Badge of Evil Read Free Page B

worshipped. And one of them, the American, worked part-time at an Islamic bookstore just down the street.
    Pennetta briefly huddled with an ESU captain. Everyone was in position and ready to go when Brock and Pennetta walked into the building. The A-team was on the stairs and lined up in its stack—the neat, single-file formation they’d use to enter the apartment. The first two cops in the stack carried the heavy ram to boom the door. Cops called it the key to the city. The next two cops, one carrying a bulletproof, Plexiglas shield and the other armed with an MP5 fully automatic, recoilless submachine gun, would be the first inside.
    These two-man units were referred to as bunker teams, and there were three of them in the stack. If the suspects were armed and ready, the first bunker team would take the big hit for everyone else. Brock was the shooter in the second bunker team. The last guy in the stack, called the doorman, was responsible for covering the apartment with an M4, a long, penetrating rifle, to make sure no one got in or out. Pennetta would handle overall command from the hallway, out of the line of fire, where he’d be ready to deal with any contingency and call for backup, the bomb squad, or the EMTs.
    Pennetta took a last hard look at Brock, who had moved into position in the stack. The commissioner, psyched and energized again, couldn’t read his stare. He assumed it was expressing anger and left it at that. He didn’t want any distractions. After a few moments, Pennetta motioned to everyone to turn off their walkie-talkies. All communication from this point forward would be hand signals until they were inside the apartment. Then he gave the sign that it was showtime.
    The cops moved quietly up the stairs to the fourth floor. The stack formed on the hinge side of the doorway to apartment 4C. Brock licked his lips a few times and tried to keep his breathing slow and even. All of the training, the months of surveillance, the hours of planning and preparation, would now come down to a precious few minutes. Pennetta winked at the doorman, who then tapped the guy in front of him on the shoulder. Each cop in succession then tapped the next guy until it reached the first man in the stack. It was like lighting a human fuse.
    THWACK. The night’s silence was quickly, jarringly broken as the heavy apartment door was rammed and knocked to the floor. The bunker teams moved in rapidly.
    â€œPolice, get down. Police, get the fuck down,” the first cop inside screamed. “Two perps right, doorway straight ahead. Two perps on the right, doorway straight ahead.” The suspects were moving around, one behind an open sofa bed and the other across the living room by a big easy chair and a television. The apartment was dark and messy. There were clothes and papers on the floor; takeout containers were strewn all over a table in the living room.
    â€œStay the fuck down, you hear me? I said don’t move. Not a fuckin’ whisker,” the cop barked as he and his partner moved deeper into the apartment. There was a kitchen on the left that was empty. As the cops inched their way past, they could see a small table with three chairs and a pile of dishes in the sink.
    When Brock crossed the threshold and moved inside, the warm, stale air hit him immediately. He had his MP5 locked on the two men in the living room as he scanned the surroundings. The third bunker team was now also in the living room. Just as the cops reached one of the bedrooms in the back, where three more suspects were holed up, the words rang out like a piercing siren.
    â€œGun! Gun! I got a fuckin’ gun!” Everything suddenly moved at hyperspeed, like a souped-up video game. The deafening bursts of MP5 gunfire filled the small space with as much noise as a jet engine. Flashes of flame-hot blue and red from the gun barrels lit up the dark space like strobe lights. As Brock pointed his weapon and squeezed his