The day manager—“Carlotta,” according to her brass name tag—asked, “Do
you need a key to one of the apartments?”
A voice beside the manager’s desk said, “Already got one,” and Carlotta’s eyes
widened when she turned and saw the ESU cop holding the battering ram. But she
relaxed when she saw that it hadn’t been he who spoke, but Detective Ochoa, coming
around the counter holding up a passkey to 4-A that he had pulled from the cubby.
Nonetheless, the ESU man and his battering ram got on the elevator with Heat and
Roach, as well, just to be sure.
As the doors started to close, Rook skidded into the car, wearing his “Journalist”
vest. “Four, please.” On the ride up, he ignored Nikki’s annoyed glance and said,
“I’m selling subscriptions to Douchebag Monthly. Have a feeling I’ve got a live
one in 4-A.”
“OK, last time, Rook. You have a job. Stay in here and hold the door open.”
“Don’t you have a sandbag for that?”
“You’ll do.” Then she brought her Sig Sauer up in a combat stance. The doors
parted onto four, and she led her team out into the hall. According to plan, a team
from the Hercules Squad had already taken positions at the open door to the
stairwell and behind the love seat off the elevator, with assault rifles and machine
guns aimed, ready to give cover.
Using only hand signals, they padded lightly up the carpeted hallway to the end unit
with “4-A” etched in a pale blue frosted glass square anchored to its outer wall.
The muted sounds of music from a radio or MP3 bled from inside. To Heat, it sounded
a lot like Billie Holiday singing “Trav’lin’ Light.” A reminder of listening to
American jazz with Rook in Paris wafted over her like a happy scent from another
time. She knelt near the doorjamb while the others took their high and low
positions; Ochoa, closest to the knob, held the key. Straining to listen through the
music, Nikki heard a man singing along.
She knew the voice well. She had heard it, disembodied, on a grainy VHS video shot
when she was five years old and played Mozart for him by her mother’s side. She had
heard it in her waking hours almost every night of the past month instructing her
ex-boyfriend to push her in front of the next subway train. Even now, over the thud
of her quickened pulse, she could hear it casually tossing off the last words she
heard it say as he left her there to die in that subway Ghost Station. That voice on
the other side of the door had said, “Shoot her, if you have to.”
Heat turned to the group around her. She touched her ear and nodded to indicate she
heard Tyler Wynn in there. Nikki then held up three fingers to indicate the coming
countdown. Still in a crouch, she rotated up the hall to make sure the Hercules men
and women saw it.
That’s when the explosion blasted inside 4-A. The floor shook, pictures fell off
the wall, and the concussion knocked Heat on her ass.
Black-gloved hands grabbed Nikki by the back of her vest and jerked her to her feet.
A giant of an ESU cop extracted her, yanking her in reverse up the hall, away from
the door. He deposited her with Rook outside the elevator and raced back to 4-A,
shouldering past Raley and Ochoa, who were clearing the area. In the pandemonium,
car alarms sounded and a few frightened tenants opened doors to hollers from Nikki
and the others to evacuate immediately, using the stairs. They didn’t need a second
warning. Heat noticed the elevator doors were closed. She also realized her
headpiece had flown out of her ear. She popped it back in to hear frenzied chatter.
“Bomb squad on the way up.”… “Paramedics standing by for all clear from the Code
Ten.”… “Ladder and pumpers rolling up, awaiting clear from the Ten.”
Heat keyed her mic to report, “Negative injuries in hallway on four.”
“Copy no injuries” came back from Agent Callan.
“ESU evacuating collateral fourth-floor tenants via stairwell; intercept in lobby
and remove via rear.”