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  So on that bright and sunny Saturday, I took Jannie, Damon, and little Alex out to do some car shopping.

  As we rode along, Twista was on the CD player, “Overnight Celebrity,” followed by Kanye West’s “All Falls Down.” All the while, the kids never stopped making wild and crazy suggestions about the new car we needed to buy.

  Jannie was interested in a Range Rover—but that wasn’t going to happen for all sorts of good reasons. Damon was trying to talk me into a motorcycle, which of course he would get to use when he turned eighteen in four years, which was so absurd it didn’t even get a response from me. Not unless a grunt qualifies as communication nowadays.

  Little Alex, or Ali, was open to any model of car, as long as it was red or bright blue. Intelligent boy, and that just could work as a plan, except for the “red” or “bright” part.

  So we stopped at the Mercedes dealer out in Arlington, Virginia, which wasn’t that far from the house. Jannie and Damon ogled a silver CLK500 Cabriolet convertible, while Ali and I tested out the spacious front seat of an R350. I was thinking family car—safety, beauty, resale value. Intellect and emotion.

  “I like this one,” Ali said. “It’s blue. It’s beautiful. Just right.”

  “You have excellent taste in automobiles, buddy. This is a six-seater, and what seats they are. Look up at that glass roof. Must be five feet or so.”

  “Beautiful,” Ali repeated.

  “Stretch out. Look at all this leg room, little man. This is an automobile.”

  A salesperson named Laurie Berger had been at our side the whole time without being pushy or unnecessarily obtrusive. I appreciated that. God bless Mercedes.

  “Questions?” she asked. “Anything you want to know?”

  “Not really, Laurie. You sit in this R350, you want to buy it.”

  “Makes my job kind of easy. We also have one in obsidian black, ash upholstery. They call the R350 a crossover vehicle, Dr. Cross. The station wagon meets the SUV.”

  “And combines the best of both,” I said, and smiled congenially.

  My pager went off then, and I groaned loud enough to draw stares.

  Not on Saturday! And not during car shopping. Not while I was sitting in this beautiful Mercedes R350.

  “Uh-oh,” said Ali, and his eyes went wide. “Daddy’s pager!” he called loudly across the showroom to Damon and Jannie. “Daddy’s pager went off.”

  “You squealed on me. You’re a dirty, rotten squealer,” I said, then kissed him on the top of his head. This is something I do at least a half a dozen times a day, every day.

  He giggled and slapped my arm and giggled some more. He always got my jokes. No wonder the two of us got along so well.

  Only this pager message probably wasn’t funny. Not in the least. I recognized the number immediately, and I didn’t think it would be good news.

  Ned Mahoney from Hostage Rescue? Maybe inviting me to a barbecue and dance out at Quantico? Probably not a barbecue though.

  I called Ned back on my cell. “This is Alex Cross. I got your call, Ned. Why did I get your call?”

  Ned got right to it. “Alex, you know Kentucky Avenue, near Fifteenth in Southeast?”

  “Of course I do. It’s not too far from my house. But I’m out in Arlington right now. I’m with the kids. We’re looking to buy a new family car. Can you say family, Ned?”

  “Meet me there, Kentucky and Fifteenth. I need your help, your local knowledge. I don’t want to say too much more on my cell.” Ned told me a couple more details—but not all of it. Why was that? What was he keeping to himself?

  Oh man, oh man, oh man. “How soon? I’m with my kids, Ned.”

  “Sorry about that. My team will be there in about ten, fifteen minutes at the most. I’m not kidding, all hell’s broken loose, Alex.”

  Of course it had. Why else would the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team be involved inside Washington city limits? And why else would Ned Mahoney call me on a Saturday afternoon?

  “What’s up?” Ali looked at me and asked.

  “I have to go to a barbecue.” I think I’m the main course on the spit, little man.

  Chapter 20

  I PROMISED LAURIE BERGER I would be back for the crossover vehicle soon; then I drove the kids home, and they were quiet and cranky for the ride. Same as me. Most of the way I was behind a station wagon with the bumper sticker FIRST IRAQ, THEN FRANCE. I’d been seeing that one all over Washington lately.

  Hoobastank was blasting irritatingly from the CD player, so that kept everything near chaos, and in perspective. They were the kids; I was the father; I was abandoning them to go off to work. It didn’t matter to them that I needed to earn a living, or that I might have a serious duty to perform. What the hell was going on at Kentucky and Fifteenth? Why did it have to happen today—whatever it was? Not something good!

  “Thanks for the great Saturday, Daddy,” Jannie said as she was getting out of the car on Fifth Street. “Really good. A memory.” Her uppity, sarcastic tone of voice kept me from apologizing, as I’d planned to do for most of the ride home.

  “I’ll see you guys later,” I said instead. Then I added, “Love you.” Which I did—intensely.

  “Yeah, Daddy, later. Like maybe next week, if we’re lucky,” Jannie continued, and flipped an angry salute my way. It went like a spear through my heart.

  “Sorry,” I finally said. “I’m sorry. Sorry, guys.”

  Then I headed over to Kentucky Avenue, where I was supposed to meet up with Ned Mahoney and his crack team from Hostage Rescue and find out more about whatever emergency was going on there.

  As it turned out, I couldn’t even get close to Kentucky and Fifteenth. DC police had every street blockaded within ten blocks. It certainly looked serious.

  So I finally got out and walked.

  “What’s going on? You heard anything?” I asked a man loitering along the way, a guy I recognized from a local bakery, where he was a counterman and where I sometimes bought jelly doughnuts for the kids. Not for myself, of course.

  “Pigfest,” he said. “Cops everywhere. Just look around you, brother.”

  It occurred to me that he didn’t know I’d been a homicide detective, and was FBI now. I nodded at what he said, but you never get used to that kind of resentment and anger, even if sometimes it’s justified. “Pigs,” “bacon,” whatever some people choose to call us, we put our lives on the line. A lot of folks don’t really understand what that’s like. We’re not anything close to perfect and don’t claim to be, but it’s dangerous out here.

  Try getting shot at on your job, bakery-man, I wanted to say to the guy, but didn’t. I just walked on, sucked it up one more time, played the Happy Warrior again.

  At least I was worked up when I finally spotted Ned Mahoney. I flashed my FBI creds so I could get closer. I still didn’t know what the hell was going on, just that unidentified hostages had been taken inside a dealer’s lab, where drugs were being manufactured and cut. It didn’t sound half as bad as it looked. So what was the catch? There had to be one.

  “Now aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” Mahoney said as he saw me heading his way. “Alex, you’re not going to believe this shit. Trust me, you’re not.”

  “Wanna bet?” I said.

  “Ten dollars says you haven’t seen this one before. Put your money up.”

  We shook on it. I really didn’t want to lose this bet.

  Chapter 21

  NED SCRATCHED AND RUBBED at his blondish day-or-two-old facial stubble while he talked in his usual animated nonstop nobody-else-gets-a-word-in manner. I couldn’t help staring at his chin. Ned is fair-skinned, and I think it impresses the hell out of him that he can grow a semblance of a beard now that he’s in his forties. I do like Ned Mahoney, obnoxious as he can be at times. I like the man a lot.

  “Some guys, maybe a half dozen—well armed—came down here to rob the dealer’s lab,” he said. “They ran into some major problems, got hung up inside. Also, there are some neighborhood
people who work in the lab, around a dozen or so from what we can gather. They’re trapped in there too. That’s another problem we have to deal with eventually. Then—”

  I put up a hand to stop Ned’s hyperintense ramble.

  “The people you mentioned who work at the lab? People who package the drugs? They would be mostly women, mothers, grandmothers? That the case? Dealers like workers they can trust with the product.”

  “See why I wanted you here?” Mahoney said, and grinned—at least he showed me his front teeth. His tone reminded me of Jannie’s rant earlier. A little bit of a wiseass masking his vulnerability about being such a “man’s man.”

  “So the drug hijackers and the drug dealers are trapped inside? Why don’t we just let them shoot each other?”

  “Already been suggested,” Mahoney deadpanned. “But now we get to the good part, Alex. Here’s why you’re here. The very well-armed guys who came to jack the lab are DC SWAT. Your old compadres are the other bad guys in today’s episode of ‘Anything Can Happen and Probably Will!’ You owe me ten bucks.”

  I felt sick again. I knew a lot of guys with SWAT. “You’re sure about this?”

  “Oh, yeah. Couple of patrolmen heard shots in the building. They went to investigate. One uniform got gut-shot. They recognized the guys from SWAT.”

  I moved my head around in circles. Suddenly my neck felt a little tight. “So the FBI’s HRT is here to fight it out with DC SWAT?”

  “Kind of looks that way, my man. Welcome to the suck and all that. You got any bright ideas so far?”

  Yeah, I thought: Leave here right now. Go back to the kids. It’s a Saturday. I’m off.

  I handed Ned the ten dollars from our bet.

  Chapter 22

  I SURE DIDN’T SEE any way out of this sticky mess, and neither did anyone else. That’s why Mahoney had called me in, hoping I might have an idea to bail him out.

  And of course, misery loves company, especially on a sunny afternoon when everybody wants to be anywhere but in the middle of a potential shoot-’em-up where people would probably die.

  The first situation briefing took place in a nearby grade-school auditorium. It was jam-packed with Washington police personnel, but also FBI agents, including key members from the Hostage Rescue Team. HRT was ready to roll if it came to that, and it looked like it might happen soon.

  Near the end of the briefing, Captain Tim Moran, the head of SWAT for the metro police, restated the facts as he knew them. He had to be in a highly emotional state, for obvious reasons, but he appeared calm and in control. I knew Moran from my years on the force and respected his courage. Even more, I respected his integrity, and never more than I did that afternoon when he might have to go against his own men.

  “To sum up the situation, the target is a four-story building where black-tar heroin was being turned into powder and a lot of cash. We have at least a dozen drug-lab workers inside, mostly women. We have the lab’s guards—well armed and on at least three floors. Looks like about a dozen of them, too. And we have six SWAT members who attempted a robbery and got trapped inside.

  “They apparently have a quantity of the heroin and cash in their possession. They’re pinned down between drug dealers and other personnel on the top floors, and about half a dozen more armed guards who showed up while the robbery was in progress. At this point we’re in a Mexican standoff. We’ve made initial contact with both sides. Nobody wants to give in. I guess they figure, what do they have to lose, or gain? So they’re just sitting tight.”

  Tim Moran continued in a calm voice. “Because there are members of SWAT inside, given the complications of it, the Hostage Rescue Team will take the lead here. Metro will give our full cooperation to the FBI.”

  Captain Moran’s summation was clear and concise, and it had taken some guts to hand the operation over to the FBI. But it was the right thing to do if somebody had to go inside and possibly fire on the SWAT guys. Even if they were bad cops, they were still cops. It didn’t sit well with any of us to have to shoot at our brothers.

  Ned Mahoney leaned in close to me. “Now what do we do, Einstein? HRT is caught in the middle of a shit sandwich. See why I wanted you here?”

  “Yeah, well, excuse me if I don’t fall all over myself thanking you.”

  “Ah, you’re welcome anyway,” said Mahoney, and he punched my arm in a bullshit gesture of camaraderie that made us both laugh.

  Chapter 23

  IT WAS IN HIS BLOOD.

  The Butcher was in the habit of monitoring metro police communications whenever he was in DC, and it was hard to miss this baby. What a royal cluster-fuck, he couldn’t help thinking to himself. SWAT against Hostage Rescue. He loved it.

  For the last few years he’d been cutting back on the kinds of jobs he did, “working less, charging more.” Three or four major hits a year, plus a few favors for the bosses. That was more than enough to pay the bills. Besides, the new don, Maggione Jr., wasn’t exactly a fan of his. The only real problem was that he missed the thrills, the adrenaline punch, the constant action. So here he was at the Policeman’s Ball!

  He was laughing as he parked his Range Rover a dozen blocks from the potential firefight scene. Yes, indeedee, the neighborhood was sure jumping. Even on foot, he couldn’t get much closer than several blocks away on Kentucky Avenue. On his walk toward the crime scene, he’d already counted more than two dozen metro DC police department buses parked on the street. Plus dozens more squad cars.

  Then he saw blue FBI Windbreakers—probably the Hostage Rescue boys up here from Quantico. Damn! They were supposed to be hot shits, right up there with the best in the world. Just like him. This was good stuff, and he wouldn’t miss it for anything, even if it was a little dangerous for him to be here. He spotted several command-post vehicles next. And at the “frozen zone,” or inner perimeter, he thought he picked out the “incident commander.”

  Then Michael Sullivan saw something that gave him pause and made his heart race a little. A dude in street clothes talking to one of the FBI agents.

  Sullivan knew this guy, the one in civvies. His name was Alex Cross, and well, he and Sullivan had something of a history. And then he remembered something else—Marianne, Marianne. One of his favorite kills and photographs.

  This was getting better and better by the minute.

  Chapter 24

  I COULD DEFINITELY SEE why Ned Mahoney wanted me here.

  A heroin factory estimated to have more than a hundred and fifty kilos of poison, street value at seven million. Cops versus cops. It looked like a no-win situation for everybody involved. I heard Captain Moran say, “I’d tell you to go to hell, but I work there and I don’t want to see you every day.” That sort of summed things up.

  No one inside was showing signs of surrendering—not the drug dealers, not the guys from SWAT. They also weren’t allowing any of the lab workers trapped on the fourth floor to leave. We had the names and approximate ages for some of the lab workers, and most of them were women, between fifteen and eighty-one. They were neighborhood people who couldn’t find other jobs, usually because of language and education barriers, but who needed and wanted to work.

  I wasn’t doing a whole lot better than anybody else at figuring out a possible solution or an alternative plan. Maybe that was why I decided to take a walk outside the barricades at around ten. Try to clear my head. Maybe an idea would come if I physically put myself outside the box.

  By now there were hundreds of spectators, including dozens of reporters and TV camera crews. I strolled a few blocks along M Street, my hands dug deep into my pockets.

  I came to a crowded street corner where people from the neighborhood were being interviewed for TV. I was starting to walk by, lost in my thoughts, when I heard one of the women talking between wrenching sobs. “That my flesh and blood trapped inside. Nobody care. Nobody give a damn!”

  I stopped to listen to the interview. The woman couldn’t have been more than twenty, and she was pregnant. From the
look of her, she was due any day. Maybe tonight.

  “My gramma is seventy-five. She inside to make money so my kids can go to Catholic school. Her name Rosario. She a beautiful lady. My gramma don’t deserve to die.”

  I listened to a few more emotional interviews, mostly with family members of the lab workers—but also a couple with the wives and kids of the drug crew trapped inside. One of the runners in there was just twelve years old.

  Finally, I headed back inside the barricades, the inner perimeter, and I went looking for Ned Mahoney. I found him with some administrative types, suits, and Captain Moran outside one of the command-post vans. They were discussing shutting off the building’s power.

  “I’ve got an idea,” I told him.

  “Well, it’s about time.”

  Chapter 25

  THE BUTCHER WAS STILL hanging around the police barricades in Washington, and he knew he shouldn’t be there. He was supposed to be home in Maryland hours ago. But this was worth it. The craziness of it all. He wandered through the crowd of looky-loos, and he was feeling like a kid let loose at a state fair, or at least what he thought a kid at a state fair would feel like.

  Hell, they even had ice cream and hot dog vendors at the scene. People’s eyes glistened with excitement; they wanted to see some real-life action. Well, hell, so did he, so did he.

  He definitely was a crime-scene junkie, and he thought it stemmed from the days spent with his old man in Brooklyn. When he was little, his father used to take him on fire and police calls that he intercepted on his two-way. It was about the only good thing he ever did with the old man, and he figured it was because his father thought he’d look like less of a freak if he dragged a kid along beside him.