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The FBI agent asked, "Who's going to do surveillance?" He nodded at the apartment. "You want to leave some of your people here?"
The implication being that the feds were perfectly happy to come along for the bust but since Galt wasn't here and probably wouldn't return--he must've heard on the news that they'd identified him--they didn't want to bother leaving their people on guard detail.
"That's not my call," the young officer said. He radioed Lon Sellitto and told him what he'd found. The lieutenant would arrange for two NYPD officers to remain on site, though hidden, until an official undercover surveillance team could be put together, just in case Galt tried to sneak back.
Pulaski then walked around the corner and into the deserted alleyway behind the building. He popped the trunk and loaded the evidence inside.
He slammed it, and looked around uneasily.
At all the metal, surrounded by metal.
Goddamn it, stop thinking about that! He got into the driver's seat and started to insert the key into the steering column. Then he hesitated. The car had been parked here, up the alley, out of sight of the apartment in case Galt did come back. If the perp was still free, was there a chance he'd returned and rigged some kind of a trap on Pulaski's car?
No, too far-fetched.
Pulaski grimaced. He started the car and put it in reverse.
His phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen. It was his wife, Jenny. He debated. No, he'd call her later. He slipped the phone away.
Glancing out the window he saw an electrical service panel on the side of a building, three large wires running from it. Shivering at the sight, Pulaski gripped the key and turned it. The starter gave that huge grinding sound when the engine's already running. In panic, believing that he was being electrocuted, the young cop grabbed the door handle and yanked it open. His foot slipped off the brake and landed on the accelerator. The Crown Victoria screeched backward, tires skidding. He slam
med on the brake.
But not before there was a sickening thud and a scream and he caught a glimpse of a middle-aged man who'd been crossing the alley, carting a load of groceries. The pedestrian flew into the wall and collapsed on the cobblestones, blood streaming from his head.
Chapter 40
AMELIA SACHS WAS taking stock of Joey Barzan.
"How you doing?"
"Yeah. I guess."
She wasn't sure what that meant and didn't think he knew either. She glanced at the EMS medic who was bent over Barzan. They were still in the tunnel beneath the Battery Park Hotel.
"Concussion, lost some blood." He turned to his patient, who was sitting unsteadily against the wall. "You'll be all right."
Bob Cavanaugh had managed to find the source of the juice and shut down the line that Galt had used for the trap. Sachs had confirmed that the electrical supply was dead, using Sommers's current detector, and quickly--really quickly--undone the wire attached to the feeder line.
"What happened?" she asked Barzan.
"It was Ray Galt. I found him down here. He hit me with a hot stick, knocked me out. When I woke up he'd wired me to the line. Jesus. That was sixty-thousand volts, a subway feeder. If you'd touched me, if I'd rolled a few inches to the side . . . Jesus." Then he blinked. "I heard the sirens on the street. The smell. What happened?"
"Galt ran some wires into the hotel next door."
"God, no. Is anybody hurt?"
"There are casualties. I don't know the details yet. Where'd Galt go?"
"I don't know. I was out. If he didn't leave through the college, he had to go that way, through the tunnel." He cast his eyes to the side. "There's plenty of access to the subway tunnels and platforms."
Sachs asked, "Did he say anything?"
"Not really."
"Where was he when you saw him?"
"Right there." He pointed about ten feet away. "You can see where he rigged the line. There's some kind of box on it. I've never seen that before. And he was watching the construction site and the hotel on his computer. Like it was hooked into a security camera."
