short and squat and held an automatic weapon in his hand. Petronov opened his mouth to shout something but the sound never made it past his lips. Before it had even formed inside his throat, a bullet had entered his mouth, passed through his neck, and blew out the back of his head. Petronov collapsed onto the flatbed car, remembering his wife, at last, remembering the blue and yellow dress she’d worn that first day he had seen her in the market square, the way she’d turned her head and looked at him, with the conception of a new world in her eyes.
Chapter 9
Thursday, January 27 – 6:18 PM
Queens, New York
Jerry Johnson, Decker’s boss, was furious. He had been dragged away from Otto Warhaftig’s lecture – which had been cut embarrassingly short. He’d rushed across the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge, all the way to Long Island City, without any direction from headquarters, mind you, to check out the situation personally. And he’d arrived just in time to see Bartolo being hoisted up into the Coroner’s meat truck.
Special Agent in Charge (SAC) for the Joint Terrorism Task Force in New York, Johnson was the kind of boss who believed that each mistake his agents made was a personal affront to him. He had no patience for imperfection, least of all in himself. And his penchant for intolerance had only grown worse since 9/11. The stakes were higher now, he told his men. Sloppiness was a greater enemy than Al Qa’ida. It was “the enemy within.”
So it came as no surprise to Decker when the SAC began to reprimand him publicly, in front of Williams and Kazinski, in front of Warhaftig too, as Bartolo’s body was being lifted up into the meat truck. “What the fuck happened?” Johnson kept saying.
Decker didn’t know where to begin, so he didn’t. He was pondering why meat trucks were always made to look like ambulances. No hospital could ever fix their grisly occupants.
The Coroner was anxious to get going. He wanted nothing to do with Jerry Johnson. The SAC looked as though he would lash out at anyone who happened across his path. The Coroner slammed the doors of the meat truck shut, muttered something indecipherable, and scurried back into the cab. A moment later, the meat truck disappeared around the block.
He wanted to hear it all, SAC Johnson said. Every last fucking detail. And so Decker told him. When he had finished, Johnson continued to rail. “What a fucking mess, a fucking disaster. Why didn’t you shoot the prick before he stabbed your partner? Jesus Christ. My grandmother would have handled this better. It was a simple stakeout. Mark my words, Decker, there’s going to be an inquiry on this. I ought to take your gun and badge right now. Jesus fucking Christ.”
Decker could feel himself grow angrier by the second. When he’d finally had enough, he said, “Well, perhaps, sir, if you hadn’t ordered Williams and Kazinski to attend that lecture this evening – no disrespect, Warhaftig – this might have been avoided. We were shorthanded, sir, and now I’ve lost my partner and a friend . . . ”
Johnson looked at Decker with a look of such penetrating venom that Decker felt the words stick in his throat. Decker had only just gotten out of the doghouse for sending those photographs of the PC wallpaper to Washington without apprising Johnson first.
Tall and thin, with pale gray eyes and even grayer hair, Jerry Johnson had a handsome, suntanned face, a black and gray mustache, well coiffed, and a polished nut-brown tonsure. His forehead was furrowed by meditation. He wore a jaunty brown tweed cashmere blend with natural shoulders, and a rust cravat in his breast pocket. His raincoat was Aquascutum. He cultivated the look of the 1960s British character actor typecast as “the Colonel,” home from the Raj. But his chin was surprisingly weak. It tended to slip into the warm folds of his neck and all but disappear.
Despite his affectations, Johnson had risen through the ranks with startling
Chapter 9
Thursday, January 27 – 6:18 PM
Queens, New York
Jerry Johnson, Decker’s boss, was furious. He had been dragged away from Otto Warhaftig’s lecture – which had been cut embarrassingly short. He’d rushed across the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge, all the way to Long Island City, without any direction from headquarters, mind you, to check out the situation personally. And he’d arrived just in time to see Bartolo being hoisted up into the Coroner’s meat truck.
Special Agent in Charge (SAC) for the Joint Terrorism Task Force in New York, Johnson was the kind of boss who believed that each mistake his agents made was a personal affront to him. He had no patience for imperfection, least of all in himself. And his penchant for intolerance had only grown worse since 9/11. The stakes were higher now, he told his men. Sloppiness was a greater enemy than Al Qa’ida. It was “the enemy within.”
So it came as no surprise to Decker when the SAC began to reprimand him publicly, in front of Williams and Kazinski, in front of Warhaftig too, as Bartolo’s body was being lifted up into the meat truck. “What the fuck happened?” Johnson kept saying.
Decker didn’t know where to begin, so he didn’t. He was pondering why meat trucks were always made to look like ambulances. No hospital could ever fix their grisly occupants.
The Coroner was anxious to get going. He wanted nothing to do with Jerry Johnson. The SAC looked as though he would lash out at anyone who happened across his path. The Coroner slammed the doors of the meat truck shut, muttered something indecipherable, and scurried back into the cab. A moment later, the meat truck disappeared around the block.
He wanted to hear it all, SAC Johnson said. Every last fucking detail. And so Decker told him. When he had finished, Johnson continued to rail. “What a fucking mess, a fucking disaster. Why didn’t you shoot the prick before he stabbed your partner? Jesus Christ. My grandmother would have handled this better. It was a simple stakeout. Mark my words, Decker, there’s going to be an inquiry on this. I ought to take your gun and badge right now. Jesus fucking Christ.”
Decker could feel himself grow angrier by the second. When he’d finally had enough, he said, “Well, perhaps, sir, if you hadn’t ordered Williams and Kazinski to attend that lecture this evening – no disrespect, Warhaftig – this might have been avoided. We were shorthanded, sir, and now I’ve lost my partner and a friend . . . ”
Johnson looked at Decker with a look of such penetrating venom that Decker felt the words stick in his throat. Decker had only just gotten out of the doghouse for sending those photographs of the PC wallpaper to Washington without apprising Johnson first.
Tall and thin, with pale gray eyes and even grayer hair, Jerry Johnson had a handsome, suntanned face, a black and gray mustache, well coiffed, and a polished nut-brown tonsure. His forehead was furrowed by meditation. He wore a jaunty brown tweed cashmere blend with natural shoulders, and a rust cravat in his breast pocket. His raincoat was Aquascutum. He cultivated the look of the 1960s British character actor typecast as “the Colonel,” home from the Raj. But his chin was surprisingly weak. It tended to slip into the warm folds of his neck and all but disappear.
Despite his affectations, Johnson had risen through the ranks with startling
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