The World Beneath (Joe Tesla) (23 page)

Chapter 41

November 30, 8:57 a.m.

Starbucks, Grand Central Terminal

Vivian took her tray with four coffees from a professionally chipper teenager with buck teeth. He wished her a good day like he meant it, wiping his hands on his black apron as he turned away to help someone else have a good day. She was not a morning person, and didn’t trust people who were.

As she added sugar, wooden stirrers, and napkins to the tray, she kept her eye on a slender, dark-haired man. He was on the phone, speaking in measured tones, drinking a coffee and minding his own business. Something about him put her on edge.

She couldn’t analyze it, but it was a feeling that had saved her life more than once. When he ended his call and left the coffee shop, she followed. The terminal was packed with commuters, so it was easy to put enough space between them to keep him from becoming suspicious.

He walked at an easy pace, not too slow and not too fast. He wasn’t in any hurry, but he had someplace to be. As he stepped to the side to let a couple of teens holding hands pass, his jacket flipped open, and she saw the gun tucked into a neat shoulder holster.

She switched the coffee tray to her left hand so that her right would be free if she needed to draw her own gun. Until now, he’d seemed like an ordinary guy heading through the concourse after having his coffee. But he wasn’t.

The way he looked from side to side, studying faces, how people walked, and where the exits were spoke of an elevated situational awareness that most people didn’t possess. He was expecting trouble, or about to cause it.

When he went to the middle of the concourse and headed straight for the clock, Vivian closed the distance between them. If he took the elevator down to Tesla’s, she’d never let him go alone.

A barrel-chested man with graying ginger hair who was standing next to the north face of the clock shook the man’s hand. She recognized him—Rash Connelly. Connelly was part of the CIA team looking for Tesla. She’d met him when she came out of the elevator earlier that morning. That meant that the guy talking to him was probably part of the team—law enforcement or someone who worked for the agency. That explained his gun and his behavior. He was looking for Tesla, too. Not necessarily a good guy, but probably not a bad one, either.

She relaxed and hung back to watch. The small man and Connelly exchanged a few words. Connelly seemed irritated by whatever the man had to say, but nodded as if he agreed with the logic. Both men checked their watches, and the slender, dark-haired man headed over to the walkway that led to the arriving trains.

He looked like he had a train to catch.

Nothing unusual about that. Anyway, he wasn’t her problem, after all. Tesla was.

She headed over to Rash Connelly and smiled her best girlish smile, ready to be ingratiating. “I brought coffee.”

He took a cup and two packets of sugar. “Did you find your client?”

She sipped her own coffee and shrugged.

“Guess you wouldn’t be here if you had,” he said.

“Looks like another long day,” she said.

“Maybe not.”

“Got a new lead?” Maybe the slender man had told him something.

“Maybe I’m just optimistic.”

She laughed. “You work for the government. You can’t be optimistic.”

He ripped open a packet of sugar and dumped it in. “You’re in the private sector. Do you have some optimism to spare?”

“I used to be in government,” she said. “My supply ran out early.”

“What’s your plan?”

“I’m going to bring this coffee down to the guys, check the tunnels.”

“You think he’ll show up down there? He has to know that we’ve got it covered.”

“People surprise you sometimes,” she said. She added another sentence, hoping it made her sound lazy: “And sitting in a nice, cozy living room beats stomping around underground not finding anything.”

When she turned toward the information booth, she saw a flicker of irritation cross his face. He wasn’t excited about a day in the tunnels, either.

“Good morning, Evaline,” Vivian said to the black woman behind the counter. She’d first met her when she’d taken the elevator with Tesla, just a few days ago.

“Good morning, Miss Torres.” Evaline gave her a friendly smile. Her eyes flicked across Connelly, but she didn’t say anything to him. “Are you going back down?”

“I am indeed,” Vivian answered. “But I brought you a coffee.”

Evaline’s smile widened. “Thank you.”

She opened the door to the concourse and ushered Vivian aside. Connelly stayed outside, drinking his coffee and staring moodily in the direction that the dark-haired man had taken.

Vivian handed her one of the coffees, and Evaline set it on her desk. As she unlocked the door in the pillar, Evaline spoke in a low voice.

“I hope you find him first, Miss Torres. Mr. Tesla isn’t a killer, like they say, and I worry for him.”

Vivian fingered the syringe in her pocket. “Me, too.”

Chapter 42

November 30, 9:03 a.m.

Harlem Line train

Dr. Dubois leaned forward in his blue seat, watching the other early-morning passengers in the well-heated train car. The blue seats were full. The car was standing room only this early in the day, but a young man with four piercings in his eyebrow and a nose ring had given up his seat for the doctor when he’d hobbled into the car on his crutches. The doctor had taken the seat as his due.

He shifted his aching leg to the side. After his meeting today, he would allow himself some Percocet to dull the pain, but not before. He was so close now.

The gray winter sun and bare tree trunks passing by outside couldn’t dampen his mood. He looked around the car. People sat reading, playing with their phones or staring out the window, all stuck in their humdrum lives. Today, for him, was a culmination.

He would hand off the serum to put his parasites into a massive trial that would prove he was a visionary. Soldiers would not have to worry about fear as they did their jobs, and they would not have to deal with long-term stress afterward. His work would spare them that.

Saddiq’s call had put him on edge. He studied the relaxed figures around him. None of them spared him a second glance. They all seemed as innocuous as they had before the call. Tesla was not here.

The doctor drummed his fingers on his metal briefcase as the train rattled toward the long low entrance to the tunnel that would take them underground and down to Grand Central Terminal. He pulled the briefcase up further on his lap, keeping it close.

He’d feel better once he’d handed everything off, and the trials were underway. At that point, everyone would have too much to lose to expose him. And the parasite worked. Maybe not perfectly, but every war has casualties, and every drug has side effects. Overall, everyone would be better off.

Especially him.

The train slowed as it headed underground, darkness washing across the outside of the car. Inside, the fluorescent lights shone brightly. Dr. Dubois studied his reflection in the window. Bags under his eyes made him look tired. He should look tired—he hadn’t slept since Subject 523 had shot him. Not real sleep, anyway, just narcotics-induced unconsciousness. But his leg was healing, and once this trial got underway he could relax. There would be plenty of time to sleep then.

He leaned his forehead against the cool glass and peered into the darkness that lay beyond. The train slowed still further. Other sets of silver tracks joined with his. They were just slowing for the approach to the platform. The train always did that.

In just a few minutes the train would arrive, probably at Platform 112. He had a long trek up ramps and across treacherously smooth floors before he could get a cab. After that he’d be able to rest again on his way to his meeting.

One long finger stroked the top of the cold briefcase. He had held it tightly the whole trip, as if it might spring from his hands and leap out the window. Or be stolen. Unthinkable, and unlikely.

When he’d left the case unattended in the lab while he’d gone to the toilet, an overzealous postdoc lab assistant had plastered yellow biohazard stickers on both sides, as regulations required. The doctor had been furious, thinking that it might make it more difficult for him to board the train, but none of his fellow passengers had seemed to notice or care. If they had, who among them would have wanted to steal a biological hazard?

A woman with a poison-green scarf leaned her hip against the edge of his seat, a paperback novel open in her hand. She’d barely looked up from its pages since she’d boarded. Next to her, a businessman in a pinstriped suit crackled his
Wall Street Journal
. The young man with the piercings looked toward the dark windows, swaying in time to music that was piped into his ears via tiny black earbuds. Everything was normal.

He returned his gaze to the window. Nothing—just a wide room with faraway stone walls and lines of steel girders to hold up the ceiling. He’d seen the view a thousand times on his way to the city. Nothing to cause concern.

Then the car stopped.

Dr. Dubois pulled the briefcase closer to his chest. Despite his earlier assurances to himself, his heart fluttered. This felt wrong.

No one else seemed concerned. The woman with the green scarf licked her finger and turned a page in her paperback. The businessman’s eyes kept scanning down his newspaper. The kid with the earbuds didn’t pause in his rhythmic swaying. This kind of thing happened all the time. Probably just a train ahead of them in the station.

A shadow drew his attention outside. There was a man in the tunnel, walking next to the train. He was tall and thin and dressed all in black except for an orange safety vest. Clearly an MTA employee. Perhaps he knew the reason for the delay. Likely a mechanical problem that wouldn’t keep them stuck for long. His meeting must commence on time.

The train worker stopped next to the car ahead of theirs and looked inside for several seconds before moving slowly to the doctor’s car. The man seemed to be examining each seat, glancing quickly from one part of the car to another as if searching.

Anxiety tightened Dubois’s muscles, making his leg throb.

The man stopped directly outside the doctor’s window. He continued his examination until he reached the doctor’s seat. Their eyes met. The man looked at him for a long time before shifting his glance to the next passenger. The doctor squirmed in his seat, eyes darting around the car. There was nowhere to go.

Saddiq’s caution had been justified. Dr. Dubois glanced at his watch. 9:10. The train should have already arrived at the station. Maybe Saddiq had defied him. He would worry when the train didn’t arrive. He would come.

The man in the tunnel smiled.

Dr. Dubois knew what he was looking for now.

The man was looking for him.

Chapter 43

November 30, 9:09 a.m.

Tunnels under Grand Central Terminal

Joe stared up into the lit train window. The smell of metal and electricity surrounded him. Trains shouldered by on other tracks, none concerned with the blue and silver train sitting stock still on its tracks. Trains stopped all the time to wait for a train to clear the station ahead.

But this train’s stop had nothing to do with the schedule. He had caused it by resetting its digital wireless signaler. The signaler gave each train permission to move forward. He estimated that he had about five to seven minutes before the central switching center noticed and reset the signaler again and the train moved forward to Platform 112.

He’d better make it count.

Dr. Dubois was in the second car. He looked just like his photo on his company web site, except more tired. Everyone looked more tired in real life than on the Internet. A silver briefcase with a biohazard sticker on the front rested on his lap. It looked as if he had brought the serum with him after all. Joe needed to get that case.

Joe ran to the side of the train car and pulled himself up in the space between the first and second cars. Taking a deep breath, he opened the door and entered. The car was full, standing room only, and he elbowed his way forward through the passengers.

The doctor was near the far end of the car. When he saw him, the doctor struggled to his feet, fumbling with his crutches. But he had nowhere to go.

Joe reached him and took hold of one of his crutches.

“Help!” Dr. Dubois wobbled on the other crutch.

A guy with a face full of piercings reached for Joe’s arm. “What do you think—”

“Careful, buddy,” Joe said. “I’m just here to save your life.”

The guy grabbed Joe’s elbow. “How?”

“I’m from the railroad.” Joe pointed at his orange vest. “They sent me down to get this case before it gets into the station.”

The doctor goggled at him.

“Are you Dr. Francis Dubois?” Joe asked.

“I…no,” said the doctor.

“You’re the only one on this train carrying a biohazard,” Joe said, “into a crowded railway station.”

“Nothing’s infectious,” the doctor said. “It’s just tissue samples.”

The doctor wrapped both arms around his briefcase.

Joe could tell that he was lying and, clearly, so could the man with the piercings. He let go of Joe’s elbow.

“I need to get that case off the train,” Joe said. “Please hand it to me.”

“Under no circumstances,” the doctor screeched.

The passengers edged away from them, except for the man with the piercings, who looked ready to pick a side and pile in. Joe hoped that the man would be on his side.

“Whose tissue samples?” Joe asked quietly. “The ones for the hundred and three people whose boat sank just off the coast of Cuba—”

“No.” The doctor regained his dignity. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Joe held out his hands. “Give me the case. The officers in charge of quarantine can decide what to do about it. You can come with me, if you’d like.”

“Give him the case,” said the guy with the piercings.

A woman wearing a green scarf nodded.

The businessman looked confused, and the people around him began to mumble to each other. No one was sure if Joe was a helper or a threat. He didn’t have time to win anybody over.

“You will regret this,” said the doctor. “You think you can take this case? Hold me here?”

Joe’d had enough. “Of course I can. You know that the contents of that case can infect thousands of people. To keep people safe, I can take it. And I will.”

“Those are brave words from a murderer,” said the doctor. “What newspaper would print your allegations, Mr. Tesla?”

The man with the piercings looked uncertain now. He must have read the
New York Post
.

Joe didn’t have time to argue. He reached for the case.

The door at the other end of the car slammed open and a thin, dark-haired man stood in the doorway. Joe recognized his silhouette and his walk. Ozan Saddiq.

“Step away from that man,” Saddiq called down the train car. He drew a gun from under his coat and pointed it at Joe.

Panic erupted in the train car. People threw themselves to the floor and tried to crawl under the seats.

Joe kicked out Dr. Dubois’s crutch and grabbed his aluminum case as the man fell. The doctor wouldn’t let go until Joe twisted it in a fast circle and smashed it into his face.

The doctor stared at him, aghast.

“I’m not done with you,” Joe said. “Not by a long shot.”

The doctor brought both hands up to his streaming nose.

“Saddiq!” he called.

A gunshot echoed in the tiny space. Heat seared Joe’s ear. He dropped to the floor, still holding the briefcase, and dove the last few feet to the door at his end of the car. He leaned against it and pulled the door open one-handed. He fell more than jumped forward.

The ground jarred his ankles when he landed.

Joe looked back at the train car. The engineer had left his post at the front of the car to investigate the commotion. He wasn’t far from where Joe had been standing.

Saddiq jumped out of the rear of the car, and Joe ran around toward the front. He needed to keep the train between them as long as possible. The case bounced against his knee. He hoped that it wouldn’t turn the area into a biological waste site if it or something inside it broke.

The train lurched ahead. Joe sprinted forward a few yards, then cut in front of the engine as the train gained momentum. He heard another gunshot.

Pain blasted up his right arm.