The Kennedy Assignation - The Wheelman

FOR A GOOD TWO WEEKS, LENNON HAD STUDIED THE street maps of Philadelphia that Bling mailed him, looking for elements that other heisters had overlooked. For the first couple of days, he kept coming back to JFK Boulevard, just one block from the target bank. JFK didn’t exist thirty years ago; a huge set of train tracks—nicknamed the “Chinese Wall”—used to cover the same ground, originating from a huge terminal a few blocks to the east. The city shitcanned the trains, then built a row of office complexes and apartment buildings in its wake. They named the street after the recently assassinated U.S. president. JFK. Lennon kept coming back to it. It felt right. It felt like the gang’s ticket out of the city, out to I-76 and by extension, freedom.

The more Lennon studied, the more he fell in love with JFK. It was a fat street, unlike almost any other in Center City Philadelphia. He took a Martz bus down to study it in person one unseasonably warm day—a Tuesday. His suspicions were confirmed. Even though JFK ran from city hall right to Thirtieth Street Station—arguably the busiest strip of the city—it was wide enough to handle all manner of traffic. Cabbies were able to weave in and out of traffic from Fifteenth Street clear through to Thirtieth. JFK was it: the fat artery that would let the blood spurt away from the heart and straight to I-76.

The only problem: Bling’s target bank sat at the corner of Seventeenth and Market. Lennon discovered that Seventeenth Street ran south, away from JFK. And Market ran east, away from I-76.

He studied the maps, drank imported beer, watched DVD movies with Katie. He knew the answer would come.

It did.

The morning of the job, Bling and Lennon put on window-cleaners’ uniforms, then carried their signs and ladders and wooden horses and ropes out of a rented van with the word JENKINTOWN WINDOW MASTERS, INC. painted on the side. (Bling said that all of the decent window-washing companies were based in Jenkin-town, a suburb just north of the city.) They set up their gear along the west side of Seventeenth Street, between Market and JFK, arranging the wooden horses in a straight line almost to the end of the curb so that pedestrians would have to walk around them to get anywhere. Chances were, nobody would bother looking up for scaffolding. Besides, it would only have to work for about twenty minutes.

When they had blocked off enough of the sidewalk, Bling and Lennon climbed back into the van, then Bling changed into his second set of clothes—baggy jeans, Vans, oversized basketball jersey. Holden, driving the van, was already dressed for the job. He was wearing an Allen Iverson jersey. Big bright colors, huge fat numbers and names. You want to give them something to look at. That way, they’ll keep looking for it later, long after you’ve changed into something else. Lennon stayed in his window-cleaner uniform. It didn’t really matter what he was wearing, not until later.

Bling pulled out his cloned cell phone, dialed in the bomb threat to the U.S. Mint—clear across town—and Lennon drove them to where he’d stashed the Acura.