Jeffery Deaver is an international number-one bestselling author. His books are sold in one hundred fifty countries and translated into twenty-five languages. He has served two terms as president of Mystery Writers of America and was recently named a Grand Master of MWA.
The author of forty-eight novels, one hundred one short stories, a nonfiction law book, and a lyricist of a country-western album, he’s received or been shortlisted for dozens of awards.
His The Bodies Left Behind was named Novel of the Year by the International Thriller Writers association, and his Lincoln Rhyme thriller The Broken Window and a stand-alone, Edge, were also nominated for that prize. The Garden of Beasts won the Steel Dagger from the Crime Writers Association in England, and he has won the Short Story Dagger from CWA, and another story was shortlisted for the award. He’s also been nominated for eight Edgar Awards by MWA.
Deaver has been honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Bouchercon World Mystery Convention, the Strand Magazine’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Raymond Chandler Lifetime Achievement Award in Italy.
His book A Maiden’s Grave was made into an HBO movie starring James Garner and Marlee Matlin, and his novel The Bone Collector was a feature release from Universal Pictures, starring Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie. Lifetime aired an adaptation of his novel The Devil’s Teardrop. NBC television recently aired the nine-episode prime-time series, Lincoln Rhyme: Hunt for the Bone Collector.
Upper New York Bay—a.k.a. New York Harbor—is considered by many to be the best natural harbor in the world.
It can also be among the most beautiful, as was the case today. The water was gunmetal, and the breeze was teasing up whitecaps. A container ship, massive, like a thirty-story building in recline, eased gracefully west, aiming toward the New Jersey docks, where the many-colored trailers would be lifted off and sent to depots around the country, and new ones seated on the vessel for a journey to who-knew-where.
Taking it all in was Miguel Torres, sitting on a bench in North Shore Waterfront Esplanade Park, the northern tip of Staten Island. He was eating his lunch, which he had made himself. It was a tuna-salad sandwich, dressed with cheese and pickles. The bread was homemade white.
Baking was a hobby of his (he could not make a casserole or cook a roast, but flour and yeast were ever at his command). He was drinking hot chocolate from a cup that he had unscrewed from a lengthy green thermos.
He was a compact man with thick, trimmed black hair and a matching mustache. His face was handsome enough to be that of a model. He was five feet eight inches tall. And muscular, thanks not to a gym (he had not been to one in five years) but to his profession of landscaper.
Presently, as often, he was mesmerized as he gazed over the water at the distant, ever-impressive fortress of buildings in lower Manhattan, at Governor’s and Liberty Islands, at the no-nonsense docks and warehouses of Brooklyn and, to his left, the bristling cranes of New Jersey’s industrial backbone: the cranes that lifted, loaded, and offloaded the containers he’d been thinking of moments ago.
He stretched. Felt a bone pop.
Tired …
The alarm had cried out at 4:30 A.M. and, after rolling groggily from bed, he’d had a breakfast of cold tamales and coffee and then driven to Mr. Whittaker’s house, a nice brick two-story in Tudor style. Miguel had been hired to “make it nice for spring.” Mr. Whittaker was a recent widower and Miguel had learned that his wife had been the gardener in the family. The retired businessman himself didn’t have the heart to putter in the yard, given his loss.
Miguel was attending to the man’s flower beds, in sore need of hand-weeding (the only way to do it) and nutrients. He still had eight, nine hours of work to make the yard beautiful once more, beautiful in the way that only living plants could accomplish.
A thought landed like a determined bee on a flower—how different was his life here, compared with that back home. The desert had its beauty but could not compare with the endlessly pulsating plane of water that stretched out before him.
This place was very special. Miguel often dreamed—waking and otherwise—about owning a house with a water view like this. There were a number of such residences available, of course, overlooking the Harbor in all of the boroughs, except Queens and the Bronx. But affording one was another matter. And Miguel Torres had another requirement that limited his ability to find his perfect residence: he would never live in an apartment or condo, water vista or not. He thrived on soil and grass and plants. Which meant that prices for even the most modest of places that would meet his standards started over a million. His age was thirty-two. Over a beer at night, or coffee after work, or hot chocolate at lunch he calculated that by the time he saved enough to buy, he would be seventy-four, depending of course on the undependable real estate market of New York City.
Of course, miracles could happen. But for the time being, he was content to stroll along the Esplanade anytime he wished. And for free.
The park was crowded with people who’d flocked here to enjoy the beautiful early-April day, one of the most temperate of the year so far. Curious by nature, Miguel gazed about. To his right, on the other side of a thick stand of boxwood, was a cluster of three or four people engaged in an animated conversation. He couldn’t help but play the eavesdropping game.
In front of him on the concrete walkway, joggers trotted past. Most were frowning. In pain? He laughed. He could tell them about muscle pain—after eight-hour days spent doing what he did.
To Miguel’s left, on an adjoining bench, a businessman had doffed his jacket and rolled up his shirt sleeves. He sloughed back and gazed upward, as if praying for a tan.
Miguel took in the Mixmaster blend of all of the sounds cascading, swirling, descending upon him—and the laughter, the caw of gulls, the slap of water, the voices …
He remained motionless, a man lost in thought, for ten minutes, then rose and tossed his trash into a nearby bin, much to the disappointment—and ire—of a large gull.
Returning to the sidewalk, he paused momentarily and glanced into the Harbor, then walked steadily from the park.
Miguel Torres had work to do.
*
The next morning, he was on Paxton Street, which was tucked between the Brighton Heights and Stapleton Heights neighborhoods of Staten Island.
He wore what he usually did on the job: jeans and a flannel shirt—today gray and blue—over a black T-shirt. Today was summer scented and even warmer than yesterday and he’d left his jacket in the truck.
Much of the huge island, one of the five boroughs, or counties, of New York City, had been gentrified. These particular blocks had not been—but they hadn’t needed much spiffing. The houses were old but masterfully and solidly built. They were kept up well, and little trim was in need of painting. Most had decent-sized yards, both front and back. Miguel was presently hard at work, engaged in his most effective sales effort: walking from house to house and offering the occupants one of his cards or leaving one on the doorstep if no one was home. If he did have the chance to meet the homeowner and they were willing to listen, he’d offer a brief description of what he might do to make their property more beautiful.
And safer.
As was the case now.
He was standing in front of a single-family home in what was called gingerbread style, the gray siding like fish scales, the roof shingled with dark red asphalt. The windows were of beveled glass, the doorknob and hinges polished brass. He guessed the structure was one hundred years old.
The small front yard consisted of carelessly mowed and under-fertilized grass. Some dirt beds were home to a few shrubs and flowering plants, looking none too healthy.
What took his attention, though, was the dominant element of the property: a towering oak, sixty feet high. He knew the rate at which hardwood trees grew and he supposed that it had been planted as a sapling when the construction of the house was completed.
Miguel walked to the front door, rang the bell.
He heard footsteps and a moment later a woman opened the door. She was about his age, maybe a bit older, and had a narrow, striking face and abundant blond hair tied up in a ponytail.
“Yes?” she asked. If she was cautious about a stranger at the door, she gave no evidence of it.
“Hi. Good morning.” He had studied English from his grammar school days, and he had only a faint accent.
He offered his card.
A-One Landscaping
Miguel Torres
Trees, plantings, irrigation, stump removal, carting
Licensed and Bonded.
She glanced at it, then behind him, at his truck, a twenty-two foot Chevy 6500, which he kept in immaculate shape (the cleanliness was part of his sales pitch—to demonstrate his responsibility and the care he took in his work). The woman was in jeans and a close-fitting light-blue blouse. Her necklace was a cross. So, most likely a Catholic, like him.
“Oh, I’m renting. I can give you the number of the owner. He’d be the one to talk to about any work.”
She wasn’t from Staten Island. There’s a unique way native islanders talk. Her sentences would have diminished in volume at the end and trailed off to silence. And “owner” would likely have been “owniz” and “number” “numbaz.” Locals often added an “s” sound to singular words.
She also had a faint accent that was definitely not from the Island: He believed it was Southern.
Miguel said, “Sure. I can call him. But I wanted to point out something. There’s a problem.” He turned to the oak. “That branch is about to come down.”
The twenty-foot limb drooped over her SUV, a black Honda, which was showing a dusting of pollen from the very oak tree that was threatening to cave in its roof.
“I never noticed it.” She stepped out onto the front porch and studied the branch, which was about a foot in diameter where it had begun splitting off from the trunk.
“What happened?”
“Could’ve been anything. Wind or that ice storm last winter. Maybe age. The tree’s healthy otherwise.”
She turned to him. They were about eye to eye, his deep brown, hers a glowing blue.
“I’m Katherine. With a K.” She noted his card. “And it’s your company. You’re Miguel?”
“With an M.”
A beat of a moment and she laughed.
They shook hands. He was always careful about this. His palms were calloused and very strong. But she didn’t shy, and her grip was firm too. When their hands retreated, she didn’t look away but scanned his face for a moment.
He too held her eyes, with a cocked head, then turned to the front of the property. “I’m thinking this could be a nice yard.”
“The owner doesn’t do very much. Obviously.”
“I wouldn’t mind getting a contract.” His eyes returned to hers. “Let me propose something. I’ll take care of the branch for nothing. If you could tell the owner about it and give him my number … What do you think?”
She debated for a moment. Then: “Well, you can’t beat the price. A deal. I’ll move the Honda.”
Katherine turned and with her left hand reached up and pulled some keys off a hook just inside the door. She was not wearing a wedding or engagement ring.
She backed into the street, then parked in front of his truck.
Miguel got his climbing gear from the back bed and one of the smaller chainsaws.
“You mind if I watch?”
He laughed. “Won’t be as dramatic as a hundred-foot redwood coming down. But be my guest.”
After mounting the climbing spikes on his boots, he slung the canvas strap around the tree and clipped it to the rings on his utility belt. The chainsaw went over his shoulder. He flipped the strap upward so that it encircled the trunk about three feet above his head. He pulled it taut and, flexing his arms and climbing with the spiked boots, moved upward. He kept repeating the process until he was at the branch.
He glanced back and saw her sitting on the porch studying him.
She called, “Like Spiderman.”
He chuckled and pulled on goggles and yellow ear protectors then fired up the chainsaw. It took only four strategic cuts for gravity to take over and the limb fell to the ground as undramatically as Miguel had promised.
He now descended and removed the climbing gear. He untucked and removed his flannel shirt, folded and set it on a boxwood nearby. The T-shirt revealed his muscular frame and from the corner of his eye he saw Katherine swiftly study his torso and then look back to the branch.
He tugged the saw to life once more and within a few minutes the limb had become six separate logs.
Removing the goggles and earmuffs, he asked, “You want it stacked for firewood? It’ll have to dry for a few months.”
“I won’t be here much longer than that myself. I don’t think the fireplace works anyway.”
“I’ll get rid of it.”
In Staten Island homeowners can leave their own yard waste at curbside for pickup, but what professional landscapers generate has to be hauled away by them. One by one, Miguel squatted, lifted the wood, and threw it in the bed of his truck. Each weighed about fifty pounds, he guessed, but they were nothing for him.
“Where will you take it?” Katherine asked.
“We have approved dump sites. Not too far.”
He wiped his forehead with his shirt, then replaced it on the shrub.
“Would you like some water?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Inside, the house was quite nice. Majestuosa—stately—was the word that came to mind.
It featured wood-paneled walls, leaded-glass panels in the doors, red-and-black oriental carpets, and more brass fixtures.
“You mind if I wash my hands?”
She pointed to a bathroom and Miguel stepped inside. Like in many old houses there were separate hot and cold faucets, with the hot too searing to use alone. He filled the basin, washed with a lavender foam soap, and then rinsed off in cold water.
He joined Katherine in the spacious kitchen, where she moved a stack of papers off the high-top island. This room seemed to serve as an office.
“Take a seat,” she said, indicating the stools.
He hesitated briefly and then sat. While customers sometimes offered him water, none had ever asked him to sit down; they usually seemed eager that he finish his drink and leave.
“Or coffee?”
This had never been offered either.
“No, just water’s fine.”
She got a glass from a cabinet, added ice, and filled it from the faucet. He wondered if she’d sit too, but no. She remained standing and sipped from a coffee mug.
After a moment of silence, he asked, “You’re only here for a while?”
Katherine replied, “I work in IT—you know, internet. A four-month assignment. It’s usually cheaper to rent a house than pay for an extended-stay hotel.” She looked him up and down again. “You done landscaping all your life?”
“No, no. Started five years ago, when I came here from Mexico.”
“I only ask because …” Her voice trailed off, and not because of a Staten Island dialect. She seemed to regret where her comment had been going. About his excellent English and grammar, he guessed.
“Down there I wore a suit and tie.” His shoulders rose and fell. “But my degree didn’t mean much here, so I started my own company.”
“That’s not fair.” She was frowning.
“I thought so at first, but I like this better. Much better. I’m my own boss. Outside, working with my hands.”
“Why’d you leave?”
His face darkened “Too dangerous. The cartels. A new president comes in. ‘Oh, I’ll clean it up. I’ll make the country safe …’ A joke. They never do. I brought my parents and sister too. They’re in California.”
“But you didn’t go there?”
“No. I like New York. It’s special.”
“It is. Very special. I’ll be sad to leave when the job’s over.”
She refilled the coffee mug, which did not seem to need refilling. “You mentioned your family … Anybody else come with you?”
“No. Just us.” A pause. “There was a woman I was seeing.” He shrugged. “She could have come. But she wanted to stay. I can’t blame her. It’s the hardest thing in the world, leaving your family. She couldn’t do it.”
He thought about Consuela a lot. He tried not to but that usually proved to be impossible.
“You’ll meet somebody here.”
“I’m in no hurry. My mother always says, ‘Just wait and see what fate has in store for you.’”
“That sounds a little … can I say? Ominous.”
“I always thought that too.”
They shared a laugh and their eyes met once more. Was she offering a flirt, perhaps an invitation of some sort?
He wasn’t sure.
But what he did know for certain was that he was.
The spell broke. He finished the water and rose. “I should go.”
Together, they walked to the front door and onto the porch. She glanced out into the yard. “That other work you wanted to do here. Why don’t you just come back and do it? If the landlord won’t pay I’ll get my company to.”
“Well …”
“No. Really. It’s too nice a yard to look like it does now. Gets prettified, it’ll be nice to sit on the steps and have a glass of wine.”
“‘Prettified.’ That’s a new one to me.”
Katherine’s eyes were very much the color of Upper New York Bay on a sunny summer afternoon.
Another silence. Neither moved.
He came a second away from easing forward to see how receptive she’d be to a kiss. He sensed: a lot.
But then he told himself firmly: Careful there.
Which he modified to: Take. Your. Time.
“I can start tomorrow?” asked Miguel.
“Tomorrow would be perfect.”
*
Overnight the temperature had dropped, and it was now ten degrees cooler than yesterday. Overcast and windier too.
The oak, one limb less, swayed, and the budding leaves rustled.
Miguel hit the doorbell button and just a moment later he was aware of footsteps approaching.
Katherine opened the door. She was smiling. He reciprocated. And, though it seemed like an odd gesture, he stuck his hand out. She gripped it firmly and the contact lingered.
He couldn’t stop his eyes from sweeping down and then back up. Her outfit was of gray, shimmery cloth, silky. Almost like pajamas.
No, exactly like pajamas.
“Morning,” he said.
“Buenos dias.”
He laughed. Her pronunciation was terrible. “So. With the wind, I checked the tree again. All good. You’re safe from falling branches.” He noted she’d kept her car parked on the street overnight.
“My hero.”
“I’ve got lime and fertilizer and some acid for the hydrangeas. Rose food too. Where would you like me to start?”
A frown, a tilt of her head. “Here.” She took his right hand and put it on her breast.
Miguel was motionless for a moment. One had to be careful nowadays of course, but if this didn’t qualify as “consent” he didn’t know what might. So he slid his other hand around her waist to the small of her back and pulled her to him, kissing her hard.
She gripped his lips with her teeth. Then opened her mouth and kissed him back just as passionately.
Katherine turned and led him into the hallway, closing the door behind them. Then, still gripping his hand firmly, led him into the bedroom. The lace curtains were partially open, and you could see a portion of the gardens surrounding the backyard. They were in even worse shape than those in the front.
Miguel Torres didn’t care.
*
He opened his eyes to find her dressing.
It was noon. Two hours had passed since he’d arrived, and only the past fifteen or twenty minutes had been devoted to sleep.
She noticed he was awake and smiled.
He did too.
And told himself not to think of Consuela. Though he did, concluding that, as good as such times had been with her, none had risen to this level.
He sat up, swung his feet to the floor. Sipped from the bottle of water on the bedside table. She’d set it there while he dozed.
Katherine walked close and kissed him. She whispered, “Sleepyhead.”
“I’m awake now.”
She glanced down. “You certainly are.”
He lifted an eyebrow. It was an invitation. To accept or reject as she wished.
She clicked her tongue and her face registered disappointment. “I’ve got an associate who’ll be here in ten minutes.”
“Well,” Miguel offered, “maybe tomorrow.”
She frowned.
He shook his head.
She said, “What’s wrong with tonight?”
His answer was a firm kiss.
Miguel rose to wash up and dress while she made the bed.
Together they walked into the kitchen.
“Coffee now?”
He’d been just a water-drinking handyman yesterday. His status had changed.
“Black.”
As she poured two cups the doorbell sounded.
“That’d be Tim,” she said, handing him the brew. He took it and sipped. Strong. He liked it.
She walked to the front door and opened it, letting inside a stocky man in his thirties, dressed in jeans, a white dress shirt, and a navy blazer. He was blond, his hair longish. He carried a backpack on one shoulder, a computer bag over the other. It dangled at his side like a large purse.
He said to Katherine, “Morning,” though his eyes were on Miguel.
She introduced him and added, “He’s a friend.”
Miguel had wondered if she’d say, “My gardener.”
“Nice to meet you.”
Miguel’s impression, however, was that he didn’t feel it was so very nice. A smile was on his face, but it was one of those smiles—of questionable DNA.
The men gripped hands. Tim’s fingers were long but were the digits of a computer person, not an outdoor worker.
Miguel was careful not to exert too much pressure.
She poured Tim some coffee as well, and added cream and sugar.
He took several sips and then set the cup down on the island and opened the computer bag. He extracted his laptop, a big one, the seventeen-inch model. He set this on the kitchen table, tugged open the lid, and booted the Dell up. After loading some documents or diagrams—Miguel couldn’t see clearly—he scanned the screen and pointed to some portion of it. Katherine bent down and read.
She said, “Good. They delivered on time. We’re right on schedule.”
Tim nodded but his face didn’t register the same satisfaction hers did.
Which had nothing to do with their project. Tim was jealous.
As Tim looked over Katherine, Miguel studied him. He was not an attractive man, but round and fidgety, unathletic—a high school student who’d kept waiting to flower, to slip from nerd to cool, but had never been able to get beyond the video-gaming, candy-sneaking, girl-ogling years.
His crush on Katherine would run deep and he knew she would always be interested in the Miguels of the world. He would have talents, important ones—like making sure things ran “right on schedule”—but that was different.
Tim, of course, couldn’t resent her, not openly, given the infatuation and the obvious fact that she was his superior.
So he’d suck it up when on the subject of Miguel Torres and offer the smile that perhaps he honestly believed would really be taken for one.
He was just wondering whether he should tell her he was going to get to work on the yard when her phone rang, and she took a call. As she listened a frown blossomed on her face.
“Well, that’s not going to work. How would that work?” Her voice had an edge he hadn’t heard before. She held her hand over the phone and said to Tim, “The trucking company. An accident. They can’t do it.”
Tim was frowning. He stammered, “They … they have to.”
She said, “It’s not happening. Their other trucks’re on the road.” She returned to the call. “You’ll just have to find another way. We’ve paid you twenty percent … I don’t want the money back. I want the shipment delivered like you’re contracted to do … No, I don’t want you jobbing it out. We vetted you. We don’t have time to screen anybody else. Oh, never mind.” She hit disconnect and it seemed she regretted not being able to slam a landline receiver down into a cradle.
She stared at the floor for a moment, her beautiful face registering dismay. She looked to Tim. “So. What do we do? They have to go on board this afternoon. There’re no options.”
He muttered, “We have to call corporate.”
“Oh, great. I can’t wait to have that conversation.”
Miguel asked, “What do you have to be delivered?”
“Computer racks for crude oil tankers’ navigation systems.”
Tim added, “They’re algorithms that measure wind, current, depth of water, draft, dimensions of ships, a hundred other things. They find the most fuel-efficient routes whatever the seas are like.”
Katherine was staring at the computer screen. “The contract … They have to be dropped at the boat we’ve chartered. Today. In the next few hours.”
She looked to Tim, who grimaced.
Miguel asked, “Where are they? And where do they have to go?”
She waved to the computer. “They were just dropped off at a warehouse in Brooklyn. Red Hook. We have a boat at Emerson Dock on Staten Island. That’s where they’re going.”
“I know it,” Miguel said. “How big are these things?”
The two regarded each other. Tim said, “Probably fifty pounds.”
“How many?”
“Twelve. What are you … ?”
“I can do it,” Miguel offered.
Tim said, “What, in a landscaping truck?”
Miguel looked him over closely. “The suspension’s just like any other thirty-footer.”
“But—”
“No,” Katherine said, smiling. “I like it.”
“Well,” Tim said slowly, “How much’d you charge?”
His face suggested he did not want another man to save the day and impress fair Katherine.
Miguel thought for a moment, calculating in his head. Staten Island to Brooklyn and back again. “Make it two fifty.”
Katherine laughed. Tim stared at him. She was the one who said, “The job we contracted for is two thousand. That’s what we’d pay you.”
Miguel lifted an eyebrow. “I think I’m in the wrong line of work.”
Tim said to her, “You sure? I mean … Security?”
“You have any other options? Those ships sail without the modules, they cancel our contract and buy from Allied Atlantic or Bermuda Systems.”
The man nodded.
He gave Miguel the address of the warehouse where he was to pick up the modules and the specific pier at Emerson Dock where the boat to deliver the products to the ships was located. The captain and crew were on their way. If they weren’t there by the time he arrived he should stow them on board, in the hold.
“Don’t just leave them on the pier. We couldn’t afford to have them stolen.”
Miguel gave a laugh and said with some pride, “Staten Island’s not like some places around here. But we’re still New York City.” He said he’d be sure to leave them out of sight.
“You’re a lifesaver,” she said warmly and with obvious gratitude.
There was a beat of a moment as he wondered how she would say goodbye to him.
But there was no hesitation on her part. She walked straight up and kissed him on the mouth.
This was right in front of Tim, who tried unsuccessfully to mask the irritation, if not anger, at his rival.
Miguel said, “I have one condition.”
“Name it.” She offered a seductive smile.
“I get that rose food on the bushes as soon as I’m back. Can’t wait another day.”
*
An easy job.
The drive to the Red Hook warehouse took thirty minutes. Once there, he displayed to a bored manager the bill of lading that Katherine had printed out. The man’s spirits improved considerably and he grew more than happy to help load the cartos when Miguel held up two twenties and a ten.
Fifty or so minutes later he arrived at the dock. It took no time at all to find the ship, or boat, or whatever you call a craft that was about thirty feet long. It seemed old but the construction was solid, the wood varnished and clean. Like Katherine’s rental, the fixtures were polished brass. The captain and crew weren’t present. He borrowed a hand truck from a sailor on another craft and three at a time wheeled the cartons to the side of the vessel. He lifted them to the deck, which was a few feet above the pier and then, jumping on board, carried them down into the hold.
He had a thought and laughed. Of course that’s what the large diesel-smelling space was called—because that was where the cargo was “held.”
After returning the hand cart he walked back to his Chevy and looked out over the Harbor, gray and dotted with more whitecaps than the other day, but magnificent still.
He started the truck and drove back toward Paxton Street.
Thinking once again:
I’m in the wrong line of work …
*
Katherine and Tim had been joined by three other men.
They were pale of complexion and in good shape. There was a military air about them, an impression aided by the fact that they wore similar outfits—tan tops and slacks. They almost appeared to be uniforms. Their hairstyle was similar too: cropped short. He wondered if they had been soldiers.
“It went well?” Tim asked.
“Fine. They’re loaded. Inside. When I left, the crew still hadn’t gotten there.”
“Not a problem,” said Tim. He nodded at one of the three men, who pulled out his phone and quickly made a call. Something was different about Tim. He was more confident than earlier. Much less of a nerd. Katherine might be in charge, but Tim was a strong second in command. The three newcomers were respectful of him. Maybe even intimidated.
Miguel spotted another difference too. Looking past the hallway, Miguel noted that the bed was no longer made. The blazer that Tim had worn lay on the chair beside it.
And Katherine had changed clothes yet again, now wearing a skirt and a blue cotton blouse.
She took in his face, aware that he understood what had happened. She handed off a look that was very different from the others she’d offered over the past two days. It was the glance you would give to a busboy passing you in a restaurant.
Then Tim said to the trio of men, “All right.”
They turned and, before Miguel could even swivel and start for the door, they were on him.
“Wait … what … ?”
This had all been planned—like choreography.
One pulled a pistol from his back pocket and pointed it at Miguel, who blinked. His eyes turned to Katherine. She gave him another restaurant-help glance and then took a packet of alcohol wipes and began scouring the laptop—the keys, the top, the sides, the battery charger. She nodded.
With the gun still on him, the other two dragged him to the laptop and forced his hands open. They pressed his fingertips onto the keys and parts of the computer she’d scrubbed.
Resisting was impossible, even if he hadn’t been at gunpoint; the two planting his fingerprints were strong as bodybuilders.
“What is this? I don’t understand!”
Tim pulled on latex gloves and sat at the computer. He began typing.
Miguel turned to Katherine, his eyes imploring her to explain.
“We’re patriots.” She shrugged. “Government’s a perversion. It’s grown into a cancerous behemoth that’s destroying true values of what America should be. It’s driving us toward the poison of globalism. We’re not going to put up with that. We won’t tolerate foreigners or their influence, and we won’t tolerate a government that supports them.”
“Spare me bullshit speeches. What did you get me into?”
Tim said absently, “Those cartons?”
Miguel whispered, “Not computer racks. They’re bombs or chemical weapons, aren’t they?”
“Twelve hundred pounds of C-4,” Katherine said as she watched Tim—her boyfriend, her lover—type away at the keyboard.
“There never was a delivery problem. You saw ‘carting’ on my business card, you saw my truck, and planned to set me up.” Then he frowned. “A suicide mission … Ah, no, the boat. It’s remote controlled.”
Tim didn’t bother to confirm. “Launching it now.” He hit return.
Glancing at the screen, Miguel could see a window of a bobbing image, a live feed. It would be from a camera mounted to the front of the boat. Slowly at first it cruised forward, aiming away from shore into the Harbor.
He closed his eyes briefly. He opened them and raged to Katherine, “You set me up! I’m the one on video picking up the packages and loading them on the boat.” He gave a sour laugh. “And my fingerprints.” A nod at the computer. “It’ll look like I was steering the boat!”
Nobody had anything to say.
Miguel Torres had merely stated the obvious.
“And that?”
Katherine looked his way to see what he meant.
He was staring into the bedroom.
She shrugged.
Which meant that, obviously, she needed to seal the deal. And, with a man, what better way to cloud his judgment and make sure he didn’t speculate too much about the curious job—picking up cartons for a big computer operation and loading them onto a small boat all by himself.
Miguel looked them over. “What exactly is your point? I mean, I wasn’t born here. I immigrated legally and I’ve worked every day of my life in this country. I love America. I’m a citizen.”
“Not a real one,” muttered one of the tan uniformed thugs.
The word that came to Miguel’s mind was: Nazi.
He asked, “And what’s going to happen to me? I’ll kill myself?”
Why even bother? Of course that was the plan.
“What’s your target? A container ship from Brazil or China or Europe?”
“Something much better than that,” Katherine said.
“Are you going to tell me?”
Tim said, “We’ll let you watch.”
Miguel said, “Planes and drones’d be monitored. A small boat in the Harbor. Nobody would pay it any attention.”
He glanced at the three clones, then asked Tim and Katherine, “Where are you all from?”
Tim said, “Outside of Birmingham.” He glanced to Miguel. “And, okay, just to let you know: we think some of you are okay.”
“What?” Miguel whispered.
“Somebody’s got to cut the grass and iron the sheets and fix the roofs. Stay in your place and it’s all good.”
Miguel stared back, his face expressionless. Was the man taunting him? Or serious?
Katherine said to the Hitler Youth, “Let’s get on with it. I want to be on the road in a half hour.”
While the gunman kept his pistol thrust forward, the other two walked to the stairway, where a length of clothesline lay on the landing. One end was a loop, like an impromptu noose. The other end one of them tied to the banister, so that the loop ended about seven feet off the floor.
“I’m going to hang myself,” he whispered.
Both Katherine and Tim were staring at the screen as his long, weak fingers typed commends which ended up as directives to the ship’s rudder.
The two placed a chair under the noose and walked Miguel toward it.
He looked back at her. “Ah, Katherine … Katherine …”
There was something about his tone that caught her attention.
Her ocean-blue eyes stared into his brown, as he shook his head slowly. His face would have to be revealing a hint of sadness—though for her, not himself.
“Oh, no,” she whispered.
He nodded.
It was then that the FBI tactical team smashed open the door with a battering ram and a dozen agents with machine guns and pistols at the ready charged into the house, screaming—literally—for everyone to drop to the floor and keep their hands in sight.
The alternative, the agents made clear, was that they’d be shot where they stood.
The quintet quickly complied.
*
The terrorists had been carted away to federal detention in lower Manhattan, and a crime scene team was scouring the house.
Miguel Torres stood outside with the lead special agent on the case, a tall, dark-skinned man of around fifty. His short, white hair was distinguished. Despite the tough job Special Agent William Nichols would have, his eyes sparkled constantly. He asked, “The cavalry cut it too close?”
Miguel replied, “I had every faith in you. If for no other reason than you’d have a lot of explaining to do to your attorney general if your confidential informant got himself hanged.”
He hadn’t in fact been too worried. Nichols had assured him that there would be two dozen agents surrounding the house and listening to every word uttered inside, through the microphone sewed into Miguel’s pockets.
They would want to get as much incriminating information on the cell as they could, but of course, since the plan was to kill Miguel, at the least overt action or command to do so, the tactical team would rescue him.
Already the press was gathering, but other agents and NYPD officers were keeping them back. Miguel knew there would be a press conference at some point. Hero though he was, he would not participate. For one thing, he was a reclusive man by nature. For another, it was obviously not a wise idea to be identified as the man who stopped a terrorist attack by the infamous Patriot Enforcers Militia. Five had been arrested, but Nichols told him that the outfit had a half dozen branches and numbed close to fifty members. Once the full extent of the plot was known that number would shrink considerably. But even then, anonymity was the better course.
“I think this is the fastest operation we’ve ever put together,” Nichols said and he stepped away to take a phone call.
Fast indeed. It was only two days ago—at his lunch on the Esplanade—that he had overheard the conversation among Katherine, Tim, and several others, probably the three Nazis, who were unaware of Miguel’s presence and assumed no one was within earshot. It was this crowd on which he was eavesdropping.
They were on the waterfront to plot out the route their explosive boat would take to its target.
They were not the most brilliant of perpetrators; they should have come up with code words for what they actually said, like “transporting the C-4,” “explosion,” “body count,” and “the day after tomorrow.”
He had also heard Katherine—tell the others to meet that night at her house, which was apparently the base of the operation.
After disposing of his lunch trash, Miguel had followed her home to the house on Paxton Street. It was not far from the water, and he could trail on foot.
He had then gone straight to FBI headquarters in Manhattan with the story and was ushered immediately into Nichols’s office. He was the head of a joint FBI/NYPD anti-terror task force. He convened a number of officers and together, in the space of only a few hours, they had concocted a takedown plan, Miguel himself suggesting that he work his way into the cell to learn exactly what they were up to.
He had an idea of how he would do so: When he’d followed Katherine back to her house, he’d noted a large oak in the front yard. That night, he’d snuck onto the property with a handsaw, climbed the tree, and cut through much of the branch that overhung the driveway.
The next day he’d gone to the house and offered to take down the dangerously dangling limb for free.
But meeting her was only part of the plan. There was an important refinement. At the meeting on the Esplanade he’d heard them talk about transporting the explosives from a warehouse to a dock but were worried about exposing themselves to CCTV cameras. So when he made his offer to cut the branch, he’d proffered his card, which stated that among other services he provided carting.
This got him inside the cell.
He didn’t share with Special Agent Nichols that a bit more had unfolded between him and Katherine. Miguel understood that she was using the time in bed to snare him. What she didn’t know was that he was using her too; it had been a long time since he’d been with Consuela.
This morning he had picked up the explosives at the warehouse in Brooklyn but instead of delivering them to the dock right away he’d made a fast stop—a garage where NYPD and BATF bomb squad teams rendered the devices safe. He’d then continued on and loaded them onto the boat per the terrorists’ instructions.
Nichols finished his phone call and disconnected. “The mayor wants to meet you. The governor too. I told them you’re in deep cover. They’re going to send you a letter or something.” Eyes dancing, he added, “Maybe an Amazon gift certificate. That’s a joke.”
“How long will they go away for?”
“Attempted murder, attempted destruction of federal property, conspiracy, maybe sedition … I guess fifty years.”
Miguel nodded with satisfaction.
Nichols gave a laugh. “Figured you’d left your prior life behind, did you?”
One of the reasons the agent and his team had so readily agreed to Miguel’s suggestion that he go undercover was his old job in Mexico: He was a senior detective investigating the Chihuahua and Sinaloa drug cartels and a political liaison officer.
After assassination attempt number three down there, Miguel had said enough was enough—they’d get him sooner or later. With the help of the U.S. authorities he’d worked with in Texas, he’d immigrated, along with his parents, his sister, and her husband.
The issue of Consuela Ramirez’s joining him had never arisen; it was she who’d set him up for the third hit.
And so America became his new home.
Miguel noted that the reporters were antsy, like racehorses just before the gates open. They wanted their facts. Or if not facts then something that approximated them.
“Have a thought, Agent Nichols.”
The man lifted an eyebrow.
Miguel continued, “You’ll need my statement, but I’ll come into your office tonight.”
“Fine. But why?”
A nod toward the press. “They’ll be wondering what I’m doing here, how I’m connected. You act like there’s nothing I can tell you and walk away. I’ll get back to work—I’m just the gardener who happened to be here, taking care of the grounds.”
“Smart. Good plan.” The agent did as he suggested.
Miguel walked to his truck, collected what he needed. A few reporters asked a question or two but he simply frowned and said with a thick accent, “Nobody tell me nothing.”
He returned to the yard.
Yes, it was true that this was a good cover to keep him out of the story.
But just as important, vines threatened to strangle the camellias, and the beds of gypsophila, delphiniums, and buddleia had clearly not been treated with lime in forever.
Those were both sins, and Miguel Torres would make certain they were remedied as soon as possible.
*
The next day, having tidied up the grounds on Paxton Street and finished “prettifying” the beds at Mr. Whittaker’s, Miguel was once again eating lunch on the Esplanade—this time a meat loaf sandwich on rye, one of his signature loaves.
His name had successfully been kept out of the press, though of course he had shared with his parents and sister the entire story.
“Dios mío,” his mother had gasped. “What a risk you took!”
He assured her that he’d been under the careful eye of the police and FBI, and the Patriot cell was more foolish and less dangerous than the cartels.
“Ah, well, I suppose. But you won’t do it again?”
“The odds of my stumbling across a second band of terrorists are pretty small.”
Not sharing that Special Agent Nichols had wondered if he might be open to more work, the consensus at the task force being that gardening was not a bad cover story for a confidential informant. Miguel was keeping the option on the table.
He promised he would be out to visit out West soon, and they disconnected.
Now, sipping his hot chocolate, Miguel Torres thought: of course he risked his life. He had to.
He would have helped the authorities bring them down, no matter what their plan. But he had a personal stake in Katherine’s operation: the target that the cell had selected was none other than the Statue of Liberty, despised because she was a gift from a foreign country to America.
When he’d come to this country, he had not gotten his first sight of her from a ship, as had so many immigrants before him, but from the sky, as his airliner settled toward Newark airport on final approach from Mexico City.
It had been at that moment that he’d fallen in love with her and with everything she meant. She was why he often ate lunch here, why he occasionally strolled along these walkways even after a grueling day of work … simply so he could glance across the huge expanse of the Harbor for a glimpse of the majestic sculpture, which was, and would always be, the most important lady in his life.
*Don Bruns, writer and editor, has a wonderful concept in creating anthologies. He picks a popular music album and invites authors to write a short story based on one of its songs. Last year the album was Thriller, by Michael Jackson.
Interestingly, when he invited me to contribute, I knew exactly what I wanted to write—a story based on the song “The Lady in My Life.”
Can I say any more about it?
Alas, no. Because, as is typical of my short stories (this one is my 101st), it contains a big twist at the end.
This is what I feel short fiction should deliver. My novels are about complex characters confronting increasing levels of conflict, in an emotional roller coaster, with some (I hope) fascinating information about topics that vary from book to book (mini reactors in Hunting Time, data mining in The Broken Window, the power grid in The Burning Wire). Yes, they have surprise endings—a necessity in any work of fiction—but those are simply a part of the entire emotional experience of the novel.
A short story, on the other hand, exists for one reason only.
A breathtaking shock.
They’re like an illusionist’s tricks. Setup, shocking reveal, and the thought: How the hell did the author do that?
Not character studies, no important messages.
Just an unexpected blow to the gut.
Anyway, that’s what I strive for.
Read “The Lady In My Life” … and let me know if I hit the mark!