Джеймс Паттерсон - Target - Alex Cross

Under Coach Winston’s guidance, Damon had blossomed into a solid NCAA Division I player.

“C’mon, Damon!” Jannie cried as he dribbled in and made a nice jump shot. She whistled and clapped, and that made me happy.

My older son’s basketball abilities came late and had been hard fought for. Athletically, Damon had long been overshadowed by Jannie’s track exploits. He was the sixth man on a team ranked fifth in the Atlantic Coast Conference. She was being recruited by the top track schools in the nation.

So it was nice seeing my boy get his chance in the spotlight. It was even better seeing how much his little sister was supporting him.

NEAR DUPONT CIRCLEin Washington, DC, a man calling himself Pablo Cruz, a fit man with hawkish features wearing a Washington Nationals hoodie, jeans, and work boots, adjusted the shoulder straps of the heavy, black dry bag on his back.

He ambled down New Hampshire Avenue, then made a right on M Street. Near the bridge into Georgetown, he took a right onto Twenty-Sixth Street and went to the dead end.

Cruz glanced around before hurrying past a sign that said Rock Creek Park was closed after dark. Twenty yards downslope, he left the path, cut to his right, and peered up at the lights in the nearest apartment building, focusing on two windows on the third floor on adjacent walls of a corner.

When he got the angle on that corner right, still watching those two windows over his shoulder, he backed down the slope woods. He shuffled his feet through the leaves and wondered if his read of the city’s drainage schematics was correct.

His left heel found the edge of the corrugated drainpipe, and he smiled. Cruz got around and below it. He felt for the edge of the cover, found it, and retrieved a hammer, a chisel, and a headlamp from the dry bag.

Cruz turned on the lamp’s soft red light feature and waited until he heard a bus crossing the M Street Bridge over the park before attacking the spot welds that held the cover in place. Twenty minutes later, he pried the cover off and set it aside.

He turned the lamp off and returned it, along with his tools, to the dry bag, then sealed the bag and put it inside the drainpipe a few feet back. Then he replaced the cover and tamped it into place.

Done, he climbed above the pipe and looked at those windows on the third floor of the apartment building again. Cruz fixed the image in his mind.

He left then, angling back across the slope to the path up to Twenty-Sixth Street and telling himself he could find his way here again, even in the pitch-dark, even under the threat of death.

As both teams lined up at center court inside the Verizon Center, the overall height disparity was clearly in favor of Georgetown, then in first place in the Atlantic Coast Conference and ranked fourteenth in the nation.

The overall muscle disparity went the Hoyas’ way as well.

Georgetown’s center had two inches on our six-foot-seven pivot man, and he easily swatted the ball to one of his guards, who passed across the court to an attacking power forward, who went all the way in for a resounding slam dunk.

The Davidson players looked flat-footed in comparison to the Georgetown team. Damon was sitting on the bench when Kendall Barnes, the Wildcats’ starting point guard, took the ball.

Barnes was as quick a young man as I’d ever seen. But coming up-court and cutting to his right, he failed to pick up a Hoya defender, who slashed in and fingered the ball out of Barnes’s control.

The Hoya went the length of the court and let go with another thunderous slam dunk that threatened to shatter the backboard.

The people in the Verizon Center crowd went nuts, giving each other high-fives and taunting the Davidson players, who looked dazed. Coach Winston wisely called a time-out to try to calm his team. I twisted in my seat.

Ali said, “This isn’t David versus Goliath, Dad. It’s more like prisoners fighting lions in ancient Rome.”

Jannie punched him lightly on the shoulder. “You know too much.”

Ali shot her a superior look. “I didn’t know that was possible.”

Bree said, “Anyone hungry?”

After getting a manageable order of hot dogs, chips, and sodas, Bree got up and left just before the teams retook the court.

“Damon’s in!” Jannie said.

I looked out and saw she was right. Damon had been subbed in at guard to play opposite Barnes. Coach Winston had also replaced one of the starting forwards for a lanky true freshman from Missouri named Tanner Ott.

Barnes had the ball again. He acted as if he was going to make the same forward charge and cut right. When he feinted that way, the Hoyas bought it and shifted. Barnes flicked the ball behind him to Damon, who was set up in three-point range.

Damon received the ball, set, and sprang into his release.

“Nothing but net!” Jannie screamed before the ball even reached the hoop and swished through.

We were all on our feet cheering as Damon spun in his tracks, pumping his fist.

The Hoyas guard brought the ball up-court and tried to flick it to his center. But Tanner Ott intercepted the pass and drove the length of the court to an easy layup.

“We’re ahead by one!” Jannie cried, leaping to her feet and clapping.

That lead went to four when Damon dropped another three-point bomb, and the Hoyas called their own time-out.

Things got uglier for Davidson after that.

The Hoyas sank five straight field goals and then a three-pointer before Barnes worked to Ott, who drew a foul scoring inside. From then on, it was a real pitched battle.

Coach Winston had taught his Davidson team to use their superior speed to swarm on defense and to stay aggressive enough with their bigger opponents to draw fouls on offense. The Wildcats took a physical beating, but the free-throw shooters and Damon’s third three-pointer kept the score a respectable 43 to 37 at the half.

“I can’t believe the score’s that low,” Ali said.

Jannie said, “I bet Georgetown’s thinking the same thing.”

“Davidson has a good defense, I’ll grant you that,” Nana said between bites of the hot dog Bree had brought her.

“Think they can keep it up?” Bree asked me.

I smiled and shrugged. “I think they can consider it a victory to be only six points behind a nationally ranked team at the half.”

Ali said, “So you’re saying if they lost by twelve points, it would still be a victory?”

“Okay, an achievement,” I said.

“It is an achievement,” Bree said. “I’m impressed by their poise.”

The second half was harder fought than the first. Georgetown came onto the court trying to put Davidson away for good. But through the third quarter, the Wildcats chipped the Hoyas’ lead to four and then to one when Damon fed to Barnes, who sank from three-point land.

Two of Georgetown’s best players fouled out early in the fourth quarter. You could see the concern in the faces of the Hoyas when their coach called time-out. You could feel it in the crowd too.

The Wildcat players looked out of their minds, especially Ott, Barnes, and Damon, who was as pumped up as I’d ever seen him. Winston kept my son in the game and Damon delivered, dropping two more three-pointers, three field goals, and a free throw in the fourth quarter.

The game was tied with a minute left, and even skeptical Ali and Nana were on their feet cheering wildly for Davidson. The Hoyas scored on their first possession, an easy layup. Then Barnes fed Ott in the paint, and he laid the shot in and drew a foul.

His free throw dropped with twenty-nine seconds left. Down by one, Georgetown called its last time-out.