“Who does?”
“But that’s where you’re putting me. What am I going to do in a wheelchair? Seriously?”
“Something different. Something that matches skills you don’t even know you have. You need to come to terms with this. You’ve had a good life, James. And with the exception of your legs and your knees and your deformed fingers, you’re also in excellent health, which many people half your age can’t claim.”
“My deformed fingers. Is that also supposed to make me feel better?”
“It’s meant to give you a sense of scope. You’ve had a good ride. You have years ahead of you, especially if you find a new reason to get up in the morning. A new kind of career.”
He consulted other doctors, but to his disappointment, they all agreed. Surgery would be the end of him. He’d die on a table with one of his titanium hips already removed, but instead of putting it back properly inside his corpse, he knew how it worked. They’d just shove it back inside improperly and sew him up, regardless of how bad it looked.
For Gelling, who had very specific plans for his own funeral and burial, to the point that he hired a theatrical agency to plant nine character actresses of various ages along the periphery of his grand mahogany casket, where they would weep for him when he went into the hole, the thought of going into the dirt with such a disfigurement repelled him.
When he finally decided to give himself over to life in a wheelchair, he bought the top-of-the-line turbo model he used now. And then he rethought his life.
What were his passions? What did he want to do before he died? It was when his longtime acquaintance Babe McAdoo called to ask him for a favor, which involved tracking down a man she knew he knew through mutual friends, that he started to suspect things about her that he couldn’t have known when the man was found beheaded days later.
It was an event that made international news because of who the man was. Over drinks, which he demanded she share with him, he learned of her “secret life,” as she called it, which stunned him, but which he found rife with excitement.
“You know a lot of people,” Babe said to him. “More than anyone I know, really, including me, which is saying plenty. And you’ve always had an inquisitive mind. You’re good with puzzles and you understand the human mind in ways that most don’t because of your medical background and your longtime practice, which is now defunct because of your age, your bum legs and your twisted fingers. You could be an asset to certain people I know. And you could do it all from that chair.”
Before she left, he was sold on the idea. And his life, at ninety-six, began anew with a string of thrilling adventures he never dreamt of having in his townhouse off Park, which had been streamlined and decluttered to accommodate the wheelchair.
When he was feeling good, as he was today because of how he’d helped Carmen, he sometimes zipped around his apartment, as if he were the boy he used to be. What did he have to lose? His body may have failed him years ago, but Gelling’s sense of adventure never had left him, even if it was only racing around his townhouse’s fourth floor at speeds that Frank often paled at because he worried that the chair might topple over, regardless of the fun Gelling was having.
Gelling sat in his chair and listened to the house. His ears weren’t what they used to be, but they weren’t bad and if he were a betting man, which he was, he was certain that was he heard downstairs was Frank in the kitchen, probably fixing himself the turkey sandwich he usually had around this time of day.
Knowing that Frank would scold him but not really caring if he did because, in truth, if Frank did reprimand him, it meant that he cared for Gelling, which was a human need he especially craved at one-hundred-and-three, Gelling looked to his right and saw the long gleaming hallway that led out of the fourth-floor room he’d turned into his second parlor. In his condition, it was more convenient to have another parlor on the fourth floor, where he lived, than on the first floor, where he rarely spent his time.
He listened to the house again, heard nobody on the stairs and then, with a smile, he propelled the wheelchair forward.
The chair was fast and robust. Soon, he was free, racing from room to room, hallway to hallway, at such speeds that he couldn’t help a laugh and a gasp. He cut around tables and furniture, nearly toppled over, but somehow righted himself and went forward faster and faster, his usually pale face flushed pink with grinning excitement until the wheelchair malfunctioned.
It all happened so quickly, Gelling wasn’t sure what to do as he raced down the long hallway that opened into the parlor, which dead-ended at a large window that overlooked East Sixty-First Street, just off Park, four stories below.
While trying to steer in a straight line so he wouldn’t topple over, Gelling yanked back on the handle, which was stuck in its forward position and thus shooting him forward.
The fourth-floor parlor was a large room, about fifty-feet long, but Gelling already was past the half-way mark and he wasn’t strong enough at this speed to do anything more than to watch the inevitable bloom before him.
So, this was it. His death wouldn’t be natural, as he always thought it would be. He wasn’t going to open his eyes one morning and realize that the white ceiling actually was a bright light that opened into another world. He wasn’t going to slump over dead in his chair while sipping his soup. He wasn’t going to expire from the sheer embarrassment of watching Frank wipe his ass and change his diaper, which he detested and caused him great stress.
Instead, his death ironically was going to end with great disfigurement, just as it might have if his hips and knees had been replaced, as he had wished.
The idea of disfigurement was something he couldn’t bear, but with death so close, he knew it was the case. The wheelchair slammed against the bottom of the window, catapulted him through the glass and into the open air, which felt so cold to him, it was as biting as everything now happening to him.
At that moment, when he was airborne, his body so rigid from age that he couldn’t lift his hands in front of his face to keep it from directly connecting with the sidewalk, James Gelling shit his pants a final time, a further humiliation met at life’s end. He shouted out for Frank, such a gem, whom he was sad he wouldn’t see again.
And then it was over.
While people stopped on the sidewalk to shriek or to stand transfixed in horror or to turn away for the same reason, he became an unfortunate part of the pavement, with Carmen’s list of names left behind him on his desk.
CHAPTER TWEN
TY-FOUR
Carmen sat with Babe and Jake in the parlor, occasionally checking her watch, worried beyond worried for Chloe, but trying to keep her emotions in check so she could stay focused and resolve the issue when she had the opportunity to do so.
The hour they’d given Katzev to respond had dwindle by half, with no response from the man who held Chloe captive and whose family’s welfare was on the line because of it.
“What’s taking him so long?” Babe asked.
“He’s playing the game, Babe. He’s making us sweat. But he’ll call. Just a matter of time.”
Five minutes later, the cell phone she held in her lap buzzed. All looked at Carmen, who looked down in surprise to see that it was Spocatti calling.
“It’s Vincent,” she said. She clicked on the phone and held the receiver to her ear. “This is Carmen.”
“So formal,” Spocatti said. “This is Vincent.”
She could hear the distinct rumblings of a plane. “Where are you?” she asked.
“On my way to New York.”
“You’re coming here?”
“I’ll be there in a few hours.”
“What for?”
“To help you. I contacted Katzev. I understand you’ve given him one hour to offer up this Chloe girl you’re so concerned about, but I need you to back off.”
“Why?”
“I’m not asking you to back off forever, Carmen. Just until I get there. Then, in exchange for the safe
ty of his family, he’s agreed to release Chloe and let her go. Turns out sending Liam there was the right thing to do—Katzev is shaken. He’s agreed to meet at a neutral place, still unannounced by him, but which we’ll both agree upon soon. He will come with her and one of his men. Both Katzev and the other man will be armed. I told him that I would arrive only with you, and that we also would be armed. So, at the very least, when it comes to artillery, we’re even.”
“If we can trust him, which is a stretch.”
“I think we can, but you’re right—we’ll never know. That said, I heard his voice. He knows you’re serious. He especially doesn’t want anything to happen to his mother. I don’t think he cares much for the others, but his mother does mean something to him. She’s the one he wants to protect.”
It’s what Carmen sensed. “So, Chloe’s safe,” she said. “What happens to me?”
“That’s where things get sketchy.”
“How?”
“We’ll all be armed, Carmen. The mood will be tense. I don’t know what he’ll do, but you need to keep your eyes on him throughout the process and be prepared for him to shoot you, because he will if he has the chance. If you sense that he or his man are about to go for their guns, you shoot them. Period. If they don’t, we’ll back out of the space. I’ll also be watching him. Together, we can take him out if he tries something stupid, but there are consequences if we do. When they learn of Katzev’s death, the syndicate will put all of their resources into tracking us down and killing us. We will be their number-one priority. They won’t allow two of their chief members to be murdered by anyone, especially since it means that you’re closer than ever to learning who they all are and thus exposing them. It will be war. If it happens, we’ll need to seek out each member and end this for good.”
“Why are you doing this, Vincent?”
“Doing what?”
“Helping me and Chloe when you yourself will become a target?”
“Because I want to.”
“That doesn’t sound like you.”
“Carmen, you’ve come to mean something to me. I know the risks. I’ve made my decision. Would you rather I step out of it?”
“No.”
“All right, then.”
“I think I might have an edge when it comes to learning who the syndicated comprises.”
“How?”
She thought of her conversation with Gelling, who was using his resources to learn who the syndicate comprised. If he pulled through for her with their names, addresses and whatever else he could find out about them, the balance would shift in her favor. The syndicate either would have to back down or risk death or exposure.
“I’ll tell you when you get here. And, Vincent, I have to reiterate, the syndicate is my problem, not yours. I’ll take them out. There’s no need for you to risk your life for me.”
“I don’t offer assistance to just anyone, Carmen. Especially for free. Just like you, I’ve worked with the syndicate for years. They’ve grown too powerful. They’ve become arrogant, which is dangerous. I think it’s time to end them before they end us, as they started to do with Alex, and now with you and Jake. Who knows? I hardly walk on water. I might be next.”
“All right,” she said. “But hear me on this. They’re responsible for Alex’s death. If only for him and also because of what he’s done to Chloe, I want the pleasure of taking out Katzev myself.”
“He’s yours. But we both know that if you go for Katzev, his guard will go after us.”
“I don’t see that as a problem.”
“I do. We don’t know how skilled he is. We’ll need to act swiftly.”
“Call me when you arrive?”
“I will. This ends tonight. By the time I land, Katzev and I will have agreed upon a location. Let Babe know I’ll be coming by to pick you up, but also let her and Jake know that they won’t be accompanying us. They’ll be disappointed, but those are the terms.”
“Understood.”
“And Carmen,” Spocatti said, a new note to his voice.
“Yes?”
“This all could go wrong in ways that neither of us expected or wanted. I want you to know that no matter what happens, I’ve always admired you.”
* * *
Moments later, when Carmen delivered the news that Babe and Jake were out and that she’d be proceeding alone with Spocatti, who was en route to New York as they spoke, Babe’s butler Max entered the room with unusual haste and bent down to Babe’s ear, where he whispered something Carmen couldn’t hear.
Babe looked up at him. Her jaw dropped. “No,” she said.
Carmen watched the woman’s face go pale.
“I’m afraid so, ma’am.”
“But it can’t be.”
“What’s the problem?” Carmen asked.
“It’s Gelling,” Babe said. “Terrible accident. Just terrible.”
“What happened.”
“His wheelchair malfunctioned. Somehow, the stick that moves it forward got stuck.”
“What are you talking about? Is he all right?”
She shook her head. “No,” she said. “Gelling isn’t all right at all. The wheelchair shot across his fourth-floor parlor and sent him flying out of one of the windows. He fell to the sidewalk and now he’s dead. Poor Gelling is dead. Max just saw it on CNN.”
Carmen sank back in her chair. Beyond the fact that she had grown fond of Gelling, with his death meant that whatever information he’d culled that afternoon on the syndicate died along with him. It was her one trump card against Katzev, that one thing she knew she could use against him if the situation called for it, which she knew it would.
Sitting there, stunned by the news, she knew that now she only had Katzev’s family to use as a bargaining chip against him. But already she knew that wasn’t much. What she saw in that video was a family struggling to keep it together. With Katzev’s money, why weren’t they in a better situation? Had he refused to help them? Obviously, he had. They meant little to him, including his mother, whom he could have set up into a better life if he wanted to do so.
Worse for Carmen, if they did mean nothing to him, would it matter if she threatened to kill them? And if it didn’t, what pull did she have over him now?
* * *
“Where are you meeting Katzev tonight?” Jake asked.
“I’m not sure,” Carmen said. “Vincent said he’d know by the time he landed.”
“You know you can’t go there alone.”
“I’m not going there alone. I’m going with Vincent.”
“I should be there,” he said. “Katzev will have his own people there, wherever ‘there’ is. It’s not going to be just him.”
“Probably not, but I can’t risk it. At the very least, I need to get Chloe out of there. You don’t understand what she means to me. She’s like a daughter to me. She’s in that situation because of me. Whatever happens to me happens. My main focus is getting her out and following Vincent’s plan.”
“Even if you die?”
“Even if I die.”
He looked at her with disappointment, as if that fact that she’d choose her death to save someone else’s life was an afront to his ideals as an assassin. “I’m not exactly an amateur, Carmen. They won’t see or hear me. Let me help you.”
What Carmen wanted to say but didn’t say is that she still didn’t trust him. She still didn’t know who he was. He was an enigma to her. Since they’d been together, he had shared almost nothing about himself. Who was he? What did she know about this man that was meaningful? Nothing. There had been opportunities for him to offer a glimpse into who he was when they were conferencing with Babe, but he chose to remain behind a shadow of his own making.
Part of her understood that. It’s what they were supposed to do—keep quiet. Reveal nothing. He was honoring his profession. She got it. But she would feel a hell of a lot better if he had offered them an honest glimpse into who he was.
She looked at him. He said h
e had no idea why the syndicate wanted him dead. Was that the truth? She wasn’t sure, if only because he came clean that he agreed to sell her out to them in an effort to buy time to get out of the city and thus save himself. Would he do so again? Of course, he would. Worse, if she was in his situation, she’d do the same thing, which complicated things. To their core, survival was at the root of who they were. It’s all they had. To keep going, to stay alive, they had to put themselves first. How could she judge him for any of this when she likely would have done the same thing in a different situation?
Frustrated with her, he leaned back in his seat and crossed his legs, removing himself from any further conversation. She felt conflicted. Was she making a mistake by not seeking his help? She wasn’t sure, but what she did know is that the man seated in front of her was someone she could never trust the way she trusted Spocatti.
CHAPTER TWE
NTY-FIVE
Time passed and it passed slowly. How long had she been here now? A day? More than a day? Probably more than a day, though it felt like three days. Maybe longer, but she knew that wasn’t true. They’d yet to feed her, though when she asked, they did allow her to use the bathroom, which was just across from her, and they did allow her to use the water fountain next to the restroom when she said she was thirsty.
Each time they allowed her freedom beyond the chair, they gave her opportunities they couldn’t understand. They had dismissed her because of her age. They had no idea what she had seen in her ife, what she had been through or how she had survived as long as she had in a world that seemed determined to conspire against her.
Chloe Philips, born to the streets, looked at things differently than most because she had a worldview that was different from most. She looked for the advantage, whatever might give her the edge should she need it, which often was the case on the streets, especially when you were as relentlessly bullied as she was.
From Manhattan With Revenge Boxed Set Page 20