Fear City

by F. Paul Wilson

  The road was nearly empty now, but in a few hours the plotters would stream out onto the highway, heading for their homes. And every weekday morning the eastbound cars backed up at the traffic light that controlled their left turn into the headquarters.

  He could strike a blow for Islam then.

  He imagined lobbing hand grenades between the twin rows of waiting cars as he drove by, shrapnel piercing gas tanks and igniting them, secondary detonations causing more explosions. And amid the fiery thunder the screaming cries of infidels as they burned alive.

  A pleasant fantasy.

  But where could he get hand grenades? He had the whole weekend to seek some out.

  5

  “Good,” said Yousef as he positioned the three fifty-five-gallon drums around the front room. “These are perfect.”

  Kadir wished he’d help them carry the second load of urea and nitric acid in from the car, but he seemed to think he was above that. Ayyad had gone back to his job.

  When the car was empty, and Kadir and Salameh were gathered in the room, Yousef said, “We have enough here now to get started with the first batch. You two will mix nitric acid into the urea crystals until it forms a gel. When that happens I’ll show you how to add strips of newspaper to thicken it into a paste.”

  “What will you be doing?” Kadir said.

  “I will be mixing the nitroglycerin in the kitchen. That’s a more delicate job.”

  Kadir had heard of nitroglycerin but knew little of it beyond that it had to be handled with care.

  “Isn’t that dangerous?”

  “Very. That’s why I’ll be in a different room where it won’t be jostled. We’ll store it in the freezer for safekeeping.”

  Kadir still didn’t like it. He pointed to the barrels of urea and bottles of nitric acid lining the floor against the wall. They’d only scratched the surface of what was stored back at the Space Station locker.

  “Do we need two explosives? We’ll have over half a ton of the urea mix.”

  Yousef’s voice took on a lecturing tone. “I have made this kind of bomb before. It will consist of four explosions.” He held up a finger. “The first will be blasting caps set off by standard fuses.” Another finger came up. “The blasting caps will set off containers of my nitroglycerin.” A third finger rose. “The nitroglycerin will set off your urea nitrate paste, which will do the bulk of the damage.” The fourth finger jutted up. “The nitrate will then rupture the hydrogen tanks.”

  “Hydrogen?” Salameh said.

  “We use it all the time back home,” Yousef said. “It creates an extra explosion and a huge fireball.”

  “But we have no hydrogen.”

  Yousef smiled. “We will when the time comes.”

  He ducked back into the kitchen and returned with two sets of swimming goggles and an oblong cardboard box. From that he withdrew small paper surgical masks to cover their mouths and noses.

  “You are going to need these.”

  Kadir took a mask and a set of goggles. “Why?”

  “Fumes,” Yousef said. “The fumes are not pleasant. And be careful with the nitric acid,” he added. “It is highly concentrated and if it splashes on you it will make a hole through your clothes and burn your skin.”

  Kadir was no longer so eager to start the process.

  6

  Rebecca Olesen stepped out of the brownstone and onto East 39th Street at a little past eight. Jack had thought she’d never leave—had started to fear he’d missed her during one of his infrequent food and bathroom breaks. He’d spent most of the time freezing his butt off at a NYNEX kiosk on the corner of Lexington, pouring coins into the phone as he repeatedly called Cristin’s home and cellular phones.

  He’d even called New Jersey information for her parents’ number in Tabernacle. He told her mother that he was a friend from FIT who was trying to get in touch with her about an assignment. Nope. Cristin wasn’t there. Hadn’t heard from her since Monday but that wasn’t unusual since she rarely called in more than once a week.

  And all the while, no sign of Rebecca Olesen. He was beginning to wonder if she lived in her office when she finally appeared.

  She turned and began walking away from him toward Park Avenue. Event planners worked late, he guessed as he followed in the dark. Not many pedestrians at this hour in this kind of cold, so he hung back, staying on the downtown side of the street while she held to the uptown.

  He didn’t have a plan yet, at least not beyond learning all he could about this woman. He knew where she worked. Now he’d learn where she lived. With those two established, he could track her movements and start looking for ways to pry into her life. While she was at work he could find a way into her home; and while she was home he’d find a way into her office. Somewhere in those two places he’d find her bank statements and phone bills and what he wanted most of all: her address book. Wouldn’t it be something to check under “O” and find, Ott, Cristin?

  But that would only confirm what he already sensed in his gut: Rebecca Olesen knew Cristin. Maybe she didn’t know where she was, but she knew her name. Which led to a big ugly question: If she knew of Cristin, why the hell wouldn’t she admit it? Why lie?

  Unless she was involved in something illegal.

  Jack stopped walking.

  Crap. That hadn’t occurred to him.

  He started moving again.

  He couldn’t see it. Cristin was kinky as all hell in bed, but otherwise pretty much a straight shooter. Never once had he seen her light up a joint or snort a line. In their two years of Sundays she’d never appeared high on anything, never even mentioned drugs. Nothing stronger than tequila—she did love her Cuervo Gold.

  But that didn’t mean people wouldn’t bring drugs to one of her parties. He was pretty sure a bigwig party being busted for drugs would have made the news, though.

  He saw Rebecca Olesen turn uptown on Park. He hurried to the corner to see if she grabbed a cab. But no, she kept walking …

  … straight into Grand Central Terminal.

  Aw, hell. She was a commuter. Now things were going to get dicey. Because Jack had never commuted anywhere.

  He followed her through the faded glory of the historic station, thinking this place could do with a good scrubbing as he wove his way through the panhandlers to the Metro North lines.

  Jack didn’t know where the trains went, how many lines they ran, didn’t even know how the ticketing worked.

  Well, he was going to have to learn, and learn fast.

  SATURDAY

  1

  “You followed her all the way into Westchester County,” Abe said, “and all you got was a license plate number?”

  “You sound like a T-shirt slogan.”

  Jack had bird-dogged Rebecca Olesen onto a Metro North train on the Harlem Line where he bought a ticket to the last stop from the conductor. Turned out he didn’t need all that distance—she got off at Pleasantville. Jack had followed her down to the parking lot, only to be left standing after she got into a Lexus SUV and took off. No taxis were waiting around the station to help him follow her, so he memorized her plate number and found a phone booth on the platform. No Olesen, Rebecca or otherwise, was listed in the county phone book. Silently cursing fate and anything else he could think of, he’d boarded the next train back to the city.

  Jack added, “But at least it’s something. You can find out who it’s registered to, right?”

  Abe shook his head as he smeared cream cheese on the bottom half of a poppy seed bagel. The tiny black seeds rained on the morning’s Post, spread open on the counter. Jack had splurged on lox and bagels this morning as thanks for tracking the answering service number and in anticipation of tracking the license plate.

  “In the DMV I’ve got no connection. Maybe Ernie you should try.”

  That was a thought. Ernie specialized in fake driver licenses. He had to have contacts in the DMV.

  “Good. Of course with the way my luck’s been running on this, t
he car will turn out to be leased to Celebrations under her office address.”

  “Sounds like a good prediction.”

  Abe began to smear cream cheese on the top half, causing a virtual monsoon of poppy seeds. As Jack watched them bounce across the paper he saw the front-page headline.

  “What’s this?”

  Abe pushed it toward him with his knife hand. “A newspaper. You should read one sometime.”

  “No … really. What’s this about?”

  He pointed to the front page image—the outline of the upper half of a female body. Printed within it were the words:

  WHO

  IS

  THE

  DITMARS

  DAHLIA?

  Abe began laying slices of lox on the bottom half of his bagel.

  “Where have you been hiding? It’s all anyone’s talking about.”

  Jack had had little sleep Thursday night and had been running around all yesterday. After getting back from Grand Central, he’d conked out without bothering to turn on the TV. He’d arisen with Ms. Olesen’s license plate number running through his brain and had headed for Abe’s.

  “Well, then, I guess we should be talking about it too. Since I’ve been a little preoccupied of late, how’s about you give me a quick rundown?”

  “Quick is all I can give because they know nothing: The body of a young woman was found floating in the East River last night. No hands, face burned by acid. They’re calling her ‘the Ditmars Dahlia.’”

  “Ditmars…” Jack said. “That’s a street in Astoria, right?”

  Abe nodded. “Actually, the whole upper corner of Astoria is known as Ditmars. They pulled her out of Bowery Bay, which is right off Ditmars. Thus the name.”

  “Okay, I get the Ditmars, but why the ‘Dahlia’?”

  Abe put the top on his bagel-and-lox sandwich and took a huge bite. After a convulsive swallow, he said, “Someone on the paper wants to boost circulation with a ‘Black Dahlia’ reference. You’ve heard of the Black Dahlia murder, haven’t you?”

  “I think I saw a book with that title—”

  “Book, shmook. It was a real-life murder in Los Angeles, but she was mutilated even worse—cut in half at the waist, her face and body slashed. Since this girl is going to be hard to identify, the paper is taking advantage.”

  “Swell.” Jack shook his head and opened the paper to the story.

  “You’re not having?” Abe said, waving his bagel.

  “In a minute.”

  The guy who found her had been walking his dog along the shore and the Post had caught up with him.

  “She was facedown and naked and at first I thought it was, like, one of those window mannequins. I mean, because she had no hands, you know? And then I notice the stumps and I know that ain’t no mannequin.”

  The guy had run to the nearest house and had them call the police.

  “I didn’t know about her face until the cops pulled her out and put her on a stretcher. All burned and eaten away, even the eyes. She was stabbed all over her front—all these little holes in her.”

  Jack straightened up from the paper. “Okay, I’ve officially lost my appetite.”

  Abe was nodding and chewing. His appetite seemed unaffected. But then, nothing affected Abe’s appetite.

  “Gruesome,” he said around another huge bite. “Obviously someone doesn’t want her identified.”

  Jack was about to close it when one final quote froze him.

  “But the weirdest thing was the cut I noticed when I first found her: a nice neat rectangle of skin sliced from the back of her neck.”

  “Oh, no.” Jack leaned on the counter for support as all his blood seemed to drain away. “Oh-no-no-no-no!”

  “What?”

  “Th-this thing about the skin cut from the back of her neck. Cristin had a tattoo back there. Her ama-gi.”

  “What this ama-gi already?”

  “A Sumerian symbol. Very distinctive. A sure giveaway it was her.”

  Abe put down his bagel, his expression stricken. “You don’t think it’s your missing girl, do you?”

  “I don’t want her to be—you’ve no idea how I don’t want that. But what else can I think? Christ, Abe, I’ve got to see that body.”

  “Really?”

  “I mean, I don’t want to see it—Christ, no—but I need to. I need to know if it’s Cristin and I can’t wait days till the cops figure it out—if they ever figure it out.”

  “But her face is gone. How will you know if it’s—”

  “I’ll know. If I can just get in the same room as that body I’ll know. Gotta be a way…”

  His gut crawled at the prospect but he had to see her.

  Abe pulled a Rolodex out from under the counter. “I know a guy…”

  2

  Hadya stepped out of the Ramallah Bakery for a breath of fresh air—cold fresh air. As her English improved, her uncle Ferran had begun letting her work the counter now and again. With Ramadan beginning in just a few days, the counter was busy so she’d been working there since the shop opened. The heat from the ovens in back and the press of customers in front made for a stifling atmosphere.

  Ramadan … a month of daily fasting, no food or drink from sunrise to sunset. Hadya enjoyed the self-discipline it required, though sometimes she felt weak and light-headed toward the end of the day. The bakery was especially busy because of it.

  Uncle Ferran would be angry if she took too long a break, but she needed a moment to herself. As she stood watching the traffic, she saw a familiar face in the passenger seat of a passing car. Her brother Kadir in a battered green car, in animated conversation with the driver as they headed down Kennedy Boulevard. She wondered where they were going. Coming from visiting their hate-filled leader in the Al-Salam Mosque, perhaps?

  All his talk years ago about bringing jihad to America and so far nothing. Good. She hoped things could remain that way. But she did not trust him. And who was his new friend?

  She returned to the crowded bakery, wondering what they had been discussing so intently.

  3

  The East Side had no subways to speak of, at least none east of Lexington, so Jack took a cab down to Bellevue Hospital at First Avenue and East 30th Street. The hospital housed the city morgue. The Ditmars Dahlia was in the city morgue.

  Abe had called his “guy” in the morgue. While they were waiting for a call back, Jack had phoned Ernie and given him Rebecca Olesen’s plate number. Ernie was happy to do it for a reasonable fee but said it would take him a while. Jack left him his apartment number and told him to leave the address on the answering machine.

  Abe’s “guy” was named Ron Clarkson and for another reasonable fee—larger than Ernie’s—he’d agreed to meet Jack at noon and arrange a look at the Ditmars Dahlia.

  Clarkson turned out to be a thin guy with long light hair and a matching goatee. He was waiting, as promised, by the bank of phones in the hospital lobby, dressed in scrubs and smoking a cigarette.

  “You Abe’s friend?”

  Jack nodded. “How do we do this?”

  “Follow me.”

  He led Jack to the elevator bank and tapped down. They stepped into an empty car and Clarkson hit the bottom button.

  “Got something for me?” he said.

  Jack pulled an envelope from his jacket and handed it over. He felt he should say something but his mind was blank except for the fervent hope that he’d just wasted his money because this wasn’t Cristin. He prayed he was wasting that money.

  “Since Abe sent you,” Clarkson said as he tucked the envelope into the pocket of his scrubs, “I’m assuming that you ain’t no perv who gets off looking at naked dead women.”

  That didn’t deserve an answer so Jack just gave him a look.

  “Okay. I’m just warning you, this one’s a little rough on the eyes. She may have been a looker once, but she’s been messed up. Especially her face. And she was in the water awhile—not long enough to do any real damage,
but it does cause changes.”

  Jack’s already churning stomach gave a slight lurch.

  “Why are you telling me all this?”

  “Because you can’t go all pussy on me and blow lunch or start screaming and crying or pass out or any of that shit. It happens all the time with people who come here to identify a corpse, but that’s okay because they’re supposed to be here. You, on the other hand, ain’t. The cops are holding back things about her so—”

  “Why?”

  “Front page murder like this brings all the kooks out of their little cracks and crevices. I mean they’re like cockroaches, man. Five’ll get you ten homicide’s had a couple dozen confessions already. Keeping stuff secret helps the cops weed out the cranks with just a question or two. So no one is supposed to see her unless they might be family, and they’ll be heavily screened before they’re allowed down here.”

  “I guess I should feel privileged.” Jack hoped Clarkson had an ear for sarcasm.

  “Damn right you should. So you gotta stay calm and quiet or my ass is grass and so is yours.”

  “Got it,” he said with more confidence than he felt. This was all new to him.

  The elevator doors opened on the basement level.

  “Welcome to the city morgue.”

  They stepped out into a fluorescent-lit hallway. Clarkson led him to a doorway marked MEN and pushed it open.

  “It gets quiet here at lunch hour but we’ve still got to make you look like you belong. Locker seventy-seven has a set of scrubs in it. Change into them real quick-like and I’ll meet you inside in about two minutes.”

  Jack found the locker and was dressed in the scrubs when Clarkson returned. He led them out another door to a gurney-lined hallway. Some were empty, some were occupied by black plastic body bags. Then through a set of double swinging doors to a small room with a battered metal desk littered with papers and clipboards, a half-filled Styrofoam coffee cup, and the Daily News opened to the sports pages.