Prologue

THE FIRST CALL CAME IN AT 6:08 AM.

“Send an ambulance to Central Park West and 75th,” a male caller said in an eerily measured voice, as if arranging a ride to the airport. “Someone just got hit by a car. There’s a body in the middle of the street. I can see it from my window.”

“OK, sir,” the 911 dispatcher responded. “Let me make sure I heard you correctly. You said someone was hit by a car?”

“Yes.”

“How long ago did this happen?”

“Like fifteen seconds ago.”

“Did you see it happen?”

“No, I heard it. Get some paramedics here quick.”

The line went silent.

“An ambulance and the police are on the way,” the dispatcher said after a moment. “Can you tell me what you heard, sir?”

“I heard a screech of tires and a kind of thud. Now this woman is standing outside her car screaming. It’s a BMW 3-series.”

“You hear screaming now?”

“The woman who hit the person is screaming. I can see the whole thing. I’m on the third floor. Hold on, I’m going to take some pictures.”

Another short silence.

“Sir, are you still there?”

“Yeah. She’s totally freaking out. You’ve gotta have more calls coming in.”

They did. Another dispatcher was speaking to a woman who lived on the eighth floor of the same apartment building. And a third caller, who identified himself as a doorman, sounded distressed.

“It looks bad, man,” he said. “Tell them to hurry.”

The first calls came mostly from the north tower of the fabled San Remo, a hulking twin-steepled architectural gem that dominated the western skyline over Central Park. The San Remo was one among many grand pre-war co-ops along Central Park West, the West Side’s so-called “gold coast.” But it was also grander than most. It even had its own Wikipedia page that included a list of celebrities—past and present—that owned apartments there.

The only eyewitness to the accident, a runner on her way into the park, reached a 911 operator a full five minutes after the first caller.

A little breathlessly she explained that she’d just seen a woman get pushed in front of a car.

“I’m sorry I didn’t call sooner but I didn’t have my phone with me. I had to borrow someone’s.”

“That’s OK,” the dispatcher said. “Have you spoken to any police officers yet?”

“No, they’re trying to keep everyone away from her. The ambulance just got here. The paramedics are working on her. There’s a lot of blood. My God, I hope she isn’t dead.”

“OK, I need you to stay there and give a statement to a police officer. They need to know what you saw. But I also want you to tell me what you saw and I’ll make sure they get it.”

The NYPD had a smattering of high-resolution cameras in and around Central Park, but none near the intersections of 74th or 75th and Central Park West; the closest was a block south at 73rd. The San Remo, however, had its own security cameras and one of them did record the accident. The grainy video would support what the jogger told the dispatcher:

“This guy, he looked like a homeless guy, came up to her while she was in the crosswalk,” she said. “She was walking her dog. He was slightly behind her to her right. She looked over at him. I don’t know if she said anything or not. But suddenly he lunged forward and pushed her into the street just as a car was coming.”

The vehicle’s front bumper struck the woman just below the knees, taking her legs out from under her. She rolled up onto the hood, ricocheted off the edge of the windshield and corkscrewed gymnastically in the air. Her right hand hit the pavement, followed by her hip and torso, and then her head, face-first. One of her shoes came off and her cell phone skittered across the street, all the way to the other side, where it was found resting next to the back tire of a parked car, the screen cracked but otherwise operational.

“I went over to help,” the jogger said, her voice wavering. “I didn’t know what to do. I’d never seen anything like that. There was so much blood. It was coming out of her ears.”

PART 1

Chapter 1 | Readers Love Ballsy Women

“MY PROTAGONIST IS THE PROBLEM,” THE PROSPECT SAID.

“The rest is good.”

The rest wasn’t good, Fremmer thought. But at least it was bad in a good way. A campy way.

“She use the U word?” he asked the prospect.

“The U word?”

“Unsympathetic.”

The prospect’s eyes flashed a glint of pain. His name was Brian.

Brian Tynan. Compliance officer by day, aspiring novelist by commute, he’d written a zombie techno thriller while riding on Metro North. Croton Falls to Grand Central and back. The first draft took a year. The rewrites another eight months, maybe longer.

“I made the changes she suggested,” Brian said, referring to his agent.

“I made him more sympathetic. But she won’t send it out anymore.

Look, the guy, the protagonist, is a tech entrepreneur. He’s a little bit of a douchebag. They all are. It’s part of their DNA.”

Fremmer nodded. They were seated near the front window of the Starbucks on Columbus Avenue and 81st Street. Fremmer had scootered there fifteen minutes earlier from his apartment a few blocks away. Brian was already at a table, waiting for him, not exactly what Fremmer expected. When a guy tells you he’s a compliance officer for a bank, you think little bald guy with spectacles. But Brian was tall. Maybe six-three, a little overweight, big head and features and wavy salt and pepper hair parted neatly to the left. In his late forties, he was wearing a standard-issue gray suit and blue striped tie. Physically, he was imposing. But as soon as he started talking he shrunk. Not timid exactly. Just unsure of himself, not comfortable in his skin. He had a tic, too. The right eye, it fluttered now and then.

“I’m more partial to penis,” Fremmer said. “Or prick. Douchebag is overused at this point. So much so that you sound like a douchebag for using it.”

“Oh, sorry,” Brian said.

“Don’t be sorry. The point is he’s not douchey enough.”

“Not enough?”

“Not even close.”

“But how would that make him more sympathetic?”

“It wouldn’t. But it would make him more likeable. You’re looking for likeable, Brian, not sympathetic.”

“Aren’t they the same—or at least similar?”

“You said your wife left you for your contractor.”

“He wasn’t my contractor. He was just a contractor. He has a masonry business. What’s that got to do with anything?”

Fremmer leaned forward, lowered his voice. “It’s a crappy situation. Wife leaves you. Custody battle. Now you get your kids every other weekend. Bummer. I feel bad for you. But then I hear you’ve got a little bit of a temper. You lose it from time to time. Go off. Some might call it an abusive streak.”

“I told you she only said that because she was trying to get full custody. Believe me, she was far more abusive than I ever was. She called me names. Demeaning names.”

“You’re the victim, Brian. I get that. But see how easily I’ve made you unlikeable. Just from the guilty look in your eyes right now I can totally understand why your wife left you for your contractor.”

“He wasn’t my contractor.”

“I know. The point is your agent who’s not really your agent because she only took you on because your older, more successful brother asked her to, isn’t going to give it to you straight because she doesn’t want to harsh on someone who’s in such a fragile state of mind.”

“Younger brother,” Brian said. “He’s my younger brother.”

“Whatever. Just understand that I don’t have a problem telling it like it is. I’m not going to toss off some dismissive comment about your protagonist not being sympathetic enough. He’s actually pathetic, if you want to know the truth. He’s completely overshadowed by the villain, the Evil Steve Jobs character.”

The antagonist had a real name, but skimming the book while sitting on the toilet that morning, Fremmer noticed a line about how the bad guy—the diabolical venture capitalist using the protagonist’s social-media start-up to turn everyone into zombies—reminded people of “an evil Steve Jobs.” The description stuck.

The prospect slumped in his chair. He was crestfallen. Mission accomplished. Teardown complete.

“So you don’t think I should publish it?” he asked.

“No, by all you means you should publish it.”

A woman at a nearby table glanced up from her laptop. Fremmer often raised his voice when uttering the “p” word in Starbucks. He likened it to a duck call—but for writers. These places were teeming with potential clients.

“I should?”

“Absolutely,” Fremmer said. “But not for the bullshit reason you gave me. Sure, in your present financial condition, it’d be nice to make some extra money. But we know the real dream is to show your ex-wife that you aren’t the putz she thinks you are. That instead of forever talking about writing that novel, you went ahead and did it.”

“So you think it’s publishable?”

“Anything’s publishable, Brian.”

“What I mean is, you think there’s enough here…you think it’s good?”

“With a little work, I can make people think it’s good. And I can also make you feel like you accomplished something.”

“How much will that cost? To do that?”

“About nine grand,” Fremmer replied without hesitation. “And that’s only if we do the e-book.”

Brian blanched. “That seems a little steep.”

“Very. So here’s what I’m going to do. Normally you’d have to pay a professional editor at least $3,000 to go through your book and give you a detailed critique. And that doesn’t include line editing or copyediting.”

“I thought that’s what you did. You’re a book doctor.”

“No, that’s just my Google title. For SEO. Think of me more as a book expediter, a shepherd if you will. I’ve spent years vetting the right cover designers, formatters, copy editors, and the people you’re going to pay to review your book, etcetera, etcetera.”

Brian laughed, but he clearly didn’t find the remark funny. In fact, he was offended. “So you have people create fake reviews for my book? That’s what I’m hiring you to do?”

“First of all, I don’t work for you, you work for me. You’re hiring me to work for me. Secondly, they’re not fake reviews. They’re real reviews written by fake people. That’s different from fake reviews written by real people. Those are the ones you get from friends and relatives. You’ll need some of those, too.”

Another laugh, this one more incredulous than the last. “You’re a piece of work, Fremmer. The scooter, the T-shirt, all part of the act, right?”

“Max,” Fremmer said, not taking offense. “Call me Max.”

Fremmer leaned down to fish out a small pad of paper from a backpack sitting on the floor next to a folded-up Xootr kick scooter. Judging from his attire, that scooter could easily have been mistaken for a fashion accessory—or, as Brian had put it, “part of the act”—for Fremmer looked like an over-the-hill skateboarder or former Internet executive who’d gotten his big exit and decided to check out of the rat race for a while. He was wearing jeans, vintage Fred Perry tennis shoes, and a white long-sleeve shirt layered under a green Mohegan Sun casino resort T-shirt that he’d picked up at a thrift shop. It had the words “Double Down” written on the front in cartoonish letters. A sporadic shaver since college, Fremmer’s face showed five or six days of stubble speckled with gray. His short hair was stylishly unkempt. His nose, prominent but straight, was juxtaposed against a set of bright blue eyes. The eyes won. They stood out.

He wrote some numbers on the pad along with their corresponding services. Then he turned the pad around and slid it across the small table toward Brian.

“I’ve read your manuscript, and except for the protagonist problem, it’s pretty polished,” he said. “So here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to tell you how to fix that problem so we can knock out that editor’s fee.” He then did just that, drew a line through the first number, $3,000. “And to be clear, what I’m about to tell you is worth far more than three grand. It will completely transform your book.”

Brian crossed his arms and smiled.

“Wait, don’t tell me, the catch is I’ve got to pay for all the other stuff to get this incredibly valuable piece of advice.”

“Nope. This is a freebie, my gift to you for schlepping up to the Upper West Side and buying me my third chai latte of the day. Walk away with it. It’s yours to keep.”

“I’m listening,” Brian said.

“You turn him into a her. You make your protagonist a woman.”

Another laugh. However, this time he seemed genuinely amused—at least until he realized Fremmer wasn’t kidding.

“You’re serious?”

“Think about. It’s an easier fix than you think. And as soon as you do it, you’ll realize how much more sympathetic your character will become. The dynamics will totally change.”

“I thought you said I wanted him to be likeable.”

“They’re pretty much the same thing, Brian. You said so yourself.”

“But what about the guy’s wife?”

“Husband. She’s a man now. Same scenario only he’s now the not-by-choice stay-at-home-dad who’s developed the drinking problem and is banging the neighbor’s wife down the street. See how much better that plays?”

Brian looked away for a moment, trying to wrap his mind around the sex-change operation.

“I know it’s a lot to process right now,” Fremmer went on. “But take a few days to go through the manuscript. You’ll see what I mean.

Yeah, you’ll have to redo some descriptions, but most of the time you’ll just be looking at a pronoun change.”

Just then a buff-looking Asian guy wearing a Philadelphia Eagles jersey and gold chain around his neck looked at Fremmer. Fremmer had noticed him scanning the place for a spot to sit down. Or so Fremmer thought. Their eyes locked, but instead of turning away, the guy kept staring.

“You know, you may be right,” Brian said. His thoughts churning, he failed to notice that the Eagles fan had approached their table and unfolded a sheet of paper, which he then held up for Fremmer to inspect.

Fremmer was looking at himself.

“This you?” asked his new friend, who upon closer inspection had a boyish face but strands of gray in his hair.

It was his Facebook profile picture, blown up to headshot size.

Fremmer noticed that he was wearing the same T-shirt in the picture that he was wearing now, which was sort of embarrassing.

“Yeah, what’s going on?” he asked.

The paper went away and was replaced by a gold-colored police shield. He introduced himself as Thomas Chu, a detective with the NYPD. “We’ve been looking for you,” he said. “There was an accident. I need you to come with me to the station house.”

Fremmer’s stomach dropped. His whole body tensed, bracing for the worst. Jamie, he thought.

“Who, my kid?”

“No, not your kid. A woman.”

The weight on his chest lifted, but only temporarily.

“What woman?”

“Candace Epstein. She was hit by a car this morning.”

Fremmer noticed that the detective observed him carefully, studying his reaction as he spoke. Fremmer couldn’t hold back the shock—and perhaps a little alarm—from showing in his eyes.

“Christ. How bad?”

The detective didn’t respond right away. So Fremmer asked again:

“How bad?”

“Bad. She isn’t expected to survive.”

Fremmer sat there, dumbfounded. Hit by a car? Not expected to survive? He had a vision of her hooked up to life support in the ICU, tubes jutting out of her, a heart-rate monitor beeping rhythmically.

With each imagined beep, he felt his own pulse speed up. He’d exchanged text messages with her only yesterday. In the last month, she’d made more than a few cryptic comments about a soured relationship that had turned threatening. He pressed her about it, but she would only say was that she knew something bad about someone. The kind of bad that lands you in prison for a long time.

He didn’t know what to believe. Part of him thought she was taking him for a ride to avoid paying him. He’d taken precautions to avoid being stiffed, but she was one of a few clients with whom he shared royalties instead of accepting a larger, upfront payment.

Now he was terrified he’d completely misread her. He’d been dismissive of her fears—and it was all going to come out that he was a callous son-of-bitch who just wanted to get paid. Or worse. Maybe they thought he had something to do with it.

“Where did it happen?” he asked.

The detective nodded to his left, in the direction of the park. West.

“On CPW.”

“Did someone run a light or something?”

“I can’t discuss that. We have an active investigation. Which is why we need you to come in. We need you to provide us with some background info.”

Yeah, right, Fremmer thought. Background info.

“Now?”

“Sounds good to me,” the detective said, flashing a charming smile. “You need a minute to conclude your business?”

Fremmer looked over at Brian, who seemed both stunned and perplexed. The poor guy had gone from despair to hope to what the fuck?

Fremmer leaned over and picked up his backpack and scooter, then stood up, one in each hand.

“I was serious about what I said, Brian,” he announced. “You’re a pair of tits and a vagina away from fulfilling your destiny. Readers love ballsy women. The detective here loves ballsy women.”

Fremmer glanced over at the detective, who, judging from the expression on his face, clearly didn’t love ballsy women—or more probably thought Fremmer was a lunatic.

“OK, maybe not,” Fremmer said. “But the readers do. And I do.

So make the change. And do it with conviction. Do whatever you do with conviction. Always.”

Excerpt from Lucidity by David Carnoy. Copyright © 2017 by David Carnoy. On sale from The Overlook Press February 7, 2017. Reproduced with permission from The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc. www.overlookpress.com. All rights reserved.

For every light there is shadow. For every sound, silence. From the moment he got the call Detective Kevin Francis Byrne had a premonition this night would forever change his life, that he was headed to a place marked by a profound evil, leaving only darkness in its wake.

“You ready?”

Byrne glanced at Jimmy. Detective Jimmy Purify sat in the passenger seat of the bashed and battered department- issue Ford. He was just a few years older than Byrne, but something in the man’s eyes held deep wisdom, a hard- won experience that transcended time spent on the job and spoke instead of time earned. They’d known each other a long time, but this was their first full tour as partners.

“I’m ready,” Byrne said.

He wasn’t.

They got out of the car and walked to the front entrance of the sprawling, well- tended Chestnut Hill mansion. Here, in this exclusive section of the northwest part of the city, there was history at every turn, a neighborhood designed at a time when Philadelphia was second only to London as the largest English- speaking city in the world. The first officer on the scene, a rookie named Timothy Meehan, stood inside the foyer, cloistered by coats and hats and scarves perfumed with age, just beyond the reach of the cold autumn wind cutting across the grounds.

Byrne had been in Officer Meehan’s shoes a handful of years earlier and remembered well how he’d felt when detectives arrived, the tangle of envy and relief and admiration. Chances were slight that Meehan would one day do the job Byrne was about to do. It took a certain breed to stay in the trenches, especially in a city like Philly, and most uniformed cops, at least the smart ones, moved on.

Byrne signed the crime- scene log and stepped into the warmth of the atrium, taking in the sights, the sounds, the smells. He would never again enter this scene for the first time, never again breathe an air so red with violence. Looking into the kitchen, he saw a blood splattered killing room, scarlet murals on pebbled white tile, the torn flesh of the victim jigsawed on the floor.

While Jimmy called for the medical examiner and crime- scene unit, Byrne walked to the end of the entrance hall. The officer standing there was a veteran patrolman, a man of fifty, a man content to live without ambition. At that moment Byrne envied him. The cop nodded toward the room on the other side of the corridor.

And that was when Kevin Byrne heard the music.

She sat in a chair on the opposite side of the room. The walls were covered with a forest- green silk; the floor with an exquisite burgundy Persian. The furniture was sturdy, in the Queen Anne style. The air smelled of jasmine and leather.

Byrne knew the room had been cleared, but he scanned every inch of it anyway. In one corner stood an antique curio case with beveled glass doors, its shelves arrayed with small porcelain figurines. In another corner leaned a beautiful cello. Candlelight shimmered on its golden surface.

The woman was slender and elegant, in her late twenties. She had burnished russet hair down to her shoulders, eyes the color of soft copper. She wore a long black gown, sling- back heels, pearls. Her makeup was a bit garish— theatrical, some might say— but it flattered her delicate features, her lucent skin.

When Byrne stepped fully into the room the woman looked his way, as if she had been expecting him, as if he might be a guest for Thanksgiving dinner, some discomfited cousin just in from Allentown or Ashtabula. But he was neither. He was there to arrest her.

“Can you hear it?” the woman asked. Her voice was almost adolescent in its pitch and resonance.

Byrne glanced at the crystal CD case resting on a small wooden easel atop the expensive stereo component. Chopin: Nocturne in G Major. Then he looked more closely at the cello. There was fresh blood on the strings and fingerboard, as well as on the bow lying on the floor. Afterward, she had played.

The woman closed her eyes. “Listen,” she said. “The blue notes.”

Byrne listened. He has never forgotten the melody, the way it both lifted and shattered his heart.

Moments later the music stopped. Byrne waited for the last note to feather into silence. “I’m going to need you to stand up now, ma’am,” he said.

When the woman opened her eyes Byrne felt something flicker in his chest. In his time on the streets of Philadelphia he had met all types of people, from soulless drug dealers, to oily con men, to smash-and-grab artists, to hopped-up joyriding kids. But never before had he encountered anyone so detached from the crime they had just committed. In her light- brown eyes Byrne saw demons caper from shadow to shadow.

The woman rose, turned to the side, put her hands behind her back. Byrne took out his handcuffs, slipped them over her slender white wrists, and clicked them shut.

She turned to face him. They stood in silence now, just a few inches apart, strangers not only to each other, but to this grim pageant and all that was to come.

“I’m scared,” she said.

Byrne wanted to tell her that he understood. He wanted to say that we all have moments of rage, moments when the walls of sanity tremble and crack. He wanted to tell her that she would pay for her crime, probably for the rest of her life— perhaps even with her life— but that while she was in his care she would be treated with dignity and respect.

He did not say these things. “My name is Detective Kevin Byrne,” he said. “It’s going to be all right.” It was November 1, 1990. Nothing has been right since.

Excerpt from The Echo Man by Richard Montanari. Copyright © 2017 by Richard Montanari. Reproduced with permission from Witness Impulse. All rights reserved.

CHAPTER ONE

BUSINESS HOURS

Lost somewhere in Newport City’s densely crowded, late-night skyline, six bulky bodies packed into some unimportant restaurant’s musty storeroom.

Bulging with prison muscles and bulletproof vests, their dark skin branded with black tattoos broadcasting their gang affiliation, the men were silent. They crowded around a single rickety card table, the room’s only furniture, and toiled under the dim glow of a single yellow bulb dangling from the ceiling. A masonry bucket full of glittering brass ammunition sat centered between them. None spoke. The rhythmic clicking of guns and bullets was the only soundtrack accompanying the tension.

Aside from their silence and the grim, practiced precision with which they pressed the unstamped cartridges into their magazines, they each had one other detail in common: Each man, whether dangling from a pocket, knotted around a wrist, or cinched across his brow, displayed a deep crimson bandana. That bandana, the gang flag of The Reds or Red Nation – the umbrella under which all the African-American gangs in Newport City fell – was the most crucial accessory.

Durel Rivers, better known as Bones, set aside his last loaded magazine and grabbed his weapon. Exceedingly illegal, the fully automatic Tec-9 machine pistol, with its taped grip and folding stock, actually had a Federal law banning it by name. A loud slap cut the stifling air as he locked a magazine into the receiver and jacked the first round into the chamber.

Bones covered his body armor with a baggy sweatshirt, loose enough to conceal the illicit firearm beneath it, its papoose pocket stuffed with the ready reloads he’d prepared. Behind him, the rest of his crew wrapped up their own loading tasks, donned jackets and hoodies of their own and then followed him out of the storeroom.

The creaky storeroom door swung open into the deep gloom of a deserted kitchen. The restaurant’s legitimate business hours long over, the white-coated cooks and staffers long gone, Bones and his crew had special access. He led them past the stainless steel appliances and shelves to and then through the back door.

Windows down, keys in the ignitions, a pair of black SUVs waited in the greasy shadows of the narrow alley behind the restaurant. Bones climbed into the shotgun seat of the leading truck while the rest of the crew split up between them, wordlessly sliding into their plush leather seats.
Bones gave a simple and wordless nod to the man who took the driver’s seat beside him. Engines came to life with deep rumbles but the music that came on in the cabins was low. They were on a mission and there would be no distractions.

As one, the pair of SUVs rolled out of the alley and onto the darkened Newport City streets. While the bustling city of nearly five million had plenty of nightlife, Bones’ crew stuck to the quiet streets of closed businesses, darkened storefronts, and slumbering apartment dwellers. It was late, or more precisely, early in the morning, and only the creatures of the night were out haunting the streets. Moving patiently, always five miles per hour over the speed limit – no more, no less – they rolled to their first stop at the fringe of a housing project complex, a U-shaped cluster of old tenement towers.

Silent and pensive, Bones scanned every inch of the block around them, scrutinizing each of the people who made up the sparse nighttime populace. A pair of teenagers with Reds’ flags
on display occupied one corner while a homeless man wandered the block further down.

No police, no “jackers,” Bones was as certain as he could be of that. He twisted in his seat and said it all to the gangster in the back with another wordless nod.

The back door popped, as did that of the trailing SUV, two men emerging into the street and crossing, their hands beneath their shirts and gripping the handles of their guns. As they disappeared into one of the building lobbies, Bones let his attention slip for just a moment. He plucked a cigarette from his pack, set it between his lips, bringing it to life with the click of his lighter, and blew the fumes from his nose.

He had only taken two deep drags when the gangbangers emerged. The one from the trailing truck led the way, alert and ready. The man behind had a small gym bag slung over his shoulder. Bones turned to look as the man climbed back aboard the SUV.

“All there,” he said simply, ripping open the zipper to give Bones a look inside at the bricklike bundles of cash.

Bones straightened in his seat, his cigarette hand pushing out through the open window and waving the trailing SUV forward. Together, they pulled away from the curb and rolled off into the city.
It was after three when they finally pulled away from their last pickup in East Charity, a sleepy neighborhood on the southeastern side of the City’s eastern borough. Bones lit up a third cigarette and then threw a glance into the backseat. Aside from the burly gangster riding with them, more of those bulging bags of cash now packed the seat to shoulder height. Over the last hour and change, they had stopped everywhere from drug dens to basement casinos, collecting the week’s deposits.

With the trucks laden with money, the first half of the job, in some ways the easy half, was done.

Alert, mind focused, Bones allowed himself to relax just a little, let the flood of nicotine calm his blood slightly. From here on, it was a straight drive to their final destination where they would turn over the money to be cleaned. No more stops, no more tense minutes of waiting on the street like sitting ducks. That said, he also knew that the best time to hit the convoy would be
now, when it was flush and the crew had backed off the razor’s edge of their nerves.

The bold glow of their headlights swung down a street heavy with shadows, most of the streetlights out except for some pale yellow ones at the far end. Bones’ hackles came up and he was just about to order them off the street when shrieking tires sang their discordant chorus into the night as something flashed out of the driveway ahead. No headlights had offered any warning.

“Shit!” Bones’ driver seethed as he stood on the brakes, grinding them to a hard halt.

In the glare of their SUV’s headlights, Bones now made out the form of the battered minivan that had darted across their path and stopped. He was already pulling his Tec-9 from beneath his shirt when the van’s sliding door scraped aside with a raspy grind of worn metal.

Crouched tightly in the back of the van, shoulder-to-shoulder, a pair of masked men took aim and opened up torrents of fully automatic gunfire.

The driver beside Bones jerked and flopped violently, his body riddled with relentless fire. Bones himself managed to duck down below the dash, behind the protection of the engine block, the only part of a normal car that would actually stop a bullet. Jagged pebbles of shattered glass rained down on the back of his neck.

Behind Bones, the back door kicked open and the armed gangster ducked out as he sprayed the van with his own vicious rake of fire.

Without rising from behind the dash, Bones reached out, shoving open the driver’s door and rolling the bloody, shredded corpse of the driver into the street. He was halfway over the center console when he saw his doom.

From behind the row of parallel-parked cars lining the far side of the street, cloaked in the heavy shadows, more gunmen popped up, bracing and steadying their rifles on the hoods, trunks or roofs of the parked cars. Bones threw his machine pistol into line but it was too late.

The last thing Bones ever saw was the hellish strobes of the muzzle flashes popping in the darkness as they poured another withering hailstorm of copper-jacketed death into the street.

***

Don’t shit where you eat. Words to live by in Kevin Wyatt’s book. So, even at three in the morning, making the drive across the Admiralty Bridge into the peninsular eastern borough was just smart business. Polished black paint gleaming, throaty engine growling melodically, Kevin’s ’67 Mustang fastback made short work of the trip, weaving only occasionally around slower moving traffic.

An oasis in the night of closed businesses on an otherwise nondescript street in East Charity, a brightly lit parking lot snipped off the corner of the block. It wrapped around two sides of a large diner that, despite its size and popularity with the late-night crowd that knew of its existence, still looked like a greasy hole in the wall.

Kevin had grown fond of the place, though. Referring to it as his office, he conducted those meetings there that required a certain degree of public exposure mixed with only a modicum of privacy. He’d chosen the spot for the food initially and had quickly adopted it as a regular haunt. Despite this, no one greeted him by name as he entered and left the biting air of the early November chill in the parking lot.

The diner was warm inside, full of the aroma of food frying in grease. At least a half-dozen parties of three or four twentysomethings in nightclub attire were scattered among the booths and tables. His regular booth, the one at the far back corner, just on the fringe of the last overhead bulb’s halo of light, was unclaimed, he noted with a smile.

Kevin took another moment to scan the diner’s patrons and confirm that his clients hadn’t arrived yet. He pivoted and swung down the row of booths running along the diner’s storefront of greasy picture windows. As he went, he sloughed his black leather jacket, a dark T-shirt with a stylish designer logo beneath.

Though he could have melded into one of the packs of club goers in the diner with his age and good looks, he wasn’t here to socialize. He had a narrow face of mildly chiseled features decorated with a light dusting of freckles that went appropriately with the rusty copper color of his short hair. He was above average height at just under six feet, but his fit and trim frame was not particularly remarkable.

A waitress, mopping the countertop with a rag, glanced up as he passed her. She made contact with his bright hazel gaze and a faint smile of passing recognition turned up the corners of her mouth. “The usual?” she asked, getting a nod and a smile in reply.

Kevin dropped into his booth’s far side, his back to the wall, his face to the door, and slid into the corner. It was a good spot, behind the wall and out of the frame of the big window while still giving him an excellent line of sight into the parking lot and the establishment.

Kevin scanned with intent while taking care to seem oblivious, just another late night customer out for a midnight snack. A nondescript sedan, gray, neither old nor new enough to be noteworthy, coasted to a halt outside. Three young men, cautious and patiently panning their gazes over every angle of surrounding night, sat in the car for a few long moments before dismounting and approaching the diner door.

The waitress returned and slid Kevin’s order in front of him just as the trio filed through the front door. She turned and left the table while he raised an arm, brushed with a sleeve of freckles, and waved them over.

In a moment’s pause of prudent appraisal, they sized Kevin up from the door before sliding down the row. They were dressed to slip under notice, plain jeans and plainer hooded sweatshirts, but that didn’t fool Kevin for a second.

“You the guy?” the first, a deeply tanned Hispanic in his late twenties, asked with no discernable accent.

“I am,” Kevin confirmed with a nod. “Have a seat.”

“How’d you know it was us?” asked the second, a black man of the same age as the first, as the whole trio – rounded out with a smaller and younger Asian man for diversity – took the opposite side of the booth.

“Lucky guess,” Kevin replied plainly. He lifted his steaming cup of black coffee and nursed a sip, careful to keep his eyes above the rim to watch the three of them. “You have something for me?” He set the cup beside the plate holding his so far untouched “Heartstopper” sandwich.

The trio exchanged glances before the leader threw one back over his shoulder at the rest of the diner. Kevin didn’t have to look so obviously to know no one was paying them any mind. Satisfied, the leader nodded at the Asian at the end of the booth. He slipped an envelope from the papoose pocket of his sweatshirt, laid it on the table and slid it across.

Kevin took the envelope and peeled it open in his lap, leafing through its stack of crisp twenty-dollar bills. He kept his poker face firmly in place as he did, lifting his head to nod to his clients in approval. He reached across the booth, stuffing the envelope into the inner pocket of his jacket and slipping out a coin-sized SD card. He slid it across the table the same way he’d received his payment.

The Asian man took it, plugging it into a small tablet and scanning through it.

“As promised,” Kevin said, his focus on the leader. “Truck routes, communications protocols and duty rosters for Allied Armored Couriers. Good until the end of the month.”

The leader looked from Kevin as he finished, to the Asian, who had completed his scan and nodded. Kevin scooped up his mug and took another sip of his coffee, watching as the leader turned back to him.

“How’d you get this?”

Kevin smiled a thin smile that didn’t reach his eyes as he lowered the mug. He offered his hand across the table for a shake. “A pleasure doing business with you.”

The leader’s eyes narrowed, but he clasped Kevin’s hand in a brief squeeze before he and his crew exited the booth. He watched them leave, as did the waitress, who glanced over at him and met his eyes. This time, his smile was a little warmer as he offered her a shrug and dropped his attention to his plate.

***

The Heartstopper was an egg sandwich, in simplest terms. To be more exact, however, it was a heaping serving of scrambled whole eggs capped with a slice of full-fat American cheese and enclosed in two slices of grilled and buttery bread. It was decadently delicious and so worth the bloated feeling in Kevin’s gut as he left his booth, leaving cash, including a generous tip, on the table top and exited the diner.

He mounted up the Mustang, kicking it to grumbling life, and swung out of the parking lot, aiming for home. Business for the night finished, it was late and, crucially, he had a very early and very important errand awaiting him in the morning.

Blue and red strobes blazed through the Mustang’s rear windshield as the howl of a siren drowned out even the healthy rumble of his powerful engine. Kevin’s heart nearly stopped as his eyes flicked to the rearview mirror framing the police sedan rushing up on his bumper.

“Fuck me,” he breathed, hands tightening around the wheel. For half a second, he considered running. Lean fingers coiled around the shifter, his dress boots settled over the pedals, and Kevin sketched out a plan for his flight for freedom. It started with a downshift and a ferocious bellow of acceleration but he had no idea where it went from there. Instead, he reminded himself he wasn’t carrying anything illegal, nor did he have any warrants out for him. At least, as far as he knew. Easing toward the first gap in the row of cars lining the curb, Kevin blinked as the patrol car blew past him.

Before he had a chance to relax, crack a smile of relief, three more cops in roaring sedans, their emergency lights screaming their urgency, sirens wailing, blasted down the road. They were moving fast, fast enough that their passing rocked Kevin’s heavy car as they went.

Kevin stared after them as they faded into the distance before whipping around the corner at the end of the next block. His hands squeezed the wheel tightly and his mind reached, pondering the possibilities. Slowly, his thin lips spread in a smile.

Something big had happened. He had a pleasant influx of new business to look forward to.

From CONCRETE SMILE, A novel, By BERNARD MAESTAS © BERNARD MAESTAS

CHAPTER 1

“Katrina, I need help.”

Katerina stumbled out of bed, her cell phone slipping from her hand.

“Damn it,” she muttered. Fumbling for the lamp, she snapped it on, blinking several times against the harsh light. She heard the low tone of the man’s voice, now coming from under the bed. Even from a distance he sounded frightened and hysterical.

“Katrina? Katrina?”

Bending over the side of the bed, her long chestnut hair cascading onto the floor, she groped for her phone. She grabbed it, bringing it to her ear.

“This is Katerina. Who is this?”

“Katr—, it’s Joe Lessing. I’m a friend of Phil’s. You remember me, right?”

Kat worked to match the voice to a face. After a moment, the film of sleep dropped away. Medium height. Built like a boxer. Strong jaw. Black hair with a widow’s peak.

“Yes, Mr. Lessing. How can I help you?”

She listened to Joe Lessing’s labored breathing at the other end of the phone; he sounded like he had just come in from a brisk jog. The clock radio read twelve-thirty. It was a little late for a run around the reservoir.

“I can’t find Phil. Do you know where he is?”

“No, I’m sorry, I don’t.”

“He’s not answering his cell phone.”

“Mr. Lessing, I don’t work for Mr. Castle anymore. Maybe his current assistant can help you—”

“Shit! Shit!” Lessing’s voice rose. “SHIT!”

“Mr. Lessing—”

“Listen, Katri—Katerina—I need some help. Be a good girl and come over here and I’ll make it worth your while. Okay?”

Katerina answered with silence. She had met Joe Lessing maybe three times when she worked for Philip. He never struck her as a crazed, rapist murderer…until now. Not a good idea, she thought. Whatever this is, I don’t need it.

“Look, this is on the level. I’m in some shit here and I need a little help. It’s worth a thousand dollars.”

That I do need. Desperately. “Okay…twenty minutes.”

“Make it ten. It’s a matter of life or death.”

“Which is it?”

“I’m not sure.” He gave his address and hung up.

Kat considered his comment and then threw on a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt, and laced into a pair of ankle boots. She twisted her mass of hair into a sloppy braid. Stuffing some cash, ID, cellphone, and her trusty pepper spray in her pockets, she rushed out into the brisk New York City night. Against her better judgment, she took the subway. But, if there should be a police investigation, a cabbie, overeager to cooperate, would be a liability. In one of his many moments of ego and hubris, Philip had bragged about his golden rule of “fixing” people’s problems: get in, get out, get gone. Don’t linger. See everything but never be seen.

Keeping alert for drunkards, creepers, and other assorted predators lying in wait, she kept one hand in her pocket, her finger on the button of the palm-sized can of pepper spray.

She found Lessing’s building. She glanced up, the bite of the chilly October night air making her give a quick, involuntary shiver. She pushed the call box button.

“Who is it?” Lessing sounded apprehensive.

Who do you think it is? “Katerina.”

The buzzer rang. Kat slipped inside.

She found the apartment door ajar. She inched inside. A colorful Persian rug covered most of the foyer. Examining the bright pattern of red, blue, and black and finding no sign of blood, she relaxed. She took tentative steps inside, scanning the living room. Everything was neat and in order.

“Mr. Lessing?” she said.

“In here,” he called from the end of the hallway.

Kat hesitated. Move ahead or turn back? She crept down the narrow space lined with modern art consisting of colorful paint splatters. The door was open.

Kat peered inside and saw Joe Lessing, a man in his forties, his overdeveloped muscular build now turning fleshy and soft. He was naked, pacing, and breathing hard. His flaccid penis, dangling like an oversized rotini, bobbed and swayed with every step.

Katerina froze. Oh shit.

He turned to look at Kat; she saw the panic in his dark eyes.

“Thank God you’re here,” he said, turning to the bed. It was a massive four poster with a distressed wooden chest squatting at its foot. A Queen Anne style night stand on each side held a Tiffany lamp. But it was the unconscious, naked blonde woman lying on top of the rumpled covers that grabbed Kat’s attention.

“I called someone. She said she would try to get here but I can’t wait anymore.” He pointed at the bed. “Can you help me, please.”

Kat didn’t know what to say to him. When he had come to Philip’s office he was always calm and relaxed… and fully dressed. He liked perching on the edge of her desk and talking about his motorcycle, his house in the Hamptons, and his wife.

His wife.

“What happened?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he said in a shaky voice. “I don’t know but I have to do something. We have to do something.”

He returned to mindless pacing and the penis began dancing again. Kat moved to the bed. The woman had bottle blond hair, a too perfect nose, but her breasts were real, her waist a size zero. Kat leaned over and touched her cheek. Warm.

“I’m fucked, aren’t I?” he asked, wiping sweat off his brow. “Am I fucked?”

“She has a pulse,” Kat said.

“Thank Christ,” Lessing said.

“Have you tried waking her?”

“Of course I did! Nothing works!”

“What happened?”

Joe scratched his head like he was trying to work out a difficult math problem. “We were going at it and it was good—shit, it was great—and then she collapsed. Look, we have to get her the hell out of here.”

“When is your wife due, Mr. Lessing?”

Joe gave a short, guilty laugh. “She’s taking a night flight from LAX. She’ll be here soon.”

“What’s soon?”

Lessing’s eyes met hers. “Less than two hours.”

Shit.

“Your —friend needs medical care.”

“I can’t take her to the hospital. No one can know about this. Her husband would be very upset.”

And your wife. “I understand.”

“Please, you work for Phil—or you worked for him—whatever. You know people. You can work this out for me, right? You have to make this—” he said, pointing in the general direction of the bed, “go away.”

Kat mentally tried to construct what Philip, the attorney who considered his oath a suggestion rather than a requirement, would do.

“Just a minute,” she said, and pulled out her cell phone. She listened to the ringing on the other end of the line. Finally, there was a click.

“Yeah,” the voice said. A chorus of coughing and gurgling noises followed.

Kat waited for him to finish. “Doc, it’s Kat,” she said when it was quiet. “I need a favor.”

“I don’t get out of bed for less than a thousand,” the raspy voice said, followed by a deep drawing sound for air.

She held the phone away from her ear. “It’s going to cost a thousand.”

“For both of you?”

“No.”

“Will he take Travelers Checques?”

“No.”

“Will you take Travelers Checques?”

“No.”

“They’re American Express,” Lessing said.

“I don’t care.”

Lessing resumed shuffling. Kat averted her eyes so that the penis was dancing in her peripheral vision. A miniature Slinky. She was tired of looking at it.

“Mr. Lessing?”

“Yeah?”

“Put your pants on…please.”

He looked down at himself and then swiped his pants up off the floor.

Kat got back on the phone. “You need to get out of bed.”

“If this needs a cleaner, it’s your problem.”

Kat glanced over at the unconscious woman. “I don’t think so.” She recited the address and hung up. Good God, I hope not.