot.
Another page came.
LOSETHERADIO+PHONE… REACHUNDERBENCH…
I set the pager on the bench, pulled the radio off my belt and switched it off. I disconnected the leads, pulled the cords from inside my sleeve and under my shirt. I put them on the bench, added my cellular phone to the pile, switching it off first. On my hands and knees I looked under the bench, found a clear plastic bag stuck to the granite with duct tape. Inside the bag was a set of three keys and another printed note, cut into a small strip.
Up the slope. Ford Escort. Start the engine.
Leave the pager.
The car was last year's model, black, used, and parked just out of sight over the lip of the slope. One of the keys opened the door, and the same key started the engine. As soon as the power came on, there was a click from the cassette player, and her voice filled the car.
"Put it in drive. Accelerate to twenty. Follow the road, second right. Do it now."
The Escort was another automatic. She fell silent as I started moving, and I took the second right, and as soon as I did, she spoke again.
"The timing on this is absolute. No delays. I am watching you. Accelerate to thirty. "
I was still in the cemetery, the roads still narrow, rising and falling, and thirty seemed about ten miles too fast for me. There was a bend at the foot of a long hill, and I moved my foot to the brake.
"Don't slow down, " she warned.
It took an effort to get my foot back to the gas. The Escort sunk on its shocks as I made the bend, the wheels whining softly.
"First left, then straight. Accelerate to fifty until the gate. "
The edge of the cemetery came into view, a service entrance. The gate was open. I slowed as I approached, and her voice told me to make a left and go with the flow of traffic. At the first light she told me to make a right again, and then, three blocks later, a left.
"Get on the Expressway, we're going to Brooklyn, " she said. "The traffic is going to be bad, so take your time with it. We've got all day, now, don't we? You should have a nice view of Far Rockaway as you cross."
Her voice was soft and sure, very conversational. Her accent stayed mid-Atlantic, but when she said "Brooklyn" and "Rockaway," she rolled her "r"s almost imperceptibly.
"How about a little music?"
Her voice faded, and the Beatles filled the car, singing "Magical Mystery Tour."
"I like the classics, " she said.
"Oh, shut up," I said, and after it was out of my mouth I realized that I was expecting her to answer.
She didn't.
***
Just as I hit the Verrazano, the music faded out.
"Traffic is going to be difficult once you get into Brooklyn, so don't worry about stopping or rewinding the tape if you get confused or fall behind. I want you to get where you 're going, and I think you do, too. Now that I've got you alone, we have a little more time to get everything in order.
"I know you can't possibly bring yourself to believe me, but if you keep following my instructions, if you keep doing as I say, you will get her back intact. It should go without saying what will happen if you don't.
"You're wondering where I am right now. That will be answered soon enough. You're also wondering about her. That answer is coming, as well. You're certainly wondering how you can make contact with your friends, if, perhaps, you can risk stopping at a pay phone to make a quick call. Believe me when I tell you that you can't. I'm monitoring you right now, Atticus, and if you stop anywhere other than the destination of my choosing…"
From the speakers there came the crack of a gunshot followed by a very stereotypical-sounding scream, both too clear to be anything but sound effects.
"Just so we understand each other. One last thing. Whatever it is you think is going on, you 're wrong.
"Just something for you to think about.
"You're going to come off the Verrazano and exit onto Ninety-second Street. At the light, turn left…"
It took until three minutes past ten for me to reach the destination, and she was right; the traffic was bad, and I had to stop the tape four times to keep from getting lost. Twice while driving through Brooklyn I saw NYPD cars, and each time I toyed briefly with trying to get their attention, but each time I thought better of it. How Drama was monitoring me I didn't know – there could be a tracer in the car, a microphone, even a camera sending her live video – but I absolutely believed that I was being watched. In its own bizarre way, we'd entered into a game of trust; Drama was trusting me not to do anything stupid, and I was trusting her to keep her word.
It seemed one-sided to me.
The directions took me through Bay Ridge, then north past Greenwood Cemetery and into the nicer homes of Park Slope. She kept me off the main thoroughfares, and several times had me making
turns that reversed my direction or even took me in a complete circle. It was annoying; she'd already succeeded in cutting me from the rest of the herd, there was no longer any need to make certain that I wasn't being followed.
Finally the directions became more straightforward, and I went east through Prospect Heights, crossing Flatbush Avenue, and then south once more past Prospect Park, and it was then that I realized where she was taking me. The last time I'd been to this part of Brooklyn Natalie had driven, and at our journey's end we'd found the body of a man named Raymond Mosier. Mosier had worked for Natalie's father, part of the detail protecting Pugh before I'd been hired to take over, and he had been a glory-hound, the worst kind of guard. Drama had tricked him into accessing our security, and when she'd finished with him, she'd clipped the loose end by killing him.
Now, over a year later, I was pulling up outside Mosier's apartment once again. The building had received a face-lift since I'd last seen it, the brick exterior the color of an infected cut and the wood trim repainted. Flower boxes hung outside windows all along the first and second floors, tended and obviously loved. The tenants here had grown house-proud.
The cassette ended and flipped itself over automatically. Nothing came from the speakers but the hiss of magnetic tape. I stopped the engine and got out of the car, taking the keys with me. Aside from the key to the Escort, there were two others. The first fit the lock in the foyer, and the second opened the door to what had been Mosier's apartment on the third floor. I turned the key quietly, hearing the bolt snick back. The hallway was empty and quiet.
I turned the knob slowly, pushing the door just enough that the latch wouldn't fall back in its receiver. Then I replaced the keys in my pocket, took the revolver from my ankle and the HK from my waist, and filled my lungs with as much oxygen as I could draw. With my shoulder to the door, I shoved it open and then went in, low, crossing the threshold and looking for anything that needed a bullet put inside it.
Nothing.
I listened for several seconds and didn't hear anything but my own ridiculously labored breathing. I straightened, and used my foot to swing the door shut once more.
When Mosier had died here, the apartment had been spare, but furnished. There had been a Murphy bed and a big-screen television, a bookshelf, even a large erotic print hanging on one wall.
Now the place was bare. The only light came from the windows on the far wall. Even the Murphy bed was folded up, a note taped to the handle. I decided to ignore the note for the time being.
The bathroom was on the wall to my right, and farther along the same side stood the closet. Both doors were open. I hugged the wall, making my way to them, and peeked into each. Both were empty. The bathroom didn't even have a roll of toilet paper.
I holstered my guns and went to the bed, reading the note.
PULL GENTLY
The butterflies again got rowdy in my stomach.
Another potential booby trap. Or maybe another body, yeah, that would appeal to Drama's sense of irony.
With great loathing, I lowered the Murphy bed, and discovered it had been made, clean white sheets and an olive drab Army surplus blanket. Another note, tucked beneath the single pillow.
GET COMFORTABLE
I crumpled up the note and went to the window, which looked out onto the street below.
The Escort was gone.
I thought about what to do, and figured that if Drama wanted me to wait here, that was just fine by me. The tracker Corry had sewn into my shorts was hopefully still working, and that meant that the longer I stayed in one place, the sooner they'd be able to get to me. Even if Bridgett hadn't been able to raise Moore or Dale or Corry on the radio after she'd left the cemetery, she certainly would have called Natalie, and Natalie would have gotten in touch with them one way or another. Between Natalie at my apartment and Corry in the back of Dale's van, they could find me.
It was just going to take them time.
I sat down on the edge of the Murphy bed, rolled my head around, trying to loosen the tension resting in my shoulders. The Kevlar vest was tight around my middle, and now that I could spare a moment to think about it, pretty uncomfortable. My mouth was dry, and I realized I was thirsty, that I hadn't had anything to drink this morning but coffee, and with the humidity and the tension and the running about, I was in danger of dehydrating.
In the refrigerator I found a sports bottle of Gatorade, and another of fancy water with a label saying it came from a crystal-pure melting glacier in Greenland. There was also a box of baking soda in the far corner of the top shelf. I closed the refrigerator and turned on the tap in the sink instead, used my hands to drink my fill, then shut the water off.
While I was drying my hands on my T-shirt, there was a knock at the door. I went for the HK, backing against the wall, lining up a shot for what would ideally be the middle of the chest on an average-sized adult male.
There was another knock.
"Mr. Kodiak? I am coming inside. Please do not hurt me."
The voice was male, and had an accent. Russian. Or perhaps Ukrainian.
I didn't say anything, and the knob turned and the door swung open, and the man who stepped into the room was anything but average-sized. He was tall enough so that Bridgett would have had to look up to meet his eyes, two small, intense pebbles set deep and wide in a broad face. His nose was flat, with a ridge of scar tissue all along the bridge, and the shape of his mouth was defined and exaggerated by a sharp goatee, black hair. His head had been shaved sometime in the past few weeks, and the stubble along the dome of his skull made it seem like the top of his head had been smeared with charcoal dust. He looked in his mid-thirties, perhaps older, and he came through the door easily, his hands held casually at his waist, palms turned out to show me they were empty. He wore black jeans and work boots and a thin leather jacket that was unzipped and fell to below his hips. His T-shirt warned that it wasn't safe to mess with a big dog.
I adjusted my sights, raising to his head. He had big and strong down, but I didn't know about fast yet. Still, anyone wearing a leather jacket on a day like today was making a statement, declaring either that they didn't notice little things like heat and humidity, or that image was far more important than comfort.
My gut told me this guy didn't give a rat's ass about the weather.
He stepped inside, craning his head slightly, searching for me. When he finally spotted me against the wall, my gun on him, he smiled broadly and gave me a little nod.
"Hello."
"Close the door," I said.
"Sure, I was going to do that." He shut the door, showing me his back, then turned and motioned to the Murphy bed. "Should I sit down?"
"Not yet. Take off the jacket, slowly."
"Sure," he said again, softer, and he removed the jacket, dropping it to the floor.
"Hands on your head, lace your fingers and turn around."
He shrugged, did as I ordered. I couldn't see any weapons on him, no wires, nothing that looked like a radio.
"Now you can sit down," I said. He started for the bed and I let him get halfway there before adding, "There's fine."
"You want me to sit on the floor?"
"You got it."
Another shrug, and he got on the floor.
I stayed against the wall, keeping my eyes and the gun on him, until I reached the door.
"I already locked it for you." He watched me reach for the knob. "I'm not here to hurt you."
"Thanks," I said, and checked the door anyway. He was telling the truth about the lock. I moved away from it, farther down the wall, keeping ten feet between us, and readjusting my sights on him. "She sent you?"
" 'Tasha?"
"If that's what she calls herself."
" 'Tasha sent me, yes."
"And who are you?"
"She told me to come here and take you someplace."
"I've already figured that much out. Who are you?"
"Dan."
"You're Russian, Dan?"
"Ah, no, I am Georgian."
"Georgian, sorry. So Dan is short for, what, Danilov?"
He looked pleased. "That is right, yes."
"How do you know 'Tasha?"
"She is my friend."
I decided not to laugh.
Dan checked his watch, a big platinum thing around his left wrist, then started to get back to his feet. "We need to go."
"I didn't tell you to get up," I said.
The implied threat didn't stop him, which told me either that he wasn't afraid of taking a bullet, or that he knew Drama's leverage on me was such that my threat was a hollow one. He bent down and took his jacket, shaking it once to make certain that nothing from the floor was polluting it, then put it back on and made for the door. He stopped with his hand on the knob, smiled at me again.
"Please," Dan said. "We go now or else we are late. You can keep your guns."
And he went out the door, leaving me to follow.
Chapter 15
Dan had a platinum-colored Mercedes-Benz Kompressor convertible that perfectly matched the color of his watch, and he drove it with the top down, oblivious to the threat of rain. The stereo was cranked just below painfully loud, rap music that Dan liked to share with everyone we passed. He drove with one hand, his left arm hanging over the door, thumping on the car in time with the beat.
"You want a drink, Mr. Kodiak?" he asked when we stopped at the first light.
"I'm fine," I said.
He twisted and reached into the space behind my seat, feeling around. The light changed and he glanced up, then let out the clutch and started us forward, using his thighs to control the wheel. It took him a couple more seconds to find what he was looking for, and he turned back around now holding two dripping cans of Bud Light in one hand. He dropped one of the cans into my lap, where the icy water instantly was absorbed by my pants, and then used his teeth to pop the tab on the other one. He still wasn't using his hands to steer the car.
