Robert Tanenbaum - Counterplay

“For the sake of love, I forgive you,” the Pope said smiling and stroking a loose lock of hair from the man’s face. “Now, for the sake of your soul, confess your sins and ask for God’s forgiveness. But I want you to know that He has not turned his face from you. Indeed, He has a place for you and the woman and child.”

Those watching turned away as the man confessed to the Pope. They knew it was over when they heard the pontiff call for holy water to perform last rites for the man.

They were all distracted by the appearance of a SWAT team that had entered from the rear of the cathedral leading a bloody-faced female prisoner and followed by two priests. Marlene recognized the woman as Nadya Malovo and that bringing up the rear were Father Mike Dugan and “Father” Yvgeny Karchovski.

“You wouldn’t have had anything to do with the reason St. Patrick’s is still standing,” Marlene asked Yvgeny as she was joined by her husband and Ned.

The tall Russian held out his hand, which contained a key. “Let’s say it was a close call,” he replied.

Yvgeny had been with Dugan, who he’d discovered in a broom closet into which both had ducked when the hostage crisis began. Leaving the older priest behind, Yvgeny had discovered the room where three terrorists were monitoring the bank of security cameras and hovering over an electronic panel he recognized was the computerized detonator. On the desk next to the panel was a small box with a key, which he believed would be turned to arm the bombs set in the cathedral.

Yvgeny had returned to Dugan, and they’d been trying to formulate a way to take out the team when they heard Nadya Malovo shouting at the men. It was apparently a pep talk.

Are you prepared to strike a blow for Islam? the Russian double agent had asked.

Allah akbar, the men yelled in reply. We will die for Allah!

As Malovo left the room, she’d rolled her eyes. But then caught sight of a priest at the end of the hall. He ducked to the left as she pulled her gun; she couldn’t chance that someone would survive who might endanger her own escape plans.

Malovo raced to the end of the hall and was about to turn left when she heard a voice behind her. Good evening, Major Malovo, or is it Colonel now? She whirled, ready to shoot, but the man intercepted her gun hand with a grip like iron, then with a simple backward twist, broke her wrist, which sent the gun clattering to the floor.

Malovo looked up into the face of Yvgeny Karchovski. She recognized him just as a fist the size of a small ham struck her in the face, knocking her back and to the floor.

Yvgeny began to follow but was driven back by a shot from one of the men who’d emerged from the room down the hall. It gave Malovo a chance to scramble for her gun. She grabbed it with one hand and began to stand up, intending to finish off the man who could identify her to the authorities for who she really was, but found herself looking into the face of the first priest and, for the second time in a matter of seconds, at a fist on its way to her face. This time, she was knocked unconscious.

Dugan kicked the terrorist’s gun across the hall to Yvgeny who picked it up just in time to shoot the man advancing down the hallway. Leaving Dugan to watch over Malovo, Yvgeny had raced back down the hall to the room just in time to hear a woman’s voice on the radio shouting to detonate the bombs. His first bullet went through the temple of a man reaching for the key to arm the bombs; the remaining bullets stopped the second man from reaching it as well. He retrieved the key to keep it safe, just as the SWAT team came in through the back.

“I think it’s time for this ‘priest’ to fade into the woodwork,” Yvgeny said to Marlene. He winked at Butch and said, “Good luck, cousin,” and left just as Jaxon arrived.

“Are you all right?” Karp asked his wife.

“No,” she said. “My daughter’s with Andrew Kane.”

Karp turned to Jaxon. “Do you have a helicopter outside?”

“Yes. What’s up?”

“Is there room for the three of us and you?”

“I think so. Want to tell me what you have in mind?”

Karp started running down the aisle, ignoring the pain in his arthritic knee. “I’ll explain on the way,” he said. “But I’ve got a bridge to cross.”

Kane stood with Lucy just inside the entrance to the Columbia University boathouse just to the north of Baker Field to get out of the rain that had begun to fall with an accompanying rise in the wind. Lying just outside the door like a useless sack of potatoes was Clay Fulton, his wrists bound behind his back.

They were awaiting the arrival of two speedboats that would carry them up the Harlem River, beneath the Henry Hudson Bridge, through Spuyten Duyvil and past the Amtrak bridge to the Hudson. There they would be met by a larger boat that would take them up the Hudson-the least likely place for cops to be watching.

When he’d formulated the plan, Kane had expected that everyone’s attention would be focused on the devastation of St. Patrick’s Cathedral and the death of the Pope, as well as a couple thousand others, including Butch Karp. And the plan had continued to go smoothly from the moment the doors on the ambulance had closed and they were beyond the police barricade.

Then Fulton had sensed something when the ambulance pulled over to the curb, but when he went for his gun, he found himself staring down the barrel of “Agent Hodges’s” 9 mm Beretta. I’m afraid you have the misfortune of finding yourself at my mercy again, Detective.

Kane! Fulton exclaimed.

Yes, indeed, Kane replied. And these gentlemen with the rifles pointed at you-and I might add just in case you’re feeling heroic, at Lucy-would like you to disembark now. We need to get ready for a little boat ride.

They’d all loaded into a couple of vans, which had driven to the apartment building across from Baker Field. There Lucy had been given another shot to wake her up while they waited for a call that the speedboats were at the boathouse dock.

When Kane got back to the apartment building, he’d been in a great mood. He was free, immensely wealthy again, and had brought ruin and despair to his enemies.

However, his mood had blackened when the dirty, bald man with the bulging eyes stepped out of the shadows of the stairwell outside the building. Master, he said, weeping and reaching out for Kane. I’ve come to warn you.

Warn me about what, you filthy pig? Kane said, backing away from the man’s hand. Two of his al Qaeda bodyguards moved between them.

They know Dickens! the man cried.

What?

Dickens! They know Dickens! “Thus, cases of injustice, and oppression, and tyranny, and the most extravagant bigotry, are in constant occurrence among us every day.” They know these things about you and are coming! the man cried, the smell of his rotting teeth wafting over Kane.

Who’s coming? Kane had asked in spite of himself, wondering at the same time, Do I really want to know this?

Who? the man asked as if he’d thought the answer was obvious. Who? Why, Karp, of course. He fell to his knees, groveling as he wept.

Karp, of course. The three words sent a shiver up Kane’s spine and formed a cold, tight fist in his stomach. “Shoot him,” he directed the bodyguard closest to the man.

He’d hoped the quick, terrified scream followed by two silenced shots would make him feel better. But the knot was still in his gut when he entered his apartment and turned on the television, expecting to see St. Patrick’s Cathedral in ruins and his nemesis Karp dead. Only to his incredulous eyes, the church was still standing and, as the broadcaster cheerfully reported, The Pope is safe!..Two terrorists have been captured, but most are dead, as are an undisclosed number of civilians. Another newscast indicated that New York District Attorney Butch Karp, as well as his wife, Marlene, plus several unknown civilians, are credited with stopping the terrorists and rescuing the Holy Father…