Allegiance (Joe Logan Book 4) (10 page)

After drinking two cups of coffee, having a shower under water that was almost stone cold, and brushing his teeth, Logan decided to sleep for a couple of hours, during which time he knew that all the information he had gathered would settle out and a plan would form in his head.  First, he knocked on the internal door and waited for Margie to invite him in before opening it.  “I’m going to grab some sleep,” he said to the two women.  “One way and another it’s been a long day.”

“That’s putting it mildly,” Della said.

“I need to see Arnie,” Margie said.  “Tomorrow…I mean today.  I’m not going to hide out here while he’s fighting for his life in a hospital bed.”

Logan could see that to argue with her would be a waste of breath.  “I’ll take you in a few hours, when we’ve all rested up.”

He said goodnight and closed the door.  Benny was already in bed, snoring lightly.  Logan could see that he was still dressed, but had at least taken his shoes off.  The guy needed to shape up and turn himself around.

Dusty called Max at seven a.m. and told him exactly what had happened, apart from the fact that he had whacked Frankie; he laid that off on Logan.

“We need to find this piece of shit, get what he has on Mr F, and take care of him,” Max said.  “What do you intend to do?”

“Will you walk into my parlor, said the spider to the fly?”

“What’re you talking about?”

“He’s going to come for us, Max, straight into a web.  We’ll be waiting for him.  I gave a cop we own a call.  He knew this Logan character a few years back.  Gave me a description; Six-four, looks a little like that actor in
Taken,
but is more powerfully built.  Hard to miss.  And the cop said that Logan was like a dog with a bone.  He sees things through.  Doesn’t like unfinished business.”

“And you think that he considers us as unfinished business?”

“Yeah.  I’d say that he has declared war on us.  He’s one of those stubborn knucklehead’ that don’t know when to quit.”

“So we ‘circle the wagons’ and wait for him.”

“Exactly.  Everyone on the payroll will have a description of him.”

“I don’t like being bait,” Max said.  “He may be better than you think, or get lucky.”

“Relax.  He thinks that he’s a faceless, unknown quantity to us, and that will be the death of him.”

Benny
drove up the ramp and found a slot on the third floor of a parking garage on 30
th
Street between First and Second Avenues, close to Bellevue.

“We’ll make this quick,” Logan said.  “I’m sure that one of Fallon’s mob will be inside the hospital, waiting to see if Margie visits him.”

“So you’ll be followed when you leave?” Benny said.

“No,” Logan said.  “I’ll make sure that we lose any tail.”

Margie and Logan got out of the car, and Della stayed inside it with Benny.

The nearer that they got to the hospital, the more anxious Margie became.  A little voice was telling her that she would be informed that she was too late; that Arnie had died.  She linked her arm through Logan’s and held on tight until they were within sight of the entrance doors.

“You go on ahead,” Logan said.  “I’ll be a few yards behind you.  I want to see if anyone takes an interest when you walk in.”

Margie made her way beneath the sheltering overhang and, passing through one of the transparent glass entrances, was once again slightly awed by the opulence of the huge building.  She made her way through the maze of corridors to the West Wing and took the elevator up to the second floor.

Nick Roach was sitting on a plastic contour chair and ostensibly reading the sports section of
The New York Times
.  He had been given a photo of Margie Newman, didn’t expect that she would show up, but kept watch on the people entering the main doors to the West Wing.  If Dusty Quaid had his facts right, she would in all probability be accompanied by a very tall, broad-shouldered guy by the name of Logan, who was an ex-cop and was now playing bodyguard. If they were stupid enough to visit the comatose guy in the ICU, Nick would phone Quaid and keep out of sight.  And if they left before backup arrived, he would follow them.

He almost missed her.  She was alone, looked a little thinner in the face than the image in the slightly out of focus photo that had obviously been taken from a distance with her face angled down. He quickly checked the mug shot he’d been given again.  It was definitely her.

Following her to where she took an elevator up, Nick went over to another waiting area, got a coffee from a machine and phoned Quaid.

“Are they at the hospital?” Dusty said after checking the caller ID and answering.

“Just the woman,” Nick said.  “Whadya want me to do now?”

“Stay put.  Logan is probably parked nearby, waiting for her.  I’ll drive over there.  I need for you to call me back when she leaves and tell me her every move.  If she’s on her own she may take the subway.  Don’t lose her, Nick.”

Dusty ended the call and left his apartment with his silenced nine-millimeter pistol in the deep inside pocket of the knee-length leather coat he’d decided to wear.  Sonny Gilmore was outside the door, armed and standing guard, just in case Logan decided to make a house call.

“Let’s go, Sonny,” Dusty said, walking over to the elevator.  “We’ll take the Nissan.  You’re driving.”

Nick waited for over thirty minutes.  He shouldn’t have had coffee, because now he needed to take a piss.  There was a bathroom for the disabled just six feet from where he was sitting, but he held on for another ten minutes until his bladder was pounding.  Jesus!  He had to go.  There was no way he would be able to follow the broad far if he didn’t. It would only take him a minute.  It was a good odds gamble that she wouldn’t slip past him.

He opened the door and went into the accessible toilet.  It was designed to accommodate wheelchairs and had grab bars for people with disabilities.  Turning to lock the door behind him, he was taken completely by surprise as a giant of a man grabbed him by the throat and exerted enough pressure to stop him being able to breathe.

Logan had followed the slightly-built, balding man along the corridors and was positive by his furtive demeanor that he was tailing Margie.  When the guy got himself a cup of coffee from a vending machine and took a seat, he watched him from an adjacent waiting area.  Hospitals are busy places.  There were a lot of people milling about, and they were all in a world of their own, too concerned with their own or loved ones’ health problems to notice much of anything else going on around them.  He got a break.  The guy put his cup down, walked across to a bathroom for the disabled and opened the door.

As the door to the stall closed to on its hydraulic arm, Logan entered and saw the surprise on the wide-eyed face as he shot his left arm out and grasped the guy around the throat, to exert enough pressure to ensure that there would be no sound emitted from the compressed windpipe.  Using his right hand to reach behind him to close and lock the door, he propelled the man backwards and down onto the toilet seat, to frisk him one-handed and retrieve a wallet and cell from his pockets, but no weapon.

Flipping open the wallet, Logan checked the driver license.  Saw the holder’s name and a photo which was a match to the now purple-faced man whose eyes were bulging from their sockets.  Next he opened the cell phone and recognized a couple of the numbers in the contact list.

Marginally easing his grip on the scrawny neck, he spoke to the man.

“Here’s what’s going to happen, Nick,” Logan said.  “I’m going to let go of your neck, and if you shout out or move an inch I’ll smash your brains out on the wall.  Do you understand?”

Nick nodded.  He did legwork for Dusty.  He wasn’t like some of the other psychos that worked for the man.  He was allergic to pain.

“Who have you phoned to report that Margie Newman is here?”

“Quaid.  Dusty Quaid.”

“And what does he want you to do now?”

“Just follow her and let him know where she goes.  If you’re Logan, he thinks that you’re probably parked nearby, waitin’ for her. He’s on his way now.”

“What does he drive?”

“A bronze-colored Nissan.  I don’t know the model, but it’s sporty.  He also has a big, black Lincoln that he gets driven round in.”

“Describe Quaid.”

“About six-one, early forties.  He’s clean-shaven, has short, blond hair and a scar on his left cheek.  The guy keeps fit. I’ve only met him once.  It’s usually a heavy by the name of Sonny that I deal with.”

“What else do you know, Nick?”

“Nothin’, I swear.  I just got given a photo of the woman and was told to report in and keep her in sight if she turned up.”

“You’re an asshole,” Logan said.  “Quaid wants the woman dead, and you don’t give a damn.”

“I don’t ask why anythin’ needs done; I just do what I’m told.”

“That’s no excuse.  You know that Quaid is a murdering bastard,” Logan said, gripping Nick by his face and slamming his head sideways and down to smash his right temple against the steel grab bar that disabled folk presumably used to lever themselves out of and into wheelchairs.

Nick was knocked senseless and went limp and slipped down onto the floor.  Logan grasped him under the armpits and set him back into a sitting position on the toilet seat and left the cubicle.

It was time to leave.  He made his way to the ICU and asked a nurse in the small reception area to let Mrs. Newman know that he was waiting.  Through the small window of the door to the extensive unit he could see a uniformed cop.  This was the NYPD looking after its own.

Margie was sat next to the bed holding Arnie’s hand.  She told him everything that had happened, especially about Logan, and how he had turned up out of the blue to visit, and was now looking out for her.

She gasped.  Arnie’s fingers tightened around her hand for a second, and then relaxed again.  A doctor had just told her that the results of all the tests were encouraging.  Nothing else.

“Help me out here, Doc,” Margie had said.  “Do you think that my Arnie is going to make it?”

“Off the record I’m cautiously optimistic,” Dr. Megan Wells had replied. “Your husband isn’t in a normal coma now, but in a medically-induced one.”

“Why?”

“In the case of traumatic brain injury, such as the bullet wound sustained by Gabrielle Giffords the Congresswoman, back in 2011, shutting down function can give the brain time to heal.  Being shot in the head can seriously alter the metabolism, impeding adequate blood flow to some areas.  The coma gives the brain time to heal and for the swelling to go down.”

“How long will he be like this?” Margie asked.

“I would think another week at least.  And you need to realize that we have no idea yet exactly what long-term effects he may suffer.”

“Such as?”

“Motor function: walking, coordination in general.  Or maybe difficulty with speech.  There will be a long period of rehab if…when he gets past the initial trauma.”

Margie now had hope.  The doctor had been talking about recovery, not death.  When Arnie regained consciousness they would deal with whatever health problems he had and get past it, together.

The doctor’s bleeper had sounded and she had given Margie an encouraging smile and left the room.

“You’re going to be fine, Arnie,” Margie said.  “One way or another we’ll deal with this and make it down to Florida.  Your days as a cop are over.”

Nurse Audrey Carden entered the private room and said, “There’s a gentleman waiting for you, Mrs. Newman.  He asked me to tell you that it’s time to leave.”

“Thanks,” Margie said and leaned over to kiss Arnie on the cheek before standing up, reluctant to let go of his hand.

“We have company on the way,” Logan said when they had left the unit. “You were spotted coming in, and the guy had already made a call before I got to pass the time of day with him.”

Margie didn’t ask for details.  She was sure that whoever Logan had spoken to was in a sorry state.

They missed seeing what had become of Nick Roach by several minutes.  An elderly man by the name of Paul Steiner had opened the door to the toilet and discovered Nick slumped on the seat, still unconscious and covered in blood.  Paul had backed out; almost losing control of the crutches he relied on to walk with, and called for help.  An orderly had rushed over, examined Nick and determined that he was badly concussed and had probably sustained a fracture to his skull.  Nick came round as he was being examined, but was in pain, confused, and had no clear memory of what had happened.

Logan led Margie through the first floor warren of corridors of Bellevue to the rear of the newer part of the building, to exit into the south parking lot and walk back up 26
th
Street to First Avenue.

There was a coffee shop on the corner.  Logan made the decision to eyeball Quaid when he arrived, so told Margie to go for a coffee while he watched the front of the hospital.

What Logan had no way of knowing, was that Quaid had made a call en route and had two other cars converging on Bellevue.