Kiss Her Goodbye

3

D — E-A-T-H.

A five-letter word for crossing over.

Donovan was trying to pencil it in when A.J. spun the wheel and took a turn at high speed. The Chrysler’s tires groaned beneath them, the shift of force pinning Donovan against the passenger-side door.

“Easy, Hopalong, you’re messing up my perfect penmanship.”

A.J. grunted and took another turn, this one only slightly less severe. A.J. never said much when he drove. Especially if he was in a hurry.

The call from Sidney Waxman had come in at 9:15 a.m. The Madison Street branch of Northland First amp; Trust was normally a ten-minute drive, depending on traffic, but with the siren on and the bubble flashing, A.J. swore he could make it in under five. That meant two to go, give or take, allowing Donovan just enough time to polish off this bitch of a crossword he’d been struggling with all morning.

Donovan was seriously addicted to crosswords. Every workday started with a glass of grapefruit juice, a sharp No. 2 pencil, and the Tempo section of the Trib, where the checker-box monstrosity was nestled among the art reviews and horoscopes.

Working the puzzle prepared him for the day ahead. Sharpened his mind. Unfortunately, he was notoriously bad at solving the damn things. So bad, in fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually finished one.

But he was close this time. Very close.

“Four blocks and counting,” A.J. said, breaking his silence. “If I push it, I can beat my own record.”

Donovan glanced up from his newspaper. “Why settle for silver when you can grab the gold?”

A.J. grinned and punched the accelerator, a man with a mission, living life on a perpetual caffeine high. Donovan was only a dozen years his senior, but working next to a live wire like A.J., he sometimes felt like a very old man.

Of course, that might have something to do with all the pain and aggravation he’d managed to pack into his thirty-nine years. Both parents were dead. His sister had committed suicide when he was seventeen. And his wife and kid-make that ex-wife and kid-barely knew he was alive. Donovan wasn’t quite sure how or when he’d let it all slip away, but he had and felt guilty because of it.

Actually, guilty was too mild of a word. What he really felt like was an A Number One shitheel and held no illusion that either wife or daughter would disagree.

The only part of his life Donovan really had a handle on was the job. He’d been a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives long enough to consider it a lifetime commitment and had spent ten years prior to that with the Chicago PD. He was a rising star in a vast federal bureaucracy and, so far, hadn’t managed to disappoint.

There was always tomorrow, of course. Or the rest of today, for that matter. But Donovan had enough confidence in his abilities on the job to ignore the failures of his personal life and approach the future with optimism.

Cautious optimism.

A.J. turned a corner. “You think we’re looking at another snipe hunt?”

“Sidney says it’s the real thing.”

“Doesn’t make any sense. Why would Gunderson take down a bank?”

Donovan shrugged. “I stopped trying to figure out that asshole a long time ago.”

Alexander Gunderson was another puzzle Donovan had yet to solve. The task force he headed had been formed specifically to investigate a local arms-trafficking ring with suspected ties to a nationwide network. The deeper they dug, the more Gunderson’s name had come up. So Donovan kept digging and was introduced to the organized anarchy of a small but potentially destructive new militia organization: the Socialist Amerikan Reconstruction Army.

S.A.R.A.

Gunderson was its founding father.

The group’s recent stockpiling activities had put them squarely on Donovan’s radar screen. Yet despite his insistence that they be taken seriously, both the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security considered a ragtag band of malcontents hardly worth their time. They were too busy scooping up olive-skinned bogeymen and carting them off to Guantanamo for a round of zap my privates.

Donovan knew different. With all the weaponry Gunderson had accumulated, the guy was capable of doing just about anything.

But a bank job?

A.J. was right. It didn’t make much sense. Unless, of course, Gunderson was vying for more attention. Something he seemed to crave.

“Home stretch,” A.J. said. “Twenty seconds to spare.”

Shooting through an intersection, they made yet another quick turn that had Donovan gripping the armrest. Why A.J. never took the straightforward route was beyond him. With a sigh of resignation, he dropped the crossword to the seat next to him. No way he’d finish it now.

Up ahead loomed the forty-story building that housed Northland First amp; Trust, the carnival already in motion. Patrol cars formed a barrier near the bank’s front doors. The street had been blocked off; a throng of rubberneckers had lined up behind long wooden sawhorses, anxiously awaiting the big showdown. News vans struggled to find a place to perch that was within camera range. A SWAT van sat at an angle several yards behind the patrol cars. Standard procedure meant a platoon of sharpshooters already occupied various sweet spots in neighboring buildings.

Gunderson or not, Donovan didn’t envy whoever was inside that bank.

Waxman and the local SWAT commander were waiting for them as they pulled up next to the van. Donovan swung his door open, climbed out. “Sing to me, Sidney.”

Waxman and Donovan had come up together through the ranks of the ATF, and Donovan had long considered him his best friend.

He was also a damn fine agent.

“It’s him, Jack. Gunderson, the missus, and two shooters in ski masks. Video feed was cut right after they made entry, so we’re flying blind.”

A.J. joined them as they crossed toward the barrier of patrol cars. “He make contact?”

Waxman shook his head. “Not a word.”

Donovan shifted his attention to the SWAT commander-a barrel-chested guy with a neatly trimmed mustache. “What about hostages?”

“We’re estimating as many as thirty. What’s this asshole’s story, anyway?”

“Just another pretty boy looking for attention,” A.J. said.

Donovan gestured toward the bank. “Any way out besides the front doors?”

“Not without a sledgehammer and a whole lot of elbow grease. We’ve shut down the elevators and sealed off the lobby. There’s a fire door in back, but it doesn’t connect directly to the bank. He’s boxed himself in.”

“Trust me,” Donovan said. “He went in, he’s figured a way out.” Gunderson always had an angle. The trick, of course, was figuring out what it was before he had a chance to use it.

They crouched low as they reached the patrol cars, taking position behind them. A.J. aimed a pair of field glasses at the front doors.

Like those in the windows, the blinds were drawn shut.

“Visibility stinks,” he said. “Shooters don’t have a prayer.”

Donovan pulled his cell phone from a pocket of his flak jacket. “Let’s see if he’s in a talkative mood.”

He punched in the number for dispatch and had the operator patch him through to the bank. He had never considered himself much of a negotiator. Found it difficult to buddy up to these scumballs. But if it meant getting the hostages out of there alive, it was worth a shot. Maybe he’d get lucky and Gunderson would tip his hand.

He thought about that a moment and almost laughed out loud.

What’s an eight-letter word for fat chance?