"You're not dead," Dan said. "That's surprising."
"No one's more surprised than me."
He roared with laughter. " 'Tasha sent you, you walk in like an old-time commissar, you have balls. What does she need, anything she needs if I can give it, it's for her."
"She needs a house."
"Big house? Little house? Apartment? Condo?"
"A secure house, somewhere access can be restricted, someplace that she can hole up."
We turned onto Brighton Beach Avenue, Dan nodding. "And she sends you to get this for her? Why does she not come herself?"
"She's finding it difficult to move around right now."
"Police?"
"Almost."
He scratched his chin, sniffing the air. "Okay, I can get a house, a good house. But it's not cheap."
"It needs to be secure."
"Real secure, this house, in Jersey. Comes with alarms, cameras, I can even give her guards, she wants them."
"She may."
"Guards, those will be extra. I will pick them myself. Only the best for 'Tasha." He looked over at me, and his tone changed, and the enthusiasm, the friendliness, disappeared. "You tell her I get her the best, okay?"
"She said you always do."
He put his attention back on the road. "That's right, I always do. You don't fuck with 'Tasha unless you have your will in order."
"How long will it take you?"
"By tonight, I can do this. Where do I contact you?"
"Doesn't work like that, Dan. I'll contact you."
He took a moment, then nodded and rattled off a phone number. I repeated it back, as much to aid my memory as to check that I'd heard him right.
"How much will it cost?" I asked.
"With guards, for 'Tasha – she gets discount – I say five large a day."
"I'll have to check with her about the guards," I said.
"Of course, of course."
"She'll want to see you there when she arrives."
"Yes, of course, okay." He nodded a couple of times, then asked where he could drop me off. I told him back at the restaurant would be fine, and he turned the car around and headed back to where we'd started, driving in silence. Then he asked, "So, you were with her? All this time, you were with her?"
"All this time," I confirmed.
We were back on Hubbard, and once again he parked in front of the hydrant, then killed the engine. I opened the door and climbed out of the car, and he watched me as I started to go, then called out, waving me back. I came around to his side of the car.
"Was it hell or heaven?" he asked.
"I'm still trying to figure that out myself," I told him.
I got back to the SoHo Grand just before two, used the house phone in the lobby to ring the room once, hung up, and then took the elevator up. Natalie opened the door for me as soon as I got there, her Glock in her hand, and when she confirmed I was alone, let me pass, saying, "It's him."
Alena came out of the bathroom on her crutches, the PDW slung from her shoulder, and the tension seeped from her face when she saw me. From where he lay on the floor, Miata acknowledged me with a slight raising of his head.
Natalie had arrived late that morning, just before I'd left for the meeting with Dan, bringing with her a short stack of legalese that roughly meant I'd get three-quarters of a million dollars for my share of KTMH. The figure had been much higher than I expected, and Natalie explained that it would be paid out over the next six months. I'd signed the agreement, and then I'd introduced her to Alena.
The two women had greeted one another politely, with some awkwardness but nothing like the tension that had existed between Alena and Bridgett. I figured that Natalie wouldn't have very much to say to Alena, either, but as I came into the room, that no longer seemed to be the case. There was a pad of paper on the desk, covered with figures written in Natalie's hand, along with rough diagrams that made it look as if she'd been working on a calculus equation, and I realized they'd found a common interest to discuss.
"We've been talking about sniping," Natalie told me as she locked the door. "Alena was telling me about the Dragunov."
"I trained on the Dragunov," Alena explained. "How was Dan?"
"I hadn't realized how afraid of you he is," I said.
She hobbled to the bed, dropping one of the crutches and then taking the submachine gun off her arm. "Is he?"
"I think so."
"Then he will do what we ask." She sat down carefully, folding her hands in her lap. "How long does he need?"
"He says he can have a house for us by nightfall, one with basic security and a few guards."
"How many guards?" Natalie asked.
"I don't know. Three or four, I'd expect." I looked back to Alena. "I told him that you'd want to see him in person. He's asking five grand a day."
She made a face as if she'd hoped for better and expected worse. Natalie said, "We don't even charge that much."
"It's a seller's market," I told her. "We've got enough loose cash here to cover a week and a half or so, but there's no way this'll be over by then. We're going to need more money."
"I'll arrange it." Alena slid along the bed to the nightstand and picked up the phone, began dialing. It was a long string of numbers, and when she got an answer, she started speaking in German.
I moved to the couch and sat down, taking the pistol out of my belt. I unlocked it and lowered the hammer carefully, making it safe again. Natalie took her seat at the desk, began examining the figures on her pad. It took Alena another minute on the phone before she hung up.
"It's done. There is a Credit Suisse branch in midtown. If you go there tomorrow, they'll have the money. Two hundred thousand. You'll give half of it to Dan." She looked me over. "You should exercise."
"I'm kind of working right now," I said.
"Natalie is here, I am safe for the time being. You should at least do some cardio."
Natalie laughed, then caught herself.
"My personal trainer," I said.
"I noticed," Natalie replied.
"I'm serious, Atticus," Alena said. "Don't lose everything you've gained."
I really didn't want to work out, but she was right, and in fact I was already feeling the effects of not having exercised in almost a week. I did feel stiff, not as loose or as fluid, and the thing that surprised me most was just how aware of the changes in my body I was.
Alena used one of her crutches to prod me. "Go."
"I'm gone," I said, and went to the gym.
The house was in Mahwah, New Jersey, about an hour's drive from Manhattan. I left Alena with Natalie at the SoHo Grand and took Miata with me when I went out to see it, and I met Dan on the Franklin Turnpike in what could charitably be called the middle of town. He was parked outside of a Dunkin' Donuts, the roof now up on the Kompressor, but only because a light, cold rain had begun falling.
I followed him in my rental, and we wound our way along thin streets lined with trees, most of which had lost their leaves. Mahwah was on the edge of the New Jersey boonies, close to Mount Campgaw, though skiing at the resort wouldn't start until around Thanksgiving. The countryside was quiet and pleasant and hilly, the houses separated not only by wide spaces but also by age, some of the houses a century or more old, others built the year before. Farther into the mountains were New Jersey's infamous hillbillies, the Jackson Whites, inbred families with atavistic brows and six-fingered hands.
I followed the Kompressor onto a small side road that wound its way down another slope, then leveled into a small valley, then into another turn and up a short drive that ended at a seven-foot-tall gate supported by two stone pillars. There was no fence, but past the pillars on either side of the drive, the road dropped into foliage, more trees and bushes grown thick together.