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door slammed.
    Twice more, the man opened the door, then slammed it.
    “It’s okay,” Ted said calmly. “Slide out the gun and nobody will get hurt. Do it now.” The door slowly opened.
    “Take it easy. You won’t be hurt. I promise.”
    “Don’t shoot,” the gunman croaked.
    “Slide the gun out slow, butt first, keep your hands up in front of you. You’ll be okay.”
    The man crouched, then shoved something out the half-open door. Metal scraped on concrete. He straightened up and emerged, skinny and scared, palms open in front of him.
    Ted had him spread-eagle against the wall and handcuffed in seconds. Cheers and applause rang out. I heard the whir of an automatic shutter over my shoulder. “Where’ve you been?” I asked Lottie.
    “You might have called,” she sniffed, still shooting, never taking her dark eyes off the subjects. “Luckily I stumbled on this myself, on my scanner. Just missed you at the school. Got the woman and her kids.”
    The bad guy was bundled off in the backseat of a patrol car. His weapon turned out to be a mean .30 caliber sawed-off carbine, loaded for bear.
    Residents crowded around Ted, relieved that no one was hurt. Somebody offered a beer, which he declined, though he looked like he could use one. He did accept a cigarette. He allowed the donor to light it. I was betting his own hands were shaky; mine were. I felt elated. For once, my timing had been right; everything had clicked into place. A good story. I got through the crowd to Ted.
    “Why did you handle it the way you did?” I asked him, knowing the answer but needing the quote.
    “There were women and children on three tiers of the apartment house in the courtyard behind me. If he had opened up with that weapon, a lot of them could have been hurt.”
    “How dangerous was he?”
    “He had abducted two people, Britt. He was committed to getting away. Because of that, he may have been one of the more dangerous men I’ve encountered in ten years on the department.” God bless Ted. He knew how to answer a reporter’s questions, none of that monosyllabic crap you get from some cops.
    “Last question. I saw your face when you were back in that stairwell, when it was a standoff. You were thinking about your family, your kids, right?”
    “Nope.” Ted paused, then grinned. “I was wishing I’d worn my bulletproof vest.”
    Later I sat at my desk after writing my favorite type of story for the early edition. A hero, a satisfying ending, readers happy at getting their money’s worth from a dedicated public servant, cops happy at getting good press. Lottie’s pictures helped it get prime display on the local page. What more could a reporter ask for?
    HERO COP NEVER FIRES A SHOT. RESIDENTS APPLAUD , in 60 point Bodoni. By Britt Montero, Miami Daily News Staff Writer. That’s me.
    Before going home that night, I plugged the culprit’s prior police record, which was impressive, into the story, and added a quote from the mother of the accused, who swore her boy must be the victim of mistaken identity. I was headed home, stepping into the elevator, when the city desk clerk yelled that I had a call. I sighed and turned back, determined to keep it brief.
    The caller had a tip: D. Wayne Hudson was in the hospital.
    “I’ll pass it along to the sports department,” I said breezily.
    “You don’t understand the situation,” said Rico, one of my sources, who works as an intensive care nurse.
    “How serious is it?” I asked warily.
    “As serious as you can get. His organs are about to be harvested for transplant.”
    Hudson was dead, or about to be, of unnatural causes.
    “Oh, no,” I whispered, and sank into my chair.
    Everybody in Miami knew D. Wayne Hudson. Quarterback for the University of Miami Hurricanes, all-American, first-round draft choice, led the LA Raiders to a national championship and starred for six successful seasons until knee injuries cut short his career. But he did not rest on his endorsements or