“What does that mean?” I demand. “Some kind of code? Religious thing?”

“Holy Cross the place,” he says, almost whining. “It’s where all of us were supposed to meet up tonight. Some shack on the corner of Dauphine and Flood.”

A late-night gathering. In a rough part of town. Inside a vacant home.

Sure sounds like a sleeper cell’s latest safe house.

And there’s a damn good chance they’re meeting there right now!

I push Angus to the ground and race back to my car.

Holy Cross is a neighborhood in the Lower Ninth Ward. Only six or seven miles from here. If I’m lucky—yeah, I know, not likely—I can get there in fifteen minutes, tops.

I yank on the handle and fling open the door—when I’m instantly blinded by the two-thousand-lumen blaze of a police spotlight.

I hear tires screeching to a stop, doors popping open, feet hitting the ground.

“FBI!” comes a shout. “Freeze! Show me your goddamn hands!”

CHAPTER 65

I can be a cocky son of a bitch. But I’m no fool.

I stop and thrust my “goddamn hands” high into the air.

Then I yell back at the feds, “You’re ten minutes early!”

No response from the assembled lawmen. But my eyes are starting to get used to the harsh spotlight. This must be what it’s like to be a rock star on stage. There are five black SUVs parked in a rough semicircle at the foot of the narrow bridge. And a ridiculous number of federal agents surrounding me.

One of them is Special Agent Marcus Morgan. He’s hunched over, his shoulders stooped. His face can be described with three simple words: tired as shit.

When he sees Angus bound with duct tape and slumped on the ground, his droopy eyes widen into saucers.

“Jesus Christ, Rooney,” he says. “You texted my office saying you were questioning a suspect. Not beating one to a bloody—”

“Get an assault team over to Holy Cross!” I interrupt. “Now! SWAT, air support, bomb squad, hazmat. Angus here just gave up tonight’s safe house. It’s at the corner of Dauphine and Flood.”

I don’t expect Morgan to start jumping for joy. But I thought he’d do more than just stand there, rubbing his temples and scratching the stubble on his cheeks.

“Did he now?” he asks. “No kidding.” Then he calls out to the others, “Hey, everybody, did you hear that? Inspector Wolfgang Puck just saved the day.”

His insult rolls right off me. But his sarcasm makes me livid.

“You think this is funny?” I yell at him. “This is the key to stopping the Mardi Gras attack!”

He sighs and twists his head back and forth, like he’s trying to loosen muscles and tendons twisted tight from staying up night after night.