Hardbingers

9

After twenty minutes of nothing but thinking about his impending trip to the Balkans he decided the time had come to give the door a try.

He signaled Zeklos to draw his weapon and crouch to one side of the door. Glock ready, Jack crouched opposite him and knocked.

No response.

He knocked again. Harder.

Nothing.

One more time: "Hello? Falafel-gram!"

Had to be empty. Who could resist that?

He pulled on a pair of thin leather gloves. Time for the autopick.

The two Yales yielded quickly. Now what?

Zeklos raised his eyebrows. "Booby trap?"

Jack shrugged. Made sense: Blow up their explosives if the wrong person found them. But would the door be boobied, or just the explosives inside?

Jack thought back to the bearded guy as he'd come through the door. He hadn't been particularly careful as he'd shut it. He'd even jiggled the knob after keying the locks. A good sign, but it didn't mean a whole helluva lot.

Had to risk it. The stakes were too high.

He waved Zeklos away. "Get back by the stairs. I'm going to peek inside."

Zeklos shook his head. "No. You get by stairs. You are Heir."

No time to argue about it. Jack turned the knob and eased the door in a fraction of an inch, then another, and another…

Finally it opened enough to allow a sliver-view of a ratty couch. A little further and he saw the whole couch, then the window. He stepped to the side and gave the door a gentle push. It swung in on creaky hinges, revealing an empty front room.

Jack signaled to Zeklos and they both went in low, pistols before them. Two bedrooms to the left—empty.

Except for pizza boxes, burger wrappers, and scattered papers, the damn apartment was empty. No sign of explosives, no primers or timers. Nada.

Jack prayed they were in the wrong place.

He positioned himself before the window and looked out. He saw the north edge of the Verrazano to the left, the drape cornice of the brick building across the street, just as the Oculus had described. But no plastique-stuffed vests.

Zeklos pointed to the side wall. "Look at this."

The scrawl had registered with Jack as he'd entered but he'd had other things on his mind. He checked it out now.

Giant-size Arabic script had been scribbled with a black Sharpie. It meant nothing to Jack.

"You read that gibberish?"

Zeklos shook his head. "I have enough trouble with English."

Jack pawed through the debris looking for diagrams, photos, timetables, a list of names, a computer, anything that would provide a hint of whatever they'd planned. But these weren't amateurs. They knew better. Keep it in your head.

But Jack kept rummaging. Wouldn't feel right if he blew off any possibility.

He came across a pair of calendars—last year's and this. He flipped through the first and found occasional time numerals combined with Arabic scrawl. Probably meeting times. No help there. In the later one the January page had a few notations in the first two weeks, then a blacked-out box.

The fourteenth.

And no notations after that.

Jesus!

"Tomorrow's the day! Got to be. They're out there with their vests and their car bombs right now."

Made sense. Monday morning rush hours were the worst of the week. If you wanted to wreak maximum panic and damage, that was the time to do it.

Shit.

Jack thumbed the recall button on his phone. Davis answered.

"That guy who left here," Jack said. "Tell me you're still on him!"

"Better than that. We've got him—as in Miller's standing here with his foot on his neck."

"He wearing a vest?"

"No. What's the problem?"

"The apartment's empty."

"That's okay. He led us to the stash. You wouldn't believe what they've got here."

He gave Jack an address on Richmond Terrace in Staten Island.