Silent Night - By Tom Barber Page 0,11

down.

Watching him struggle with the pie, the man sitting across from him frowned. Dark-haired and wiry with a forgettable face, he was dressed in a thick jacket and sweater, the faint wispy lines of some tattoos visible just above the collar.

‘How the hell can you eat right now, Bleeker?’ he asked.

The man called Bleeker glanced up at him. He hesitated, then admitted defeat and tossed the fork on the plate, grabbing his coffee and forcing down a mouthful of caffeine. Around the cup, his knuckles were red and bruised.

His first name was Paul but everyone called him Bleeker. Even his mother. At twenty eight years old, he was a complete and utter failure in every aspect of his life. He’d dropped out of high school with no qualifications. He had no girlfriend. He lived alone and was overweight. He’d never held down a job for longer than a couple of months and that was only if they took him on in the first place. Being a convicted felon didn’t help his cause. The only thing he had in his life that meant something was membership of a certain organisation. After a stint upstate two years ago, he’d joined the group his first week inside and had been a member ever since. He’d signed up partly out of curiosity and a need to belong, but mostly out of wanting to survive his prison term and avoid getting gang-raped in his cell or shanked out in the yard. However, he’d been pleasantly surprised at the perks that had followed after he was released. Given that he’d done legit time, he found he wasn’t at the bottom of the food chain for once. Suddenly he had some authority and people willing to do what he said. For the first time in his life, Paul Bleeker had a say in something. That unfamiliar feeling of importance had increased over time, to the point where he now didn’t take shit from anybody. And if he saw an opportunity, he took it.

All those factors had put him in the diner this morning and set in course what would take place in the city later that day. His bruised knuckles tightening around the mug, he drank from his coffee, thinking of all those years when he’d been treated like shit and how he’d had to put up with it.

After this morning, that would never happen again.

The diner was reasonably busy, people drifting in and out, the bell above the door frequently dinging and a blast of cold air accompanying each entrance and exit. Christmas music from the sound system filled the air, mingling with the murmurs of low conversation and the noise from the kitchen around the back. A tired-looking middle-aged waitress wandered over to their table, giving them a perfunctory smile, a pot of coffee in her hand.

‘Refill?’

Bleeker nodded, pushing his cup towards her. The woman filled it, then looked at the other two men. Neither responded and she moved away.

‘You think he got cold feet?’ asked the man sitting beside Bleeker, looking at the empty space in the four-man booth. He was the youngest of the group, just turned twenty years old with a slight frame and a weak face. His eyes were darting nervously around the room, his leg jiggling under the table.

The man across the table shook his head.

‘You know Ray. He isn’t a pussy.’

‘So where the hell is he?’

‘Forget him,’ Bleeker said. ‘Whether he ran or not, we’ve got a job to do. You need to focus. We do this and we do it right.’

Silence followed. Bleeker drank some of his fresh coffee, then looked at his watch.

‘Time check.’

The other two looked at their watches.

‘10:25.’

‘Check.’

‘Check.’

Bleeker took a deep breath. ‘So let’s do this thing. Donnie, pay the tab.’

Bleeker and the other man slid out from the booth. The kid called Donnie pulled a twenty from his wallet and trapped it under a glass, then moved out and joined the others. Together, the three men walked to the door of the diner.

Each of them carrying a white plastic bag containing a rectangular shoebox.

FIVE

‘Don’t let Jorgensen get to you,’ Josh said, turning the steering wheel. ‘He’s an asshole.’

He and Archer were in one of the Bureau’s blacked-out Ford Explorers. They were just moving onto the Queensborough Bridge which led across the East River and into the east side of Manhattan. It was a sunny morning, but it was still damn chilly. They had the heating going in the car, but it was taking a