MANHUNT

CHAPTER 1

Alexander Cage hung to the shadows. The tree branches were bare overhead, and the cold bite of December had given way to a somewhat milder January. It wasn't
hot, but at least the wind chill factor had vanished.
He had been waiting now for forty minutes. His getaway motorcycle, a red Suzuki Bandit was propped against a tree trunk, and he hoped he looked inconspicuous. This
wasn't the time for a cop, any cop, to get over conscientious. Across the Avenue, parishioners were starting to leave the Monday services, and Cage's cool grey eyes narrowed as he spotted the man he had been waiting on leaving the cathedral. He knew the man's routine to a tee, and he smiled coldly as the man approached across the Avenue, cutting across to where he had hurriedly parked an hour before. His victim was a staunch Roman Catholic and a daily celebrant at church services.
A shudder passed through Cage's body.
This was one of the guys, he thought. The man responsible for the death of his father - Lieutenant Jack Cage. His thoughts shifted to his sister, and as he thought of her, another deep shudder shook through his thin body. Yeah, this guy would pay, he thought. He deserved to pay. He was a cop, a pillar of the community, but his past hid a dark secret, and Cage knew what that secret was.
The blackmailer's information had been very good. The information he had sold to Cage had been well worth the price. Two hundred thousand green ones. Cage had paid the man without question. Well actually, with a lot of questions.
He was a man who despite his upbringing in a string of orphanages had made good on his life, and he had matured into a somewhat successful young man. He had won a university scholarship, which threatened to elevate him into a successful society.
He had straightened as his target had left the gothic style church and took the steps outside the church. He knew the history behind Saint Patrick's cathedral. History was his forte. History had won him his scholarship.
He knew that the cathedral had been built in 1858 by Archbishop John Hughes to replace the old Saint Patrick's Cathedral, which was still in use today as a parish church. He knew that it was the seat of the archbishop of the city, that the American Civil War had delayed the building project during the war years from 1860 to 1864, and that work had resumed in 1865, with the doors opening in 1879. Archbishop Michael Corrigan added the towers and began work on the east addition, including the Lady Chapel. Since then additional works had been carried out under the tutelage of different archbishops, and Cage knew that the entire Cathedral could seat roughly 2,200 people. He knew that the spires rose 330 feet from street level, and he knew that within, the deceased archbishops of New York were buried in a crypt under the high altar, the galeros of their cardinals hanging from the ceiling over their tombs. It was the kind of place that one felt a sense of peace and prayer and was certainly not the place to engender feelings of murder and revenge, and yet the man lounging near the getaway motorcycle was harbouring such notions. It was what prosecutors would have labelled cold-blooded murder, premeditated murder, murder in the first degree.
He grinned at his own knowledge.
His aptitude for history had been spotted at an early stage. The year after he had started his scholarship he had gone on a trip to South East Asia, and he had researched what had become his first historical tome - a novel detailing the intricacies surrounding the Vietnam War. Perhaps that had raised his public profile enough, that Werner had sought him out. Werner had sold him the dope on his father. He had travelled the length and breadth of the narrow country that lay alongside the South China Sea. He had taken to wearing a Vietnamese conical hat, he had travelled by sampan out to Ha Long Bay with its mysterious islands, and he had lost his virginity in a back alley in Ho Chi Ming city, formerly Saigon.
Cage thrust himself away from the tree he had been leaning against as his target came close. He had removed his helmet so that Sinnott could see his features.
Sinnott stopped dead when he saw him.
The resemblance between father and son was uncanny.
Cage's voice was cold. "You know who I am?"
Sinnott nodded, wishing he wasn't wearing such a heavy overcoat, wishing he had easier access to his regulation issued glock in his shoulder holster beneath his heavy winter overcoat. He could see that Cage was armed. Sinnott licked his suddenly dry lips.
"Listen," he began.
"No," Cage snapped. "You listen, cop. This is the end of the line for you...do you know how many years I've been waiting for this?"
"The blackmail?" Sinnott managed, his voice strained. Harsh.
Cage smiled coldly. "No," he said. "If you had kept paying him, I might never have known. But you all decided to stop, so he came to me."
"He sold you the dope?"
"Yeah, cop."
"And now you blame me for your father's death?"
Cage didn't reply.
His gun came up.
Sinnott swallowed hard and his green eyes blinked. He had talked down guns before. His hand made a move closer to his own weapon. "Wait," he warned, "it wasn't like that...you don't understand...you have to understand?"
Cage fired.
The shot wasn't fatal; it caught Sinnott in the throat, choking off his entreaties to the younger man, making him cough instant blood. He felt himself going down. He was only slightly aware that Cage was still firing at him, the second, third and fourth shots were killing shots. Shots to the face and head. Cage emptied his gun, ignoring the shouts of alarm from across the street.
Coolly he put his helmet back on, snapping the visor down, and thrusting his weapon back beneath his jacket. He took a final look at his victim, the leg of the dead cop twitching spasmodically, and mounted his Bandit.
He revved the engine high and squealed away. Downtown.
Nobody stopped him.

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