Deadfall (5 page)

WHEN THE SUBWAY
doors open, Rafe slips out first. He scans the platform. You’re right behind him, pushing through the turnstile and up the stairs, into the sun.

You head west. One Hundred Tenth Street is completely different from the stops downtown. The curb is lined with crushed coffee cups, dead leaves, and fast-food bags. A man is sleeping along a garage door, a piece of cardboard covering his face. You’re only a few blocks from Morningside Park, the other meeting place Connor told Rafe about.

Inside the park, you head north to the pond. It’s midday, but the grass is mostly clear. No one sits along the benches by the water. You look up the bank and see why.

A body is lying at the edge of the water, under a white sheet. Police are everywhere. Walking along the dock, combing the area beneath a nearby bridge. One officer ties
yellow tape around a tree trunk and asks people to move back.

Rafe sees it at the same time as you. You’re not looking at him, but you hear the sharp intake of breath, the word on his lips:
No.
One of the officers has lifted up the sheet. The boy’s face is visible. A black Mohawk, a bullet wound in the side of his neck.

“It’s him,” Rafe says. “It’s Connor.”

YOU GRAB RAFE’S
hand and yank him back, but he won’t stop staring at the body. You’re too exposed here in the crowd. You force him away from the scene, trying to get a better vantage point.

You exit the park and walk several buildings down, finding a perch on the top stair of an apartment stoop. “The Stager didn’t get here in time,” you say. “There’s no way they’d just leave him there. Maybe someone saw it happen—maybe we could find them.”

Rafe remains silent. He grabs the top of a window ledge and hoists himself onto it, trying to see the scene from above. It’s enough to draw attention. “Rafe, come down,” you say. “They could still be here somewhere.”

“Do you see that mark?” Rafe points to a stone wall thirty feet from the body. The graffiti looks fresh. Glossy
red paint. You can just make out the lettering.
WBD + WY
.

“There was that similar one downtown,” you say. “Also red. He’s communicating with the targets.”

Rafe scans the street signs, the stoplights. “There’s some logic to it. . . .”

You watch the crowd across the street. One person has turned toward you, a woman in her early forties. She has short blond hair, thick bangs that cover her brows. She might just be noticing a boy balancing on a window ledge, worried he’ll fall. Or she might not.

“Come on, get down,” you say, keeping an eye on her. You reach out and grab Rafe’s leg. “We gotta go.”

The woman pulls out her phone. Before you can react, she’s aimed it at you and Rafe. It’s clear she’s taken your picture.

“What the hell . . . ?” Rafe says, finally seeing her. He jumps back onto the steps and onto the street. Together, you start to move away.

You glance back as you reach the corner. The woman has stepped out of the crowd and has the phone up. She’s still aiming it at you as you start into a run, keeping your head down, your hair covering your profile. You need to get as far away from here as possible.

You round the first corner and go south so you don’t have to wait for the light. Rafe is right behind you. When you look back she hasn’t followed, but you keep heading toward the subway.

The sidewalks are full. People stare as you race past them. It must look like you’ve done something wrong, with your stained clothes, messy hair. You’re frantic. When you’re several blocks from the park, Rafe turns into a side alley and waits with you, hands on knees, drawing long, thin breaths.

“Who was she? You’ve seen her before?” you ask.

“No clue,” he says. “Maybe she thought we were someone else.”

You laugh. “I like your optimism.”

You go to the edge of the wall and peek out, scanning the street. An elderly couple is talking in front of their steps. A middle-aged man has just turned the corner and is walking toward you, holding his suit jacket over his arm. “We have to get out of here,” you say. “If they found Connor they must know about the meeting spot.”

Rafe follows you down the block. You can see the subway entrance up ahead, the green globe atop a post. Beneath the grates, you hear a train coming.

You’re thirty feet away when you notice a man behind you. He’s picked up speed, and his jacket looks clumsily placed, covering something in his right hand. “He has a gun,” you whisper to Rafe.

A girl with a green stripe in her hair passes, pushing a double stroller. Rafe stares straight ahead, pretending he hasn’t heard what you told him. Then a woman turns the corner, walking toward you. She’s wearing a sweatshirt,
sunglasses, and cargo pants. Her shoulder-length red hair spills out underneath her purple baseball cap. Her hand is on something attached to her belt.

“The hunters. They’re here,” Rafe says, his voice low.

“We need to draw them apart,” you say, knowing it’s only a matter of seconds before they’ve got you on both sides. “I’ll go into the subway, you cut through the park. Go east.”

You take off toward the stairs as Rafe crosses the street. You realize a moment too late that you haven’t made a plan of where to meet up next. You want to call out to him, but it’s too dangerous. From the sound of his footsteps, you can tell that the man behind you has doubled his pace.

The wind from the oncoming train rushes up the stairs, tangling your hair. You glance up once more before you’re underground. The woman is coming toward the subway stop.

She notices Rafe but keeps going, heading toward you instead. You take the remaining stairs two at a time, landing hard at the bottom. The information booth is empty. You press your hands flat on both sides of the turnstile and sling your legs over.

Just hearing the noise of the train, the screeching stop of the brakes, brings back the panic of the day you woke up. Your muscles tense up. As the train pulls into the station you run to the end of the platform.

You can’t see the hunters—you hope they were slowed
down at the turnstiles. You head for the back of the train. Behind the last car there’s a metal ledge just a foot deep. Three chains, waist-high, run across it. There’s just enough room for you to stand there, hiding behind the back door.

This is a Brooklyn-bound C train. The next stop is One Hundred Third Street. Stand clear of the closing doors, please.

You grab on to the chains and swing your leg over. You press yourself against the back door, duck beneath the window, and take a deep breath.

THE TRAIN RUSHES
forward, the platform disappearing from view. You don’t see the hunters in the station or coming down the stairs, but you know they were right behind you. They may have already made it onto the train.

You grip the chains and peek through the square window into the last car. The hunter is at the opposite end of the subway car, his hand on the metal door that leads into the next compartment. Nothing about him looks familiar. His light blue dress shirt is tucked in, his dark brown hair is combed in place, the jacket still over his right arm. He looks to be in his thirties. He slides back the door and continues through the train.

He’s searching for you.

You pull the knapsack off and drop down, getting the knife that’s hidden in the bottom of it. No matter how many
times you’ve washed it the handle is still stained with Goss’s blood, the brownish-red flecks dried into the grooves. You hold it in your hand. If both hunters made it on board it’ll be useless against two of them.

As the train rolls into the next stop you stay completely still, wondering if the hunters will get off here.

The next stop is Ninety-Sixth Street. Stand clear of the closing doors, please.

When the train pulls back out, they aren’t on the platform. They’re still somewhere inside the cars. You stay pressed against the back of the subway car. Two more stops go past, then four. At each stop, you check the platform and they aren’t there. They’re still somewhere inside the train.

They’ll find you if they keep looking. You grab the handle on the back door. It’s locked from the outside. When you look through the window again the female hunter is in the next car, and you catch a glimpse of her profile as she surveys the passengers. She ignores the young man reading his Kindle, and the mother who rolls a stroller back and forth, trying to soothe her baby. But as she pushes open the door to the next compartment, she looks back one last time. You duck down, but it’s too late. She’s seen you.

The train barrels on into darkness. You crouch down, and pray for the pressure of the brakes, signaling the next stop. Another train rushes past, all sound and air, and you make yourself as small as you can, pressing into the cold
metal platform. You’re expecting a bullet to come through the door at any second. If she has a silencer, she might aim directly in the center of it, expecting the train to cover any noise.

Instead the door opens. She wedges the barrel of the gun into the gap and nearly gets her hand through before you jab it up, hoping you’ve broken her wrist. She winces in pain and pulls her hand back. You slide the door shut and press your sneaker against the handle to leverage it shut.

You can feel her struggling against the door. You straighten your leg, putting all the weight of your body against the handle to keep it closed. Someone inside the car says something, and then there’s the welcome sound of brakes. The fluorescent light from the platform is a relief.

This is Forty-Second Street.

In the ten seconds between the train stopping and the doors opening, you tuck the knife back in your belt and climb over the chains. You jump the three feet to the platform. Before she’s even off the train you’re lost in the crowd.

Someone is playing reggae music. The keyboard creates a strange, cheerful melody. When you get to the stairs you take them two at a time, flying past people on their way up. A pack of tourists in Church of Bethlehem T-shirts. A homeless man with two carts behind him, piled high with plastic bags. Your legs are burning as you reach the top of the steps, but you take a deep breath and head toward one of
the exits. A group is gathered around a steel-drum band. A dozen or so people have their cameras aimed at the singer. You shield your face, making sure there’s no record of you.

You spot the female hunter first, emerging under a glittering sign that reads
SUBWAY
. You have a thirty-foot lead on her, but she’s coming in the same direction, moving down Forty-Second Street. There’s a movie theater, rows of restaurants—towering, cartoonish places with glowing marquees. It’ll draw attention, you know that, but you start into a sprint, betting you have a better chance of outrunning them than hiding.

You head east, and within a few minutes you’re in Times Square. The area is packed. Every five feet someone is trying to hand you something. “Come to our restaurant, try our lunch special.” “Can I ask you a question about your hair?” “Do you like comedy?”

When you’re close to the corner you glance back. She’s coming after you. She weaves in and around people, offering hurried, flustered apologies as she tries to catch up.

You make a left down a wide street. There’s an alley up ahead. Before she turns the corner you tear down it, looking for a way into the back of a building. There’s a rusted fire escape behind a Dumpster. You grab the end of the ladder and climb to the third floor.

Down on the street, you see her run past. She checks the alley, then moves on. You go up another story, then another,
your palms burning from gripping the metal. When you reach the roof you’re exhausted. There’s a billboard advertising some financial group named LeMarc Brothers. You ease out behind the sign and let the heavy, spinning feeling of vertigo take you as you peer down.

She’s stopped at the corner. From five stories up she’s just a shock of red hair, a purple cap. She paces, frantic. Even when the light changes she doesn’t go anywhere. It’s hard to tell if she’s on the phone, but one hand is up, her head tilted. She’s lost you. You’re about to sit back, to wait the rest of the hour out, when a man joins her from across the street.

It’s a different guy, this one in a black dress shirt and slacks. Bald, sunglasses. He scans the street. It’s only after a minute or two that the man from the train comes up the block, approaching from the other side. The three of them meet there on the corner. The man in sunglasses gestures with his hands, and the woman shows them both her phone.

Suddenly it’s clear that this isn’t just a hunter and a Stager, or a person sent by AAE to kill you . . . this is something different. Something bigger. Another man, this one younger, has stopped to talk to them. He takes out his phone, too. There are four of them now.

You reach your hand into the pocket of your jeans, feeling the burner cell. If they know that Goss is in prison, they must know that you were the one who put him there. They might suspect you’ve tried to expose them. You think of the
way Rafe ran right past the woman, how she saw him and kept going, choosing to close in on you. He would’ve been the easier target. She could’ve followed him into the park. She could’ve had the kill all to herself.

You stare down at the group on the sidewalk as they disperse. They’re each scanning the crowd, watching the passing faces of strangers, checking the front windows of stores and restaurants. They haven’t stopped looking for you.

BEN STARES OUT
the window of the town car. He can’t see much from the 105, just the concrete Metrolink track above, and the other freeways in the distance, circling in on one another. The sun is blotted out by smog.

“We’re going to the airport?” Ben asks. The driver is a gaunt middle-aged man. He doesn’t answer. He hasn’t said anything since they left the house.

“It’s not like it’s that hard to figure out,” Ben says. “The 110 South, the 105 West. You’re taking me to LAX.”

No response.

He was told to pack a bag for three days. That was the only thing that made Ben feel better when the man showed up at seven this morning. They wouldn’t ask him to pack a bag if they were going to kill him.

At least, he didn’t think so.

He knew it was only going to be a matter of time before AAE showed up. As soon as Sunny left he was just waiting to see how they were going to deal with him. The contact at AAE had called him twice to ask where she was. Had he heard from her? Where was she when he last saw her? Ben had told them the truth, as much as he could tell—that she had come by his house. She’d seemed worried, preoccupied. He hadn’t heard from her since.

The driver takes the Sepulveda exit. Ben almost comments on it, but decides not to. The only question now is where they’re flying him. For a brief second, he considers the possibility they’re bringing him somewhere for a hunt . . . that they might use him as another target. He wipes his palms on the front of his jeans. His hand is still sore from where Sunny slammed it in the door.

The car makes a U-turn, passing the airport, and instead pulls into the In-N-Out. A teenager in a white hat and red apron takes orders from a line of cars snaking all the way to the street. The driver chooses a space at the end of the parking lot, next to a silver BMW. Ben checks for the license plate but there is none. Just a small black piece of paper that reads
Glendale BMW
.

A man gets out of the Beamer and pulls open the back door, sliding in next to Ben on the leather seat. A blast of hot air comes in with him. It’s early October, but the day is scorching, almost one hundred and five degrees. When Ben looks at him
there’s a vague sense of recognition. The man is older now—thinning white hair and an extra ten pounds that can be seen in his face and neck, but Ben has met him before. He was a friend of Ben’s father.

“Benjamin,” he says, “I haven’t seen you since you were ten. You were flying a remote-control helicopter in the backyard.”

He puts his hand out for Ben to shake. “Isaac.”

Ben remembers that helicopter. He can almost see Isaac sitting there with his parents in the kitchen that day. He reaches over and takes his hand, hating him already. What does he want? What will he have to do for them now?

“That girl you were watching for AAE,” he says. “We’re concerned about her. She’s disappeared and I think they told you—she’s the niece of one of the executives.”

Ben knows the story. It’s what they said when they first asked him to get to know her. He also knows that it’s a lie. “Yeah, Sunny. We became friends.”

“Sunny?” Isaac says. “Is that what she’s going by now?”

He’s wearing a suit despite the heat. He withdraws his iPhone from the front pocket of his jacket. He pulls up a picture and hands it to Ben.

It’s her, in profile. She’s turning away from the camera, staring at something to the left, unaware of the person taking the picture. Her long black hair is braided to the side, covering her scar. “That’s Sunny . . . yeah.”

“She was seen in New York this morning. We need to find
her as soon as possible. Or, I should say—we want
you
to find her.”

“Me?”

“She knows you, and we think you might have a better chance of talking to her. She was seen on the Upper West Side. We can send you text updates letting you know if she’s seen anywhere—we have a few people on the ground that are looking for her. We’ll give you a few days. Let us know as soon as you establish contact.”

Isaac reaches into his suit pocket and takes out the ticket. It has Ben’s name on it. First class. LAX to JFK. Arriving at 6:12
P
.
M
. Isaac also hands him a stack of hundred-dollar bills and a card with a phone number on it. “Keep your phone on.”

Then he slides out of the car. He leans down, staring at Ben. “I always liked you,” he says. “So let me give you a piece of advice. Do whatever AAE asks you to do, no questions. Understand?”

Ben nods, but Isaac has already slammed the door.