Stephen replaced the pistol in his book bag and pulled out his knife. “You going to help me?”

A no-brainer, of course. If Jodie didn’t help he’d be dead in sixty seconds. And he knew it.

“Okay.” He extended his hand.

Stephen ignored it and asked, “How do we get out?”

“See those cinder blocks there? You can pull ’em out. See, there? It leads to an old tunnel. There’re these delivery tunnels going underneath the city. Nobody knows about them.”

“There are?” Stephen wished he’d known about them before.

“I can get us to the subway. That’s where I live. This old subway station.”

It was two years since Stephen had worked with a partner. Sometimes he wished he hadn’t killed the man.

Jodie started toward the concrete blocks.

“No,” Stephen whispered. “Here’s what I want you to do. You stand against that wall. There.” He pointed to a wall opposite the doorway.

“But he’ll see me. He checks in here with his flashlight and I’ll be the first thing he’ll see!”

“Just stand there and put your hands up.”

“He’ll shoot me,” Jodie whimpered.

“No, he won’t. You’ve got to trust me.”

“But . . . ” His eyes darted toward the door. He wiped his face.

Is this man going to buckle, Soldier?

That is a risk, sir, but I’ve considered the odds and I think he won’t. This is a man who wants money badly.

“You’ll have to trust me.”

Jodie sighed. “Okay, okay . . . ”

“Make sure your hands are up or he will shoot.”

“Like this?” He lifted his arms.

“Step back so your face is in the shadows. Yeah, like that. I don’t want him to see your face . . . Good. Perfect.”

The footsteps were coming closer now. Walking softly. Hesitating.

Stephen touched his fingers to his lips and went prone, disappearing into the floor.

The footsteps grew soft and then paused. The figure appeared in the doorway. He was in body armor and wore an FBI windbreaker.

He pushed into the room, scanning with the flashlight attached to the end of his H&K. When the beam caught Jodie’s midriff he did something that astonished Stephen.

He started to pull the trigger.

It was very subtle. But Stephen had shot so many animals and so many people that he knew the ripple of muscles, the tension of stance, just before you fired your weapon.

Stephen moved fast. He leapt up, lifting the machine gun away and breaking off the man’s stalk microphone. Then he drove his k-bar knife up under the agent’s triceps, paralyzing his right arm. The man cried out in pain.

They’re green-lighted to kill! Stephen thought. No surrender pitch. They see me, they shoot. Armed or not.

Jodie cried, “Oh, my God!” He stepped forward uncertainly, hands still airborne—almost comically.

Stephen knocked the agent to his knees and pulled his Kevlar helmet over his eyes, gagged him with a rag.

“Oh, God, you stabbed him,” Jodie said, lowering his arms and walking forward.