by J. D. Barker
She knelt down and pointed her gun toward the door, elbows locked.
Nash lowered one finger, then the other. On three, he slammed the weight of his body into the door and nearly tumbled into the room as the frame gave way with a defiant crack.
Still crouched, Clair swept the space, gun at the ready.
A large four-poster bed stood at the back of the room, positioned under an elaborate tray ceiling. To the left she spotted a small sitting area with book-lined shelves and a desk with a large couch separating the space from the rest of the room. A fireplace sputtered in the corner of the sitting area. On the far end of the master, another hallway led around a corner.
Nash moved cautiously and Clair followed.
A woman lay on the floor beside the couch, bound and gagged like the housekeeper downstairs.
Nash went straight for the walk-in closet on the far right, swatting clothes, making sure it was empty. Clair went on and turned the corner. She found herself standing in a large bathroom of white marble. The elaborate space offered no place to hide; the shower was encased in glass and clearly empty. A linen closet stood on the left, lined with thick towels and enough bottles of shampoo, conditioner, and cleaning supplies to stock a small hotel. Nobody hid in there.
She returned to the bedroom to find Nash checking beneath the bed.
Clair knelt down beside the woman and removed her gag. “Is he still here?”
“I . . . I don’t think so,” the woman said, her voice shaky. “Oh God, I think he took Arty!” She thrashed frantically now, trying to force her body into a sitting position. Nash helped her up, untied her, and eased her into an overstuffed chair beside the bed.
“What about your daughter?” Nash said.
“Carnegie won’t be home until . . .” She craned her neck back toward the fireplace in the far corner where a small mantel clock ticked away the minutes. “What time is it? It’s dark. I can’t make it out.”
“About five thirty.”
“After five?”
A siren cried out in the distance.
Clair stepped over to the large window beside the bed and pulled back the curtain. She couldn’t see anything. “Ma’am, how long ago did he leave?”
Nash had untied her hands, and she rubbed at her temples. “Arty came home at a little after two to change for a meeting. He got here right after that. Ten minutes later at the most.”
“What happened?”
“I don’t know exactly—it all happened so fast. I was over there on the couch reading, and someone knocked at the bedroom door. I figured it was Miranda. Arty said he’d get it. I heard a loud bang a second later, and when I stood to figure out what was going on, this man came rushing in. He barreled into me and shoved me down onto the couch. I think I hit my head because I blacked out for a second. When I came to, my hands were tied and he was working at my feet. I screamed and he just smiled at me. He actually apologized for intruding on my afternoon, said that he simply must have a word or two with my husband. Then he tied the gag over my mouth. I saw Arty lying right over there”—she gestured toward the hallway—“he was moving but not very fast. I think he was trying to stand up. The man went back to him and stuck him with a needle in the neck, some kind of narcotic, because Arty was out after that. Then he came back to me, apologized again, and jabbed a needle in my arm. I blacked out again, and when I woke, most of the fire had burned down, so I must have been out for a while. Then the two of you got here.”
Clair loaded a photo of Bishop onto her phone and held it out to the woman. “Is this him?”
She nodded. “Is he going to hurt Arty?”
Nash located the light switch and flicked it on. He wished he hadn’t.
Scrawled across the bedroom wall in blood were the words DO NO EVIL.
90
Porter
Day 2 • 5:40 p.m.
When Porter reached the eleventh floor, he tasted a sinking rot in his gullet. Scrawled across the door in fresh blood dripping down the faded green paint were the words SPEAK NO EVIL. Discarded in the dust at his feet were a human tongue and a pair of bloody pliers.
This was his floor.
He dropped the radio into his pocket, switched off the flashlight, and tightened his grip on the baseball bat before pushing through the heavy metal door. He entered the space swift and low, ignoring the throb in his leg.
A hallway lit by candles.
Small white candles about an inch wide and two inches tall lined the left wall. They followed the corridor nearly thirty feet before disappearing around a corner.
Porter pulled the cell phone from his pocket and hit the Home button; still no signal. He put the phone away and rolled the bat between his hands.
Guns N’ Roses began to howl through the air midsong—
Welcome to the jungle
We take it day by day
Porter nearly dropped the bat while attempting to cover his ears. He pressed both palms against the sides of his head, holding the bat with his fingertips. He had never heard music so loud. It was like standing in the first row of a concert. He didn’t see any speakers, but the music was clearly coming from up ahead, up ahead and around the corner.
He started down the corridor.
It didn’t seem possible, but the music grew louder. Porter swore the flames were dancing to the bass.
When he reached the end of the corridor, when he was ready to turn the corner, he had no choice but to lower his palms from his ears and grip the bat with both hands. He did just that, rushing around the corner with the tiny barrel of the weapon leading the way and his bleeding leg lagging behind. He found himself in a lobby of sorts, one littered with the remains of whatever business once occupied the space.
An old desk stood at the center of the room surrounded by candles on the floor. On the desk stood a battered boom box the likes of which Porter hadn’t seen in twenty years. The black plastic housing was covered in dust and paint, one of the two cassette doors was missing, and the glass meant to protect the tuner made the station numbers nearly unreadable beneath a spiderweb of cracks. LED lights flickered and danced across the display in time with the music, a sea of red, green, yellow, and blue. A wire protruded from the top, snaked over the desk, and terminated in four large loudspeakers stacked beside one of three open elevator shafts. A sign taped to the front of the boom box read: CHANGE THE CHANNEL FROM 97.9 AND I’LL TOSS YOU FROM THE ROOF. SIGNED, YOUR FRIENDS AT LOCAL 49. Below that, someone had scribbled: CLASSIC ROCK 4-EVR.
All of the hardware was plugged in to a red Briggs & Stratton generator, which huffed at Porter’s right. He reached down and flicked the kill switch. The generator sputtered and went dead, cutting off the music.
“You don’t like GNR?” Bishop’s voice cracked from the tiny radio in his pocket.
Porter yanked out the radio and jammed down the Talk button. “Where the fuck are you?”
“I forgot to tell you who Mrs. Carter became in her new life.”
“What?”
“Lisa Carter died the same day as my father, but she was born anew, a brand-new identity to go with her new life. Want to know her new name? I think you may recognize it.”
Porter heard Bishop’s voice crackling not only from the radio but from somewhere else too, his real voice, somewhere close, like an echo. He couldn’t pinpoint the source, though. His ears were still ringing.
There were four open doorways surrounding the elevators, two on either side. The candles surrounding the desk made it impossible to see into the gloom beyond. He could feel Bishop’s eyes on him.
“Don’t you want to know who Mrs. Carter became after that day at our house?”
Porter started toward the first open doorway, the bat held high, ready to swing.
“Don’t.”
Porter froze.
The shadow across the room moved as Anson Bishop emerged from the gloom, pushing Arthur Talbot on a rolling office chair. The man was duct-taped to the frame, his hands, feet, and torso bound. A cr
ude bandage covered his eyes, and blood dripped from his mouth.
Anson Bishop stood behind him with a knife pressed to Talbot’s throat. “Hi, Sam.”
Porter approached with caution, his eyes scanning the otherwise empty space. “Where is she?”
“Do you have a gun, Sam? If you do, I’ll need you to leave it over there in the hallway.”
“Just this.” He held up the bat.
“You can hold on to that if it makes you feel better. Stop there, though. No need to come any closer.”
Talbot let out a watery moan from the chair, his head lolling to one side.
Porter heard sirens in the distance. “Let me get him to a hospital. He doesn’t have to die.”
“We’re all dying, Sam. Some are just better at it than others. Isn’t that right, Arty?” He pressed the knife against Talbot’s throat, and a thin trickle of blood appeared. Talbot didn’t react; he must have been in shock. Bishop glanced back up and frowned. “You should get that leg checked out. All those stairs might not have been a good idea.”
Porter looked down and realized his entire pant leg was soaked in blood; the stitches must have opened up completely now. He pressed his hand against the wound, and blood seeped through his fingers. He was growing lightheaded. The bat slipped from his left hand and fell to the floor. “I’m fine.”
“You’re a good detective, Sam. You should know that. I knew you’d puzzle it out. And putting others before yourself? That is admirable. It’s not something you see much of these days, not anymore.”
Porter drew in a deep breath and forced himself to stand up straight, ignoring the white flecks dancing around his vision. The sirens were getting close. “They’ll be here soon. You still have time to do the right thing. Tell me where Emory is, and let Talbot go. Just walk away. I can’t chase you, not like this.”
Bishop eased the wheeled chair toward the first open elevator shaft, a grin at his lips. “Let him go?”
“No! Don’t!” Porter started toward him.
Bishop held up the hand with the knife and pointed it at him. “Stop! No closer.”
Porter fell still.
Talbot’s blood dripped from the tip of the blade and landed on his arm. The chair was no more than five feet from an eleven-story drop plus the subbasements. Porter tried to do the math, but his thoughts were fuzzy. One hundred feet? One twenty? He wasn’t sure. It didn’t really matter. It was far enough.
“Emory I understand, but why do you want to protect this scumbag? You’ll see the files soon enough, Sam. I’m sure Clair and the boys have found them by now. This man has had his hand in every dirty deal passing through this city for thirty years. All the murder and corruption you live to prevent, he lives to create. How many people died because of him? How many more will die so he can line his pockets?”
Outside, the steady chomp chomp of helicopter blades approached, the copter landing on the roof. Bishop heard it too; his eyes flashed quickly to the ceiling, then back to Porter. “Sounds like your friends have arrived.”
“They’re coming from the top, and SWAT is probably already on the stairs. You’re out of time, Bishop. It’s over.” Porter’s vision clouded for a second, and his legs felt wobbly. He forced himself to steady. “Step away from Talbot and get on your knees.”
Bishop spun the chair in a slow circle. “This world will be a better place without him, don’t you think? That’s what Father would have wanted.”
“Kirby’s partner, how was he connected?” Porter said, a distraction at best. “The man who shot your father.”
“What?”
“Kirby planned to run off with your mother and the Carter woman, but what about the other man, the one you called Mr. Stranger?” Porter was having trouble standing up. His entire body was heavy. He wanted to sleep. He had to keep Bishop talking, though, long enough for backup to arrive. Long enough—
“His name was Felton Briggs. He worked for our friend here,” Bishop said, giving Talbot another spin. “I believe he was some kind of security specialist. I asked Arty about him, but he wouldn’t answer me, just kept babbling on about his eyes—‘Can’t see! Can’t see!’ Blah, blah blah. I finally had to shut him up. You should have seen it.”
“Was he involved?”
“Until he pulled the trigger on Father, he was probably the only innocent man standing in the house that day. Just doing his job. He had no idea Kirby was involved, and he surely didn’t know that Kirby planned to kill him.”
Talbot’s body jerked in the chair, his head snapping back. His fingers stretched out in an odd array as every muscle in his body began to convulse.
“He’s going into shock. You need to let me get him to a hospital.”
Bishop smiled. “Your friends will be here soon enough. I’m worried about you, though. Are you okay? You look awfully pale, Sam.”
Porter wasn’t okay. He saw two Bishops standing in the corner instead of one, and his arms were numb. He wanted to reach down, pick up the baseball bat, and charge across the room to beat this man senseless, pound his head into a pile of bloody pulp, but he had to concentrate on standing right now. He needed to focus on not passing out. “What was Mrs. Carter’s new name?”
Bishop’s face brightened. “Ah, yes! In all the excitement, I nearly forgot. Thank you, Sam, for reminding me.”
Talbot had fallen still. Porter couldn’t tell if he was breathing.
Bishop continued. “Mother changed her name to Emily Gerard. Took me a few years to learn that. Sadly, I think that identity died right there or she figured out how to live off-grid. I tried to track her down, but the name never popped up. No credit records, land sales, nothing. I don’t think she ever used it. Mrs. Carter, though, she did use her new identity. She didn’t even attempt to hide. I think it’s a name you may be familiar with too, one you’ve picked up in the last handful of days. Mrs. Carter changed her name to Catrina Connors.”
Porter’s brain was fuzzy. The thoughts were there, but they were moving slowly, molasses. He recognized the name, knew it, but couldn’t place it. Then—
“Emory’s mother?”
A grin spread across Bishop’s face, and he spun Talbot around like a top. “You asked me to gather information on her back at the war room, and I wanted desperately to tell you what I already knew, but there would have been no fun in that.”
“But how?”
“Simon Carter had moved over fourteen million dollars into offshore accounts, and I know she and Mother lived off that money for a while. But they also bought property, a lot of property. Property she knew Talbot would one day want. When he finally approached her about a particular stretch of warehouses along the waterfront, she seduced him. Emory was the result. On Emory’s first birthday, she moved all the property into their daughter’s name, then told Talbot who she really was. She also told him she had all the documents her husband had stolen years earlier and would release them to the press unless Talbot agreed to transfer all his legitimate holdings to Emory at the time of his death. He changed his will shortly thereafter.”
“How did you learn all of this? You said you didn’t know where your mother or Mrs. Carter disappeared to.”
“Gunther Herbert was very forthcoming,” Bishop replied. “We had a wonderful chat about a week back.”
“Talbot’s CFO?”
“Yes.”
“So if Talbot dies—”
“Emory inherits billions and all criminal activity he’s attached to will crumble.”
Porter looked down at Talbot. He was moving again. His head bobbed from side to side, and a deep, guttural moan rose in his throat. “You can’t kill him.”
“No?” Bishop replied, shoving the chair.
Talbot skidded across the floor toward the open elevator shaft on the far left, and Porter dove for the rolling chair, forcing every ounce of strength he had into his legs. He landed hard on the concrete and slid, his hands reaching out, fingers brushing the cold steel, grabbing at one of the wheels as it rolled over t
he edge. He held on for the briefest of seconds before it tugged away and disappeared into the black.
He heard Talbot crash far below, followed by a scream. A girl’s muffled, weak scream from the next elevator shaft over, the one in the center of the room, only a few feet to his right.
Emory.
From the corner of his hazy vision, he spied Bishop as he walked calmly to the third elevator shaft and stood with his back to the door’s edge. Porter watched as the man gave him a final wave and said, “Good-bye, Sam. It’s been fun,” before stepping backward through the opening and disappearing into the dark chasm.
All went dark then as Porter finally passed out.
91
Porter
Day 2 • 5:58 p.m.
“Sam? Can you hear me? I think he’s coming around—”
It was Clair.
Clair-bear.
Five little bears heard a loud roar, one ran away, then there were four.
Where had Bishop gone?
“Please step back, ma’am.”
Bright light.
The brightest of all possible lights.
“Detective?”
The light disappeared with a click, and Porter blinked. His head was pounding. “Where?”
Clair pushed the medic aside. “Ground floor, just outside the building. We brought you down with the chopper basket. Carrying your fat ass down all those stairs was not an option.”
“Bishop killed Talbot.”
Clair brushed a strand of hair from his eyes. “We know. Hey, look—”
Porter followed her finger.
Nash pushed through the glass door beside the revolving turnstile and held the door open as two paramedics wheeled out a stretcher containing a young girl. An IV bag hung above her. Her head and wrist were wrapped in white bandages.
“Is she . . . ?”
“She’s going to be okay,” Clair said. “Bishop had her handcuffed to a gurney at the bottom of the elevator shaft. She’s severely dehydrated, and the cuffs did a number on her wrist, but I don’t think she’ll lose the hand. Other than the ear, he didn’t touch her. Just left her down there. Construction crews have been in and out of the building this entire time, but nobody had a clue she was down there. They’ve been working on the upper floors.”