by Sean Black
‘What’s only for a little while? Where are we going?’ He paused and took a shaky breath. ‘If we don’t go home right now, I’m telling Dad, and he’ll fire your ass.’
The partition window slid down and the driver swivelled round. His hair was cut military-short and flaked with grey at the temples. The black suit he’d been crammed into, to lend the appearance of a chauffeur, looked in danger of tearing under his arms.
‘Take us home!’ Josh screamed at him. ‘Now!’
The driver ignored him. ‘Either you get the little brat to sit down or I will,’ he said to Natalya, pulling aside his jacket to reveal a shoulder holster with a Glock 9mm pistol tucked into it, the handle showing black against his white shirt.
Josh stared at him, the sight of the gun quietening him, boiling down panic to a silent rage.
Beyond the driver, through the clear glass of the windshield, he could see a trademark blue and white NYPD cruiser driving towards them. In a few seconds it would be parallel with them. A second after that it would be gone.
Sensing that this was his one chance, Josh made a sudden lunge towards the front seat. The driver’s right elbow flew up, catching the top of his forehead with a crack and sending him spinning back into the footwell. ‘Sit the hell down,’ he said, pushing a button on the console, the partition gliding back into place.
Natalya pulled Josh back up on to the seat. A welt was already starting to rise where the driver had caught him. An inch or two lower and he would have crushed the bridge of his nose. Fighting the tears was futile.
His eyes burned into Natalya’s. ‘Why are you doing this?’
As Josh’s sobs came, raw and breathless, Natalya closed her eyes, the knot of quiet dread that had been growing in her stomach for the past few weeks solidifying. Knowing now what she’d denied to herself all this time. That she’d made a terrible mistake.
Feet away from them, the police cruiser sped past. Neither cop gave the town car a second glance.
Seven
Ten minutes after the driver had struck Josh, the partition lowered again and he tossed a backpack in Natalya’s general direction. She opened it with trepidation, even though she’d been told what would be inside.
First item out was a plastic bag emblazoned with a trademark Duane Read blue and red logo. Digging a bit deeper, she retrieved a set of children’s clothes, brand new and in Josh’s size: blue jeans, a white T-shirt and a navy sweatshirt. No cartoon characters, no brand names, no slogans, no distinguishing characteristics of any kind. Plain. Generic. Anonymous. Chosen precisely for those qualities.
‘Look, new clothes,’ Natalya said, doing her best to coax Josh from the far corner of the back seat.
Josh turned his face to Natalya, half-dried tears like glycerine on his cheeks. ‘They suck.’
‘Let’s get you changed, yes?’
‘Why? What for?’
‘Please, Josh.’
Josh glanced towards the partition. ‘Forget it.’
Natalya leaned in closer to him. ‘We don’t want to make him angry again, do we?’
‘Who is he anyway?’ Josh asked. ‘Your boyfriend?’
Natalya bit down on her lip.
‘He is, isn’t he?’
‘It doesn’t matter who he is.’
‘Why are you doing this to me?’
Natalya lowered her voice. ‘Look, I made a mistake. I’m going to try and get you out of this. But right now, I need you to cooperate.’
‘Why should I believe you?’
‘Because you don’t have any choice.’
Finally, after more stalling, Josh got changed. Natalya jammed his party clothes into the backpack, the easy part out of the way. Next, she picked up the bag from the drug store, steeling herself, then put it back down. Unless she was going to pin Josh to the ground to do what she had to do, and risk injuring him in the process, this was going to take careful handling.
‘You look nice in those,’ Natalya said.
‘No I don’t.’
‘They look good.’
None of this was cutting any ice and Natalya could see that Josh was getting jittery again.
He shifted position on the back seat. ‘Can we go home? Please? If you want money my dad can give it to you, but I want to go home.’
‘It’s not that simple.’
‘Why not?’
Natalya pulled a pair of hairdresser’s scissors from the drug store bag.
Josh’s hand shot to his scalp. ‘No. Not my hair.’
The car slowed and pulled to the side of the road, as a car behind blared its horn. The partition fell. This time the driver had the gun in his hand. He pointed it directly at Josh. ‘If I have to pull over one more time, you’ll regret it.’
Shaking, Josh turned his back to Natalya. Legs crossed, she sat behind him, and set to work.
Barely five minutes later the back seat was festooned with long strands of dark brown hair. Josh reached his hand back, ran it through the uneven spikes.
Natalya took Josh’s hand and squeezed it. ‘You can always grow it back. Now, let me tidy it.’
She made some more tiny adjustments, momentarily getting caught up in the task.
‘There. Now you know what would really suit this style?’
‘What?’
‘A different colour.’
‘I guess so,’ Josh said, sounding utterly defeated.
Natalya rummaged in the bag again, sighing as she came up with a plastic bottle of hair dye. Quickly scanning the directions on the back of the bottle, she tutted loudly, then leaned forward and rapped on the partition. ‘I can’t use this now.’
The driver stared at her in the rear-view mirror. ‘Why not?’
‘It needs water. It’ll have to wait.’
‘You sure?’
‘You think I’m stupid?’
She thrust the bottle through the partition, two fingers covering the part of the label which read ‘unique dry application’. The driver grunted, tucked the bottle into his jacket and restarted the car.
‘Don’t worry, I won’t let anything bad happen to you,’ Natalya whispered, putting her arm around Josh.
‘This isn’t bad?’ he demanded.
Natalya pulled him closer and he finally relented, snuggling in to her.
Fifteen minutes later he was beginning to doze off, his head resting against Natalya’s shoulder, as the car came to a stop and the driver opened the door, pulling them both out into the cold.
As they stood shivering in a freezing mist of rain, the driver produced a brand-new cordless car vac and used it to suck Josh’s hair off the back seat. Someone else would be along later to collect the car.
The area was desolate and semi-industrial, with a road off to the left. They trudged through a sugar coating of powdery snow towards an oversized metal gate which lay smack bang in the middle of a seemingly endless chain-link fence. Cars flitted past in the distance. Other than that they were alone. A man with a gun, Natalya, and the child she’d been charged with looking after and had just so cruelly betrayed.
Natalya looked around, trying to find a point to fix on — a street sign, maybe, or a store — but all she could see was waterfront. Close by she could hear the slurp of waves against a dock.
Everything had changed for her the moment Josh had been hit. Regardless of what was at stake for herself she was determined to make good her mistake. And that meant getting Josh safely home to his father.
She’d have to pick her moment with care, though. There would be no second chance at escape.
They hadn’t driven through any tunnels or over any bridges so she was sure they were still in Manhattan, but it didn’t take a genius to work out that this neighbourhood was a long way from the Upper East Side.
The driver pushed Natalya towards the metal gate with the heel of his hand. ‘Move,’ he grunted.
At the door, a solitary security camera panned round, accompanied by a faint hydraulic whirl. The gate clicked and the driver pushed it
open, ushering Natalya and Josh through.
Perched at the end of a pier, a single-engine speedboat was tied up, no one aboard. Painted a dark grey, it sat low in the water. They walked towards it, the driver clambering down into it first, almost losing his footing as a sudden swell rose under the hull. For a split second Natalya considered running, but with the dock stretching thirty feet out into the water she knew they’d never make it in time.
Natalya helped Josh into the boat.
‘Get the rope for me,’ the driver said, pushing Josh down so he’d be out of view of any passing traffic on the river.
Natalya unhooked the stern line from the mooring and threw it back to him. Now was her chance.
The driver waved her forward with his hand as the boat began to inch away from the dock. ‘Quick.’
She hesitated, then caught Josh’s terrified eyes. There was just no way she could leave him. Taking one quick step, she jumped down, the driver catching her hand and half hauling her down into the boat.
The driver gunned the engine and they set off in a wave of spume and diesel oil. Soon the dock was out of sight, a black skyline etched against grey.
Natalya counted off those buildings she recognized. The tower of the Chrysler building. The Empire State. The gaping maw of a breach where the Twin Towers once stood, now replaced by the first nub of the Freedom Tower.
The driver dug into his jacket and pulled out the bottle of hair dye. He squinted at the instructions on the back like they were written in Sanskrit. Finally, he looked up at Natalya. ‘Dry application. Bullshit.’ He threw the bottle at Josh. ‘Make sure you rub it in good.’
Eight
Lock woke in a bed in a small room, hooked up to a monitor and some kind of IV. He prayed for morphine, but suspected saline. If he was still in this much pain, it had to be some weak-ass morphine.
He wiggled his toes and fingers, relieved to find that they seemed to be responding. To make sure that it wasn’t some kind of phantom sensation he flipped back the sheet, surprised that he could move so easily, and amused to find that he had an erection. Maybe it was some kind of evolutionary response to a near-death experience. Either that or a full bladder.
He waited for his excitement to subside, conjuring up the most unerotic of images to hasten its demise. No dice. Not even a yoga-emaciated Madonna could shift it. The blinds weren’t closed all the way, and he could glimpse the lights of the city that didn’t sleep beyond the window, getting on just fine without him.
Tentatively, he swung his legs over the side of the bed and, with one hand on the bed rail, stood up. For a second or two the room shifted suddenly, but the sensation quickly abated, and he managed to walk gingerly over to the tiny bathroom.
The man staring back at him from the mirror with a deadpan expression was sporting three-day-old stubble and a close-shaven head. Running his fingers across the top of his skull, he found a set of stitches. Whether it was a wound or the result of an incision wasn’t entirely clear. He touched his fingertips to it. No real pain, but definitely stitches.
His face was puffy, especially around the eyes. His eyes were set blue amid the deathly pallor of the rest of his skin, his pupils like dots.
He took a moment to work back to how he got here. Relief. It was all there. The protestors, Van Straten’s unexpected walkabout, then Lock standing on the steps outside Meditech and the bullet. Correction: bullets. His glimpse of Carrie running for cover. More relief at recalling that. Then him taking on the threat, the young Korean storekeeper tied up, then walking up that staircase, a bang, and a sudden cut to black.
Total recall. He allowed himself a smile at that.
He filled the sink and began to splash his face with cold water, freezing mid-splash as the door opened into the main room. Pressing his back against the wall, he peered out.
In the room, a man in a blue windbreaker looked around, like the empty bed was evidence of some kind of magic trick. For a second, Lock half expected the guy to start shining his Mag light under the covers.
He stepped out of the bathroom, and the guy’s face relaxed into a smile. ‘There you are.’
‘Here I am,’ was all Lock could think to say in reply.
Overcome by a sudden wave of exhaustion, he took a step back towards the bed, and stumbled. The man put out a hand, steadying him. ‘Easy there.’
Lock waved him off, keen to get some sheets between him and his visitor. ‘Lemme guess, JTTF?’
The Joint Terrorism Task Force’s field office in Manhattan was based downtown in the Federal Plaza. Composed of members of the FBI, ATF, as well as NYPD, it was charged with dealing with all incidents of domestic terrorism in the five boroughs and beyond. The campaign against Meditech had fallen under its jurisdiction as the animal rights activists had escalated their actions. Lock had liaised with a number of suits from their office, although the man standing in front of him wasn’t one of them, as far as he could recall.
‘John Frisk. Just got transferred over.’
‘Ryan Lock.’
‘Least you can remember your name, that’s a start.’
‘So where’d they transfer you from?’
‘FBI.’
Lock sat back on the bed. Frisk pulled up a chair and sat next to him.
‘You’re a lucky guy. If you’d been hit a couple of inches either side of your plates you’d be toast.’
Lock had been sporting four plates. Two front, and two back, they slid into pouches either side of his ballistic vest to provide additional protection.
Lock smiled. ‘Maybe I should hit Vegas, while I’m still on this hot streak.’
‘Take me with you. I could use the vacation.’
Lock eased his head back on to the pillows and stared at a fixed point on the ceiling. ‘What’d they hit me with?’
‘Twelve-gauge rigged to the door,’ said Frisk.
‘Better that than the alternative, I’m guessing. You pick anyone up yet?’
‘We were hoping you could help us with that one.’
Lock chewed the side of his mouth. ‘Professionals. Both male. Both over six feet. I didn’t get much of a look beyond the back of their heels. What did the crime scene team turn up?’
‘I can’t really say.’
‘That many leads, huh?’
It was Frisk’s turn to suppress a smile. ‘I thought I was the investigator and you were the witness.’
‘Old habits die hard.’
Frisk hesitated for a moment. ‘OK, from what we can gather, as you said, it was a pro job. High-calibre sniper rifle — we’re still working on the exact type, but a fifty cal.’
‘Fifty?’
‘Yup. If they’d rigged that to the door we wouldn’t be having this conversation,’ Frisk said, super-casual.
‘Got that straight,’ said Lock. Having seen what the.50 cal had done to Stokes’ head, Lock knew that no amount of body armour would have saved him.
‘They had the escape route scoped out ahead of time, not much left behind for forensics. No shell casings anywhere to be seen, not like that would have given us much anyway. Plus the room was bleached down before they exited via the window.’
‘What about the shotgun?’ Lock asked, leaning over to reach for a glass of water perched on the locker next to his bed.
Frisk beat him to it and passed it over. ‘Looking to buy themselves a few extra seconds would be my guess.’
Lock grunted in agreement.
‘We traced it to the owner of a house out in Long Island. Place has been vacant since the summer, guy didn’t even know he’d been broken into.’
‘Did the girl make it?’
‘The girl in the wheelchair?’
Lock nodded, took a sip of water.
‘She’s down on four.’
‘She OK?’
‘Pretty shocked. Knows about as much as you do.’
‘You’ve got some great witnesses lined up by the sounds of it. What was the final count?’
‘Five dead in tot
al.’
‘Five?’
‘Three shot, one run over, and one heart attack.’
A knock at the door. A young African American doctor in her late twenties who looked like she’d been awake about as long as Lock had been unconscious poked her head round. ‘I thought I was pretty clear that I didn’t want my patient disturbed until he was ready.’
‘It was my fault, doc,’ Lock said. ‘I was quizzing Agent Frisk, not the other way round.’
‘Well, if you have any questions, you can always talk to me.’
Lock glanced back to Frisk. ‘Never got to ask Agent Frisk what my federal prognosis was.’
‘Well, your weapon was legally held, although how the hell you got a concealed carry in the city these days beats me.’
Lock looked skywards to the ceiling. ‘Friends in high places.’
‘And your luck doesn’t end there,’ Frisk continued. ‘Seeing as you never fired a shot, there won’t be any charges. But next time, leave the cavalry charge to the cavalry, OK?’
Lock bristled. He’d been the only one taking on the threat and here was Frisk treating him like some rookie cop. ‘I’d be happy to, if they manage to show up before the final reel. Speaking of which, what’s happening to Brand?’
‘Police department are keen to go to bat on vehicular manslaughter. But the DA’s getting a lot of pressure to go for a lesser charge, or let it slide entirely.’
‘If you speak to anyone in their office you can tell them I’d be happy to step to the plate for the prosecution on that one.’
Frisk raised an eyebrow. ‘You and he not too close, huh?’
‘Different approaches, that’s all.’
‘Oh yeah, and what’s the difference?’
‘Mine’s correct,’ Lock said curtly.
‘Mr Lock really does need his rest,’ the doctor broke in. ‘I’m sure there’ll be plenty of time for you to talk to him tomorrow.’
‘What day is it anyway?’
‘Thursday,’ said Frisk.
‘Wait. I missed Christmas?’
The doctor arched an eyebrow. ‘You got the gift of life.’
