The Greater Good

by Casey Moreton

  They saw the girl. She was walking leisurely, with a look of contentment on her face, her mind a thousand miles away—everything pie-in-the-sky. They only needed a few seconds. Before she understood what was happening, it would be too late. Game over.

  He patiently went through the routine. The bank employee smiled at St. John as he set the box on the table.

  “Just let me know when you’re done,” the man said.

  St. John nodded in return.

  When he was alone in the room, he pulled out a chair and sat at the table. The box sat before him. There was no reason to delay any further.

  He inserted his key and turned it. He lifted the lip and peered inside.

  A ribbon of warmth and gladness lifted in his stomach. There inside the box was a yellow envelope. He reached in and pulled it out. Just the act of holding it in his hand was like taking the first, broad step away from his old life. He let out the long, deep breath that he had held ever since the bank employee had gone to retrieve the deposit box for him.

  Could it really be over? It was hard not to break into a full smile, right there at the table. He wished Megan were sitting there beside him so that he could wrap his arms around her and kiss her on the mouth. This envelope would tell him how to find his money. Then Belfast would be a part of the past, and Olin St. John could step into the future and live the way a man was meant to live.

  He pushed the metal box away and flipped the envelope around so that he could run his finger beneath the flap. The paper tore as he worked his finger along the edge. He took a breath, and smiled, then removed the folded card. He opened the card, read what was written, and the smile evaporated.

  R’mel spoke into the mike in his helmet. He thumbed the ignition switch, and the Ducati eased away from the curb. It was time to move again.

  Belfast had emerged, clearly in a huff. R’mel knew to hang back. Belfast’s reputation preceded him. Belfast could kill him with a pencil through the ear in the time it would take to blink.

  He watched him stop at a pay phone half a block dead ahead.

  St. John was infuriated. The folded card was in his hand. He dug a fist into a pocket, looking for change. He snatched up the pay phone and looked at the phone number written on the card. The number had a Manhattan prefix, and the suffix began with 9, which told him he was calling a pay phone.

  This was bad. Very bad, indeed.

  The arrangement had always been simple: he did the job, the wiring information was left in the bank box, and then he transferred the money wherever he desired. This development, though, was highly out of the ordinary. And that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up straight and tall. He struggled to remain cool. He wanted his money, that was all.

  A bitterly cold wind rushed down through the street, but he did not notice. He looked up ahead on the sidewalk, at the faces going in any and every direction. Then he pivoted and looked down the way he’d come. A city bus had stopped a few hundred feet behind him, and passengers were boarding. Several car lengths behind the bus, a man with a helmet sat on an idling motorcycle.

  He had to get control of himself. He hadn’t survived the past decade by sweating every unexpected development. But something wasn’t right. In fact, every molecule of instinct was telling him that something was very wrong.

  He inserted the correct change into the pay phone and punched in the number, slowly, one digit at a time. He pressed his hand against the side of the phone booth and closed his eyes.

  The call was answered on the first ring.

  29

  THE SUBWAY TRAIN CAME TO A GRINDING HALT AND THEdoors slid open. A few passengers wandered in and out. St. John stood and exited. The voice on the phone had told him where to go. The instructions had been brief but precise. He found the rest room exactly where he’d been told it would be. A nervous flutter ran through his belly.

  He stole up behind a trash receptacle and eased his Glock from a coat pocket, checking that the clip was fully loaded and that the safety was off—he had come for his money but had no plans to die for it.

  There was a derelict asleep on the ground on the other side of the trash receptacle. St. John stepped around with caution. He eased along the wall and stopped at the mouth of the rest room. There was grime and graffiti on the walls. Banks of fluorescent bulbs spewed puke yellow light on the tiled floor. He eased inside, his senses and instincts on full alert. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure the derelict hadn’t moved.

  A cinder block partition divided the bathroom entrance from the remainder of the rest room. He kept one hand in the coat pocket with the Glock. He stopped. The old paranoia was back. His palms were suddenly sweaty. His hand tensed around the gun.

  It had been thirty minutes since he’d found the yellow envelope in the bank box. In that time, he’d had to think through his options. Something was afoot. Were they reneging on the payment? Was it their plan to get him alone and put a bullet through his brain? He’d made it very clear to those who needed to know, that the James Ettinger job was his last. His decision had not been questioned. There was no fuss.

  True, this was the largest payment he’d demanded in his career, but they’d seemed willing enough to pay. There had been no quibbling; his client apparently had very deep pockets. Taking out the vice president of the United States was no small order, so his price had been steep. And if they had made a fuss, he would have politely declined the assignment. But they hadn’t. The 5.9 had been acceptable to all parties involved.

  What then? The voice on the phone had been vague. He was to meet someone named Albertwood.

  The ground rumbled underfoot as a subway train roared past outside the rest room. It created a breeze that cooled the sweat on his face. The rest room had the stink of neglect. He was mindful of any hint of movement, any alteration of heat or light.

  He stood with his shoulder against the partition, facing a corner where the wall opposite him led into the open expanse of the rest room. He parted his lips to speak, running his tongue along his lower lip. He breathed in and out, his eyes fixed on the opposite wall; if there was a shift in light from within, that was where it would show up. Finally, he called out, somewhat tentatively, “Albertwood?”

  His voice boomed off the walls and the tile floor, and carried outside the rest room, where it finally died out over the tracks. The sound of his own voice startled him. It reminded him of how alone he was down here.

  “In here,” a voice said.

  St. John tightened his grip on the gun. It was not the voice from the phone; the voice from the phone had been more…muscular.

  “Please, come forward.”

  St. John eased into the light.

  There was a row of urinals opposite a long countertop fitted with rows of metal sinks. The mirrors above the countertop had all been broken out. There was a small, round drain in the center of the room, to which the floor on all sides sloped. Beyond the row of urinals were six or seven toilet stalls. St. John would have liked to check the stalls. If he’d had earlier notification of this little rendezvous, he’d have staked it out, to know the terrain. But, of course, that was the reason it had been sprung on him. They wanted him shaken. They wanted him off guard.

  In the center of the expanse sat an old man in a wheelchair. His lips were drawn back in a sickening grin. He looked ancient. One hand lay across his lap. The other gripped the steering wand on the wheelchair. His long gray hair was fastened in a ponytail that looped around over his shoulder. He was a grotesque sight.

  “Albertwood?”

  “Of course. Thank you for coming on such short notice.”

  St. John had his finger on the trigger. He stood tall, facing the old man and wondering where this all might lead.

  “I apologize for the inconvenience and for the change of plans. If you plan on using the gun in your pocket, I’d have to discourage it on the basis of the three automatic weapons aimed at you at this moment,” Julius Albertwood said. He was pleased. He could have had Desmond hand
le this matter, even Shelby. He could have simply shown up and watched. But to have a legendary assassin on the ropes was more than he could bear to pass up. Very few had ever seen Belfast. He hadn’t been photographed since his teens. Many did not believe he existed. As with Carlos the Jackal, no one knew for certain whether the man behind the name was a myth. Actually, he appeared younger than Albertwood had imagined. No one knew his birth date or age. Hiring him was no easy matter, either.

  A ghost in the flesh, Albertwood thought. All the stories he’d heard were chilling. He was all too familiar with Belfast’s work. He was a fan, in fact. It was heartening to find the legendary Belfast so human after all. He was really just a kid. He’d seen and done a lot, traveled many miles, but in the end he was just a kid with weaknesses. Weaknesses that could be exploited.

  Looming retirement had blinded Belfast, mused Albertwood. He’d gotten sloppy in these last days. He’d allowed himself to be spotted and to be tailed. He’d fallen in love—amateur mistake. Love deadens the survival instincts. And perhaps he thought he was being cautious, even with the girl. But her mere presence had divided his attention. Every second spent with his eyes on the girl was a gap in his defense. Of course, even as he congratulated himself, Albertwood never let Belfast’s potency slip far from his mind. There was at that moment enough lead pointed at the assassin to ground a zeppelin.

  St. John did not move his head. His eyes found the toilet stalls, and he had to assume that at least one gunman had followed him into the hellhole, but he did not turn to find out. He’d gone against his better judgment, coming here, and now he felt like a fool. But if they’d simply wanted to kill him, it would have been easy enough to take care of the job on the street. He removed his hand from the coat pocket.

  Albertwood signaled his approval with a slight nod.

  “I’ve come for my money,” St. John said.

  The wheelchair surged forward twelve or eighteen inches, Albertwood’s upper body jerking from the sudden thrust. He controlled the machine with three fingers curled around the shaft of the steering wand. “Payment will be forthcoming, I can assure you. It will be wired to your account, as prescribed. In addition, a second payment of three million dollars will be wired. Both payments will be available when completion of your new assignment is confirmed.”

  New assignment?A plume of fury rose in St. John’s chest. He could feel the sudden heat spreading across his face. “I have retired,” he said.

  Albertwood ignored him. “Because of an unforeseen development, your further services are required.”

  “I’m not interested.”

  “When you’ve completed this task, you will be paid in full. Until that time, you will receive nothing.”

  “I want only what is owed me.”

  “That is not an option, Mr. Belfast,” Albertwood said.

  St. John touched his right hand to the lump in his coat pocket. He could kill Albertwood with a single blow to the larynx. The old man saw the movement but ignored it; he was ninety and paralyzed, and had been within spitting distance of the grave too long to fear it.

  “Like I said, my services are no longer for sale—at any price.”

  “It’s a lot of money, Mr. Belfast.”

  “Keep your money.”

  The old man stirred where he sat. He released his grip on the steering wand and raised his good hand, fishing something from a pouch strapped to his armrest. “Syracuse, New York. There you are to find a woman named Brooke Weaver. She has gone there to visit her parents for Christmas. She has in her possession a VHS videocassette. You are to return the videocassette to me. Payment will be made upon delivery.”

  Olin St. John, enraged, turned to go.

  “Before you go…,” Albertwood called out.

  He ignored the old man.

  “I’ve enjoyed the company of your fiancée.”

  A cold spike shivered down his spine. He turned slowly.

  The old man’s posture hadn’t changed. He was still a stooped, crippled, grinning…freak.

  “What?”

  Albertwood held a small manila envelope in his good hand. He set it on the corroded corner of a metal sink. “Megan is safe. She will remain in excellent health until midnight, tomorrow. If you are mathematically impaired, that’s thirty-six hours from now. If I have the videocassette by then, you will have Megan and eight-point-nine million dollars—not bad for a day’s work. I don’t think it’s necessary to discuss the alternative, do you?”

  He staggered back a step, then braced, and took a long stride forward. He had made a catastrophic error. There had been absolutely no need—none—to take this job. He was among the wealthiest one percent of the population on earth. All he’d had to do was walk away. Marry the woman he loved, and walk away. Simple as that.

  His ears were buzzing. The room spun. All his instincts had crashed and burned around him. He could have passed on the offer to kill Ettinger, and some other hired gun would have gotten a shot at him. Nobody was as good as he, but he was no magician. He’d simply mastered his craft. Now this was no longer just about him, this had become completely about Megan. They had her. And she could be dead by midnight tomorrow.

  “How did you—”

  “What’s important is that you have only thirty-six hours, and the clock is ticking,” Albertwood said.

  “Where is she?”

  “Where she will be at twelveA .M. Sunday morning is the only relevant question, Mr. Belfast.”

  St. John had a sudden impulse to jam a key through the old man’s throat. He could saw the man in half with three swift strokes. In the past, he’d done more with less. If indeed they had Megan, most likely they’d kill her anyway. This was his one shot at vengeance. If not, they might kill him in addition to Megan.

  Could the old man be bluffing? The question hovered over the shifting waters of his mind. If so, where did he get her name? Then it hit him: the bank, he’d been followed from the bank yesterday. The realization was like vinegar in his mouth. In his newfound bliss, he’d disregarded the rules that had kept him alive all these years. The rules had been his lifeblood. And now he was bleeding.

  “Where do I bring the videocassette?”

  Albertwood made a sweeping gesture with his good hand. “Call the same number you received from the bank box. It is a pay phone, but I assure you the call will reach me.”

  A thumb between the ribs, St. John mused, that’s what the old man needed.

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me,” Albertwood said, manipulating the steering wand on the armrest. The wheelchair motor whirred to life and the wheels squeaked on the tile.

  St. John watched him go.

  His gut told him that the envelope on the corner of the sink contained a photograph. His chest was tight, his breathing forced. He took a hesitant step forward. Then another.

  The photograph was facedown in the envelope. He snatched it out with two fingers, holding it down at his side for a long moment. He then strode across to the entrance to the scummy rest room. The subway tracks stood before him, running into infinity in either direction. He looked both ways and saw no trace of Albertwood or his henchmen.

  Then he raised the photograph, and saw Megan’s face, a gag of duct tape twined around her head and a Colt .45 automatic shoved in her ear.

  30

  WHEN SHE CALMED DOWN, SHE PLACED ANOTHER CALL TONBC. Yes, it was Darla’s apartment that had exploded, but neither Darla nor the other six NBC employees had been accounted for. Rescue crews were still sifting through the rubble, searching for survivors. Everyone seemed relieved to hear that Brooke had not been in the building. Next, she phoned her apartment. There was no answer, which didn’t astonish her. Terri came and went like the tides, only not nearly as predictably. She lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling. She should have been dead. The talking heads on the news were saying that a possible gas leak was suspected. Someone had likely lit a candle or a cigarette and the place ignited. It would be, they said, weeks or months before anything more sp
ecific was known.

  She was supposed to be at that party. And she would have been, had her mother not phoned her with word of Wyatt’s decline. She stared at the ceiling, raising her hands above her face, studying her fingers, moving them in a wavy motion. She was alive. Her eyes filled with tears. As she slept last night, Darla’s apartment was ablaze.

  The tears streamed down the sides of her face. She closed her eyes and stared into the dark void. She pressed her hands to her face, weeping violently.

  There was a knock at the door. Grace Weaver poked her head in the door. “Sweetie, you all right?”

  Brooke wiped the streaked tears from her cheeks with the backs of her hands. “Yeah,” she sniffed. “Yeah, Mom. I’m okay.”

  “You want some soup or something?”

  “No. Thanks. I’d just like to be alone.”

  Her mother nodded, offered a sympathetic smile, and withdrew, shutting the door behind her. Her face ached. She would have to see about catching a flight back to the city in the next day or so. If Darla and the others were in fact dead, there would be a ton of details to be taken care of. She would be needed in the office. She would have to—

  Something needled her. Something from the back of her mind.

  She rose from the bed and opened the door, marching down the hall to the kitchen.

  Her mother was working on the breakfast dishes, rinsing them and stacking them in neat rows in the dishwasher.

  “Mom?”

  Her mother looked up from her chore, and smiled.

  “Where’d Dad put today’s paper?”

  “It’s in the magazine rack beside his chair in the family room.”

  Brooke ran in and grabbed the local paper, staring dumb-founded at the front-page headline:VP ETTINGER ASSASSINATED.

  “Mom!” She felt breathless.

  “What? What?” Grace Weaver headed toward her daughter’s frantic tone.

  “This! What is this?” Brooke held the paper out.

  Grace, shaken and confused at exactly what her daughter wanted, drew a blank. “What?”