and intelligence takes it seriously, so it’s not as easy to be a terrorist these days as it was then. Sure, screwball amateurs can always pull off a spectacular atrocity, murder some innocent people and die doing it. But there are only a few terrorists competent and capable enough, with the necessary network, to really do something that would hurt Western civilization. Abu Qasim is one of them. He’s a damned dangerous man.”
“There aren’t many men, good or bad, who can make a difference,” Winchester mused.
“That’s not really true,” Grafton said. “I was just getting started in the Navy when I learned that every single person who makes a stand makes a difference. How you live, what you believe, what you do — it all matters. Results are important, too, but the critical factor, the most important thing, is making a stand, which is why we have to fight the Abu Qasims.”
“You see, when I weigh my life,” Winchester said, “and my son Owen’s, his was the more important. I’ve built a company, made a lot of money, but if I hadn’t made oil field equipment someone else would have. Owen, on the other hand, set forth to save lives. He gave all he had doing it.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” Jake Grafton said. “You raised a fine son, which is more than many of us manage. And you took a stand when you signed on to this goat rope. With a little luck, your stand will pay off.”
“Umm.” Winchester sipped at his drink. “How will you know which one of these guys you think is coming is Qasim?”
“I’ll know.”
“How?”
“Marisa will tell me.”
“How will she know?”
Jake’s cell phone, which was lying on the bar, rang. He glanced at the number. “Ask her,” he said to Winchester, then answered the phone.
“Hello, Tommy.”
When I had finished briefing Grafton, he said, “I want the guy in the Saturn, too. Alive, if possible. In fact, get him first.”
I took a deep breath. “There are no parking places on the street, as you well know. He’ll probably pull up and the bad guys will pile out. If they’re suiciders, he’ll just drive away, leaving them.”
“I understand,” Grafton murmured.
“I can’t just shoot him right then. These may not be bad guys. And if they are and I gun him, I’m going to be in a shoot-out with three or four armed men right on the street. I can’t get ‘em all before they get me.”
“Use your best judgment.”
“I’ll try.”
“After you pop him, or when he drives away, have Willie call 911.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Call me when it’s over.”
“Yes, sir.”
We hung up then, and fifteen seconds later, I heard Callie’s cell phone in the kitchen ring. It was undoubtedly her husband.
I tested my radio with Willie and Robin, then grabbed four wedges and my hammer and headed for the stairwell. Robin went out into the hallway, and Amy bolted the door behind her.
In the stairwell I hammered home four wedges under the door to the eighth floor, then two in the gap between the top of the door and the upper jamb. There wasn’t room in the little vertical gap for a wedge. I figured they would blow the lock with some kind of explosive, unless they were willing to take the time to break the lock, pick it or remove the door from its hinges. Even if they blew the lock off with a charge of plastique, the door wasn’t going to open with the wedges jamming it. I hoped. When and if they did get through, Robin was going to be in the hall with the 12-gauge. Meanwhile I was going to be coming up the stairs behind them.
I climbed a flight of stairs and left the hammer there.
I had thought about wedging every door in the stairwell shut, but the risk was too great. If these guys were bombers and a fire started, everyone in the building would be trapped.
I was trotting down the stairs with my shotgun in hand when the fourth-floor door opened and an elderly gentleman poked an old revolver at me. “Who the hell are you?” he demanded.
“Uh, Tommy Carmellini, sir. I’m staying with Jake Grafton on the eighth floor. You probably know him — a retired admiral? And who are you?”
He was suspicious, but I looked clean-cut and wholesome. “Fred Colucci. I heard someone pounding and came to see. Don’t want no trouble. What you got that gun for?”
“I heard the pounding and came to investigate. Would you please stop pointing that pistol at me?”
He lowered the revolver. Slowly, waiting for me to do something dumb.
“Thanks,” I said and trotted on down the stairs.
“Four-B,” Colucci called. “Stop by and tell me what’that pounding was. I’m gonna call the Homeowners. Too much damn noise in this building.”
“Okay,” I called, and kept going.
I paused at the bottom of the stairwell and stuck the shotgun under my coat. Got my pistol out and put it in my right trouser pocket where I could get at it easily. The spare magazine was already in my left trouser pocket.
I stepped out onto the ground level, the basement. The elevator control box was mounted right there on the wall beside the garbage cans. It was locked, but I managed to open it with a pick in approximately thirty seconds. The elevator power switches were big and obvious.
“Hey, Willie, can you hear me?”
He answered in about four seconds. “Yeah.”
“I need to know the instant you see them.”
“They’ll probably drive by a few times, man, before they pull the trigger. No parking places out here.”
“Keep me advised.”
“Okay.”
“Robin?”
“Yes, Tommy.”
“They blow that door to get onto your floor, have your mouth open and ears covered.”
“I’ll manage, Carmellini. You handle your end.”
Willie chuckled into his mike.
The super had a little folding chair at his desk. I put the shotgun on the desk and parked my heinie in his chair. I waited.
“I’m leaving, Grafton,” Simon Cairnes said to the admiral. “I’ve called for my car.”
“Okay.”
Cairnes was standing by the bar, leaning ever so slightly on his cane. He looked a little startled at Jake’s answer. “What?” he said. “No comment about it’s my funeral?”
Jake shrugged. “I’ll send flowers. See you on the other side.”
“You nervy son of a bitch,” Cairnes growled and turned to go. He shot a glance at Winchester, who was descending the stairs. “Don’t ever call me again, Hunt. Not for any reason under the sun.”
Then he was gone along the hallway toward the front door.
Winchester came the rest of the way down the stairs and parked himself on a bar stool beside Grafton.
“She’s Qasim’s daughter.”
“Maybe.”
“Damnation, Grafton! He’ll come here to get her.”
“No,” Jake said with a sigh. “If he comes, he’ll be coming to get you.”
“And you, I figure.”
“More than likely,” Grafton muttered and keyed the radio on his belt. “Car will be coming to pick up Cairnes.”
He received two mike clicks in reply.
It was a quarter past eleven in the evening when Willie’s voice sounded in my ear. “It’s the Saturn. He’s slowin’, drivin’ by, four in the car maybe.. maybe five. On past and down the hill toward the subway stop.”
