by Mark Dawson
She glowered at him resentfully. “Once or twice a week.”
Milton tried to be discreet. “So Carlos likes you?”
“Not him,” she said, shaking her head. “His brother—Savio.”
“Tell me what it’s like up there. Just imagine you’re out in the corridor, out there.” He nodded to the door. “There’s a door at the end, on the left. A big metal door. What’s inside?”
“You got a flight of stairs.”
“Describe them, please.”
She shook her head with a mixture of impatience and reluctance. “They go up to a landing. There’s another door there, halfway up; they usually leave that open. You step through that and then there’s a door that opens out onto the roof. They got a garden up there—they go out and smoke weed in the summer.”
“They keep it locked?”
She nodded. “It’s like the door downstairs. I tried to open it one time—it’s fucking heavy.”
Milton indicated that she should continue.
“So you go through the cage door, you turn left, then you go up the stairs again and then you get to the second floor. The whole floor is one big room.”
“Describe it.”
“It’s big. They knocked the walls through. They got couches, a big flat-screen TV, pool table.”
“Is it where Acosta lives?”
“No,” she said. “He’s on the next floor up, on the third floor.”
“Tell me about it.”
“It’s bedrooms,” she said. “I only been in the one Savio uses, so don’t ask me about the others because I can’t help you.”
“How many rooms?”
“Don’t know. Four?”
Milton concentrated hard, building a picture of the interior that he would be able to rely upon later. “That’s good, Sarah,” he said. “Nearly done. Last question. Did you hear anything about two people who might have been taken up there? A man and his son?”
She looked at him and gave a slow nod. “Sure. I heard about that. You know who they are?”
“Tell me about them.”
“I know a girl who cleans up in the club—used to go to school with her. She says she was here early, like nine o’clock, and they were bringing a young kid and this guy in through the door that goes out to the yard. I asked why; she said she didn’t know, just that they took them upstairs.”
“Where would Carlos keep them?”
“One of the bedrooms, I guess. Who are they?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Milton said. “Almost done. You help me a little more and all this worry goes away.”
She stared at him. “What do I gotta do?”
“Two things. First of all, I need to know what Acosta looks like.”
“Skinny. Got a gold cap in his front tooth; his hair’s bleached blond. He thinks he looks like Bruno Mars.”
“The second thing,” Milton said, “you go outside now like nothing has happened. We didn’t have this conversation. Find out whether the two of them are still there and, if they are, which room they’re in.”
“How am I gonna do that?”
“I don’t know. Ask around. Ask the other girls. You’ll figure it out.” He took a piece of paper and wrote down his number. “Call me when you know.”
108
Milton’s phone rang as he walked back to his motorbike.
“Hello? John?”
It was Fedorov. “Hello,” Milton said.
“I am calling about your friends. They have left the apartment. They have been away all morning.”
“Could I come and see you?” Milton said. “I might need another favour.”
“Of course. Have you been to Russian bath before?”
“Not for a long time,” Milton said.
“I have one every day, straight after lunch. You come—we can talk.”
Milton drove to Sheepshead Bay. He parked his bike on Neck Road and walked to the address he had memorised. He passed market stalls, where old women wrapped up in fur lined to buy salo—smoked and salted fat—and then a closed-down matzoh bakery and a vodka joint, authentic and real, the antithesis to the fake places that were popping up in hipster Manhattan.
Milton found the building and went inside. He bought a ticket and was given a towel, robe and slippers and directions to the changing room.
He passed through the bath’s main hall. The space was dominated by a full-sized swimming pool. The ceilings were low, and the effect was to imbue the place with a cosy, secluded feel. Milton looked in the pool, but could not find Fedorov. There were two mixed saunas on either side of the pool, and Milton tried both. The rooms were equipped with faucets for cold water buckets. Adults lounged on the hottest benches while children played with the cold water.
There was one more sauna around the back of the changing rooms. Milton pushed open the doors and went inside. It was hotter than the others, and men were allowed to be naked inside it. Milton saw elderly men, their flesh drooping in pendulous folds, drinking beers and engaging in long conversations just as they might have done if they were in St Petersburg or Moscow.
Fedorov was sitting on one of the benches, his legs apart, a towel around his waist.
He saw Milton and waved a hand.
“John,” he said.
“Do you mind?”
“No, not at all. Come. Sit.”
Milton lowered himself to the bench next to Fedorov. The wood was hot, and it took a moment to get used to it.
“You like?”
“It’s warm,” Milton admitted.
“Good for the digestion,” Fedorov said.
Milton looked over at the Crimean. He was older than Milton, but his body was taut with muscle. He had a tattoo running from his shoulder down to his elbow. It was in Latin: Si vis pacem, para bellum.
Fedorov noticed that Milton was looking at it. “You understand?”
“’If you want peace, prepare for war.’”
“Plato wrote about it,” Fedorov said. “Have you read the classics?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“You should. There is much to learn.”
Fedorov got up and poured cold water onto the hot coals. They fizzed and spat, and Milton felt the dizzying wave of heat that was thrown out.
“So,” Fedorov said. “Your friends. They were gone when my brother visited this morning. He had food for them. He stayed for thirty minutes, but they did not come back. I thought I should tell you.”
“They’re in trouble,” Milton said.
Fedorov leaned forward. “How?”
“They went back to their house. Someone was waiting for them there, and they were put in the back of a van and driven away. I got there too late to stop it.”
“By who?”
“Freddy’s evidence could cause a lot of trouble to a man called Acosta.”
Fedorov’s brows lowered. “Carlos Acosta?”
“You know him?”
“He deals drugs,” Fedorov said, his words leaden and heavy with antipathy. “His drugs killed Dmitri. I found out where they came from, but there was nothing that the police would do.”
“He’s a powerful man. And I’m worried what he might do to my friends.”
“Then what can I do to help?”
“I know where Acosta is holding them. There’s a strip club on Atlantic Avenue.”
“It is where he does his business?”
“One of the places. He took them there this morning. I’m going to go and get them out, but I need help.”
“So call the police.”
“Acosta owns the police. I can’t take the chance.”
“So you will do it alone?”
“I told you at dinner—I have experience. If I can get in, I can get them out. But it’s getting in that’s going to be difficult. I scouted before I came here. I need to get upstairs, but I’ll need someone to make some noise so I can do it.”
“And this is what you need from me—a distraction?”
“Yes. Nothing difficul
t or dangerous. I’m thinking of a little stunt in the bar that will divert their attention for long enough so that I can do what I need to do.”
Fedorov shrugged. “Whatever you need,” he said. “Tell me where I need to be and what you want me to do and I will do it.”
“I have some preparations that I need to make,” Milton said. “If I come by the restaurant this evening, would that be okay? Ten?”
Fedorov nodded. “And Acosta,” he said. “What will you do with him?”
“I haven’t decided yet.”
Fedorov put out a hand.
Milton took it. “I’ll see you tonight.”
“I will see you then, John.”
109
Milton rode to the Kings Plaza Shopping Center in Marine Park. It seemed a long time ago that he had visited the branch of Foot Locker there so that he could replace Freddy’s stolen sneakers, but it hadn’t even been a week.
He remembered the roster of stores and knew that he could get everything that he would need.
His first stop was an outdoor sports store, where he bought two one-pound tubs of Tannerite, a black powder usually used to make explosive targets for rifle shooting. He selected a hunting knife with a serrated edge and a scabbard to put it in. He added a pair of black combat trousers and a black jacket, telling the clerk that he was going to go to Coyne Park range and do some target shooting. Then, he went into Duane Reade and bought a box of latex gloves. He visited Home Depot and purchased two dozen cable ties, a DeWalt cordless drill, a large pack of stump remover, a dozen clear plastic Ziploc bags, a can of spray adhesive, a roll of duct tape, a length of stiff cardboard, a roll of wax paper and a ball of string. Finally, he added a Ryobi inspection scope with a camera on the end of a thin, articulated stalk that a plumber might use to examine the insides of a pipe.
His phone rang as he was making his way back to the parking lot. Milton looked at the display: he didn’t recognise the number.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Smith.”
He stopped.
“Mr. Acosta.”
“Would you still like to see the boy and his father again?”
Milton turned into a doorway and stopped. “I would.”
“Then you need to come to Red Hook tonight.”
“Where?”
“The grain terminal. At the mouth of the Gowanus Canal.”
“I know it. What time?”
“Two o’clock.”
“And then?”
“The boy walks.”
“What about his father?”
“You and he will stay. I’m going to give you both a chance to persuade me that you won’t cause me any more trouble.”
“Really? You wouldn’t just shoot the three of us?”
He chuckled. “You’ll have to trust me, Mr. Smith.”
“That’s not a very attractive offer.”
“It’s the only offer you’re going to get.”
“Can I make a counter?”
Milton heard laughter. “You’d be wasting your breath.”
“Here’s what I propose, Carlos. It is Carlos I’m speaking to, isn’t it?”
There was no reply.
Milton had been thinking very carefully about what he would say when Acosta called him back. He had to give him something to think about.
“This is what I would do if I were you. I would let them both go. Right now. If you do that, maybe you get to walk away with your pretty face in one piece. How’s Savio? Or the man I shot? They doing okay?”
The laughter returned, but Milton couldn’t mistake the angry, bitter foundation to it. “Two o’clock. If you’re not there, they’re both dead.”
The line went dead.
Milton took a moment to breathe. He was sweating despite the cold.
He put his purchases into the sports bag that he had taken from Rhodes’s house, slung it over his shoulders, and set off back to Coney Island.
Milton returned to his apartment and locked the door behind him.
He went into the kitchen, took out the things that he had purchased, took down a bag of sugar from a cupboard, pulled on a pair of the latex gloves and set to work.
He mixed the stump remover and sugar and then poured the mixture into a frying pan of boiling water that he had on the stove. He stirred it in until it dissolved and then let the water boil out, leaving a slurry that was saturated with the flammable chemical solution. He took around twelve feet of the string and placed it in the pan to absorb the mixture; then, when that was done, he arranged it on a cookie sheet and baked it for twenty minutes. He removed the sheet, allowed the cord to cool, and then used the scissors to cut the stiff string into four-inch fuse cords.
He set them to one side and attended to the rest of the preparation that needed to be done.
He took the battery from the DeWalt drill and removed the screws so that the top assembly slid out. There were fifteen NiCad cells that comprised the battery pack, a collection of identical cylinders held together in a neat honeycomb pattern. He removed the tape that held them together and then snipped each connector band so that he was left with the component cells. He pushed the batteries out of the casings and threw them away; he just wanted the casings. He took the first casing, added a bead of hot glue to the flat sleeve on the bottom, and stuck a circle of cardboard to it.
He poured more of the stump remover and sugar into a hot pan and folded it into itself until the sugar began to caramelise. He made half a kilogram of the explosive mixture, heating it until it passed from white to golden brown and then filling each casing with it. He added a length of fuse, pushing it into the mixture all the way to the bottom of the casing, and left it to harden. He repeated the procedure for the other casings until he had ten of them lined up on the counter.
The room was filled with a harsh, acidic smell. Milton opened the windows and carried on.
He took the Ziploc bags, one of the tubs of Tannerite, the spray adhesive, the stiff piece of cardboard, the wax paper and a roll of tape. He took one of the bags, went to the tap and filled it with cold water. He sealed the top and then reinforced the seal with a folded-over length of duct tape. Next, he took the Tannerite, held the water-filled Ziploc bag on the side of the tub that was facing him, then lashed it in place with tape until it was secure. He took the length of cardboard, the same length as his forearm, placed the tub on top of it and then wrapped it around with tape. He took the spray adhesive and emptied it over the surface of the cardboard sheet. Finally, he carefully unrolled the wax paper over the freshly sticky cardboard, cut the paper with a pair of scissors, and then gently lowered his handiwork into the sports bag.
He was done. He filled a glass with tap water and drank it in one go, trying to rid his mouth of the taste of the chemicals that still pervaded the apartment.
He needed a walk to clear his head. He closed the windows, locked the door and made his way down to the street.
Milton’s phone rang as he made his way down the stairs to his bike.
“Hello?”
“This is Sarah—from the club.”
Milton stopped. “What did you find?”
“There’s a man and his kid upstairs on the third floor. They’re still there.”
“Which room?”
“I don’t know. Just that they’re still there.”
“Thank you,” Milton said. “You won’t hear from me again.”
“Fuck you, asshole.”
Milton put the phone in his pocket and opened the door to the street.
Milton was next to his bike when he noticed Detective Mackintosh behind him. She was with two uniformed officers.
“Mr. Smith?”
“Yes?”
“I’m arresting you as an accessory to murder.”
“What?”
“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you.”
“This is crazy,” Milton said.
The uniformed officers stepped forward.
“Put your hands behind your back, please, sir.”
“You want to talk to me, we can do it tomorrow. I can’t do it now. I’ve got to—”
“You’ve got to what, Mr. Smith?” Mackintosh said. “Where were you going?”
Milton bit his tongue.
One of the uniformed officers put his hand on Milton’s shoulder. “Put your hands on the hood of the car, please.”
Milton recognised the Hyundai Sonata facing his bike. He cursed himself for allowing himself to be distracted enough not to see it. He did as the officer told him and concentrated on maintaining his composure as he frisked him. The man was quick and expert, patting him down for weapons or evidence. He pulled out his cigarettes and lighter and dumped them in the street. He took out his wallet, flipped through it, and dropped it on the hood. His cellphone was next, ending up on the hood next to his wallet. The officer found nothing because there was nothing to find. Milton was grateful that he had left everything in his apartment, but then, remembering what he had left there, he became anxious. He would have a difficult time explaining why he had smoke grenades and homemade explosives laid out in his kitchen.
“Hands, please. Behind your back. I’m arresting you as accessory to murder.”
Milton had been cuffed before, and he crossed his hands one over the other; they could rest one against the other that way, and it would be more comfortable. The officer cuffed him as efficiently as he had searched him.
“Where are we going?” he asked Mackintosh as he allowed the officer to nudge him into motion.
“The Seven Five,” she said. “I’ve got some questions I need you to answer.”
110
Mackintosh drove into the yard at the back of the station house, and Milton was led in through the same door as he had used a week ago, when he had been brought in with Freddy Blanco to give his evidence about his discovery of González’s body. He was booked and then taken down to be searched. His phone and wallet were confiscated, and he signed a voucher to acknowledge that those two items were the extent of the property that had been taken from him. An officer took his name and address. Milton cooperated, hoping that compliance might speed the process and expedite his release. He was fingerprinted, placing his hands on a digital scanner and waiting as pictures were taken and checked.