Jenssen, yawning Aldrich, and Nouvian all mumbled their good-nights and quietly retired to their rooms.

This was Gersten’s cue to hand them off to DeRosier and Patton. Gersten’s own room was one of the last ones at the far end of the twenty-sixth-floor hallway. She heard cello music from Nouvian’s room as she passed, and could easily picture him sitting on the bed, astride his instrument, practicing in his underwear. She imagined the rigors of practice were a balm to him, a man whose life was predicated upon routine. She bet he practiced every night before bed. Gersten had glimpsed his visiting wife earlier, a mouse of a woman who could not have looked any more shaken if her husband had died.

Gersten carded in, unclipped her shield and her weapon, and set everything on the nearest countertop, then went back to double-lock the hotel door.

She kept the lights low, unpacking her toiletries by the bathroom sink, then running water to fill the tub. She checked her phone for messages and then, finding none worth listening or responding to at that moment, shed her clothes. She tossed them onto the made bed, where they lay almost in the form of a fractured person. She pulled a plush white Hyatt robe down from the closet and put it on, and sighed. Nothing like soft, laundered cotton.

She switched on the bathroom fan for white noise, wanting to block out everything for a while. Steam from the hot water drifted up to the dimmed ceiling lights like morning mist. She turned off the faucet when the tub was nearly full, but instead of submersing herself immediately she remained seated on the edge. She ran her hand through the surface, tracing a series of lazy figure eights. The humidity moistened her hands and face. She had been looking forward to this bath for so long, but now . . . now that it was here, it didn’t feel right. She made waves in the tub with her hand, hoping this was just a momentary hesitancy, trying to convince herself just to get in . . .

. . . but it was no good. She couldn’t do it. Instead, she stood and went back into the hotel room, wandering to the windows. The twenty-sixth floor was not quite high enough for a commanding view of the city, but she could eyeball the building across the street, the people moving in its windows, and all the cars and pedestrians below.

They were the ones keeping her from her relaxing bath, she realized. The people on the street, out and about on a hot Friday night in July. The people Gersten wanted to be.

She went back to her phone, checking again for messages. So difficult to unplug. She hoped for something from Fisk, something to engage her restless mind. She really wanted to call him, but she would only be a bother at this point. She opened her laptop on the workstation desk, but there wasn’t anything productive she could do.

Sometimes she hated this job she loved.

She looked at her clothes, the empty person they described, lying atop her bed. She thought about her future with Intel, her future with Fisk. Where was she going?

She was essentially happy, if not totally fulfilled. Just like all those people out on the streets tonight, she realized with a smile. Things felt right, both personally and professionally. Was that enough?

She realized that these are the thoughts that occur to people stuck alone in hotel rooms on weekend nights.

She found that she was twisting her robe belt into knots, and made herself stop. She returned to the window, like a prisoner hoping for inspiration. After this weekend, she promised herself, she would make some decisions. She would map out a plan. She would define her aspirations and act accordingly.

But right now she was too concerned with the immediate future of those down on the street below to do much of anything.

Out there, somewhere, was the man they were searching for.

Part 6

Intercepts

Saturday, July 3

Chapter 27

Bin-Hezam showered, shaved, and was dressed in his dishdasha by 6:00 A.M.

He had consulted the prayer time website for New York City before departing Riyadh. Fajr was at 6:03. He unrolled his rug and reveled in the holy connection of Salah, which he shared at that very moment with a billion and a half of the faithful around the world.

Yet, among those billion and a half, he felt the special light of God shining down upon him alone.

When he was finished, Bin-Hezam rolled up his rug and dressed for the day. Stonewashed blue jeans, a short-sleeved black cotton pullover, a loose-fitting dark blue nylon Windbreaker, and black Adidas sneakers. He had stowed the pistol, ammunition, and shoulder holster in the closet safe in his hotel room. The combination was set to the month and year of the birthday of Mohammed: 04570.

Bin-Hezam still had plenty of time to fulfill his duties before returning to his room by Dhuhr at 12:35. Too much time, almost. He wanted to act, not to think. Time had slowed down on him. Things would seem different near the end, of this he had been warned. And so he tried to submit to the strange experience, rather than resist it. But it was more important to him than ever that he not miss prayer and the moment of communion that gave him strength.

When he was ready, he left his room, rode the elevator down to the lobby alone, and exited the hotel, turning right on Twenty-eighth Street. The heat was there early, but not the humidity—not yet.

On that early weekend day, the flower shops were just opening, the proprietors carrying buckets of ornamentals to the sidewalk in order to exhibit their wares. The narrow crosstown street was a canyon of bright colors and fragrant aromas. His senses were wide open, almost as though filters that had been present during daily life were now removed. He was more alive than ever. He moved and the world seemed to move with him.

Bin-Hezam stepped inside a coffee shop. He did not feel a need for food, but he knew he must eat. He pointed out a single pastry in the display under the front counter, and watched to be certain that the clerk grasped it with a wax napkin. He purchased a hot tea as well and paid cash. Bin-Hezam was aware of two surveillance cameras, one aimed at the clerk and the cash register for the purpose of theft reduction, the other on the high wall behind the counter, aimed at the customer.

With practiced self-consciousness, Bin-Hezam was careful not to look straight at the camera. He would let it find him. He was relieved to not be wearing any disguise today.

He found an open table near the stand containing packets of sugar and stirrers, and sat. He pushed the flaky croissant into his mouth, no butter, no jam. He did not look out the window at the passersby, because he did not want to attract the attention of those who might look in. Nor did he make eye contact with those sitting around him. Bin-Hezam imagined himself to be the focal point of the room; the rest were minor figures, like anonymous extras in a film. He was performing, in a way.

Only one thing pierced the haze of his solipsism. It was a television screen mounted at a downward angle from the ceiling. The sound was low, and only occasionally audible.

Following another weather update addressing the weekend heat wave, they showed more footage of the airplane Bin-Hezam had flown aboard. Then video of the five passengers and the flight attendant who stopped the hijacking, standing before cameras like patients undergoing a painless yet intimate radiological medical procedure. They showed the jet again, this time on the ground at Newark. They showed passengers disembarking.

Bin-Hezam watched in apprehension, half expecting to see his own passport photograph on the screen . . . but then the report ended and they did not show him.

He deduced from the graphics that what he was watching was in fact a teaser for a forthcoming in-studio appearance by the group of heroes the media were calling The Six.