He pulled the trigger from his pocket with his good hand and rubbed it with his thumb like an amulet, a holy object.

Chapter 73

Fisk was yelling Jenssen’s name when law enforcement converged on him, stopping him before the entrance to the tunnel.

That was as far as he could go. No one entered the chute who wasn’t cleared to be on the stage. He could have persuaded them eventually, but there wasn’t enough time. Fisk backed away from the hands that wanted to restrain him. “He’s in there!” yelled Fisk, past all sense now.

Alain Nouvian, the cellist, was next to go in. He turned in alarm at what was happening, recognizing Fisk. He said to the nearest official, “That’s one of our police detectives.”

The coordinator was lost in her headphones, the ceremony’s choreography the defining principle of her life at that moment. “Go,” she told him. “Now!”

Nouvian, unsure, did as he was instructed, starting slowly into the tent, checking back over his shoulder.

Joanne Sparks and Maggie Sullivan joined the fray near Fisk, echoing Nouvian’s words. “What’s happening?” said Maggie. “Where’s Detective Gersten?”

The mention of her name gave Fisk a sudden burst of strength. He pulled away from the cops and raced around the two female heroes, in essence using them to set a pick, allowing Fisk to get free and go around the entrance to the side of the tunnel.

He ran along it, trying to guess Jenssen’s position inside. He shielded his head with his arm and cut sideways into the tunnel, bracing for impact against the unseen metal rib cage.

He struck a cross-pipe just a few inches away from a conjoined vertical post. The force of his impact ripped the blue tarp from the side bar, setting the entire tunnel wriggling like a giant blue worm.

The pipe held firm, but exposed a weakness at a connecting joint above, dislodging the frame.

Fisk fell sprawling into the tunnel, landing hard on the gravel path. He looked up fast and saw a body stumbling to the side. The dislodged pipe had struck Jenssen on the right side, nearly throwing him to the ground.

Fisk righted himself. Jenssen did not. He looked up, wild-eyed, his cast hand held out from his side, his right hand open and empty.

He was searching the gravel path around him frantically.

Fisk slipped on the gravel with his first step toward the larger man.

Five paces behind Jenssen, Nouvian stood in shock. He was looking down at something at his feet.

A small white device lay in the gravel. He started to reach for it.

It was the trigger.

Fisk yelled at him, “Don’t touch it!”

But Nouvian already had it in his hand. He straightened, examining the strange device—then saw Jenssen running at him.

The Swede let out a howl, charging the cellist like a bull.

Nouvian’s eyes saw Fisk beyond Jenssen, pointing, yelling, “No!” Then back to Jenssen coming at him.

The cellist’s eyes cleared of all confusion. As Jenssen reached him, Nouvian tossed the trigger device away, toward Fisk.

Jenssen crushed into Nouvian, driving him to the ground in an open-field tackle.

Fisk caught the trigger with both hands, receiving it as gingerly as a newly laid egg. Jenssen turned from where he was crouching on top of Nouvian, seeing that the device was in Fisk’s hands now.

He got up, then pitched hard to one side, holding his cast arm as he staggered.

Fisk saw that the Swede was near delirious with pain and panic.

Jenssen pitched himself toward Fisk, attempting another mad dash. But after a few uncertain, unbalanced steps, Jenssen stopped.

Voices echoed in the rippling tunnel now. Police were rushing toward them from the staging area. People were massing outside the tarpaulin, pressing against the fabric walls.

They were closing in. Failure was collapsing on Jenssen.

He held out his broken wrist, looking at the explosive cast. Fisk saw blood dripping off the man’s fingertips to the ground.

Gunfire now. Two rounds thumped the ground near them, tearing through the tarp.

Somebody had given the sharpshooters orders to fire blindly into the tunnel in an attempt to stop the threat.

Fisk remembered that TATP could be ignited three ways: electronic pulse, fuse, or impact.

Jenssen knew that he could not reach the trigger in Fisk’s hand in time. Now he turned, looked for the source of the gunfire. He wanted suicide-by-cop like his comrade Bin-Hezam.

Only—Jenssen wanted impact on his arm. He wanted detonation.

Fisk saw a wild thought come into the terrorist’s blue eyes. The Swede, who had killed Gersten, stepped to the side of the tunnel. There, he reared his forearm over his head.

Fisk started toward him but could not close the gap in time.

Jenssen brought his cast down full-strength against one of the metal support bars.

A massive crack . . . but no flash. No explosion.

The pain from this desperate act crippled Jenssen. He fell to his knees as though struck, holding his cast out in front of him as though it were consuming his arm.

For the moment he had lost all awareness of Fisk.

Fisk lowered his shoulder, hurling himself at Jenssen. He struck him low against his ribs, laying him out. The terrorist stared up at the wind-rippled ceiling of the tunnel. He was trying to get his cast arm up. He was still trying to detonate.

Fisk gripped Jenssen’s elbow, forcing the cast back into the terrorist’s throat. He had seen the bruises on Gersten’s neck. Fisk was choking him with his own weapon of mass destruction.

The terrorist’s eyes bulged and his lips turned blue, his mouth open, breathless.

Fisk used his free hand to reach into his pocket. Not for the trigger. He found his phone and held it before the terrorist’s dying eyes.

He wanted him to see. Gersten’s picture. Krina’s dead body.

Fisk wanted this to be the last thing Jenssen would ever see.

Chapter 74

Krina Gersten was posthumously promoted to Detective First Grade. She was buried six days later on a knoll overlooking the Verrazano Narrows at St. Peter’s Cemetery on Staten Island. Police officers from all across the city and the country attended the Saturday morning service, more than a thousand men and women in full-dress uniform.

The NYPD Pipe and Drum Band played “Amazing Grace.” Fisk didn’t hate the bagpipes. Their song was beautiful. Their plaintive cry was his cry.

The long blue line of mourners filed past the open grave and Gersten’s grieving mother. The Six—now five—attended, though Fisk tried to avoid any contact with them.

They were obviously devastated, both by the death of a person they had come to know and by the duplicity of a person they had believed to be one of them.

The flight attendant, Maggie Sullivan, was especially shaken. As was the cellist, Alain Nouvian. He was the only one who made a point of seeking out Fisk, perhaps guessing at his relationship with Gersten. Nouvian’s arm hung in a muslin sling, thanks to his scuffle with Jenssen. He had broken his hand, and his future with the New York Philharmonic was in doubt.

His status as an American hero twice over was not.

Later, Fisk shared a private moment with Gersten’s mother, following the long and emotionally exhausting tribute. Afterward he honestly could not recall a word either of them had said. The way Jenssen had felt when the pain in his improperly set arm overloaded the nerves throughout his entire body—that was how Fisk felt now. He too wished he could self-detonate.

Fisk found Dubin standing with the commissioner after the service. Fisk had been out that entire week.

“I don’t know if I can come back,” he told his boss.

Dubin laid his white-gloved hand on Fisk’s uniform shoulder. “Take some more time. You’ll come back. We need you.”