NYPD Red

Chapter 90



RICH, POWERFUL BUSINESSMEN always have an exit strategy, Gabriel thought as he raced down the steps toward the stern. In Shelley Trager’s case, it was the Zodiac Bayrunner, a fifteen-foot yacht tender with a sleek, fire engine red fiberglass hull and a forty-horse Yamaha outboard engine. At about twenty thousand bucks a pop, it was the rich man’s dinghy, and Trager, of course, had a small fleet of them.

Two were waiting for him at the swimming platform. He untied one, slid it into the water, and got in, taking care not to do anything stupid that might get his cell phone wet.

The evening light was picture-perfect, bouncing off the wake of the yacht as it slowly pulled away from him. But the statue was still too far in the distance. He had to get closer.

He started the Zodiac’s engine and, with about a hundred feet between him and the yacht, followed her, cupping one hand to his forehead to block out the sun. With both eyes fixed on Liberty Island, he waited for the perfect shot.

“O beautiful, for spacious skies,” he half talked, half sang. But he was so wrapped up in the visual that he wasn’t even aware of the sound track.

The first bullet snapped him out of his reverie. The gunshot rang out, instantly followed by the cracking of fiberglass as it bounced off the hull.

“It’s a rigid inflatable, you idiots,” he yelled at the two cops standing on the swimming platform of Trager’s boat. “You think you can sink this baby like it’s a rubber raft?”

Another gunshot. And another.

He crouched low in the Zodiac and yelled over the gunwale. “Keep shooting, a*sholes. You’re only making this movie better.”