Jaywalking pedestrians darted across the choked roads, dodging the honking Yellow Cabs, themselves ritually jerking from lane to lane.
The same chaotic picture screened all the way up past Central Park, and all the way back down Broadway to Wall Street where elevators worked overtime as neck-straining office buildings spewed out their human guts into the streets, into teeming rivers of floating workers bobbing home, thirsting for a cool can and a warm TV for tonight’s big game.
THE train slithered in from Connecticut, against the tide of suburbanites on their rush-hour flow out of Manhattan. With busted airconditioning, thank you for nothing, Metro-North. Despite the outside temperature, it sweltered inside the railcar like a foil-wrapped string of frankfurts left out in the sun, with passengers’ eyes drooping from the fixed windows as they wished the journey was over.
33
DESPITE THE BADGERING from the dwindling line of couriers, Dwayne and Gary completed their task on time, as Isis expected. In their circle, Dwayne’s planning was revered, as was Gary’s dogged execution. Usually. The episode with Jax Mason in London had been a rare exception.
With no more messengers or boxes, they ripped down the SatTV sign they’d hung outside the warehouse. After rolling it up and shoving it into Gary’s backpack, they walked briskly into the loading bay, fired up the truck they’d stolen earlier that day and hammered it the six miles to LaGuardia airport’s freight terminal, where twenty or so cargo planes were lined up. To anyone not blinded by the pink-washed glints of sunset, the odd-looking pair scurrying between the planes was like a silhouette of the nursery-rhyme dish running away with the spoon.
The pilot whose plane they were pacing toward was pumping his money into the vending machine in the waiting bay, a solemn pre-flight ritual that involved concentration and dexterity but, with years of practice, even this reformed drunk could manage it.
Three dollars for a cup of tepid coffee was a bit rich, he bellyached. Yet one more setback. He’d become a shit magnet he decided and, no longer caring, he dressed the part. His standard issue navy, tan and gold uniform was designed so even the most shapeless individual could impress; on most, it evoked the image of neat hospital corners, but on him it was an oversized blanket tossed over a sagging torn mattress. Self-esteem was not his strong suit. He hadn’t seen a razor for at least three days yet no one would dream of complimenting him as fashionably unshaven.
He was in luck for a change. The click signalled the coffee was about to drizzle out. Gut-warming sludge it might be, but he loved the burnt aroma.
One of the planes taxiing off the apron shot a glint of the low sun into his bloodshot eyes and, as they swung over to check his own plane he puzzled, squinting at the two shapes he thought he saw clambering into his cockpit. “Hey,” he yelled, abandoning his coffee. It was a reckless move. And they say that coffee kills.
He puffed and wheezed up to his Cessna just as its engines fired. Even if Gary and Dwayne hadn’t been wearing headphones, the roar of the motors would have blocked out his screams. His fists slammed against the cabin door. Dwayne, focused on take-off, sneered at him and signalled to Gary to deal with the inconvenience. Smiling, Gary unlatched the door so it smacked the pilot in the head and yanked the dazed man up into the small two-seater cockpit.
Gary’s serrated grin stayed fixed. With crazed eyes, Gary poked his scraggy nose into the man’s terrified face and, without warning, roughly shoved the hysterical fumbler into the narrow space behind the seats that he and Dwayne had commandeered. “Shut the fuck up!” shouted Gary as his hand closed round the pilot’s throat. Dwayne neither heard nor felt the pilot slump. He looked at his watch and remarked, “On time.”
THE sweat dripped down the parcel courier’s pink hair and trickled under her collar. The appointed 5:25 PM had passed and not even a hint of the expected TV crew had materialised. Maxine’s eyes scoured the subway platform again. “Damn it,” she blasted, out loud, but no amount of cursing would alter fate… that in three minutes’ time nothing would matter to Maxine Powers.
When Maxine involuntarily stamped her foot in frustration, the already nervous young mother close by edged back and nuzzled even deeper into her baby’s neck, as if their private bond would block out this crazy woman.
“Excuse me,” Maxine persisted, shoving a crumpled dispatch voucher forward.
The mother flinched, keeping her eyes down.