48
A Beer Outdoors, October 2016
O’Rourke’s men were in position outside the door of the box. He noted the logo of one of the Vikings’ sponsors on the frosted glass. Two men stood ready with the little battering ram, three others behind them with weapons trained on the door, the lights on the gun barrels lit.
“Kilo and Lima are ready,” he whispered into a walkie-talkie.
O’Rourke breathed slowly as he waited for a response. Could feel in his pulse that this was the good kind of tension, on the right side of being nervous. It brought a strange feeling of safety to know that he was so alert. They were totally prepared for just about any eventuality. On the other hand, they could never know exactly what lay in store for them. But that was what he loved about the job. The combination of the intoxication of control and the thrill of the risk. It was like fucking and being fucked at the same time.
Then Springer’s voice was coming through the walkie-talkie.
“Alpha. Do you have to use stun grenades?”
“Have to,” said O’Rourke.
“We’re worried that might create panic in the stadium.”
“Tell the band to play louder.”
“Nothing plays louder than a stun grenade, and the flashes of light will be visible all over the stadium. Sixty thousand frightened people. You see what I’m getting at…”
O’Rourke saw all right. Not using stun grenades would deprive them of a tactical advantage and increase the risk of loss. On the other hand, nothing SWAT did was free of risk, and if only one man had been observed in there then the risk was acceptable. His decision was easy.
“Okay then, we go in without the stun grenades,” said O’Rourke.
—
Brenton Walker stood in a corner watching Springer talk into his walkie-talkie while the female member of the mayor’s own security team explained the situation to Patterson. Walker’s phone rang and he saw it was Myers calling. He pressed Decline. Seconds later the phone gave a slight tremor, like a shudder. He read the text message:
Gomez is a white man, 58, real name Mike Lunde.
Walker tapped the Call symbol and Myers answered before he had raised the phone to his ear.
“I found Gomez’s body,” she said. “He’s been flayed. Mike Lunde has been using his face as a mask.”
Walker—who liked to think he was capable of calm in moments of crisis—heard his own response, explosive and involuntary:“What?”
“Lunde is a taxidermist. He’s left his house and he’s carrying a rifle, that’s about all we know. I’m on my way to the stadiumnow. JTTF have people working around the clock on this who can locate a photo of Lunde and send it to you.”
“Good, JTTF are here.”
“Okay. So the name is Mike Lunde, address 1722 Erie Avenue, Chanhassen.”
He hung up at the same time as he heard Springer speak into his walkie-talkie:
“Okay, let’s go, Kilo.”
—
O’Rourke followed directly behind the five who went in front. By the time he was around the corner they had already surrounded the man sitting alone at the table and were pointing their automatics at him. The man’s eyes were wide and black with fear, his mouth was open and his hands raised, though no one had given him the order. In front of him on the table was an open beer bottle with a label that O’Rourke knew identified it as a local brew, an Utepils. In a cabinet with a glass door behind the man he saw several more bottles of the same beer. O’Rourke wasn’t sure if it was the bottle or the look on the man’s face that told him right away this was neither a sniper nor a terrorist. But rules were rules, so he nodded to his men and they took up position behind the chair in which the man sat. They lifted him up, laid him on the floor on his stomach and handcuffed him. O’Rourke squatted in front of him.
“Where are the others? Tell me right now or we’ll blow your head off and say you attacked us.” The routine empty threat was delivered without its usual conviction.
“What?” the man stammered. “I’m on my own. I’m the janitor here. I’ll pay for the beer, I promise!”
—
Walker stood beside Springer and listened to O’Rourke’s voice over the walkie-talkie. The band had stopped playing, and nowthere were a few whistles from the crowd as a clearly impatient Patterson kicked his heels at the exit.
