‘Kill you? I ain’t gonna kill you, you stupid fucking mick. I want you alive. And you know why? To show you that I’m smarter than you think. I’m gonna help you, Doyle.’
‘I don’t need your help.’
‘Oh, yes, you do. Think about your situation. Think about your ex-boss lying in pieces behind that rock over there. Think about his missus with your bullet in her brain. She’s got great tits, by the way — I copped a feel on the way out.’
Doyle tries to suppress his anger. His mind struggles to work out where Bartok’s going with this.
Something — probably his gun — taps against his skull.
‘This,’ says Bartok, ‘gives you a story. You say that the lieutenant tied you up and put the hood on your head. That he was going to shoot you and dump you in that hole over there. And then somebody else came along. You have no idea who. You heard noises and that’s it. You got that, Doyle?’
Doyle doesn’t answer. He feels his coat being opened, a hand reaching into his inside pocket.
‘And this,’ Bartok continues, ‘gives you the rest of what you need to get out of the fix you’re in.’
‘I don’t want it. Whatever it is, I don’t want it.’
Bartok laughs again, but it’s more of a chuckle this time.
‘We were quits,’ Bartok says, ‘but now you owe me. You owe me big time.’
Doyle swallows down some blood. ‘I don’t owe you shit. Take your crap out of my pocket. I’ll take my chances.’
‘It stays, Doyle. And I think you’ll use it. But even if you don’t, you still owe me.’
‘Yeah? How d’you figure that?’
Another cruel laugh. ‘Because I got something else up my sleeve. Something you don’t want anybody to know about. Any ideas yet?’
Doyle’s mind races, but doesn’t seem to get off the starting line.
Bartok’s voice drops to a whisper. Although carried on lungfuls of air that feel almost burning against Doyle’s ear, the words themselves chill him to the bone.
The breathing moves away. When Bartok speaks again it sounds as though he’s standing up again.
‘Think about that, Doyle. Not so much the dumb brother now, huh? We’ll talk again soon. Oh, and one other thing before I go. .’
Doyle waits for more words he doesn’t want to hear. What he gets is something hard smashing into the side of his skull, and then a feeling of sinking into the soil as though it’s quicksand, swallowing him up and closing over him.
He thinks he’s dead.
When he opens his eyes he sees nothing, feels nothing. His brain sends out commands to the rest of his body, but nothing responds. It’s like he’s become some kind of disembodied soul, floating in a featureless limbo.
Gradually, he realizes that his limbs are moving, but the cold has numbed them — turned them into unfeeling slabs of frozen meat. He manages to roll into a sitting position, then starts pumping his legs along the ground to get the blood circulating again.
Next, he flexes his biceps, rubs his arms up and down his back, wrings his hands together until they start to thaw a little. When he has finally re-established the perimeter of his own body, he goes to work on the cord binding his wrists. He frees his arms more quickly than expected, and when he pulls off the hood he sees why: the lack of sensation in his hands meant that he didn’t notice he was sloughing off layers of skin as he pulled and twisted them against the rope.
He stands up. Shakily at first, he stamps his feet and slaps his arms across his body, trying to dispel the iciness that seems to have sunk right down into his bones. Each movement sends jolts of pain coursing through his battered body.
He burrows his hands deep into his pockets, then scans the clearing. It’s so quiet, so peaceful here. It’s almost impossible to believe that this place was recently witness to such extreme, sickening violence.
He knows he has to look, has to confirm what he already knows to be true. He’s a cop. He has seen numerous corpses, in various states of decay and putrefaction. But as he circles the rock and glances at what lies behind, even he feels the bile rise in his throat.
He performs a quick search of the area. There’s no sign of either his gun or the lieutenant’s, but what he does find is Franklin’s flashlight. He switches it on, but just before he aims for the woods he takes another look at the hole he started digging. The site that almost became his grave.
With no idea of the route, and nothing that looks familiar, it takes him a long time to get back to the house. When he finally arrives, he stamps across the back porch, enters through the kitchen, then goes straight to the living room. He wonders why he finds it surprising that Nadine is still there in the armchair. Still half-naked, still staring sightlessly, still dead.
There’s one slight difference: Nadine’s skirt is pushed up around her waist, and Doyle’s Glock has been tucked under the waistband of her panties. A parting message from Bartok.
‘Sonofabitch!’ Doyle mutters.
Gingerly, he retrieves his gun, then smoothes Nadine’s skirt back into a more respectable position. As if it makes any difference to her.
He looks long and hard at the face of Nadine, tries to see past the mask of blood she now wears. He pictures her laughing, smiling, teasing, flirting. He tries to comprehend how such a vision of beauty can be the trigger for such a tidal wave of destruction. How she could possibly have acted as the inspiration for all that hate, all that evil. He wonders, too, whether she managed to convince herself that it was none of her doing, or whether she suspected the real reasons for what was happening to Doyle and chose to say nothing.
He reaches into his inside pocket, takes out Bartok’s present.
A cassette tape. Presumably containing a record of everything said in this room since Franklin arrived home.
Doyle goes over to the tape recorder he left on the table. He slips the tape in, rewinds it a little, then hits the play button. He hears Franklin’s voice telling how he used a nanny cam to confirm his wife’s infidelity, how he was convinced that Parlatti and Alvarez couldn’t be allowed to live after that. And then. .
Nothing.
Just hiss. Nothing about Rocca or Bartok. Nothing about the dirty cop in the precinct.
When a voice cuts in again, it’s Doyle asking what happens next.
So, okay, Lucas, you’re not so stupid after all.
He ejects the tape, holds it in the air and looks at it questioningly. And what, he thinks, do I do with this? Destroy it? Consign it to the fire like the other one?
What the hell. Bartok was right. This tape is the only proof of what really happened. Much as Doyle hates to admit it, this tape saves him. Unless Bartok’s whispered message was a bluff, destroying the tape gains him nothing and could lose him everything.
Sighing, he pockets the tape and reaches for his cellphone.
THIRTY-TWO
It’s one of the longest days of his life.
The Westchester County police get him first. They bring in a doctor to look him over. After listening to the parts of the medical assessment that suit their purpose, they pummel him with questions until he feels he’s just gone ten rounds in the boxing ring.
The cops from the city get him next. To the obvious relief of the Westchester guys, who seem overjoyed not to have to deal with such a complicated case, his ass gets dragged down to One Police Plaza, where he undergoes another grueling sequence of interviews. Despite the fact that he’s had no sleep, and that he keeps telling this to everyone he meets, the questioning continues throughout the day. The Puzzle Palace, as the police headquarters is affectionately known, is like a hornet’s nest which has been hit by a big stick. All kinds of people, some wearing polished brass, some just in neat blue suits, keep dropping in on him and asking him the same damn questions, again and again. It’s clear from the consternation that they are worried about damage control. It was bad enough when cops were just victims; but when one of them — a lieutenant at that — turns out to be a serial murderer. .
So what, they ask him, about Franklin’s death? Who was responsible for his brutal murder, and why? On that one, Doyle pleads ignorance. Obviously, Franklin must have made himself some vicious enemies in the course of his nefarious dealings. A stroke of luck that they caught up with him when they did, hmm?
Lucky also, they remark, that Franklin didn’t notice that the tape recorder was still running when you brought it into the house, him usually being so meticulous and all.
Yeah, says Doyle, I really got the luck of the Irish there, didn’t I? Except for that small malfunction in the middle, the wire seems to have picked up damn near everything.
When it becomes apparent that there are no more answers to be had — at least for today — they tell Doyle he can go. They also inform him that he remains suspended for the time being, and that he needs to remain available for questioning in the next few days.
Doyle nods his consent to one and all. Anything to get out of there.
There’s only one place he wants to be right now.
He puts the key in as slowly and quietly as he can. Pushes the door gently open.
There’s nobody in the living room, but he can hear them in Amy’s bedroom — Rachel helping their daughter out with a tricky part on her Nintendo game.
He softly closes the door behind him. And waits.
When Rachel walks out and sees him, she jumps with the shock, her hands leaping to her mouth. That’s when he thinks maybe the surprise idea wasn’t such a good one, him looking like a man who’s just walked out of a train wreck.
But he forgives himself when he hears her call his name and sees her fly across the room at him and feels her crushing his bruised, battered body until it feels like his organs are about to pop out.
And when Amy pokes her head out to discover what all the commotion is, and sees her Daddy — the man who chases the burglars away for her — she too clings to him with arms too tiny to go all the way around and yet powerful enough to squeeze every last teardrop out of him. Later he will tell her that he has something for her — a huge cuddly toy rabbit called Marshmallow — but right now he doesn’t want her to let go.
He would skip and dance with his wife and daughter like he did all that time ago at the hospital, but he hasn’t an ounce of energy left, so instead he dances with them in his mind, and he pictures himself dancing with them every day from now until at least Christmas, when he will give thanks for the presents that have come slightly earlier this year.
The man in the hospital bed flicks through the pages of his magazine before tossing it with disdain to the foot of the bed. He adopts a more quizzical expression as Doyle comes over and plonks a brown paper bag onto his bed table.
‘You look worse than me,’ says Paulson. ‘I think maybe we should trade places.’
‘This is nothing,’ Doyle says. ‘You shoulda seen me in my boxing days. I was just one big bruise.’
Paulson aims a finger at the table. ‘What’s in the bag?’
‘Coffee and donuts. On me.’
‘I don’t know if I can drink coffee. I think it might come pouring outta the hole in my side.’
‘Saves going to the bathroom, I guess. Maybe you could plug it up with the donut.’
‘Yeah. I might try that. Thanks.’ He gestures at his magazine and frowns. ‘I don’t suppose you thought to bring me any porn?’
‘Hey, have you seen the nurses in this place? Who needs paper when you’ve got it all in 3D?’
‘True. Remind me to pass on your thoughts to the staff before you leave. Especially the hairy one with three eyes and a humor bypass.’
‘How’s the. . the uhm. .’
‘The massive injuries I sustained while heroically throwing myself in front of an assassin’s bullet meant for you? Bearable, I suppose, although I still get twinges when I do too many back-flips.’
‘You seem pretty upbeat.’
‘Yeah, well, ’tis the season to be jolly, and so forth.’
‘They letting you out for Christmas?’
‘I hope so. I’m supposed to be moonlighting as Santa at Macy’s. Good thing it’s a sit-down gig.’
‘No, seriously. You coming out?’
Paulson nods, but Doyle detects a sadness there. Like maybe he hasn’t got much to look forward to when he gets out of here.
Paulson pulls on a happier mask and clears his throat. ‘Yeah. A day or two. I should be back trying to put your ass in jail before you can say Internal Affairs.’
Now it’s Doyle’s turn not to see the funny side. ‘Maybe you won’t have to worry about me.’
‘You planning to deprive me of the one thing keeping me going? What are you talking about?’
Doyle shrugs. ‘I’m not sure the job’s gonna take me back. In case you didn’t hear, I raised a pretty big stink. There are some who think it’ll always follow me around.’
Paulson stares at him for a while. And then he starts laughing.
‘Ow! Don’t do that to me, Doyle. The doc tells me I can turn myself inside out if I laugh too hard.’
‘What’s so funny?’
‘You. You’re so fucking pessimistic. Try flipping it over, will ya? You’re a hero, goddamnit. You were victimized, driven to the depths of loneliness and despair, but you rose above it and uncovered the identity of a cop killer. What’s not to admire?’
‘There’s a lot of cops won’t hang those clothes on it.’
‘Well, fuck ’em. They don’t know shit, and they don’t deserve to be cops if that’s how they decide to treat a brother.’
Doyle notices something in Paulson’s tone. Bitterness, maybe. Something that suggests he may not be talking just about the man sitting at his bedside.
‘Besides,’ Paulson adds, ‘I know they’re gonna take you back.’
‘Yeah? You read my horoscope in your magazine there?’
‘I been asking around. Just because I’m confined to bed, it don’t make me totally incommunicado. When Mohammed can’t go to the mountain, et cetera.’
‘Paulson, what are you talking about?’
‘You’re not my only visitor, you know. It can get pretty crowded around this bed at times. Admittedly, a lot of them just want to ask about you.’
‘Me?’
‘Don’t act so modest. They want to know why you came to see me. They also want to know why you booked the scene after I got shot.’
‘What’d you say?’
‘On the first count, I told them you were working on the notion that the guy doing the number on you might be a cop, and so you asked me if I had intel that might point to that. On the second count, I told them that, despite my orders to chase down the perps who shot me, you insisted on staying with me right up until the medics arrived. Only when I was in safe hands did you then go after them. It’ll all be in my report.’
Doyle finds it hard to believe that the man in the bed is the same guy who, only a year ago, chewed him up and spat him out. It’s like he’s experienced some kind of epiphany.
‘Thanks. You didn’t have to do that.’
‘Can the gratitude. You’re making me start to doubt my vocation. Anyway, while they were asking me questions, I fired a few back at them. Story is they’re about ready to bring you in from the cold. My guess is they’ll put you on modified duty at first, but if you can put up with being a house mouse for a while, it’ll soon blow over.’
Will it, Doyle wonders, be as straightforward as tha
t? But then maybe Paulson’s right. Maybe that’s my pessimistic streak showing itself again.
He glances at his watch.
‘Listen, I gotta go. More Christmas shopping. We already got a freezer busting at the seams, but who am I to argue, right?’
‘Sure,’ Paulson says, and when Doyle stands up he adds, ‘You mind if I ask you something?’
‘Go ahead,’ says Doyle.
‘Why’d you come here today?’
‘You have to ask? You saved my life.’
Paulson nods, apparently satisfied with the response.
Doyle starts to turn away, then pauses. ‘You mind if I ask you something?’
‘What?’
‘Why are you being so nice to me? Why all the help?’
Paulson looks back at him for a long time, as if debating whether to give him the full or the condensed version.
‘You bought me coffee and donuts.’
Doyle narrows his eyes. ‘Is that all?’
‘Sometimes that’s all it takes.’
Doyle thinks this over, then completes his turn and heads for the door. Paulson’s parting shot floats after him.
‘Merry Christmas, Detective Doyle.’
‘Yeah,’ says Doyle. ‘You too, Sarge. You too.’
He goes back to work on the first day of the year. A fresh start and all that. His New Year’s resolution: to take whatever’s coming and make the best of it.
He barely has a foot through the door of the station house before he starts to think that resolutions are the most ridiculous invention known to man.
The atmosphere reminds him of the night this all began — when they clustered around the body of Joe Parlatti. The stares, the nudges, the winks, the muttered asides. It starts with the desk sergeant, who looks goggle-eyed at him like he’s an alien invader, then spreads from there in a wave. Even a pair of handcuffed skells seem to sense deep in their coke-addled brains that something is amiss with the new arrival.
He takes the steps to the second floor, passing a couple of undercovers who stop in their tracks and follow him with their eyes. Along the hallway, clerical workers glance out through the glass windows of their offices and call to their colleagues to bring their attention to the phenomenon drifting by.
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