Fear City

by F. Paul Wilson

  Shit.

  “Ay, Tony—” Vinny began but Tony karate chopped the air.

  “You’re both gonna spend some time together and iron out this beef you got with each other. But I’m setting some ground rules. First off, Vinny’s junkyard stays his and his alone.”

  “But—”

  Another karate chop. “Vinny bought it. He let you in by the goodness of his heart as a favor to me. You left the business on your own. You don’t go back unless he wants to take you back.” He looked at Vinny. “You want him back?”

  “No way.”

  “Then that’s settled. But here’s what you will do: You’ll help Tommy get the loan business healthy again. Capisce?”

  Vinny nodded. “Capisco.”

  So there it was, all settled, all done. Their crew capo had spoken: Tommy was out of Preston Salvage and not coming back. That was the good news. The bad news was he’d be sharing a car with the jerk for the next few weeks.

  “Which taxi depot we talking about?” Tommy said through clenched teeth. “Long Island City?”

  “Nah. West Fifty-third—way west. Guy’ll be there noonish.”

  Tommy said, “What’re we charging?”

  “Twelve. But if that looks like a deal breaker, Vinny here will mention a special this week: ten.”

  “And if he pulls some rug-merchant shit and tries to Jew us down?”

  Tony stared at him. “Did you just say what I think you just said?”

  Tommy looked around. “What?”

  Tony sighed. “Never mind. If he don’t like ten percent you bust his face for wasting your time.”

  “You got it,” Vinny said. “I’ll drive.”

  No way was he going to try to squeeze into Tommy’s Z.

  “Damn right you will,” Tommy said.

  2

  If Tony thought putting them together in a car would ease things, he was dead wrong. Usually Vinny hated when Tommy sat in the back, making it look like Vinny was his chauffeur, but this trip he was glad for it. And usually Tommy talked nonstop, but he said maybe six words on the way across town.

  The taxi depot turned out to be a long, one-story brick building with a rolling steel door. A few yellow cabs sat in the long lot next to it, the rest presumably out on the street hunting fares. Eleventh Avenue rumbled half a block away.

  Turned out they were dealing with two Arabs—a tall one with weird red hair and a short one—who were looking for one loan of ten Gs. As the four of them stood in the cold on the sidewalk in front of the depot, Vinny took an instant dislike to both of them. Something not right about these bozos. They didn’t even blink when Tommy said the vig was twelve percent per week. If it was up to Vinny he wouldn’t lend them a friggin’ dime.

  But Tommy had had a couple of snorts on the way over from Ozone Park, so maybe his judgment wasn’t the best. And since nothing else was happening for him, he was looking to do business.

  “You got jobs?” Tommy said.

  Both nodded.

  The tall one said, “I drive a cab from here.”

  “Yeah?” Tommy said. “Let’s go in and check that out with the dispatcher.”

  As they went inside, Vinny looked at the little guy.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Kadir.”

  “Kadir, eh. What kinda name is that?”

  “I am from Palestine.”

  The other guy had better English. This one’s accent was so thick he shouldn’t even have bothered trying English.

  “What’re you gonna do with this money, Kadir?”

  His gaze slid away. “We are starting a business.”

  “Yeah? What kind?”

  “Delivery.”

  Start a delivery business with ten grand? Good luck. Bad lie.

  “You got a job, Kadir?”

  “Yes.”

  “What do you do?”

  Again the sliding gaze. “I … I run a machine. I put labels on things.”

  This was starting to make sense now. These guys weren’t getting into a legit business they could talk about. Nothing wrong with less than legit.

  “Where’s this job?”

  “In Jersey City.”

  Tommy and the tall redhead returned.

  “Okay. He’s for real. What about this guy?”

  “Does piece work over in Jersey City.”

  “Yeah? Let’s go see your boss.”

  The little guy suddenly became hyper. “No-no! I cannot! He will not like that!”

  Tommy grabbed him by the collar of his coat and dragged him toward Vinny’s idling car.

  “I said we’re going to see your boss.”

  As Tommy tossed him into the backseat, Vinny looked at the tall one, Mahmoud.

  “You too.”

  For an instant he looked like he might run for it, then shrugged and followed Kadir.

  Looks like we’re headed for Jersey City, Vinny thought.

  3

  Jack arrived promptly at noon, just ahead of the lunch rush, and got a table for two near the rear of Le Pistou. Still hated the name, but it seemed like a friendly enough place. He asked about French beers and Kronenbourg 1664 was suggested. It sounded more German than French, and the Germans knew beer, so he ordered.

  He checked his watch: ten after. Well, she’d said noonish.

  He peeked at the menu and spotted a prix fixe lunch for $19.93. Weird number. Did they price it by the year? Could he have saved a penny by coming here back in December? He checked out the possibilities. It started with choice of garlic sausage in brioche or duck liver paté, followed by a hangar steak with French fries, or a navarin of lamb, or a duck, pork, and sausage cassoulet.

  Helluva lunch for under twenty bucks. He could get to like this place.

  He finished the beer and still no Cristin. The waiter was acting antsy. Jack spotted a phone in the corner near the restrooms and called her apartment. He left a message on her answering machine. He remembered she had a mobile phone and kicked himself for not getting her number.

  He gave the waiter ten bucks for the beer and for blocking his table from paying customers, then went outside to wait. He wandered down to the corner of Lexington and Sixty-first, then back. Still no sign of her.

  Had she forgotten? Not like her to forget. She lived a dozen blocks uptown and a little east of here. Easy walk. Why the hell not?

  4

  “All right,” Tommy was saying as he pointed to one raghead and then the other. “I know where you work and I know where you work.”

  The four of them stood next to the Crown Vic outside the short one’s workplace. Vinny now understood why he hadn’t wanted them to check it out. Tommy had barged into the office, pushing Kadir ahead of him, and had got confirmation from the older fat raghead inside that Kadir did have a job there. Tommy had then bulled into the garage area and Vinny had followed. They’d both seen the labeling machines and the crates of cigarettes stacked against the wall.

  “So how this loan is gonna work,” Tommy continued, “is you’re both responsible. If one of you dies, the other is still on the hook. I’ll show up at the depot back in the city at noon every Thursday and one of you had better be there with an envelope. If you ain’t, and I gotta come looking for you, you’ll wish you’d never been born.”

  “Yes, we understand,” the short one said. “When can we get our money?”

  Damn, he seemed anxious to lay his hands on cash. All the more reason not to give it to him.

  “Tommy, you sure?”

  That earned Vinny a glare. “You stay outta this. Just unlock the trunk.”

  Clenching his teeth, Vinny keyed the trunk open and stepped back. He watched Tommy open the briefcase inside and put two rubber-banded stacks of fifty C-notes each into a manila envelope. He handed the envelope to Kadir.

  “There you go. Ten Gs.” When Kadir started reaching into the envelope, Tommy slapped his hand. “It’s all there. You can count it later.”

  Kadir nodded and folded the envelope over.
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  Tommy said, “Just so’s there’s no confusion: You’re gonna have one thousand two hundred bucks waiting for me at the taxi depot at noon one week from today. We clear on that?”

  Kadir nodded. “Yes. Very clear. We will be there.”

  “Good.” He glanced at Vinny. “Let’s go.”

  With Tommy in back again, Vinny got the Vic moving. He wasn’t familiar with Jersey City—the ragheads had guided him in—but he remembered the route.

  “‘You sure?’” Tommy said from behind. “What the fuck kinda thing is that to say?”

  “I don’t trust them.”

  “Neither do I.”

  “But you hand them ten large of Tony’s money?”

  “Yeah. ’Cause I know where they work. They try to stiff us, we squeeze the guys they work with till we find them. But yeah, I was on the fence till I saw the operation in that garage.”

  “The cigarettes.”

  “Right. The cigarettes. Like a way to print money. I want an excuse to come back here, because if I ain’t getting a big piece of that action before spring arrives, I’ll be getting it all.”

  “You’re moving in?”

  “Damn right. I’ll leave the main raghead in charge to keep his lines of distribution, but I’ll be calling the shots.” He clapped his hands. “This is gonna be sweet.”

  Sweet indeed, Vinny thought.

  The only downside he could see—at least from where he stood—was the Jersey City location. The wrong side of the river. But he wasn’t going to say nothing to discourage Tommy. The farther away, the better.

  5

  For the second time in half an hour, Jack punched the combination into the keypad at the entrance to Cristin’s apartment building. He’d seen her enter it enough times to know it by heart. On his first trip he’d buzzed her unit but got no answer, so he’d let himself in and climbed the stairs to the third floor. Knocking on her door got the same response as the buzzer: nada.

  Worst-case scenario? She’d suffered a heart attack or stroke during the night and was lying unconscious on the floor. No, even worse, she’d found a new boyfriend who’d strangled her when she wouldn’t let him stay over—no one slept over at Cristin’s.

  All possible, none likely.

  He didn’t have a key so he’d cabbed home and back with his lock-picking tools. Back on the third floor, he knocked again on her door, but still no reply.

  The hallway was empty and he had the Schlage open in thirty seconds. Calling out her name, he did a quick walk-through. No body on the floor, nothing out of place, the bed made, an empty coffee cup in the sink. All as normal as normal could be.

  So why this gnawing unease?

  Because Cristin was as efficient and organized as anyone he’d ever met. She had a calendar and a Rolodex embedded in her brain. She made her living planning events and that meant keeping appointments. If something had come up, she would have called Le Pistou. But she hadn’t.

  So where the hell was she?

  He decided he’d be here to ask her when she came home.

  He saw copies of Vogue and Cosmopolitan stacked on an end table. He sat on her sofa and picked one at random. This issue’s cover blared Cosmo’s Annual Bedside Astrologer Tells What’s in Store for You in 1993.

  Well, how could he resist that?

  6

  Kadir came out of the Space Station on Mallory Avenue waving the keys at the waiting car. He’d taken some of the freshly borrowed cash and rented a ten-by-ten-foot storage locker here while Mahmoud hurried off to round up Yousef and Salameh.

  Salameh’s battered green Nova was idling at the curb with him behind the wheel and Mahmoud beside him.

  “We have a space,” Kadir said. “Now we have to fill it.” He slipped into the backseat beside Yousef. “Where to next?”

  “We’re meeting someone at City Chemical,” Yousef said.

  “Someone? Who?”

  “His name is Nidal Ayyad. I told you about him. He is the engineer who inspected the North Tower for us. But he works for a company called Allied Signal. We will need his contacts there.”

  Kadir wasn’t sure he liked the idea of adding a newcomer to their inner circle. This Ayyad might already know of their desire to topple the towers, but he didn’t know when. As far as Kadir was concerned, too many people knew already. Aimal Kasi had gone back to northern Virginia, saying he had to attend to his business, but he swore an oath to look for ways to bring jihad to the American capital on his own.

  “How do we know this Ayyad? Can we trust him?”

  “He was recommended by my uncle. He is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood and, although he was born in Kuwait, he is a Palestinian, just like you. He has a degree in chemical engineering from an American university. He is devoted to jihad. We will need him to show us the best spot in the basement to place the bomb to topple the tower. He will be very helpful.”

  Kadir sighed. If this Ayyad was good enough for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, then he supposed he was good enough for Kadir Allawi.

  Salameh put his old Chevy into gear and headed for City Chemical. Kadir had the address—in the area known as the Heights—and they pulled to a stop before a young Arab waiting out front.

  Yousef introduced Ayyad around, then spoke in Arabic. “You placed the order?”

  Ayyad nodded and handed him a slip of paper. “I need money to pay for it and an address for delivery.”

  Kadir studied the handwritten sheet over Yousef’s shoulder.

  Urea—1,200 lbs

  HNO3—105 gal

  H2SO4—(93%)—60 gal

  He had no idea what it all meant, but it included more than half a ton of urea, whatever that was. Was the storage space going to be big enough?

  “How much?” Mahmoud said from the front seat.

  “Thirty-six hundred and fifteen dollars.”

  Kadir blinked. He had paid 772 dollars for the storage locker. No one would rent on a monthly basis so he’d had to pay a year in advance. And now another 3,600 dollars. That meant they’d run through almost half the money in less than an hour after they’d borrowed it. And they still hadn’t found a safe place to mix the chemicals. What would that cost?

  Mahmoud had the money, and as he began counting, Kadir gave Ayyad the address of the Space Station on Mallory Avenue.

  “Locker four-three-four-four,” he told him.

  Yousef said, “Have you found a mixing space?”

  Ayyad nodded. “A converted garage on Pamrapo Avenue. I spoke to the owner. It’s available immediately.”

  Kadir had to ask. “Did he say how much?”

  “Five hundred fifty per month and he’ll let us rent month to month.”

  “Good.” He smiled with relief. “We won’t need more than a month.”

  “But he also wants a month’s security, so we’ll have to give him eleven hundred in advance.”

  Eleven hundred … that put them past the halfway point in their funds. Kadir would have to cut his hours at Diab’s labeling machines to devote his time to the bomb. He wondered if he still even had a job. Diab had to be furious at him for bringing those criminals to his place. But what choice did Kadir have? He was being manhandled, and if he’d somehow managed to escape and run, he would have ended the day with empty pockets. They’d have no money at all.

  If only that greedy Egyptian Diab supported jihad in America, he would understand and make allowances, but he did not. He was making too much money selling his smuggled cigarettes. America was a land of milk and honey for him.

  “This place will suit our needs?” Kadir said.

  Ayyad nodded. “It has cinder-block walls and is back from the street. It is perfect.”

  “Yousef said you have a degree from an American university. Which one?”

  “Rutgers.”

  “And yet you risk everything for jihad. May Allah bless you into eternity.”

  Before Ayyad could reply, Mahmoud handed a roll of hundred-dollar bills through the window. “You can add the last fif
teen yourself?”

  Ayyad shrugged. “I can. But you should know that when I spoke to them inside they said it’s too late for a delivery today. So I’ll arrange a time for tomorrow. Is ten A.M. good? I’ll tell them one of you will be waiting for the truck then.”

  “Why not have it delivered straight to the garage?”

  Ayyad shook his head. “The owner will cancel the lease if he sees all those chemicals going in. We need to do it piecemeal.” He patted the Nova’s roof. “You can use this car. How old is it?”

  “Nineteen seventy-eight,” Salemeh said.

  “Let’s hope it holds up. Who will be at the storage place to take delivery?”

  “We’ll all be there,” Yousef said.

  “Good. Meanwhile I will need another eleven hundred to secure the rental on the Pamrapo place.”

  Mahmoud counted out another eleven bills and handed them through the open window.

  The four of them watched Ayyad walk inside, then they drove away.

  It’s happening, Kadir thought as his stomach tingled with anticipation. It’s really happening.

  7

  “Damn.” Jack slapped a rolled-up Cosmo against his thigh. “Where the hell are you?”

  Almost midnight and still no sign of Cristin. He’d watched TV—Top Cop, Cheers, Wings, LA Law, and made it through The Tonight Show monologue with that new guy, Jay Leno, before bailing. He couldn’t stand any more waiting.

  Okay. She probably had an event tonight, some party or reception for one of her CEO or politician clients, and she had to stay until the end to make sure everything ran smoothly. But midnight? What event ran till midnight?

  She’s fine … she’s fine …

  He kept telling himself that, but it didn’t ease the neck-tightening tension. He couldn’t put it off any longer. He’d told himself he wouldn’t go through her things to see if he could track her down, but the imminence of the midnight hour changed the rules.

  He started searching through her drawers. He found a checkbook, he found an electric bill, a water bill, a NYNEX bill and a Nokia bill.