by Bob Mayer
“Selkis switched over to your firm, Toni, as a client at the specific request of your father three weeks ago, so this was not a matter of loyalty. At least not to you. It seems your father wanted to keep an eye on you. Selkis set up the meeting on the boat at the behest of your father. Your father told Selkis to ask for Kane by name. Your father told Selkis where the boat should go. Since there is no connection between my father and your father, that means that Kane was the target of the attack. Boss Crawford is not pleased that he almost became collateral damage in some sort of familial spat.”
As Yazzie spoke, Kane looked out the window, watching an airplane curving over the Bronx to land at LaGuardia. He hoped his father was home watching TV and the descending jet drowned out the sound as one did every ninety seconds, but he knew, given it was a weekday, that his father was at work. He heard Yazzie’s words distantly, not wanting to accept them.
Toni had put up a hand at the end of the second sentence and kept it up. “Wait. Wait. Why would my father do that?”
“That’s what we’d like to know,” Yazzie said, looking back and forth between her and Kane.
“This is bullshit,” Toni snapped.
“You don’t seem too surprised,” Yazzie said to Kane who had turned back from the windows.
“My life is full of surprises,” Kane said. “Takes a lot.”
“Someone trying to kill you isn’t a lot?” Yazzie asked.
“People have tried to kill me before,” Kane said. “And I’m not buying your story. Makes no sense to go through all this just to get to me. Lots of easier ways. Selkis brought Crawford in from out of town to set me up? I live here.”
“Deniability,” Yazzie said. “Putting distance between the instigator and the act. Cloud the issue as to who the real target was. Use my father as a distraction as he has a much higher profile than you.”
“Did you just insult me again?” Kane asked.
“I don’t know what’s going on here or between both of you and Mister Thomas Marcelle, but I can assure you that Boss Crawford is very, very irritated, to understate it, that he was involved.” Yazzie stood, slinging the satchel over a shoulder and towering over both of them. “I’ll take my leave.”
“Sounds good,” Kane said, also getting up.
Toni protested. “No! Wait. We need to—“
“Not right now, Toni,” Kane said. “I’ll walk you out,” he said to Yazzie.
They left Toni behind with the cash on the table and shocked anger.
Mrs. Ruiz managed to smile at Yazzie and frown at Kane at the same time, which was an impressive contortion.
The two men walked to the elevator in silence. Took the local to the 78th Floor Skylobby. Rode it, then transferred to the one to ground level. They were the only occupants.
Kane broke the silence. “Who on your end knew that Crawford would be on the boat?”
“Me,” Yazzie said.
The elevator dropped.
“That’s it?”
“My brothers,” Yazzie said. “There was no breach on our end.”
“How many brothers you got?” Kane asked.
“Six.”
“They also sons to Boss?”
“Yes.”
“All adopted?”
Yazzie didn’t answer. “It appears we received as much information as you, Kane. Be at that pier at a certain time. That was it. Boss was surprised when Mister Selkis didn’t show and Miss Truvey did. But he assumed it was a rather obvious and crude attempt to sweeten the offer.”
“He went below deck with her,” Kane noted. “Seemed the crudeness appealed to him.”
Yazzie stared straight ahead, face impassive.
“And there was the cocaine.”
“That’s a lie,” Yazzie said, the first flash of anger.
“Why would I lie about that?”
“If there was, it came from Truvey.”
Kane shrugged. “Right.”
“Or perhaps you supplied it.”
“Wrong.”
The elevator reached ground level. The doors opened. They stepped into the lobby.
Kane spoke. “I figured Crawford would send the Marlboro man or someone like that. Why did he adopt you and your brothers?”
“That’s none of your business.”
“This still doesn’t add up,” Kane said.
Yazzie glanced at him, but didn’t say anything.
“What will you do if I was the target of the bomb?” Kane asked.
“Boss doesn’t take well to being attacked, whether intended or not,” Yazzie said. “There must be a reckoning.”
“That sounds ominous,” Kane said. “If I was the target, you’d want to weigh in?”
“We’d like to be kept up to speed.”
“Sounds vague,” Kane said. “How come you or your brothers weren’t providing security for Crawford?”
“I told you. We checked you out. You seemed adequate to the task and, as I noted, this is your stomping ground.”
“Where were you?”
“I was otherwise occupied.”
“What was more important than his safety?”
“I don’t answer to you,” Yazzie said.
“Did you confront Thomas Marcelle with your accusation?”
“I told you. He wasn’t at the firm this morning when I went there.” Yazzie faced Kane. “Who wants to kill you? Besides Mister Marcelle, obviously.”
“I’m a friend to all mankind,” Kane said.
“You’ve got scars on your wrists and neck. Recent ones.”
“Got hurt remodeling my diner. Vic’s in the meatpacking district across from the end of the High Line. You should stop by sometime. Good food. Even the sign says that.”
Without another word, Yazzie walked away across the spacious and bright lobby and out of the World Trade Center.
Kane got back on the elevator and zoomed skyward.
Toni was in her office, behind the desk. An almost empty drink in one hand, the phone in the other. She slammed the receiver down as Kane entered.
“Father’s disappeared. He’s not at work. Mother says he never came home last night.”
Kane went to the bar. “What are you having?”
“Fuck!” Toni threw the glass across the room. It bounced off the wall rather than shatter.
“Should I just bring the bottle?” Kane asked.
“He tried to kill you.”
“He never liked me much,” Kane said.
“There’s nothing humorous about this at all,” Toni said. “Not a fucking thing.”
“Technically he tried to have me killed,” Kane said. “But, yeah, the essence is the same.” He left the bar and perched on the corner of her desk. “With such a great view, you should face the windows. I know you want to impress visitors, but you’re in here more than they are.”
“What do I do?” Toni asked. “Mother’s losing her mind. He didn’t say anything to her. No note. No message. No one at the firm knows anything. He’s vanished.”
“He didn’t consider the possibility of his plan failing and is scrambling.”
“What was the plan exactly? Why would he do this?” Toni demanded.
“To cut him some slack and I don’t want to,” Kane said, “the reality is that he pointed the people who wanted to kill me in the right direction. When I left his office the afternoon before the Blackout, he figured Damon and his Trinity would make short work of me. He must have been surprised it didn’t turn out that way. When he didn’t hear from Damon after the Blackout and learned I was alive, he had to assume the worst.”
“Which was?”
“That Damon was gone, which meant divvying up Westway was screwed. Worse, in the more immediate sense, the IRA’s connection with NORAID, the Irish Northern Aid Committee, for guns was gone. Along with a shipment of two-hundred-and-forty M-16s. And several million in cash.”
“My father wasn’t involved in that,” Toni said. “You didn’t say anything about several million to me o
r Yazzie.”
“A man has to have a few secrets,” Kane said.
“Stop that.”
“One thing I learned when we were conducting cross-border ops was that a sense of humor gets more essential the grimmer it gets. We lost two teams before we realized Ngo was a double-agent. We didn’t laugh about that.”
“Father wasn’t involved with the IRA,” Toni insisted.
“Are you certain?” Kane asked. “Do you know what he was doing with Westway?”
“Not the particulars,” Toni said. “When you found those maps on the back side of the boards, you had more than me.”
“You never saw them?”
“Just a glimpse of the Westway plan.”
“Who else would be pissed about Westway?” Kane asked. “The mob because Damon wouldn’t be able to parcel out the contracts? Your friend Sofia Cappucci?”
Toni considered it, then shook her head. “No. Westway is years off. It’s not a lock to happen and it depends on the election, which is up the air now. There’s some buzz about Ed Koch, but it’s still tight between Cuomo and Azbug. She wins, it’s dead. Even if Cuomo wins and it’s a go, by then someone will have replaced Damon to divvy out the contracts.” Something occurred to her. “Unless Sofia knows about Quinn.” As soon as she said it, she reconsidered. “No. She didn’t care about Quinn except as a tool. She’s all business.”
“As you were with her?” Kane asked and immediately regretted.
Toni ignored the barb. “You said several million in cash. Whose?”
“I assume it was NORAID’s,” Kane said.
“They’ll be wondering where the money went,” Toni said.
“Your father was Damon’s lawyer,” Kane said. “He’s the first person NORAID would come to when Damon disappeared along with their money and the guns. Once your father realized things had turned out differently then he’d hoped the night of the Blackout, he told NORAID I took out Damon. Then your father sent Selkis as your client to play you to get to me.” Kane shook his head. “Your father is the key person who also knew I was meeting Damon the night of the Blackout. Before he died, Damon said he had insurance, that someone knew he was taking me there. Quinn thought he was full of shit.”
“Slow down,” Toni said. “Slow down.”
“Your father must have been his insurance. Which meant your father knew that Damon was planning on killing me.”
“No,” Toni weakly protested.
“Your father gave me up to the Irish,” Kane repeated. “It wasn’t a hard decision for him since they probably couched it in terms of him or me. There’s a likelihood it never got to the threaten stage.”
“But—” Toni began. “The Blackout was three and a half weeks ago. What took so long?”
“People knew Damon was gone not long after the Blackout. The weapons didn’t get to Ireland and the money was gone. That was definitely a blip on NORAID’s radar. The IRA too when their guns didn’t get delivered. So people start checking. Once they learned Damon was missing they went to your father. He gave me up, and it didn’t take them very long to put together a plan and come after me. More likely, it’s locals, probably guys from NORAID, doing the IRA’s dirty work state side.”
Toni was trying to catch up. “Why do it this way?”
“It sorta makes sense now,” Kane said. “I’m sure Crawford has lots of enemies. Hell, Toni, even I didn’t believe I was the target. No one else would think I was the intended since my connection to the NORAID angle died with Damon. Your father must have gone through his rolodex, looking for someone who would divert suspicion. He talked to Selkis, who told him about Crawford. It also means your father probably knew Damon was running guns for them. I hope he didn’t—” Kane stopped.
“Hope what?” Toni was struggling to understand.
“Nothing,” Kane said. “But I will say this: Yazzie is lying about something.”
“About what?”
“I don’t know,” Kane admitted. “But something doesn’t ring true.”
“Is that why you kept baiting him with the Indian stuff? That’s not who you are.”
“When you take a deposition, don’t you try to get the witness off balance? I poked Yazzie to get a reaction.”
Toni stomped to the bar and poured herself another drink. “God-damn him. God-damn him.”
“Yazzie?”
She gave Kane a withering look that wasn’t intended for him, but he was in the blast radius. “My father. First, selling out to Damon when he was in the US Attorney’s office. I finally wrapped my brain around that years ago. Managed to file off all the rough edges and put it in a box in my brain and seal it. But this?” She slammed back the drink and poured another. “Betrayal. He betrayed you. He betrayed me.”
“It was him or me,” Kane said. “He made the choice most would.”
“Are you defending him?”
Kane went to the meeting table and sat down. He indicated for Toni to join him.
“No, I’m not. He gave in to Damon’s blackmail and allowed that evil to exist.”
Toni gave him a sharp glance. “What do you mean?”
“I watched one or two of Damon’s films.”
“Did you see—”
“I saw the case but I didn’t watch it,” Kane said, knowing she was referring to her own film. “The way it was set up, that place was a kill house. Damon called it a factory. They tortured and murdered people and then cremated the bodies in the ovens that used to make Oreo cookies.” He sighed. “Your father hated me long before all this. Ever since Ted. He blamed me for it. He thought it should have been me.”
“We’ve been over that,” Toni said.
“You and I have. Your father has his own version, doesn’t he?”
“He blamed both of us,” Toni said. “Me for West Point. And for the company swap that happened when you both arrived at the 173rd. And you, because you were the one who was switched with Ted. He always felt you should have been killed at Dak To.”
“I almost was, just five months later.” Kane held up his right arm and peeled back the Velcro cover on the military issue watch that had once graced Ted’s wrist. “This, and his dog tag, are all I have of Ted.”
“Memories,” Toni said. “We have our memories.”
They both looked at the saber, the current storm forgotten in the sea of misery of the past.
Toni swam out of it first. “What do we do?”
“The immediate threat is the Irish. I’m going to check on the bomb and some other things.”
“What should I do?” Toni asked.
“Try to find your dad. And talk to Selkis. Find out what Yazzie already knows.”
“What about Crawford?”
“I’ll check on him,” Kane said. He took the two bundles of cash. “I might need this.”
4
Friday Afternoon,
5 August 1977
GREENWICH VILLAGE, MANHATTAN
The battered pickup truck with Massachusetts plates had two tires on the sidewalk in front of the row of brownstones on Jane Street, blatantly ignoring the graffitied alternate side of the street parking signs indicating Friday was the day for Jane Street in Greenwich Village to be car free. A parking ticket was under one of the wipers. Kane pulled it off and stuck it in his pocket. Crime might be rampant in New York, but violating alternate parking was sacrosanct because eventually on some Friday, a street sweeper might actually come through and do what it was designed to.
One day, but not this day or any recent day given the amount of debris lining the curbs and sewer grates. The Sanitation Department, like the rest of the city, was still trying to catch up to the detritus of the Blackout. Kane imagined his father was logging plenty of overtime.
Trees grew on both sides of the cobblestone street, branches arcing over and meeting, giving welcome shade when the sun was out. Kane opened the gate to the steps leading to a small alcove in front of his basement apartment in the three-story brownstone.
The door wa
s open, the matchstick he stuck in the doorjamb as a tell, on the small table inside.
“Making yourself at home?” Kane called out as he entered.
Master Sergeant Lewis Merrick reclined on the old couch, jungle boots propped on the coffee table, the bomb from the previous evening next to him and the detonating device in his lap. He wore OD green jungle fatigues, a faded and crumpled green beret stuffed in the cargo pocket. There was no insignia or patches on his uniform. An HK-94 submachinegun was on the couch next to his right hand.
“Want some coffee?” Kane asked.
Merrick indicated a mug. “Already made some.”
“Why sterile?” Kane asked, referring to the lack of insignia or patches on the fatigues.
“We’re supposed to wear Class-A’s if we’re in uniform off post and I only do that for payday inspection.”
“You can wear civvies,” Kane suggested as he sat in the drooping chair on the other side of the coffee table.
“You called a Prairie Fire.” Merrick referred to the code word the team used for emergency exfiltration in Vietnam. “I came ready for whatever. Besides, lots of hippies wear old army stuff.”
“I appreciate it.” Kane didn’t add that the grizzled master sergeant would never be mistaken for a hippy. Six-four, solidly built, his thinning red hair had a tint of gray. His face was lined with the stress of having gone to war at seventeen in Korea and then multiple tours in Vietnam
Merrick held up the C-4. “Military grade.”
“You told me a guy in Third Battalion was nailed selling some in Boston,” Kane said, referring to Merrick’s unit, 10th Special Forces Group headquartered at Fort Devens, Massachusetts. “Could that be from the lot?”
Merrick tossed the explosives aside on the couch. “Possible.”
“Who did he sell to?”
Merrick shrugged. “I’ll ask around.”
“You pick up anything about M-16s being stolen? Two hundred and forty?”
Merrick shook his head. “Nope. If I was going to steal some, I’d hit a National Guard armory. And there’s a good chance whoever is in charge would want to cover it up for a while. Losing weapons is a career ender. Why? Did you find them?”