So close.
So very, very close.
* * *
“They’re moving in,” Special Agent Maloney said.
Three different oversize monitors in the conference room tracked the progress of the SWAT team. Stride could see the Woodland yard lit up like daylight by the hot klieg lights on the street. A camera atop the black tactical van broadcast the panorama of the scene. Uniformed men converged on the metal shed from three sides. One camera, mounted on the helmet of the lead officer, shuddered as he moved, giving them a real-time perspective on the assault.
Stride could see them getting closer. The command center was as silent as a church. Beside him, he realized that Agent Durkin was holding her breath.
At that moment, he felt his phone vibrating in his pocket. He wanted to ignore it, but when he slipped it into his hand, he saw that the 911 call center was trying to reach him. He got out of his chair and found the remotest corner of the room, where he answered the phone and murmured, “Stride.”
He recognized the voice of the 911 supervisor for St. Louis County.
“Lieutenant, I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but we’ve got a caller who insisted on being forwarded to you. He claims it’s an emergency, and he says he won’t talk to anyone else.”
“What’s his name?”
“He won’t give us a name, but he says he’s a friend of Khan Rashid. That’s the only reason I thought I should check with you.”
Stride’s eyes were glued to the monitor.
“Put him through,” he said.
“Yes, sir.”
He heard a clicking on the line and then the sound of someone breathing rapidly and frantically.
“This is Stride,” he whispered.
The phone line was silent except for the breathing.
On the monitors, he saw the SWAT team within ten yards of the shed. Among them were men he’d known for years. He trusted them and their training. Move in, throw open the door, immobilize the suspect.
“Who is this?” Stride continued. “What do you want?”
Finally, the man spoke. “It’s a trap.”
“What?”
“It’s a trap. He’s wired. Keep your men away!”
Stride threw his phone to the floor and shouted, “Pull them back! Pull them back! Pull them back!”
But he was too late.
The monitors went white with light, blinding them. An instant later, the noise of the explosion erupted through the speakers. Chaos and screams followed. When the scene revealed itself again, they could see only smoke, but as the smoke drifted, they could see the bodies of good men on the ground.
45
Serena studied the closed door to Cat’s bedroom from where she sat. She hadn’t knocked. She hadn’t gone inside or listened at the door. It was nearly midnight, and she wanted more than anything to know whether the girl was still there. Either Cat was asleep in bed, or she’d slipped out her window to go to Curt’s party.
If Serena got up and opened the door, it was like admitting that she would never really trust Cat to do the right thing.
She was sitting at the dining room table of their cottage, papers spread around her. Phone records. Calendar printouts. E-mails. She’d been there for hours, working her way through the chain of events the previous Tuesday at the marathon headquarters. Somewhere in all the people coming and going from the building was the person who had disconnected the street camera. Hours later, someone had placed the bomb inside the Duluth Outdoor Company shop.
For all the research she’d done, for all the phone calls she’d made, she had to admit to herself that she was nowhere close to finding a lead. Nothing leaped out at her. The sheer volume of visitors inside the marathon headquarters that day made it almost impossible to identify a likely suspect. All she could do was go down the list name by name and number by number.
Her phone, which was sitting on the table, buzzed. She picked it up and saw that Jonny was calling.
Her husband.
A smile crept onto her face, but when she answered and heard him tell her what was going on, her smile vanished. She closed her eyes. A quiet moan of anguish escaped from her throat.
“How many?” she asked.
“Two dead, eight injured,” he said.
“Do you need me there?”
“No. I’ll be home when I can.”
She could hear the sheer exhaustion in his voice, and she wished she could help him and hold him. It wasn’t just the days without sleep. It was the weight of violence. It was the hopelessness of one man pushing against a glacier.
“I love you,” she murmured.
“I love you, too.”
Then she was alone in the silence of the cottage again. She couldn’t work anymore. She got up from the dining room table and went into the great room, where she sat in the red leather chair by the fireplace and stared into space. The lights were low. The room was warm. Part of her wanted to sleep, but she couldn’t. Part of her wanted to drink, but she couldn’t do that, either. Part of her wanted to believe in God, but judging by all the evidence around her, God had left the building.
She’d run out of anger. She was numb, and that was the scariest thing of all.
People never changed.
Then the door to Cat’s corner bedroom opened. Cat, the most beautiful teenager Serena had ever seen, padded in her bare feet into the great space. Her chestnut hair was mussed, and her face was full of sleep, with no makeup, not that she needed any. She wore her usual roomy pink nightshirt. It had a stenciled slogan on the front: PRISONER OF LOVE.
“Hey,” Cat said. “You still up?”
“Yeah.”
Serena couldn’t stop herself. She began to sob. She’d never been the kind of person to cry, but she cried, anyway. Cat, her face alarmed, ran across the room and slid to the carpet in front of her.
“Serena, what’s wrong?”
Serena shook her head. She could have said that everything was wrong. There was absolutely nothing right with the world. And yet that wasn’t the truth. She didn’t know how to explain that she wasn’t crying because she was sad. She was happy. It made no sense at all, but in the midst of everything, at that moment, she was happy. Cat was still there. She hadn’t gone out.
“Do you know what I’d like right now?” Serena asked.
“If I had to guess, chocolate,” Cat said.
“That’s exactly right.”
Cat grinned and got to her feet. She disappeared toward the kitchen, but a moment later, when Serena looked up, Cat stood in the dining room doorway. She leaned her head against the frame. Her face was serious.
“You thought I was going to go to Curt’s party, didn’t you?” she asked.
Serena smiled. Cat was always a step ahead of her. It was scary sometimes.
“Honestly? I had no idea what you were going to do.”
“Honestly,” Cat said, “I didn’t know myself.”
“So why didn’t you? Because you thought I didn’t want you to go?”
“No.” The girl smirked. “You know that wouldn’t have stopped me.”
“Then why?”
Cat shrugged. “Because I’m someone else now. I decided I like this person better.”
She turned around with a swish of her brown hair and headed for the kitchen, where they kept the chocolate. Serena could hear the girl singing softly to herself, but she didn’t recognize the song.
WEDNESDAY
46
Khan woke up at dawn in the parking lot of Grand Casino Mille Lacs.
Following Malik’s instructions, he’d headed west out of Duluth in the darkness and made his way via back roads to the town of McGregor. His plan had been to turn south there, but when he spotted a Highway Patrol vehicle near the intersection, he’d gone straight for another fifteen miles to Highway 169. Then he drove as far south as the town of Onamia on the shore of Lake Mille Lacs.
Despite the late hour, dozens of cars had dotted the casino parking lot. He’d dec
ided there was safety in numbers. He found an empty spot between an SUV and a vintage Cadillac, and he closed his eyes. The uncomfortable space made it hard to sleep, and when he did drift off for short stretches, he dreamed of Malik. It was a pleasant dream, about the old days, but when he woke up in the morning, he remembered that his friend was dead. Even from a mile away, he’d heard the explosion and felt the ground vibrate under his feet. He knew that Malik was gone.
There was nothing else to do but run.
Now it was a new day. Sunrise hadn’t come yet; it was time for fajr. If he went inside the casino to pray, he would attract unwanted attention, so he started up the Taurus and backtracked half a mile north to a wayside rest by the lake. It was deserted. He parked and found a grassy spot near the pier, and he performed his morning ritual the way he had every day of his life since puberty. Normally, it brought him peace, but not today. He’d never felt lonelier or farther from Allah. Even the refuge of prayer had been stripped from him by the horrors of the past three days.
The morning was still young. He needed to be in Minneapolis by ten o’clock, and the city was only two hours to the south. Staying here, by the water, was the safest thing to do, so he rolled down the window and waited. The time passed slowly, as if every second were a kind of torture. He wondered if anyone was looking for him yet. He didn’t know how long it would be before the world realized he was still alive. It didn’t matter. As far as Khan was concerned, he was already dead.
By seven in the morning, he decided it was time to leave.
He had one stop to make, so he drove back to the casino and parked near the entrance. He was conscious of the numerous cameras and security personnel, so he kept a baseball cap planted low on his head and his face down and his hands in his pockets as he went inside. No one paid attention to him. He threaded his way through the slot machines, dismayed to see so many old people frittering away their retirement money in a kind of bored trance. His throat tightened as he passed through clouds of cigarette smoke.
He found a shop where he bought a razor and shaving cream and several other items, and he took the bag with him to the restroom and locked himself inside a handicapped stall that included its own mirror and sink. He ran hot water and inhaled the steam.
Khan stared at his reflection. He’d had a beard since he was sixteen years old. Ahdia had always loved his beard and how neatly he kept it trimmed. Pak had asked him how old he would have to be to grow his own beard. Khan fought back tears, bathed his face in shaving cream, and slowly used the razor to cut away his beard until his chin was smooth. He only nicked himself once. He washed his face and then used a pair of scissors to shorten his hair and give himself a higher forehead. When he was done, he didn’t even recognize himself in the mirror.
He was a stranger. A new man for a new life.
Leaving the bathroom, Khan realized he was hungry, and he didn’t know when he was likely to eat again. With his disguise in place, he felt more comfortable being around other people. The casino’s breakfast buffet was open, so he got a table and overloaded a plate with eggs, spicy potatoes, and cut fruit. However, when the food was actually in front of him, he found that his appetite was a mirage. He ate a few bites without enthusiasm and then put down his fork. He drank half a glass of orange juice, but the acid unsettled his stomach.
There was a television in the restaurant. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from the morning news. He was the star of the show, and he was dead. His awful driver’s license photo was on the screen, and when he saw it, he looked down, certain that everyone in the restaurant was staring at him. But no one was. They didn’t recognize him. When he looked again, he saw the scorched aftermath of the events in Woodland. Burnt grass. Broken windows. Twisted metal debris. He saw the photographs of the police officers that Malik had murdered.
His heart was sick.
Two tables away, he heard an elderly man mutter, “It’s always Muslims.”
Khan wanted to scream. He wished he could go to the man and shout, “Yes, Malik did a terrible thing, and I hate him for it! Yes, he disgraced the religion that I cherish! But what about my wife and child? Who mourns for them? Who gets justice for them? I did nothing to anyone, and now my whole life, everything I love, has been stolen from me. Who will give it back? Who even cares?”
He sat in the chair, staring at his cold food, and said nothing. The old man got up and left. No doubt he was going back to his lucky slot machine. Khan wondered if the man had a wife who was still alive. He tried to swallow his own bitterness. Sooner or later, we all end up alone.
The face of a friend filled the television screen. It was Haq Al-Masri, doing a live interview. Haq had the thankless job of mourning the loss of innocent lives while separating Islam from the violence done by Malik in its name. No one listened or cared. Khan thought about the last time he’d talked to Haq, when they’d shared their concerns about Malik. They’d laid out a plan: Separate him from his friends in Minneapolis; keep him away from the online recruiters; try to cure the disease in his heart. Khan knew what people would say: You should have turned him over to the authorities. But it wasn’t that easy. Malik was a friend; he was practically family. And it was impossible to know what was mere talk and what was a real plan that would leave police officers dead on the burnt grass.
He heard the reporter ask Haq, “Did you know Khan Rashid?”
On television, Haq’s face was full of sadness. “Yes, I did. The man I knew could never have perpetrated this atrocity. Not Khan. If it really was him, then it was the act of someone who’d lost everything. If you push an innocent man past the breaking point, sometimes he breaks.”
Khan couldn’t listen anymore. He was done with this life. He paid his check and stood up to leave—to drive south, to meet up with Malik’s friends in Mill Ruins Park and be smuggled somewhere new—but then everything changed for him. He turned his back on the television, but as he did, he heard a new voice. A voice he recognized. A voice that was like the roaring of a train in his head.
He swung around and walked to the television and stared up at the face on the screen.
Dawn Basch.
In that one moment, all his anger and hurt suddenly had a focus. Dawn Basch came to Duluth, Dawn Basch sowed hatred, Dawn Basch spread poison, and now that poison had cost him everything. Without her, Malik would be alive. Without her, the police officers in Woodland and in the Forest Hill Cemetery would be alive. Without her, Ahdia and Pak would be alive, and Khan’s life would still be what it was before. Innocent. Perfect.
She was the cause.
She’d made it all happen.
She was Satan.
Khan felt a murderous passion in his heart like no emotion he’d ever experienced. The transformation rolled over him like a tidal wave. The old Khan was gone; the man in the mirror was someone new. He had died, but now he was reborn with a purpose. Every man needed a purpose.
Ahdia and Pak are dead. Who mourns for them? Who gets justice for them?
I do.
He stalked from the restaurant. His breath was loud in his ears, blocking out every other sound. He was conscious of the weight of the gun that was still secured under his belt. It didn’t seem strange or fearful now to hold a gun. To point a gun. To pull the trigger and wreak havoc.
Khan got into the Taurus. He made the engine roar like a snorting bull.
To the south was Minneapolis, freedom, and a new life.
To the north was Duluth and Dawn Basch.
Khan turned north and sped away.
47
On Wednesday morning, they found the Bug Zappers van.
Maggie bumped her Avalanche over the curb as she parked outside a boarded-up storefront on First Street. She climbed out and dropped down to the grease-stained, cobblestoned pavement. The still, sticky air gave her face a sheen of sweat. She crossed to the four-story U.S. Bank parking ramp that took up most of the opposite block. She trotted up the steps to the roof, where she found Max Guppo waiting next to the van. One
of their uniformed officers had identified the vehicle an hour earlier.
“Morning, Max,” Maggie murmured, stripping off her sunglasses. She matched the license plate on the panel van to the photo from the SuperAmerica gas station and confirmed that this was the same van Travis Baker had used to fill up multiple gasoline cans.
“Morning,” Guppo replied, chewing on a peach scone that left crumbs in his mustache.
They were both grim. It had been a bad night and a bad stretch of days. Maggie put her hands on her hips and squinted at Lake Superior through the haze. Her lips bent into a frown.
“Do we know how long the van has been here?” she asked.
“I reviewed the ramp cameras with the security staff. The van entered the lot yesterday evening at about eight o’clock.”
“Was Travis Baker driving?”
“Yeah. Kid looked scared to death.”
“Anybody else in the vehicle?”
“No, he was alone. Two minutes after he pulled into the ramp, the cameras caught him on the sidewalk outside. He headed south on First Street on foot. I added what he was wearing to the BOLO.”
Maggie did a circuit around the van. “The truck’s clean. Not a speck of dirt on it. Travis was trying to cover his tracks.”
“Yeah, but check out the paint near the rear tire on the driver’s side,” Guppo told her.
She squatted and examined the chassis between the left rear tire and the tailpipe. She saw what Guppo had seen. An inch of white paint was bubbled and blackened, as if scorched by fire.
“He set off the blaze a little too close to the van,” Maggie concluded. “Flames licked the paint.”
“Looks like it.”
“Kid’s lucky he didn’t blow himself up.”
Maggie walked to the rear of the van. She cocked her head and assessed the vehicle. Something didn’t look right. “Does this thing look lopsided to you?”
Guppo came and stood next to her. “Little bit, yeah.”
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