The Cutting Edge (Lincoln Rhyme #14)(123)

Nobody responded. She picked up a stone and flung it at a second-floor window—the first-story windows were, like the basement, protected by gratings. The projectile shattered a pane. If anybody was inside, they didn’t notice or chose not to respond.

Yes, this was the target. She could smell the gas now.

“Evacuate!”

No response.

Looking around, she noted a line of cars parallel-parked across from the building. She noted a Lexus and other nice vehicles too, in addition to some more modest wheels. If Agent Carmella Romero knew anything, it was cars. She walked up to the Lexus and kneed it hard in the front fender, denting the metal. The alarm began braying.

She passed by the Taurus and a Subaru. But slugged a Mercedes and an Infiniti. Horns sounding fiercely.

Windows began opening. On the top floor of the building, Romero noted a woman and two small children looking out.

“Get out! There’s a gas leak!”

Her uniform apparently added authority to the command. The woman disappeared fast. Several others appeared in windows too and she repeated the command in English and Spanish.

Romero looked up and down the street. No Bomb Squad yet. No other police.

Six minutes now.

The front door was opening and people were running out. The smell of gas was very strong. She held the door and encouraged them to run, as she shouted loudly into the dim hall, “Gas leak, gas leak! Evacuation. The building’s going to blow!”

If even just three-quarters of the apartments were occupied, there had to be at least twenty or thirty people remaining inside. Some asleep maybe, some disabled.

No way to get them all out.

A deep breath. Carmella Romero, flashing on Commissioner Selleck, ran to the basement door. She descended the rickety stairs on her thick, sure legs. Her nose tightened at the rotten-egg smell of the gas odorant. A wave of nausea hit her.

The basement was damp and dim, the only light from the grated windows in the front, small ones, above eye level. It was hard to see anything at all, let alone a tiny device on a gas line, which was probably intentionally hidden from sight. But there was no way she was going to click a light on.

Thinking: We’re looking for bombs in basements; they damn well could’ve issued us flashlights.

Four or five minutes left, she guessed.

There seemed to be three rooms down here, large rooms. The one in the front, where she stood, was mostly for storage. A fast examination revealed wires overhead and sewage pipes but nothing that seemed to carry gas. The second room contained the furnace and water heater, dozens of pipes and tubing and wires. The smell of gas was stronger here. Romero was growing light-headed and felt about to faint. She jogged to a window, shattered a pane with her elbow, took a deep breath and returned to the second room, searching among the labyrinth of pipes and tubing for the device.

She glanced toward the water heater but noted that it was electric. She found the furnace. The unit was hot but wasn’t running at the moment. Of course there’d be a pilot light or some kind of ignition device. Apart from the bomb that man had planted, the heating unit itself might turn on at any moment, igniting the gas. She found and pressed the emergency cutoff switch.

Dizzy once more, she dropped to her knees. Apparently natural gas was lighter than air and was rising to the ceiling; there was more breathable air down here. She filled her lungs again, fought the urge to gag, and then rose. She located the furnace gas feeder hose and followed it to the incoming pipe. It was about one inch in diameter. In one direction it disappeared into the concrete wall. In the other, it continued into the third room. She hurried there and, after debating, flicked on the flashlight of her phone.

No explosion.

She played the beam along the pipe, to where it disappeared behind a dozen boxes and other items stored by tenants: rolled carpets, battered chairs and a desk.

One minute remaining, she guessed.

She heard voices calling from the open window, behind her. Ignored them.

No backing out now.

Blue Bloods…

She swung the light from right to left and, yes! There it was! A small white plastic box taped to the gas line. Beneath it a half-inch hole gaped and gas hissed out.

She lunged forward, scrabbling over the mountain of furniture and boxes. She had no real plan, other than to rip the box from the line. Maybe then spit on the leads. Pull the battery out, if there was a battery. She’d sprint for the window, throw it out.

Now with the images of different faces in her head—her late husband and the most recent addition: twin grandsons—Carmella Romero ripped the device from the line and sprinted toward the stairway.

Only seconds later, as she was looking down at the device, noting it had no switch, it uttered a snap, almost silent, and a flash of blue flame filled her vision.





Chapter 66



Amelia Sachs sped the Torino Cobra around the corner to Front Street.

She braked to a stop quickly, as the entire avenue was packed with fire and other emergency vehicles.

Climbing out, she hurried to the ambulance where a solid woman, Latina, in a uniform, sat on a gurney.

“Agent Romero?” Sachs asked.

The woman, being tended by a male NYC medical technician, squinted.

“Yes?”

Sachs identified herself and asked, “How are you?”

Traffic Enforcement Agent Carmella Romero, in turn, asked the medical tech, “How am I?”