Carnal Curiosity (27 page)

Anita had her bag open now. She put everything on the bed, then brought out a stubby shotgun from the bottom of the bag and racked the slide. A shell popped out onto the bed. “Riot gun,” she said. “NYPD issue, I’ll bet. Where do they get this stuff?”

“Who cares?” Murphy said. The phone at bedside rang, and he picked it up. “Yeah?”

“Meeting in five in the corner suite,” Jerry’s voice said.

Murphy hung up. “Class is about to begin,” he said to Anita.

“I’m up for it,” she replied, “but if I don’t like the plan, I’m walking.”

“Do you think they’re going to let you walk out of here now? Do you want a bullet in the head? We’re in. Get used to it.”

“In until the cops come,” Anita said.

“That’s right, until the cops come.”

60

S
tone’s iPhone rang, and he answered it.

“It’s Dino.”

“How’s the thing going?”

“Everybody showed up at the hotel. They’re in their rooms on the thirty-sixth floor, and we’re sitting on them. We don’t expect movement until tomorrow morning. The show starts at ten. I expect we’ll see them soon after that.”

“Sounds right.”

“You want a ticket to the party?”

“Yeah, I think so. Ann has a birthday coming up—maybe I’ll buy her a bauble.”

“Don’t think of this as a shopping excursion, pal. You could end up with a shotgun stuck in your ear.”

“Don’t worry about me,” Stone said.

“I’ll pick you up at eight tonight,” Dino said.

“Dinner?”

“We’ll be dining at the hotel, in our room.” Dino dug into a
pocket and came up with a plastic key. “Corner suite, thirty-fifth floor. Bring your jammies. No women.”

—

M
urphy and Anita listened as the big guy, who was wearing a very creepy plastic mask, walked them through the plan.

“We enter the stairwell at nine o’clock, climb to thirty-seven, and take the rooms. There are four of them that will have goods on display. We’ll take one at a time, then leave a man in place and move on to the next. As you enter the room, there will be a coat closet on your left, just as in your rooms. That will contain a cop with a shotgun, but they won’t be in the closets until ten, when the show opens. You’ll each have a plastic garbage bag with a drawstring. You’ll empty each tray into the bag. When you hear this whistle”—he showed them a referee’s silver one and blew it for them—“you head back to the stairwell where we entered. No hesitation, no exceptions. We walk back down a flight, where an elevator will be locked open for us. The elevators on the thirty-seventh floor will be locked shut at nine, so nobody will be joining us unexpectedly.

“You’ll keep your police uniforms on until we’re in the vans and out of the building. As you get into a van, you’ll be relieved of your plastic bags. When you’re dropped off, leave your uniforms in the vans and take at least two cabs to your destination to be sure you aren’t followed.

“There won’t be a full complement of cops on the show floor until nearly ten, so we shouldn’t have a lot of opposition. Your shotguns are loaded with number nine birdshot—no double ought. We don’t want to kill anybody. If you have to shoot an
armed man, aim at his gun shoulder. You’ll knock him down, don’t worry. Any questions?”

“Will any of the jewelry sellers be armed?” Anita asked.

“Good question. Probably not, but maybe. Everybody will be frisked and, if necessary, disarmed. Check for ankle holsters, too. Remember, you’re wearing full-body armor, so you’ll be well protected. The cops and security people will be in plainclothes, and they’ll be wearing lapel buttons for ID. The only SWAT team will be on the roof. They’re expecting a chopper, and they won’t be expecting us to come up the stairs. The door to the staircase to the roof will be locked from the inside. We want to be off the floor in five minutes, so move your asses.”

“Have you considered what traffic will be like?” Murphy asked.

“Just past rush hour, so not as bad as it could be. The vans are equipped with police lighting and whoopers, so that will help us move along.”

“Where will we be dropped?”

“You’ll see when it happens. You won’t be far from a cab. When you leave the vans, take nothing with you but your own luggage, which will be taken from your rooms and placed in the vans.”

“When do we get paid?” Anita asked.

“On Monday,” the big guy replied. “You’ll be contacted, and you’ll meet to get your cash. The next payment will come in a couple of weeks. You’ll be paid in used hundreds, fifties, and twenties. Live your lives as usual. It would be very unwise of you to start making expensive purchases or paying off your bookies or other debts. Wait a few months. With your second payment you’ll get written instructions on how to open an
offshore bank account. You’d be very smart to do that. They’ll give you a credit card you can use anywhere in the world, and the purchases deducted from your account.”

He looked around. “No more questions. Everybody back to your rooms, and stay there until we come and get you at eight forty-five tomorrow morning. Be fully dressed and armed, and leave your luggage on your bed. You may already have noticed that you can’t make outside calls on your phones. The only call you can make is to room service. Tell them to leave the food outside your door. Everything will be already paid for, and the waiter tipped. Don’t be seen by anybody.”

He held up a black mask. “There’s one of these with every uniform. Don’t leave your room without it tomorrow morning, and keep it on until your van has left the hotel garage. See you in the morning.”

The big guy walked into the bedroom of his suite and closed the door, and Jerry Kowalski shooed everybody out.

Back in their room, Murphy sank into a chair. “So? What do you think?”

“I think it’s going to work,” she said. “When do we get out?”

“Unless the cops interrupt us, we’re out when we get out of the van.”

“That works for me,” she said.

61

S
tone tossed his duffel into Dino’s black SUV, and they were off. “I’m hungry,” he said, “and I want a drink.”

“You haven’t already had one?” Dino asked.

“I wanted your company. I hate drinking alone.”

Ten minutes later they were in the hotel’s garage and waiting for the elevator. Three minutes after that they were in their suite. “Very nice,” Dino said.

“Do we have any of the rooms upstairs wired?” Stone asked.

“Yes, but they only got up and running an hour ago. We may have missed a lot.”

Stone tossed Dino a room service menu. “What would you like?”

“Steak, rare, onion rings, green beans, double Johnnie Walker Black first, then a bottle of your choice.”

Stone ordered the same and a bottle of the Mondavi Napa Cabernet. The drinks came almost immediately. “Long time since I was on a stakeout,” he said.

“Me, too. Not since I made lieutenant, except for that one thing at the Carlyle that time.” That was when Dino had gotten shot, and Viv had saved his life.

“I don’t recall ever doing a stakeout as comfortable as this,” Stone said, flipping on the huge flat-screen TV. He stretched out on one of the two beds. “What did you do with Crane?”

“She’s at home, with two cops all over her.”

“She’ll like that,” Stone said, laughing.

—

D
on Dugan picked up his cell phone and called Crane’s cell.

“Hello?” Sounded like she was in the room.

“How’s Atlanta?”

“It’s Atlanta.”

“Good flight?”

“Passable.”

“Still mad at me?”

“A little less so. Is everything all right?”

“Everything’s going like clockwork. It’s going to be a masterpiece. If everything clicks, I won’t leave for Mexico. I’ll come to your place.”

“I won’t be back until Friday,” she said.

“Oh, right.”

“There’s a TV show starting I want to watch,” she said. “Good night and good luck.”

“Thanks.” They both hung up.

—

A
floor below Dugan’s suite, Stone and Dino were into their steaks. Dino’s cell rang and he answered. “Bacchetti.”

“Crane Hart just had a cell call from Don Dugan,” Connor said. “He thinks she’s in Atlanta.”

“Good.”

“By the way, his suite is directly over yours.”

“Swell. Did you hear anything about his plan for the robbery?”

“No, I think we were too late for that.”

“Rats.”

“Yeah.”

“How many people have we got for tomorrow?”

“Two dozen. All the sellers will be either cops or Strategic Services people. The jewelry will be real.”

“Good. I’ll be up there in good time. Barrington is with me.”

“We won’t shoot you.”

“Good night.”

“Good night.” Dino hung up.

“You nervous?” Stone asked.

“Not until I wake up tomorrow.”

“You’ll sleep?”

“I always sleep, and I wake up when I want to. On the dot.”

“Wake me when you wake,” Stone said.

Dino pointed up. “Dugan is right up there.”

“In this same suite, up one floor?”

“Right.”

“Why don’t we put a few rounds through the ceiling?” Stone suggested.

“Lovely idea, but noisy. Anyway, I’d rather take him than kill him.”

“I’d enjoy it either way,” Stone said.

“You’re bloodthirstier than I am.”

“Only where Dugan is concerned.” Stone brushed his teeth and got into his nightshirt.

“I always forget you wear those things,” Dino said. “I don’t get it.”

“Well, if you’re sleeping with a woman, there are no bottoms to take off. She can get at you.”

“That’s something, I guess.”

“I’m turning in,” Stone said.

“Me, too.”

Stone switched off the TV, and the room was dark, curtains closed against the light from the New York skyline.

“Happy dreams,” Stone said.

“You bet your ass.”

62

S
tone and Dino were having a fine room-service breakfast in their suite. Dino checked his watch. Simultaneously, his phone rang. “Bacchetti.”

“They’re up and around upstairs,” a cop said.

“Good.” Dino hung up.

“What’s the plan?”

“We’re going to let them come up the staircase and take the jewelry,” he said. “I want it in their hands—and the real thing in their hands—before we bust them. When they come back and head down the stairs, they’ll be met by a SWAT team coming the other way, and we’ll be right behind them.”

“Smooth. What about helicopters?”

“We know that Dugan canceled his, but we still have a team of four guys on the roof, in case they’re needed.”

“You have your own choppers?”

“I did have four, then I cut it to one, then I cut that.”

“Why?”

“I was being too cautious. They can’t get out that way.”

“What would you like me to do?” Stone asked.

Dino handed him a lapel pin. “Put this on, and go up there unarmed. They’d just frisk you anyway. Take it all in and be a witness. We can use the testimony of a cool head in court, and you don’t need to bust anybody.”

“Whatever you say.”

“And don’t get brave—we’ve got it covered.”

“Fear not,” Stone said. “I’m not feeling brave.”

—

J
ust short of nine o’clock, the team leader on the roof heard a helicopter coming. “Everybody quiet,” he said. The chopper set down on the roof, and the rear door opened.

“Get set.”

A tall Hasidic Jew in a black suit and hat, with beard and ringlets, got out of the machine and unloaded a suitcase on wheels.

The cop stepped out to meet him.

“I’m delivering,” the man said. “I’ll be leaving again shortly, so my helicopter will wait for me.”

“Go ahead,” the team leader said. He went back to the shed. “Stand down,” he said. “We’ve got a seller here, that’s all.”

The man in black went to the rooftop door and started downstairs. The helicopter pilot cut his engines, and the rotors came to a halt.

“What’s that guy doing?” one of the men asked.

“He’s waiting for his man,” the team leader said, then radioed downstairs. “They say it’s okay—nobody else can land while that chopper is sitting there.”

Dugan walked down the stairs to the thirty-sixth floor and
let himself through the fire door. His group was standing in the hall, waiting, their uniforms on. “Surprise,” Dugan said to them. He checked his watch: “Two minutes and we go upstairs. Nobody makes a sound or says an unnecessary word. Rack your shotguns, safeties on.”

Stone and Dino arrived two floors up from their suite by elevator and stepped into the hallway. There was considerable bustle as sellers found their rooms and arrayed their wares on tables already set up.

“You go in there,” Dino said to Stone, pointing at an open door. “Look like you’re selling or buying—you choose.”

“Gotcha,” Stone said.

“Are you still packing?”

“No, I left it in the room, unloaded.”

“I’ll be around,” Dino said.

Stone watched as a detective with a shotgun went into a coat closet and closed the door behind him. Another detective, pretending to be a seller, buttoned his jacket to conceal his weapon.

Then suddenly, and very quietly, the room was flooded with SWAT members, armed and wearing masks. The occupants of the room were covered, and two men went to the closet door, yanked it open, and rousted the surprised detective, then everybody was frisked and disarmed. Nobody said a word. Two of the SWAT team raked jewelry into a bag, then they left the room, leaving one man to cover the room. He was enough.

Stone stood there and listened but heard nothing except the breathing of the people around him. Three or four minutes passed, then the man covering them stepped into the hall. “Nobody move,” he said, then closed the door behind him.

Stone tried the phone: dead. His cell phone had no signal.