Tick Tock (26 page)

STARVING AND BITING MAD, I listened to some more Gov’t Mule as I hammered back toward Manhattan’s big-city bright lights. It was nine thirty on the button when I rapped on Emily’s hotel room door.

She surprised me when she answered it. She was in a bathrobe.

“Hey, Mike,” Agent Parker said, hurrying toward the suite’s bedroom after she let me in. “Karen isn’t here yet. Why don’t you have a seat and a drink while I get changed?”

“Twist my arm,” I said, spotting a six of Brooklyn Lager on a table by the terrace door.

I rolled open the sliders to her room’s small terrace and drank by the rail. The first beer was good. The second even better. Down on the street in front of the hotel, taxis were lined up back to Central Park West. One after the other, they pulled into the hotel’s driveway, and well-dressed,
smiling folks got into them on their way to a night on the town. With my drink, the sultry night air, and the romantic city lights, I felt like I was having one, too. Almost, at least.

I decided to raise my drink to them and the city at large. I was proud of them. They weren’t going to let Apt ruin their night. That’s what the Carl Apts of the world didn’t understand, I thought as I took an icy sip. New York was just like the human race. Sure you could scare it, slow it down, maybe even halt it for a little while. But it kept right the hell on going. No matter what. That was the best thing about New York City.

“Mike, where are you?” Emily called behind me.

“Out here,” I said, turning.

I froze in midspin by the terrace sliders. Inside the doorway, Emily wasn’t wearing her usual Fed business getup. She was wearing a midnight blue dress. A short dress that hugged her hips and showed a lot of cleavage. As I failed to close my gaping mouth, she fingered the string of pearls around her neck.

I was still stumped for a verbal reaction when there was a knock on the door.

“Is that Karen?” I finally said.

“I don’t know. Go see,” Emily said.

It wasn’t Karen. It was two white-jacketed room service guys with two white-linen-covered rolling tables. On one table were two silver trays, on the other two silver buckets. They wheeled them both out onto the terrace and brought
out two chairs. The older of the waiters smiled at me as he popped the champagne bottle’s cork.

“Shall I open the other, sir?” he said to me as he filled two flutes.

“That won’t be necessary,” Emily said, tipping the man as she shooed him off the terrace and out of the room.

“UM?” I said when she came back.

“I forgot to tell you. Karen’s not coming,” Emily said as she put a glass of champagne in my hand.

She sat down in a chair above the sparkling city lights and took a sip of her bubbly.

“In fact, she never was coming,” she said. “I made it up.”

“Why?” I said.

“Several reasons,” Emily said, staring at me as she crossed her long legs.

She was wearing high heels, I noticed. Very high, very black, peep-toed ones.

“I’ll tell you all of them as we eat, Mike,” she said as she lifted the lid of her tray.

“You should see your face,” Emily said as I sat.

“I’d rather see yours,” I said, shaking my head.

I devoured the dinner. I couldn’t decide which was better,
the perfectly cooked baby lamb chops smothered in lemon, parsley, and rosemary, or the white truffle–garlic mashed potatoes. The champagne we washed everything down with was cold crisp Veuve Clicquot. After the third glass out in the night air, I could feel bubbles dancing in my bloodstream.

Emily popped the other bottle and filled our glasses again.

“I’m still waiting for those reasons, Agent Parker,” I said, smiling at her. “Why am I here? What the heck are you doing? What the heck are we doing?”

She set down the wet bottle carefully on the linen.

“Okay. First,” she said. “Happy birthday.”

“But it’s not my birthday,” I said.

“I know,” she said, taking a little bow. “It’s mine. My thirty-fifth, to be exact.”

“No!” I said, reaching over and giving her a hug. “Happy birthday! Why didn’t you tell me?”

A huge, beaming smile crossed her face as she gazed out at the city. In the dim glow of the building lights, her face took on an amber cast, as if she were made of gold.

“Ever since I got divorced, Mike,” she said, still looking away, “I’ve dated some pretty great guys. But every time I feel myself getting close, I start thinking about this guy I know. This New York cop who, no matter how wise he is with his mouth, just can’t quite disguise the sadness in his pale blue eyes, the light in them that’s so bright yet somehow so sad.”

In the warm breeze, the candle flame flickered between us and she looked at me full on. Her beauty was always striking, but never more than at that moment. Seeing her face and smile were like looking at a gift I’d given up on getting.

“For my present, I wanted you all alone, Mike, for a couple of hours,” she said, standing and lifting the bottle off the table. “No kids. No cases.”

Her free hand found mine, and she tugged me up out of the chair and guided me into the room. She set the bottle down, closed the door, and pulled the curtain, and then she was in my arms.

“Just you,” she said, kissing me.

We kissed for a while, standing. I could feel the goose bumps on her arms as I touched her. She shivered when I laid my palm on her bare back.

“I want you, Mike,” she whispered a few wonderful minutes later. She took my hand again, this time tugging me toward her bedroom.

“I always have,” she said.

We kissed on her bed for a while, and then she broke off suddenly and headed for the bathroom.

“Get the champagne from the other room,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”

I went out and took the champagne off the coffee table. I was turning back to the bedroom when I stopped. Suddenly I couldn’t do it. I didn’t even know why. Pascal said that the heart has reasons that reason itself knows nothing about.

I placed the bottle back down on the coffee table. Instead of opening the bedroom door, I crossed the room to the hotel room door and left.

I looked back up at Emily’s terrace one time as I walked out onto the street. Then I just shook my head and headed uptown, searching for my car.

SAVORING THE LAST BITE of his Magnolia Bakery cupcake, Carl Apt crumpled the wrapper and, without breaking stride, hook-shot it at the corner garbage can he was passing. It bounced off the light post a foot in front of the can before landing in the exact center.

Bank shot! Yes! Swa-heeet! he thought as he pumped his fist.

Wiping frosting off his nose, he continued to walk south down Christopher Street in Greenwich Village. He now wore a pair of black suit pants, a crisp white shirt, red silk Hermès suspenders, and an undone red silk Hermès tie. The point of buying the outfit at Barney’s after killing Wendy was for him to blend in on the street, and it was working like a charm.

Except for his gun in the laptop bag strapped to his side, he could have been just another Wall Street hump trudging home from a busy day of destroying the world’s economy.

Despite the APBs and whatever video the NYPD had of him, he knew he was okay. He knew how hard it was to catch someone with means on the move if he didn’t want to get caught. With his ATM card and Lawrence’s dough, he could walk around forever if he wanted. If he didn’t do something stupid to get himself arrested, he would never get caught.

And the last thing he was was stupid.

He was on his way to one of his safe houses, the one in Turtle Bay, where he was going to gear up for tonight’s grand finale. He could hardly believe he was almost done. There was only one more name to go. One more target. One more hit. It was a doozie, too. He was actually looking forward to it because it was the biggest, ballsiest challenge of all.

Spotting an HSBC Bank on the opposite corner, he remembered he was running low on cash. How much would he need? he thought as he crossed the street. Two hundred? Screw it, three. After all, it was only money.

“Hey, bruva. How about a dollah, bruva?” said someone at his elbow as he was carding himself into the alcove of the bank.

He looked up and shook his head, smiling.

He’d seen white street guys with rasta dreads before, but never a pudgy Asian. The short Chinese-looking guy even had a six-string guitar with a Jamaican flag on the strap.

New York was a trip. You never knew what was going to happen next. He was going to miss it.

“Maybe, bruva. We’ll see,” Apt said.

WELCOME TO HSBC
, the screen of the ATM inside said.
PLEASE INSERT YOUR CARD
.

“The pleasure’s all mine,” he mumbled as he followed the instructions.

His account kicked out a thousand a day for expenses. Since he didn’t have to use the whole grand every day, there was more than nine grand in it.

Tonight when he was done, it would have a lot more.

Eight million more, to be exact.

It was his big payday. His retirement money. The real reason he was going to such incredible lengths to take out everyone who had ever crossed his dearly departed and extremely wealthy friend, Lawrence.

He wiped the smile off his face. He had to stop thinking about it. After all, he wasn’t done yet. Couldn’t start counting those chickens. Couldn’t get cocky now.

He typed in his card’s PIN: 32604. It was the date he’d killed his Delta Force boss. The day he’d shown bad-ass Colonel Henry Greer who really had the bigger set of balls. Greer had tried to get him transferred, but he’d ended up getting himself transferred, hadn’t he? Into the great beyond.

Apt was busy reliving his own Ode to Joy of putting two ACPs in the back of the big, ball-busting bastard’s head, when a little screen popped up that he’d never seen before:

CODE 171. INVALID ACCOUNT
.

He cocked his head at the screen like a poked rooster.

Huh? he thought. That was funny. Not funny fucking ha-ha, either. Not even a little.

He hit the cancel button, trying to get back the card to try again. But nothing happened. He tried it again, hitting the cancel button harder this time. Same result. Nothing. Shit. Why wouldn’t it return his card?

He punched in his PIN again. Nothing.

He pounded the screen, clanging panic bells going off in his head. What the hell was this? What the bloody fuck was going on?

After a moment, the screen changed, and the
PLEASE INSERT YOUR CARD
crap came back up.

No! he thought, cupping his head with his hands. How could this happen? Without the card and the money, he was wide open, on his own, completely and utterly screwed. Something was wrong. Very goddamn wrong.

“How about that dollah, bruva?” said the Asian street musician, stepping in front of him as Apt exited the bank.

There was a
snick
sound as Apt whirled instantly. He embraced the man from behind, knife already in his hand, blade in, the way they’d taught him.

The derelict’s guitar gonged against the sidewalk as the kid dropped to the sidewalk, holding his slit throat. Apt, already at the corner, calmly went down into the subway pit, Metro-carded through a turnstile, and hustled down the crowded platform.

A train came a second later, and he got on it without caring where it was going, his mind a blank screen of burning, pulsing, white-hot rage.

LAWRENCE BERGER’S LAWYER, Allen Duques, lived in New Canaan, Connecticut. His house was a nine-thousand-square-foot Tudor mansion on a fifteen-acre estate set back off an unpaved road filled with similar ridiculously ostentatious castles.

Apt knew this because he had been there twice, running errands for Lawrence. Apt knew Duques was the executor of Lawrence’s estate, which was why he was paying him a visit.

Apt used an electrical meter to check the rear chain-link fence for voltage, then bolt-cut a hole in it, all the time listening for dogs.

Through the window of the massive five-car garage was, of all things, a blue Mercedes convertible. It was an S165, even nicer than Lawrence’s, with something like 600 horsepower.

Apt smiled at his luck as he checked the load in the
suppressed Colt M1911 pistol. Instead of the rental car, which he’d left on the service road, he’d drive the German luxury rocket out of here when he was done.

He walked quickly around the perimeter of the imposing house until he spotted where the underground power and phone lines went in behind some azaleas. Sparks shot from the bolt cutter’s blade as he snipped them both at the same time.

He started to pick the rinky-dink lock on the rear kitchen door, then decided instead to tap in its window with the handle of the bolt cutter. He was inside, approaching the dining room, when he saw it. A paper printout banner stretched chest high across the threshold:

MR. APT, I KNOW HOW UPSET YOU ARE. I AM NOT HOME. THERE IS A CELL PHONE ON THE DINING ROOM TABLE. PLEASE HIT THE REDIAL SO WE MAY SPEAK. ALLEN.

A trick? Apt thought, listening very carefully. Duques was smart, almost as smart as Lawrence.

After a minute, Apt broke through the banner and picked up the Motorola in the center of the huge antique Spanish farmhouse table.

“Carl, I’m so glad you called,” Duques said with audible relief.

“Where’s my money, Allen?” Apt said.

“I froze the account. I didn’t know any other way to contact you. There have been some developments.”

“You have my complete, undivided attention, Allen.”

“I’m sorry to tell you this, but Mr. Berger is dead.”

Carl closed his eyes as he took a long deep breath. Knowing this was coming didn’t make it hurt any less.

He opened his eyes and stared at the painting over the sideboard. It looked French Impressionist, but he could tell right away that it was actually a cheap French Impressionist knockoff bought in Vietnam.

Carl swallowed, his eyes watering.

Lawrence had taught him that.

Lawrence had given him everything.