About halfway down the ramp, I stopped. I looked into the pit, but I didn't see anyone. The stadium lights didn't cover the entire site, and large areas were in darkness or in shadows cast by the equipment.
I texted Paresi: Where?
He replied: Center, big semi.
I looked at the tractor-trailer I'd seen, about two hundred yards away, and I saw someone pass from light to darkness.
I continued down the hard-packed earth ramp.
Okay, so why did Paresi want to meet here? Something to do with the big tractor-trailer? Who else was here? And where were the Port Authority cops? Down in the pit? And what's with the cell phone silence?
The drizzle had stopped, but at the bottom of the ramp the softer earth had turned muddy, and I wished I'd changed out of my loafers. I also noticed deep, fresh tire marks made by what was probably an eighteen-wheeler that had come through not too long ago. Assuming these were made by the big semi in the center of the site, I followed the tread marks.
I was passing in and out of darkness, and the banks of stadium lights to my front were shining in my eyes.
I saw the tractor-trailer-CARLINO MASONRY SUPPLIES-about fifty yards ahead, but I didn't see Paresi or anyone else.
I took another few steps and stopped. I was getting a weird feeling about this. Something in the back of my mind… the stadium lights… the shadows…
I pulled my Glock and stuck it in my belt, then moved more slowly toward the tractor-trailer.
My cell phone buzzed loudly in the quiet pit. I looked at the text from Paresi: I am to your left.
I stopped beside a big dump truck and looked to my left. About ten yards away, I could see something moving in the half-light. As my eyes adjusted, I could see an object swinging from the cable of a crane… and it took me a few seconds to realize it was a person… and then I realized I was looking at the face of Vince Paresi.
I grabbed my gun out of my belt, and as I was dropping to one knee, I heard a high-pitched scream from the top of the dump truck behind me, and a fast-moving shadow flitted across the light, then something slammed into my back with such force that I was driven face-first into the wet ground. The wind was knocked out of me, and I saw my gun lying in the mud a few feet in front of me. I lunged for it, but something hit me in the back of my head, and then a foot kicked the gun away.
I jumped to my feet and realized I was wobbly, and as I caught my breath and tried to get my bearings, I saw someone in dark clothing standing about ten feet from me. I took a deep breath and stared at The Lion.
Asad Khalil had a gun in his hand, but it was at his side. I could cover the distance in about two seconds, but it would take him one second to aim and fire, and he didn't have much aiming to do at this distance.
Finally, he said, "So, we meet again."
He wanted to talk, of course, so I replied, "Fuck you."
He informed me, "That is the second time tonight someone has said that to me. But the last man said it in Russian."
Well, I knew who that was, and since Khalil was standing here, I knew that Boris was not standing anywhere. And Vince… my God… I felt a rage rising inside me, but I knew I had to keep it under control.
He said to me, "I know you are alone, and I want you to know that I, too, am alone." He said, unnecessarily, "It is just us. As you requested, and as it should be."
I nodded.
He nodded in return and said, "I saved you for last, Mr. Corey."
I replied, "I saved you for myself."
He smiled, and it wasn't a nice smile. He said, "I didn't feel a bulletproof vest when I knocked you to the ground."
I didn't reply.
"No matter. I am not going to shoot you in the heart." He held up his gun and said to me, "This is the gun of your deceased wife. I am looking forward to shooting off your manhood with this gun."
He had a few more things to say before he did that, and I thought about a few moves I could make, but none of them seemed promising.
Without moving my head, my eyes darted around at what was nearby. My gun was too far away, and there was nothing close by that I could use. I quickly scanned the top of the distant foundation walls. The observation deck was closed, and even if someone was walking by at street level, they couldn't see this far into the dark pit.
Khalil said, "Look at me. There is no one here to help you." He let me know, "They are all dead. The two policemen in their comfortable trailer are dead. And as you can clearly see, your superior officer is close by, but he cannot help you." He held up a cell phone and said, "His final message to you is this-Asad Khalil has won."
Again, I felt the rage and anger taking over-this psychotic piece of shit, this cold-blooded, murdering- "Did it not occur to you, Mr. Corey, that this was not as it seemed?"
I looked at him and I thought about that. Maybe it did occur to me, way deep down inside… so deep that I just left it there because… it didn't matter to me if it was Paresi or Khalil.
He said to me, "I have dreamed about this moment. Have you?"
I nodded.
He looked at me and said, "It was fated that we meet, but often we must help fate." He smiled again and said, "Both of us have helped fate tonight, and it is my fate, Mr. Corey, to cut off your face."
I assumed he brought his own knife for that, and I said to him, "Try it. Put the gun down and try it, asshole."
He ignored my invitation and glanced around. He said to me, "Here we are, where three thousand of your countrymen died."
I reminded him, "There were hundreds of Muslims who died in the Towers."
He ignored that, too, and said, "This, I think, is a good place for you to die as well." He asked me, "Did I choose well?"
I didn't reply, and I wondered if he somehow knew that Kate and I had actually come within minutes of dying here on 9/11. But I didn't die here then, and I wasn't going to die here now.
In fact, he said to me, "But I will not kill you unless you force me to. I will, however, shoot you in the groin, then slice off your face as I promised."
I had no reply to that.
He reached behind his back and produced a long, wide knife. He said, "This is what I will use, and you will be alive to feel it and to see your face being pulled from your skull."
He was into taunting, which was part of the ritual for most pleasure killers. And they get so deep into their fantasies that they forget to be careful.
Khalil, however, was also a trained killer, and he asked me, "Do you have another gun?"
Well, I did, but I loaned it to Kate. I didn't reply.
He looked at me, then said, "I didn't feel one… but…" He stuck his knife back in his belt, and then he surprised me-or maybe not-by also sticking his gun-Kate's gun-in his belt at his right side.
He stood perfectly still, looking right at me. His legs were slightly parted and bent at the knees, and his arms were away from his sides. Did he learn that from Boris? Or too many cowboy movies?
As though he read my mind, he said, "You are a cowboy-no? Is your gun hand faster than mine? Please. Reach for your gun."
Well, if I had one, asshole, the first and last thing you'd see was the flash of the muzzle. It also occurred to me that Khalil would rather not fire a shot that could be heard… or maybe he simply preferred the knife.
He straightened up and said, "You either have no gun, or you are a coward."
Well, I had no gun, but I did have a knife he didn't seem to know about. I said, "I can't hear you. Step closer."
He drew his knife again and moved toward me, saying, "I once flayed a man's flesh from his chest, and I could see his ribs, his lungs, and his beating heart."
As he came closer, I could see his face more clearly, and he looked exactly like the photograph in the wanted poster-deep, dark, narrow-set eyes, separated by a hooked nose that gave him more the appearance of a bird of prey than a lion.