The Equalizer (79 page)

“Not to me,” McCall said. “Are they in this restaurant? Just look around casually, as if you're a little restless while I talk.” Laura glanced around the busy room. “What else did Emily's ex-boyfriend say at Morgan Stanley tonight? Anything you can remember, no matter how insignificant it might have seemed.”

“Well, Blake, that's his name, Blake Cunningham, sounds like he should be in a soap, doesn't it? He was on his cell phone when he walked out of his office. I was waiting for him in the reception area. He was repeating an address. He was startled to see me and got off the phone.” She looked back at McCall. “They're not here.”

“What does Blake look like?”

“Maybe six-two, dirty blond hair, an athlete's body.”

“What was the address he repeated?”

“Eighty-nine Whitehall Street.”

“That's near the docks, outside Battery Park. He was going there tonight?”

“He said, ‘When does it start?' I heard the person on the phone say, ‘Midnight.' Then Blake saw me and hung up.”

“We'll go there,” McCall said.

“Then you believe me?”

McCall reached across the table and took her hand to stop it from trembling.

“I'm going to find your daughter. If she's in danger…”

“You'll equalize those odds?” she asked, smiling through her tears.

“Yes,” McCall said. “I will.”

When they walked out, McCall looked into one of the mirrors along the top of the opposite booths. He saw the two young men he'd noted when he first walked in, who'd been watching Laura, get up from their table and follow them.

*   *   *

Eighty-nine Whitehall Street turned out to be a deserted office building under construction. Faint music pounded from the shell. McCall paid off a cab and he and Laura walked around to an alleyway at the back. That's where the action was. There were four entrances to the building, all of them being monitored by young men in burn masks, giving their faces a hideous, macabre look. Young people were pouring inside, but there were enough older partygoers that McCall and Laura weren't completely out of place.

The first three floors of the building were open—no ceilings. Stairs crawled up from four or five places. The music reverberated up to the rafters. There were six bars set up. The floors were so jammed with people dancing or standing drinking it was hard to move. McCall and Laura were jostled as they pushed their way deeper inside.

“Rave party,” Laura said, keeping her voice low, not that anyone could have heard her.

McCall nodded. He was watching the drugs being handed out freely, little packets of pills. Molly's. Joints were being passed around. The drinks consisted of wine and beer. The music was loud enough for eardrums to bleed.

Suddenly Laura gripped McCall's arm.

“Oh, my God,” she said. “There's Emily!”

She pointed to a part of the dance floor where it was hard to locate just one person. But McCall saw her. She was dancing apparently on her own, in a black goth outfit, torn in revealing places, ripped stockings, her face with black Alice Cooper tears on it, pale makeup. Her hair was jet black.

“She's changed her hair color,” Laura said. “She's lost so much weight. It doesn't even look like Em, but that's her.”

“You're sure?”

“I know my daughter. Even if I've never seen her like this before. She's high.”

“Stay here,” McCall said. “Put your back against this pillar. Don't move from this spot. I'll bring her to you.”

Laura put her back against one of the big steel columns. She watched her daughter gyrating in the center of the ground floor. Her eyes filled again with tears.

McCall pushed his way through the dancers toward the girl. He picked up the two young men who'd been at the River Café behind him in the crowd. He noted three other young men on his right, coming down stairs from the next level, heading for his client's daughter. On his left two more men were edging their way toward her.

Going to create a barrier right around her.

McCall looked up. Two more men leaned on the iron railing on the next level, watching Emily be surrounded. They'd spotted McCall and both of them had their coats open, revealing Heckler & Koch 9 mm pistols in their belts.

A young man with dirty blond hair in a dark business suit pushed aggressively through the crowd right up to Emily. This had to be Blake Cunningham. He grabbed the girl's arm and swung her around to face him.

Then he backhanded her.

McCall heard Control's voice in his mind.

Just make sure the odds you're equalizing aren't too high. Will you do that for me, Robert?

McCall counted his adversaries, two behind him, five on either side, closing in on the girl, her ex-boyfriend holding on to her wrist, two more above on the next level with weapons.

Ten to one.

McCall smiled.

He'd take those odds.

 

A
BOUT THE
A
UTHOR

MICHAEL SLOAN
has been a showrunner on such TV series as
Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Kung Fu: The Legend Continues,
and
The Outer Limits.
He has also written and produced numerous TV movies and features. He co-created the series
The Equalizer
for Universal TV and CBS, and is one of the producers of a feature-film version of
The Equalizer
for Sony Pictures, which stars Denzel Washington in the title role of Robert McCall. Michael is married to actress Melissa Anderson, and they have two children, Piper and Griffin.

 

 

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.

An imprint of St. Martin's Press.

THE EQUALIZER.
Copyright © 2014 by Michael Sloan. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

Cover design by Lisa Marie Pompilio

Cover photographs: man © CollaborationJS/Arcangel Images; street © Christian Adams/Getty Images; newspaper ©
Shutterstock.com

www.thomasdunnebooks.com

www.stmartins.com

eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to [email protected].

The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

ISBN 978-1-250-04196-8 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-4668-3916-8 (e-book)

e-ISBN 9781466839168

First Edition: August 2014