account. Funny, I thought, that he was standing there next to a drug dealer and didn't even realize it.
They both pressed the buzzer and waited. When they were rung through they both entered, the nicely dressed guy holding the door for the young punk.
Ten minutes after the door closed, I felt my cell phone vibrating. I took it out, looked at the call log. It was Rose. Jackpot.
Adrenaline began to course through me. As soon as hat guy came through the door, I was prepared to go wherever he did. My hands were sweating. I was ready.
Then the front door opened, and a man stepped through. Only it wasn't the young guy with baggy pants and a backpack that looked sketchier than a forty-year old at a dance club. It was the young-executive type.
I looked at him with intense skepticism, debating whether to wait until the other guy came through. This guy didn't look anything like a dealer. He looked too well off, and I doubted most drug dealers bought their briefcases at Coach.
It couldn't be. The guy was young, looking like he'd just stepped out of his b-school graduation. He was about five foot ten, in terrific shape. There was a small, moon-shaped birthmark on the front of his neck, and he gripped the briefcase so tight it looked as if it could crumble in his hands.
Then, as the man began to walk away, I saw him stop, look at his briefcase. He picked it up, clicked a loose clasp into place, then walked away.
Then my cell phone vibrated. The screen had a text message from Rose. It read
Gordon 'Vinnie' Gekko has just left the building.
That sealed it. This man about town was Vinnie.
Waiting until he was half a block ahead of me, I began to follow. He walked north to Fourteenth Street, when he stopped for a moment to look at his cell phone.
I stopped as well, retreating into the shadow of an elec tronics store. When he put the phone back in his pocket, he began to look around. His eyes caught something, and suddenly he turned and jogged across the street. He zigged between several cars, making it impossible for me to follow him without drawing attention to myself.
Instead, I watched in between traffic as he approached a pay phone. I saw him put money in the machine and make a call. He hung up less than fifteen seconds later.
No doubt he was calling whatever number had just come up on his cell phone. Briefcase man had another delivery to make.
He turned West on Fourteenth Street and made his way to what I assumed was the Union Square subway stop.
I picked up the pace, narrowing the gap between us to thirty feet or so. I wanted to remain behind him, but if he was heading for the subway, losing him in the bustle of pedestrians was a chance I didn't want to take.
He went down into the subway, paid his fare and headed for the 6 train. I followed.
He went down the two flights of stairs onto the 6 train platform. I followed ten feet behind. He walked halfway down the platform then stopped and waited. I stopped two car lengths away, and hung out behind a steel column, peeking out every now and then to make sure he was still there.
The 6 train rattled into the station. My heart was pumping. I wanted to run up and grab this guy, make him give up everything he knew. But that would cut off my only source of information. And unless I killed him, he would tell whoever he worked for what happened, and the whole thing would clam up faster than a mute on the witness stand. And while I was willing to do a whole lot to figure out just what exactly happened that night at Helen Gaines's apartment, murder wasn't on my approved list of actions.
The man stepped into the car, and I got into the adjacent one, making sure I could see him through the separating window. For a moment I had a sense of deja vu, remembering that it was not too long ago when I was on the subway running from two men who wanted me dead. Funny how the tides turn.
The doors closed, and the man took a seat. That likely meant we were traveling a few stops. I stayed standing, not wanting to lose sight due to a bad angle.
This was slightly awkward considering there were half a dozen open seats and I was the only person standing in our car. Still, I'd rather be considered an antisocial weirdo than lose the rabbit.
Every stop I braced myself in case my target left.
Finally as we approached the Seventy-seventh Street subway stop, I saw him stand up, check to make sure his briefcase was still looped around his shoulder and approach the door. I didn't move.
When the train stopped, a mass of passengers exited.
The Seventy-seventh Street stop was right by the entrance to Lenox Hill Hospital. This Upper East Side location was right near a large residential area. Though heavily populated, it wasn't as crowded as Union
Square or one stop higher, Eighty-sixth Street.
The man walked east across Seventy-seventh. I followed him. Between First and Second Avenues, he went up to a brick town house, stopped in front of it. I sat on a small brick outcropping and pretended to tie my shoe. He took out his cell phone, looking like he was double-checking something, then went up the stairs and pressed a buzzer. I heard a ring, then he said something but I couldn't hear what. He opened the door and walked in.
I retreated around the corner, peeking back every few seconds to make sure I didn't lose him.
I only had to wait five minutes, then the man was back outside and walking west, toward me. My heart raced. If he was dealing-or delivering-drugs, this seemed to fit the profile. Short and sweet. No chitchat.
Just in and out, over and done. Pay the man his money.
And the bulge in the briefcase even seemed to have gone down a little bit.
I bought a bottle of water at a corner store as he walked past, then I got back into our familiar pace. I needed to see how many stops he made, see if anything interesting presented itself. I decided to follow him the rest of the day. I took out my cell, and sent Amanda a text message.
Got a lead. Will call when I can.
Don't wait up.
If I were a girlfriend and my boyfriend sent me that kind of text, I'd probably scour the city looking for him, half expecting to find him in the arms of some illicit lover. But I trusted Amanda. And after everything we'd been through, I believed she trusted me back.
My phone vibrated. I took it out, checked the message.
Go get em, Tiger.
God, I loved this woman.
The man with the briefcase made four more stops the rest of the day: 124th and Broadway, Ninety-eighth and
Broadway, and then back downtown to Fourteenth between Fifth and Sixth. Each time I noticed the bag on his shoulder became a little easier to carry. It swung at greater arcs as he carried it. As his stash grew lighter, the bag weighed him down less.
During his journey, I decided that I would follow him home. I had no idea what to expect, or what I would say to this man. But I needed to know where someone like him lived. And I needed to know where I could find him again.
It was nearing eleven o'clock. My legs were getting heavy. Vinnie had just downed his third bottle of water of the day. So when I followed him to the N train, the night having fully descended over the city, I hoped this would be our final ride of the day.
Vinnie rode the N train to the Canal/Broadway stop.
He looked weary, his eyes fluttering open and closed as his breathing grew deeper. I knew how he felt. My muscles felt sluggish. Private detective work was cer tainly not a calling I was prepared for. Spenser I was not.
Where he sat, Vinnie opened his bag and dug through it. He pulled out an MP3 player, then scrounged around some more. He seemed unable to find something. Then he turned the bag upside down and shook it. A thin white wire fell out. He picked it up, plugged one end into the MP3 player and took the two earbuds and fit them into his ears. Then he pressed a button on the player and relaxed.
No doubt this was the last stop. When he turned the bag upside down, not a thing fell out. No bags, no foil, no vials.
Vinnie was heading home.
