by Dick Wolf
“Well . . . you know how hotels work, right? You go back up.”
“Of course. I just . . . the door opened on the lobby, and I didn’t know where everybody else went . . . and so I thought I’d stretch my legs a bit.”
They were directly behind the elevator bank now. A small concourse of shops. “Shopping?”
“No, no. Clearing my head, mostly.”
“Stretching your legs, clearing your head.” She took his arm and started back around to the elevators. “We tried calling you.”
“My phone is still upstairs. Didn’t need it for the interview.”
Gersten pressed the up button. She quickly called DeRosier’s cell, hoping they hadn’t called in this mishap. When he answered she said, “Found him, coming back,” then hung up. She went quiet then, waiting to see what Nouvian would say next.
“I didn’t mean to . . . I hope I didn’t alarm anyone.”
“Little bit,” she said, as an empty car arrived.
They entered and stood on opposite sides as the elevator rose. She glanced at him in the reflective golden doors, sweating him a little. Trying to figure out whether he was just odd or if there was any more to it.
He kept his eyes on the floor as though they were strangers—indeed, they weren’t much more than that—and when the doors opened he waited for her to exit the car first, in the most automatically cordial way. She did the same for him at the turn into the corridor, passing the two NYPD cops. She saw him into the suite, watching him enter past Patton and DeRosier, neither of whom addressed him, letting him pass without a word into the adjoining room. Gersten gave them each a tiny shrug that said, “I don’t know,” then turned and went back to the elevator.
She rode back down to the lobby, turning the corner and returning to the small concourse behind the elevators where she had found him. He had appeared near a small jewelry shop catering to midrange tourists and a souvenir shop with the usual “I ♥ NY” kitsch, tiny Lady Liberties, and New York Yankees gear.
Across from the store was a pair of pay telephones—only, unlike the ones upstairs near the ballroom, these still contained actual phones. A rarity in modern Manhattan—if they still worked.
Gersten picked up each receiver. Both phones gave her a dial tone.
Chapter 36
Do not come veiled. Not even a hijab.
Aminah bint Mohammed pulled the twin loaves from the refrigerator. Each was wrapped in wax paper and clinging plastic. She padded the bottom of a large Macy’s shopping bag—blue with a big red star—with cotton dishcloths, laying the chilled cakes on top. She covered them with a brown cardigan sweater from the plastic storage bin at the back of her bedroom closet, about five years out of fashion and three months out of season.
Aminah prayed as she packed, giving thanks that the wait was finally over. She continued her prayers while she undressed. She had grown so comfortable with the black burka she had been wearing daily for almost three years that—with the exception of her nursing scrubs—she felt nude in ordinary Western clothes. Especially with her head uncovered—without a hijab, or head scarf.
This was the second time that week she had shed her comfortable current identity for her unfamiliar former one. When she had shopped for the ingredients three days ago, she wore blue jeans, a T-shirt, and a jacket. And it was as though she had disappeared. No suspicious looks on the sidewalks, for a change. No dismissive stares. No tiny pointing fingers from children. Her old style of dress had felt to her exactly like a disguise, symbolizing the completion of her three-year journey from Kathleen Burnett to Aminah bint Mohammed.
Kathleen Burnett had been born to a Methodist minister and his wife in New Bedford, Massachusetts. The youngest of five, she had an undistinguished public school education, trained at a community college, graduated with a nursing degree, and began working at a hospital there.
For twenty-nine years she was Kathleen Burnett. Thirty-two now, she was five feet, three inches tall, with a lifetime of trouble keeping weight off. She had dark curly hair that she believed was her best feature. She had never married. She was not a virgin, but only due to a traumatizing date rape in the summer between her junior and senior year of high school.
Following the death of her mother, less than twelve months after the initial diagnosis of kidney cancer, Kathleen scoured out-of-state employment opportunities and impulsively accepted a job as an emergency room nurse at St. Vincent’s Hospital in Greenwich Village. She had relocated to her Bay Ridge apartment five years ago and started her life over with great anticipation, becoming very passionate about saving lives. She was proud that, every time she went to work, someone who otherwise would have died without her did not.
Her first and best friend at the hospital was a physician’s assistant named Na’ilah Al-Mehalel, a Westernized Muslim with roots in Jordan. Kathleen experienced a kind of crush on the older, wiser woman. Accepting an invitation to accompany Na’ilah to the Masjid Ar-Rahman mosque on West Twenty-ninth Street had at first seemed more like fellowship than religion. The religious barriers between men and women startled her at first, but she quickly came to honor them as a matter of respect and protection, rather than repression.
What began as her half-earnest pursuit of Na’ilah Al-Mehalel—which was unrequited, and remained Kathleen’s secret, more unfocused impulse than reality—led to something much more profound. Two years later, she became a Muslim. The imam asked her three questions:
“Do you believe in one God?
“Do you believe that Jesus was a prophet but was not the son of God?
“Are you willing to accept Mohammed as a prophet?”
Kathleen Burnett answered yes to all three questions. She had joined the Islamic religion by repeating the imam’s next words:
“There is no god but Allah and Mohammed is His prophet.”
Like many Western converts to Islam, she took a Muslim name, Aminah—it meant “Trustworthy”—and bint Mohammed. “Daughter of Mohammed.”
For a small filing fee at the Department of Records, Kathleen Burnett’s transformation into Aminah bint Mohammed was legalized, and her rebirth complete.
A few months later, Na’ilah’s brother, Robeel, was taken from his Queens apartment by men claiming to be law enforcement, though without a formal arrest. Na’ilah was inconsolable, and Aminah sat with her day after day after day.
Six months later Na’ilah’s parents received a letter from the U.S. government asking them where they would like their son’s remains to be shipped. Robeel had committed suicide in the prison at Guantanamo Bay—or so the letter claimed.
Some months later the father of another of Aminah’s friends from the mosque disappeared without a trace. Vanished. Na’ilah grew paranoid and embittered, talking ceaselessly about the United States’ war against Islam. Aminah was devastated when Na’ilah and her family decamped for Jordan, leaving Aminah angry and alone once again.
She came to believe that the accident of her birth had placed her on the wrong side of this conflict. When another American woman from the mosque befriended her and offered her the opportunity to enlist in the army of God, Aminah knew that she could not refuse. She met secretly with this woman, who encouraged her to stay away from Masjid Ar-Rahman due to American law enforcement surveillance. She was told that she would be most valuable to jihad as a deep-cover sleeper agent, though not in so many words. She was to continue to live quietly and pursue nothing out of the ordinary until the moment came when her presence in New York could turn the tide of battle. Asked if she would be willing to give her life for Mohammed, she answered yes, but she was thinking not of Mohammed but of Na’ilah.
In the swirl of this heady cause, Aminah bint Mohammed had found more purpose for her life than ever before. Saving the lives of the victims of street crime at St. Vincent’s paled by comparison with helping to bring God’s plan into this world. But St. Vincent’s Hospital closed in April 2010, an
d after Aminah’s unemployment payments ended, the woman from the mosque offered to offset Aminah’s lost salary so that she could keep her Bay Ridge apartment without concern. Most critical, said the woman, was that Aminah remain available and unencumbered for when the call to service arrived.
The first call had come earlier that week. A different man’s voice. A different code word.
He had instructions for her. She was to purchase six twelve-ounce bottles of hydrogen peroxide, six one-pint cans of acetone, and a gallon bottle of muriatic acid. Each item had to be purchased separately from different stores in different neighborhoods.
The voice had slowly recited the URL for an Internet site where she would find instructions for blending the ingredients. She wrote it down and read it back to him before ending the conversation and dressing in the strange disguise of her former life.
Chemistry lab had been Aminah’s favorite class in nursing school. Following procedures carefully and exactly was second nature to her.
Hydrogen peroxide was a common household antiseptic. The acetone was identical to nail polish remover. When mixed with water, and used carefully with rubber gloves, muriatic acid powder worked miracles on dirty stonework.
Mixing the explosive took her three days. On the counter of her tiny kitchen alcove, she laid out her tools. White, cup-shaped paper coffee filters. A measuring cup. A 60 ml syringe. A pint bottle of household ammonia. Two one-quart glass mason jars that had been in the freezer with her ingredients, as it was necessary to bring their temperature down to thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit.
Using the syringe and measuring cup, she mixed hydrogen peroxide and acetone in a 3:1 ratio in the large glass jar, then put the mixture in the freezer. She mixed the powdered muriatic acid with water in a jar to make 120 ml of a 30 percent solution, and put that in the freezer as well. A half hour later, she mixed the hydrogen peroxide, acetone, and acid in one of the jars, and set it in her refrigerator overnight.
In the morning, she saw exactly what the instructions said she would: fine white crystals in the bottom of the jar. She had derived approximately one-third of the amount required. She strained the liquid through a coffee filter into the empty jar, leaving a residue of white paste. That was the explosive, known chemically as triacetone triperoxide. Finally, she poured the ammonia over the white paste until it stopped bubbling and frothing, further purifying it. She repeated this process until all the liquid was out of the jar, then set aside the coffee filters with the TATP to dry on a newspaper.
The following day, and the next, Aminah repeated this careful process until she had derived exactly one pound. She disposed of the empty bottles and cans nightly in a gas station waste barrel, running fans in her apartment with the windows open to expel the scent. She carefully cleaned the jars, measuring cup, and syringe, but did not dispose of them, just in case she would have to repeat the process of mixing the explosives sometime in the future. She stored the cleaned equipment inside her refrigerator, on the same shelf with the twin loaves of explosive.
The woman Aminah now faced in her bedroom bureau mirror startled her. She wore a long skirt, a blue cotton wraparound that concealed her legs to the ankles, and another of her outdated sweaters, a mock-turtleneck beige pullover. Brown flats completed the disguise.
How odd it was to meet her old self on this fateful day.
She did not feel as brave or as holy as she had hoped. She knew nothing about the larger plan. Indeed, she believed that there were many links in this magnificent chain such as herself, none of whom knew anything other than their own blessed duty. And for some reason this reassured her.
Down on the street, shopping bag in hand, Aminah completed another of her tasks. She returned to the same gas station two blocks away and discreetly ejected the battery from her cell phone and disposed of both in the trash. Jettisoning that device was yet another profound moment for her, a no-turning-back display of conviction.
Two blocks on, she hailed a livery cab. She gave the driver the address of the Hotel Indigo in Manhattan, and as he pulled away from the curb, Aminah sat back against the firm leather upholstery and resumed her prayers. When the driver accelerated onto the Brooklyn Bridge, crossing into lower Manhattan, she closed her eyes, not wanting to view the city of infidels that rose like a fortress against the one true God.
Chapter 37
The Six dressed in formal attire for the aircraft carrier event. Four NYPD motorcycle policemen escorted their convoy of Suburbans across Manhattan to Pier 86 on the Hudson River, at the end of West Forty-sixth Street.
Gersten, like DeRosier and Patton, had never before been aboard an aircraft carrier. From the street, USS Intrepid looked enormous, rising above them to the height of a twenty-story building. The stern was a quarter mile from its bow. The floating city-weapon inspired pure awe.
Security was reassuringly tight. Unbroken lines of people shuffled up two gangways that led to the middle of the ship in the sweltering midafternoon heat. At the foot of each, zigzagging airport-style queues held more people awaiting metal detector screening.
The Six got to avoid the exterior scrutiny, receiving VIP treatment. Past the gangways, their motorcycle escorts peeled off, forming a perimeter between the three Suburbans and the crowd. They idled for five minutes, cool in their cars, waiting as one of the huge aircraft elevators on the outside of the carrier descended to within twenty feet of the dock. From it, a broad ramp extended to bridge the remaining distance.
The Suburbans drove right into the belly of the ship, unloading inside the cavernous hangar deck, which ran the full length and breadth of the carrier.
Uniformed navy officers saluted as they exited the cars. The group returned the salutes awkwardly, except for old man Aldrich, who snapped off his salute with precision.
They waited in a comfortable officers’ wardroom on the hangar deck for almost an hour. Secret Service agent Harrelson apologized for the delay, yet explained that it was routine. “We have to stabilize the area for at least a half hour before POTUS arrives,” Harrelson explained. “You may be the heroes, but he is the commander in chief. Military protocol dictates that the senior officer arrives last.”
They sat silently, excitement building, threatening to overwhelm them. Meeting Barack and Michelle Obama had been an abstraction until now. They were actually going to shake the president’s hand, look into his eyes, receive his thanks. Gersten saw the realization coming over them.
Aldrich said, “I’ll shake his hand, but I’m still glad that I didn’t vote for him.”
Maggie rubbed his arm, gently teasing him. “Who are you kidding, Doug? You’re melting like a polar ice cap. When I come up to visit you in Albany, you’re going to have a big old ‘Yes We Can’ sign on your lawn.”
The others laughed—except for Joanne Sparks, who had been noticeably cool to her fellow female hero since the morning. Gersten wondered if Sparks suspected what had happened between Maggie and Jenssen last night, or if she was beginning to. Sparks was not as flirty and attentive with Jenssen either, not at all like she had been yesterday.
Nouvian looked away when he saw Gersten watching her. She noticed that he kept clasping and unclasping his hands.
Two men in suits were escorted into the room, introduced as the Canadian ambassador to the United States, Gary Doer, and the Swedish ambassador to the United States, Jonas Hafström. Ambassador Doer embraced a flattered Maggie Sullivan, a Canadian citizen. Ambassador Hafström shook Jenssen’s hand, huddling with him in the corner. Gersten smiled to herself, having the feeling that, following Jenssen’s words on the Today show that morning, the Swedish ambassador had been dispatched with special instructions to bring him into line. Jenssen was a phenomenal PR opportunity for Sweden as well, as his handsome face could sell quite a few tourist packages to female international travelers.
Jenssen looked wary at first, but after a few exchanges, Gersten watched him activate his nati
ve charm. They conversed in Swedish, cordially, mostly question and answer.
When the time came, The Six and Ambassadors Doer and Hafström and their handlers were led from the wardroom, emerging from the towering command island onto the vast flight deck in the baking heat. The broad blue-brown Hudson flowed to their left, the hump of midtown Manhattan buildings rising to their right, windows flashing in the reflected light of the sun. A heat mirage hovered over the city like rising steam.
Once The Six were recognized as they made their way to a riser against the island from which they had just emerged, two thousand people aboard the four-acre flight deck erupted into cheers. Television cameras tracked them as they walked and waved, the ceremony being covered by every cable news network.
The group took its place among the dignitaries, while Gersten, Patton, and DeRosier were relegated to an off-camera area to the side, not twenty feet away.
The whapping approach of a helicopter drew everyone’s face skyward. A big green-and-white Sikorsky approached from the north, nose high, its twin turbines loud enough to drown out all other local sound.
The aircraft settled gently into the white circle with the letter H at its center, two hundred feet from the crowd, the wash from its rotors bringing a moment of relief to the overheated spectators.
Two marines in dress blues stood at attention at the edges of a red carpet leading precisely to the helicopter’s door just behind the cockpit. The crowd cheered, waiting for the president and First Lady to emerge.
But instead, confusingly, the giant chopper’s engines howled to takeoff power, as though the pilot had changed his mind. The helicopter lifted off and rose abruptly to an altitude of about one hundred feet, spun sharply on its axis, and flew back the way it had come toward the George Washington Bridge in the far distance.
The fading sound of its engines was replaced with a buzz from the crowd, their puzzled conversations expressing concern, fearing an unfolding emergency. Then fingers pointed into the sky.