Dead Man Running

by Steve Hamilton

  It would work exactly as he wanted.

  He put it down on the bed, just as he heard a knock. He opened the door and saw the same woman from downstairs standing outside, holding a small pile of towels.

  “Is this the right room, sir? I didn’t see a record of—”

  She stopped when she saw the chain hanging from the hook in the ceiling.

  Another long moment passed as her eyes went from the ceiling to Livermore’s face. She dropped the towels, caught in that one long moment, torn between screaming and trying to run away.

  “Yes,” Livermore said calmly as he grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her inside. “This is the right room.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  A BELL RANG IN THE DARKNESS.

  A fire alarm. An air raid siren. A sound as loud and as jarring as that first explosion in the canyon.

  I opened my eyes. It was dark.

  It rang again.

  This time, I pushed myself up from the bed. I didn’t even know where I was for a moment, until I finally put it all back together.

  I’m in St. Louis. I’m in a hotel.

  My curtains were closed, with only the thinnest beam of light coming into the room between them. I’d been so tired, after I don’t even know how many nights of not sleeping. I had collapsed on this bed, and now . . .

  The phone rang again. I needed to either smash it against the wall or answer it.

  I answered it.

  “How many more women are you going to let die, Alex?”

  That voice.

  “Where are you?” I said.

  “Right above you.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  The line went dead. I fumbled with the switch on the lamp, almost knocked the damned thing over, got it upright again, finally turned it on. I blinked in the sudden light, everything a blur until my eyes focused and I saw what was on the bed.

  Red.

  Bright red.

  Against the white bedcover, a great scarlet stain, all around me. No, it was on me, too. On my pants, on my shirt. That familiar coppery smell . . .

  Blood.

  My first animal reaction was that the blood must be mine. I’m shot. I’m cut. I’m bleeding.

  Then the next thought: No, it’s not my blood.

  Then the next, as I looked around the empty room, then finally up at the ceiling.

  A hole.

  The rim of the hole . . . it was red. Another drop collected and fell onto my face.

  There was blood coming from this hole in the ceiling.

  I grabbed the gun off the nightstand and threw open the door to my room, ran down the empty hallway to the stairwell. I went up one flight, paused for one half second as I checked the sixth-floor hallway. It was empty.

  I ran to the room above mine, 604, and kicked open the door, my gun drawn. I could barely process what I saw next, the woman wrapped up and hanging by a chain from the ceiling. She slowly turned toward me, as if to greet me, and I saw the jagged line across her throat, the two streams of blood running down either side of her face, into her hair, and then one final stream dripping down onto the floor.

  I went to her and was about to put two fingers to her throat to check her pulse. Pure muscle memory in the face of madness, until I saw her lifeless eyes and realized that most of the blood from her body was either on the floor or on my bed. Or on me. I wheeled around with the gun still extended, made sure there was nobody waiting for me in the blind spot behind the door or hiding in the bathroom.

  The phone rang. I picked it up.

  “I’m outside, Alex.”

  I left the room, went down the hallway to the stairwell, and pounded my way down all six floors to the ground level. When I opened the door, the lobby was empty. I had no idea where the clerk was, until I saw the lighted panel above the elevator. He was on his way upstairs. God help the man if he walked into room 604, but I couldn’t stop him now.

  I stepped outside, into the cold air. The old train station loomed behind me in the darkness. I didn’t see anyone, in any direction.

  I pictured my cell phone, sitting up on the desk in my room, plugged in and charging. But I wasn’t about to go back for it. I wasn’t about to do anything except keep moving forward, keep trying to find him. I went up to Market Street and looked west. It was just one lonely streetlamp after another, as far as I could see. When I looked east, toward the river, I saw more streetlamps, more darkness, more emptiness. But then something else, in the park across the street. A movement.

  It could be one of the homeless men, I thought. Or it could be him.

  I ran across the street, into the park. It was two city blocks long, a great tree-lined rectangle, with a single pathway crossing through the middle. I could make out a number of fires spread out along the perimeter. Homeless men in small groups, huddled against the cold.

  I stayed on the tree line, going from one tree to the next, looking into the interior of the park. I came upon three homeless men all wrapped up in blankets and gathered around a fire in a small metal bucket with holes poked into the sides. I scanned their faces.

  “Did you see someone come this way?” I said.

  “That’s blood!” one of them said, and as I looked down at myself I realized my clothing was still soaked and the blood was splattered all over my arms and probably my face. I didn’t have a coat on. I was stumbling around in the cold darkness, looking like I’d either been stabbed half to death or had done the stabbing myself.

  The men all ran away from me, scattering in every direction. As I followed the progress of the man who’d pointed me out, I looked past him and saw, a block down, a silhouette standing under a streetlamp. Leaning against the pole, as if waiting for me. As soon as I started running, the figure vanished.

  It’s suicide, said a small voice in my head as I got closer to the streetlamp. You’re running into the light, and you might as well paint a target on your chest. But I was past reason now. Past all of the training I’d received as a cop, past any amount of common sense I’d ever had. It was only the madness now, everything I’d seen, the images coming back to me one after another as I ran. Agents blown apart in a canyon, the shotgun wound in Agent Cook’s neck, the blood pumping from a hundred holes in Agent Halliday’s chest, his face looking up at me as he asked me to send one last message to his daughter and grandson.

  A woman taped up and left to die. Left to burn.

  Another woman hung from the ceiling by a chain, bled like an animal on a killing floor.

  I made it to the streetlamp, stopped in the light for a moment, and put one hand against the post to catch my breath. My wrapped-up left knee was throbbing.

  “Where are you?” I yelled into the night as soon as I had my wind back.

  I saw him another block down Market Street, standing under another streetlamp, this one at the base of the steps leading up to a huge courthouse. Behind him, far down the street but lit up and positioned perfectly over his head like a frame, was the Gateway Arch.

  I ran down the street toward the courthouse, but by the time I got there, he was gone again, and I thought I saw him standing at the very top of the steps, between two of the great columns. I took the steps two at a time, still holding the gun in my right hand, forgetting everything I’d ever learned about trigger discipline as I tripped and almost squeezed off a shot. I pushed myself back up and kept climbing, limping now, until I was at the very top. He wasn’t there. I tried pulling on the great glass doors leading into the courthouse, but they were locked tight.

  I turned around and looked everywhere, at each cone of light under each streetlamp. Then I heard the crack of a gunshot and one of the glass doors behind me shattered. I ducked down behind a concrete rampart.

  “I’m right here, Alex!” A voice coming from the darkness, maybe a block away. “Are you that old? Are you that s
low?”

  I knew the gunshot would bring the police eventually. The only smart play was to stay behind the rampart. But I saw another movement across the street and I took off down the steps. When I hit the street I saw the long concrete wall on the other side, and beyond that a parking lot. The perfect place to wait for me, safe behind the wall, another easy shot as soon as I came to a stop.

  I should be dead already. He’s had at least three shots at me, and the only time he fired he took out the glass behind me.

  He’s toying with me.

  But that just made me want to kill him even more.

  When I got to the wall, I stood with the gun in both hands, peering down the line in one direction, then the other. The movement I’d seen was left to right. He was moving farther down Market Street, toward the arch.

  I started running again, my left knee a riot of pain with every step, my lungs screaming. There was another streetlamp, another silhouette. This time I actually stopped and leveled my gun at him, half a block away. Trying to steady my hands, trying to aim . . . I knew it was an impossible shot.

  This is insanity, I told myself. You can’t shoot at a shadow from fifty yards away.

  “Alex!”

  A different voice this time. I turned and saw Agent Larkin racing to catch up to me.

  “He’s there!” I yelled. “That’s him!”

  I pointed back toward the silhouette, just as he disappeared around another building. I kept running, one block, then another, stopping just long enough to look for him. There was another small park, just before the arch.

  I saw a movement in a break in the trees, kept running until I reached it. Livermore was gone. Before I could move again, Larkin intercepted me and did everything but tackle me to the ground to stop me.

  “Alex,” he said, putting his face close to mine. “What are you doing?”

  I tried to answer him. But I was gasping for air.

  “The police are coming,” he said. “Give me the gun.”

  “That woman . . .” I said, still fighting for air. Then there was another gunshot. I could practically feel the bullet passing over my head. As I pulled Agent Larkin down to the sidewalk, he drew his own weapon.

  I pulled him away from the light, toward the line of trees. We stopped with our backs against two thick trunks, a few feet away from each other.

  “Think about what you’re doing,” he said. “What he’s making you do.”

  Breathe, I told myself. Breathe and get ready.

  “Do you hear me?”

  In the distance, the faint sound of a police siren.

  Then Livermore’s voice again, from behind us. Not far.

  “Alex! Where are you?”

  I turned and ran toward the voice. I didn’t care if he shot me anymore. He could put a bullet right through me. It wouldn’t even be the first time in my life. Shoot me as many times as you want, you evil piece of shit, and I’ll keep coming.

  I heard Agent Larkin calling my name behind me as I saw the figure moving. Then it stopped. There was one more line of trees behind him, one more square of open ground, then the last empty road and the arch glowing high in the sky. Beyond that nothing but the dark water of the river and the lights from another city on the far banks, looking so far away it might as well have been in outer space.

  I’ve got you. There’s nowhere else you can go.

  I didn’t have any strength left in my legs, or any air in my lungs, but I kept running, getting closer and closer, waiting for the shot.

  Go ahead. Try to kill me. It’s your last chance.

  He was standing next to another campfire, the embers glowing at his feet. I didn’t slow down. I didn’t aim. I jumped over the fire and grabbed him by the shirt with my left hand, put the gun to his head with my right.

  I looked the man in the eye. He stared back at me, with no understanding of what was happening to him. All he could see was a blood-soaked stranger leaping at him from the darkness. I could feel him shivering.

  It wasn’t Livermore.

  I half doubled over, drawing the air into my lungs.

  “Right here, Alex.”

  Livermore’s voice. I turned and pointed the gun.

  Right at Agent Larkin.

  He was on the other side of the fire. Standing there, not moving, both of his hands empty. It didn’t make any sense for a second, until I saw the man behind him. There was a homeless man’s blanket wrapped around him. It fell to the ground.

  I saw that face over the agent’s right shoulder. Most of the hair was gone from his head. He had whiskers and a mustache. Everything was different, and yet he was the same man.

  Livermore.

  “Drop your gun, Alex.”

  I didn’t. I tried to hold it steady. I had three inches of clearance. Thirty feet away.

  “Do what he says,” Larkin said. I could see his face clearly in the firelight. He looked scared and embarrassed at the same time.

  The sirens got louder.

  I dropped the gun to the ground.

  “Let him go,” I said. “He’s got nothing to do with this.”

  “I let you live in that canyon,” Livermore said. “I’m going to let you live again. Remember that, Alex. Remember that when we get to the end of this.”

  “The end of what? I don’t even know what this is.”

  “You haven’t figured it out yet? How we’re connected?”

  The sirens, louder and louder. The red and blue lights, flashing through the trees.

  “It’s over,” I said to him.

  “Not even close.”

  Then he shot Agent Larkin in the back.

  As Larkin went down in slow motion, Livermore turned and ran. I had a gun at my feet, and a young man dying in front of me. I made my choice, the only choice there was. I went to him and tried to stop the bleeding, took off my shirt and held it against the entry wound in his back, turned him over and saw the exit wound.

  Matt Larkin looked up at me. It was always hockey or the FBI. That was what he had told me. A kid’s dream that went one way instead of the other, leading up to this moment, bleeding on the ground as I yelled at him to hold on. For the second time in a week, I was about to watch a federal agent die in my arms.

  “Fuck that,” I said, picking him up off the ground. I staggered for a few steps, found my balance, and started moving toward the street.

  “Alex . . .”

  “I’m going to get you some help. Just stay with me.”

  When I finally got to the street, a police car came to a skidding stop right in front of me.

  “Ambulance!” I yelled as soon as the officer came out of his door. He had his gun drawn, but he holstered it when he saw me.

  “Where’s the shooter?”

  “That way,” I said, jerking my head toward the park. But Livermore had at least a full minute’s head start by now. This was a man who had escaped from seven armed men while handcuffed. Then he’d gotten out of Amarillo, driving right through the roadblocks.

  I knew he’d walk away from this, too.

  “The ambulance will be here in two minutes,” the officer said to me. Then he picked up his radio to communicate with the other cars.

  “Ten thirty-two, Fourth Street and Market,” he said. He repeated the information and then gave the ambulance a ten fifty-two for the same location. I kept cradling Larkin, looking into his eyes to make sure they were still open.

  “You’re going to make it,” I said to him. “Just hold on.”

  When the ambulance finally arrived, they wheeled around a gurney with collapsible wheels and took him from me. He gave out a loud groan as they laid him down and wheeled him toward the back of the unit.

  “One shot through the back,” I told them. I didn’t have to say anything about the exit wound, because the blood had already soaked t
hrough his shirt, to his coat.

  “Alex . . .” he said again as they lifted him into the ambulance. I jumped in behind them, waiting for someone to stop me.

  “Go with him,” the cop said to me. “I’ll catch up to you at the hospital.”

  I nodded, and they closed the doors. Then I watched the two medical techs working to stabilize Larkin, compressing the exit wound, checking his vitals, starting an IV.

  “What’s his name?” one of them asked me. He gave me a towel to wipe the blood from my face.

  “Matt Larkin. He’s an FBI agent.”

  They kept talking to him, told him he’d be at the hospital soon. His eyelids fluttered, and I thought we were going to lose him. But then he coughed and waved me over to him.

  I came closer, struggling to keep my footing as the ambulance took a tight corner.

  “You have to get him,” he said to me.

  “I will.” It was the one thing he didn’t have to tell me.

  “Don’t talk,” the tech said to him. “Just relax. We’re almost there.”

  “No,” he said, looking me in the eye. “They’ll try to stop you. You have to go.”

  I sat back down on the ledge, thinking it over. He was right. As soon as we got to the hospital, I’d be detained. At least overnight, possibly longer. Hell, I could picture Agent Madison on his way to St. Louis to personally escort me back to Phoenix. In handcuffs, if necessary.

  Meanwhile, Livermore was still out there. Still moving.

  “I’ll be okay,” Larkin said. “I promise.”

  I put my hand on his leg and gave it a squeeze. When the ambulance pulled up next to the hospital, they threw open the back doors and wheeled him inside. I saw two police cars, just a few yards away. I didn’t see any officers yet. In about ten seconds, someone would find me.

  I turned and moved away as fast as my wrecked body would let me, slipping into the night.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  LIVERMORE PULLED UP to the house, to the place where everything would end. He saw the man there, already waiting for him.