Trap (9781476793177)

by Tanenbaum, Robert K.

  “What’s going on?” Garcia asked Karp.

  Karp normally wouldn’t have involved “civilians” in his business or, for that matter, have had them remain in his office. But he was trying to stay focused, and besides, Alejandro had befriended the boys and protected them in the past. Something prompted him to quickly explain even as he was calling Marlene back.

  When she answered, her voice was tense. “There’s a chance he’s headed for an abandoned tenement building that’s undergoing renovation over near where he lived with his mom,” he told her. “He may be looking for a place to hole up or . . .”

  “Or shoot our sons,” Marlene finished the sentence for him.

  Karp let the comment pass, though he couldn’t ignore the lump in his throat. “Apparently this place may have a fence around it,” he said with difficulty.

  “There’re a lot of old buildings under construction around here.”

  “That’s all I’ve got,” he said, but his intercom buzzed insistently before Marlene answered. Mrs. Milquetost sounded in a near panic, “Mr. Karp, there’s a man on line two who says he’s going to kill your sons!”

  Karp then spoke in the phone. “Marlene, Forsling’s calling. I’ll put you on speakerphone so you can hear.” He then punched the button for Line 2. “This is District Attorney Karp.”

  “Is that you, Karp, you fucking Jew bastard?”

  “I’m here, Lars.”

  “I’ve got your kids.”

  “I’m aware of that,” Karp said, trying to sound calmer than he felt. “I’m asking you to let them and the woman go before this escalates.”

  “Too late, Karp, it’s . . .” Whatever Forsling said after that was obscured by background sound.

  “I didn’t hear what you said.”

  “I said it’s too late; it escalated when my mom died. And it’s all your . . .” Again, Forsling’s sentence was cut off by the sounds. Karp looked up and noted Garcia’s furrowed brow but didn’t have time to ask about it.

  “Did you hear me, Karp?” Forsling asked. A vehicle door slammed and there was the sound of an engine starting.

  Stalling for time, Karp asked him to repeat himself.

  “I said I’m going to shoot your fucking kids,” Forsling said. “I’m especially going to enjoy killing the smart-assed one.”

  “Lars, this isn’t going to solve anything or bring your mother back,” Karp said. “Let me send someone there to negotiate with you so that everybody gets out of this safely.”

  “Safely?” Forsling laughed harshly. “Yeah, right. Like I can trust a fucking Jew. I can see tomorrow’s headlines, Cops Forced to Shoot Mad Dog Nazi. I’m not falling for your tricks or your lies, Karp.” The young man’s voice broke. “Besides, I don’t give a shit anymore, and I’m not going to prison with a bunch of niggers waiting to jump me.”

  Wherever Forsling was driving, it wasn’t far. The engine stopped and there was the sound of him getting out and closing the door again. “Well, I think we’ve said everything there is to say,” he told Karp. There was the sound of the metal gate being pushed shut and then of him walking across gravel. “But I’ll call you back in a minute so that you can listen when I shoot your little Jew boys and that old bitch.”

  “Forsling!” Karp shouted into the phone but the line went dead.

  “He’s over near the river,” Garcia blurted out.

  “What?”

  “That’s my turf,” Garcia replied. “I’ve been listening to those sounds all of my life. They’re tugboat whistles; a bunch of them and they’re close. I’m guessing the garbage transfer station at East 91st Street where they load up the barges and then shove them out to the ocean to dump.”

  Karp nodded and picked up his phone. “Marlene, did you get that? Alejandro thinks he’s over near the garbage transfer station on the East River at 91st.”

  “Already on my way,” Marlene replied. “I’m only a few blocks west of there.”

  After a tense minute, she shouted. “I see the van. It’s parked on a side street. And that must be the tenement. There’s a padlock on the gate. I think I can squeeze through. . . . I got to run. Butch?”

  “Yes.”

  “When he calls back, stall him as long as you can.”

  “I will. And Marlene?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Be careful.” But there was no reply.

  17

  LARS FORSLING STOPPED AT THE bottom of the stairs leading up to the top floor where his unfinished business waited. He looked down at his Doc Martens boots, and tears fell from his eyes as he contemplated the changes twenty-four hours had brought to his life. The only person who ever really cared for him was dead. And he’d murdered two, or three, of the only friends he’d ever had.

  Now he was about to climb fourteen flights of stairs and shoot two teenaged boys and an old woman. Not your fault, said that little voice in his head. They made you do it. They have been against you all of your life. The Jews. The niggers. The kids whose dads hadn’t walked out on them. The whole fucking world.

  He thought back about the last time he’d seen his mother. She’d begged him not to go out. “These friends of yours are trouble,” she’d said. “What do you do with all that time you spend together?”

  “Just hang out,” he’d said with a shrug. “Talk.”

  “Why don’t you stay home and talk to your mother tonight?” she’d whined. “I won’t be here much longer, you know. I think the Jew doctors are poisoning me. I can hardly get out of bed to go to the bathroom.”

  Forsling had looked at her and tried not to be repulsed by the pasty swollen face or the partly exposed obese body. “Maybe you should get more exercise, Mom.”

  That, of course, only set her off. He didn’t understand. The medicine the Jew doctors claimed was for her heart actually was killing her, making her too weak to even get out of bed. “I might die tonight, you know, then you’ll be sorry you left me home alone.”

  Forsling almost gave in. But he was the one who’d called for the protest outside of the bakery. “Someone has to stand up to the lies about the ‘Holocaust’ and the threat of Zionism,” he’d told the other drunks at The Storm Trooper bar the night before. If he didn’t show up, he’d lose face.

  “I got to go,” he’d said. “We’re having an important meeting. Promise me you won’t smoke in bed.” But his mother shifted her bulk and turned away from him without saying anything.

  “I’ll see you later, Mother,” he’d said. “I’ll check in with you when I get home.”

  There was still no reply, so he’d left without saying anything else. As usual, he felt guilty leaving her; then again it was no different than any other time he tried to do anything on his own. She even complained when he got the job checking out the tenement construction site, shining a flashlight around a couple times a night to make it look like there was regular security. He didn’t like going over there at night—there were a lot of spics and niggers in that neighborhood—but he didn’t have a lot of employment options, and he was trying to save up for his move to Idaho.

  Looks like I’ll be moving sooner than expected, he thought as he began climbing the stairs to the top of the building. He’d saved a few hundred dollars and there’d been roughly another hundred in the till at The Storm Trooper. Enough to get out there, he figured, and once there, he’d drop some hints that he’d been responsible for the car bombing they might have heard about in New York. He imagined the admiring acceptance he’d receive once among the white supremacist militias; he’d assume a fake name and identity and blend in.

  Thinking about his new life was followed by a pang of guilt. His mother was lying in a morgue, her skin charred, her lips curled in some ghastly grimace of pain. He imagined the dark figures who’d crept into their home and up the stairs in the dark, dousing her with gasoline as she slept and then lighting the match. She would have woken from her drunken stupor as the flames engulfed her and pain began. And there was no one to protect her. No one to save her.
She’d died alone as predicted.

  The thought made him angry, and he climbed the stairs faster. He was going to get his revenge and then he’d be on his way to the Promised Land. He’d explained it all to the teenagers and the old woman as they drove north on Third Avenue. “Blame your old man for what’s going to happen,” he said. “He’s trying to frame me for setting off that car bomb . . . him and that nigger cop of his. That’s the way you Jews operate. Figure out who needs to be removed so that you can get away with your lies, then get the mud people to do your dirty work.”

  “My dad wouldn’t frame anybody. You didn’t plant the bomb?” the skinnier of the teens asked.

  Forsling scoffed. “No. I had nothing to do with it, though I could not care less that there’s one less Jew in the world. I was there to stand up to the lies about the Holocaust. But I didn’t kill anybody. I was sitting in a cop car when the bomb went off. But they hauled my ass to jail, and then burned my mom out, so now you got to pay.”

  He looked over at the old woman expecting to see fear in her eyes. Instead, she smiled at him then leaned over and patted his knee. “If God wills us to die tonight, so be it,” she said, though there was a strange quality to her voice as if she didn’t use it much.

  When they reached the entrance to the fence around the tenement, Forsling handed a key to the teen in the passenger seat to unlock the padlock and remove the chain so they could drive in. “If you try to run away I’ll shoot the old woman and your brother.”

  Giancarlo had done as he was told and then got back in the van. He’d then instructed the driver to pull up as close to a side door leading into the building as he could and made the passenger get out and unlock the door. With the boys in the lead and the old woman walking in front of him with the gun pointed at her back, they started ascending the stairs.

  Reaching the tenth floor, the old woman, who had been struggling, suddenly collapsed. “Carry her,” he’d instructed the larger teen, who picked her up and brought her to the loft. He’d then placed her on an old mattress that had been left by workmen.

  “You sit,” Forsling had told the bigger teen, pointing the gun at an old wooden chair. “And you grab that rope and tie his wrists to the arms of the chair. . . . Now wrap it a few times around his waist.”

  Once that was done, Forsling had tied the other teen down in a similar fashion though it was with some difficulty with one hand still holding the gun. “Try anything, and I’ll make sure the old woman dies first,” he’d warned.

  Satisfied that both teens were secure, he’d just turned around when he was surprised by a large rat that scurried across the floor ten feet away. He screamed and backed away, almost losing his balance.

  “Wow, some tough Nazi you are,” said the larger of the two teens. “You peed in your pants?”

  Forsling felt shame flood to his face at the kid’s comments. He walked up to the mouthy teen and backhanded him across the face.

  “Why don’t you untie me and see if you dare doing that again,” the teenager snarled.

  Forsling struck him again. It felt good. He felt powerful. “Yeah, you’re talking big now,” he said. “Let’s see what you say when I stick this gun in your mouth before I pull the trigger. I’ve already killed three guys today, and they were my friends. Shooting you will be even easier.”

  With that he’d stormed out of the loft and down the stairs. He was worried that someone would see the van parked inside the gates and call the cops. But first he placed a call to Karp. He wanted the man to suffer. Negotiate for my safety, yeah right, he thought, like I’m going to fall for that Jew trick.

  Karp thought he was stupid, but he had a plan. First he’d get his revenge while Karp listened to his kids die. Then he’d drive the van to Newark, where he’d ditch it and catch a bus to Idaho. There among the green mountains and clear rivers, he’d live among like-minded supremacists, away from the mud people and Jews. Maybe even find a good Aryan woman for a wife.

  The daydreaming had been put on hold when he reached the loft and got ready to exact his righteous revenge. At first seeing the rat again had thrown him off, but backhanding the teen had put him back in the mood. He’d loved hearing Karp pleading with him to not kill his sons. “Which one should I shoot first?”

  “Me, shoot me.” The old woman’s voice surprised them all. She was standing unsteadily on her feet, her hands bound at the wrist in front of her. “I’m old. Shoot me if you must kill someone for your mother.”

  Forsling pointed the gun at her. But looking in her clear, calm eyes, he couldn’t pull the trigger.

  “No, me,” the thinner of the teens said. “I’m not afraid of you, you Nazi son of a bitch.”

  Anger took over Forsling’s brain. He aimed the gun at the teen. “Well, you should be,” he snarled, intending to pull the trigger.

  “Hey, asshole!” the other teen yelled.

  “WHAT?” The kid was really getting on his nerves.

  “Catch.”

  The comment was so unexpected that at first he didn’t recognize the large gray object the teen lifted off the floor with the toe of his shoe and flung up at him. Not until the rat landed on the arm he held outstretched with the gun in his hand. Even then the rodent had scampered onto his shoulder and bit him on the ear before he reacted.

  First, he screamed so high and so loud that some part of his brain registered surprise that the sound had come from him. Then he shook his arm so violently that the gun flew from his hand and clattered across the floor. Next he reached up with the other hand and grabbed the rat, which bit him again, causing him to howl in pain and fear as he flung the rodent across the room.

  At the same time, the larger of the two teens, though still bound by his wrists and waist to the chair, bellowed with rage and propelled himself at Forsling. He struck him so hard he was propelled backward, with the teen landing hard on him.

  “Get her out of here,” the youth yelled at his brother. Forsling turned and saw that the other teen had slipped his bonds and was helping the old woman toward the door. Then the teen on top butted him in the head.

  Hurt and suddenly afraid, at first all he could think about was disentangling himself from the battling youth and fleeing. But all of that weight lifting hadn’t been a waste and as he fought back, he discovered his strength, especially against an adversary who was at such a disadvantage. He balled his fist and struck the boy and then struck him again.

  Grabbing the teen’s neck, he tried to strangle him, but the youth was too strong and struggled, using his knees to strike at Forsling. Getting desperate, he pushed the youth off him and sprung to his feet while his adversary struggled to rise with the chair still attached.

  Forsling ran to where the Luger had landed and grabbed it with a yell of triumph. He turned, intending to shoot them all. However, instead he found himself looking at a petite woman who was pointing a gun at him.

  For a moment time seemed to stand still. He saw the larger teen still on the floor. The other teen and the old woman were off to the side. “Drop your gun,” the woman demanded.

  There was a brief moment when he considered doing what she said. But he thought about the past twenty-four hours and then about what the rest of his life would be like. No Idaho, only prison. He raised the weapon and felt something kick him in the chest, and at the same time there was a loud shot that seemed to fill the entire loft. Then something kicked him again and he fell backward to the floor.

  Life seemed to play out in slow motion after that. The woman approached, still aiming the gun at him. Her face was a mask of rage, but then it softened as she looked down at him and he wondered if her expression was one of sorrow. Then another face appeared; the old woman, who knelt beside him and held his hand.

  One part of him wanted to accept the sorrow and the kindness. But the larger part of him grew angry. Idaho was gone. His mother was dead. He was dying and it was all Karp’s fault. But there was still a way to get even, still a way to be a hero to the Aryans in the West.
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  He tried to speak but it was difficult because of the blood in his mouth. “I did it,” he managed to blurt out, raising his head. “It was my bomb that blew up the car. I killed the Jew bitch.”

  Then it was too much of an effort to speak anymore. His head felt so heavy and he lay it back down. Everything was fading, and the last image was of a mountain stream before the lights went out.

  18

  TOMMY MONROE ENTERED THE JAY Street Bar and looked around suspiciously. It was a Tuesday evening and the crowd was light, just a few regulars and a couple of people he didn’t know. These he looked over carefully.

  One was a young Hispanic guy sitting at the bar, dressed in a long wool coat and beanie cap with a New York Knicks logo, and drinking a beer. He glanced at Monroe and went back to minding his own business. A large black man in a leather coat and black beret sat at a back table with his eyes closed, nodding his head to whatever music was playing into the earplugs he wore as he sipped a glass of wine. Across the room a youngish couple cozied up with their heads together; the man’s hand was beneath the table and he appeared to be stroking her leg, from her giggles and mild protest noises.

  He nodded to a big, rough-looking guy in a Yankees letterman’s jacket slouching on one of the seats at the bar. The guy wasn’t a regular; he was a New York City cop on Brooklyn DA Olivia Stone’s payroll who’d been sent on ahead to look out for any traps and provide muscle if needed. His unconcerned facial expression comforted Monroe.

  The person he’d come to meet was sitting at the back table where Monroe usually sat. Micah Gallo spotted him and raised his chin to acknowledge he’d been seen, but didn’t bother to get up or shake his hand when Monroe approached the table, carrying a briefcase and a laptop. He set the device on the table and the briefcase on the floor, then took a seat.

  “Micah.”