Carter glances at his watch. Two o’clock in the afternoon and plenty of work to be done. ‘Head for the Home Depot, the one in Flushing,’ he tells Angel. ‘I’m going in tonight.’
Carter lays out his equipment on the living room rug: the M89, a holstered 9mm Glock, a combat knife in its scabbard, a hooked pry bar, a two-pound hammer and a wood chisel, a ski mask, thirty feet of rope with a grappling hook attached to one end, a Grade II bulletproof vest, a small bolt cutter, a propane torch and a pair of two-way radios.
‘Do you know how to use these?’ Carter hands one of the radios to Angel.
‘They look like someone dragged them up from the Stone Age. You sure they’re not petrified?’
‘Walkie-talkies have been around for a long time, but they have certain virtues. First, they communicate directly with other radios. They don’t need the phone system or a satellite. Second, they’re set to a specific frequency that helps to maintain privacy. But we’re not going to use them to talk to each other. Press that button on the side, the large one.’
Angel complies, producing an audible click in the second radio. ‘That’s it?’
‘You’re going to drop me behind the warehouse at three o’clock in the morning, then find a parking space within sight of the front entrances. When I need you to pick me up, I’ll key the radio three times. If Bobby or any of his people show up before I come out, you do the same thing, one click for each person. If the cops show up, click four times fast. But don’t speak, Angel. Don’t give me away.’
Angel clicks the radio several times, then drops it beside her on the couch. ‘Something has to happen before you go, between us.’
‘Fine with me.’
‘I’m not talking about sex.’ Like Carter, Angel’s been guarding her privacy for a long time. She has acquaintances, but not friends, partners, but not lovers. Yet Carter’s somehow defeated her security system, as he intends to defeat Bobby Ditto’s.
‘What if I forget about the Caribbean?’ she asks. ‘What if I was willing to stay here?’
‘Are you asking me to go steady?’
Angel’s right foot lashes out, catching him midway between knee and ankle. ‘One day you’re going to have to come out of that closet. You can’t hide in there all your life.’
Carter rubs his shin. ‘Isn’t that your plan? To hide inside a rich man’s wealth for the rest of your life?’
‘Actually, I was counting on him dying young and me becoming a fabulously rich widow, after which I’d marry the man of my dreams. But my failings aren’t the point. I’m asking about you.’
‘Listen, Angel, what I do ... ? Let’s just say my occupation doesn’t lend itself to a long-term outlook. Or to intimate friendships. As for you tossing away your life’s ambition? If I was you, I’d think twice. Sooner or later, probably sooner, I’m going to be killed or caught. I know I’ve made these points before, but they haven’t changed.’ Carter’s smile is wicked. ‘Unless, of course, I settle down, become a member in good standing of the moral middle class. Maybe I could open a small business, stop working out, gain thirty pounds, learn to fall asleep on the couch after dinner.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘No risk, no gain.’
Angel grimaces. Not only has she failed to make her point, she’s not certain that she even knows what it is. Carter’s concentration is so intense, as he packs his gear, that she finds herself envious. He’s an athlete before a championship event, or maybe an addict contemplating his drug of choice, knowing that he’ll be stoned by morning. Stoned or dead.
Finally satisfied, Carter retreats to the dining room table where he lays out the items he purchased at Wal-Mart, the wooden matches, the sandpaper, the X-Acto knife, the glue and the ping-pong balls. Alongside, he places two shotgun shells, a sheet of newspaper and a pair of kitchen shears.
‘Let me show you a trick.’ Carter motions Angel to stand next to him. ‘I learned this in the military, part of my super-secret advanced training. But then I came home to find thirteen-year-old nerds posting how-to-make-a-flash-bomb videos online.’
Carter fits a blade into the X-Acto knife and cuts one of the ping-pong balls in half, leaving only a tiny strip to act as hinge. He bends the two halves back, creating a pair of small cups, like the halves of an eggshell lying on end. Into each cup, he glues strips of coarse sandpaper in the shape of a cross. The matches come next. Carter cuts off the heads, roughly divides them in two, then lays them on the sandpaper strips.
‘There are three men in the basement, untrained and undisciplined. I’d bet my life savings against a quarter that they have no concerted plan of action if the basement door is breached. How much experience and practice they have with handgun combat is also suspect. Remember, they’ve been in that basement for several days and nothing’s happened. Are they psychologically prepared for combat? I don’t think so, Angel. But I don’t mind giving myself another edge anyway.’
Carter breaks down the shotgun shells, extracts the gunpowder and wraps it loosely in newspaper. He lays the packet on top of the matches in one of the cups, then closes the ping-pong ball.
‘I want you to glue the edges together,’ he tells Angel. ‘Nice and even now. Let the glue drip slowly.’ Carter rolls the ball against the tip of the glue tube, describing a neat circle. He blows on the glue, a long slow breath, again turning the ball. Finally, while the glue is still tacky, he covers the seam with a strip of tape and lays what now looks like an ordinary ping-pong ball on the table.
‘If you throw this against a hard surface, the sandpaper will ignite the matches and the matches will ignite the gunpowder. There won’t be an explosion because the gunpowder isn’t packed down. What there will be is a flash of light intense enough to blind someone for about five seconds.’ Carter smiles, remembering Gentleman Jerry Miculek. Gentleman Jerry could take out an entire platoon in five seconds. ‘That should be enough time.’
TWENTY-SEVEN
Whereas before Angel felt both thrilled and frightened, now she’s just frightened. They’re in Red Hook, she and Carter, cruising past a long-abandoned factory, its peeling stucco façade reminding her of an elderly aunt whose incurable skin disease kept her indoors for the last several years of her life. Above the van, a bone-white moon edges from the shadow of a raggedy cloud to stare, accusingly, through the van’s windshield.
Carter’s behind her, in the rear of the van, strapping the Glock to his thigh, donning the vest, checking and rechecking his gear. His expression remains neutral, almost casual, throughout. Angel feels like she’s seeing him for the first time, what he is, what she can never be. She’s thinking this is a good lesson, though it’s a bit late in the game to be learning that you’re not cut out for robbery and murder. But, of course, Carter would never use the word murder to describe his plans for the gangsters in Bobby Ditto’s basement. No, he’d probably say something like ‘Combat related deaths, by definition, are not murders.’
‘You having buyer’s remorse, Angel?’ Carter’s tone reveals a hint of amusement that Angel instantly resents.
‘Is it that obvious?’
‘You do seem a bit nervous.’
Angel shakes her head. They’re passing through a narrow park that extends along either side of the road. Baseball fields, a makeshift soccer field with sagging nets at either end, an expanse of greening grass that runs the length of a block and appears silver in the moonlight. A cigarette lighter flares on the edge of the park closest to the Red Hook Houses, illuminating a dozen men gathered together in spite of the hour. It’s now three o’clock in the morning.