The Greater Good

by Casey Moreton

  The streets were clogged. The taxi puttered forward a few feet at a time. A block from Donovan’s apartment building, the van pulled down a side street and then into an alley behind a frozen yogurt shop.

  The van’s side door rattled open, sliding on its tracks, and Carmichael barreled out, looking both directions down the alley. A stray cat watched them from atop a Dumpster. Porter stepped from the passenger’s door, saying something into the mike on his lapel, and then nodded. Standing in the slush and muck of the alley, he faced the van, double-checking that his weapon was loaded and ready to go.

  Carmichael checked her weapon, also. They nodded at one another, then walked as a group, hurrying through the alley.

  25

  CONNORKINGSTON, THE NEW INTERN, ANDJILLPALMGRASS,who’d been on her research staff the past eight years, were sitting in the hallway with their backs against the wall when Darla stepped from the elevator.

  “Well, hey,” Darla said, surprised but not startled by their presence.

  “Hiya, boss,” Connor said, getting to his feet. “We thought maybe you could use a hand getting ready, before the rest of the gang shows up.”

  Darla was tired and half-asleep from the cab ride from Rockefeller Plaza, and had fully intended to have time to sit down and enjoy a moment’s silence before the festivities began. But maybe this was better, she thought. Jill and Connor could get things cranking in the kitchen, while she stole away to the bathroom and ran some warm water over her feet in the tub.

  “Sounds fine to me.” Darla fumbled through her purse for her keys.

  “Joyce called me from her car,” Jill said. “She and Lesley are on their way up. They had to park a couple of blocks away.”

  Darla nodded, fitting the key and pushing the door open with a knee.

  “Here ya go, let me take care of that,” Connor said, taking the paper bag from Darla. “Mmm, champagne! You know the way to a man’s heart!”

  Darla set her purse on a tall, narrow table just inside the door and pitched her keys into a pewter dish on the table. The keys settled in the dish with a clatter.

  Desmond’s people moved along the outside wall of a brick building a few hundred feet from their destination. They moved quickly and with purpose. Carmichael kept a hand on the Walther automatic in her coat pocket. It was fitted with a silencer, as was her associate’s weapon of choice.

  From where they now stood, their view of the apartment building was obstructed by another high-rise. They turned to the left, stepping into an adjoining alleyway, which would lead them out to the sidewalk that ran along the street. A small import car was parked there. They stepped around the car, hurrying toward the light from the street.

  Porter adjusted his cap.

  Lewis did not have a wig or a cap, but a trim mustache was attached to his face by spirit gum. When this business was over, he would discard it in a trash bin or just out the window of the van. He glanced at his watch, noting the exact time, and thought they should be done and out in less than ten minutes.

  The same voice crackled into all three earpieces. “Hold tight,” Desmond instructed.

  Lewis put his arm out, halting his associates just short of the sidewalk. “What gives?”

  “She’s home, but she’s not alone.”

  They eyed one another, momentarily bewildered, and then crept back into the shadows of the alley.

  “Okay, what’s your call?” Porter said.

  “Hold up,” Desmond ordered. “Wait for my signal.”

  Porter adjusted the Chargers cap, shrugged at the others, and said, “Roger that.”

  There was a platter of sandwiches in the neighbor’s refrigerator. A deli had delivered it in the afternoon, and Darla had requested that Miss Landers please keep it in the refrigerator until she got home. Barry Hickman had arrived by now, so he and Connor took a stroll next door, where they received a snooty once-over from Miss Landers.

  The platter smelled heavily of green onions and mayonnaise.

  When they returned to Darla’s apartment, Lipton Stephenson was seated in an overstuffed armchair in the front room. The armchair was against a big window that overlooked the street. He had a coffee table book on his lap. He flipped pages slowly, scanning the pages through rimless glasses. Lipton was the oldest and least social of the bunch. He was from the old school of print journalism, and carried an air of superiority, which goaded his colleagues.

  The sounds of activity in the kitchen carried into the front room. Lipton looked up from his book for just an instant, then returned his attention to the page. He did not offer to help.

  There was an indoor grill already set up on the counter in the kitchen. Darla had directed them to the buffalo wings in her refrigerator. The chicken was divided between two crystal plates on the bottom shelf. Joyce pulled them out and peeled off the Saran Wrap. The grill heated up in a matter of seconds, and Joyce found a set of stainless steel tongs in a drawer and set about spacing the chicken pieces above the burner. She then basted the meat with a prepared sauce that Darla had worked up. The meat began to sizzle.

  Barry and Connor stood around one of the islands in the kitchen, shooting the breeze. Barry lit a cigarette. Connor grabbed a wine cooler from the refrigerator. Lesley worked on a salad. Around this time, everyone echoed the same sentiment: too bad we have to work tomorrow.

  Desmond listened to every word, every sound, every breath.

  He crouched in the darkness. The only light was that of the moon coming through the office window. He listened through the headset, closely monitoring the sensitivity level of the telescoping microphone. So far there was nothing of value. But he would give them a little time to say what he wanted to hear.

  Then he would be forced to get physical.

  The flashlight snapped on in the basement, pitching an oblong spot of light across the wall. Lewis played the beam of light across the rows of electrical boxes, then turned and spotted the metal boxes that housed the telephone lines. He ran his tongue along his lower lip.

  The lump of putty was still in place. Lewis picked it off and tossed it over his shoulder into the darkness, then opened the hinged metal door. He scanned down the rows of masking tape until he found the strip of tape that had been labeled with Donovan’s apartment number. Disconnecting the phone line was an elementary task. He simply reached up and twisted the connector, detaching it from its post.

  Lewis spoke into his mike. “Phone is down,” he said.

  Across the street, a spot of moonlight on his face, Desmond dialed his cell phone. The line rang fifteen times without being answered. He had dialed Donovan’s apartment. He keyed his radio and said, “Let’s do it.”

  Lewis nodded to himself. He left the hinged door open, and then turned and moved across the small, cinder block room, approaching the metal boxes that housed the breaker units. Again, he found the lump of putty on the proper box. He found the appropriate unit and swung the metal door open on its hinges. Each room in the apartment had a separate breaker switch, and at the top of the unit was a main breaker, which would cut all power to the apartment.

  He held the flashlight against his collarbone, making sure that everything was in order. Then he spoke into his mike. “Ready and waiting.”

  Porter and Carmichael were in the stairwell. They came through the door and into a hallway on the eighteenth floor. The hallway was empty. They moved with precision, staying shoulder to shoulder. They stopped at the door to Donovan’s apartment, checking to make certain no one had entered the hallway on either side of them. There was light visible beneath the door. They removed their weapons and readied them. They prepared to pull the night-vision goggles down over their eyes.

  Porter spoke into his mike. “Let’s do it.”

  Lewis nodded, reaching up and putting his thumb on the main breaker switch. “Say good night.” His thumb flipped the main breaker into the off position.

  The light beneath the door was suddenly gone. Porter shoved a thin metal tool into the lock, and turned th
e knob.

  Everyone but Lipton was in the kitchen. Lipton looked up from his book in the dark. He furrowed his brow, a bit put off by the sudden loss of light.

  The instant the lights went out, there was a brief hush in conversation, then a mix of humorous chatter and subtle dismay broke out. The guys loved it. The women, though, had reservations about how long they were willing to spend in the dark with them.

  No one heard the gunshot that killed Lipton. By now he had crumbled into a heap at the foot of the overstuffed chair. The coffee table book was spattered with blood.

  Darla felt her way to the end of the counter, where a phone was mounted on the wall. The numbers on the phone glowed a sickly yellow in the dark.

  “Must be the snow,” Lesley said. “It builds up on the power lines.”

  Everyone nodded in the dark.

  Darla dialed the super’s office downstairs and put the phone to her ear. No dial tone. She frowned. “The telephone is down, too.”

  “You have matches around here anywhere?” someone asked.

  There was a coughing sound and a flash of light in the archway that led to the kitchen, followed by a clatter as someone fell to the tile floor.

  “What wasthat!” someone yelled in the darkness of the kitchen.

  Another quick flash of light and a coughing sound. Someone standing beside Darla, maybe Barry, slumped to his knees, then fell forward lifelessly. There were screams, followed by flashes of gunfire.

  Suddenly there was scrambling in the unlit space. Then another flash of light, and another body crashed into a service cart that was parked along a wall. In the chaos, those who remained found themselves tripping over bodies, no one too sure of which way to run. They collided with one another, slipping and fumbling as the tile floor became increasingly slick with blood.

  Darla found herself frozen where she stood. She heard a rapid succession of coughing sounds; bullets ringing off of pots and pans. Someone screamed, but that scream was quickly silenced as a body hit the floor. Someone was lying against her leg. She dashed forward, her hands groping blindly in the dark. She felt a hard edge topped with Formica. The island. The flashes of light seemed to be coming from the entrance to the kitchen. She squatted behind the island, with her knees tucked against her chin.

  Bullets chipped away at the wooden cabinets.

  Suddenly it was quiet. The firing stopped.

  There was no more scrambling. No more flashes of light.

  Darla could smell the acrid odor of what she suspected was burnt gunpowder. She shook uncontrollably. She was going to die. She knew she was going to be shot but did not know why or by whom.

  There were no screams or moans, and she feared she might be the only one of her staff left alive. She began to weep. For what had already happened, and for what she knew was still to come. Now there were footsteps. They drew nearer to her. The footsteps stopped inches from where Darla huddled at the base of the island.

  A voice from the darkness said, “Darla Donovan?”

  Tears streamed down Darla’s face. She was afraid to look up, afraid to open her eyes. Death was imminent, but her instincts had her convinced that as long as she kept her eyes closed, she could prolong the inevitable.

  “Are you Darla Donovan?” The voice was stronger this time, more insistent.

  She felt a cylinder of warm metal pressed to her forehead.

  The tears burned her eyes, and she began to blubber. But she managed to say, “Y…yes.”

  “Where is the videotape?”

  She turned her face up, daring to confront the voice in the darkness. There was not enough light to make out a face or a definite shape, only a vague outline of someone standing before her. She was shaking so badly she could hardly enunciate. “What?”

  The warm cylinder pressed harder against her head. She knew it was the barrel of a gun.

  “Where…is…the…TAPE?”

  “I…don’t understand! What tape?”

  The barrel pulled away from her head and an instant later there was a coughing sound and a flash. A bolt of indescribable pain shot up from her thigh. She’d been shot in the leg.

  Darla rolled onto her side, clamping her hands around her thigh. Sticky gore seeped between her fingers. She wanted to scream but feared the repercussions.

  She felt the metal cylinder press between her eyes again.

  “Let’s try this one more time,” the male voice said. And she had no doubt that his patience was quickly expiring.

  Videotape? What was he talking about? Why would she have a videotape worth killing over?None of it made sense. But that did not matter, she decided. All that mattered was that this man, whoever he might be, was dead set on obtaining something she did not have.

  “What videotape?” she said, beyond desperation.

  “The one you found in your secret little box.”

  Pure insanity!“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Her sobs overpowered her ability to think clearly. “Please…please!Iswear…”

  Speaking to someone else, the voice said, “She’s useless.” In a moment, he said, “Roger that.”

  The heat of the cylinder was burning the flesh between her eyes.

  “You have two seconds to tell me where it is. One…”

  Breathlessly, “Iswear—”

  Her brains sprayed throughout the kitchen, specking the cabinetry and the tile floor. Porter kicked her legs out of his way so that he could get by. They were careful to collect each of the spent shell casings. Carmichael had gone back to the front room. She came back now, her gun in one hand and something else in the other.

  “What is that?” he asked her.

  “Donovan’s answering machine,” she said.

  He nodded. He stepped over a corpse and paused in the front of the oven range. From a fanny pack on his waist, he removed a small device the size and shape of a track-and-field stopwatch. On the back of the device was a small mound of incendiary putty. The front of the device had a digital readout. The readout had been preset. It read: 03:45:00. He opened the oven door, firmly attaching the explosive inside the appliance.

  Standing, he reached over the range and turned the gas knob, cranking it clockwise until it would turn no farther. He squatted, leaning in, listening, making certain he could hear the hiss of the gas line. He gave her the thumbs-up. She waved him out.

  The explosive he’d planted in the oven would cover their tracks. It would only create a limited detonation, and the digital device would melt to the size of a guitar pick. An investigation would find that the resident had failed to turn off the gas for the oven after cooking dinner.

  They exited the apartment, descending the stairs, the way they’d come. On cue, Lewis reinstated power and telephone communication to the home of Ms. Darla Donovan. He came out an access door and awaited his confederates outside the building.

  Desmond had seen only the initial muzzle flash, the shot that had killed Lipton. Less than two minutes later, he’d given the okay to off Donovan. She had had nothing to offer them, and they could not let her live. One of his agents had reported finding something of interest, not the videocassette, but something she said might be of use to them.

  For now, he needed to get out of the office building. There’d be quite a pyrotechnics display very shortly. And he didn’t want to stick around for it. He radioed them from the Ferrari. They were already at the van. The tape was still at large, so that put them still very much in the thick of a crisis. Another day was coming to an end without results. Tonight he’d have to answer to Mr. Stott, Albertwood, and Shelby—a truly bleak consideration. The only possible upshot would be if the item from Donovan’s apartment happened to put him within arm’s reach of the videotape. He felt pessimistic, but he uttered a quick chant to the twin gods: Luck and Chance.

  26

  DEAN ANDGRACEWEAVER HAD OWNED THEIR HOME INSyracuse for the better part of three decades. It was a 2,700-square-foot timber-frame structure, with three bedrooms, a large family room, a well-
furnished kitchen, and a large stone fireplace. It had been a great home to raise kids in, and would make a fine place to live when they reached retirement.

  The back door was open, and the wind was slapping the storm door against the doorframe. It was late in the evening, Thursday. Dean Weaver shuffled across the patio, his arms heaped with split firewood. He kicked at the storm door, nudging it open with his house shoe enough so that he could catch it against his hip.

  The storm door clacked shut behind him. A narrow hallway led from the back door, through the kitchen, dissected another hallway, and ended at the family room. His wife moved the metal screen from in front of the fireplace, and Mr. Weaver carefully added the pieces of split wood to the fire. The flames rose, warming his face. Satisfied, he then headed back the way he’d come, to lock up and turn off the patio light. He was pleased to have both his children home.

  Wyatt’s hospital bed was set up in his old bedroom. The bed was raised so that he was sitting up. His mother had added a second pillow behind his head. IV stands stood to the side of the bed; tubes ran to his nose and arms. The smile on his face was weak but genuine.

  Grace Weaver had brought in a dining room chair for Brooke. Brooke sat right up against the hospital bed, her hand wrapped around Wyatt’s fingers.

  “I’m glad you came,” Wyatt said. His voice was tired, and the act of speaking drained him of whatever tiny reserve of energy he possessed. He would close his eyes for long stretches, even during conversation.

  “It’s Christmas,” Brooke said. “I wasn’t going to miss out on the presents, Mr. Wiseguy.” She smiled at him. Indeed, he had lost another ten or fifteen pounds since her last visit.

  “How is the big city?”

  “Big and noisy,” she said.

  “Are you a star yet?” he said with wink.

  “I wasborn a star.”

  “Amen.”

  “I’d like you to come stay with me for a few weeks when you get better. You’d love my roommate. In fact there are a lot of girls who’d fall in love with you.”