“I know that. Your mom and dad… we all know it. We all believe in you, Charlie.”
“Whatever you hear about me next, I just want you to know: I was trying to do the right thing. See, there’s a man who’s going to be killed…”
“What? Charlie, what are you talking about?”
I closed my eyes. I leaned my forehead against the cold plastic edge of the phone booth. There wasn’t enough time. It was all too complicated to explain. I just wished I could see her. I wished I could touch her face.
“Never mind,” I said. “It doesn’t matter. I just want you to know that I’m trying to do what’s right. There are all these bad things happening. I can’t make anyone understand. I don’t understand it myself. The thing is, Beth, I can’t remember anything. I mean, I remember everything up to that day you gave me your phone number, but after that-this whole last year-it’s just gone.”
When I stopped talking, I heard Beth crying, sniffling. “You don’t remember?”
“This year. What happened. It’s all a blank.”
“You don’t remember… us? You and me?”
I reached my hand up to the phone as if I could reach through it and touch her. “I remember you,” I said. “I remember you and how much I liked you, but…”
“But… you said you loved me… we love each other. Don’t you remember?”
My throat felt so tight I could hardly get the words out. “I want to, Beth. Believe me, I want to a lot, but…”
Beth’s voice sounded sad and small. “We were going to spend our lives together. You were going to join the Air Force and we were going to get married…”
I shut my eyes tight. I was sorry I’d called. It was selfish. I hadn’t accomplished anything. I’d just hurt her feelings.
“I want to remember, Beth, I really do,” I told her. “I’m trying as hard as I can. Beth, listen, I just have to do this one thing and then… somehow, I’ll find my life again… I’ll find you again… I promise. I just…”
“I love you, Charlie,” Beth said.
My heart swelled up in my chest.
“I’ll come back to you, Beth,” I told her. “So help me, I will find my life again and I will come back to you.”
My hand was shaking as I reached out to hang up the phone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Death Over Indian Canyon As I walked down the road, I felt as if there were a lead weight in my chest. I could still hear Beth’s voice inside my head. I love you, Charlie. I could still hear the sound of her tears.
I thought about that, and I thought about my father crying on TV. And about my mother crying so hard she could barely speak. I’d caused everyone so much pain-so much pain-and I didn’t even know how or why.
I walked along the side of the road, leaving the little town of Cale’s Station behind me. I’d barely gone half a mile when the road curved. I looked back and saw that the last buildings and houses of the town had disappeared from sight. I waited while a huge tractor trailer went groaning past. Then I was alone.
I left the road and headed up into the forest.
There was no trail. I had to push through underbrush and tangled branches. The going was slow at first. But as I went higher, I found myself in the shadows of tall pines where there was little undergrowth. The ground was more open here, and I could move more easily among the tree trunks.
All the way, the sadness traveled with me. I didn’t know if I could stop what was going to happen, but whether I did or not, I was pretty sure I would not escape. At the very least, I was going to be captured, arrested, sent back to prison, maybe for the rest of my life. I couldn’t prove my innocence. I couldn’t even remember for sure if I was innocent. All those tears I had caused-they were going to keep on falling. I couldn’t see any way to a happy ending.
I climbed on. It was cold in the shadows beneath the trees, but the walk warmed me. Soon I was sweating into my shirt. I’d bought a bottle of water at the bus station with my last dollar. I stopped near the top of the hill to take a sip. I checked my watch. It was five minutes after noon. Assuming he was on schedule, Richard Yarrow would be starting his trip from Centerville. Judging by my map, he would be at the Indian Canyon Bridge in about twenty minutes. I had to hurry.
When I reached the crest of the hill, I found a clearing where I could stand and look out at the other hills to the west and north. They spread out in front of me, rising and falling expanses of autumn trees. They looked peaceful from where I was. For a moment or two, the view held me there. I stood and gazed at it without thinking. I would’ve liked to have remained standing there that way a long time. But I blinked and came back to myself and headed down the hill.
With gravity helping out, the trip down was quicker. I spilled along the side of the mountain, the rocks and dirt tumbling out from beneath my feet. Sometimes I had to grab at trees to keep from falling. It wasn’t long at all before I began to sense I was getting close to the road. I still couldn’t see it, though-not at first.
Then, suddenly, there it was. The forest ended and gave way to a short expanse of rocky cliffs. Underneath the cliffs was the Indian Canyon Bridge.
The setting was amazing, really majestic. Below me and to my right, the forest just seemed to open wide. The trees parted on two sheer rock walls that plunged down into a gray stone canyon six or seven hundred feet below. On the far side, you could see the winding highway appearing and disappearing through the gaps in the hills. Finally, it emerged for a last stretch of straightaway and then reached the canyon itself. There it became the graceful arch bridge of gleaming steel, a narrow manmade passage that seemed almost to leap from one side of the gulf to the other. The bridge was at least as long as the gorge was deep, and the steel lacework of the arch structure that held it up looked so light it seemed to float impossibly in the empty space.
The moment I came out over the edge of the rock to see the bridge, I had to drop to my belly so I wouldn’t be spotted. The police were already there. I hadn’t expected that. Slowly, carefully, I inched my head up over the rock again until I could see them.
There were two state police cruisers, one parked just below me at one end of the bridge, the other stationed at the far end, where Yarrow’s motorcade would soon be. Between the two cruisers was another car-dark blue, unmarked-parked in the bridge’s center. There was one man standing by each car, a state trooper in khaki beside each cruiser, and a man in a dark suit standing by the unmarked car in the middle.
This was bad, really bad. I glanced at my watch. It was twenty after twelve. By my calculation, Yarrow’s motorcade should be coming into view around the final bend in the road any minute. How could I get down to the road, cross the bridge, get in front of Yarrow’s motorcade, and stop him before he was attacked-without the police spotting me and arresting me first?
I racked my brain to think of a plan. Obviously, the easiest way to avoid the police would be to work my way to the other side of the bridge through the forest, skirting the canyon. But was there enough time for that? I figured I had no choice but to find out.
But before I could, the killing started.
I was just about to move back into the trees when the man in the blue suit-the Secret Service agent standing by the unmarked car in the middle of the bridge-lifted his hand to his ear. I could tell he was listening to something-a message of some kind coming in over his earpiece. He stood like that a second or two, then he came away from the side of the bridge and stepped out in the middle. He lifted his hand to his mouth. I guessed he was talking into a microphone.
The state troopers at either end of the bridge reacted. They came away from their cars too. They moved to the center of the road, the same as the agent. They were looking at him. He lifted his hand and waved them toward him, first one then the other.
The state troopers hesitated a second. This wasn’t what they were expecting. Then they started to come forward, approaching the agent from either side.
A movement in the corner of my eye caught
my attention. I turned and saw the first car of the secretary’s three-car motorcade appear on the road in a gap between the hills. It didn’t look to be that far away. I figured it would reach the bridge in about five minutes, maybe less. That settled it. There was definitely no time for me to make my way through the woods to the other end of the bridge before the cars arrived. I would have to go straight down and warn the police already stationed there. I would just have to hope they believed me and stopped the motorcade. There was no other choice. I was out of time.
I was about to head to the end of the bridge and crawl down onto the pavement where one of the state cruisers was parked. I took one last look and saw the two state troopers now approaching the agent from either end. The agent waited until they were about ten feet away.
Then he went into his jacket and pulled out a gun.
My lips parted. I understood at once. The man in the blue suit: it was Orton.
I was about to shout out a warning. But I had no chance-and I was too far away; they wouldn’t have heard me anyway. All I could do was stare as the man in the blue suit pointed his pistol at the state trooper on his far side and fired. There wasn’t much noise, only a muffled report. But I saw the hole open in the trooper’s chest. He started to fall but before he did, the man in the blue suit turned around and fired again, hitting the second trooper just where he’d hit the first.
The first trooper had fallen to his knees. Now he toppled over onto the surface of the road. The second trooper was staggering backward. Then his legs folded under him and he went down.
As I lay there, gasping, staring, the man in the blue suit-Orton-calmly slipped his pistol back inside his coat. He walked to the unmarked car parked by the side of the bridge. He pointed his key at the car and pressed a button. I heard an electronic chirp. Then the trunk slowly came open.
From my position on the rocks, so far from the center of the bridge, I didn’t have a clear view of the trunk’s contents. I didn’t need one. I could see there was some sort of mechanism in there, and it wasn’t hard to guess what it was.
The car was a bomb. Orton was going to wait for the secretary’s motorcade, then blow up the bridge and send him and everyone with him crashing to their deaths in the canyon below.
Almost as the thought came to me, I was off the rock, racing to the edge of the bridge. I slid down the last part of the incline and tumbled onto the road. Then I was on my feet, running over the bridge as fast as I could.
There was no more time to think or plan or do the smartest thing or the safest. I had to get to Orton. That was all I knew. I had to reach him-I had to stop him- before he destroyed the bridge and everyone on it.
CHAPTER THIRTY
The Battle for the Bridge It wasn’t far-but it was the longest run of my life.
Orton was at the center of the bridge. He had his back to me. He was leaning over the trunk of his car, working on the mechanism inside-activating the bomb, I guessed. I flew toward him, pumping as hard as I could, knowing that any second he might hear me, might turn and see me and gun me down as he had the troopers.
One of the dead troopers lay between us in a spreading pool of blood. It was a horrible sight. But I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. I had to push past it. I had to get to Orton.
I ran and ran. It seemed to take forever. Slowly, slowly, I got closer, closer.
I was only a few steps away when he heard me coming.
He turned to look over his shoulder and spotted me. His mouth dropped open, and his smooth, long features showed his surprise. I didn’t slow down. I kept charging at him, full speed. He recovered himself quickly. He jammed his hand into his jacket. He started to draw his pistol again. I could see there wasn’t going to be time to reach him before he leveled it at me.
He swung around. He pointed the gun at my chest.
Then I was on him.
I spun to the side. He fired. The bullet went past me. I grabbed his wrist with my left hand, pulling it past my body, pulling him toward me. I hit him with my right fist, sticking the thumb out so it went into his eye.
The blow stunned him. I twisted his gun hand. I grabbed the gun and pulled it free. I stepped away and turned the gun on him.
He kicked it out of my hand.
It was a great kick. A black-belt kick. The kind you usually only see at tournaments, at the highest level. It caught my wrist full force and sent my arm flying upward, the gun spinning out of my hand and into the air.
I never got to see where it fell.
Orton let the force of the kick bring him close to me, spinning to bring a slashing hand around at my throat.
I managed to duck. The hand chopped into the side of my head. It felt like a hammer blow and knocked me to the ground.
I rolled to get away from him. Orton, seeing me on the ground, charged after me. That was a mistake. I looped one foot behind his ankle and kicked out with the other, catching him just below the knee. It toppled him over to the pavement. I leapt on top of him.
The next moment, we were locked together on the bridge, ripping at each other’s faces, looking for an opening, each of us trying to drive a knee into the other’s groin or ribs. We rolled over each other once and then again, and then I was thrown free and smacked into the bridge’s railing, hard. The impact stunned me. Orton seized his chance. He drew up on his knees, drew back his fist, ready to knock me out.
I lashed out with my leg and kicked him in the chest.
He toppled over backward and rolled. I rolled and got to my feet. He was up first and rushed at me.
I was pinned against the bridge’s railing. I could feel the top of it where it hit me in the small of the back. Orton was coming in low and fast. I think he wanted to pick me up and lift me over the rail, hurl me down to my death in the canyon. The whole thing happened in a second. He was there. I was spinning aside. His arms were out, reaching for me. I dodged his grip and caught hold of his shirt and his shoulder.
I swung around and hurled him at the railing full force. He hit-and flipped over it.
It happened so fast there was no time to stop it. One moment Orton was at the bridge rail, the next he was spilling across the top. The sight of him tumbling over toward certain death made my heart clutch. Without thinking, I lunged after him, trying to stop his fall.
I touched something. I grabbed it. His arm. His wrist. I had him. His weight pulled me hard against the railing, nearly pulled me over with him. I braced myself against the steel. Held my grip on his wrist. I looked over the railing, looked down.
Orton’s face peered up at me, a mask of terror. His body dangled over the abyss. Moment by moment, his weight was dragging him down, dragging him out of my grip. Already, I could feel his arm slipping through my fingers.
“Help me,” he said.
I got a better hold on him. It wasn’t easy. I had to pull him up until I could reach him with my free hand. Then I had two hands on him. He grabbed hold of my wrist too. But my grip still wasn’t very good. I wasn’t sure whether I’d be able to pull him up or not.
“Help me, Charlie,” he said then.
His words stopped me. I stared down at him where he twisted above the chasm.
“You know me,” I said.
“Pull me up, please,” he said, his voice straining.
I held on to him, but I didn’t try to pull him up. “Who are you?” I said down at him.
Orton glanced down at the fatal fall beneath him. Then he glanced up at me again desperately.
“Please,” he said.
“Just tell me. Then I’ll pull you up. Who are you? Why are you doing this?”
“You know me, Charlie. I’m Howard Orton. I’m your friend. One of the Homelanders. Just like you.”
I stared. “Like me?”
“Please…”
“Tell me,” I said. “Tell me or I’ll let you fall.”
I wouldn’t have done it, but he didn’t know that. He started to talk, babbling in his fear.
“I was always on your side, Ch
arlie. I told them they were wrong about you. I swear. You know Prince. You know what he’s like.”
I felt him begin to slip from my grasp again. I adjusted my hold to get a better grip, but I was losing him. “I don’t know Prince. I don’t know you. I don’t know any of you. Who are you? Who are the Homelanders?”
“Please, Charlie…”
“Who are they?” I shouted.
He glanced down again. I tried to hold him, but he was slipping away.
“Americans,” he said. “Recruited by the Islamists. Because we’re not foreigners. We don’t draw suspicion. We can go places they can’t go, do things they can’t do. We’re going to destroy this country from the inside… That’s the plan. But you know this. You know all this. You’re one of us. Please, Charlie.”
“You’re lying,” I shouted down at him. “I love this country. I would never do anything to hurt it. You’re a liar.”
He slipped another inch in my grasp, another inch toward that fatal fall.
“Please!” he said.
I pulled him up. It took all my strength. Grunting with the effort, I stepped back from the railing, lifting him inch by inch until he could bring his own hand up and grab hold of the metal himself. Then I shifted my grip and helped him climb over. He tumbled, gasping, onto the bridge pavement. I bent over, hands on my knees, trying to catch my breath.
Orton lifted his hand. “The motorcade. They’ll be here any minute. We’ve got to activate the bomb.”
Rage erupted inside me. I reached down and grabbed the front of Orton’s jacket. I dragged him off the pavement and brought his face close to mine.
“Listen to me,” I said. “I don’t care what you say. I don’t care what you think. I’m not one of you. I’m not a Homelander. This bomb is not going off, you hear me? You’re finished, Orton. I saw you kill those troopers and I’m turning you in.”
He struck with lightning speed. His arm flashed across my wrists and hammered back at me, hitting me in the throat. I went down to the pavement, gagging. Through a blur of tears, I could see Orton staggering to the car. He went into the open trunk again. He worked at the mechanism.
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