by Boyle, Gerry
Brandon was already moving, down the hall to the elevator. He punched the button. Heard the clerk say, “Oh, hi, Mr. Gould? Is everything okay?”
Brandon slipped the gun out, pressed against the wall. A moment passed. Another. Fuller didn’t appear. He moved to the corner of the hallway, saw the desk guy out from behind the desk, short and slight, like a crab out of its shell.
He saw Brandon and said, in a stage whisper, “Back stairs.”
Brandon turned, saw a stairwell beyond the elevators. He started for them, was blocked by three men stepping from the elevator. Dodged them, slammed the doors open, bounded up the stairs.
Second.
Third.
Fourth.
Room number 405 was facing him and he turned, gun out now, went to the next door. It was 403.
Brandon turned back, followed the corridor, some sort of loop, numbers going up as it turned. He hurried, making no sound on the carpet, the corridor silent except for TV from a room. Heard a knocking ahead as he approached the next corner, peeked around it to see Fuller, a glimpse as he stood, one hand on the wall, waiting for the door to open.
When it did, Fuller stepped inside.
The door clicked shut.
CHAPTER 64
She was in the chair by the bed, hands tied in front of her with a computer cable, gagged with a blue bandanna. There was a large black suitcase against the wall, half open.
Inside was the pink bath towel they’d used to cushion Mia’s head.
The television was on. Kelvin watching a show about people in a contest to lose weight. He’d turned the screen so she could see a big guy struggling up a long staircase.
When there was a knock.
“It’s me,” Fuller said.
Kelvin got up, opened the door. Fuller stepped in and Kelvin said, “What happened? You’re all bloody.”
“No shit,” Fuller said. “I got shot. Her fucking boyfriend shoots me in the leg.”
He reached for the handgun on top of the television. Griffin’s Glock.
“So you get the money?” Kelvin said.
“Not yet. We gotta go.”
“How come?”
“He’s got the car. He’ll find the name. Cops’ll figure it out.”
“Where we gonna go?”
“I got a Jeep. We drive right the fuck out into the country, dump it in the woods. Hit some houses until we find another car. Then we drive west, New Hampshire. New York. The hell outta here.”
“That’s what I said we should do—”
“Shut up,” Fuller said. “Get her up.”
“We’re taking her?”
“You bet your ass we are. There’s a backpack full of fucking cash out there now and Blake’s got it.”
People were cheering on the TV as the heavy guy made it to top of the stairs, all sweaty.
“Maybe he won’t even call the cops,” Fuller said, wincing. “Maybe we can still work him.”
“But what if—”
“If he won’t deal, we dump her in the woods,” Fuller said. “Let’s go.”
He went to the TV, slammed it off. Kelvin went to Mia, helped her up.
“We’re gonna go again,” he said gently, as if her ears had been gagged, too.
“And you listen to me, blondie,” Fuller said, stepping up to Mia, putting the barrel of the gun on her forehead. “I oughta kill you just to get even. But I’m not gonna. But let me tell you something. You make one peep, I’ll shoot you right in your pretty little head.”
He pressed the gun against her, forcing her head back.
“I’m telling you right now, bitch. I got nothing to lose.”
Leaning against the wall, Brandon punched in the number.
Nine. One. One.
He told the dispatcher who he was. He told her where he was. He told her there was a possible hostage in a room on the east end of the hotel. She told him to stay on the line. He hung up, turned the ringer off, and put the phone in his pocket.
Held the gun against his side as he started down the covered walkway. As he approached the door, he slowed.
Heard voices.
Fuller.
Angry.
Brandon stepped across the door, leaned against the wall. The door opened and there was a rattle, Fuller saying, “Take the goddamn chain off for God’s sake.”
Brandon started to slide the gun up his leg. The door closed again and there was more rattling. Then the sound of a siren, distant. Closing.
The door opened and Kelvin stepped out. He looked away from Brandon, in the direction of the sound of the siren. Kelvin paused, listened to the tone, the cadence. He took a step into the hallway and listened as the siren got close, then turned off.
“Cops,” he said.
A suitcase appeared, big and black, on wheels. As Brandon watched, he saw something inside it move.
Mia.
“Stay still, bitch,” Fuller said. Then Brandon saw a gun in Fuller’s hand, a big handgun. Griffin’s. Then the bandaged leg. The face twisted in pain.
He heard another siren approaching.
“We’re toast,” Kelvin said.
“I ain’t going to jail,” Fuller said. “And I’m taking her with me.”
He glanced to his right as he started to pull the suitcase backward. Saw Brandon, the gun pointed.
Fuller smiled.
“Hey, Blake,” he said.
“Don’t shoot,” Kelvin said, his hands going up.
Fuller started to raise his gun, then reconsidered.
“Easy there, Blake,” he said, and he lowered the gun slowly.
“Throw it down,” Brandon barked. Then again, “Throw it down.”
Fuller grinned, the gun still held low, the other hand on the suitcase handle.
“Brandon, dude. Just chill. We gotta talk. You know, you and me, we’re a lot alike. Your mother went down with the ship, dude, left you standing on the fucking dock. My old man, he hated my guts. Ma, she could take or leave me. Doesn’t it suck? I mean, I get this judge who screws me over. You got these fucking criminals coming, taking advantage of you. Isn’t it a fucking mess? I mean—”
“Throw it,” Brandon shouted.
Fuller smiled. Shook his head.
“Can’t do it, Blake,” he said.
He let the gun barrel rest on the top of the suitcase, muzzle down. It touched the fabric, scraped over the handle, stopped on top of a round lump.
The lump moved.
Mia.
Brandon fired. Once, twice, three times. A second, maybe two. Fuller let go of the suitcase and it fell with the gun as he staggered backward, cried out as he put a hand on the wall and slid slowly to the floor.
Seated on the carpet, bandaged leg in front of him, a hand on his side, he looked down. Blood ran between his fingers. His face contorted and he cried out. A child’s low wail.
CHAPTER 65
Dozens of cops. Uniformed outside the hotel, detectives in the corridor, gawkers standing around the cars outside by the cruisers, the fire trucks, and ambulances.
It was a white-washed room with a Formica-topped table and plastic chairs. Brandon sat on one side of the table, four detectives sat on the other. O’Farrell was there, along with two detectives from Falmouth P.D., and Jackie, too, but she left.
Brandon told them everything that had happened. The detectives listened, the digital recorder measuring the story in minutes and seconds. After Brandon had finished, the detectives looked at each other. Jackie came back in.
“So we need that truck,” O’Farrell said.
“Just stopped it,” Jackie said. “New Hampshire tollbooth.”
“Full of women?” he said.
She nodded.
“Right now they’re both saying they’re victims of a home invasion,” O’Farrell said. “Holding them on a firearms charge, sawed-off shotgun. I guess we got more to talk about.”
“She’ll turn on him if she has to,” Brandon said.
“She’s been on the phone
with some New York City lawyer. Speaking Russian or some goddamn thing.”
“And Lucky?” Brandon said.
“Maine Med. Surgery. Came around long enough to ask for his New York lawyer, too.”
A pause, and then Brandon said, “So did he make the hospital?”
“Joel Fuller? D.O.A.,” O’Farrell said, like it was a good thing, the cop killer getting what he deserved. “But Kelvin is spilling his guts.”
Brandon closed his eyes, took a long, deep breath. “I wouldn’t have shot him if there’d been a choice,” he said.
“I know,” O’Farrell said.
“There just wasn’t any.”
“Right.”
“He would have killed her. He was going to.”
“Very likely,” the detective said. “Did Grif, no big deal to kill her, too.”
“Still,” Brandon said.
Another deep breath. Felt tears welling up and fought them back. Not now, not ever. The detectives watched him closely.
“There’s counseling,” O’Farrell said. “Helps sort things out. We can put you in touch with somebody.”
“Maybe for Mia,” Brandon said. “I’m okay.”
“Sure you are,” the detective said. “And when you’re a little more okay, we’ll talk more.”
“I’m fine now. Talk about what?”
O’Farrell hesitated. “About how you screwed up. Should’ve called us right in.”
“Fuller said they’d kill her if there was even a hint of cops. That’s what he said. Leave her to die of thirst.”
A long pause. Jackie cleared her throat.
“You got lucky, Blake,” O’Farrell said.
Brandon didn’t answer.
“Yeah, well. We all need at little luck on this job. Speaking of which, when you’re ready, when this is all cleared up, we’ll talk about the academy.”
“Back on the horse?”
“If you want it.”
“Sign me up,” Brandon said.
The cops looked at him.
“You doing this for Griffin?” O’Farrell said.
“What if I am?” Brandon said.
O’Farrell paused, looked at him.
“For a kid,” he said, “you’re one tough son of a bitch.”
CHAPTER 66
It was a good sailing day, clouds clearing early, becoming sunny with a northwest wind, fifteen knots. Boats were streaming out of the harbor at eleven, sails going up, heeling with the first pull of the breeze.
Nessa was on the porch, the Portland newspaper on the table in front of her, a bottle of Chardonnay, too. A single glass.
Brandon sat in the chair, looked out at the bay, but for once didn’t see the sails, the lobster boats, the black-hulled draggers chugging in from the fishing grounds.
They both watched, were silent. A gull landed on the lawn, snatched something from the grass, and flew off.
Finally it was Brandon who spoke.
“You had no way of knowing,” he said.
Nessa didn’t answer, just shook her head.
“You wouldn’t have hurt her, Nessa. Not for anything,” he said. “You were her best friend.”
Nessa sighed.
“I shouldn’t have been her best friend,” she said, her voice quivery and weary. “I should have been her mother. I should have been the one to say, ‘No, honey, this is a bad thing. Don’t do this.’ Instead I … I joined right in.”
“But there was no way to know what was going to happen,” Brandon said.
“There was a way to know right from wrong,” Nessa said.
“Nessa,” Brandon said. “What would you have done if you had known someone was going to hurt Nikki?”
“I’d stop them.”
“And they didn’t see it coming. Nobody did.”
Another shake of the head. Nessa reached for the bottle, uncorked it, and began to refill the glass.
“I couldn’t bear to tell you,” she said. “All these years.”
“It was crushing you, wasn’t it.”
“Yes.”
“Well, now you’re even,” Brandon said. “We’re even. Both of us. We’ll shake it off together.”
He moved over and took a seat beside her on the couch and put his arm around her shoulder. Nessa, tears running down her pale cheeks, put the glass down and took his hand.
CHAPTER 67
The counselor was a woman in her fifties, with short salt-and-pepper hair, a soothing voice, and an attentive, unblinking stare. Mia went once and Brandon went once and then they asked if they could go together.
“Of course you can,” the counselor said. “This is all about you.”
Mia talked about how she kept having dreams, and no matter how they began, they ended with her in a box, or a tunnel, or a big plastic bag. She couldn’t sleep with blankets over her, couldn’t wear her favorite sweat-pants to bed because they made her feel like her legs were trapped. She couldn’t be in the dark.
That led to talk about Mia’s father, her feeling that she couldn’t shake loose from his expectations.
“It’s your life,” the counselor said. “You have the control. Not your father. Just you. And when you were locked in that case, it was the ultimate loss of control. You’ve got to take it back.”
Brandon had dreams, too. Fuller came to him every night, shot full of holes, blood streaming out. But Fuller was smiling, standing by Brandon, and saying over and over, “Dude, we were just bullshitting. You didn’t have to kill me.”
Brandon said, “I didn’t know there were bullets in the gun.”
Fuller took Brandon’s hand, like Jesus with Doubting Thomas, stuck Brandon’s finger in the holes.
The counselor nodded, like it all made sense. “A tremendously traumatic thing, to take a life,” she said, “no matter what the circumstances. And you have unresolved issues about loss, about separation, all stemming from your mother, early responsibility for your own care-giver. Internalized grief, a very strong propensity to shoulder everything alone.”
“But I’m not alone now,” Brandon said. Mia, sitting beside him on the couch, took his hand.
“No,” she said. “We’ve got each other.”
Brandon and Mia were stretched out atop the covers on the cabin berth, rain drumming on the deck above their heads, a single light left on. They were quiet, staring at their intertwined hands held above them.
“You okay?” Mia said.
“Yes,” Brandon said. You?”
“Yes,” she said.
A wake rocked the boat and then it was still, or at least as still as a boat ever can be.
Mia smiled, turned to him. “You know, I don’t want you to think I’m one of those people, you save their life and then you can’t get rid of them.”
Brandon kissed her hand.
“Oh, baby,” he said. “Don’t you know it’s the other way around?”
THE END
