Kill Alex Cross

every time I opened them, I thought about what Ned Mahoney had said to me after my encounter with Glass. Or rather, everything he hadn’t said. I could feel the idea of it taking shape like a heavy ball in my chest — half dread, half adrenaline.
    If I’d understood Ned correctly, we were talking about something I’d resisted ever since I became a cop, a line I’d never crossed. But then again, maybe that was only because I’d never had to.
    What if this was the one night — the hour, the minute — that might make a difference for Ethan and Zoe? Could I live with that? And what if it was my own kids out there, I thought, or Ava, for that matter? Would I even be lying here wondering what to do?
    Of course not. In a strange way, my fight with Nana only drove that point home. I would do almost anything to save those kids.
    Finally, just after midnight, I couldn’t stare at the ceiling anymore. I sat up fast. In the dark, there are two things I always know how to find — my phone and my Glock. I reached for the phone. Dialed Sampson’s number.
    “Hullo?” he answered in a thick voice. “Alex?”
    “Sorry to wake you,” I said. “I need to talk, John. Actually, I need your help on something.”
    “No prob, sugar.”
    “Put on a pot of coffee. I’m coming over.”
    “See you in a few.”
    I threw on some clothes, splashed water on my face, and left the house.
    On the way to Sampson’s, I called Ned Mahoney, too.
    He answered on the first ring. “I thought you might call,” he said.

SAMPSON WAS ON board the minute I told him what I wanted to do. He knew I couldn’t ask outright, so he volunteered, and I was just desperate enough to accept. John is six nine, with the kind of arms Michael Vick might wish for. Plus he had exactly the skill set I needed to back me up.
    And Ned Mahoney had the tools. He was carrying a small messenger bag when we picked him up at a Park and Ride in North Fairlington.
    With twelve years on Hostage and Rescue, Ned was the break-in expert of our group. For the rest of the ride, he did most of the talking. Planning. I just drove and listened.
    By two thirty a.m., the three of us were huddled around the back door of Rodney Glass’s condo in Alexandria. It was an attached duplex with a well-lit shared driveway in front, but a lawn and pool area in the back that was all dark and closed up for the night.
    I held a penlight for Ned while he unrolled a leather kit of picks and tension wrenches, each one in its own pocket. Usually Ned’s all about the forty-pound battering ram, but he knows how to do small and quiet, too.
    Less than ten seconds after he’d angled the first pick into the dead bolt, it turned with a soft click.
    The lock on the doorknob went even faster.
    I took it from there and led the way inside. It was dark and quiet on the first floor. We stopped there to pull the black balaclavas down over our faces. Honestly, it wasn’t a good feeling. Seeing Ned and John in their masks really drove home for me what we were doing. This was nowhere I ever thought I’d be, but there was no turning back now.
    For that matter, I didn’t want to. I wanted to save those kids if they were still alive.
    We went in a line up the hall to the front of the house. The stairs were carpeted, and therefore no problem. It didn’t take long before we were standing outside Glass’s open bedroom door. I could hear him snoring and saw his outline, sleeping on his back with one arm thrown over his head.
    I signaled John to take one side of the bed. I hurried around and took the other. Mahoney stayed at the foot with his first syringe uncapped and ready.
    Then I counted it down for them on my fingers.
    Three — two —
    All at once, Glass roared awake. He rolled toward me and reached for something under the mattress, but John was already there to pull his arm back. I stuck my hand into the same place and felt the contours of a pistol. He was an avid hunter , I knew, with several legally registered firearms in his name. I left the pistol where it was.
    As soon as Sampson had him, I tore off a length of duct tape and pressed it over Glass’s mouth. Then I pushed him facedown into the mattress while John slapped a pair of speed cuffs onto his wrists.
    Mahoney was next. He knelt on the bed, flipped back the covers, and jammed a needle into his hip. Glass tried to scream from behind the tape. Then his whole body went rigid like he was being Tasered.
    The rush of adrenaline made him even harder