There. An open doorway with a red plaque saying something about AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY—ALARM WILL SOUND. No, it won't. It needed electricity for that. And besides, the door was already open.
Joe played his beam along the concrete steps within. They ran one way: up. To the roof. The scratching sound was louder here. Definitely coming from the top of the empty stairwell. Someone was scratching on the other side of the roof door.
"Lacey?" he called as he took the steps two at a time. "Lacey, is that you?"
He hesitated at the door, hand on the knob, afraid to turn it, afraid to see what was on the other side, afraid it might be Lacey, horribly injured. And afraid it might not be Lacey. Might be one of them, lying in wait for a victim.
He'd hung his big silver cross around his neck before leaving tonight. He unslung it and held it ready, to wield as either club or firebrand. But still he hesitated. This was foolish. He should call for the others, go out there as a group.
He turned and was about to call them when he heard the voice, a faint, agonized rasp.
"Help me . . . please. . . help''
"Lacey!"
Joe shoved the door open and stepped up onto the moonlit roof. Something heavy struck him at the base of his neck, sending shockwaves of pain down his arms and driving him to his knees. He lost his grip on the cross. Then a thick quilted blanket was thrown over him. Before he could react he was knocked flat, rolled, and trussed up like an Oriental rug. Panicked, he kicked and twisted, but he was helpless. He shouted for the others but knew his cries were too muffled by the fabric to be heard.
Joe felt himself lifted by his feet, dragged along the roof, and then he was falling. They'd thrown him off the roof!
No. The cold, steely grip never released his ankles. And now he was rising instead of falling, being carried through the air.
But to where?
- PART TWO -
TWILIGHT MAN
- 6 -
JOE . . .
Joe had lost all track of time during the seemingly endless flight. But he knew when it ended: the cold fingers released their grip on his ankles and he fell. Before he could cry out his terror, he hit hard, head first. Only the multi-layered padding of his blanket cocoon kept him from cracking his skull.
"This is the priest," said a harsh voice. "Search him and take him upstairs. Franco is waiting for him."
Joe was then rolled over—kicked over was more like it. As he felt the ropes binding him loosen, he tightened his fists and prepared to fight. But when the blanket was pulled away from his face he found himself blinded by light.
Fluorescent light. Somebody had electricity.
As he blinked in the brightness he was kicked again, in the ribs this time. He struggled to a sitting position and felt something cold and hard as steel slam against the side of his head.
"Easy, god-boy," said a new voice to his left, and someone on his right brayed a harsh laugh.
Joe groaned with the pain and clutched his stinging scalp. He blinked again, and finally he could see.
He sat on a sidewalk in a pool of light outside the brass and glass revolving doors of a massive granite building. The rest of the world around him lay dark and quiet. A red canopy blocked out much of his view above. He did notice the number 350 above the revolving doors. Surrounding him were half a dozen men wearing earrings he knew too well. The nearest held a huge revolver; most likely its long barrel was what had slammed against his head.
Vichy.
The one next to the gun-toter was playing with a knife with a nasty reverse-curve blade, twirling it on a fingertip as he said, "This supposed to be one of them vigilantes from down the shore, huh? The guy that killed Gregor?" He kicked Joe's thigh. "Don't look so tough. Hey, Barrett. What say we soften him up before passin him on to Franco?"
Vigilante? Joe thought. Zev had mentioned something about a group that was killing off the local Vichy. Was that why he'd been brought here— wherever it was?
"Not on my watch," said the one with the gun. Barrett. The same voice that had called him god-boy. He was dressed in a tan silk Armani suit with a white shirt open at the collar. It looked tailor-made for him. "He won't want damaged goods. When the damage gets done, Franco will want to do it."
Joe looked around. "Where am I?"
"In big trouble," said Barrett.
The one with the knife, bearded and denimed, brayed again. "Yeah. Big trouble! Wouldn't wanna be you no-how."
"Drag him up to the office," said Barrett. "We'll search him there."
A pair of the Vichy grabbed him under the arms and roughly hauled him through a glass door set beside the revolving door. They entered a vaulted lobby of polished gray-beige marble. At the opposite end, floor to ceiling in chrome and marble, was a bas relief image of a building known the world over.
The Empire State Building. I'm in New York.
They'd kidnapped him and flown him to Manhattan. For what purpose?
And then he remembered . . . Franco is waiting. . .
The old Saturday Night Live running gag about General Franco still being alive flashed through his brain, then fled in terror.
When the damage gets done, Franco will want to do it. . .
A two-way radio squawked. Joe saw Barrett unclip it from his belt. He turned away and spoke into it. Joe looked around for an escape route, but even if he could break away from the pair who held him, the lobby area was acrawl with Vichy.
After Barrett finished his call, they led him past the remnants of metal detectors that had been kicked down and smashed, past a newsstand with outdated papers and magazines, a ruined souvenir shop, a deserted Au Bon Pain, then to a bank of elevators with black and chrome doors. Only two cars seemed to be working. The others stood open, dark, and empty. After a short ride with the suit, the beard, and two others to the third floor, Joe was propelled down a hallway to a large, desk-filled room lined with computers and monitors. A few scurvy Vichy lounged around, but three other men, older, more conventionally dressed, worked the equipment. They appeared to be under guard.
"Search him," Barrett said. "And I don't mean just pat him down. Search him. Confiscate any contraband here and dispose of it."
He was hiding nothing, of course. He'd been armed with his silver cross back in Lakewood but that had been stripped from him and left behind.
Barrett's words filtered through to his muddled brain. Confiscate? Contraband? Barrett didn't fit the typical Vichy mold. He dressed like a Wall Street broker and spoke like an educated man. What was he doing here?
BARRETT . . .
James Barrett watched Neal search the priest, making sure he didn't miss anything. Neal was not the brightest bulb in the box.
But he did a good job this time, turning all the priest's pockets inside out, removing his socks and shoes.
"He's clean," Neal said.
"You'd better be sure."
"I'm sure."
They hustled him back down to the first floor for a swift, ear-popping ride toward the top of the building. The red numbers on the readout counted the passing floors by leaps of ten. Barrett had always liked that. It was the way he'd planned his career at Bear Stearns to go: to the top by leaps and bounds. But being a hotshot investment banker these days was like being a poster boy for obsolescence.
He heard Neal chuckle. He was grinning through his beard at the priest and shaking his head. "I'm glad I ain't you. Holy shit, am I glad I ain't you. I don't know what Franco's got planned but it ain't gonna be pretty, I can tell you that."