spot on the edge of the lot, facing the courthouse. All around them, other lunch trucks were setting up, preparing for a day of business. Tucked among them, My Greasy Balls looked like just another vendor.
Freddie set the brakes and cut the engine with a jolt. He hopped out of the driver’s side and lifted the sides of the truck to reveal the service windows. When he climbed back into the truck, the floor swayed with his weight. Unlike his brother, Freddie’s thick figure bore the marks of a distinct love of carbohydrates.
“You girls doin’ okay?” Freddie asked.
“Super,” Caroline said, trying not to breathe in the scent of old cooking oil. Her stomach was already in knots as it was.
She glanced over at Annie, whose face held the same inward look it had borne in the Calvutos’ kitchen. Caroline wanted to reassure Annie, to tell her that they’d make it back, but the words died on her tongue.
“We need to stake things out,” Freddie said. “I brought supplies.”
Reaching into a plastic milk crate, he withdrew three sets of binoculars. He offered a pair each to Annie and Caroline. He hung the third pair around his own thick neck.
Taking the binoculars, Caroline looped the strap around her wrist.
“First thing we needs to do is figure out who our surveillance is,” Freddie said.
He pointed a thick finger at the side of the gray structure.
“That’s the north entrance over there,” Freddie said. “At lunchtime, hundreds of people are gonna come pouring outta there like ants. I always do good business in this lot. In the meantime, we should be able to see when your police escort shows up . . . and we should be able to see who’s out there that don’t belong.”
Caroline put her eyes to the binoculars and focused the lenses. She swept them across the front of the courthouse in a slow, deliberate arc. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for. As far as she could tell, it was just another morning at the United States District Court, Southern District of New York. Lawyers in gray and blue and black suits holding briefcases. Litigants in everything from dresses to torn blue jeans. The occasional staffer or security guard hurrying up the stairs to work.
Beside her, Freddie made quiet grunting sounds as he examined the scene.
“Ah,” he said to himself, then, “Hmm.”
Finally, he put his binoculars down and turned to Annie and Caroline.
“I count three guys we gotta be watching out for,” he announced.
Caroline put her binoculars down and raised an incredulous eyebrow at the balding man. With his belly sticking out from his too-short T-shirt, Freddie was an unlikely expert on surveillance. Then again, she was an unlikely tech geek–turned–lawyer.
“There are three guys,” Freddie said. “They pretend like they’re walking by, but then they loop back around. They’re changing their clothes somewheres, but the shoes don’t change.”
At Caroline’s expression, he added, “Hey, you can tell a lot from a guy’s shoes.”
“Shoes?” Caroline repeated.
“Yeah. See the guy in the black jacket?” Freddie pointed at a man strolling past the doors of the courthouse.
Caroline put her binoculars back up to her eyes. Soon, she saw the man Freddie indicated. Balding across his head, the man wore a black leather jacket and tan slacks.
“I see him,” she said.
“He’s the same guy who walked by wearing a gray hoodie ten minutes ago. He’s wearing green Converse. He must’ve changed his jacket at his car or something, but he didn’t bother to change his shoes,” Freddie said.
“Good catch,” Caroline said, her tone holding appreciation for Joey’s brother’s abilities.
Freddie shrugged. “I saw it once in a movie.”
Caroline watched the front of the courthouse with new eyes, focusing on the shoes of the people on the sidewalk. Sure enough, over the course of fifteen minutes, she saw the same three men circle back along the sidewalk. Their clothes changed, but not their shoes. She realized there had to be a car parked somewhere around the corner where the men were changing. Or an alcove somewhere out of view.
She shivered involuntarily.
The obvious planning that had gone into Med-Gen’s surveillance disturbed Caroline. If there were creeps waiting on the sidewalk for them, there were probably creeps waiting inside the courthouse, too. She reminded herself that the metal detectors and marshals inside ensured that no one was armed.
They just had to get past the doors.
Caroline scanned the streets again. Still no police escort.
Settling in to wait, she kept the binoculars up to her eyes.
“Where are they?” Annie asked.