The Intercept jf-1

by Dick Wolf

  “We have a face, we have two names, we have a Social Security number, an apartment full of fingerprints… but we don’t have a location.”

  Gersten shook her head. She turned to scan the lobby. “So now I have to watch for a Caucasian woman…” She thought about the exposure of the lounge, with its glass walls and floor hanging over Forty-second Street. And a woman with a backpack full of TATP standing on the sidewalk below…

  “I’ll try to wind up The Six, or those who are left.”

  “You’re still at the lounge?” said Fisk.

  “Yeah,” she said. “Waiting for you.”

  “Ah,” he said. “No chance now.”

  “It’s cool. You’ve got a job to do.” As she was looking back toward the lounge, Frank and Sparks walked down the short stairway together on their way to the elevators. Sparks glimpsed Gersten on the phone and shot her what could only be termed a nasty look, leaving Gersten wondering, What the hell was that all about? “I need her photograph.”

  “Alert sheet should be in your inbox now.”

  “So she’s a fundamentalist convert. Maybe a radicalized sleeper agent? An assassin?”

  “If so, then her cover here is airtight. I mean, she looks for all the world like a cat lady, only substitute jihad for cats. She’s involved, that’s all we can know for sure. How involved? That information died with Bin-Hezam.”

  “So what if…” She let her thoughts trail away for a moment. “What if Bin-Hezam, not the hijacker, was the real distraction? What if… this whole weekend… when we thought we were tracking the real bad guy, we were chasing his decoy?”

  “A double deception? It’s… possible, I guess. At this point, anything’s possible.”

  “You took it to Dubin?” asked Gersten.

  “Had to. Waiting to hear back now.”

  “He’s going to go public with this one. No more secret hunt.”

  Fisk said, “He should. This has gone too far. It’s gotten out of hand. We need to find this woman.”

  She lost part of the word “woman” because he was getting another call.

  “That’s Dubin,” said Fisk. “Gotta go.”

  “Good luck. Talk tomorrow morning if you can.”

  “If I can.”

  And he was gone.

  Chapter 62

  Jenssen sat rigidly at the end of the lounge. He could no longer see Detective Gersten, who had disappeared around the back of the bar and down some stairs. He had to fight the urge to stand and observe her.

  He was certain she was talking to Fisk, the other one she arrived with in Maine. The detective with dark hair and eyes, whom she seemed closer to than the others. Whom Jenssen had misled by linking Abdulraheem to Bin-Hezam in the airport lounge in Sweden.

  He was the lead investigator. What was she telling him?

  The Swede has changed his cast?

  She had played it cool, but Jenssen could not be too careful now. His background was impeccably respectable — but if they harbored too many suspicions, they would exclude him from tomorrow’s ceremony simply as a matter of precaution.

  His arm ached, as with every throb against the hardening cast, the pain increased. The only reason for coming down to this gathering was to avoid suspicion caused by his absence. Now he was certain he had drawn suspicion and imperiled his mission by attending.

  The shirtsleeve over his cast felt damp now. Given the pain, he imagined it was bright red with his blood, but a peek beneath the bar showed him it was clear. A combination of moisture from the setting gauze and perspiration. The faint chemical smell was masked by the musk and social desire of the lounge setting.

  The flight attendant, Maggie, was the last of the group to leave, avoiding Jenssen either out of embarrassment or shame. She left with Detective Patton, chatting as casual companions. The IKEA manager, Sparks, was the more dangerous woman of the two. Clingy, prying, predatory. Taking the flight attendant back to his room had been a most effective way to neutralize the manager’s smothering desire.

  And it had worked. God would forgive Jenssen for taking the flight attendant. Jenssen had been forgiven many times in the past.

  So the rest of them had retired to their dreams of great fortune and fame — all to be dashed tomorrow morning. They had wasted their last night on Earth with drink and self-congratulation.

  Jenssen scowled again at the old man’s toast to Bin-Hezam’s murder.

  A few moments later Detective Gersten returned, walking the length of the bar — slowing a bit when she saw they were the last ones there. It looked like she was still distracted by her phone call.

  “Late, huh?” she said.

  “You look troubled.”

  “Do I?” She was disappointed that her expression had given her away. “Just tired. Got to get up early. So do you.”

  “Indeed,” he said, putting forth his best smile. “Still, I hate to see a Saturday night in the city come to an end. I am thinking I will make an exception on this fine night.”

  Her eyebrows rose over a grin. “An exception to what?”

  “I think I might order a nightcap after all. If you will join me.”

  Her grin spread into a smile. She looked away, only inches, out the window behind him. Then back to him. “Magnus?” she said.

  “Yes, Detective?”

  “I’d like to. I really would. I’m flattered. But — I just can’t.”

  “Can’t we both make an exception tonight?” he said, smiling, pushing. He laid his good hand gently on top of hers.

  She smiled at the gesture, and he saw that she was teetering on the edge of yes. But just at that moment, the clocks over the entrance to Grand Central began to chime. The twelve notes of midnight. These tones decided the matter for her, and she slid her hand out from underneath his.

  “Good night, Magnus,” she said.

  She turned to go away, but Jenssen could not read her thoughts. What had her look said to him? That she knew? Was she toying with him? Keeping him close to her — and yet at arm’s length?

  He decided he could not let her go without knowing.

  When he offered himself for recruitment in Malmö, they had promised him that the honor of martyrdom would be his. Jenssen, having had time to think deeply about the afterworld, wasn’t convinced about the details. But dying in an act of vengeance against the Western powers that had corrupted and destroyed the lives of his family was the best way to end his own life. A desire for blood revenge ran deep in Jenssen. He embraced the dawning of the day of his own death, as he believed he’d soon be reunited with his mother and father.

  When he accepted the mission, they made him memorize the martyr’s prayer, which he repeated in his head as he rose from his bar chair.

  Think not of those who are slain in Allah’s way as dead… I would love to be martyred in Allah’s cause and then get resurrected and then get martyred, and then get resurrected again and then get martyred and then get resurrected again and then get martyred…

  Chapter 63

  Upstairs Gersten laid her Beretta 84FS Cheetah on her bedside table. She slipped her cell phone from its pouch inside her suit jacket and checked it for messages. Nothing more from Fisk.

  She opened the scramble alert for the woman known as Aminah bint Mohammed, just to look at the convert’s face. Not the face of evil. The woman’s eyes said nothing. That was the scary thing, the thing that kept people like her up at night: the limitations of profiling. Not every terrorist fit the bill.

  She darkened the screen to show just the clock and the date. Just a few minutes into Sunday, July 4. After Christmas, this was probably her favorite holiday. Cookouts and parades and Popsicles. It took her right back to childhood. She had a sudden craving for orange soda.

  Later that day, there would be a ceremony marking the opening of One World Trade Center, the new tallest landmark in New York City. Taking the place of the ones that fell on that day that changed everything. That gave her the job she had now.

  She turned and cau
ght a look in the mirror. She pushed away a rogue strand of hair and wondered what exactly had so entranced the tall, blond, and blue-eyed schoolteacher from Sweden. Tempting, that one. Something about his face and the inflection of his translation of his own words from Swedish to English, giving them a formal politeness that contrasted with the diffidence of his personality. Perhaps, she realized, she ought to play hard to get more often.

  Then she heard a knock at her door. She frowned, assuming it was either DeRosier or Patton — and if so, it meant something else was up, and bedtime was that much further away.

  Or was it Fisk? A long shot, but…

  She looked through the eyehole. None of the above.

  It was Jenssen. So tall, the top of his head was not quite visible.

  Christ. Apparently she hadn’t been firm enough downstairs. He had crossed the line from flattery to boorishness. Time to drop the hammer on this frisky pup, and send him back to his room.

  Chapter 64

  The bolt was thrown, and the door opened. Jenssen saw her stern expression and, below it, her uncovered neck.

  He was on her immediately, before she had a chance to speak or cry out. He used the element of surprise to take her down fast. Even one-handed, his six-foot-four-inch, 210-pound frame was too much for her. He threw all his weight on her as the door closed behind him.

  The momentary shock passed and Detective Gersten realized what was happening. She fought him, though Jenssen already had the advantage. He had her on the floor and forced his good forearm against her windpipe, up hard into her jaw. She gripped his arm with one hand, but was not strong enough to pull it away.

  With her other, she balled her fist and aimed for his groin first. Then his throat.

  Jenssen pushed back mightily against the top of her throat, feeling her thrashing beneath him. She kicked his legs but not with much force. He only worried about an impact to his cast, which could ignite the explosive prematurely.

  She tried to call out, but her voice was caught beneath his forearm. Her eyes bulged, moving within her incapacitated head as she searched for a weapon, anything.

  Jenssen put all his weight into her throat, grinding the top of her skull into the carpet.

  She struck him against his ear. The pain was sharp, and knocked him off balance. She squirmed out from beneath him, one hand to her throat. She was trying to scream, but only a whisper came out.

  He reached for her neck again. She kicked him in the side, and he struck her temple, knocking her head into a low cabinet.

  She was crawling, dragging herself around her bed toward her nightstand. And her handgun.

  Jenssen gripped her leg and yanked hard, pulling her away. He climbed up her back, forcing her against the carpet. She kicked at the floor — eager to make any noise, raise any alarm. With his explosive cast held out at his side, he jammed his good arm beneath her neck, feeling the architecture of her throat as he squeezed, whispering the martyr’s prayer into her ear.

  Part 8:

  Moment of Silence

  Sunday, July 4

  Chapter 65

  Fisk received a call around 6:00 A.M. from an overnight captain who had a call from one of his detectives. He had just come off a homicide in the park, near the Met. “He came in and got a look at your alert. The decedent resembles this bint Mohammed lady. Said the resemblance was strong enough that I should call.”

  “Dead in the park?” said Fisk, jotting it down. “Who found the body?”

  “Didn’t get that part. That time of night in Central Park, you probably don’t wanna know.”

  Fisk hung up. Before he could call the Office of Chief Medical Examiner, the overnight coroner rang through to him.

  “I just heard,” said Fisk. “You have pictures?”

  “Not for a while now. Backed up. Three suicides, a motorcycle accident, and an overdose.”

  Fisk knew he’d have to appear in person to make the positive ID anyway. “On my way right now,” he said.

  * * *

  Fisk called Dubin from the cold basement on First Avenue near Thirty-second Street, beneath the pavement of the East Side.

  “It’s her,” he said.

  Dubin said, “You’re sure?”

  “DNA will confirm, but”—Fisk again looked at the dead eyes staring out of the head protruding from unzipped plastic—“it’s her. Strangled in Central Park. Time of death, approximately twelve hours ago.”

  “Murdered? Christ.”

  “Nothing found at the scene.”

  “Christ,” said Dubin again, with more emphasis this time. “Where does it end?”

  “With whoever killed her, maybe.”

  Dubin said, “Cameras in the park? I’m assuming there’s zero witnesses.”

  “Cameras take time. The One World Trade Center dedication starts in two hours.”

  “You still think it’s that?”

  “I can’t imagine what else it could be.”

  Dubin said, “Am I missing something? About how all this makes sense?”

  “Same thing we’re all missing. There’s a piece we haven’t seen yet.”

  “Goddamn it. Next step?”

  Fisk shook his head, at that moment the only living person in an overlit room of seven corpses lying on seven stainless steel tables. “Call off the bint Mohammed alert. Raise the threat level.”

  Dubin said, “Raise it to where? We’re already doing traffic checkpoints looking for car bombs. We’ve got men with automatic weapons stationed all over lower Manhattan. We towed away parked cars all day yesterday. Rounded up undesirables midweek. We’re running random bag searches, radiation detectors. And a cell phone blackout starting at eight A.M. down around Ground Zero.”

  Fisk waited patiently for him to finish the list. “If this is about the boom, one pound or thirty isn’t going to matter to that building. The target isn’t the structure itself.”

  “It’s something to do with the ceremony,” said Dubin. “Terrorism is theater. And the curtain rises in two hours.”

  Chapter 66

  At 6:30 A.M., the heroes were loaded into the Suburbans in the VIP parking garage beneath the Hyatt, their motorcycle escorts’ engines burbling outside the already-raised chain-link gate.

  Secret Service agent Harrelson was back with them today. He came up to DeRosier and Patton after spending some time with his finger pressed against the radio in his ear. “We gotta get moving,” he said.

  Patton hung up his phone. “Still nothing.”

  “Her cell?” said DeRosier.

  “What?” said Harrelson.

  Patton said, “Gersten, the other detective. Can’t raise her.” To DeRosier, he said, “I tried the room phone a couple of minutes ago.”

  DeRosier needlessly checked his watch. If The Six didn’t get down to Ground Zero in time, it was their jobs. “Maybe she got hung up in the lobby, getting coffee?”

  Harrelson shook his head. “We’ve got a specific window for penetrating the security bubble downtown. We miss it, we’re fucked. All of us. So we’re not gonna miss it.”

  DeRosier said to Patton, “I’m not getting written up because she decided to sleep in. When did she leave the bar last night?”

  Patton shook his head. “She wasn’t there when I left. But I don’t remember her saying good night either.”

  “Ask Jenssen,” said a voice from the lead Suburban.

  The Intel detectives turned. The rear window was halfway down, and DeRosier looked inside and saw Joanne Sparks sitting forward in her seat, her head in her hands. Hungover.

  “What’s that?” asked DeRosier.

  “Ask Mr. Sweden where Gersten is.”

  DeRosier and Patton exchanged looks, then went and did just that. Patton tapped on the closed window of the second Suburban, and it was lowered. Journalist Frank sat with his head tipped back, sunglasses on. Maggie Sullivan sat on one side of him, Magnus Jenssen on the other.

  “Mr. Jenssen?” said Patton.

  “Yes?” answered the Swede
, looking apprehensive.

  “We’re wondering, do you know what time Detective Gersten left the lounge last night?”

  He thought about it, then slowly shook his head. “She left to take a call on her telephone at one point. I never saw her come back. I left a short time later.”

  Patton and DeRosier nodded, backing off. “Okay. Just wondering. Not a problem. Thanks.”

  They stepped away, not wanting to get the group riled up over nothing. Harrelson looked over at them from the first vehicle. They nodded to him.

  DeRosier said, “I’ll call Fisk en route, let him know.”

  Patton climbed into the front passenger seat of the second Suburban. From the back, Maggie asked him what was wrong.

  “Nothing,” he answered. “Just looking for Detective Gersten. Could be she went in ahead of us,” he lied.

  Agent Harrelson climbed into the middle row, sitting in front of Jenssen. As they pulled out of the garage, Jenssen eavesdropped on Harrelson’s coded exchanges with the Secret Service detail at the first checkpoint.

  Except for the missing Gersten, everything was going according to plan.

  Chapter 67

  Fisk zoomed up FDR Drive and was on the Queensboro Bridge on his way to Queens when DeRosier finally reached him. “Gersten didn’t make the trip.”

  Fisk said, “What? Why not, what’s wrong?”

  “Don’t know. What’s wrong is she was a no-show. We couldn’t wait. Not answering her phone.”

  Fisk was not expecting this. He tried to think of the last time he spoke with her. “Nothing happened overnight?”

  “No. Nothing to speak of.”

  Fisk knew she wasn’t one to oversleep. “No word at all?”

  “Nada.”

  “You knock on her door?”

  “Couldn’t. No time. Didn’t realize she wasn’t coming down until too late. And this leg of the journey is the Secret Service’s show.”