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I pictured the van going up in a fiery explosion forty feet froe ofbaby-duck yellow, beating her spoon on the table Would I ever see her again?

Just then the white van’s passenger door opened and J juh a bullhorn boomed, “Don’t move Hands in the air”

J ignored the warning

He ran across the four lanes and reached the concrete guardrail He looked out over the edge He paused

There was nothing between him and the road below but forty feet of air

Shots were fired

I saw J jump

Rich shouted at me, “Get down!”

We both ducked below the dash, linked our fingers over the backs of our necks, as an explosion boo us hite light

That sick bastard had detonated his bomb

THREE

RICH AND I sat parked in the no-parking zone outside the terhth of a mile from the airport terminals

We had seen J jump from the departures lane to a service road and knew that he had detonated his vest before he hit the pavement

We had tried to guess what he had been thinking Our current theory was that he hadn’t wanted to be captured He didn’t want to talk

Conklin said, “Maybe he figured ju vehicle, like he was in a Jackie Chan movie”