Dead Man Running

by Steve Hamilton

  Livermore took Jeannie’s chin and tilted her face away from mine, toward his. I rattled the cuffs again as I pulled at the drainpipe.

  “Don’t touch her,” I said.

  He looked down at me and laughed, then he turned back to Jeannie.

  “Stand up,” he said. “Stand up for the most important moment of your life.”

  She kept looking back down at me as she did, swaying and then catching her balance as she got to her feet.

  I nodded to her, willing her to see the only way out. The only way to at least buy some more time.

  You have to go along with this, Jeannie. Whatever it is, just play along.

  But then I saw Livermore take the gun from his belt.

  I rattled the cuffs again, remembering how he’d stood behind Agent Larkin and shot him right in the back. Jeannie saw the gun but didn’t even react. She just stared at it.

  “Let me tell you what’s going to happen,” he said.

  “Please don’t kill him,” she said.

  “I could have killed him ten times already, if that’s what I wanted.”

  She kept staring at the gun. Her chest rose and fell with each breath.

  “No, I’m not going to shoot Alex,” he said.

  He handed her the gun.

  “You are.”

  She took it from him, looking down at it like she had never seen one before. But I knew she could handle a pistol. I had taught her myself.

  “Right now,” he said. “This is where you prove yourself.”

  She looked at him, down at the gun again, then at me.

  “Go ahead.” He took a step backward.

  She stared at the gun, finally wrapping her right hand around the handle, and then stabilizing her grip with her left. Just like I had taught her.

  She wasn’t looking at me anymore. She was concentrating on the gun, and in that moment I had a sudden doubt . . . Had she been traumatized enough that she’d actually kill me?

  I can’t blame her if she does, I thought. If that’s the way this has to end . . .

  She looked at me, raised the barrel, put her finger on the trigger.

  I waited.

  She looked back at him for one moment, reset her grip on the gun.

  She pulled back the hammer.

  Raised the barrel.

  Closed one eye.

  Then she turned and pointed the gun at Livermore.

  He made no move to stop her. He put his hands in the air.

  She squeezed the trigger.

  Click.

  She reracked and squeezed again. And again.

  Click.

  Livermore stepped forward and took the gun from her. He didn’t say a word, and the silence hung in the room as he slowly tucked the gun into his waistband. I held my breath, waiting for whatever would come next. Jeannie stood motionless, looking at nothing, until her eyes finally drifted to Livermore’s face.

  His back was turned to me, but Jeannie saw something new in his eyes that seemed to bring her back to life. She backed away from him, and as soon as he took one step toward her, I pulled at the cuffs, ignoring the damage to my wrists.

  “Livermore!” I said. “Over here! I made her do that! Take it out on me!”

  But he wasn’t hearing me. In that moment, he was aware of nobody else but Jeannie, as she kept backing away until the wall stopped her.

  He advanced until he was close enough to reach out his left arm, to close his hand around her neck. She looked down at me, the panic spreading across her face.

  “Livermore!” I yelled. “You coward! I’m right here!”

  He still couldn’t hear me. He had her pinned against the wall, every ounce of force pressed into her neck. Then he raised his right hand and brought it across her face.

  “Livermore!”

  He did it again. Then again. She would have fallen to the floor if he hadn’t kept holding her up. Then he looked down at the phone unit that was still hanging from the wall by one wire, bent over just enough to let Jeannie start sliding down the wall, then pushed her back upright as he stood with the phone in his right hand. Held it like he was going to hit her in the head with it.

  Think of something, I told myself. Something to break the spell.

  “I took her from you!” I yelled at him.

  He froze.

  “That’s right, Livermore! I took Jeannie from you. How does that feel?”

  He let out a breath, and then he looked down at me, as if suddenly remembering I was there.

  “She used to talk about you all the time,” I said. “The boy from the lake. For years, Livermore. I knew she was still thinking about you.”

  He let the phone drop. It crashed against the wall, dancing on the end of the wire. Then he let go of Jeannie’s neck and she slid to the floor, her eyes half open, her left cheek glowing red from where he had slapped her.

  That’s it. Stay focused on me.

  “Every day I was married to her,” I told him, “every night when I took her to bed . . . I laughed in your face.”

  Come over here, you son of a bitch. Come closer.

  He was standing over me now. Then he took one step sideways so he could aim a kick at my rib cage. I tensed up as I tried to absorb it, but it hit me like a knife right in the side, knocking the wind out of me. He kicked at me again and again. It was my turn to see the unhinged fury on his face. My turn to see the evil. But it was me now and not Jeannie, and that was all that mattered.

  I tried to time his motion so that I could swing my legs around and trip him. It was Jeannie’s last chance to get away, if I could get him on the ground, tie him up just long enough for her to make it out the front door. She was already on her hands and knees and crawling into the living room.

  When I tried to catch him, he brought his foot down hard on my sore left knee, sending a jolt all the way up my body. Then he turned and went after her. I pictured her crawling to the front door, getting to her feet and running out into the darkness. But then I heard her scream as he captured her and dragged her back into the kitchen, pulling her by her hair.

  “No!” I yelled, straining at the cuffs, waiting for him to start hitting her again. To end her life right in front of me.

  “Let her go,” I said. “Livermore, you piece of shit, let her go.”

  But he kept pulling Jeannie across the tile floor. He took one more look down at me. Then without another word spoken, he threw open the kitchen door and dragged her outside.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  I AM GOING TO DIE.

  She heard those five words in her head as she felt herself being pulled from the house, out into the cold air. The snow was a sudden shock against her bare feet. And yet it was drowned out by those five simple words, echoing over and over again.

  I am going to die.

  “Please,” she said, already shivering. “Martin . . .”

  She went down on her hands and knees in the snow. He pulled her up and started to push her from behind, gathering her tank top in his fist and driving her forward. Through the trees, past the dark empty house next door, through more trees, past another house. All closed up for the winter. There was nobody to help her. Nobody but the man left behind in her kitchen, handcuffed to the drainpipe.

  I am going to die.

  She tried to resist him, tried to find some kind of leverage to pull away, but she kept slipping in the snow. Her knees and elbows were bleeding. A cold wind came off the frozen lake and sliced through her bare skin.

  I am going to die.

  She reached around and grabbed his wrist, tried to twist the thumb, a distant memory coming back from a self-defense class in college. His grip loosened just enough for her to break free, but then he pushed her hard from behind, and she went right out onto the ice and fell onto her back. Another sudden shock as the ice and
the snow bit into her skin.

  She rolled over and tried to push herself up. He stayed there on the edge, a shadow, not moving, as she kept slipping and falling back down, each time another cold shock, another scrape of her skin. In the end, she settled on her hands and knees, pulling herself into a ball, making herself as small as possible to protect herself against the wind.

  This is it, she said to herself. That same calm voice from a thousand miles away. This is the end. I’m going to die right here on this lake, and they’ll find my frozen body tomorrow. Or a month from now. Or in the spring . . .

  He came out onto the ice and grabbed her again, dragging her back to the shore. As she stood up straight she was close enough to see his eyes reflecting the dim ambient light. He hadn’t said a word since she’d pointed the gun at him, and how much more terrifying was this silent disjointed face that looked back at her. There was something fundamentally different about him now, as if some basic human quality had been left behind in that house, some essential gear in his mind stripped and spinning free.

  She tried to scream again, but he slapped one open hand against her cheek, making everything explode in a white flash of heat and pain. As he grabbed her arm, she went down to the ground, and he dragged her across the snow like a father pulling a child on a sled. The ice and the rough ground cut at her skin, until she finally managed to scramble to her feet. They continued around the lake this way, Livermore half pulling, half dragging, past more empty houses, past the part of the road that came near the lake, where Jeannie desperately hoped for one last chance, one pair of headlights coming from White Cloud. One vehicle she could wave to, could throw herself in front of.

  But the road was just as dark and empty as the lake, and he kept pulling her toward the single light that loomed ahead of them. The Livermore house on the other side of the lake.

  As they got closer, some primal part of her longed to be inside it, out of this cold air, sheltered from this wind. A dim light came through the back door and spilled out onto the snow. As he opened the door and pulled her inside, she blinked in the sudden glare and went down on the floor. She saw the skin on her arms, how red it was, and all the cuts and scrapes that were bleeding. She couldn’t feel her feet anymore, and she was still shivering uncontrollably.

  She saw drops of blood on the floor. Dried stains that had already been there for God knows how long, her own blood dripping from her face and arms to mix with it.

  She didn’t bother to wonder who else had bled in this room, or when. She was past caring. Past comprehending. When Livermore left the room, she looked up and made one last reach for the door. Her hands were just as numb as her feet, and she couldn’t even work the knob to turn it.

  “No,” Livermore said as he came back into the room and threw a blanket at her. “You’re not leaving.”

  He was talking to her again, but his voice sounded like the flat, emotionless drone of a machine. She grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around her as tight as she could, taking one breath at a time, staring at the floor, watching the snow melting and dripping from her hair, the drops of water mixing with the blood from her arms.

  “There were others,” he said, standing above her.

  She didn’t even try to move away from him.

  “Women who had to pay the price.”

  She had nothing left. No strength, no fight.

  Please stop talking, she thought. If you’re going to kill me, kill me . . .

  “It’s time for you to meet them.”

  She was still trying to comprehend what those words could even mean as he pulled her back to her feet and led her down the stairs.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  I KEPT CALLING Jeannie’s name, long after Livermore had dragged her from the house. I wanted my voice to reach her, to let her know that I wasn’t giving up hope. I couldn’t let her believe that I wouldn’t follow them, couldn’t let her believe that she’d never see me, or anyone else, again.

  But you’ve got nothing, I said to myself. No chance at all. Livermore will come back eventually and finish you off.

  I rattled the handcuffs again, feeling the frustration washing over me, overwhelming me. My wrists were shredded, my arms sore from pulling against the pipe. My forehead was still bleeding, and there was no way to clear the blood that dripped into my eyes.

  I’m not going to die on this floor.

  One more rattle, the cuffs biting into my skin. Then I made myself stop. I made myself think.

  I’m going to find a way out of this.

  I have to find a way.

  I pulled myself deeper under the sink, looked at everything that was around me. But it was just cleaners and sponges and a bottle of bleach. I curled up into a ball so that I could bring one foot against the side of the top drawer. I pushed the drawer out with my foot, feeling it stick as it came to the end of the track. I kicked it a few times, and the whole thing came crashing onto the floor. It was a junk drawer, old batteries, flashlights, keys, hardware. But nothing with a blade. Nothing that would be of any use to me.

  I worked on the next drawer, pushed it out and heard the silverware rattling onto the floor. I kicked the drawer clear and tried to see what kind of knives I could get to.

  There, a steak knife.

  I worked it closer to me with my foot, but it got stuck against the lip of the under-sink cupboard I was lying in. I worked it back away from the lip until I could get one foot around each side of it. It took a few tries, but I was finally able to lift it and fling it at my own head. I was past caring if it hit me.

  I pulled myself as close to the drainpipe as I could and twisted my arms around until I could get one hand on the knife. It wasn’t much of a blade, but it was all I had. I twisted my arms back and tried to get an angle on the chain between the cuffs. Then I started sawing.

  I had no leverage, could hardly put any force at all behind the blade. But I picked one spot and worked at it. After five minutes, stopping whenever I had to shake my head to clear the blood from my eyes, I had a small nick worn into the chain link. I took a breath and refocused. Then I kept sawing back and forth, willing the blade to cut into the metal. It wasn’t working. I was just dulling the blade more and more with each stroke, and then eventually it slipped right out of my hand and fell behind the back of the bottom drawer. I let out a yell of frustration, brought my foot up again and slid that drawer open, finally kicking it hard enough to send it sliding across the kitchen floor. Even with the drawer out, there was no way I could get to that knife.

  I pictured Jeannie being dragged from the house again, could only imagine how cold she must have been feeling at that moment, wherever she was. Or what Livermore was doing to her.

  I could see only one choice left.

  You’re going to have to find another knife. Only this time, you’re going to have to cut your wrist.

  You lose your left hand. You find something to stop the bleeding. You go find Jeannie.

  It’s the only way you’re going to save her.

  I cleared my eyes one more time and looked through the rest of the silverware on the kitchen floor. None of the knives looked like they could cut through anything. Not the metal chain on the cuffs. Not even my own flesh and bones—unless I was prepared to saw away at myself for the next three hours.

  I yanked on the cuffs again, felt them cutting even deeper. Curling myself into a ball again, I brought my feet around and tried to set them against the back wall of the cupboard. There was a time when I would bend my legs like this a few hundred times a day, every time I put on the mask and crouched down behind the plate. Sometimes doubleheaders. Now I could barely get myself halfway into that same position. But I took a deep breath, and I forced my legs to bend . . . farther . . . farther . . . twisting my whole body around, the cuffs burning on my wrists . . .

  Until there, I had one foot on the wall. Now the other . . .

&nbs
p; You can do this, I told myself. You have to do this. No matter what it takes.

  I kept bending, pulling against the cuffs, willing my sore left knee to bend, until I finally had my other foot braced against the wall. I was completely twisted over like a pretzel now, so tight I couldn’t have gotten myself free again even if I had wanted to. I tried to grab at the drainpipe, to take some of the pressure off my wrists. My hands kept slipping.

  More, you piece of shit. You need to move more.

  I folded myself up the last inch, until I could get my fingers around the pipe, almost interlacing them on the other side. Just enough to keep the cuffs from cutting me any deeper.

  Now I had to pull with my hands and push with my legs at the same time. I gritted my teeth and bore down on it. Straining against the pipe.

  You have to explode. You’re a fucking rocket ship now. Blasting out of this place.

  I kept straining and finally felt the drainpipe move a quarter of an inch. I got a new grip, tried again.

  One more explosion.

  Move, you son of a bitch. Move!

  Another breath. Another reset on the grip. I kept my eyes closed against the blood, pushed against the wall, pulled at the pipe. Pulled and pushed and pulled and I felt it give another quarter inch, and suddenly I was back in my own mind, a million years ago, seeing Jeannie walking across that campus for the first time, talking to her for the first time, kissing her for the first time, finally walking down the aisle to marry her, this woman who I’d lost and hadn’t seen in how many goddamned years.

  I screamed out with the pain, giving it everything I had left inside, going deep enough to find more. More than I’d ever had before.

  Livermore’s face. My hands around his throat.

  I’m going to kill you. I’m going to kill you. I’m going to kill you.

  I felt the pipe give a little more and started to time my efforts into short bursts of strength, rocking the pipe back and forth like a car stuck in the snow, give and pull, give and pull, work it, take a breath, work it, take a breath.