And now the light goes green.
What does Big Bear do?
Luke had heard this story before, from Rico Groza, but it was a good story, and he liked the way Grizzly could tell it.
So Big Bear thinks, man, what the hell, and he floors the Caddie, absolutely buries the pedal, the big rig squats and roars and bulls right up the tailpipe of that shit-brindle Toyota, plows through the intersection with it, sparks flying and the guy screaming. Big Bear rams them both into a mailbox on the far side of the street.
Nobody hurt, but damn!
“Damn,” says Luke, seeing it.
So, long story short—hah, thought Luke; not from you—a year later, the fullness of time, yadda-yadda-yadda, Big Bear’s in court, his lawyer has him all primed with some bullshit about mechanical malfunction, momentary loss of control, pressures of life, dreadfully sorry old chap, and so Big Bear is called to the stand. The black guy’s there with his lawyer—a real Fordham switchblade, one of those bone-rack black chicks with fiery eyes, you know? A cobra with PMS, in a double-breasted suit jacket and a little miniskirt—and she’s got Big Bear on the stand—
The glass doors of the squad room popped open, and Rothgar Fiertag, one of the hundreds of Justice Department liaisons for combined-force fugitive operations, blew in on a cloud of papers and energy, followed by a gaggle of suits from the DA’s office and the attorney general’s office in Albany. Grizzly was now into his final aria.
Okay, okay, Big Bear thinks, just hold your temper, but she really gets to him, and he can feel his control going. She asks him, “And after my client had exchanged a few words with you at the lights”—Exchanged Words?—“what did you what were you thinking, as the lights changed?” She goes quiet, fixes Big Bear with her narrowed eyes, and the courtroom is all hushed, and Big Bear looks up at the judge, a bluff old trooper named Luther Tredwell, and he fixes the judge with a look, and Big Bear says, “What was I thinking, Your Honor? I was thinking, bye-bye baby!”
As he bellowed out his punch line and his big booming voice rumbled around the squad room, all the youngsters looked over at them. Rothgar Fiertag gave a weary seen-it-all headshake as he strode firmly and full of grim purpose up to the podium, where he turned, his lean gray face set and hard, silvery hair brushed straight back and curling slightly over the collar of his blue pinstripe suit, his hands splayed out on a sheaf of documents.
He lowered his eyes, glanced at the papers in front of him, and looked across the room at Luke and Grizzly—shook his head again—then looked back to the roomful of waiting men. He signaled the video tech at the back of the room.
“I want to welcome all of you to this final tactical briefing today. I know some of you from Arlington. Others I see here from as far away as Los Angeles—Bart, Dylan, good to see the DEA here—and of course Sergeant Rizzo and his men from the city Fugitive Apprehension Team, and our people from Albany and the district attorney coordinating teams, and all of you from various Marshals offices around the country. This is of course a very exciting day in law enforcement. This operation will contribute greatly to the security of our state—as you know, we in the Justice Department and our associates in the United States Marshals Service—ably assisted by local and state agencies”—a gracious aristocratic nod to the NYPD grunts leaning on the rear wall—“make over sixteen thousand felony arrests each year. Some of you here took part in Operation Sunrise in 1991—I see Luke Zitto is here—hello, Luke—you’ll all remember Luke Zitto from his courageous actions in the confrontation with Delbert Sutter in Michigan—and Deputy Marshal Dalton—you’ll have to tell me that joke after the meeting, Deputy—”
Grizzly smiled at Fiertag and said nothing. Luke had his head down, thinking about Delbert Sutter, also thinking, Goddammit, Fiertag, this isn’t a Shriners’ potluck supper here. Fiertag had done his level best to get Grizzly a permanent posting to Puerto Rico last year, after Grizzly had single-handedly busted a Bronx crackhouse and sent four dealers to Rikers in an ambulance. Fiertag liked corporate players. Grizzly was a nightmare for Fiertag. Grizzly knew it. Grizzly worked at it.
“… and I know, I want to take this opportunity, with all of us here together today, to say how badly we all feel about the death of Bill Degan. Many of you got to know Bill when he ran the Sunrise Op—I can see people here from the Boston office who worked with Bill personally—and I share your grief at the death of this fine man.”
There was a silence as the men in the room remembered how Degan had died, shot to death in Idaho in 1992, during the takedown of an ex-Special Forces soldier named Randy Weaver. Weaver, a survivalist and suspected white supremacist, had holed up on Ruby Ridge, far up in the Idaho panhandle, and refused to comply with ATF—Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms—warrants to answer weapons charges relating to possession and sale of a sawed-off shotgun. It had gone badly, so badly that there were Senate hearings proposed for the summer of 1995, at which point Luke expected the FBI and the ATF to do their usual number—lie like wild dogs and point frantically to anybody but themselves.
Fiertag let the silence run for thirty seconds exactly, timing it on his Rolex. “Well, let’s get on with this. You’ve all been briefed, you’ve all got your personal assignments. This evening Deputy Zitto’s team and detectives from the NYPD will be running a takedown up in the Bronx, am I right about that, Luke?”
Was he right about that? Christ, they’d been all over it for a week. Luke pretended to think it over, as if just exactly who they were going to chase all over hell’s half-acre up in the Bronx around midnight tonight was a matter of astrological calculations.
Luke’s Fugitive Pursuit team had been assigned thirty targets from Target Acquisition in Arlington. Tonight, they had a fink ready to deliver the location of one Elijah Olney, a Blood-associated gunrunner and serial rapist who specialized in home invasions and drive-by assassinations. Fiertag knew that very well. Maybe he loved to stand up there and be seen by everyone. Or maybe he was just a really gifted world-class buttwad.
“I believe we are running an op on Elijah Olney this evening, sir.”
Fiertag beamed at him, as if he had just answered a difficult question on unsprung rhythms in German expressionist poetry.
“Ah, yes. Mr. Olney. Good luck on that one, boys. Now, today I just want to run down the latest information from Target Acquisition in Arlington and show you a couple of recent surveillance tapes. Let’s start with the tapes. Pete, if you would. Gentlemen, this first tape is the Newark job. It was taken last Tuesday at 1400 hours. They came in through the main doors.”
Grizzly whispered something to Luke. Luke laughed once, a short sharp barking noise.
“Perhaps you want us all to wait while your capacity for undivided attention becomes fully operational, Deputy Zitto?”
Jeez. What a complete asshole.
“No, sir. Sorry, sir.”
“Fine then. Shut up. Watch.”