The 19th Christmas (Women's Murder Club #19)(31)

She blew out a long, exasperated sigh, returned to the rear of the van, and threw herself down in the bunk against the wall.

How was she supposed to calm down?

On the one hand, freedom. On the other hand, jail.

She put a T-shirt over her face and was counting backward from a hundred when Corey thundered down the length of the van.

“Get up,” he said.

“Get up please. Mr. Loman called?”

Corey was standing on the bunk, rummaging in duffel bags in the overhead cabinet.

“Here,” he said, handing her a semiauto pistol. He grabbed one for himself, jammed a second into his waistband. He tugged open the blackout curtain.

A line of vehicles came up the road from behind them, some stopping along the sagging chain-link fencing across the street. An SUV with its headlights off sped up and passed their van. She couldn’t see where it went. A fire truck stopped, backed up, parked behind them.

“What’s happening?” she shouted.

No answer from Corey.

Megan could just make out men in dark clothing clambering out of vehicles. She saw long guns.

Corey’s face was next to hers; he was also looking out at the swarm of activity on Donahue. Then, bellowing commando-style, he ran toward the front of the van.

Had he wigged out completely? What was he doing? Were they going to run?

Glass shattered.

No, no, no, no.

Megan Rafferty’s life wasn’t supposed to go this way. Christ.

Am I about to die?





CHAPTER 41





“SHE WAS CRYING when I left the house,” Conklin shouted over the scream of the siren.

“Another night and I’m not home for dinner and cannot say when I will be home.”

He was driving.

I was bracing myself against the inside of the door and standing on imaginary brakes in the footwell as we followed Octavia Boulevard onto the ramp for 101 South. The skyline winked on our left, and ahead of us cars peeled off into the right lane, getting the hell out of our way.

He said, “She gets that this isn’t my choice. She respects what I have to do. But she doesn’t like it.”

“Do you need a note? I can vouch for you.”

Conklin laughed. It was an ironic, tired little laugh, but there was mirth in it.

I made a mental note: If Rich and I survived the night, the four of us—Joe, Rich, Cindy, and I—should treat ourselves to a first-class outing. Something to look forward to.

My thoughts jumped back to the matter at hand and the “hot Loman tip” that had launched our Code 3 response out to Hunters Point. Information had come from one of Brady’s own CIs that Loman was sending a caravan of transport vehicles to an unknown target—tonight. That the targeted hit would be big. According to Brady’s informant, two people in a dark-blue 2009 Chevy transport van that was part camper, part arsenal would be spearheading a heavily armed assault team and would join the rest of Loman’s crew at an unknown location. We had no clue about what we were about to walk into.

We had some background on Corey Briggs and his partner-girlfriend, Megan Rafferty.

Briggs had done time for a home invasion and petty larceny and for possession with intent. Rafferty had been arrested for possession, sent to court-ordered rehab, then released. The pair had found each other and were now living in a housing project in this predominantly low-rent, high-crime area under redevelopment.

Not the pair I would have pegged for criminal masterminds, but from what we knew about Loman, he needed henchpeople he could manipulate.

As other cops headed out to banks, a museum, and the art gallery, my partner and I were assigned to the takedown of a pair of small-time criminals with big-time aspirations.

SWAT commander Reg Covington and his unit were waiting for us on Donahue, a low-traffic side street near the replacement housing. Covington’s unit would approach covertly in unmarked vehicles.

My partner and I were only four miles out, and he was concentrating on his driving. We got off the freeway, followed the signs to Cesar Chavez Street, and slowed as we approached the stoplight at Evans.

Adrenaline had burned off my fatigue and focused my mind. I didn’t think about home, bed, Julie, Joe, or Gloria Rose. I thought about my partner. And I hardened my nerves for whatever shit-storm was about to come down. I hoped we could bring these two nobodies in alive.

I hoped we could head off a bloody heist and get our hands on Loman.

Commander Reg Covington’s voice came over the radio. He had located the dark-colored van two hundred yards up Donahue Street, right-hand side, registered to Corey Briggs. He told us to kill our lights. His team would isolate and launch an assault against the van, with our car bringing up the rear.

“Boyle will wait for you and hand off the first aid,” Covington said.

Conklin hung a squealing right around the bend where Evans becomes Hunters Point Boulevard, and we slowed for local traffic, then crawled for a mile along Innes Avenue, bordering the construction site. I stayed in radio contact with Covington and he guided us in.

Four miscellaneous trucks and SUVs, one small all-terrain fire truck, and Conklin’s old Bronco converged on the dog-grooming van up ahead.

Everyone involved was heavily armed.





CHAPTER 42





AT OUR SWAT commander’s direction, Conklin eased the Bronco onto Donahue and braked halfway down the stretch of pitted asphalt bordering the bulldozed site.