by James Hunt
“You found out who he was,” Mullocks said. “You did what you set out to do.”
“I was supposed to catch him,” Jim replied.
“Let someone else pick up the slack,” Mullocks said. “You can’t do everything by yourself, Jim.”
Jim glanced back at the house, balling his hands into fists. Since his partnership with Kerry, Jim had always been someone who shied away from working with others. But since they’d been partnered, he had understood the importance of working with a team.
All of the officers on scene—the forensic techs, the cyber division—everyone was working toward the common goal. But sometimes, Jim was so hell-bent on solving the case that he forgot to look around at the other people still marching forward.
“Go home, Jim,” Mullocks said. “We’ll find him.”
For the first time in three months, Jim felt like he finally exhaled. He suddenly felt weightless but also tired enough to fall asleep right where he was standing.
“Do you need an officer to drive you to your house?” Mullocks asked, with a tenderness that Jim had never heard from her before, which sounded out of place considering the setting.
“No,” Jim answered. “I’ll be fine.”
Mullocks tried to object again, but Jim returned to his car and got back onto the road before she could stop him. However, Jim didn’t make it very far.
Once Jim was out of the neighborhood and he was certain no one from the crime scene could see him, he pulled over and turned off the car. Jim sat alone with his thoughts for a moment, which he hadn’t done for himself in a long time. The past three months of running himself ragged had distracted him from a truth that he had been trying to escape from for a long time.
And that was a truth of inadequacy. The reason Jim had worked so hard at his job, was so relentless with his cases, wasn’t just because he understood the horrors that a child had gone through. It also stemmed from a troubling tendency that most orphans dealt with: they believed they didn’t deserve to be happy.
Jim had seen it in kids all the time. The trauma of losing parents, or being abandoned, triggered thinking that made them feel as if it were their fault they were in that position. If they had just worked a little bit harder or would have been more well-behaved, or if they would have eaten more vegetables, any of the million silly things that floated through a child’s head to justify why something had happened to them, then maybe they would still be with their parents.
Jim had avoided trying to tackle those emotions for a long time. He had buried them deep, so deep he never believed he was going to have to revisit them again. But they had been steadily rising to the surface over the past several years, and Jim had done his best to outrun them, ignore them, keep them covered up. But he couldn’t do that anymore. Meeting Kelly had finally eroded the last of his mental abilities to keep them at bay. Now, they demanded to be seen and heard, and Jim couldn’t stop himself from crying as he slowly lowered his head to the crest of his steering wheel.
How many years had he been walking around with this? How long had he kept it inside and hidden it from his friends and family? It had been a long time.
Never before had Jim North asked for help or so desperately needed it. Never before had he wanted to be with someone who saw through the façade he had put up.
“Jen,” Jim said, whispering her name in the quiet space of his car.
Jim needed to see her. He needed to tell her everything that had been happening with him. If there were ever anyone to understand what he had gone through, it was her. If there were a single person who could help him, it was Jen.
Jim wiped his eyes and started the car. He had never been a fast driver, even in his youth. He always took his time on the road, which was one reason why Kerry always drove when they were on the clock. But when he merged onto the highway, he floored it, speeding through traffic, weaving around vehicles like he was at the Daytona 500.
Even though Jim felt like his life was falling apart, the closer he moved toward home, the happier he started to feel. It was like Jen’s presence was pulling him toward her, a force as strong as gravity and as undeniable as truth itself.
But when Jim entered their neighborhood, he saw Jen’s car crashed into a telephone pole. He immediately pulled over and checked the driver’s seat, but it was empty.
Jim glanced around, heart pounding, but there was no sign of Jen anywhere. He reached for his phone and dialed Missy at the precinct.
“Hey, Jim,” Missy answered.
“I need you to track Jen’s phone,” Jim said. “Find her, now.”
Missy offered no objections, and she clicked away at her keyboard. “She’s at your house.”
Jim rushed back over to the car, staying on the line with Missy. He floored the gas and then slammed on the brakes when he reached the house. He shifted the car into park but left it running as he hurried up the driveway to the front door.
“Missy,” Jim said, drawing his gun. “I need you to say on the line with me, okay? But don’t make a sound.”
“Jim, what’s going on?” Missy asked.
“Just stay quiet until I start talking to you, okay?”
“Sure,” Missy answered.
Jim slipped the phone into his pocket and then entered the house. The lights were off inside, but everything appeared to be in order.
“Jen?” he shouted, but there was no reply. He walked to the hallway and saw the glow of light coming from beneath their bedroom door.
Jim pivoted toward the bedroom, palms sweaty as he adjusted the grip on his pistol. He positioned himself in front of the door and then slowly reached for the handle. He opened the door and found Jen sitting in the corner with a man standing next to her, a gun pointed at her head.
“Hello, Jimmy,” Charlie said. “So good of you to join us.”
24
Brian was the only one left in the waiting room this late, and he was getting the stink eye from the nurses who had already told him that visiting hours were over.
The kids were at home with Brian’s sister, who had driven over to help out. They were practically asleep by the time they had left, and while both of them understood the concept that their mother was hurt, neither of them knew just how grave the situation was.
“Is Mommy going to be okay?” Jake asked.
It took all of Brian’s willpower not to break down in front of his son, who was looking up to him for assurance. “She’s fighting really hard to be back with us soon, okay, bud?”
It wasn’t the answer Jake was looking for, but he didn’t ask any further questions. Their daughter seemed like she understood what was happening a little more than her younger brother. She said nothing, but Brian recognized the look on her face. It was the same terror he felt, but that wasn’t something a girl her age needed to weigh herself down with.
“Everything is going to be okay,” Brian said as he watched his children leave.
Brian knew it wasn’t the best phrase to have used, especially given the circumstances. He had always hated when people spoke like that instead of being more honest about the situation, but he had panicked. He couldn’t tell his children the truth, not when he couldn’t face it himself just yet.
“Mr. Martin?” a nurse asked.
Brian spun around, his heart catching in his throat. “Yes?”
“I understand you’ve been waiting for an update on your wife,” the nurse said. “If you’d like, we can take you back to see her so the doctor can explain what’s going on.”
Brian felt like he was dangling off the edge of a cliff as he followed the nurse down the hallway. She gave no indication that Kerry had gotten better and no indication she had gotten worse.
When Brian turned the corner and saw his wife of almost fifteen years on a bed, with tubes and wires running through her, it took every ounce of his strength not to collapse. “Oh my God.”
“Mr. Martin,” the doctor swooped in next to Brian, holding his arm, “I know this is a lot to see, but your wif
e has been stabilized.”
Brian looked away from Kerry and up at the doctor. “Is she… going to be okay?”
“It’s still a long way to go before we know for sure, but yes,” the doctor answered. “We believe she’s going to pull through.”
Brian’s knees buckled, and this time, he did fall to the floor. The doctor and nurse were quick to rush to his side, but the tears he was crying were of relief.
Eventually, with the help of the doctor and the nurse, Brian was able to stand up, and he wiped his eyes.
“You have to understand that she has a very long recovery ahead of her,” the doctor said. “But my colleagues and I believe she’ll be able to return to near one hundred percent. She had a healthy liver, so that helps a lot in her prognosis.”
“I don’t know what to say,” Brian said. “So I’ll just stick with thank you. Thank you so much.”
“She’ll be unconscious until we can get her breathing on her own again, but you can stay with her for a little while,” the doctor said. “If you need anything, the nurse’s station is just down the hall on your left.”
“Thank you,” Brian said.
Once Brian was alone with his wife, he walked over to her as if the air around her were made of glass and would shatter at any moment. He gingerly reached out his hand and touched Kerry’s fingertips. She was surprisingly warm, despite the coldness of the room they currently occupied.
“Keep fighting, Kerry,” Brian said, his voice cracked and worn. “Fight for me, for the kids, and for our life together. We have so much more ahead of us.”
And Brian truly believed that, but what he had no idea of knowing was a threat miles away inside of Jim North’s home was about to become Kerry’s threat as well.
Jim remained frozen. He didn’t dare move a muscle in fear that Charlie would put a bullet in Jen’s head. He could clearly see that Charlie had his finger on the trigger. All it would take was one wrong muscle spasm and a bullet would fly through Jen’s head and Jim’s life would be over.
“Took you long enough to come home,” Charlie said. “I would have thought you would have come straight here, but you took a little detour to my house.”
“Let her go,” Jim said, sounding incredibly weak and frail.
“And why would I do that?” Charlie asked. “You’ve already ousted me, Jim. You’ve ruined my life, so why don’t I go ahead and ruin yours?” He looked at Jen, who had her mouth covered with duct tape. Her stare was locked on Jim, and despite the danger they were staring down, Jen held a glint of hope in her eyes. Hope that Jim could save her.
“You can leave,” Jim said, on the verge of begging. “I won’t tell anyone I saw you.”
“I don’t trust you, Jimmy,” Charlie said. “Don’t you find it interesting how Mom picked names for us that end in an E sound? Charli-E. Jim-E. I wonder if she did that on purpose or if it was just a happy accident.”
“It’s going to be okay, Jen,” Jim said.
“You know, I heard your conversation with our mother,” Charlie said. “It’s easy to listen to conversations. All I had to do was hack into your phone’s microphone, and it was like I was right there in the room with you.” His face darkened, his downturned mouth opening to bare his teeth. “She was my mother. Not yours. You shouldn’t have come looking for her.”
“You’re right,” Jim said. “And I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” Charlie spat back at Jim. “I don’t want your apology. I want you to feel what it’s like to lose someone like I did.”
Jim frowned. “You didn’t lose anyone.”
“No?” Charlie asked. “Are you sure about that? Because I think I lost my mother to you tonight. I’ll never get her back, no matter how hard I try, because you’re the monster who took her from me. You’re the person who showed her what I am!”
“She cares about you, Charlie,” Jim said. “More than she cares about me.”
“That’s not true,” Charlie said. “I already told you I heard what she said. She’d always wanted me to be like you, even before I knew you existed. It was how she looked at me, wanting to find something that just wasn’t there. And you have no idea how hard I tried to make her happy, to prove to her that I could be something and that I was special.”
Charlie stepped closer to Jen, pushing the end of the pistol against Jen’s temple.
“I was accepted on a full ride to MIT, graduated at the top of my class, all before I was twenty years old,” Charlie said. “Hours of studying, of learning, of pushing myself. And I did it all alone, with no one else’s help!”
“She is proud of you, Charlie,” Jim said. “If you just talk to her—”
“And see that look in her eyes?” Charlie asked. “I’m not going through that again. I’m not going to crawl back to her and beg for her forgiveness.”
Jim’s shock was slowly wearing off, and he started to formulate a plan to get himself and Jen out of this. He was in no condition to bum rush Charlie. Doing so would most likely result in his own death, Jen’s death, or both. And Jim didn’t trust himself to be quick enough to get there in time, even with the short distance. And if Jim couldn’t physically stop him, then he needed to outthink Charlie.
“You want to hurt me,” Jim said. “I understand. It’s why you stole Jen; it’s why you wanted me to come here. But there’s another way to hurt me.”
Charlie’s wild eyes made him difficult to read, but Jim believed his half-brother was considering changing his mind. “How?” Charlie asked.
Jim took one step forward, testing the waters to see how close he could get, but when he did, Charlie shoved the pistol harder into the side of Jen’s head. “Don’t push me, Jim.”
“I’m sorry,” Jim said. “I’m sorry. Listen, okay? You’re not the bad son. I am. I did so many bad things in my life, and I’ll confess all of them to you. You can tell the world about all of the terrible things I’ve done. But only if you let her go.”
Jim wasn’t sure how Charlie would take the Hail Mary pass, but as Charlie studied Jim, he thought it might work.
“No,” Charlie said.
Jim’s stomach flipped. “Charlie, just wait for a second—“
“You’re used to being in charge, Jim,” Charlie said. “You’re used to calling the shots and having things go your way. But that’s not how life works for the rest of us.”
Charlie reached into his pocket with his free hand and held up one of the phones he had used to give the children when he reached out to him. “Recognize it? I’m sure you do. It’s just like the other models of phones I sent the kids I spoke with over the internet. But this phone is special because you know what it does?”
Jim didn’t want to know.
“It’s connected to the Seattle power grid,” Charlie answered. “One section of the grid in particular.”
Jim still wasn’t sure what Charlie was doing, but dread and anxiousness sat in the pit of his stomach like a heavy chunk of lead.
“I saw what happened to your partner,” Charlie said. “From what I gather, she’s not having a very good go of it in the ICU.”
“No,” Jim said.
“Her life depends on machines now,” Charlie said. “They’re pumping air into her lungs; they’re keeping her alive, monitoring her vitals. If the power goes out, there are generators in the hospital, but they’re also connected to a grid. And I’ve managed to gain access to those as well.”
Jim trembled. “Don’t do this, Charlie. I’m begging you, let’s just talk—”
“Talking is over, Jim,” Charlie said. “I’ve talked and talked and talked ever since I started taking these jobs. Now I’m in the fray. Now I’m the one calling the shots, and you’ll have to make a choice.” He gestured to Jen. “Your girlfriend, the wonderful Jen, whom you love and adore, a woman you want to spend the rest of your life with.” He gestured to the phone. “Or your partner, Kerry. A person who helped you grow beyond your selfish ways, who made you not just a better cop, but a better person.” He raise
d the phone so Jim could see the screen and hovered his finger over a button. “Kerry will be lost in approximately five minutes without the life support systems currently keeping her alive. They’ll perform CPR, of course, but because her body is so fragile from the surgery, they won’t be able to keep it up for long. They’ll try to move her, but the closest hospital is twenty minutes away. They’ll never get her there in time to hook her up.”
Jim looked at Jen, who was crying now. “I love you.”
“So is it Jen then?” Charlie asked. “Do you want to save her? I have to say that’s a bold choice. Kerry will undoubtedly suffer before she finally passes, her body fighting to stay alive. But Jen here will only receive a bullet to the head, quick, utterly painless. But then again, Jen is conscious while Kerry is not. Jen is sitting here, afraid of what I’ll do, afraid you won’t pick her.”
It was an impossible decision, but Jim knew the answer before he uttered it aloud. “Jen. I choose Jen.” Jim’s voice was barely above the volume of a whisper, and Jim couldn’t comprehend the impact of the decision he had just made, but he knew he would never forgive himself for it.
All Jim could see was the same image of the little girl he saw die at the hospital earlier today. She was hooked up to the same kind of machines keeping Kerry alive, but not for much longer.
“Very well,” Charlie said. “Bye, bye, Kerry.”
Brian kept hold of Kerry’s hand, gently rubbing the soft skin with his thumb in a circular motion. He didn’t want to leave her but knew the doctors would eventually force him out. And just when he was thankful for Kerry’s recovery, allowing himself to believe everything was okay, the lights in the room shut off.
Brian stiffened, unsure of what was going on, but his shock was short-lived the moment he heard Kerry gurgling and spasming in the bed. “Oh my God, Kerry? Kerry!”
