Death Angel (13 page)

So he waited, and he watched. He was as curious as ever about
Salinas’s future plans, but while he didn’t have many virtues, patience was one he possessed in abundance. Something was going on; he could tell by the expressions on the faces of
Salinas’s goons, on
Salinas himself. The assassin had observed the man coming and going several times, and it was obvious he was in a bitch of a bad mood.

When he judged
Salinas had waited long enough, he first indulged himself with a leisurely tour of the
Metropolitan
Museum
, which was one of his favorite places in
New York
. He didn’t mind the tourists, or the gaggles of children; the exhibits were their own reward. When he was finished, he stood on the broad steps and made the call.

“Come to the penthouse,”
Salinas ordered. “When can you be here?”

“I’m nearby,” the assassin said calmly, “but it’s a nice day. Bethesda Terrace, in half an hour.” He disconnected, then turned off his phone and slipped it into his pocket. Not only would Salinas have trouble setting up an ambush in such a short time, but the Terrace was a public place, full of both tourists and city residents. It was also wide open, so his avenue of approach wouldn’t be limited. From there he could disappear into the depths of Central Park, should
Salinas be of a mind to have him followed.

He had no idea exactly where
Salinas was, so half an hour might be an impossible deadline for him to meet. For himself, though, Bethesda Terrace was a pleasant walk. If
Salinas was up in the penthouse, he’d have plenty of time to get there. If he was across town…tough. For something important, he’d make contact again.

The assassin enjoyed making things difficult for the bastard, even in such a small way. Pleasure came where he found it, though, so he followed both his instinct to play it safe, and his inclination to jerk
Salinas’s chain.

He walked into the park, pausing to get an ice-cream cone. Though he knew the park fairly well, he nevertheless bought a map, and spent a few minutes studying it because he liked to know exactly what his options were if he happened to need one. He kept the map in his hand, knowing
Salinas would spot it, and draw the conclusion that the assassin didn’t live locally and therefore wasn’t familiar with the layout of the park. The conclusion would be half right, because he didn’t really live in any one place; he stayed in various places for various lengths of time, and right now that place happened to be a few floors below
Salinas.

He found a vantage point and watched. If he saw anything that looked suspicious, he’d call off the meet. He knew
Salinas wouldn’t meet him alone; a man like that couldn’t afford to go anywhere without his muscle in attendance. The assassin didn’t worry about the thugs he could see, though; it was the ones who weren’t out in the open that he looked for.

Finally he saw
Salinas, only a couple of minutes late, and with three men behind him. The assassin studied the surroundings, but didn’t see anything suspicious: he knew many of
Salinas’s men on sight, so he didn’t have to rely only on behavior in judging whether or not it was safe to approach. No one appeared to be lurking without reason, no one seemed to be trying to stay out of sight. Finally he left his own concealment and strolled forward, still eating his ice cream.

Salinas
was irritably checking his watch when he looked up and saw the assassin. “You’re late,” he snarled as he gestured his men back.

“Long line at the ice-cream stand,” the assassin said lazily. “What’s up?”

Salinas
looked around, then took an old-fashioned transistor radio from his pocket and turned it on. The volume was loud, so loud that if
Salinas hadn’t taken a step closer, the assassin couldn’t have heard him.

“Drea stole two million bucks from me, four days ago, and took a powder. I want you to find her and take care of the matter. Permanently.”

A rivulet of melted ice cream trickled down the cone. The assassin caught it with his tongue, hiding his surprise. “You sure? She didn’t seem bright enough—though I guess that would be the proof, right?”

“I’m sure.”
Salinas gave a grim smile. “And, yeah, on the list of stupid things to do, ripping me off is right at the top.”

10

NEVER PISS OFF A SMART WOMAN.

Given the timing, he didn’t have to be a genius to understand what had happened. Drea had been more than upset by
Salinas giving her away; she’d been furious. This wasn’t just an “I’m leaving you” message, but an “I’m leaving you and take that you bastard!” gesture. As gestures went, it was an attention-getter.

Amused, he took another lick of ice cream. He was more inclined to applaud her than go hunting for her. Still, a job was a job. “Make your best offer,” he drawled. “What’s it worth to you?” He couldn’t decide if he’d take the job until he knew how much was on the table.

Salinas
looked around and thumbed the volume on the radio even higher. The people passing by gave him annoyed looks, not that he gave a shit. “The same amount she stole.”

Two million, huh? That definitely put a different light on the situation. He’d have to think about it, but in the meantime he didn’t want
Salinas looking for anyone else to take care of the situation. If he didn’t take the job, his delay would at least give Drea a better chance of getting away clean, and the thought gave him a certain satisfaction. He didn’t have to like his clients, but he had nothing but contempt for
Salinas.

“Half up front,” the assassin said. “I’ll let you know where to wire it.” Then he tossed the rest of the ice-cream cone in a nearby trash can and strolled away, his manner relaxed, though his eyes never stopped searching his surroundings. He spotted someone who was almost certainly a fed, too suit-and-tie for his surroundings, stooping to tie his shoe while keeping his head slightly turned in
Salinas’s direction. That would be
Salinas’s tail, hurrying to catch up.

The assassin wasn’t particularly concerned. His meeting with
Salinas had taken less than a minute, not enough time for a tail to get in place and snap some photos. By the time the tail had arrived, the meeting was over and he was already walking away. He went across the
Bow
Bridge
, then into the heavily wooded Ramble, where there was plenty of cover. Though the day was hot and humid, the temperature hovering close to ninety, there under the thick shade the air was cooler, and he could feel a slight but pleasant breeze against his skin.

He deliberately didn’t think about the offer; time enough for that later, when he was certain he wasn’t being followed. As a matter of habit he focused intensely on the right now, aware of everyone around him, whether or not anyone was approaching him from behind, what his ever-changing avenues of escape were. Paying attention to details had kept him alive this long, so he saw no reason to change his habits. That was why he spotted the second tail almost right away; this guy wore jeans and running shoes, so he wasn’t the fed who’d been following
Salinas.

The assassin calmly analyzed the situation. Just because this new tail wore casual clothes, didn’t mean he wasn’t a fed. It just meant he was better prepared. The FBI wouldn’t have any reason for having him followed other than his meeting with
Salinas; it was possible they were exploring any and all contacts. Or the tail could be one of
Salinas’s goons, following him for God knows why. Maybe
Salinas was pissed because he’d had to walk to the park, and he thought an attitude adjustment in the form of a beating was needed—though, in that case, he’d better send more than one man. Maybe he wanted to know where the assassin lived, no more than that, on the theory that there was no such thing as too much information.

He kept a steady pace. Up ahead the path took a sharp turn, and the tail’s view would be blocked by trees and shrubbery for…he considered how far behind him the tail was…about seven seconds, which was plenty long enough. The tail must have noticed the same blind spot, because he picked up the pace. The assassin didn’t respond by speeding up, which would have telegraphed his awareness he was being followed. He was close enough that it didn’t matter, though his time was down to about five seconds.

He made the turn, whirled, stripped his white shirt off over his head and crumpled it in his hand as if it were a towel, then burst into the steady, loping pace of a runner as he rounded the turn going back in the direction from which he’d come.

The tail didn’t even glance at him as he loped by; instead, the guy was hurrying to get around the turn and get him back in vision.

Good luck with that, he thought as he cut off the path and disappeared into the thick growth. He was just another shirtless runner, among hundreds, maybe thousands, who were sweating through their routines in the park that day. His dark gray pants, at first glance, would resemble sweatpants enough that no one would think twice about him. Only his shoes would be a giveaway, because who went jogging in Gucci loafers? Evidently he did, but it wasn’t something he recommended.

When he was a hundred yards away, he paused to pull on his shirt. The humid heat had caused sweat to sheen his skin, and the fabric stuck to him as he tugged it into place, but he wasn’t breathing any faster than normal. Keeping a leisurely pace, he made his way out of the park.

“DID YOU GET a shot of the meet?” Rick Cotton asked, his expression calm as he listened to the answer.

Xavier Jackson marveled at Cotton’s forbearance. He hadn’t said, “Did you at least get a shot of the meet?” and there was nothing in his tone that implied any hint of impatience. Most SACs would have been biting heads off left and right, but not Cotton. He was always fair, even when the results weren’t what he’d hoped for.

They hadn’t been prepared for
Salinas to walk anywhere, much less into
Central Park. By the time the agent on the street had realized
Salinas wasn’t being picked up by a car, he and his entourage had already been halfway down the block. Then, though he’d been hurrying as unobtrusively as possible to catch up, a traffic signal had caught him and forced him to wait before he could cross the street. As a result, the meet had already happened before the agent could catch up, and all he could give them was a partial description of the man Salinas had gone to meet, for all the good it did them. About six-one, two hundred pounds, short dark hair described at least a hundred thousand men in the area, if not more.

“I think it was the same man on the balcony with the girlfriend,” Cotton said when he hung up.

Jackson
thought so, too. The big question was, where was the girlfriend? She’d left four days ago, and hadn’t been seen since. They had stopped following her months ago, because their budget and manpower was limited and using it to follow
Salinas himself had been deemed more productive. Besides, she’d never done anything interesting, at least not until that scene on the balcony.

Maybe her absence was due to nothing more dramatic than a breakup with
Salinas, but something was going on.
Salinas and his men were stomping around as if they were spoiling for a fight with someone, anyone. If it were just a breakup, Salinas might—might—be upset, but his men wouldn’t be.

And now
Salinas had met with probably the same man who’d been on the balcony making love to
Salinas’s girlfriend. Something was going on, but it was more than likely personal crap, and they weren’t interested in that. Unless they could use it against him somehow,
Salinas’s love life was his problem, not theirs.

THERE WERE OVER twenty-three hundred known street surveillance cameras in
New York City, and God only knew how many hidden ones. If anyone was on the street in the city, odds were he, or she, would be caught on camera, which was why he was always so careful to change his appearance on a regular basis. Even if he happened to be tracked on camera, his trail would be lost when he entered a building as one person and left as someone else. Only extensive analysis would, with a lot of luck, pick him up again, and he went to great pains, in this country, to ensure he wasn’t worth taking that much trouble.