Silent Night (Sam Archer 4) (9 page)

This bomb was different from the one left in
Central Park
. It had no disruptor or disturbance reactor.

And it also contained much more of the virus in the vial rigged up to the detonator.

The device he’d given to the drug dealer was just a tester. He’d had a small sample of the virus extracted from one of the main vials and transferred into a pressurised cylinder. He’d made a small bomb, something he could do in his sleep. He wasn’t the most intelligent guy out there, but certain things he knew how to do just fine. But he’d needed to see the virus at work, to ensure everything he’d heard wasn’t just bullshit. He knew from a job he’d held briefly in
Central Park
last year that the groundsman in the Meadow area, Luis Cesar, emptied the trash like clockwork between 9:45 and 10:10 every weeknight.

He’d been watching the Meadow from an upper floor corridor of a hotel on West 67
th
at 10pm last night. He’d seen Cantrell deliver the box earlier. He hadn’t opened it, which Hurley had assured Bleeker he wouldn’t, and it meant Bleeker wouldn’t be on any security cameras mounted inside the Park. Through binoculars, he’d seen the groundsman approach, spot and open the box. He’d watched in fascination at the devastating effects of the virus as it killed the man, blood spraying from his mouth as he fell back and died out there on the snow. It wasn’t a hoax and it hadn’t been exaggerated.

This poisonous yellow shit was the real deal.

He looked down at the bomb in front of him. At the top of the box was a long vial. Inside the glass cylinder was a portion of noxious-looking yellow liquid. Below it was a digital timer, pre-set at
15:00
in lime-green numbers on a black display.

Fifteen minutes would suffice. It would give him enough time to get out of Midtown and be on his way back to
Queens
by the time it detonated, was sucked into the air ducts and killed everyone in the building.

Reaching forward, his finger rested on a small button on the side of the timer.

He coughed as he pressed it, covering the beep.

The countdown started silently.

14:59.

14:58.

14:57.

Reaching beside him, Bleeker lifted the panel and put it back in place, then quickly replaced the screws. When he'd finished, he slid the other shoebox into the plastic bag and rose. He grabbed the shirt on the hangar and pulled open the door, walking out of the stall.

Outside, Bleeker moved down the aisle to where the changing rooms met the main shopping floor. A female employee was standing behind a counter, a half-filled rail of clothing behind her.

She gave him a courteous smile which he didn’t return.

‘Any luck?’ she asked.

‘Not today,’ he said, passing over the shirt.

She took the garment from him, turning to place it on the rail behind her. Bleeker didn’t hesitate. He moved back out into the store and walked rapidly towards the escalator across the level.

He stepped onto the metal stairwell headed to the ground floor and within a few moments he disappeared out of sight.

At the Counter Terrorist Bureau, Shepherd was leaning on the table beside Rach, watching her work. She was logging into the NYPD’s advanced security camera network. They were connected on speakerphone to Marquez and Jorgensen, who were still in their Ford Explorer in
Harlem
with the arrested street dealer, Rashad Cantrell.

Rach typed in her password and a grid of security cameras came up on the screen. Each one was from a different vantage point in the city and all were moving in real time.

‘Right. We’re in,’ Rach said. ‘Where did he meet the man, Lisa? And what time?’

‘You heard the lady,’
Marquez said, talking to Cantrell. There was a quiet murmur. Then Marquez came back. ‘
Corner of 72
nd
and Broadway. Around 9:30 last night.’

‘Which side?’

Pause.

‘
South-east.’

Rach nodded, and her fingers went to work.

One of the newest improvements in the NYPD’s fight against crime was to have high-tech security cameras placed all over the city. It was now impossible to walk around the
Lower Manhattan
area without your movements being recorded and documented by CCTV. The software was some of the most advanced available and one of its key functions was clothing recognition. It allowed effortless tailing of a suspect. If you wanted to follow someone, all you had to do was freeze a frame and draw a box over a piece of clothing that the suspect was wearing. With one command, the computer would scan through its recent footage and pull up any other recording of the article of clothing in seconds. Worlds away from the old school methods, it saved hundreds of man hours trawling through grainy CCTV recordings and meant the cops could track a suspect’s movements with relative ease, either in the present or in this case, the past.

Rach found the relevant camera, and the shot came up on the screen.

It was a vantage point from a post, probably three quarters up a street-light,
72
nd
/Broadway
in white letters on the upper right of the screen.

It was a current feed, showing crowds of people and vehicles moving across the intersection, the usual daytime hustle and bustle. Rach scrolled back to last night, everything moving in reverse at hyper speed, the day turning into night. Although the screen was now darker, the plethora of street lights and festive lighting meant the whole area was clearly illuminated.

‘Check the time,’ Shepherd said, pointing at the bottom right corner.

Rach looked down and saw it showed
20:54:02.

She pushed a key and the clock started whirring forward, past
21:00:00
.

Everything in the shot moved in a blur, cars stopping at lights then moving off at high speed, people scurrying in and out of shot.

Rach paused at
21:29:32
, then hit
Play
.

‘Right. Here we go,’ Shepherd said.

They watched in silence.

The intersection was dark but still busy. There was a constant stream of people and cars, but nowhere near the same quantity as during the day. People were wrapped up against the cold, but there was no sign of anyone wearing a red coat.

‘Any luck?’

‘Hang on, Marquez,’ Shepherd said.

They waited.

Then Cantrell appeared.

He walked into the shot from up the street, his hands stuffed deep in his pockets, his collar pulled up and a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. Taking his right hand out of his pocket, he took a final drag then dropped the cig to the sidewalk, crushing it with the toe of his shoe. He was facing south-east, towards the camera, his face lit up by a streetlight. Shepherd had the man’s file open on the desk. He glanced at the mug-shot, then at the slender man on the screen.

‘It’s him,’ he said, loud enough so Marquez and Jorgensen could hear. ‘Cantrell just entered the shot. So far, so good.’

Then the man in the red lumberjack-style jacket arrived.

He had his back to the camera and was carrying a box under his arm. He joined Cantrell on the corner. They didn’t shake hands.

Nothing happened for a few moments as the two men seemed to talk, their heads moving slightly as they spoke.

Then the man passed over an envelope which Cantrell quickly tucked into the inside breast pocket of his jacket.

He took the box and immediately walked off, headed east, out of the shot and towards
Central Park
.

‘Cantrell wasn’t wearing gloves,’ Rach said. ‘That’s when his prints got on the box.’

‘He’s telling the truth,’ Shepherd told Marquez. ‘The trade happened like he said.’

‘Can we ID the guy in the jacket?’

‘He has his back to the camera,’ Rach said. ‘Hang on.’

They watched the shot. Now Cantrell was gone, the man in the jacket raised his gloved hand, hailing a taxi. He climbed inside and shut the door, but his hat was obstructing the view of his face. The car sped off, out of frame, and just as soon as they’d arrived, the two men were gone.

‘Shit,’ Rach said.

‘What about other cameras?’

‘That’s the only one at the intersection,’ Rach said. ‘‘I’ll run clothing recognition.’

As she worked, Shepherd’s cell phone started ringing. He pulled it and looked down at the display. It was Archer. As he pushed the
Answer
button, he tapped the computer screen with his other hand.

‘We need to find out where he went.’

‘I can do better than that, sir,’ Rach said. ‘If he’s still in the city, I’ll find out where he is right now.’

As Shepherd turned, taking the call, Rach ran the tape back then froze the frame of the man talking with Cantrell. He had his back turned but the fabric and pattern of his coat was lit up perfectly by the street lamp.

She drew a box around the image, then tapped a few keys and hit
Enter.

Bleeker had ditched the jacket in a trash can less than a minute earlier. Wearing a zip-up dark hoodie and jeans, a Yankees cap over his head, he was just about as anonymous and now cold as a man could be in
New York City
. He’d left Macy’s through the south entrance and was standing on the sidewalk on West 34
th
between 7
th
and Broadway, the building directly behind him. The temptation to stay and watch the effect of his work in the store was almost overwhelming, but he knew he needed to get the hell out of here. The winds were blowing strong today. No use watching the bomb go off if he got infected with the virus as well.

Particularly after seeing what it could do.

As Christmas shoppers and tourists moved past him either side, he shot his cuff and checked his watch.

He had thirteen minutes.

He stepped to the kerb, raised his hand and a passing taxi slowed to a stop. The driver lowered his window as Bleeker stepped forward.

‘Where to?’

‘
Queens
,’ Bleeker said, entering the cab and slamming the door shut. ‘Earn your tip.’

‘TB, sir,’ Archer said to Shepherd on his cell, standing in the lobby of the building. ‘That’s what she told us. Apparently her father was trying to create some kind of revolutionary cure for lung cancer but it went badly wrong.’

‘
Tuberculosis?’

‘Yes.’

‘But that’s curable, right?’

‘Not this type. It’s been grown with a virus.’

‘
Did she explain?
’

‘Yeah. I just about kept up. Radiation in the virus knocked out some elements that made the TB medicinally safe. Basically if you breathe in this shit you cough so hard you rupture the blood vessels in your lungs. You spew out pieces of lung, break your own back from the spasms and drown in your blood within thirty seconds of inhalation.’

‘Jesus Christ. How on earth did this stuff get out of the lab?’

‘She doesn’t know. But when she and her father arrived at the lab this morning, five of the six samples of the virus were gone. Then they got a phone call from us.’

‘So that’s why he stepped off the roof. He knew.’

‘And that’s what killed the groundsman in the Park last night.’

‘Who else works at the lab?’

‘Only five people apparently. Peter Flood, his daughter, and three other doctors.’

‘Names?’

‘Kruger, Glover and Tibbs.’

‘I’ll tell Marquez and Jorgensen. We’ll locate and bring them in. In the-’

He suddenly paused, mid-sentence.

‘Hang on.’

Pause.

‘
Wait a minute, Arch. Stay on the line. Rach just got something.’

Pause. Archer looked back at Josh, who was still with Maddy Flood, comforting her.

Shepherd came back.
‘Listen. Rach found the man who arranged for the package to be left in the Park last night on surveillance. She’s located him again this morning via his clothing.’

‘Where?’

‘He was in the subway station at
34
th
Street
about twenty minutes ago. He got off a Downtown-bound R train. She’s speeding up the tape. Wait.’

Pause.

In the meantime, Archer caught Josh’s attention.

He beckoned his partner to come over quickly.

‘We’ve got him on the street, walking through
Herald Square
. He’s carrying a white plastic bag with something inside. It looks rectangular.’

‘
Like a shoebox,’ Archer said. Then realisation dawned.
‘Oh shit.’