Jeff Abbott - The Last Minute

I pulled my phone from my pocket, placed it before my eyes, the modern electronic blinder. My thumbs scrabbled on the touchscreen like I was writing the most urgent message in the history of humanity. I kept my gaze down, hung back from the car, trying to move fast enough and also not veer out of the driver’s blind spot. I risked a glance. A taxi barreled toward me, but I still had room. He was clearly expecting me to jog, pick up the pace. New York cabbies are reincarnated kamikaze pilots and they subscribe to the inarguable theory that it’s best that you get out of their way. It’s the food chain at work.

The limo yanked out from the curb, and I stepped right in its way. The right front fender clipped my leg, a nice hard tap that would register not only in my pain centers but inside the limo itself. I yelped and fell, sprawling back into the street, diving like a soccer player hoping for a red card against the opposition, and the cab stopped about a foot from my head; I could see the reflection of my face, carnival-house bent, in the gleam of its newly washed fender.

The driver and the cabbie both burst from their cars, the limo driver saying nothing, which made him very unusual. You might expect protestations of innocence, or of concern. The limo driver just looked at me with eyes carved from the same indifferent chrome as the cabbie’s fender. The cabbie practically brayed at me in English, accented with a sharp Hebrew.

The doorman, though, he was golden. He bolted forward, knelt by me. ‘Sir? You okay?’

‘Ohhhh,’ I moaned. ‘My leg.’

‘You stepped out in front of me,’ the limo driver said. ‘It’s your fault. Watch where you’re walking.’ He spoke with a mild eastern European accent.

Sandra Ming, I saw, remained in the limo.

‘You’re right,’ I said. Shakily, the doorman helped me to my feet. ‘I… I think I’m okay.’

The limo driver, the doorman, they exchanged a glance. Pure unease. The doorman’s said I don’t think this is the kind of guy who’s gonna sue if we help him. The driver’s said I don’t care. He looked like he’d just as soon run over me as he would a speed bump.

The cabbie hovered, uncertain. ‘Good you were paying attention,’ I said to the cabbie. ‘Unlike some others.’

There: I threw down the gauntlet. The limo driver slid his steely stare back onto me as the doorman forced me toward the curb. Traffic began to back up behind the cabbie, horns jeering in the infinitely patient way of New Yorkers. The cabbie saw I was now the doorman’s problem. He started to slide back into his taxi.

And, four cars behind him, I could see Leonie, in a silver Prius. She wore an expression on her face that mixed nervousness with the determination only a parent can have.

I staggered to the curb, waving off help. ‘I’m all right,’ I said. Normally a person might ask the driver for his license, or his phone number, in case there was a further injury. And I thought about it, but I weighed that it might send his suspicions soaring. I didn’t like the vibe from him at all; he was watching me in the way that the interviewers did years ago when I applied at Special Projects. Measuring me, solely as an enemy. I didn’t know who he was and I decided it was best to play nice now that Leonie was in position. I raised a hand. ‘It was my fault, you’re right, I wasn’t watching what I was doing. Sorry.’ I put my phone down at my side and powered it off.

The driver inspected me with a studied glance.

‘What? What the hell now?’ I said, earning an Oscar nomination for my role as Irritated New Yorker.

The limo driver got back into the car without another word and he inched away from the curb. Other cars caught in the jam had filtered past him, but, when he merged into the stop and start traffic, Leonie in the rented Prius was two cars behind him. She looked like she intended to cement herself to his bumper. I noticed she’d put on large, heavy sunglasses big and dark enough that she could have done welding wearing them, and her lush auburn hair was pulled back and covered with a Mets baseball cap. Something about her look was vaguely familiar.

I was nervous for her. She wasn’t trained to shadow someone, she’d been up most of the night and was running on excitement and fear. The driver looked like a tough customer. She was clearly smart, book-smart, and if she was used to dealing with criminals she must have developed her own toughness. She had to follow him.

‘You sure you’re all right?’ the doorman said.

‘My leg’s hurting and I think my phone’s broken. I just need to sit down for a minute.’ I was careful not to ask him to let me inside the building. Let it be his idea.

‘Sir, come here, why don’t you sit inside for a minute. Or at least wash the grit off your hands. Is there someone I can call for you?’

The air inside felt nice after the humid squeeze of the afternoon. The doorman pointed to a bathroom where I could rinse my bloodied knuckles and I thanked him.

‘I’m sure I’m okay, I don’t want to be any trouble. I’ll just wash up and let myself back out.’ I limped extra hard as I walked to the men’s room. Another resident, a heavy-set man pushing an older woman in a wheelchair, exited the elevator and the doorman moved to open the door for them. The heavy man was busy convincing the wheelchair lady that going for an outing, even with the chance of rain, was a good idea, his words running over the protestations of the woman like water gushing in a stream.

I washed my hands, quickly. Then I glanced out the bathroom door. The doorman was busy hailing the pair a cab. I had gotten very few lucky breaks since my pregnant wife vanished but this was one of them. I ducked into the elevator.

Sandra Ming was on the fourth floor.

The doorman would likely look for me, or he might assume I slipped out when he was hailing cabs or providing directions to confused tourists. So I didn’t have much time.

No answer to the knock at the Mings’ door. I dropped to my knees and brought out the lock picks. Thirty seconds later the door was open.

I shut it behind me and listened to the hush. No one was here. I didn’t have a gun with me and I moved through the rooms. Den, decorated with objet d’art from China, from Africa, from South America. A Mayan mask frowned at me from the wall. A kitchen. The coffee maker was on, the scent of dark French roast a caress in the air. A length of hallway, and a master bedroom. Immaculate. A woman’s room – it held a woman’s scent, a subtle mix of irises and Dior perfume. My wife had worn the same scent and for a moment grief overwhelmed my caution. Nothing like a memory of your wife’s skin to bring down the avalanche. I pushed it away.

Back down the hallway. Past a study, where I glanced into the doorway. A large desk, one with a masculine weight that didn’t quite match the feel of the rest of the apartment.

I stepped into a bedroom, frozen in post-collegiate amber. Jack Ming’s room. A framed diploma from NYU. A collection of books, but not textbooks: these were books he liked to read. A well-worn history of Hong Kong – had he been happy there? Biographies about computer pioneers like Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace and Steve Jobs. George R. R. Martin’s epic fantasies. A bound collection of graphic novels, of Iron Man, Spider-Man, the Avengers.

From the wall Jack Ming’s face looked out at me from a scattering of party pictures, the kind taken by a pro photographer at college events. His smile looked pained, as though the party wasn’t quite his deal. His hair was longer and his face was fuller. His friends often had buzzed smiles and protective arms around Jack’s slender shoulders. He had a shy but sincere grin.

He was just a kid, goddamn it, just a kid I was supposed to kill.