Blood and Ashes (29 page)

He thought of Kristallnacht, and how he’d planned his own night of broken glass, and decided that his original plan of detonating a bomb in Times Square would have held nowhere near the significance it would here in the heart of the Jewish community. Here and now was more befitting his character and his message. Forget Crystal Night, this would be his Day of Broken Spirits.

Feeling that there was no time like the present, he thumbed the button on his cell phone. A corresponding cell began to ring in a parked vehicle at the intersection of Sixty-Eighth and Amsterdam, but no one could hear it over the simultaneous percussive roar of flame and debris blossoming between the buildings. Carried on the super-heated wind was Hicks’ statement to the world.

Chapter 38

‘Let’s hope that it’s nothing more serious than a car smash.’

Squinting over Vince’s shoulder, I saw the traffic coming to a shuddering halt and I didn’t think a collision was the reason for this sudden hiccup to the flow of yellow cabs and limousines that normally hurtled along here. ‘Unless there’s an accident on the other carriageway as well, I wouldn’t bank on it, Vince.’

The cars on our left were also coming to a stop, and their drivers were fiddling with the buttons on their car radios, dawning shock and disbelief on their features.

‘Holy crap,’ Rink moaned. ‘You think we’re too late? It’s happened already?’

We were passengers in the back of Vince’s government car, Vince driving. We were on FDR Drive between the twin spans that arched over the East River towards Brooklyn Heights. On Manhattan Bridge the traffic heading on to the island was coming to a standstill and if I bothered to turn my head, I was sure that Brooklyn Bridge would paint a like picture. The only discernible movement was on those lanes of the bridge heading out of the city, and if anything they were speeding up as people realised they should make themselves scarce as rapidly as possible. As with any traffic jam, the air was filled with honking horns and racing engines. People were shouting wordlessly, some in frustration but others in anger or dismay.

I dropped a window and smelled the tang of exhaust fumes, wondered if that was all the poison that the air held. From a distance came the wail of multiple sirens, first responders heading to a scene of catastrophe. ‘Turn the radio on.’

Vince did and the voice of an announcer cut into the middle of an R&B track to confirm out worst fears. A bomb had exploded in the Jewish quarter at Lincoln Square. Details were sketchy, but preliminary reports said an improvised explosive device in the trunk of a stationary vehicle had detonated causing chaos and destruction. Casualties were in their dozens, but as of that time fatalities were unconfirmed by the police. The announcer suggested what everyone else must have been considering: that this was a second wave of attack launched by al-Qaeda or another radical-fundamentalist Muslim cell. The police were coordinating an immediate evacuation of the surrounding area, the announcer said in a grave voice, for fear that further devices were timed to explode.

‘That’s the lie they’re telling people? More bombs? They’re evacuating ’cause of the goddamn fallout.’ Rink shifted in his seat as if he wanted to climb out of the car. It wasn’t through fear of being irradiated, but from a need to put an end to this inaction. I knew exactly how he felt.

Cars were jammed to the front and back of us, and to all sides. ‘We’re going to have to find another way up town.’

Vince shook his head, as he started to lay his hand on the horn. ‘You honestly want to be anywhere near Lincoln Square? You’re crazy, Hunter.’

‘I’m not talking about going to Lincoln Square. We still have to get to the Koreans.’

‘Don’t you think that’s pointless now? Considering how Hicks has already detonated the bomb?’

‘Those bastards brought their poison here. They’re as responsible for this as Hicks is.’

‘We can leave them to the FBI,’ Vince said. By the look of him his plans didn’t include staying on the island for much longer.

Rink touched my wrist. He held my gaze like we were children making a lifelong pact. ‘Brother, if that bomb was laced with radiation we’re already fucked. We might as well get a little payback before we start rotting.’

‘I’m with you,’ I said.

‘We should concentrate on Hicks!’ Vince twisted round so that he could look at us, his face stricken with anger. My take on it was that the young man was panicking as the truth of the situation began to dawn on him. If we stayed on the island, we were probably committing ourselves to a slow and painful death.

‘You heard what Walter said. We have to find out how much isotope he had with him. That’s our mission Vince, now suck it up.’

Rink rumbled, ‘We’ll still get our chance at Hicks. You don’t think he was standing near to where the bomb went off, do you? He’s positioned himself upwind of the explosion, but my guess is he’s close enough to see the consequences.’

‘That’s quite a goddamned supposition,’ Vince said.

‘Would you want to be standing in the way of a dust cloud laced with plutonium?’ I demanded. ‘The wind’s blowing towards the north-east. If Hicks doesn’t want to get irradiated along with everyone else, my guess is he’s not a million miles away from where we’re going now.’

‘Have you seen the road?’ Vince indicated the jam of cars all around us. ‘We won’t be going anywhere soon.’

‘Jesus,’ Rink said. ‘What kinda lame-asses are Arrowsake employing these days?’ He stabbed a finger into Vince’s forehead, none too gently. ‘Don’t you have the capacity to improvise? Use your head, boy, cause there’s always more ways to get to where you’re going than swanning around in limo-fuckin-sines.’

Stretching over the seat, I dug in the young agent’s pocket. ‘Give me your badge, Vince.’

‘Hey! What do you think you’re doing?’

Snatching the FBI ID badge from his pocket, I threw open the door. ‘I’m improvising.’

I approached two men on motorcycles who had been weaving through the stalled traffic, stepped in their way, forcing them to stop, and held up Vince’s badge. Rink clambered out of the limousine, Vince calling after him. ‘Hey, I can’t just abandon a government vehicle like this. They’ll have my ass if it doesn’t go back in one piece.’

Rink leaned back inside. ‘So stay here. Leave what needs doin’ to someone who gives a shit.’

Cowed, Vince came out of the car, jabbing numbers into his phone. I didn’t know who Vince was calling – and I didn’t really care. Vince swore as he listened to what was most likely a recorded announcement stating his call couldn’t be connected. All over Manhattan other callers would be getting the same message as telecommunication systems overloaded. Vince returned to the car and used the satellite phone instead.

When he came out, we were straddling the two motorcycles while their owners stood kicking at the road surface in bewilderment.

‘What about me?’ Vince asked.

‘Get on the back,’ Rink said. ‘Or stay with the car, the choice is yours.’

Vince took one last forlorn glance at the Lincoln, then he climbed on the motorbike and wrapped his arms round Rink’s middle. ‘Y’know,’ Rink grinned, ‘I always wanted to commandeer a vehicle like you see the cops do in the TV shows.’

We set off, weaving our way through the stalled traffic. Some drivers had left their vehicles and were standing in the road, hands on hips or shadowing their eyes as they sought some sign of the catastrophe a couple miles away. We shouted at them to move. A few cars picked up scratches as we squeezed through. There was a bottleneck where the jam had bunched up at the intersection for the Williamsburg Bridge, but then we found a clear stretch and hit the throttle, making up ground. At a turn-off I went right, swooping back under FDR Drive with Rink and Vince hurtling along behind. We skipped through service alleys, dodging parked vehicles and dumpsters, and came out on to surface streets that would take us back to Delancey where the Red Moon Club awaited.

As we sped along, I thought about how this entire thing had started with a red moon over Bedford Well; now I was approaching another. I considered how symbolic that might be: would this be where the trail ended for me? Only one way to find out, I decided.

The news of the bombing in Lincoln Square had apparently reached the interior of the go-go bar, bringing a halt to the proceedings as even the scantily clad dancers had jumped down off bar-tops to stare at TV sets or to try phoning home. Some had tried leaving the bar, to find that they had been blocked by a cordon of FBI agents and NYPD cruisers. The customers and staff were in a mild panic, which had grown ten times worse when the small group of Koreans realised who the real prisoners here were. By the time we arrived, the scene had descended into chaos.

In fear of injuring any of the innocents inside the bar, the law enforcement officers had refrained from returning fire, but the Koreans had no such scruples. The front windows were smashed, glass glittering on the pavements, and gunfire rang out, forcing the cops and FBI to take cover. Already it looked like the Koreans had tried to make a break for it via a side entrance, but a cop car had been driven directly up to block the door. The door was pocked with bullet holes, as was the cruiser.

Vince was first off the motorbike, running to the officers in charge who were squatting low behind a NYPD cruiser across Delancey. I let him go, because, unlike the cops, I had no intention of trying to end this in a peaceable fashion. I pulled out my SIG and angled for the corner of the Red Moon, hearing boots slapping the pavement behind as Rink hurried to cover me. The Koreans weren’t the only ones without scruples.

Slamming my shoulders to the red-brick wall, I saw Rink come up close to my side, raising his Glock. There were shouts coming from the cops, but they’d recognised us as allies, so I wasn’t fearful of being gunned down. Vince snapped off orders at the scene commanders, and that was all the notice we gave them.

I was one for direct action. Always had been. Forget intricate plans, because anything more than getting in there fast and hard wasn’t worth its weight in horse crap.

Inside the bar someone was shouting, the sing-song strains of an eastern language made discordant by anger and fear. I zoned in on the voice, which located one of the Koreans no more than ten feet away on the right. I measured my breathing with the man’s screeching, then stepped forward, leaned in the window and fired a short burst of tightly grouped rounds. The man went silent.

There was a moment of shocked awareness that the tide had suddenly turned, and into this space I threw myself. The Devil himself could be waiting inside, but I didn’t care; I was going to assault him in his lair if it meant saving Manhattan from a further descent into hell.

Chapter 39

At the time it never entered my mind that I was engaged upon anything other than a righteous track. As perpetrators of the terrorist attack on Lincoln Square, the Koreans were as guilty of the atrocity as Carswell Hicks was, and all the proof I required was that they had reacted to the police’s arrival with deadly force in their attempt to escape. Beyond that I had no idea who they were or why they’d chosen to come to a go-go bar when a dirty bomb had targeted the very city they were in. None of that meant anything as I vaulted inside the Red Moon. It was enough that they were murderers of innocent people and I had a duty to make them repay that crime with their blood.

Inside the main bar area it was dark, but coloured strobes bounced off the metal poles where girls had recently been dancing. A large plasma screen flicked through images of devastation streamed directly from Lincoln Square by circling media helicopters. I saw movement, the staff and punters caught in the middle of the gunfight seeking cover or escape. On my left lay a dead man, the muscular Korean that I had already killed. I moved to the right, placing the thick wooden bar between myself and where I guessed the other Koreans were. Aiming high, I fired twice, smashing a retro-style disco ball to smithereens. Glass tinkled and a kaleidoscope of colour exploded throughout the room as the strobes refracted wildly in all directions. People yelled and screamed which provided the ideal cover for Rink to come inside.

Rink scrambled over. ‘This would be so much easier if we didn’t have to keep one of the frog-giggers alive,’ he said.

‘Yeah, that’s always the hard bit.’ We scanned the area at the back of the bar room. Now that everyone had had the good sense to dive for cover no one remained in sight. There was a doorway on one side, behind a beaded curtain. It corresponded to the position where the NYPD cruiser had jammed the door shut. ‘You think there’s another way out?’

‘I’m guessing the cops already have that covered.’

Standing up was a calculated risk but no bullets came our way.

Dropping down again, just in case I was wrong, I said, ‘I’m thinking that our Korean friends have headed upstairs.’ The Red Moon Bar was in a converted walk-up residential building. On arrival, I’d noted that it was an old structure with only two levels and a flat roof, dwarfed on either side by more modern constructions. ‘Hopefully Vince has positioned snipers to watch the roof, which means they’ll be on the upper floor.’

Rink glanced at his Glock, no doubt wishing he’d brought a Mossberg 500. The assault shotgun was always his weapon of choice for this kind of work. Heavier firepower came in handy when clearing a building while going room to room. He chewed a corner of his mouth, then waved the Glock. ‘Suppose this’ll have to do. You want me to go first?’