by Neal Baer
She realized her parents thought she’d gone off the deep end.
“Should I call Doctor Fairborn?” her mother asked.
“I’m not crazy, Mom,” Claire assured her. “Please. Just give me the phone.”
It took less than an hour for Wilkes to arrive at Claire’s bedside. Now wide awake, she was in pain from her incision, refusing to push the button that would release opiates into her veins, trading discomfort for clarity.
“You could have saved yourself an hour of agony if you told me this on the phone, Doc,” Wilkes said after Claire told him the story. “We already know our guy drove Nick’s Jeep to Rochester, and we’ve told the cops up there that we have it.”
“But he had to know where he was going when he stole it,” Claire said. “It’s not a coincidence that he tried to kill my father.”
“You’re right,” came a voice from the door, causing Claire to turn her head as Nick, wearing a fiberglass cast on his left arm, entered the room.
“Nick,” was all Claire could think of to say as a smile spread across her face, his presence momentarily obliterating the pain. He came over and kissed her on the cheek.
“They told me it was just a chipped ulna,” she said, touching his cast.
“And a hairline fracture from there to the other side,” Nick informed her, “or however you say that in doctor-ese. On the positive side, it’s another weapon.”
Claire introduced him to her parents, who could see the relationship between them was more than just that of two injured colleagues.
“Okay,” said Wilkes, finally growing impatient, “now that the reunion’s over can we get back to business?”
“Yes, sir,” Nick said to his boss as he turned to Claire. “The bastard was tailing you the night I gave you the Jeep. Apparently he thought it was the perfect vehicle—no pun intended—to use to hurt your father, then me and you.”
Claire knew there wasn’t much more to be said at this point. Whoever wanted to hurt her had done an excellent job.
“What about the girls?” she asked Nick.
“Protective custody,” he replied.
“So they’re safe,” she exhaled with a sigh of relief.
“As safe as they could ever be,” Wilkes assured her. “With my wife and three kids in our house out on Long Island, surrounded by a dozen Suffolk County cops and five of our own Emergency Service guys armed with automatic rifles. Just like the two we’ll have standing outside your door, Doc, and the security detail your parents will have with them, whether it’s here or back in Rochester, until we catch this lunatic.”
Claire tried to hold back the tears she felt welling in her eyes. “You know that Nick was collateral damage.”
“I was in the right place at the right time,” he said.
“That makes your safety even more tenuous, Doctor,” Wilkes said. “When the perp finds out you’re still alive, we have to assume he’ll try again. Your strategy of pissing him off at the news conference worked, maybe too well. I gotta believe that’s why he’s coming after you.”
This was the last thing Claire’s parents wanted to hear. “You’ve got to find him first,” Frank told Wilkes.
“Doctor Waters, let me assure you that in addition to the two dozen detectives we have on it, there’s not a cop in this city who isn’t looking for him,” said the inspector. “We’ve even got people coming in off duty and volunteering.”
“Thank you,” Frank said.
“I should be the one thanking you two,” Wilkes said to Claire’s parents, “along with the rest of the city. Your little girl here done you, and us, proud.”
“Do you think you’ll catch him?” asked Charlotte.
“Up until now, unfortunately, this guy’s been a ghost,” Nick told them, turning to Claire. “But now he’s a ghost with fingerprints.”
“What?” Claire exclaimed, the news filling her with hope.
“Mr. Smartass slipped up,” Wilkes said. “We got his prints off a metal post he was leaning against at Nick’s younger daughter’s school. That’s the good news. The bad news is, the prints don’t match anyone in any database, including the FBI’s. That means he was never arrested, and that means the chances of finding him aren’t great. We have two detectives on a plane to Rochester with the slugs the surgeons dug outta your daughter and Detective Lawler, to compare with the ones found on the murder victim up there. But even if they’re a match, all that’ll tell us is it’s our guy for sure. There’s no way to trace the ammo.”
“What else can you do?” Claire asked, closing her eyes as the pain returned.
“The girls gave our artist almost identical descriptions of the sonuvabitch,” Nick said. “As soon as they’re ready, the sketches are going out everywhere—cops, feds, media. He’s on the FBI’s Most Wanted list. We’re hoping someone’ll recognize him.”
Claire gave in, pushing the button that would soon bring her relief from the intense pain in her back.
“I’ll help you any way I can, Inspector—” she began, until Wilkes cut her off, laughing. “You think this is funny?” she demanded.
“Doc,” he said, “you’ve given more than enough of your blood to this city and our job. More than most cops give in their whole careers.” He turned serious. “You keep saying you don’t work for me, but I’m giving you an order anyway, and you’re going to obey it. I’m putting you on sick leave. When I’m satisfied you’re better, and only then, I will bring you back into the fold. In the meantime, I don’t want you anywhere near this. If you need information, call me. But we’ve got it from here. Are we clear?”
“Yes,” she answered with reluctance. “But there’s one more thing I need to ask you. Both of you,” she said, looking at Nick, “and it’s a favor.”
“Go ahead.”
“I want to be kept in the loop,” she said. “Please.”
Nick turned to Wilkes. “As long as neither you nor the information leaves this room,” Wilkes said.
“Thanks, Inspector.”
“Don’t thank me until we have this guy,” said Wilkes. “And we will get him. I don’t know how, but we will.”
Then Wilkes did something Nick had never seen his boss do except at a cop funeral. He stood at attention and gave Claire a sharp salute like the marine he once was. Then lowered his arm and kissed Claire’s hand.
She looked up at him, tears in her eyes. And she could see water in his.
“Don’t do that to me,” Wilkes said, grasping her hand quickly, then wheeling and heading out the door.
The soothing relief of the opiates erasing her pain hit her full force, and she drifted off to sleep.
Bright colors flooded Claire’s consciousness as her eyes opened. As she focused, she realized they were flowers; not real ones but the pattern on the tunic worn over white pants by an obese nurse whose name tag read Rita Grantz. “Hi there,” Nurse Grantz said with a smile. “I’m Rita, and I’ll be taking care of you tonight. How’s the pain?”
Claire could feel the discomfort from her incision. “Not great,” she said, reaching for the button that would give her another dose of morphine.
“Let me check your vitals before you give yourself another hit,” Rita said, touching the button that inflated the mechanical blood pressure cuff on Claire’s right arm while she checked the monitors above Claire’s bed for her heart rate and pulse oxygen level.
“Where is everyone?” Claire asked.
“The police took your parents back to the hotel when visiting hours ended,” said Nurse Rita.
“What time is it?”
“One twenty-five in the morning,” Nurse Rita informed her as the BP cuff automatically deflated. “Everything’s looking good. Anything I can get you?”
Claire felt parched. “Can I drink yet?”
“Ice chips only,” the nurse said. “But Doctor Mecklin told me to get you on your feet.”
“Now?” asked Claire, too out of it to even think about getting up.
“Yes, Doctor,”
Rita replied. “And you know why.”
“We don’t want any clots forming,” said Claire. “Okay.”
Nurse Rita lowered the side rail and helped Claire sit up.
“Ow,” Claire exclaimed, grimacing at the pain from the incision.
Nurse Rita placed hospital slippers on Claire’s feet. “Ready?” she asked.
“Ready as I’m gonna be,” Claire responded.
With Nurse Rita’s assistance, Claire’s legs cooperated. She stood up, Rita’s thick hands under her armpits, her heft blocking her view.
“Okay, honey, now grab the IV pole,” the nurse said to her. Claire obeyed, holding the pole for dear life with her left hand as Rita moved to support her from her right, revealing the rest of the vast room that was only available on the VIP floor.
A man was curled up on what passed for a sofa against the opposite wall. He appeared to be out cold.
“Nick?” she asked, though she knew it was him from the cast on his left arm.
“Guess he’s one of the cops protecting you,” Nurse Rita said. “C’mon, just a few steps out to the hall if you can do it.”
“I can do it,” Claire said, commanding her legs to shuffle forward though her eyes were glued to Nick’s sleeping figure on the couch. “How long has he been here?” she asked.
“He was here when I came on shift,” Rita replied. “Two more outside the door, all armored up. Like they’re expecting an invasion or something.”
Claire saw them when she made it out the door. As Wilkes had assured her, each one carried an assault rifle in addition to a sidearm. They nodded to her, and Claire waved back at them, thinking she barely had the energy to walk. She made it halfway down the hall and back before telling Rita it was enough.
“You did great for your first outing,” Rita said as they entered the room.
Nick was still sleeping, snoring a little. Seeing him lying there made Claire’s truth clear: he wasn’t just another cop protecting her, wasn’t just a friend and colleague. He was the man she loved.
“Leave us alone. Please,” Claire said as Rita helped her back into bed.
“You know where the call button is, Doctor,” Rita reminded her as she left. “I’ll be right outside.”
Only when Rita was out the door did Claire’s tears start to flow, the emotion of seeing him there, being there for her, overtaking her. “I’m sorry,” she began, “for dragging you into all this.” She began to sob. “I’m sorry your daughters had to see what happened, because no child should ever—”
“They’re okay,” came Nick’s groggy voice from across the room.
As best as she could, she composed herself. “You should be with them,” she stammered.
“No,” he said, swinging his legs over the couch and standing. “Until we collar this guy, I should be as far away from them as possible.” He crossed the room to her bed. “But they’re okay, I promise you,” he continued, pulling a tissue from a box on the nightstand and dabbing her tears. “They’ll get some therapy—yeah, I said that,” he admitted with a smile, “and all the love they need from Wilkes’s wife.”
Claire grinned. “She’s not a pushover, married to a curmudgeon like him?”
Nick laughed. “Where do you think he learned to order us around? She makes him look like a girlie man.”
He lowered the side rail of Claire’s bed.
“I already took my maiden voyage,” she said to him.
But that wasn’t what he had in mind, she realized, as he sat on the mattress.
“The girls will be fine,” he assured her, stroking her forehead. “Right now, this is where I belong.”
He said the last sentence staring into her eyes. Grimacing, she slid over as far as she could and he lowered himself beside her. He held her free right hand while balancing the cast on his chest.
“How’s the pain?” he asked.
“Better,” she answered. “What do we do now?”
“Make him pay,” he said, closing his eyes.
It was nighttime when he woke up. Still sleepy, he tossed the comforter to the side, slid his legs off the mattress and into his foam slippers, not liking the feel of his bare feet on the cold parquet floor.
He glanced at his watch. It was after two in the morning. He’d slept thirteen hours. After the exhaustion he’d built up over the last day, he knew there was more slumber ahead. But right now he had to find out. He had to know.
Shuffling across the floor, he reached the desk and hit a random key on his computer to wake it up. He sat down and scoured the news for any word of his quarry’s fate.
It didn’t take long for him to find it. Doctor Waters and Detective Lawler were both listed in “guarded” condition. The shooter had escaped. Police were keeping mum on the whereabouts of Detective Lawler’s two daughters, but speculation was that they were in protective custody, lest their kidnapper try abducting them again.
He laughed. It was never the girls he wanted. In fact, it wasn’t even their father he wanted. Yes, he’d aimed too low on the first shot, hitting her in the stomach. But if Lawler’s arm hadn’t been in front of the bitch’s head when he fired his perfect second shot, the hollow-point bullet would have ripped right across her midbrain. She would’ve had just a split second at the end of her life to realize that he’d won. That she’d been beaten.
By someone much better than she. Much smarter.
But he was willing to keep the game going. In fact, maybe it was better this way. He’d see just how strong she was. Whether she could rise above the adversity he created. The stolen Jeep. Her father’s near death. The kidnapping of Nick Lawler’s daughters. Did she love them? Did she love the detective?
What if Nick died? Could she survive that?
He couldn’t wait to see. He’d gone to so much trouble to find out, traveled so far. Taken so many risks himself, proving his own strength at every step of the way. He’d driven nearly eight hundred miles in twelve hours, to Rochester and back. He’d killed the slug at the bus depot who tried to stop him from taking that which was rightfully his. He’d missed killing the bitch’s father but that couldn’t be helped; the old man had good reflexes. And he’d done all his driving at night, just in case he was pulled over. For he was fully prepared to execute any parasitic state trooper who dared to interfere with his life’s work.
Just as he was prepared to execute Lawler and his two rug rats. In fact, maybe that would be even better. To see that bitch Waters suffer before he finished her. But next time, he decided, it wouldn’t be from a distance. Next time they met, she’d see his face when he plunged one of his knives into her chest, drowning her in her own blood like he’d done to Rosa Sanchez. Enjoying the sight of her in her final throes of agony.
He got up from the computer and moved to his masterpiece, his crossword puzzle. It was almost entirely filled in, and soon it would be complete. He knew, though, that he had to wait. He couldn’t risk killing another subhuman right now. He’d see the bitch again soon enough, and as badly as he wanted to strike, he’d muster the patience to bide his time.
For patience required perhaps the most strength of all, did it not?
CHAPTER 23
“I got an A on my math test!” Katie Lawler screamed with joy as Nick escorted Claire through the door of the apartment, wheeling a suitcase behind him.
“I guess all that tutoring in the hospital helped,” said Nick as the girl ran over to hug Claire.
“Thanks for teaching me how to divide fractions,” Katie said.
“Thanks for being such a good student,” answered Claire, smiling even though she still felt some pain.
“Easy on Claire,” Nick chided his daughter, removing her arms from around Claire’s abdomen. “She just got the staples out from the surgery this morning.”
Katie looked like she was about to cry. “Did I hurt you?” she asked in alarm.
“Not at all,” Claire assured her. “After three weeks of seeing you from a hospital bed, being here with you is the best m
edicine ever.”
She kissed Katie on the head, meaning it, feeling lucky after what had turned out to be a rocky convalescence from the shooting. Three days after the surgery her fever had spiked, revealing an infection that cost Claire an additional week in the hospital to be pumped full of intravenous antibiotics. Her surgeon, Doctor Mecklin, would’ve kept her a fourth week had Nick not stepped in, offering her the spare room in his apartment to complete her recovery so she wouldn’t be alone.
It was an offer Claire wanted to refuse, reluctant to be a burden to anyone. But Nick wouldn’t allow it. His daughters, both of whom Claire had tutored in math while in the hospital, helped convince her.
“You’ve taken care of us,” Jill had argued. “Now it’s our turn.”
Walking through that door to the welcome Katie had given her made Claire realize she’d made the right decision, as Jill came out from the kitchen, wearing a torso-length apron with the familiar Life Is Good character on it.
“Hi, sweetheart,” Claire said as Jill embraced her.
“Your room is ready,” Jill said, “and I’m working on dinner.”
“Let me help you.”
“Not a chance. You’re gonna rest. It’ll be ready in half an hour.”
Jill smiled as she hurried back to the kitchen, leaving Claire alone with Nick in the hallway.
“They love you, you know,” he said, his arm around her.
“The feeling’s mutual,” Claire replied without hesitation. “Everything okay at work?” she asked. For all the time she’d been in the hospital, there hadn’t been a peep from the Anagramist.
“We’re all walking on eggshells,” Nick replied, guiding her down the hallway to the comfortable room that had been his mother’s, being careful not to hit her with the cast still on his left arm. “Not just looking for that lunatic and waiting for him to surface, but what’s gonna happen with the new commissioner. Rumor is Wilkes is gonna get jumped over everyone above him in the Bureau to chief of detectives,” he said.
