An FBI agent adjacent to Uzi’s right shoulder slumped forward as the crackle of a sniper rifle rang out.
“Shooter!” DeSantos said, then grabbed Vail and started moving down the stairs as he craned his neck in all directions to get a read on where the shots were coming from. “See anything?”
“Came from the east,” Uzi said as they headed toward the massive Duffy statue. “Agent was right in front of me, facing west. Entry wound was through his back.”
“Hope you’re right, Boychick.” They moved around to the side of the replica Duffy, using its breadth as a shield.
Russo squeezed in beside them on the edge, keyed his mike, and reported the sniper’s suspected location.
“All these Hercules teams and no snipers?”
“The teams make people feel safe,” Russo said. “A show of force. But no, we don’t deploy snipers unless we get a specific threat. Even if we could put a hundred sharpshooters on buildings in high profile areas of the city, no one wants to live in a police state. And the mayor—”
Another two shots, and a couple of cops, who were trying to get a better angle to locate the gunman, fell to the pavement.
“Body shots,” Uzi said, peeking around the edge. “Whoever’s up there knows what he’s doing.”
On Russo’s radio command, a number of emergency service unit officers and uniformed cops from the NYPD’s substation at the south end of Times Square headed into the surrounding buildings to lock them down and begin a search.
Vail moved to the far end of the statue and craned her neck, stealing a look around its edge, searching the buildings. Raindrops plunked into her eyes and she blinked them away.
“Gotta be a roof,” she said. “Windows don’t open.”
Uzi moved slowly around the edge and then pulled back. “There’s only one possible twenty, given the angle of the shots. Above the Sbarro, maybe nine or ten stories up. Otherwise, it’s just billboards, lights, and electronic signs — or the angle’s all wrong or the building’s too high.”
Vail and DeSantos inched around the front of the statue and looked at the area Uzi had described.
“I see him,” DeSantos said, then ducked back. “You’re right.”
“Do we have a clear shot?”
“Tough angle, but it’s possible.”
Where’s Russo? Vail texted him the sniper’s location. But another rifle blast rang out and a cop who was attempting to cross to the other side of the street went down. Goddamn. I’m not waiting for Russo’s guys to get this asshole. “Let’s take a shot.”
“That’s not funny,” DeSantos said.
Russo’s text came back:
esu and hercules en route sit tight
“Hercules is coming to save the day.”
“Again, not funny.”
“No, the Hercules team. They’ve only got submachine guns so I’m guessing they’re getting rifles and double timing it over here. ESU’s coming too,” she said, referring to the NYPD’s SWAT equivalent. “We don’t have time to wait. I say we put this bastard down.”
“With handguns?” Uzi asked. “From this range? Against a sniper rifle? Soon as we clear the cover of the statue, he’ll pick us off. Just like the others.”
“I did something like this with Delta Force,” DeSantos said. “He’s sighting through his scope. If he’s not looking at us when we expose ourselves — which would be a hell of a coincidence — he won’t see us till it’s too late.”
“And if he does happen to be looking our way?”
DeSantos shrugged. “He won’t be able to hit all of us. And he may not even hit any of us.”
“Sounds like an awesome plan,” Uzi said, the sarcasm thick as he drew out the word “awesome.”
“This can work,” Vail said.
Another shot, this time striking a young female pedestrian a block away who had not taken adequate cover. Her torso absorbed the hit, then she fell to the ground in a heap.
Uzi turned away from the downed woman and faced Vail. “Okay. I’m in.”
“Who’s the best shot?” Vail asked.
Uzi and DeSantos simultaneously said, “Me.”
“Men.” She shook her head. “Hector, still using that canon?”
“Yep,” he said as he attached a sight to his .50-caliber Desert Eagle. “Now outfitted with a Leupold scope.”
“Sorry, Uzi. His is bigger.”
“Hey, a .50-cal with a scope? All yours, Santa.”
“Do me a favor,” Vail said, “and get him before he gets us.”
DeSantos checked the Leupold, then held his Desert Eagle in both hands between his thighs, pointed at the ground.
“On my mark.” Vail peered around the edge. A few seconds later the shooter revealed himself, sighting through his scope for another victim.
“Got him,” she said. “Mark!”
DeSantos swung out into the open and squared himself as Vail and Uzi came out firing. Before the cacophony of gunshots ended, the sniper tipped forward over the edge of the building and tumbled face first to the pavement, passing the Broadway billboard ads for Phantom and Wicked.
It did not take long for him to touch down.
22
They stood over the suspect’s prone body, a stream of blood leaking into the street and joining rainwater running off into a nearby sewer. The drizzle persisted and had dampened Vail’s hair, making it frizzy. Her hands were starting to freeze.
But she hardly noticed. Rather, the image of the man free falling from the building had dominated her thoughts, bringing back memories of another high profile terror attack she was once involved in.
“Pretty clear what he was after,” Uzi said.
The comment drew Vail from her reverie. “What?”
Russo joined them, three Hercules teams alongside him. They fanned out and brought their rifles up, searching the surrounding rooftops through their scopes.
Russo craned his neck to the spot where the sniper had been perched. “Nice shot.”
“Lucky shot,” DeSantos said.
“Shoulda waited.”
“Couldn’t,” Vail said. “Seconds counted. He wasn’t stopping till we stopped him.”
“You think this was all about me?” Uzi asked.
DeSantos knelt down and carefully moved the shooter’s jacket with the back of his hand, searching his pockets. Russo pulled out a glove and handed it to him.
“Maybe,” Vail said, “given what’s written on that note. But I think there’s more to it than that. Like why they didn’t set off a bomb. And why they used the murder of that woman to send you a message. And why they chose to do it here.”
“Which is?”
“Times Square isn’t just a public place, it’s high profile.”
“High profile doesn’t quite cut it,” Russo said. “We had a discussion about this in our counterterrorism briefing last month. Based solely on tourists, Times Square is the number two attraction in the world behind the Las Vegas Strip. It gets over 130 million visitors a year, a bit more than Disneyland and Disney World. It don’t get more high profile than this.”
“We got security footage?” DeSantos asked.
“Oh, yeah, plenty a cameras. I’m sure we’ll have this goon on film on at least one a them. I’ll see what we got.” Russo pulled his phone and walked off to make his call.
“You okay?” Vail asked.
“Hmm?” Uzi was staring at the body, then pulled his gaze away. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m — whenever someone takes a shot at you and kills someone else instead, you feel kind of guilty. Responsible.”
“I don’t have to tell you that’s ridiculous.”