Easy Prey

gravel; a small rock bounced off the Porsche’s pristine hood, and Lucas groaned and said, “I’m gonna shoot your ass for that.” He moved far left, and the GTO plowed along the shoulder lane for another ten seconds and then suddenly hooked into an upcoming exit.
    Del had time to say “Jesus” before Lucas cut across the highway and barely made the ramp approach. At the top, the GTO was moving way too fast to make the corner; the driver tried, but the big car slid out of control, hit a curb while skidding backwards, bounced across a bus bench, and spun sideways into the pump pad of an Amoco station. Lucas had both the brakes and the clutch pinned to the floor, bounced across the intersection, narrowly missed a flying piece of bus bench, and finally stopped in time to see a man humping out of the GTO. He was carrying a long gun, and was headed for the gas station.
    Lucas killed the engine, and he and Del were out on the street, Del still screaming into the phone. Through the plate-glass window of the station, they could see the GTO driver pointing his gun at a woman who had her hands over her head. But he was screaming at somebody else, and a moment later, the man inside the cashier’s booth pushed the door open.
    The driver pushed the woman inside the booth and closed the door behind them all.
     
 
IN TEN MINUTES, half of the on-duty Minneapolis police department was there. Lucas talked to the man in the booth by telephone: “We know who you are, Mr. Scott. You can’t get out of there. I don’t think you want to hurt yourself or those innocent people. That’s not what you’re all about.”
    “I don’t want to talk to you,” Scott said.
    “We think it’s best to keep the lines of communication open,” Lucas began.
    “I want to talk to your negotiator.”
    Lucas looked at the phone, unsure that he’d heard it right. But he had. “Whatever you say, Mr. Scott.”
    THE NEGOTIATIONS BEGAN just before seven o’clock. Because of Scott’s fixation on a woman, Alie’e, somebody decided that they should try a woman negotiator first. That seemed to work. The negotiator and Scott had a friendly chat to establish trust, and then Scott listed his demands: a Northwest Airlines jet at the airport with enough fuel to get them to Cuba, or he’d start killing his hostages.
    “Aw, Jesus Christ,” Lucas said. He went to look at the paint job on his Porsche.
    The TV trucks began showing up at 7:10; Rose Marie was there at 7:12, with Lester two seconds behind. “That the guy?” Lester asked, looking toward the gas station.
    “That’s him,” Lucas said. “You owe me some money for a Porsche paint job, by the way.”
    “How’re we gonna get him out of there?” Rose Marie asked.
    “I don’t know,” Lucas said. “He’s locked in a bulletproof booth with about six hundred Cokes, a hundred pounds of corn chips and Hostess cupcakes, a thousand bucks’ worth of cigarettes, and a TV.”
    “Sounds like a good weekend,” Lester said.
    “As long as he doesn’t kill the hostages,” Rose Marie said. She looked around at the line of TV trucks. “You think we could get any more coverage than this?”
    “I don’t know. We might be missing the Russians or the Chinese, but that’s about it,” Lucas said.
    The negotiator was sweating. On the monitor, Scott was saying, “I know what you’re doing. You’re stalling. I’m not going to put up with it. I’ve seen this same deal twenty times; I know you’re supposed to stall. But I’ll tell you what: I know there are planes that fly out of here every day for Los Angeles and San Francisco and Hawaii, and any of those will get to Cuba. Don’t give me any of that shit about reprogramming the computers or getting gas, let’s just get me down to the airport and on the plane before I have to kill this lady here.”
    “I think we got a problem,” the negotiator said to Rose Marie.
    Del, standing next to Lucas, said, “More than one. Look at this.”
    Jael Corbeau, trailed by three unhappy cops, was marching down the street toward them. A cop at the perimeter moved to stop her, but she pointed at Lucas, and Lucas said, “Aw, jeez,” and waved her through.
    “That’s him?” she asked. She was dressed in black from head to foot: a black woolen coat, black slacks, black boots, and small black pearls at her ears. She was luminous.
    “That’s him. He’s a guy from Burnt River named--”
    “Scott. Yeah, the guys told me. Martin Scott. So how’re you