by Tom Wallace
The library was dark, but not unoccupied. A black woman was on her knees washing the baseboard in front of the big window. She jumped when he entered the room.
“Lordy, lordy, child, you scared me,” she said, her hand over her heart. “I wasn’t expecting anyone.”
“I’m from security,” he answered. “I’m here to check the library.”
“Yes, sir, you go right ahead. I can come back and finish this later.” She walked to the door. “How long before I should come back?”
“About an hour.”
Seneca waited ten minutes before locking the door. He pulled the curtains and flicked on the light. Without hesitating, he located the five movies that were to be replaced. He opened the bag and removed the five plastic containers. Time for one last check, one final comparison to make sure his five were in the exact order of the original five. He took his five and held them directly beneath the five lined up on the shelf. Slowly, his eyes went from top to bottom, checking the order.
All About Eve, Anatomy of a Murder, Animal House, Annie Hall, Apocalypse Now.
Perfect.
He removed the five from the shelf and dumped them into the bag. Carefully, he filled the empty spaces with his five. Stepping back, he looked at the shelf. Nothing was different. He moved closer and looked for the wire binding the bomb together. It was invisible to the naked eye.
Satisfied, he turned and paced off the distance between the bomb and the table where the principals would be sitting. Just over five feet.
They would never know what hit them.
Andy Waltz entered his Bank Street apartment shortly before 11 p.m. He switched on the light, tossed a handful of magazines onto the sofa, loosened his tie, and went into the kitchen to mix a drink. Jameson and Diet Coke, his drink of choice following an exceptionally rough day at work. And today had been one of the roughest.
He stirred and sipped. The Jameson was smooth as silk and hit the spot. After dropping in another ice cube, he turned off the light and went back into the den.
Where he found himself staring into a pair of dark, familiar eyes.
Seneca.
“How’d you get in?” Waltz asked, backing away.
“That’s a rather lame question coming from a gifted orator like you.”
“Considering my surprise, it’s the best I could come up with.”
“What’s so surprising about an old war buddy dropping in to visit a fellow vet?”
“Breaking in, I’d call it.”
“Dropping in, breaking in—call it what you will. The important point is, two old friends have been reunited.”
“We were never friends, Seneca. You didn’t have friends.”
“I’m crushed, Houdini. All this time I thought we were tighter than O.J.’s glove. You just never know, do you?”
“What do you want, Seneca?”
“Why are you shaking?”
“Because you’re a scary fuck; that’s why. I repeat: what do you want?”
“You know the answer to that one.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Where’s Cain?”
“Cain? How would I know? I haven’t seen or heard from him in ten years.”
“Is that right? Then, why is it that I don’t believe you?” Seneca reached behind him and pulled out his knife. He pointed toward the sofa, motioning for Waltz to sit. “One more time, Houdini. Where’s Cain? And don’t insult my intelligence by saying you don’t know.”
“One of the hotels uptown. I’m not certain which one.”
“Not good enough.”
Seneca grabbed Waltz’s hair, pulled his head back, and placed the tip of the knife against his throat.
“Ask yourself this: is Cain worth dying for?”
“You’ll kill me either way,” Waltz managed to whisper. “So why should I tell you?”
“Because maybe I’ve become a nice guy over the years.”
“You? Nice? Don’t insult my intelligence.”
“You’ve got guts, Houdini. I’ll give you that. An admirable trait.”
Seneca picked up a cell phone from the table and handed it to Waltz. “Call Cain,” he ordered. “Tell him to meet you in Central Park in an hour. By the carousel.”
“Cain’s not stupid. He’d know something’s wrong.”
Seneca pressed the knife harder against Waltz’s throat, drawing blood. He pulled the knife away and flashed the bloody blade in front of Waltz’s eyes.
“Convince him, and maybe I’ll let you live.”
Waltz’s eyes scanned right to left. He listened. Nothing. Only darkness and silence.
And the thumping of his own heart.
Seneca’s knife pressed against his back. Waltz fought hard to keep from wetting his pants.
“It’s 12:50. He’s not gonna show.”
“He’s already here, Houdini. Out there, somewhere in that darkness. He only needs a little incentive to join us.”
“Incentive? What incentive?”
Seneca grabbed Waltz and put the knife against his neck. “Watching me kill your sorry Jew ass.”
“Come on, Seneca, cut me a break.”
“Don’t beg, Houdini. It’s beneath you.”
Seneca slammed Waltz to the ground, pressed a knee hard against his chest, and drew the knife back. “Looks like your big hero let you down this time, Houdini. Sorry about that.”
“Seneca.” A voice—his voice—coming from the trees.
Seneca jumped to his feet, took two steps forward, and let his eyes search the darkness. For nearly a minute there was total silence and no movement. Even the wind had vanished. Waltz would later say it was as if time stopped.
After a few more seconds, the outline of a man began to take shape within the shadows. The figure moved forward several steps, stopping at the line dividing darkness from light, his face still hidden from view.
The silence seemed to last forever.
Finally, it was broken by the man in the shadows.
“Been a long time, Seneca.”
“Is that you, Cain?” Seneca laughed. “Well, kiss my Cherokee ass. Cain. The great Cain. The big man himself. I knew you’d show up.”
“How could I disappoint a wonderful guy like you?”
“No flattery, please, Cain. It’s not you.” Seneca took a step forward. “I’ve been expecting you for quite a while.”
“Is that so?”
“Ever since I heard what you did to Deke. Not a very nice thing for you to do, Cain.”
“What you did to Cardinal wasn’t nice either.”
“Had done to Cardinal. I would never have fucked things up like Deke did. Sloppy bastard.”
“You’re sloppy, too, Seneca. Leaving a survivor in Arlington. Terribly amateurish for someone with your reputation.”
“Horseshit explosives. Never did like them.”
“Is that what you’re using tomorrow? Explosives?”
“Don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.”
“Playing dumb isn’t your style, Seneca.”
“Okay, if you’re so smart, Cain, you fill me in.”
“Long Island. Cohen estate. How’d I do?”
“You’ve done your homework. I’m impressed, Cain. But what else should I expect from a legend? Explosives it will be; C-4 to be exact. Not my preference, but under the circumstances, the best I could come up with.”
“It won’t happen.”
“Who’s gonna stop it? You?”
“Yeah, me.”
Seneca laughed. “You’ve been away too long. Things change; legends fade. Your time has passed.”
“You trying to scare me or convince yourself? Because I’m catching a drift of fear coming my way.”
“Save the psychology, Cain. That shit won’t work on me.”
“I don’t need psychology to take you out, Seneca. I don’t need anything. Just these hands.”
Seneca reached out, hooked his arm around Waltz’s neck, and placed the tip of the blade against his
throat. “First, I’m gonna make you watch your friend die, then I’m gonna take care of you and your fucking legend.”
“Kill him. He means nothing to me,” Cain said.
“You’d give up your little buddy that easily? What’s that say about friendship?”
“Be done with him, Seneca. Then you can come for me.”
“I’ll give you credit, Cain. You’ve never given a damn about who gets sacrificed during a mission. That’s one of the few qualities I admire about you.”
Cain stepped out of the shadows and into the light.
Upon seeing Cain, Seneca pushed Waltz to the ground and moved forward, holding the knife in front of him. “To hell with Houdini. It’s you I want.”
“Here I am.”
“You have one of those death cards with you?” Seneca asked. “The ace of spades?”
Cain smiled. He knew. Seneca was afraid.
“My last one. Just for you.”
Seneca gripped the knife tightly and began to creep toward the shadows.
Cain seldom considered a man with a knife to be a serious threat. Unless the opponent launched a surprise attack from behind, in which case the situation could get dicey, the knife wielder had little chance of success. Even an opponent with Seneca’s experience and gift for killing.
A man with a knife invariably makes two fatal mistakes. First, he concentrates totally on the use of his weapon, thus forgetting completely his other killing tools—hands, feet, fingers, head, teeth. Second, by assuming his opponent’s concentration is focused only on defending against the knife, he underestimates his opponent’s offensive abilities. Those two miscalculations usually spell death for the man whose weapon of choice is the knife.
In all his years in this business, Cain couldn’t recall one blade-happy assassin who lived to retirement age.
Cain had suspected from the beginning that Seneca would ultimately prove to be no better than ordinary. The Indian was deadly but only on his own terms. He was a classic bully, one who lacked the ability to improvise or ad-lib. His weakness: not being able to vary his game when the script demanded sudden change. In the final analysis, Seneca’s greatest gift was selectivity: the ability to choose the right opponent and the right moment.
Unlike now, when the opponent and the moment chose him.
Seneca made his first move when he was still ten feet away. He came at Cain quickly, slashing right to left. It was, Cain thought, a weak and poorly executed opening gambit, certainly not one worthy of an assassin of Seneca’s repute. Or one Cain had taught.
Cain crouched, pivoted slightly to his left to avoid the knife, parried the weapon downward, and sent his elbow deep into Seneca’s kidney.
The blow achieved two critical results. It drove the air from Seneca’s lungs and momentarily cost the Indian his balance.
In that tiny fraction of a second, Cain established a huge—perhaps an insurmountable—advantage: he gained immediate control of the situation. With such an early edge, only the biggest error of his career could cost him his life.
And the great Cain didn’t make errors.
Not during blood time.
Moving slightly to his left, he squared his body, then snapped a kick that found Seneca’s ribs. Cain followed with a blow aimed at the neck, and although it missed its intended mark, the carotid artery, by less than an inch, it had enough force to send Seneca crashing to the ground.
The Indian grunted loudly, rolled over several times, spit up a mouthful of blood, then began a desperate life-and-death struggle to get to his feet.
He never made it.
In rapid succession, Cain executed four moves with deadly precision.
First, he drove his foot into Seneca’s groin.
Second, he grabbed the knife arm just above the wrist with his left hand, hooked his right forearm behind Seneca’s elbow, and then in a single, powerful move, snapped the Indian’s once-deadly arm like plastic. Seneca’s screams pierced the night.
Third, he took Seneca by the shoulders and pulled him up into a standing position. With all the force he could muster, Cain smashed his open right palm into Seneca’s chest, sending vibrating shock waves through the chest cavity that in all probability stopped the Indian’s heart.
Fourth, he drew his right hand back, then slammed a judo chop onto the bridge of Seneca’s nose, driving bone and cartilage into brain.
Seneca slumped to the ground, dead. Cain knelt behind him and felt for a pulse. He couldn’t find one.
Although Cain was certain the Indian was dead, there was yet one final move to be executed.
For insurance.
He rolled Seneca over onto his stomach, placed a knee in the middle of his back, cupped him under the chin, and gave a quick, strong backward pull. The crunching sound of breaking bone echoed in the still night air.
Never leave an opponent breathing.
Cain stood and walked quickly toward Waltz. “Hey, Houdini, thanks for the help. I appreciate it.”
“You kidding? I’m a hustler, not a fighter. No way I was about to get involved in that brawl.”
“Let’s go before someone shows up.”
Waltz stared down at Seneca’s lifeless body. “The fucking bastard made me set this up. I had no other choice.”
“I know. Don’t worry about it.”
“Hey, Cain, you didn’t really mean it when you told Seneca to kill me, that I meant nothing to you, did you?”
Cain laughed. “Every word.”
“Serious?”
“If I hadn’t said it, he would have killed you,” Cain answered. “But when I said I didn’t care, he didn’t care.”
“Forgive me, but it was somewhat disconcerting to have a crazy fucking Indian holding a knife to my throat and hear a good friend tell him to go ahead and use it. You can understand why I almost crapped my pants.”
“Perfectly.”
“Where to now?” Waltz asked.
“You’re going home. I’m heading to Long Island.”
Sunrise was less than an hour away when Cain parked his car a short distance from the Cohen estate. He shut off the motor and got out. Through the misty night, he saw the helicopter circling above the compound. The chopper, with its powerful searchlight, could be a problem. To reach his final destination would require an exposed fifty-yard sprint from the wall to the wooded area near the main house. He had to hold off making that dash until the light was aimed out over the ocean.
There were, he knew, simpler, safer options than the one he had in mind. Why not choose one of them? Why not drive to the front gate now, alert security, tell them about the bomb, and let them handle it? Or wait until full daylight, then approach the estate and inform security?
Safer choices, perhaps, but not necessarily wise ones. For starters, personnel deployed for this mission had surely been ordered to shoot first, identify later. This was a take-no-chances situation. A no-mistakes-allowed situation. The men would have been warned to not let any unidentified vehicle get close as it might contain explosives: death coming at you on four wheels in the form of a deadly, improvised explosive device. That was one of the hard lessons learned in Iraq. Everything, and everyone, was a potential IED.
Then there was the issue of trust, a factor he never overlooked or discounted during any mission. How could he be certain all security personnel were righteous? What guarantee did he have that one trigger-happy traitor hadn’t been planted within the group guarding the estate, ready to silence any dissenting voice? It’s not something Seneca would have done, but Seneca was only the executioner, not the mastermind behind the plan. Whoever had orchestrated this assassination would have put in place several contingencies, and the first would be to take out any unknown interloper.
No, Cain would do it the hard way. His way. As always. Alone and coming out of the shadows.
He cut through to the beach and headed north. The helicopter, which was now well out over the ocean, was not a factor at this point and wouldn’t be for several minutes. Walk
ing briskly, he reached his point of entry in less than five minutes. The decayed section was wide enough for him to slip through. The only danger was noise. To enter meant climbing over a caved-in section, almost certainly sending loose stones falling to the ground. But behind him was the ocean, which should provide enough background noise to drown out the sound of falling rubble.
At this stage, it didn’t matter. Risks were a non-factor. He had to move.
Cain lifted himself up and looked over the wall. He saw nothing, heard plenty. Footsteps, two men, thirty to forty yards to his right. An animal, most likely a squirrel, in a tree no more than twenty yards away. The static of a walkie-talkie closer to the house.
After scaling the wall, he eased himself down to the ground and listened again. No new sounds. Next, he looked up at the sky and found the helicopter. It was moving in the direction of the estate, with the searchlight aimed away from him. He took a deep breath, let it out slowly, then began his sprint toward the big house.
Reaching the wooded area, he knelt behind a tree and surveyed the scene. There were at least eight men wandering around the back part of the estate. Six were standing within a few feet of each other at a safe distance to his right. The remaining two were approximately twenty yards apart, one walking toward him, the other at the back door.
The approaching man posed no problem. Cain could easily avoid him. However, that might not be the case with the man at the door. That situation was much trickier.
Although Cain had no taste for killing one of his own, if it came to that, he would.
It wouldn’t be the first time.
Cain moved to within ten feet of the approaching soldier, stopped, and waited until the man passed. He continued creeping forward until he came to the edge of the wooded area. The G.I. guarding the door paced nervously back and forth, stopped, yawned a couple of times, shook his head in an effort to stay awake, and then began pacing again. He wore an automatic pistol on his hip and carried an M16 in his right hand.
Cain had no choice but to kill the young soldier. It was his only option if he hoped to gain entrance into the house. And he had to do it now, in a one-on-one situation. The lone soldier would be no match, but that situation could change if he delayed. The others were sure to return within minutes, and he wasn’t keen on a one-against-eight confrontation.