Read Murder at Union Station for Free Online

minutes later, the man with the newspaper was gone. Russo looked for Marienthal. Where was he? People passed him in a rush, the staccato rhythm of women’s heels on the white marble floor sounding louder to him than it actually was. The whirl of human movement around him became dizzying, and he felt light-headed. He turned and stared into a shop window filled with travel accessories, closing his eyes against his reflection in the glass.
    A mild panic set in. He hated the accompanying feeling of hopelessness that had been cropping up frequently of late. Crowds confused him, and he’d avoided Tel Aviv’s bustling shops and restaurants for that reason, to Sasha’s annoyance.
    Where was Marienthal?
    He couldn’t continue to stand there, he knew. He had to move to avoid passing out.
    The sense of confusion and disorientation increased as he walked aimlessly into the train concourse, behind the Amtrak ticket counter and past the Exclusive Shoe Shine’s raised platform, where Joe Jenks awaited his next customer.
    “Shine, sir?” Jenks said to Russo.
    “What?”
    “Shoeshine? Best in D.C.,” Jenks said, flashing a broad grin at the old man with the red toupee and cane. “Comb your hair in your shoes when I’m done.”
    Jenks’s face went in and out of focus. He looked puzzled.
    “Chiacchierone incoerente,”
Russo snapped at the bootblack, who put up his hands as though to defend himself against the old man’s obvious anger.
    “Have a nice day, man,” Jenks said, shaking his head as Russo continued to glare at him before resuming his path deeper into the mass of humanity that was Union Station at that hour. Marienthal’s phone number was in his pocket but Russo didn’t look for a phone. He needed to get outside, away from the crowds whose chatter, mixed with music from restaurants, and blaring train announcements, assaulted him.
    A woman brushed him.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, smiling.
    For a moment, he thought she was Sasha, and he wondered where he was. Tel Aviv? No, Washington, D.C.
    He turned right, in a direction that promised an exit from the huge station to sunlight and fresh air, passing a florist’s kiosk and one selling Godiva chocolates, the Main Hall with its soaring 96-foot-high ceilings, modeled after the Baths of Diocletian and the Arch of Constantine in Rome, ahead, its doors leading out.
    He tried to walk faster, but pain in his legs and side prevented it. He stopped and took in air, closed his eyes against the blur of movement around him, then opened them.
    The light-skinned black man stood between him and the Main Hall. The trench coat he carried over one arm had no right hand showing.
    Deterred from continuing into the Main Hall, Russo turned and limped in the direction of a set of swinging yellow doors, next to a tobacco shop whose sign read PRESIDENT CIGARS. The light coming through small windows on the doors beckoned him. To what? To safety?
    The doors opened and a man in kitchen whites pushing a laundry cart came through, allowing the doors to close behind him. Russo looked back. The black man was following—casually, not in a rush it seemed, but following.
    Russo’s heart tripped as he continued toward the doors. He thought of the handguns he’d never been without years ago, and wished he had one now. He would blast the black bastard into oblivion, he thought, save himself. You don’t mess with Louis Russo. But that bit of braggadocio was fleeting, displaced by palpable fear.
    He was within ten feet of the doors now, and stopped again. The man had closed the gap, was only a few feet behind. Russo shoved against one of the two doors, causing it to open. The long hallway was brightly illuminated by overhead fluorescent fixtures, which momentarily blinded him. Ahead, men pushed service carts and carried trays to and from restaurants served by this off-limits employee area.
    Russo took steps into the hallway and shouted at the men. “Hey, hey! Listen to me. I need—”
    His voice was