Markov hoped to God the car hadn’t been towed.
“Okay, Gregor will help you down. You drive away from here with your comrade. Don’t try to make it to hospital. Go north.” Markov tried to think of a neighborhood where a carjacking might be possible. “Try to make it into the twenties. Off the highway. There’s a project over there. The story is, you and Igor got hijacked at a stoplight. They pulled you out of car and beat you. Igor fought back. They shot him and ran. Blacks. You can’t identify anyone. You call nine-one-one. Wait for ambulance. That’s it. You don’t remember anything else.”
Markov turned to the man who had been shot. There was no point in telling him the story.
Markov turned back to Gregor. “Can you carry Igor down to the car?”
“Yeah.”
“Wrap a towel around him, so you don’t leave blood everywhere. Then bring it back up. We’ll leave everything for Alan to clean up.”
Crane turned to yell at Markov, “For chrissake Leonard, get this fucking tape off me.”
Markov turned to him and suddenly something snapped. He moved quickly to Crane, picked up the thirty-two-ounce hammer, and began smashing it into Crane’s precious cherrywood dining table.
He hit the table over and over and over, banging divots and dents into it, all the time yelling, “Shut up, shut up, fucking shut up.”
Crane kept his head down, trying to cover his face with his right hand so he wouldn’t get hit by flying chips of wood. He couldn’t look. He had his left hand in a tight fist, steeling himself, hoping the hammer didn’t land on him.
Finally, Markov’s rage ended. He dropped the hammer on the destroyed wood and muttered a final curse.
He turned away to watch Gregor lift Igor to his feet. He then moved to the third man, who put his good arm around Gregor’s shoulder. Stepanovich was strong enough to get them both as far as the elevator door, but Markov saw they might never make it to the car. He would have to go down with them and bring the car to their side of the street.
He shouted for them to wait as he made his way toward the elevator. There was an astounding amount of blood where the fight had taken place. Puddled on the floor, splattered on furniture. Counter stools had been turned over. Books had been knocked off shelves. Chunks of Crane’s carefully plastered walls were gouged out from bullet holes.
What the hell had just happened, Markov wondered.
*
The elevator stopped on the ground floor. Beck dug in his coat pocket and found a knit watch cap. He wedged it into the bottom of the elevator door to prevent it from closing, so it couldn’t return to Crane’s apartment.
He limped out onto Hubert Street, blood squishing in his left shoe. He checked his leg. The pants were torn, exposing a ragged knife wound oozing blood. He tried to calculate how much attention he would attract trying to get the Mercury out of the garage versus the mess he would make in a taxi.
He decided to get the Mercury. Blood all over a cab would attract too much attention.
He walked as quickly as the pain would allow him to the parking garage on Greenwich. Just before he entered, he plastered the loose flap of black denim against the wet knife wound, hoping the cloth would stick. The blood didn’t show much on his dark jeans. Maybe the garage attendant wouldn’t notice. Unfortunately, Beck saw he was making bloody left footprints on the garage’s concrete floor.
He reached the attendant’s booth and slipped his ticket under the Lucite barrier. A tired-looking, small Hispanic man time-stamped Beck’s ticket, took his money, then came out and hustled off to get Beck’s car, too busy to even glance at Beck.
As he waited, Beck called Manny.
“It’s me. Your cousin still there?”
“She’s just leaving.”
“Don’t let her go. Tell her she has to stay.”
Manny knew by Beck’s tone not to ask any questions.
“Okay.”
“I’ll be there soon.”
Beck hung up. The blows from the steel baton were beginning to hurt now that the adrenaline had burned off. Beck tried to remember where else he had been hit. His right wrist, below the back of his hand. Elbow. Knee. Nothing felt broken, but it was going to be hell getting out of bed for the next week or so.
The Mercury came.
He tipped the garage attendant, who hustled back to his booth.
Beck slid into the driver’s seat, furious at how much he had misjudged the situation. Milstein had double-crossed him. And he never envisioned the arms dealer stepping in so quickly with fighters of that caliber. But was he protecting Milstein? No, more likely all he cared about was his money. It looked as if he was about to begin torturing Crane when Beck walked in.
Beck took a quick look at himself in the rearview mirror. There was a red welt forming on his jaw just under his left ear. His hair was disheveled. He was flushed and sweating. But there was no blood or noticeable bruises on his face that would attract undue attention.
He took a deep breath. Ran a hand through his hair. Told himself to take it easy. Use the ride back to calm down, plan what to do. As he drove the Mercury out of the garage and took the right turn that would take him past Alan Crane’s block, he thought to himself, man, the next time you get surprised like that … you’re dead.
19
By the time Beck had reached the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel exit onto Hamilton Avenue, he had called everybody he needed to come to the Red Hook headquarters.
By the time he pulled up in front of the bar, he still hadn’t figured out exactly what to say to Olivia.
He double-parked the Mercury next to Ciro Baldassare’s Cadillac Escalade.
He limped into the bar. Only Demarco was downstairs, leaning against the back bar, in his usual spot.
Beck tossed the car keys to Demarco and said, “Put it in the garage, will you D? Sorry, but there’s some blood on the front seat and the floor mat. I don’t think there’s any on the carpet.”
Demarco’s eyes widened. He came out from behind the bar, heading for the front door, checking Beck for obvious wounds as he passed him.