Part 13 (1/2)

The British a.s.sa.s.sin entered the Holland Tunnel from Manhattan to New Jersey at a little after twelve noon.

It began to snow lightly when he came out of the tunnel. He turned up the heat in the rental car, a Chevy Camaro LS, which he thought would be c.r.a.p, but it was actually surprisingly nice, fast, comfortable, and quiet.

He drove through Jersey City and got off I-78 before the Newark Bay Bridge. At a Sh.e.l.l station on the opposite side of the exit ramp, he stopped and went in and bought a cold bottle of raspberry-lime seltzer that he drank as he checked the address again on his phone.

After he had his bearings, he sat patiently, sipping his refres.h.i.+ng beverage as he looked out at the traffic on the exit ramp for another few minutes. He'd already made several maneuvers to deter surveillance, but you couldn't be too careful.

Things were looking positive, for a change. He'd been able to establish contact with a new representative for the client last night, and everything was full speed ahead again. Regrettably, someone had tortured the information regarding his whereabouts out of his handler, Pavel. They didn't know who this inquisitive person was, but they were thinking perhaps a member of the CIA, as the torturer seemed to know a lot about what was going on and was an American.

He thought about what had happened at Gramercy Park. Whoever was after him, he was confident he could handle it.

The client apologized profusely for such an unfortunate incident and, in addition to getting him a new handler, offered compensation for the screwup on their end in the form of a 50 percent increase in fee upon completion of the job.

Being a good sport, the British a.s.sa.s.sin had readily accepted the apology. And, of course, the money. It was the least he could do. One never wanted to disappoint so gracious a client.

Drink and thoughts finished, he pulled out of the gas station. Ten miles and minutes later, he pulled off 440 onto Pulaski Street near Port Jersey Boulevard. He pa.s.sed along a couple of football field lengths of chain-link fence with s.h.i.+pping containers stacked behind it before turning into a parking lot.

The low, ugly brown brick building he parked in front of had the words FLEET LINE RENTALS above the door. There was a security camera bolted to the brick beside the sign, so he pulled a bloodred Was.h.i.+ngton Nationals ball cap low over his eyes before he got out of the car.

Spa music was playing softly in the small reception area inside. The office was quite dingy, but in one wall sat a plate gla.s.s window with an open view of the Manhattan skyline across New York Bay.

”Can I help you?” said a middle-aged woman from a windowed slot in the scuffed Sheetrock wall after a couple of moments.

”Yes. I spoke to Mr. Rodriguez this morning. My name is Peters,” the British a.s.sa.s.sin said with a perfect Midwestern American accent. ”Is he around?”

”He's on the phone. If you have a seat, he'll be more than happy to help you when he's done.”

As he waited, he took out his phone but decided not to fiddle with it. He was trying to quit that nasty modern habit. He turned it in his hand as another atrocious spa song began. He stared out at the distant lower Manhattan skyline, the ugly new Freedom Tower standing out like a broken tooth. As he watched, two tugs appeared close offsh.o.r.e, pulling a bulk freighter through the Claremont Terminal Channel.

”Mr. Peters?” said Rodriguez, suddenly standing beside him. He was a heavy, very pale, bald Hispanic man with striking hazel eyes.

”Mr. Rodriguez. Thanks for meeting with me,” the British a.s.sa.s.sin said, shaking Rodriguez's soft, gold-ringed hand.

”Thank you for waiting,” Rodriguez said, swiping away sweat from his forehead as he nodded rapidly with a little smile. ”I had one of my guys bring her up this morning so you could take a look right away. If you'll follow me.”

They went out back. Parked in front of a five-vehicle bay of garage doors was a fifty-thousand-pound tri-axle Caterpillar dump truck, blue in color. It looked far bigger than it had in the online ad, the British a.s.sa.s.sin thought, concerned. A real monster. Maybe it was too big.

He took a slow walk around it.

”How old?”

”Two thousand eleven. But it runs perfectly,” Rodriguez said. ”Listen.” He nimbly climbed up and turned it over. It coughed once, and again, and then snarled to throaty, rumbling life.

”Sounds great,” the a.s.sa.s.sin said.

”You need it for a month?”

”Yes,” the a.s.sa.s.sin said. ”Tell me: off the top of your head, how wide is it?”

”Did you say wide?” Rodriguez said, squinting at him.

The British a.s.sa.s.sin smiled, nodded.

”Um, standard width,” Rodriguez said with a shrug. ”Eight and a half feet, same as a tractor-trailer.”

Excellent, the British a.s.sa.s.sin thought. It would be snug, but it would fit.

”Shall we start the paperwork?” asked Rodriguez hopefully.

The British a.s.sa.s.sin smiled again.

”Yes,” he said. ”Let's.”

Chapter 46.

Around two on Wednesday, Doyle called with news on the Rafael Arruda drug hit that he needed to share with me in person.

Thirty minutes later, I found him and my other protege, Detective Lopez, in Was.h.i.+ngton Heights' Thirty-Third Precinct's second-floor break room.

With a grand flourish, I placed on the table, between the Styrofoam cups of wretched coffee they were nursing, the plastic bag I was holding and removed the two huge waxed paper soda cups and perfectly greasy white paper bags that I'd just brought them from Shake Shack.

”Eat, gentlemen,” I said. ”And talk.”

”We'd hit a brick wall in the investigation, Mike,” Doyle said between bites of his double cheese with bacon. ”No witnesses, no nothing. So we decided to go back and look at all our video that faced the street near the drug building two weeks prior. I mean, it was just hours and hours of nothing. I was thinking maybe we could market the tape as the breakthrough cure for insomnia when we saw him.”

”Who?” I said.

”This neighborhood guy,” said Arturo, smiling. ”His name is Sol. Sol Badillo. But everybody calls him Jinete, which means, like, jockey in Spanish, on account of he used to be a horse trainer or something when he was younger.”

”Sol's one of these hang-around guys you often see in an inner-city hood,” Doyle said. ”Divorced, late fifties, lives with his grown daughter. He's sort of a super's helper, runs errands in the local stores, deals a little weed on the side. He's in and out of the barbershop every five minutes. He patrols the block the way a beat cop does, but instead of enforcing the law, he more likely helps the friendly neighborhood crooks break it.”

”Exactly,” Arturo said. ”In medieval times, this guy would be, like, the town crier or fool. He shuffles around twenty-four/seven and acts like he's half homeless or crazy, but meanwhile, he knows everything and everyone on the block. He's like the block's memory. Its underground eyewitness news anchor.”

”Go on,” I said, smiling. I liked the sound of this.

”Jinete was actually one of the first guys we canva.s.sed,” said Doyle. ”Of course, he said he didn't know anything, but then we saw him in the video. Two weeks prior to the hit, plain as day, he puts a camera in a car parked across the street from the drug building.”

”The camera was pointing right at the building?” I said.

Doyle nodded, sipping his shake.