by Steven James
“Stop it!”
“I have to get them out.”
* * *
+++
Tessa was scared watching him and wanted him to stop, but when she edged closer, she finally saw who was trapped in the backseat of that car.
A woman.
A woman she definitely knew.
Her mom.
79
Tessa rushed forward. “Mom?”
Her mother stared dumbstruck at her, then tried frantically to get out of the backseat, beating on and then kicking uselessly at the window.
“Get back!” Timothy warned Tessa.
“Ah,” the other man said. “This is even more perfect than I could have planned.”
He leaned into the car and clicked on the ignition, then stood back and faced Timothy. “In one of your books, you wrote about a woman drowning. Now you get to see what it looks like in real life.”
He moved behind the trunk and leaned hard against the bumper.
As the car began to roll forward down the ramp toward the river, Tessa realized that he must have stuck it in neutral.
As fast as she could, she darted toward the car to try to somehow stop it before it took her mom into the East River.
* * *
+++
Thick, wandering tendrils of smoke were filling the room, making it hard to breathe. Images from earlier in the week returned to me: Mist. Our lives are only a vapor, and then they’re gone. A brief moment, and then they’re over.
I didn’t see Blake, but I did recognize this as the room where Sasha had died.
Braids of fire were snaking up the wall and across the ceiling. More flames crept toward me on the floor. The heat, in sharp contrast to the weather outside, singed my skin and forced me to stay back by the doorway.
“Blake? Are you here?”
No reply.
The room was empty.
Though he might’ve gotten away, four more doors lined the hallway.
Clear the rooms. Make sure no one else is in the building.
* * *
+++
At first, Tessa thought she might be able to get in front of the car, but it was moving too fast.
That would be stupid. They’d both die.
She went for the backseat door, but it was locked.
They were halfway down the boat ramp on that icy pavement, slick with snow. Barely keeping her balance, she snagged the driver’s door, threw it open, and scrambled inside.
“Tessa, get out of the car!” her mom shouted. “Now! Hurry!”
“I can do this.”
Tessa punched the brake with her foot, and as she did, the car began to skid sideways, sliding to the right.
Steer where you veer, she thought, something Patrick had taught her: “It won’t seem to make sense, but steer into the skid.”
She cranked the wheel to the right and then slammed the car into park, but on the frozen ramp and with its forward momentum, the car continued to plummet—now sideways—toward the water.
“Unlock the back door,” her mom said, “so you can get me out!”
Tessa searched for the unlock button, but it was some sort of cop car, and she was missing something. “I don’t know how,” she yelled. “I can’t find it!”
“It’s okay. You just need to go.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
The car hit the water, and the current, fueled by the furious wind, grabbed hold of it.
“Get out, Tessa!”
“Wait.” She had an idea. “Hang on, I’ve got a gun.”
“A gun?” But then, almost immediately, Tessa’s mom tracked with her. “Get it to me. Slide it under the seat. Quick.”
Tessa tucked the gun under the driver’s seat and shoved it back to her mom.
The car continued to sink into the dark river.
“Tessa, go! You have to. Now!”
She didn’t want to leave until she was sure her mom was alright, but she also knew that if she didn’t get to safety now, she might lose her chance.
She wrenched the door open and managed to slip out, but water poured into the car.
After dropping into waist-deep water, Tessa struggled to get her footing. By the time she did, half of the car had already been swallowed by the river.
* * *
+++
In the final room, I found Blake.
He was standing near a computer monitor, jamming thumb drives into his pocket.
He aimed my gun at me.
“You had the chance to shoot me earlier,” I said. “You’re not going to kill me. Put it down.”
* * *
+++
Christie positioned herself on her back, took aim at the window, and fired the Beretta, but the glass did not explode. The window must have been reinforced somehow. Cracks emanated from the point where the bullet had struck the glass. She tried kicking it.
It held.
Another shot. Then another. Finally, the glass was weakened enough for her to kick it from the doorframe.
* * *
+++
Tessa watched her mom emerge from the window, almost as if she were being born anew, as the East River engulfed the car.
Her mom sank out of sight. “Mom!” Tessa splashed over to help her get to shore.
It was hard to keep her balance in the current, but at last both of them were on their way back to the bank. “I’m okay, Tessa. You did it. You saved me.”
Somehow, her mom had managed to keep the gun with her when she got out of the car, which was now gone, under the water.
“Get behind me,” she said unequivocally.
Tessa did.
“Do not move, Peter!” her mother shouted to the man who’d left that car in neutral and started it rolling toward the water.
But he ignored her warning. “I’ll be with you two in a minute. First you get to watch my son die.”
The evil in the guy’s voice left Tessa feeling dirty just hearing it. She couldn’t even comprehend how lost he was.
All at once, he ran straight toward Timothy, hammer raised high, and Tessa thought her mom really was going to shoot him to protect the novelist, but Timothy stepped forward and ended up in the line of fire. He flicked his right hand out of his jacket pocket and raised something shiny and metal.
* * *
+++
As his dad was about to bring the hammer down at his skull, Timothy drove the letter opener into the murderer’s neck, and he made sure that it went deep enough to do the trick.
To get the darkness out.
80
I was right—for some reason Blake must not have been interested in shooting me today because he slipped the gun under his belt, grabbed a desktop printer, yanked the cord from the wall, and threw the printer at me.
From where I was standing, I couldn’t get completely out of the way, but I was able to turn and raise my left arm in time to absorb most of the impact.
Last summer, I’d fought Blake’s brother, whom he’d trained in hand-to-hand combat and martial arts.
Dylan was good.
I anticipated that Blake would be better.
He angled toward me, leapt and spun, and kicked me hard in the gut. The force of impact knocked the wind out of me. As I was struggling to draw more air in, he came at me with his right hand chambered for a high punch. When I went to block it, I realized too late that he was faking the punch, and he landed a blow with his other fist directly where he’d kicked me. I coughed and fought to stay on my feet.
Advice from Ralph on fighting: Find a weakness and exploit it. Find pain and capitalize on it.
Yeah, Blake knew what he was doing.
I shoved him backward, but the desk was behind him, and he didn’t stumble far.
I went to tackle him, but he
pivoted as I did, using my momentum to carry us both toward the window.
The glass shattered at impact and we flew outside, fell nearly two meters, and crashed heavily to the ground.
I landed on my back, shaken, Blake on top of me.
He pushed himself to his feet and dashed toward the nearest greenhouse. It took me a second to catch my breath, but as soon as I had it, I was on my feet as well and after him.
* * *
+++
Mannie was a grappler too and managed to get Ralph in a rear choke hold.
Ralph turned his head and dropped his chin to keep his airway open and to break the choke. He jammed his jaw into the crook of Mannie’s elbow, shrugged his shoulders up, then clenched his teeth to tighten his neck and buy himself a little more time before passing out.
If someone grabs you around the neck from behind, you attack him at his weakest point—his fingers are within your reach. Bend them backward and break them. It took snapping four of Mannie’s fingers before Ralph broke the choke.
They both rose.
Mannie’s fractured fingers were splayed to the side at odd and irregular angles.
Ralph circled right to reduce his adversary’s right arm attack.
It was difficult for him to keep his balance on the snowy ground, but he had an idea, launched himself at Mannie, and wrestled him back toward the open doors of the semi.
* * *
+++
Unlike the first greenhouse I’d peered into—the one with the mannequins—this one was overgrown with untended plants. The dried brown stalks reached tenaciously toward the ceiling.
Blake appeared at the end of the aisle. “Have you figured it out yet, Patrick? How it all fits together?”
I thought of the flag that’d been near the man whose throat was slit. “You treated the mannequins with Tranadyl. Once they get shipped out and people start dying, who’ll be to blame? I think you want it to be you. You want it to be the Brigade.”
“Go on. Why?”
“I don’t care why, Blake. I don’t care about your motives. I’m just here to bring you in.”
“What about the backlash of the deaths?”
“It’ll result in heightened antiterrorist campaigns.” Then I had it. “Ah. Arms sales. You’re playing both sides. But how does ending the Selzucaine shipments benefit you?”
“You’re close, Patrick, but you’re not quite there yet.”
“Quantum encryption, Krazle’s CEO, and the legislation Senator Murray is working on. It’s all connected. That closer?”
Blake didn’t reply.
“Where is Julianne Springman?”
“Gone.”
“Gone?”
“Dead.” He raised the gun and I prepared to dive to the side, but then he said, “You know what? For old times’ sake, let’s make this interesting. What do you say? We’ll see who can get to your SIG first. One of us will walk out of here alive. One of us will join Julianne.”
He slid the gun directly between us in the middle of the greenhouse.
Without a word, I flew forward.
And so did he.
81
I slid in, feet first like a baseball player sliding into the bag.
I was able to snag the gun, but Blake leapt on top of me as I did, and before I could aim it at him, he shoved me brutally to the concrete floor.
With his left hand, he pinned down my right wrist, then, straddling me, he grabbed my throat with his free hand and leaned forward, squeezing, choking me.
I tried to draw in a breath.
Nothing.
The day became a dizzy smear of darkness and bleary, drifting pain.
I attempted to aim the gun at him, but the angle wasn’t right, not with him holding down my wrist.
But it was right to aim at something else.
Find a weakness.
Exploit it.
Okay, I will.
I fired up at the glass ceiling, then squeezed my eyes shut and turned my head to the side to protect my face from what was about to happen.
I sent four shots through the glass, and as the bullets exited the ceiling, a burst of fragmented glass shards rained down over us in a deadly shower.
Opening my eyes, I saw shock sweep over Blake’s face and I was able to roll out from under him.
He stood and turned just enough for me to see the hand-sized glass daggers that’d augured into his back and neck. He lurched toward me, and I directed the gun at his chest. “That’s close enough. Do not move.”
But he took another step, his foot landing on the snow-covered pieces of glass. He lost his balance, his feet flew out from under him, and he fell backward, landing solidly and unforgivingly on his back.
Driving those glass shards all the way in.
I went to his side. “Who’s the donor, Blake? Who’s the one paying to watch people die?”
He grimaced and then said, “Leeson.”
“I know about the grave. Who is the donor?”
He opened his mouth but no words came out.
“The 4D encryption, is that it?” I said. “The quantum research?”
Blake smiled faintly and squeezed my hand, then drew in two long, labored breaths and gazed past me at the snow lashing down at us through the shattered ceiling.
Then he stopped moving, and when I felt for a pulse, I found none.
Gone.
I checked myself to see if the glass had found me.
Three pieces had embedded into my left leg, but it wasn’t enough to worry about at the moment. Not life-threatening.
After retrieving the thumb drives from Blake’s pocket, I hurried outside, SIG drawn, to see how Ralph was doing with Mannie.
I found my friend standing beside the back of the truck.
Mannie was nowhere in sight.
“Did he get away?” I asked.
“Not quite.” Ralph patted the truck.
“He’s in there?”
“Oh yeah.”
I holstered my weapon. “How are you going to get him out?”
“I haven’t really thought that part through yet. Blake?”
“No longer a threat. You alright?”
“Yeah. You?”
“I’m okay.”
He was staring at the glass sticking out of my leg.
“Oh, that,” I said. “I’ll be fine.”
For a moment I considered prying the glass out, but I had the sense that it would bleed quite a bit and I didn’t want to deal with that right now.
What did Blake mean by mentioning Leeson’s name?
Wait.
I’d been making an assumption this whole time—that the man I’d chased into the subway was the only one to show up at the cemetery. But Duane had told me that he went there to meet the donor. Someone else could’ve easily come by while I was in the tunnel and either found the graveyard empty or noticed the CSI team and left.
We could tackle all that in a minute.
The sirens told me that backup was close. Well, with a big enough team, we could address how to get Mannie out of this truck.
My thoughts returned to Christie and Tessa, and I pounded against the side of the semi, then shouted, “Mannie, do you know where my wife and stepdaughter are?”
“No,” came the hollow, metallic reply. “Duane?”
“Dead.”
“Good,” the rumbling voice responded, and once again I was reminded of Mannie’s confusing allegiances.
Then, harsh smashing sounds came from inside the truck, drowning out anything else Mannie might have been saying. He was either trying to bust his way out or he was destroying the mannequins Ralph had sealed him in there with.
Well, we would find out soon enough.
Two police cruisers arrived.
; I told Ralph what I was thinking regarding the graveyard, and he contacted the team to get exterior security camera footage from surrounding businesses to see if someone else might’ve been there.
I tried dispatch to find out if there was any news on Christie and Tessa, but they put me on hold.
While I was waiting for a reply, a call came in from a number I didn’t recognize.
“Hello?”
“Pat. It’s me.” Christie’s voice was tense and tight.
“Christie!” I exclaimed. “Are you okay?”
“Yes. Tessa’s here with me. We’re fine. I promise. A little chilled—not a good day for a swim.”
“A swim?”
“Can you come?”
“Absolutely. Where are you?”
“The paramedics want to take us in, get us checked out for hypothermia and shock.”
“Christie, what happened?”
“I’ll tell you when I see you. I’m calling from Timothy Sabian’s phone. Use this number if you need to reach me.”
Sabian’s phone?
“You’re sure you’re okay?” I said.
“Yes. Can you meet us at the hospital? The closest one is Metro Medical. That’s where they want to take us.”
“I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“I don’t want you to worry, but there’s something important I need to talk with you about, and it’s something I need to tell you in person. Alright?”
“Um. Sure,” I said, but after hearing her say that, I couldn’t help but worry. “I’m on my way.”
It was now quiet inside the truck, and I could only guess what Mannie was preparing to do.
I left while Ralph and three other officers were gathering around the back of the semi in preparation to open its doors.
82
I wished Christie would have told me more about what was wrong or what she wanted to talk with me about, but I trusted her.
