We walked away.
“What the hell are you doing, Mike? How can you make a promise like that?” Emily said under her breath as we headed down Wall Street toward the Stock Exchange entrance.
“Easy,” I said, shrugging my shoulders. “If things go south, I won’t be around for him to yell at me.”
Chow met us at the security barricades and briefed us a final time while we walked through the maze of steel.
“Everything is in place,” he finally said, stopping by the Exchange’s door. “The rest is up to you two.”
Emily and I passed the metal detectors in the huge empty lobby. We walked silently, thinking our own thoughts as we stepped down the hall.
“Good luck, Detective Bennett. This works, I’ll buy you dinner,” Emily said as I stopped by the door that led to the balcony stairwell.
“Hope you brought your American Express card, Agent Parker,” I said as she continued on, heading for the trading floor. “Because if this works, I’m planning on about fifteen before-dinner drinks.”
Chapter 94
COMING DOWN THE hall, Parker was grateful for the speed with which all this was happening. There was no time to think. Which was good. If she’d had to think about things, she knew she’d be walking in the opposite direction.
A couple of Stock Exchange cops were crouched by the last security station, staring through the window of the entrance to the trading floor. Parker badged them.
“Where is he?”
A couple of brokers cringing behind the trading desks whispered loudly.
“Watch it, lady. That guy’s nuts.”
“He’s got a gun,” a pudgy white guy with thinning black hair told her.
She stepped out into the space.
“You actually thought you’d get away with it, didn’t you, shit for brains! Yes, I’m talking to you, scumbag!”
“Who are you?” Mooney called over the microphone.
“Me? I’m a moral person who went to work today,” Emily screamed. “You, on the other hand, are a common murderer, a killer of children, a serial killer, and probably a pervert.”
“Hey, lady!” one of the brokers said. “Shut up! You’re going to get us all killed!”
“I am not!” Mooney yelled.
“I am not!” Emily said, mimicking him. “Who are you kidding? You got off on killing every one of those kids.”
“Those kids, as you call them, were worthless, useless. They deserved to die!” Mooney screamed. “Their parents should have educated them better. Should have taught them the importance of being human.”
“Oh, you’re teaching all of us humanity?” Emily screamed. “My mistake. I thought you were just killing children!”
Chapter 95
CHECKING MY WATCH, I knelt down next to the tactical “mouse hole” the HRT guys had already made into the hallway wall to avoid the explosives. At the top of the narrow stairs, I unscrewed the fluorescent light and laid it down carefully on the dusty, worn marble tiles and slowly opened the door.
About twenty feet away with his back to me, Mooney stood at the front railing of the balcony with his captives, yelling down at Emily. Between us, dividing the balcony in half at an angle, was a five-foot-wide stripe of bright sunlight that fell from the Stock Exchange’s front window. I stared at the light intently for a moment before I opened my mouth.
“Francis! Over here! Hey, don’t listen to her!” I called to him.
Mooney swung around toward me, angry and confused. He shook the detonator at me.
“You’re sneaking up on me? Try something, and I’ll do it!” he screamed. “Right now. I’ll do everyone! Where are the fathers? Why is no one listening to me?”