“Keep your radio on,” he says. “I’ll be in touch shortly. If I hear you—or anyone else—moving in the house, I’ll hurt Dennis a lot worse than he’s hurt now.”
“Understood,” I say.
I hold myself stock-still, the radio shaking in my hand.
Think, think, think, I tell myself.
The door opens behind me. I spin, have my gun halfway raised before I see it’s Pete. He holds up a hand. I lean against the wall, waiting for my breath to come back. Pete shuts the door, shuffles toward me in sock feet.
“Captain Stealth,” I whisper. “You trying to get yourself killed?”
“You can’t do it, Cheryl,” he says.
“Do what?”
“Take him to Jarry. Or whatever else it is he wants you to do.”
“I don’t see what choice I have,” I say. “He’s got Dennis.”
Even in the dark, I can make out Pete’s hangdog expression.
“You won’t be trading yourself for Dennis,” he says. “That lunatic will just kill you both.”
“Not if I play it right,” I say.
Because there has to be a right way to play it.
A fresh burst of static has Pete and me grabbing up our radios.
“I’m ready for you, Cheryl,” the Sniper says. “Meet me in the basement. Unarmed, of course. I’ve already taken a strong dislike to your colleague, so don’t give me a reason to kill him.”
“How do I know he’s alive?” I ask.
“Don’t you dare come down here, Cheryl,” Dennis yells. “Don’t you dare.”
Then the line goes dead.
“Listen to Dennis,” Pete says.
He takes out his cell phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling this in.”
“No,” I say. “You can’t do that.”
He looks down at the screen, steps to the window, checks again.
“I should have known,” he says—more bitter than dejected.
“What?”
“He’s jammed the signal.”
I take Pete’s arm, turn him toward me.
“Listen,” I tell him, “I’ve got an idea about how to make this work.”
“Do I get a say?”
“There isn’t time. Give me a ten-minute start. Then you and Patsy find Dennis. After you drop him at urgent care, head straight for the hotel.”
“To do what?”
“Get Jarry moved to another room.”
“And?”
“Wait.”
Before he can say anything more, I hand him my gun and bolt from the room.
Chapter 41
I stumble over a loose floorboard, bang my shoulder on a cabinet I don’t remember being there before. I can’t imagine how Jarry, mostly blind, managed to live here alone.
The entrance to the basement is off the kitchen. I open the door, yell down the stairs. I want him to yell back. I want a sense of where he is in all that darkness.
“One foot in front of the other, Cheryl,” he calls.
The words echo around the empty space, and I can’t tell if he’s standing in front of me or behind me, to my left or right.
I start down, holding tight to the railing. When I reach the bottom step, a beam like a spotlight hits me in the face. I throw up my hands, spin my head away.
“That’s far enough for now,” he says. “Turn around. Slow. Arms in the air.”
He trusts his training, doesn’t need to pat me down.
“Lose the phone,” he says.
I tug it out of my back pocket, set it on the floor.
“Now come toward the light.”
I take a step forward.
“Dennis,” I say, raising my voice. “Are you all right?”
“He’s resting comfortably.”
“Where?”
The beam slides across the floor, reveals Dennis lying on his side, hogtied, a makeshift bandage wrapped around one shoulder.
“Did you…?”
“I gave him a sedative,” he says. “I couldn’t take another word. Now let’s discuss whether he lives or dies.”
The light is back on me, then at my feet, guiding me one step at a time toward the Sniper.
“All right,” I say. “How do we keep him alive?”
“I told you: take me to Jarry.”
We’re just a few feet apart now, but I can’t make out his face behind the beam.
“Let’s go, then,” I say. “He’s in a hotel. We’ll take your car.”
He cuffs my hands behind my back, and we leave Dennis behind.
He’s pushing me forward through a concrete tunnel littered with dead bugs. I know now how he slipped inside, got the drop on Dennis.
“Where does this lead to?” I ask over my shoulder.
“Why pose the question when you’re about to see for yourself? Do you think chitchat will make us buddies?”
He isn’t dumb. The next push comes hard.
We exit the tunnel, pass through a Cold War bunker that’s bigger than any apartment I’ve ever lived in. Then it’s up and into the forest. I catch my first glimpse of his face in the moonlight: early forties, olive complexion, angular features. That’s as much as I get before he sees me looking, spins me away.
And then we’re off through the woods with him on my heels, still pushing. I trip over a rock, scratch my face on a tree branch. By the time we make the access road where he’s left his car, I’m bruised, bleeding, and winded.
It isn’t like in the movies—he doesn’t make me drive while he holds a gun to my ribs. Instead, he shoves me into the passenger seat, leaves my hands cuffed behind my back so that I have to lean uncomfortably forward. Maybe he thinks I’d hit the gas and aim for a tree. Maybe he’s right. I remember what Jarry said: how many of us get to be useful at the end?
“So where’s Jarry?” he asks.
“Take this road back out the way you came, then—”
“No, no, no,” he says, clipping a GPS to the dashboard. “The name of the hotel. I won’t have you driving me in circles.”
I tell him. I only hope it takes us a while to catch up with the county road—long enough for Pete and Patsy to build a lead.
But then there’s a break in my favor. He can’t get a signal—not even a faint sputtering. He curses, beats on the steering wheel with open palms, slams back against the headrest. It’s hard to believe this is steely-nerved Night Sniper. I take a long look this time. It can’t be forty degrees out, but there’s sweat streaming from his hairline. His skin is cadaver-pale.
He feels me looking, makes his first eye contact. His pupils are encircled by red. I wonder how long it’s been since he slept. Whether I survive the night or not, he’s breaking down, closing in on the end of his run.
I try my best to sound calming.
“It’s all right,” I say.
And then I soften my expression, look at him one more time, searching for something I can hold onto, some hint of kindness, some visible wound. Something to make me believe what I’m about to say.
“I want to help you. I was wrong before. I misjudged you. I see now that what you’re doing comes from a place of love. Deep love.”
His anger fades. For a moment I think he might cry. Beneath the exhaustion, he’s a handsome man. High cheekbones, strong jawline. A rich crop of brown hair that’s just starting to turn gray.
And the compassion comes easier than I’d thought. I’ve done enough interviews to know: there’s a part of him—some buried part—that wants to be someone else.
“So you’ll take me to Jarry?” he asks.
“I will,” I say. “As long as you can find the county road from here.”
He turns the key in the ignition, puts the car in drive.
There’s something I’ve learned during my years on the job: a broken man will let himself hear what he’s always wanted to hear.
Chapter 42
I keep talking as he drives us through the blackness, the speedometer holding
just under the limit. For now, my only agenda is to sound like a friend.
“Why do you think Jarry lives out here?” I ask.
“An accident of birth,” he says. “Like most of what happens to us.”
“What do you mean?”
“We think we make our own choice,” he says, “but what we aren’t born with, we’re taught. And we don’t choose what people teach us.”
I want to ask—What were you taught?—but that would be too much, too soon.
“So Jarry saw people as lonely and isolated because he grew up out here?”
“I don’t think he saw anything that wasn’t there. I think his upbringing made him able to see.”
“Until he went blind,” I say.
There are eyes gathered on the side of the road, but I can’t make out the animals they belong to. He sees them, too, slows without braking.
I decide to push.
“Can I call you something other than Night Sniper?”
He hesitates, seems flustered.
“You can call me Miles,” he says.
The fact that he doesn’t offer a last name tells me I have a ways to go—and not much time to get there. I jump all in:
“Let me kill Jarry,” I say.
I can’t tell if he’s grinning or snarling. Either way, he doesn’t look surprised.
“You mean you want to be partners?” he asks.
“More like an acolyte,” I say.
“I don’t know—”
“I’ve killed before,” I tell him. “You don’t have to worry about that.”
He takes his right hand off the wheel. I think he might hit me, but instead he reaches into a pocket, pulls out the key to the cuffs, and sets it in my palm.
“Keep talking,” he says. “Convince me.”
I squirm in my seat, feeling for the keyhole. The cuffs drop off. I tell Miles he’s doing God’s work. I tell him I resisted before because I wasn’t ready to believe, but now I am. Now only his mission matters. I set up at Jarry’s not to capture him but to join him.
It’s working. I feel myself winning him over. I put a hand on his knee. He blanches, looks a little lost, but he doesn’t push me away.
Miles, I think, really is a virgin.
I’ve added a few small detours, but we’re still getting too close, too fast. I can’t gauge whether Pete’s had enough time. I’ve got no choice: I have to stall.
“I think the turn’s coming up,” I say.
“You think?”
“I’m a city girl,” I say. “I’m not used to wilderness and unlit roads. Everything looks the same out here.”
“Does the road have a name?”
“It’s in my phone.”
I see his jaw muscles bulging.
“And you don’t remember?” he asks.
I think: Apologize, and he’ll know you’re playing him.
“It’s not like I expected to be giving you the tour,” I say.
He’s simmering, pushing down thoughts he doesn’t want to have. He turns into a sharp bend without slowing down. For a moment, I’m thrown up against him. I think about grabbing the key from the ignition, but then I can’t think of what I’d do past that.
“Here,” I say, pointing. “Turn here.”
He slams on the brake, but we’ve already gone too far.
“Are you sure?” he asks.
“I remember the road being off a blind turn,” I say. “It’s either this one or the next one.”
Miles hesitates, then throws the car in reverse. It’s clear he’s having doubts about his acolyte. I reach over, stroke his cheek with the backs of my fingers.
“Trust me,” I say.
Chapter 43
By the time the hotel’s in view, I’ve bought a good twenty minutes.
“That’s it,” I tell Miles. “There at the top of the hill.”
He pulls off the road and onto a dirt shoulder. The hotel’s a Victorian, as old and large as Jarry’s mansion but in mint condition. The facade’s been updated with cedar shingles painted forest-green. Towers topped with jet-black spires flank the east and west wings. The perfectly manicured lawn lit up by ornamental lamps planted along the walkway. A calligraphic sign reads: Hudson Manor. There’s a line of cars parked where the curb should be.
“How do we do this?” I ask.
“There’s a burner phone in the glove compartment,” Miles says. “Call ahead. Tell whoever’s with him that you’ve received a threat. Jarry needs to be waiting outside for you in five minutes. Alone.”
His face has gone blank, his voice flat.
“If I say alone,” I tell him, “then she’ll know something’s wrong.”
“She?”
“His nurse.”
For a beat I think he’s going to call it off, tell me to drive on to some secluded place where he can have me dig my own shallow grave. I’m about to run my fingers through his hair when he says:
“Go ahead and call her. But put the phone on speaker.”
I dial Kelly’s cell, which is already a kind of code: if I were just checking in, I’d go through the hotel switchboard.
“Nurse Byrd,” I say, “this is Detective Mabern. I’m sorry if I woke you.”
I say it all in one breath, before Kelly can get a word out.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
“A threat,” I say. “I need to move Jarry. Have him out front in five minutes.”
I do my best to sound urgent, authoritative. I’m performing for two people at once.
“It takes me five minutes just to get Mr. Jarry out of bed,” Kelly says.
“As fast as you can,” I say.
I hang up, my mind racing, trying to guess what it is Kelly has planned.
“You heard her,” I tell Miles. “What now?”
“The nurse will be outside with him,” Miles says, “so you’ll have to drive. I’ll be in the back with my head down. You escort Jarry yourself. Don’t let the nurse near the car.”
He climbs into the backseat, and I slide behind the wheel. There’s nothing to do now but watch and wait.
And for once I’m scared. Not for me, but for Pete, Patsy, Kelly. For Dennis, lying on a surgeon’s table under the bright lights. For what will happen to Randy’s career if we fail. I’m at the center of so many leaps of faith, and what happens next will decide whether or not they pay off.
The hotel doors swing open, and a wheelchair emerges with Kelly pushing. The figure in the chair sits hunched forward, wrapped in blankets and a scarf. He wears his knit cap down to his eyes.
“Here we go,” I say.
“All right,” Miles says. “Take the approach slow.”
I switch on the lights, wait for Kelly to reach the end of the walkway before I begin creeping forward. I flash my brights. Kelly looks, sees it’s me at the wheel, gives a slight nod. I hear the window behind me rolling down.
“Remember,” Miles says. “Don’t get too close.”
I stop in the center of the empty road, just a few yards from Kelly and the fake Jarry I now recognize as Pete. Kelly steers the chair into a gap between the parked cars. Pete begins to rise. I jerk my thumb toward the back, start to open my door, but before I have a foot outside Miles is up and firing. Pete reels, falls from his chair. Kelly goes for her gun. The car is still moving so I pound the brakes. The jolt is enough to throw off the Sniper’s aim. Kelly takes one in the leg, loses her footing, writhes in the grass.
Now Miles has his gun on me, the muzzle burning my temple. There’s a sound like a car alarm echoing through my head. At first I don’t hear him say:
“Drive, traitor.”
I’m shifting gears when a final explosion turns me stone-deaf. I shut my eyes hard, open them again, suck in a breath. There’s a beat before I realize the blood on the dashboard isn’t mine.
I turn, see Randy running toward the car with his gun raised. Miles is slumped over, the top of his skull gone. When I turn back around, I see Patsy approaching from the front. They
were hiding in the parked cars, waiting.
I jump out, yell:
“He’s down. He’s down.”
I scan the lawn. Pete’s stripped to a tank top and is crouching beside Kelly. I spot his vest lying on the ground where he fell.
Chapter 44
A week later, Randy picks me up in front of my motel. He gives me the news as we drive off: Jesse Smits is awake. He’s corroborated my story.
“Corroborated how?” I ask.
“He kept saying, ‘I lost, I lost,’ over and over. It took a department shrink to tease it out of him. He thought the two of you were playing some post-apocalyptic video game. He wasn’t running from you so much as leading you to that abandoned lot.”
“Why?”
“Because it looked like a scene from the game. He was supposed to jump out from behind the rubble and shoot the cannibals.”
Neither of us can think of a thing to add, so we leave it at that.
We’re entering the tunnel now, headed for the Long Island Expressway.
“You’re officially reinstated,” Randy tells me. “Your job will be there when you’re ready for it.”
“Thank you,” I say.
“For what?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I say. “Saving my life. Safeguarding my secrets. Fighting to keep me on the force. Chauffeuring me around. Generally being there to protect me from myself.”
“I wouldn’t be here to protect you if Bryzinski—”
I cut him off.
“We’re even now, Randy,” I say. “You don’t owe me anymore. If anything, you’re ahead.”
He brakes to let a station wagon enter our lane.
“I was never keeping score,” he says.
And for a moment I’m ashamed all over again.
“What did you tell Branford?” I ask.
“About what?”
“Two cops shot, a few hundred miles from their jurisdiction. I’m sure he wanted answers.”
Randy shrugs.
“I told him the Night Sniper was dead. I told him that was all he needed to know.”