Angus shifted slightly. “He was wearing one of those NYPD rain slickers.”
Something anyone could buy on eBay, Eve thought.
Then Angus added, “Plus, he moved like a cop. With authority. Like he’d dealt with wackos too many times. Like he was beat after a long shift. I think that’s why he wasn’t very patient with the woman.”
“And he definitely went inside the center bronze door?”
“Yeah. Guess he was the last one in before somebody locked it.”
The reality of it dawned slowly on Eve. They had so many unresolved questions about who was inside the Cathedral. It was a relief finally having one answer—even if it was incomplete. Despite the enormous odds stacked against them, maybe there was a cop inside.
A trained ally. One of the good guys.
But lacking patience. Not the right sort of temperament to be helpful at all.
And possibly disabled. Because a cop would surely have been a target. Who knew what had happened to him, once he went inside?
HOUR 6
1:19 p.m.
For our viewers just tuning in now, we’re bringing you the mayor of New York with an urgent update on the emergency response effort under way to contain a hostage crisis at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral…
THE MAYOR: Today is, obviously, a difficult moment for our city. On what should be a joyous day, when thousands of tourists and locals come together to mark the beginning of our Christmas season with the annual Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree Lighting, we’re instead confronting an emergency at one of this city’s most beloved landmarks.
As this is an ongoing crisis, we will be taking no questions at this time.
However, before I turn this over to the police commissioner, who will update you on the city’s response and closures in the area, I want to broadcast a special number. If you have concerns about friends, family, or coworkers who may be impacted by the events of this morning at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, please call 212-555-6699.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #1: How did this happen?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #2: Has FBI or NYPD taken control of the scene?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #3: Is this terrorism?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #4: How many people are inside?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #5: What are the terrorist’s demands?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #6: Can you tell us if there are casualties? We heard a woman was shot.
Chapter 20
One witness down. Four to go.
Haddox punched Cassidy Jones’s name into the database next. With a name like Cassidy, he bet she would be young and interesting.
He waited as the computer whirled through DMV records. Tax files. Arrest records. Visa applications. Social Security numbers.
Meanwhile, he ran a search on the Web, including Facebook, Instagram, ask.fm, and other sites. And immediately saw that he had a problem.
Stumped.
There were too many Cassidy Joneses. The New York area had them in spades. Maybe not quite as bad as results would be for Joe Smith or John Doe—a name for which, surprisingly, there were plenty of the genuine article around.
Without information to narrow his search, he didn’t know how to proceed. Guess Eve was going to have to ask the Hostage Taker for clarification. And unless he happened to call her, she was probably going to have to do it herself the old-fashioned way: in front of the Cathedral with a sign or a bullhorn. Because so far, the Hostage Taker hadn’t called from the same cell number twice. He was cycling through burners.
Haddox glanced at the cellphone the Hostage Taker had used to communicate—first with the boy, then with Eve. And his thoughts snagged on a half-remembered conversation. Despite the throbbing pain that the Advil had yet to quell, he grinned with anticipation.
Maybe there was a different way.
It was a long shot that he would be able to do anything. Of course they had identified the original number the Hostage Taker had called from, using the phone Luke Miller had used. Both burner phones had been manufactured by Nokia and were part of a batch sold in the Netherlands. Both operated on GSM—the Global System for Mobile Communications—and thus were able to work anywhere in the world. Both had been purchased with cash, so no personal data was exchanged. And if the Hostage Taker were anything like Haddox, he would have purchased a store of these—procured not just from the Netherlands but from around the world.
Based on something he’d once learned from an NSA hacker named Shadow Fox, Haddox knew that it was possible to gather information on a target who routinely cycled through random cellphones. You looked for phone numbers on the network that had been used for single, unique contacts—and you focused on the time each call started and ended. Basically, you looked for a sequence of calls that had distinctive characteristics. Shadow Fox called them lonely calls. Onetime calls from onetime numbers that were never used again. Each call would be short, lasting a limited amount of time—and after it went dead, another unique, lonely number would come online. If the analysis worked out right, you could identify a whole series of burner phones that—taken together—created a portrait as unique as a fingerprint.
This was going to be a challenge.
A completely irresistible one.
And the only place to start was with what he already knew.
Haddox’s screen refreshed with the details of the burner phone they had recovered from the boy.
Its first call was received at 10:12. That was the Hostage Taker on the line with the boy, giving him instructions. Its last call was made at 10:23. That was Eve reverse-dialing the Hostage Taker after the NYPD negotiator was shot. Giving them two cell numbers in the sequence.
The key question now was: Could he identify the other burners in the Hostage Taker’s control?
Every cellphone identified itself less by its mobile identification number—the number assigned by the service provider that was similar to a landline number—than by its electronic serial number. Called the ESN, that number was a thirty-two-bit binary number assigned by the manufacturer. Unlike mobile numbers, it could never be changed. And when manufacturers sent phones to suppliers, they tended to sell them in large blocks. So if the Hostage Taker had bought more than one phone from each supplier—which seemed likely—Haddox would be able to track him down by running all the ESNs in that shipment.
Assuming the Hostage Taker had left the batteries inside—charged up and ready to go, of course. Because even if a cellphone was turned off, so long as its battery was present, it emitted a signal looking for base stations within range. That signal—a “ping”—lasted less than a quarter of a second. But it contained both the mobile identification number and the ESN.
Haddox focused his attention on the monitor and called up a new search. It yielded a screen covered with numbers.
His fingers raced over the keyboard, typing in the parameters for two different searches. One was designed to search for any ESNs that were close enough to the cellphone they had in hand, so as to be part of the same supply shipment. The other was designed to search for any ESNs within close range of the cell tower nearest Saint Patrick’s Cathedral that were active but had never been used. Primed for action but not yet in the field. The screen split in two. Each contained a string of numbers that flashed by fast, blurring into green psychedelic lines.
Eight minutes later, he gestured for Eve to join him. “You want to call the Hostage Taker—or should I?”
She frowned. “I don’t follow.”
“We need to ask him which Cassidy Jones. Because there are currently forty-seven Cassidy Joneses in Manhattan, never mind Brooklyn, Queens, Long Island, or Connecticut.”
“And you found the Hostage Taker’s number? So you can just dial him up whenever you want?”
“Better than that. I’ve got a whole series of numbers he’s either already using or is just about to use. In other words, luv, I’ve given you the upper hand.” With a wink, he passed her the phone. “You can thank me later.”
Cha
pter 21
Mace wiped off a park bench and sat, eating two double cheeseburgers and slurping a mega-size strawberry milkshake. The rain had finally stopped, but the sun hadn’t pushed through the clouds and the temperature was dropping fast. Behind him, the dollars were flowing as the chess hustlers ran their games. He watched a homeless man with gray hair resembling an overgrown shrub push a grocery cart along the path, peering into one garbage can after another for discarded cans and bottles. An NYU student tour, led by a tall, perky blonde, made a wide semicircle to avoid him. The kids in the tour continued chatting and sloshing through puddles. A handful of parents—probably visiting for the first time from some flyover state—gawked.
His bench was near the center of Washington Square Park. The heart of Greenwich Village. Bordering NYU. A lot of real estate that you had to be LeBron James to afford. And right next to the East Village, which still had some of the city’s best watering holes. Mace usually came around when he was heading to a pickup game at the Cage—a public court on West Fourth Street where some of basketball’s best talent cut their teeth. Today he’d come to meet Sweet Pea. She was a former Knicks City Dancer. Twenty years ago, she’d had a dancer’s body—lean, loose-limbed, and damn…he still remembered those legs. When her dancing gig ended, she’d opened her own East Village bar. Except hers wasn’t filled with wannabe punks sporting tattoos and piercings. Hers attracted two kinds of guys: NYPD’s finest and guys deep in the game. That meant she had her ear to the ground when almost anything happened. White Hat or Black Hat side, didn’t matter.
“Hey, baby.” She sidled up behind him. Planted a kiss on his head before coming around to join him on the bench. It groaned in protest.
Mace flashed her a wide smile. Sweet Pea might’ve traded a size six for a size sixteen, but that meant only that her style was less Tyra Banks, more Oprah Winfrey. A fine woman either way. “You’re lookin’ good,” he said, and meant it.
“Don’t you know it.” She gave him a sly smile, then edged a few inches closer. “How’s things at the Bull Pit?” She meant No Bull Pit, the organization Mace had started up a few years back when he’d found himself rescuing one dog—then another, and another—from the fighting rings. He healed them, rehabilitated them, and trained them to be working canines: detecting explosives and drugs. Someday, it might be a living. Meanwhile, he was having fun.
“Same old. How’s things at the Blue Parrot?”
Sweet Pea took a bottle of water from her tote bag, swallowed a gulp. “Business is good. No complaints.”
“You still shoot the shit with Freddy and the boys?” Some of Mace’s former contacts in the black-market trade. They dealt in all kinds of contraband and stolen goods. But especially weapons.
“Most every night.”
“They talk recently about somethin’ interesting?”
“What interests you these days, darlin’?”
“Anything involving concertina wire and explosives. The kind you might use to make an IED.”
“Sounds military to me.”
“Yeah, but the military ain’t in the resale business. Least, not to regular guys.” He leaned in a little closer. Caught her scent: something lemony and lavender. It made him remember the night they’d met. She’d stopped by the Cage to watch her boyfriend—and witnessed one of Mace’s best moments ever. He’d gone one-on-one against his namesake—the original Mace-in-your-Face—and won. Later that night, she’d said goodbye to the boyfriend and let Mace buy her a drink. She’d chosen him that night. And then kept coming back for more. ’Cause Mace’s skills didn’t end on the basketball court.
She tipped her head back and laughed. “Regular guys don’t buy military-grade stuff.”
“But supposing they did?”
“You wanna know where. This have anything to do with what’s goin’ on today at Saint Patrick’s?”
Mace put a leg up on the bench. “Maybe…assuming you heard people talkin’.”
“Freddy and the boys are quiet. If they got anything goin’ on, they ain’t runnin’ their mouths.”
“But?”
She let out a noisy breath, like the weight of the world was escaping her. “The fuzz is another matter. Drug Enforcement guys were in last night.”
“I’m not lookin’ for missing drugs.”
“Will you shut up and listen? Stuff’s been goin’ missing from their evidence locker for a few months now. Meth. Coke. Ecstasy. Even outright cash. But last night, they were talkin’ ’bout a different kind of theft. Few months ago, they chalked up a huge bust. High fives all ’round, special commendations, ’cause it was a big, influential dealer. Took a lot of manpower, too. Drug dealer had partnered with guys just come off a private security detail in Iraq to guard his stash. So in addition to the drug haul, they took in all kinds of shit. Military-grade stuff—including explosives, barbed wire deterrent, the works.”
“Shit that got stolen.”
She nodded sagely.
“Which precinct division?”
“Midtown West logged it in. And here’s the kicker: It’s the same locker where the drugs got stolen, too.”
“They know who did it?”
“They got a line on somebody, but who the hell really knows?” Sweet Pea heaved herself to her feet. “I gotta get back. New staff learnin’ the ropes today.” Her smile flashed. “You know where to find me. And if you do, you won’t be disappointed.”
Chapter 22
There were moments when Eli was ashamed of himself. Sure, he felt bad that not a hundred yards away from him, people were suffering, their lives in imminent danger. But there was one part of this hostage crisis that he could get used to: the food. Because Eve’s team was expected to work around the clock until this thing was resolved, a junior agent—so young and inexperienced that the ink on his college diploma still hadn’t dried—had brought him lunch. And not just an ordinary lunch: a pastrami-and-corned-beef combo, dripping with mustard and sauerkraut, coupled with a cream soda. Eli willed himself to eat it slowly, savoring each bite, as he rebooted the Hostage Taker’s video on the open computer in the adjacent MRU.
Eli paid close attention, taking in everything on the video. But he was distracted by the quality of the recording. It made his heart sink with disappointment. Dimly lit, with grainy pixels. Not a professional effort. Focus on the message, not the medium, he scolded himself.
His finger pressed a button. The video slowed, each frame moving forward at a careful pace.
There was no time stamp. No frame division. First the camera flashed on a hostage or two—so quick, he couldn’t really tell—and the explosives threatening them.
Then it didn’t.
It centered on two stone columns with some pretty disturbing pictures.
He slid his chair closer, pushed up his glasses. They wiggled, so—eyes still on the screen—he pulled a piece of tape out of his pocket and wound it around the left temple. The added bulk filled in the gap behind his ear.
Then he reviewed the footage.
What did he really see? The Brooklyn Bridge was breaking in half as a bus plummeted into the water. Waves from the rising water crashed over the city skyline. People ran hell for leather below the New York Stock Exchange. And next to the people, a scorpion, snake, and other vile creatures swarmed around a skeleton. Meanwhile, the Statue of Liberty stood by, apparently unaware that she was drowning.
Eli burped. Guess he wasn’t eating his sandwich slowly enough.
What else did he see? Images that were even more unsettling. The city skyline—including the Chrysler Building, Citigroup Center, and the former Twin Towers—was swaying wildly, with plumes of smoke over it. What looked to be a big church was underneath its looming shadow.
Saint Patrick’s Cathedral?
And if so, what the hell did this Hostage Taker want everybody—and particularly his five “witnesses”—to see?
Eli closed his eyes and exhaled. He’d lost his appetite.
Maybe it was just because he was
a New Yorker who didn’t like seeing his home depicted this way. Maybe it was because he’d lost friends on 9/11. But this didn’t feel like the work of a religious nut, like Eve thought. This felt like something else.
Terrorism.
Chapter 23
The sounds from outside were deafening. Officers barked orders. Phones trilled. Motors hummed. Somewhere overhead, a chopper was circling. So much activity, so many vehicles actually generated a smell. An odor somewhere between grease and transmission fluid.
And the temperature was continuing to drop. Inside the drafty MRU, Eve could tell that the air was growing more frigid. The wind was whipping with more velocity.
Eve dialed the last number the Hostage Taker had used. There was no response. As expected, he’d removed the battery and trashed it. Time to use the advantage Haddox had given her.
Eve tried the first number on Haddox’s list. One from the Amsterdam shipment. And the moment she dialed, all trace of the world around her faded away—and everything was an eerie calm.
Eight rings. Then a message that the wireless number had not been activated.
“Keep going,” Haddox instructed. “One of them is the magic number. Linked to the phone he has charged up, ready to use next.”
She kept trying. Another six from Amsterdam. Four from Dallas. Five purchased in Bangkok. Seven from San Francisco. A large shipment of twelve from Munich. Just when she was starting to think Haddox had it all wrong, she hit pay dirt with a number from the Barcelona batch.
Someone answered. She knew because the ringing stopped. But this time, there was no recording. Just the soft rasp of someone breathing. The person on the other end of the line was waiting.
Eve didn’t.
“It’s me,” she said, forcing an intimacy into her voice that she didn’t feel. Creating the illusion that they had a relationship—that they could trust each other—was part of the game.
“How did you get this number?” Her heart leapt. It was the Hostage Taker.
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