The Intercept jf-1

by Dick Wolf

  “What has changed… is my mind-set. This incident… my so-called heroic action… in many ways it has decided things for me. I need to act, and I know that now. And now I know that I can, you understand? But — in such a way that I can make the best future for my family as possible.”

  Gersten raised her hands. “Again — your private, personal business. I think you’ll do the right thing. But will you do one favor for me? Not a favor — I’m going to insist upon it.”

  He waited to hear what it was.

  “No more scares like that. Okay? Let me and my fellow detectives finish our job here, and then you can go on to face whatever you have to.”

  Nouvian nodded. “That sounds reasonable.”

  Gersten smiled. “It does, doesn’t it?”

  She turned and went to the door. Nouvian did not stand up from the corner of the bed.

  “Krina,” he said, before she could get the door open.

  She turned. “Yes?”

  “I don’t want to write a book and I don’t want to make any money from this. I just want to play my music and raise my children. And that’s about it.”

  Gersten nodded, feeling for him. “Well then, my advice, if you’re asking for it, is to just wait until after tomorrow to tell Colin Frank. Because it’s going to break his greedy little heart.”

  Chapter 51

  Back inside her own room, Gersten kicked off her shoes, watching NY1 on mute, her phone to her ear.

  “Bin-Hezam was just a few blocks from Penn Station, Krina,” said Fisk. “He was right here. Can you believe it?”

  “You saw his face,” she said, envious. “What did it say?”

  “Great question.” She smiled, waiting while he thought it through. “You know what it said? It said that he knew he was going to die. He knew he was walking to his death. He wasn’t just resigned to his fate, he was dictating the terms.”

  “Wait. After he got outside?”

  “No. I never saw his face outside, his back was to me out on the sidewalk. This was in the lobby. The elevator door opened, and I looked at him — and it was like he had arrived at the pearly gates already. He was reporting for death. You just helped me confirm that.”

  “What does it mean to you?”

  “Dubin thinks he was going somewhere on another errand, but I don’t. I think he was headed to death. That’s the reason he came downstairs.”

  “With a half pound of homemade acetone peroxide explosives in a bag?”

  “Boom in bag, gun in hand. I think he heard that helicopter… I don’t know, maybe even before that. I mean, he called Saudi Air directly and spoke in Arabic. The first time all weekend he used his native language over the phone. He knew we’d be able to screen for that. He had to.”

  Gersten chewed on that. “Maybe the helicopter over the hotel told him the game was up. That’s what it would tell me. If he knew he wasn’t going to get out of that building a free man, then what’s left for him? Instead of biting down on a cyanide pill, he went out the hard way.”

  More silence from Fisk, then, “Another fair point. Maybe I’m overthinking this. Hey, you know what I miss? Cops and robbers. Jesus. Why can’t these shitheads just rob a bank?”

  “The bad guy is gone. Focus on that. You found him — doesn’t matter how now. Bin-Hezam sleeps with the virgins. Call it a win.”

  “I want to,” said Fisk. “But what can I do? I don’t feel good about feeling good about this. That’s the bottom line. Maybe I need to stop thinking about it for a while. What about you? Catch me up on Nouvian.”

  She did. Fisk listened.

  “I think he’s making a big mistake,” said Fisk. “Given what you just told me, I bet his book would outsell all the others.”

  “It was kind of fascinating, though. He sees the foiled hijacking, and his role in it, as giving him permission to change. Like a near-death experience.”

  “Hmm.” Fisk waited for more. “What does that say to you?”

  She smiled. She was going to say this. “I’m thinking about maybe transferring out of Intel.”

  “You… what?”

  “Like you just said. I miss cops and robbers. Look at me here. I could get shit assignments like this out of a regular precinct. But at least I’d be doing something.”

  Fisk said, “You’re serious.”

  “I’m getting there,” Gersten said. “Maybe it would be better for us.”

  “For us?” He thought about that. “Maybe it wouldn’t, though.”

  “Not living this twenty-four seven?”

  “Look,” he said, realizing she wasn’t just bitching about this, but that she was serious. “It’s been a rough weekend. We need to go somewhere so I can talk you out of this.”

  “You’re welcome to try. Supposedly we’re meeting with the group later for a nightcap in the hotel lounge, after the fireworks.”

  “Sounds totally unprofessional,” he said. “I’ll be there. Assuming nothing else breaks in the next few hours. Where you headed now?”

  “Nowhere. Paperwork is calling to me. I’ve got to write up everything from the past two days. I’m going to play some music and get into it.”

  “No fireworks?” he said.

  “Depends on you. I’ve got a nice hotel room all to myself here.”

  “Ah, you’re killing me. I have so much to clean up with this Bin-Hezam thing.”

  “I know, I know. Try for the drink.”

  “Sunday night,” he said. “That’s my goal.”

  “What are you thinking? Cafe Luxembourg?”

  “Like two regular people.”

  “Sounds marvelous. Only problem is, we’ll probably both fall asleep before getting out the door.”

  He said, “Takeout’s okay too.”

  She smiled. It was good to talk to him. It helped. “Hey — I think maybe his mission was to get blown up and take out a bunch of cops in the process. Including you. So be more careful, all right?”

  “Yeah, yeah. I’ll see you later.”

  She hung up, dwelled on the conversation for a few minutes, then set it aside.

  Focus on paperwork. Get through this. Table everything else until Sunday.

  Chapter 52

  Back at the Hyatt, Colin Frank sat in the common room, alone with his laptop. He was framing out the story in the form of a book and transmedia proposal. He knew some documentary filmmakers and was considering going that route first, a video document that would coincide with the book’s release in six to eight months, each one promoting the other.

  He cracked open a second nip of Bacardi and dumped half of it into his Diet Coke, pushing back his ball cap and cycling through e-mails, leisurely reading the ones from prospective literary agents and managers, and a handful of personal introductions from various big-name movie producers.

  When it all became too much, Frank at once leaped up out of his chair and gave a Tiger Woods — like fist pump, rejoicing silently in the empty hotel room.

  * * *

  Joanne Sparks put the finishing touches on her face in front of the bright bathroom mirror, smoothing out the cracked lipstick in the corners of her mouth. That bitch Maggie Sullivan was going to the fireworks, and this was Sparks’s first — and maybe last — shot at the Swede without the others serving as an audience.

  She checked the skirt again — clingy-tight but not desperate-looking — tugging down the fabric at her slender hips and then grabbing her handbag, heading out to Jenssen’s room.

  She paused halfway out her door, spotting Jenssen in running shorts and a wicking T-shirt down at the far end of the hall, talking to someone. Sparks stared down the hallway, unseen as yet. That far down the hall, she realized, were the cops’ rooms.

  Detective Gersten.

  Sparks watched a few moments longer — long enough — and then stepped back inside her own room, her door closing with a click.

  She turned and whipped her handbag at the wall over her bed. It bounced off the headboard and landed on the nightstand, knockin
g over her alarm clock and television remote.

  She returned to the bathroom mirror, face-to-face with her furious self.

  “Cocksucker,” she said, gripping the counter.

  She was done with Jenssen. Or even if not, she sure was going to act that way from now on.

  * * *

  Gersten stood in the doorway to her room, shoeless, feeling short. Jenssen stood almost a head taller than she. One of the sporting goods chains had sent over some swag, and he wore a blue-and-white Adidas shirt and shorts, and New Balance running shoes.

  “You’re sure,” he said, “I can’t change your mind?”

  Dangerous, dangerous man, thought Gersten. He knew just how to say it, delivering the line with just the right amount of play, in such a way that she felt somehow foolish declining.

  At the same time, she didn’t appreciate the attempt at manipulation.

  “Too much work, unfortunately,” she told him. “Appreciate the invitation, though. Nothing like a nighttime run.”

  “Actually, more satisfying is the cool shower that follows.”

  Gersten smiled, as much at the sentiment as the cheekiness.

  “You’re certain I can’t change your mind?” he said. “What if I get lost?”

  “Tell you what,” she said. She had her phone in hand. She quickly dialed DeRosier. “Detective DeRosier? Mr. Jenssen needs a buddy for a night run.”

  “Aw, fuck,” said DeRosier. “I just ate.”

  Gersten smiled at Jenssen. “He’d be thrilled to accompany you.”

  Jenssen smiled wanly. “The feeling is mutual.”

  Gersten smiled for real. She felt as though she’d gotten the upper hand in this exchange. “Be careful in the dark,” she told him, and closed her door.

  She felt a little short of breath. She was flattered by Jenssen’s attention, and briefly wondered what sort of vibe she was putting out there.

  “I hope I brought my sneakers.”

  The voice surprised her. DeRosier was still on her phone.

  “Good luck,” she told him, and hung up.

  * * *

  With Nouvian in a self-imposed exile, practicing the cello in his hotel room, flight attendant Maggie Sullivan and retired auto parts dealer Doug Aldrich were the only ones interested in attending the fireworks.

  They left the hotel in a lone Suburban, no motorcycle escort, only an off-duty cop driving them and the mayor’s office’s PR person. The driver used his grille lights only when they hit the barricade on Tenth Avenue.

  “Gonna be tough going back to being a regular citizen,” said Maggie, looking out at the revelers walking toward the water.

  “Wish I was able to bring my grandkids to this,” he said.

  The Suburban pulled over at a mobile NYPD checkpoint. At the corner was a rectangular box with windows, not much bigger than an SUV. Security cameras and satellite dishes stood on top of it.

  “Here we are,” said the PR woman.

  She opened the door for them and walked them to the enclosure. People looked their way, but nobody was close enough to identify either Maggie or Aldrich.

  “In here?” said Maggie.

  “You first,” said the PR woman.

  Maggie entered the hinged door. Aldrich followed, then the PR woman. She had her phone out, but for taking photographs, not calls.

  The door closed and the box started to rise. Maggie realized now, she had seen these things before in Times Square. It was like a hydraulic riser, a promontory nest giving a good view of the street below… but an even better view of the night sky, from above street level.

  “Best seats in the house,” said the PR woman.

  Maggie laughed hard and hugged Aldrich. “The others are going to absolutely kick themselves!”

  Chapter 53

  Jenssen waited at the twenty-sixth-floor elevators. The police detail on their floor had been reduced from two to just one, he noticed.

  It was after 8:00 P.M. now. Jenssen was anxious to get moving.

  He heard cello music from Nouvian’s room. Jenssen recognized the tune: “America the Beautiful.” Interesting, in that it was a patriotic song not about battle or victory or God. It was a song about beauty. Jenssen thought to himself that in today’s America, that sentiment could only be taken ironically.

  The elevator doors opened, but he was still obliged to wait for the detective. He noticed the camera panel in the interior corner of the car. It was a fact that, while hotel cameras constantly recorded, the images themselves were rarely monitored.

  Jenssen was still unsure about the female detective. She watched him at times, but it was difficult to gauge her intent. Had she accepted his invitation, he would have completed an easy two- or three-mile loop and been done with it. Her years as a law officer had given her confidence, but he believed her still insecure about her tomboyish look. She was not a lesbian; of that much he was certain. He clearly recalled how she had interacted with the detective she was paired with in Bangor, Maine. Jenssen remembered thinking at the time that they could be lovers.

  So perhaps it was simple desire on her part. Another loose American woman. He needed to know for sure, of course. He had witnessed their alarm at the brief disappearance of the cellist, Nouvian, and noted that Gersten was absent for some time after that, which Jenssen suspected was an assignment resulting from Nouvian’s actions.

  This was a time to be most careful.

  DeRosier, the bald-headed male detective, finally exited his room, walking down the hallway in light nylon pants and an NYPD Softball T-shirt. “You’re gonna go easy on me, right?” he said, with a big New York smile.

  “I am,” said Jenssen. “At first.”

  They rode together down to the busy lobby of the Hyatt, DeRosier checking his phone, then zipping it into his pants pocket. They exited in the lobby, walking past the reception area and the concierge desk, looking up at the lounge.

  “We could just get a drink,” said DeRosier, only half kidding.

  Jenssen smiled. Just as in Sweden, the slam-and-go drinkers crowded against the long bar, downing cocktails before dinner.

  Reflected in the facing windows were the lounge television screens, some showing a baseball game, the others showing helicopter footage from the police investigation of the shooting of the terrorist, Baada Bin-Hezam.

  “We nailed that fucker,” said DeRosier. “Good weekend for the good guys, huh?”

  “Very good,” said Jenssen, stepping onto the short escalator down to the front entrance.

  “Oof,” said DeRosier, as they exited the revolving doors to the sidewalk and the heat. “This is going to be fun.”

  “I am fine if you want to stay behind. This city is on a numbered grid, no?”

  “No, no.” DeRosier was swinging his arms, improving his circulation. “I probably need this.”

  “Tell you what,” said Jenssen. “Let’s take the subway part of the way, and just run back. I want to see the park.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  Nighttime Manhattan had its own distinct rhythm. This was Jenssen’s first visit to the United States. He followed the detective, moving with the flow of pedestrians heading east on Forty-second Street. Half a block later, they descended into a white-tiled cavern known as the Lexington Avenue subway station. DeRosier sought out a Port Authority officer and badged them through the turnstile.

  Jenssen trotted down another flight of stairs to the uptown platform, the smell gagging him, a hideous mélange of piss and dead animals. People crowded near the yellow line, all so nonchalant about the nauseating circumstances in which they found themselves.

  Discipline taught Jenssen not to react to every little dissonant note in his surroundings. As always, visualization soothed him. He summoned images of the magnificent Rådhuset subway station on Stockholm’s Blue Line, its escalators running from the wide, clean track platforms through dramatically lit solid rock. He imagined himself traveling out of Stockholm on a trip to visit his widowed mother, Hadzeera, in Mal
mö.

  Jenssen had never known his biological father. His mother had met his stepfather, Jonas, when he was a member of a United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Srebrenica. Jonas had discovered Hadzeera hours after she had been raped and left for dead by Serbian soldiers, after instructing her eight-year-old son to bury himself under clothes and blankets in the back of a bedroom closet. Against his own better judgment, as well as the advice of his commanders, Jonas Jenssen fell in love with the brutalized single mother. She and Magnus triggered a caretaking instinct in him that was simply irresistible. His father converted to Islam out of sympathy and love. But the marriage was fated to last less than two years; Jonas was killed in a car accident on his way home from the Malmö mosque after Friday prayers. That was the day Jenssen resolved to be the man in his mother’s life.

  “First time in New York, right?” said DeRosier. It was an attempt at conversation. Jenssen nodded, but did not take it any further, feigning interest in the arrival of the 5 train, shrieking out of the tunnel beneath Lexington Avenue, stopping at the platform.

  Together they boarded the crowded train, standing two seats apart. The riders rocked in silence. DeRosier nodded to him, and the two men exited the subway at East Eighty-sixth Street, reemerging into the heat.

  Jenssen checked the street signs in order to orient himself. West was to the left. DeRosier wanted to stretch, so Jenssen went through the motions, keeping an eye out for a tail car. Sure enough, he spotted the other detective, Patton, in an unmarked car double-parked across the street. DeRosier straightened then, announcing that he was ready.

  They set off together at a slow lope, like any of the other weekend evening joggers heading for Central Park. Two minutes in, Jenssen felt his arm beginning to throb against his cast.

  When Jenssen tore the bomb trigger from Awaan Abdulraheem’s hand in the galley of Flight 903, his forward motion coupled with the impact against the floor caused a fracture of his left distal radius. The minor break had required only immobilization. Jenssen had insisted that the doctor sent by the mayor’s office cover only his forearm and the back of his hand, over a soft palm grip stabilizing his palm. He had been taking ibuprofen for the swelling, but disposed of the prescribed pain medication. The pain was bearable.