Cut to the Bone

by Shane Gericke

  “Thank you, Officer,” Danny said, gripping his granddaughter’s hand. That congregant was absolutely right - to be here at all was a miracle. The transmission blew in western Iowa, and the lone garage didn’t stock bus parts. The tow driver sympathized and said his pastor might lend his bus to the cause. Danny met him, arranged the swap - “I’ll fix yours while you’re gone, and we’ll trade back when you return,” the pastor promised, glory hallelujah - and they were back on the road. “Everybody, listen to the policemen. They’re here to help us.”

  The cop saluted with his ax handle. “Thanks, padre. Have a good day.”

  “I intend to,” Danny said.

  Patting the grenade in his jacket.

  4:09 a.m.

  Corey Trent belched. Backed away from his own breath. Last night’s Last Supper - corn dogs, Twinkies, and Dr Pepper - was giving his belly the yips. Better than nutrition loaves, though.

  “Doing all right in there, son?” inquired a Justice Center security man.

  “Couldn’t be better,” Trent said.

  4:15 a.m.

  Emily shivered. The hotel’s air-conditioning was atomic.

  She slipped on undergarments, bulletproof vest, uniform, and twenty pounds of gun, knives, handcuffs, and other tools of the trade. In the hollow on her neck, under her hair - where Danny Monroe shoved that ice pick into poor Sage Farri’s brain - she taped a spare handcuff key. On her chest went the battered but proud badge. Finally, she sat on the bed and double-knotted her boots.

  Her cell sang “Paranoid.” She rolled backward and snatched it off the bedstand.

  “Look both ways before you leave the room,” the familiar voice rumbled. “Check the car for tampering. Spot anybody suspicious . . .”

  She didn’t mind Marty’s lecture. He did it for love, not because he thought her dense.

  “I really wish you could be there,” she said when he finished.

  “I tried,” Marty grumbled. “Barbara vetoed it. Says the rocks in my head need to settle. She even called the sheriff to make sure I don’t play hooky. Chicks are evil.”

  “You’re just figuring that out?”

  She played I-L-Y on the keypad, disconnected, and tucked into breakfast. French vanilla ice cream, not the spinach quiche and cantaloupe she’d ordered from room service. She needed comfort food today. Seeing Corey Trent die would be satisfying - particularly after hearing those sickening details from Marty - but nauseating. She ate five tablespoons, called it a day. Tomorrow she’d eat that and half a steer.

  Finally ready to leave, she plucked Marty’s photo from her wallet and slipped it into the pocket of her vest.

  Her final backup.

  4:40 a.m.

  “So whaddaya think? Gonna have a riot?” the state trooper said.

  “Hope so,” the Guardsman replied.

  “Me, too,” the trooper said, popping his gum as he scanned the floodlit sea. “This kumbaya stuff is boring. They issue you girls real bullets this time?”

  The Guardsman snorted. When his unit was deployed to O’Hare Airport in the wake of September 11, the troops were issued rifles but not ammunition. To make sure nobody got hurt. Osama probably wet himself laughing when he heard that.

  “Real as a heart attack,” he said, patting the thirty-round magazine in his full-auto M-4 combat assault rifle. “This governor’s a grown-up.”

  4:48 a.m.

  “No hints of trouble, and the crowd’s still happy,” Annie reported. “But what are those folks doing? Ten rows to your left?”

  Branch craned his neck. “Sticking flowers in the Guards’ rifle barrels.”

  “Groovy,” Annie said. “Castle out.”

  5:01 a.m.

  The Executioner pulled the Land Rover into the parking lot at Safety Town, the child-size Naperville that sat kitty-corner from the police station. The chartered bus to the Justice Center idled quietly in the humidity, several dozen employees ready to board.

  5:02 a.m.

  “I can’t see anything, Grandpa!”

  Danny swung her up on his shoulders. “Better?”

  “Wheee! I’m halfway to Heaven!” she squealed.

  5:03 a.m.

  The Executioner gargled a double squeeze of honey, tucked the bottle in his glove box, removed the knife from his jacket, tilted his head back, clipped the fish line between his molars, let the plastic slide into his throat. The handle touched the uvula.

  No problem.

  He grinned. Like good bourbon and bad women, knives were an acquired taste.

  5:04 a.m.

  “Change already,” Emily snapped at the light. She was mere yards from Safety Town. Might as well be miles. “My bus leaves in six minutes.”

  The light didn’t care.

  She looked both ways, floored it through the red.

  Nobody to write tickets, anyway.

  5:05 a.m.

  Marty power-surfed the channels, absorbing updates from “Mount Deathmore,” the nickname du jour for the Justice Center.

  The night nurse walked in, looking beat. They traded sympathies about his head, her bunions, and how everyone but cops and nurses got to sleep at home nights. She checked his monitors, flicked the IV to ensure smooth dripping, headed out.

  She stopped at the door.

  Turned, shuffled back, pinched his cheek, and left.

  5:07 a.m.

  The Executioner walked to the bus. He’d miss the Land Rover. It had performed well. He wondered when they’d find the fuel truck driver. Probably when their trees started to smell funny.

  “Good morning, sir,” the Justice Center security guard greeted.

  “And the same to you,” the Executioner said, handing over his letter of invitation. “The governor mentioned something about a preboarding search?”

  The guard held up his wand. “Just like the airlines, we’re checking everyone for weapons.” He tapped the plastic bucket. “Keys, change, and other metal objects, please.”

  The Executioner dropped in everything but his tiny gentleman’s knife. “What about this, Officer?” he inquired, displaying the red herring. “It’s my good-luck charm.”

  “Mmm, that’s a beaut,” the security man said, admiring the intricate inlays of onyx and titanium. “But it’s not allowed. Run it back to your car if you like. Or I’ll hold it for you, give it back after the event.”

  “The latter. I’m too lazy to go back to my car,” the Executioner said, handing over the knife. It would make the guy’s day when he realized what he had.

  The metal detector moved around his body. No bleeps. A pat-down followed. The guard looked in his mouth - more diligence than the Executioner expected - but didn’t notice the monofilament hidden by teeth and tongue.

  “Welcome aboard,” the guard said. He sealed the knife in an envelope and handed over a receipt. “We leave for the mountain in three minutes.”

  5:10 a.m.

  “C’mon, baby,” the next in the bathroom line whispered when “Occupied” became “Open.” “Let’s join the mile-high club.”

  “You are high,” she giggled. “But I’m game.”

  5:11 a.m.

  “Wait for me! Wait!” Emily cried as she tumbled from her car.

  Brake lights flashed. The security guard came out.

  “Hi, Emily,” he said, checking his manifest. “How’s things?”

  “Hurried,” she huffed.

  The guard knew her well, but checked her ID anyway. “You’re you,” he said. “And authorized for weapons. Welcome aboard.”

  She scrambled up the steps.

  5:13 a.m.

  “How come that Porta-Potty’s rocking, Mommy?”

  “Earthquake,” Mommy said, hurrying her son to another line.

  6:14 a.m.

  Kit Covington stared at the plasma TV hanging between the bedroom mirrors. The longer she watched, the deeper her melancholy became. Despite Wayne’s solemn promise that this was the end of his obsession with death, it was clearly just the beginning.

/>   7:24 a.m.

  “Approaching the mountain, Governor,” his bodyguard said.

  “So I see,” Covington said, chest tightening. It was one thing to know intellectually someone in this crowd intended to kill him. Quite another to feel it. For the first time since dragging his brother from that burning Plymouth Fury, he doubted himself . . .

  Cowboy up, pal, he chided. You’re doing this for Andy. The motorcade turned up the hill.

  7:25 a.m.

  “Covington’s on the mountain!” a protest leader announced after the long squawk from his walkie-talkie. “He’s driving up the back way, the coward!”

  Jeering spread like radiation.

  7:28 a.m.

  “What are hell are they chanting?” Covington asked, the limousine’s armor muting the words.

  “Fe fum fo fi,” his bodyguard said. “Corey Trent, he should not die.”

  Covington rolled his eyes, misgivings forgotten.

  7:52 a.m.

  “Come here often, sailor?” Emily said as she walked the concrete ramparts. The crowd’s roar, barely a whisper inside, thundered like afterburners up here.

  “Only to pick up guys,” Annie replied, binoculars sweeping. Even at highest zoom, she couldn’t see the end of the bus line. Twenty thousand seemed conservative now. Guardsmen piled out of Humvees. Network anchors mouthed “heartland” and “rock-ribbed” and “the common people.” Humidity percolated, water reached fifteen a throw, and toilet lines grew triple deep.

  Yet not a wink of trouble. She’d seen more violence at her son’s Little League games.

  “How’s things downstairs?” Annie asked. “Dull. Only a few witnesses have arrived, so I thought I’d visit,” Emily said. She cupped her ears, trying to catch their words. “What’s that they’re chanting?” “Wayne’s World,” Annie said, grinning.

  7:59 a.m.

  “We shall overcome,” Danny sang with the rest of the congregation, the grenade as heavy on mind as pocket. “We shall overcome.”

  8:07 a.m.

  The Executioner walked into the washroom and entered a stall. Instead of relieving himself, he fished the polymer knife from his throat.

  “Perfect,” he whispered, wiping it down with tissue. It passed the pat-downs and metal detectors with aplomb, and now was the fox in the high-security henhouse.

  He peeled and flushed the protective tape from the blade. Hit the handle again for the stubborn scraps. Anchored the knife into the cloth sheath sewn onto his right shirttail, which was accessible through slits in both trouser pockets. He stood, tucked, belted, and washed.

  A minute later, he was drinking coffee from the refreshment bar and chatting with three witnesses. The steam from the cup reminded him of the puffing towels in the barbershop.

  He smiled.

  “Remember that time on Wayne’s boat?” one asked the other. “K.J. got so seasick that . . .”

  The Executioner reviewed the schedule as he listened.

  Covington would start the press conference at 11:00 sharp. The witnesses would enter the viewing room at 11:30. Security would remove Corey Trent from his cell at 11:35, have him strapped and capped by 11:45, open the curtains at 11:50. The dynamo would finish powering by 11:55, Covington would direct the reading of the official death warrant, Trent would say any last words, and the chair would deliver justice.

  That was the official plan, anyway.

  The Executioner’s was different.

  8:14 a.m.

  “Nope,” said the Naperville patrol officer as she examined the Iowa plates. “Wrong state, wrong number, wrong church, wrong type of bus.”

  “Just like the first 100,” her partner said, typing plate and description into his PDA and flashing it to the intelligence unit. Intel would contact the registered owner to ensure the bus wasn’t stolen and was supposed to be in Naperville.

  “Cheer up,” the officer said. “Only 200 to go.”

  “Glory be,” her partner said, rolling his eyes.

  9:01 a.m.

  “Hello, hi, great to see you,” Covington said, shaking hands with each Justice Center staffer. “I really appreciate what you’re doing for the good people of our state.”

  Emily, back from the roof, kept her head in motion and her ears open. Covington had plenty of bodyguards, but this was her room, in her city. Nobody would be hurt on her watch. Not that there was any serious danger of that - Daniel Monroe’s presence out there ensured the castle was locked down tight. Her expression stayed serious, “game face” as much a weapon as gun and pepper spray. But she was excited inside. It wasn’t every day you met a governor.

  9:11 a.m.

  “Twenty thousand?” Marty said. “And growing,” Branch said.

  Marty tented his hospital sheet, power-flipped the channels.

  “Emily’s fine,” Branch said.

  “I wasn’t thinking about her at all,” Marty said.

  “Right,” Branch said, sucking the creme from his Boston. “And I hate doughnuts. Gotta go act like I know what I’m doing. Talk to you later.”

  Marty disconnected the call, deeply troubled.

  9:45 a.m.

  Danny left his granddaughter with his most eagle-eyed congregants, then joined the elders on the far side of the bus corral. He’d dreaded this moment since leaving Idaho. But these people were family, and needed to know.

  10:00 a.m.

  “All right, Trent,” the senior guard said, holding out the condemned’s T-shirt, slacks, slippers, and deodorant-infused adult diaper. “Time to get dressed.”

  “Sure thing, boss,” Trent said, jumping to his feet.

  “Did hell just freeze over?” one guard said to the other as Trent dropped his drawers.

  “Why?”

  “He didn’t give us static. Stateville says we’d have to Taser him to get his clothes-”

  “Uh, hey, fellas?” Trent asked.

  The guards looked.

  Trent was stroking himself at them.

  “That’s better,” the guard said, cracking up.

  10:07 a.m.

  “Let ‘er rip, make sure she’s working,” the Royce Road water crew chief said. “Then we’re gone.”

  The engineer pushed the starter. The massive booster pump kicked to life.

  10:30 a.m.

  “And that’s what I must do,” Danny finished. “Questions?”

  “My God, Reverend,” one breathed. “You really murdered all those policemen?”

  “Yes,” Danny said. “And Earl took the blame. He died so I might live.”

  “Your brother’s a saint,” said another, looking to the sky.

  “No,” Danny said. “He wasn’t. But he’s the best man I ever knew.”

  “There’s no other way to resurrect Earl’s good name?” the choir director asked.

  Danny shook his head. “I’m a killer. So is Governor Covington. It’s time we paid for that. This is the only possible way.” He rubbed his face. It felt 1,000 years old.

  “I understand if you need to turn me in right away,” he said. “But I pray you don’t. I need to bring down Covington to pay for the blood on my hands. This is my Golgotha.”

  He paused.

  “And his.”

  10:42 a.m.

  “Boss?” the walkie-talkie crackled.

  “Go ahead,” the crew chief replied.

  “I’m in a driveway east of your location: Water’s pouring like Niagara. It’s coming from the ground and inside the house. I rang the doorbell, but nobody’s home.”

  The crew chief stomped in frustration. “Extra pressure broke something.”

  “My guess. Lots of old pipes in this sector.”

  The engineer silenced the pump. The crew chief grabbed his radio.

  “Send a water evacuation team ASAP,” he told the public works dispatcher. “And police to open the door.”

  10:45 a.m.

  “He congratulated me for pulling you out of the house,” Emily said. “Then he shook my hand.”

  “
I hope you washed after.”

  “Very funny.”

  Marty smiled at the phone. “All’s well on Deathmore, I trust?”

  “So far. Ten of my witnesses are here. The others are at Safety Town, waiting for the bus. Chair’s ready, and so is the staff. The protest is noisy, but nonviolent. Danny Monroe’s nowhere to be found. Tell the truth, I’m bored.”

  “Beats the alternative,” Marty said.

  “Love you, too,” she said.

  They hung up.

  He looked at the phone, then at the television, debating.

  10:47 a.m.

  Danny Monroe floated as he walked toward the police command bunker. To his astonishment, the elders not only blessed his plan, but vowed to stand with him.

  “There’s no escaping 1966,” one said. “What you did was horrific. But you’re no longer that man. God changed you for the better.” She opened her arms. “We love you, Danny. We’d be honored to stand by your side at the press conference . . .”

  “Thanks, boss,” he murmured to the sky.

  The sun seemed to wink back. Danny smiled. Probably a cloud.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Dr. Winslow demanded.

  “To do my job,” Marty said, tying his shoelace.

  “Trent will perish just fine without you,” she said.

  Marty shrugged, headed for the door.

  Winslow planted a hand in his chest. “The sheriff excused you from witness duty. You’re trying to rescue Emily.” She nodded at the TV. “Aren’t you?”

  “Never entered my mind, Doc. This is strictly about me and Corey Trent.”

  “I worry about her, too, Marty,” Winslow said. “But I know she’ll be fine. You’re not. Just because I let you play horsey before doesn’t mean you can handle the stress of an execution. You still need several days’ rest.”

  Marty took her lightly freckled wrist, gently pushed it to the side.

  “I’ll call the sheriff,” she called after him.

  “Tell him I said hey,” Marty called back, waving.

  10:57 a.m.

  “Three minutes, Governor,” the director said. “Take your position.”