Dark City (Repairman Jack - Early Years 02) (23 page)

“Hadya, you are a guest here. It is not your place to question my comings and goings.”

She lowered her head in acknowledgment. “May I ask you a question on another matter, then?”

“Of course. A question about the imam’s teachings?”

“No. At the bakery today they were talking about the brutal murder of one of Sheikh Omar’s enemies.”

Kadir’s insides tightened. “Yes. A terrible thing.”

“People think Sheikh Omar is responsible.”

“Lies!” he shouted.

Hadya flinched back. “But they say he issued a fatwa—”

“That is true, but this is all a plot by the FBI to discredit him in the eyes of the faithful! Why do you vex me with this nonsense?”

“Because…”

“Because why?”

“Because although his body was discovered on Thursday, they say he was murdered sometime between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.”

A wave of cold swept over Kadir. He had a feeling where this was going.

“So?”

“Wednesday morning you came home with blood on your pants. Please tell me that didn’t come from the murdered man.”

Kadir resisted a sudden urge to throttle her. Keeping his voice low, he said, “How could you think such a thing of me?”

She shrugged. “I do not think. I am asking. You are devoted to Sheikh Omar, who declared that Mister Shalabi was no longer a Muslim. You came home after the time of his death with pants that were bloody but not torn. I can’t help but have questions.”

Kadir bottled his scream of rage. He had to put a stop to this line of thinking here and now.

He grabbed his Qur’an from the shelf and held it before him. Closing his eyes he said, “I swear by Allah that I did not in any way harm Mustafa Shalabi. Nor do I know the identity of whoever did him harm.” He opened his eyes and stared at her. “Now do you believe?”

She looked genuinely contrite. “Of course. I know your righteousness. You would never swear a false oath in the name of Allah. I am sorry I thought…” She shook her head. “It’s just…” She seemed to run out of words.

Time to act the big brother.

“I forgive you. You are new to this strange land. It is all overwhelming. I was overwhelmed too at first, but I came to see that I was here for a holy purpose.” He pointed to the tape player. “Go back to the tape. Continue your education in jihad, your enlightenment as to our true purpose here.”

She looked away and reached for the player. “Yes … my education.” She rose. “I will leave you to your nap and listen in the bedroom.”

When the door closed behind her, he held up his Qur’an and gave silent thanks to God that his sister was listening to the wisdom of the imam. He also prayed that tomorrow’s endeavor would have a successful end.

TUESDAY

1

For some reason, Jack had thought it would be a good while before the Mikulskis called, but his phone rang just two days after their scenic ride. He was pretty sure it wasn’t Abe or Cristin, so that left the brothers.

“Jack.”
Black’s voice.
“Word’s out: the auction goes down two
A.M.
tomorrow.”

Jack glanced at his clock radio. “That’s like fourteen hours. Where?”

“Amityville.”

“Sheesh. A new horror.”

“Yeah. Worse than any fucking poltergeist. I’m parked on Atlantic Avenue near Fourth, with a clean view of that refugee center we talked about. Been watching for about three hours now. We’re gonna need an extra body, so if you still want in, drive on over here and relieve me.”

Jack wasn’t sure what he wanted. He wanted the sale of children stopped, for sure, but kind of wished the Mikulskis could handle it on their own. Despite all his string cutting, he felt bonded to the two murderous brothers. On the other hand, he’d made an offer on the apartment yesterday and the real estate agent had just called back: The landlord was okay with a no-credit-record tenant if he put down extra security. Jack was scheduled to meet with her in an hour.

Priorities, priorities … the apartment could wait. Those kids couldn’t.

“I’m still in. What should I bring?”

“You’ll want your heat along because we don’t know where this’ll take us. No worry about food—couple of places with takeout here, but you might want a bottle to pee in.”

“I don’t know Brooklyn that well.”

“Fastest route is the Manhattan Bridge onto Flatbush Avenue, make a right onto Atlantic. Look for the Mark Seven on your right. I’ll give you my spot.”

“I’m on my way.”

2

“You are sure you can drive?” Mr. Drexler said as the Mercedes pulled into a Hertz lot on Coney Island Avenue in Flatbush.

Reggie sat in the backseat. The robed Arab, al-Thani, had the wheel, while the man in white commanded the front passenger spot.

Reggie flexed his knees. “Good as ever.”

Not true. They were stiff and they hurt all the time, but he didn’t want to be left out of this operation.

First off, he had a personal stake. The setup was a trap for the two guys who had broken up the biggest deal of his life. If he’d been able to wholesale those girls as planned, he’d have been pretty much set for life. Well, maybe not his whole life, but he was pushing forty and his cut would have covered a damn good fucking part of the time he had left.

But even worse, his suppliers—the people who’d delivered the girls to him—never got their cut. Well, in a way they did—a big cut of the
zero
Reggie collected. As a result, he couldn’t go back to his old contacts because his name was shit with them. That made the second reason all important.

He wanted—no, he
needed
—to prove himself useful to these people, this organization. Whoever they were, they had money, they had connections, they had
power
. He’d heard about groups like this, but he’d always written them off as crackpot bullshit. But he had a growing feeling that these guys were the real deal. He knew that because they didn’t refer to themselves by some bullshit name like the Illuminati or the New World Order or anything like that. He’d heard them mention “the Order,” but never anything more specific. When your organization was so powerful that you didn’t have to mention its name, that was saying something.

He smiled at that: Not saying spoke loads louder than saying.

So he needed to be an important part of this sting. He could drive—his knees were plenty good enough for that, especially since he’d be driving automatic transmission all the way.

“But you walk with a limp,” the long-robed al-Thani said.

“I kept up with you in Sea Gate, didn’t I?”

“Not quite.”

“All right, I’ll admit I ain’t as quick as I used to be. But who is? The thing is, you know I’m game. I proved that last week. And I can do this route standing on my head.”

“Sitting in the driver’s seat will be quite enough,” Mr. Drexler said.

The guy in the white suit seemed to be the head honcho here. Al-Thani answered to him, and to a third guy Reggie had never seen, referred to sometimes as “Roman” or “Trayadoor” or something like that.

Mr. Drexler added, “I hope that the possibility of being reunited with your old acquaintance Lonnie has not caused you to overstate your abilities.”

“Not even a tiny bit, Mister D. I’m good to go. I swear.”

No lie there. No chance in hell that Lonnie would show up at this shindig. Reggie had led these two on about Lonnie being involved in the heist, and how Reggie could finger Lonnie and Lonnie could finger the two guys who’d killed everybody in sight and taken off with the girls and the money. That line of bullshit had worked to give him some value to their “Order.” But after tonight, after they’d got their hands on the two shooters, Reggie would lose that value. And so he had to find other ways to make himself useful.

Mr. Drexler looked at al-Thani. “I still prefer Szeto.”

Szeto, always fucking Szeto.

Al-Thani’s lips twisted. “Let’s think about that. Szeto is not a citizen, does not have a valid license, and has never driven the route. This man is American by birth, has a legitimate license, and he’s experienced with this sort of thing. By all criteria, he’s the better choice.”

Reggie had yet to meet an Arab he liked, but he could have kissed this one—given him a little tongue, even.

“Very well,” Mr. Drexler said, turning to Reggie. “A young Palestinian named Kadir—you’ve ridden with him before—will be along for the trip.”

Reggie remembered him from the time Mr. Drexler had tried to capture Lonnie. What a royal fuckup that turned out to be. Kadir didn’t say much, which was fine with Reggie.

Al-Thani said, “All right. Go inside. Arrange a one-way rental to Arlington, Virginia. Pick up Kadir at the refugee center, and head south. He’ll have the name and address of who you are to meet. Your contact will turn the truck over to you and you will drive it to the address Kadir will give you. He will have maps for both ends so there will be no confusion. Any questions?”

Oh, yeah. Reggie had plenty. He wanted to ask why the big charade? Why not just put out the word that another multimillion-dollar deal was going down and wait for these assholes to show up?

Instead he said, “How do we contact you?”

Al-Thani handed him a slip of paper. “I will keep my mobile phone with me at all times. That is my number. Memorize it.”

Reggie studied it. A 212 area code. He committed the other seven digits to memory and handed it back.

“I ought to have one of those phones too. We always carried one when we made a run.”

“If you were transporting real cargo, I would agree. But exits and rest stops are plentiful along your route. Each has a gas station of some sort. You will have no trouble contacting us should the need arise.”

Reggie nodded. He got the message: If anything went wrong, al-Thani didn’t want anyone—cop or hijacker—finding a phone that had been used to call his number.

Like Reggie gave a shit. He’d rather have a phone along. But this wasn’t his operation and he didn’t want to make waves of any sort. Not even ripples. He’d be a good soldier and do just as he was told in the hope that maybe they’d let him join up.

Because right now his future was a black hole and this bunch was his only hope.

3

Atlantic Avenue sported two lanes each way and wide, busy sidewalks. Jack arrived around two. When he showed up, Black pulled out of his space and let him take it. Then he double-parked and eased himself into the Corvair’s passenger seat where he pointed out the place Jack was to watch.

“Watch for what?”

Black shrugged. “To tell you the truth, I don’t know. My bro and I are heading out on the island to scope out the Amityville place, get the lay of the land, find a vantage point so we can see who’s coming and going. Basically sniff around and see what kind of stink it gives off.”

Jack stared at the entrance. The sign over the double doors had green Arabic squiggles above
MASJID AL-FAROOQ
in red. At six stories, the building was by far the tallest on the block. The second and third levels showed floor-to-ceiling windows. A steady flow of Arab types passed in and out of the doorway.

This was the place Bertel had gone on about. Wheels within wheels …

“Busy place for a refugee center.”

“Al-Kifah takes up just a tiny part of the first floor. Upstairs is a mosque and Islamic center. I don’t pretend to know what else goes on in there.”

Jack felt at sea. “I still don’t get what I’m looking for.”

Black turned in his bucket seat to face him. “Figure it this way: If the jihadists are expecting a real shipment of kids, they’re gonna have to pay for them. The money—and it’s got to be cash—is gonna have to come from Al-Kifah. I don’t have a photo of any face you should look for, but if you see heavy-duty wheels roll up, and see an Arab with a satchel surrounded by a bunch of wary-looking guys come out that door and pile into it, you get on that phone to us.”

“And then what?”

“You don’t let it out of your sight. We’ll all keep in contact and one or both of us—depending on what the Amityville scene looks like—will catch up with you as backup.”

“What if they’ve got the money stashed somewhere else?”

He shrugged again. “Then we’re shit out of luck on this end and we’ll have to concentrate on Amityville. These are the only contact points we know. That’s the hand we’ve been dealt. We’ll play it the best we can.”

Fine, but Jack wasn’t even sure what game they were playing.

Black handed Jack a mobile phone. “Plug this into your lighter socket. The number’s programmed in just in case you lose it. You see something, call right away. Probably best if you call in every hour or so no matter what, just so we know everything’s cool on this end.”

“How long do I hang out here?”

Black reached for the door handle. “Well, if nothing’s shaking here by one
A.M.
, I think you can pack it in.”

“One
A.M.
?” Jack glanced at the dashboard clock. “That’s like eleven hours.”

“Yeah, a long time on your ass,” he said, getting out. “Stay as long as you want or can. We appreciate the help.”

He slammed the door, jumped into the Mark VII, and roared off.

Stay as long as you want or can …

Shit.

Soon as he’d heard those words Jack knew he’d be here for the duration.

He restarted the Corvair’s engine and turned on the heater. Another downside of a convertible top in winter, besides not being able to put it down without freezing, was lack of insulation. The heat seeped out through the fabric like it was netting.

So he sat and watched the sun slip behind the mosque, which meant he’d be restarting the car even more often. He checked the dashboard clock again. Just three now. He’d been sitting here for only an hour but it seemed like half a day.

As he warmed his hands over the heating vents, he saw a blue Ford Taurus pull into the curb before the mosque and stop beside the fire hydrant. The driver’s door opened and a skinny guy with a mullet haircut got out and limped around to the sidewalk.