The Florentine Deception

by Carey Nachenberg

  Chapter 48

  My limited options had, in an instant, been reduced to one. With no light to direct my hands, any attempt to retrace my way downward would be a death sentence. And the featureless wall above was not an option. My choice, therefore, was to either let go (and pray I’d land somewhere in the pool) and then attempt the climb again with just a single, dim glow stick, or make one last go at it.

  “Sorry, Linda,” I murmured.

  I closed my eyes tight and like an apparition, the outline of Linda’s arm glowed in an afterimage on my retinas. Without shifting the angle of my head, I edged my feet higher, then, with both feet smeared high against the wall, I launched up through the darkness toward Linda’s iridescent, outstretched arm. Just as my body reached its apex, my fingers clamped around Linda’s wrist and her tendons and muscles groaned sickeningly under my full hundred-and-sixty-five-pound load. Linda’s body jerked forward, the friction of her corpse against the rough rocks above battling against gravity’s pull on my body. I threw my right hand around her forearm, then used my stomach muscles to steady my swinging feet and draw them in up against the smooth cliff wall. The shoe’s rubber gripped; all I needed was just a second of friction, enough to throw my right hand up to the ledge above. I hiked my feet higher, released the grip of my right hand, drew my body up high with my left bicep, and lunged.

  Linda’s body jerked forward under the increased tug just as my right hand hit its mark and locked onto an uneven volcanic outcropping atop the ledge. I realized I was holding my breath, so I inhaled, and then pulled myself up and onto the ledge.

  My entire frame shook as I collapsed on the floor next to Linda.

  “Why?” I screamed, tears streaming from my eyes. “What have I done?” My body convulsed in sobs.

  “I’m so sorry, Linda,” I stammered. “Potter … I’ve been the cause of so much death.” I shook my head. “So much. I’m so sorry.”

  I lay there in the dimming green light, weeping, my mind numbed by guilt. And then, when the tears refused to flow further, I rose and gently lifted Linda’s body and drew it away from the edge.

  “Why couldn’t it have been me?” I asked, my eyes welling again with tears. “I’m so sorry.”

  I leaned in to kiss her forehead.

  And then I felt her breath.

  Chapter 49

  “Linda?” I pleaded. “Linda, can you hear me?”

  Nothing.

  I leaned in closer, placing my face just a fraction of an inch from her nose, and felt it again, shallow and slow. But how? How could she have survived? Agonizingly, I directed my gaze down at her blood-soaked shirt, at the bullet hole. The slug had entered just over her left breast—through her shirt pocket—and traveled directly into her chest.

  I ripped the dimming glow stick from my shoe and clamped it between my teeth, then carefully unfastened Linda’s top two buttons and peeled away the blood-soaked fabric. The bullet had penetrated Linda’s chest four inches below her clavicle, its entrance hole pooled with coagulating blood. But why hadn’t it killed her? A shot like that from less than five feet away?

  Then it dawned on me.

  Her backup battery pack!

  I hurriedly unbuttoned Linda’s breast pocket and withdrew the trio of batteries. There it was—a dime-sized hole punched through the tape, midway between the rightmost two batteries. The pack hadn’t stopped the bullet but had slowed it. Just enough.

  I needed to get her medical attention immediately, but I had to stabilize her first. There was nothing I could do about her chest wound other than to keep her still, so I shifted my gaze down to her right knee. Tourniquets were only called for if there was uncontrolled bleeding, and while her knee was pretty mangled, the blood had stopped flowing.

  There was nothing more I could do.

  “Linda,” I squeezed her hand gently, “if you can hear me, just hang on. And if you need some motivation, just remember that margarita I owe you. If nothing else, hang on for that margarita. Just for a few more hours. I’m going to bring help.”

  I kissed her forehead and headed for the entrance.

  Resting on my hands and knees, just hidden from view, I surveyed the dimly lit cavern from within the tube, listened for any movement. Nothing. It was empty. Khalimmy was gone.

  I shimmied through the shaft’s remaining few feet, then stood up and ran to the mouth of the cave. As I reached the entrance, the intense afternoon light blinded me and I staggered back reflexively into the darkness.

  “Steven!” I yelled.

  Nothing.

  “Goddammit, where the hell are you? Crouch, it’s Alex!”

  I cupped my hands over the top of my eyes and stepped from the cavern and into the full daylight, squinting painfully up and down the canyon. Was he still alive?

  “Or dead?” I mumbled. “God help you Khalimmy, if you even touched a hair on him. God help you.”

  “Steven,” I screamed again.

  “Alex?” The voice was faint and distant but unmistakable. “Auuughh,” he groaned.

  “Where are you?” I yelled.

  “Over here.” He was upstream.

  “I’m coming,” I responded.

  I carefully picked my way through and over the nearest group of boulders, then yelled again, “Where are you?”

  “I’m not exactly sure,” he groaned. “I’m injured.”

  “Just take it easy,” I said. I worked my way up the canyon and scrambled onto the top of a boulder the size of a VW Bug.

  “Marco,” I yelled.

  “Polo,” he replied feebly. His voice seemed to project from a narrow crevasse separating two massive boulders, each easily fifteen feet tall.

  “I’ll be right there,” I said. Steven groaned more persistently while I worked my way up a series of pockets to the top of the nearer boulder and to the edge of the fissure. I cupped my hands and yelled down, “Marco.”

  “Polo,” he sputtered from the shadows below.

  “Thank God,” I said. “Are you okay?”

  “I’ve got a broken leg.” I could hear him wince.

  “Do you have your phone?” I asked. “We’re going to need a helicopter.”

  “Yeah, but I can’t get a signal.”

  “One second, I’ll see if I can find a safe way down.”

  I backed off from the edge and worked my way down the back side of the boulder and to the edge of the creek. Then I waded upstream through the shallow water until I reached the nearer of the two boulders.

  “Marco,” I yelled.

  “Polo.” His voice was louder. I rounded the first boulder and shimmied several feet through a narrow, water-smoothed gap into a darkened grotto. I could just hear his breathing over the trickling stream outside.

  “I’m so glad you’re still alive,” I said, near tears.

  “So am I,” he grunted. “Now just do me a favor and get me to a hospital.”

  “Give me your phone.” I waded slowly over toward Steven’s voice until I bumped into his foot and he screamed.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  “Shit it hurts. The bone’s sticking out.”

  “Jesus. Give me your phone.”

  “Here,” he said a moment later. I cautiously waved my arm through the air until it bumped into his outstretched hand.

  “Got it?” he asked.

  “Yeah.” I tightened my fingers around the handset. “Give me a second. I’ll try it on top of the boulder. If I can’t get a signal, I’ll head down to the canyon, to the visitor’s center.” I thought back to Linda. Will she last that long?

  “Don’t worry,” he called out, “I’m not going anywhere.”

  I pocketed the phone and then climbed atop the VW Bug boulder, stopping once I’d found a safe place to make the call. Disregarding the phone’s weak signal indicator, I punched in 911.

  After about ten seconds of silence, the phone flashed a “No signal” message and issued a beep. It was a long shot—this far back, the canyon had notoriously bad reception. I
pushed the talk button again, with the same result. I pocketed the phone again and worked my way back atop the closer of the two huge boulders.

  Again, I tapped the three digits in and hit the talk button. A few seconds later, I heard a garbled ring from the handset.

  “Got it,” I yelled. The line rang once more and picked up. “911 Emergency. Please—” the signal cut out, “—nature of the emergency.”

  “Can you hear me?” I asked.

  “Yes sir. Please state the nature—” The phone cut to static again.

  “I’ve got two injured people a little more than one mile beyond the rock pool in the canyon at Malibu Creek State Park.”

  “Excuse me? You broke up. You’re where?”

  “In the canyon beyond the rock pool in Malibu Creek State Park. We’re about one mile up the canyon from the rock pool area.”

  “Let me confirm. You’ve got two injured hikers one mile up the,” the voice descended into digitized fuzz, “ool in Malibu Creek State—”

  “Correct, one mile up the canyon from the rock pool area,” I repeated. “One person with a serious gunshot wound, the other with a broken leg, maybe other injuries. I can’t tell.”

  “A gunshot wound?”

  “Yes. A woman’s been shot in the chest and leg. Two injured people, one critical.”

  “Okay, I’m going to dispatch Search and Rescue now. Make sure to stay where the helicopter can see you. Do not try to mov—” she cut out, “—injured.”

  “Hold tight, Steven.” I worked my way back down and around to the base of the two boulders. “They’re coming. Just hold it together.”

  “Okay.”

  “What happened to you?” I asked.

  “I was looking around up here when I saw Khalimmy and this other guy,” he sucked air through his teeth in pain, “so I backed up to hide and tripped.” He paused. “I’m so glad you guys are okay. Where are Linda and Potter?”

  “Potter is dead,” I stammered, trying but failing to suppress tears. “Linda was shot in the chest. I don’t know … I can’t tell how bad it is.”

  “Oh shit.”

  We sat in silence for a minute, Steven waiting for me to calm myself.

  “All right,” I said, wiping my eyes, “I’m going to go up top to wait for the helicopter. Just hold it together for another twenty or thirty minutes. And pray.”

  My ears registered the powerful thwapping of the rotors nearly half a minute before the rescue helicopter rounded the bend and came into view. I waved my arms frantically from atop the boulder until the chopper, now one hundred yards away, slowed in recognition. After a moment of hesitation, the machine inched forward, hovering directly above us, the wash from its powerful rotors overpowering in the narrow canyon. Instinctively, I sat down, plugged my ears, and squinted to avoid the vortex of dusty air.

  A Search and Rescue ranger descended via a winched steel cable, landing about a dozen steps away on top of the adjacent boulder. The ranger detached the cable from his harness and gave a hand signal to the winch operator above; immediately the cable began to rise. The man worked his way onto my boulder and stepped up to my ear.

  “Where are the injured?” he yelled.

  “There’s a gunshot victim inside that cave,” I responded, pointing at the narrow crevasse in the rock. “I think she’s lost a lot of blood. And the man with the broken leg is down there.” I pointed between the two boulders.

  “Got it,” he said. Then, into his walkie-talkie, he yelled, “I’ve got two injured, one critically inside a cave. Ask Lee to come down with the second med-kit and tell him to bring ten units of blood.” He hesitated, holding his hand over his earpiece. “Well then send whatever we’ve got. And then request another chopper, stat—we’re going to need backup.”

  Chapter 50

  “Any news on Linda Reynaud?” I asked, still sniffling.

  “Reynaud? R-E-Y?”

  I nodded.

  “One second, I’ll check.” The diminutive Filipina nurse keyed Linda’s name into her terminal. A few clicks later, she said, “Nothing yet, she’s still in surgery.”

  “She’s been in there for hours. Can’t you find out her status?” I asked.

  “Not until the surgery is done. Will you be in the waiting room?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll come get you the moment they take her to the ICU for recovery.”

  I nodded, then walked back to the sitting area. My bench had been taken by a man in his early thirties and his five-year-old. I crumpled onto the lone empty seat across from them and closed my eyes. After two hours of interrogation by the police, an hour in the ER getting sutures, a violent confrontation with Hillary that resulted in me being bodily shoved from Steven’s hospital room, and nearly forty hours without sleep, I was emotionally drained and running on fumes.

  “What’s that one with the spines on its back?”

  “Huh?” I asked, opening my eyes.

  The man sitting across from me pointed at a page in the thin picture book.

  “Mmmmmm.” The boy shifted on his father’s lap as he noodled over the image.

  “Starts with an S,” hinted the father.

  “Stoopidosaur?” The kid giggled infectiously. I sighed. Potter would never experience the joy of fatherhood, of dinosaurs, of father-son outings. And what about Linda? I shivered.

  “Steg …” the dad hinted.

  “Stegosaurus!” screamed the kid.

  “Correct!” He flipped the page. “And that one?”

  The kid giggled. “Tyrannosaurus Rex! Rawr!”

  Click. All of a sudden, something went off in my head. I couldn’t quite place it, but my subconscious had sent a signal-flare up. Tyrannosaurus Rex? It made no sense but I took a mental note anyway.

  “Spot-on,” said the father. “And this one?” He flipped the page.

  “Tri. Ser. Ahh. Tops!” screamed the kid.

  “Right again!”

  The boy jumped to the floor, placed his hands on his hips, and asked, “When are we going to see Mommy?”

  “In just a little bit, Tyler. The doctors are working with her now to bring you a new baby sister.”

  “Excuse me.”

  “I’m sorry?” I gazed up. It was the nurse. “Is she okay?”

  “I don’t know her status, but you can visit her now. They’ve taken her to Recovery Room 5 in the ICU.” She pointed down the hall.

  “Thank you so much,” I said.

  She nodded once, wordlessly, then headed back to her station.

  Linda lay unconscious in a railed hospital bed in the narrow ICU bay. A menacing chest tube poked from beneath her gown and led down to a plastic bag, its interior tinged with fresh blood. An IV drip connected her wrist to three hanging bags of fluid, and a pair of oxygen tubes fed into her nostrils. Her chest rose and fell weakly as the heart monitor droned on. She looked bad.

  I stepped from the bay and scanned the hallway for someone who could tell me more. No one. I walked over to the ICU desk.

  “Excuse me,” I said.

  The attendant, a fortyish man in blue scrubs, glanced up from his paperwork. Dark bags sagged from beneath tired eyes.

  “Yes? How can I help you?”

  “I’m Linda Reynaud’s f–” I hesitated, “fiancé. Can you tell me how she’s doing? Will she be okay?”

  “They just wheeled her into bay five. She’s in critical condition. If you’d like to talk to the attending physician, I can page him.”

  “I’d appreciate it,” I said.

  The man nodded and returned to his paperwork. After ten seconds, he looked up, an impatient expression on his weary face.

  “Why don’t you go back and keep her company? I’ll page him in a minute.”

  I dragged the plastic chair from the corner of the alcove to Linda’s bedside and sat down.

  “Well, Linda, I’m crossing my fingers and praying for you. As you know, I don’t believe in God, but I’m praying just in case. I don’t know what else I can do.�
��

  Her body shifted slightly.

  “I’m so sorry I dragged you into this. I just … I just don’t know what to do. How to end it.”

  I leaned forward and rested my face on my palms, exhausted.

  “God, I hope you make it. I don’t know how I’m ever going to cope with Potter’s death, but if I lost you too …”

  I wiped my eyes on the sleeve of my blue loaner scrub shirt, then laid my hands on the bed’s railing.

  “Assuming you do make it through,” I continued, “and assuming I do, I’ve got some things I want to tell you. Things I’ve never had the guts to say that I should have said a long time ago. So, if some part of your brain can hear me right now, now you’ve got something to look forward to.” I paused. “Or not.” I laughed cynically. “Either way, I just hope you make it.”

  “Hello.”

  Startled, I looked up.

  “You must be Ms. Reynaud’s fiancé?”

  “Yes. I’m Alex,” I said, standing up and extending my hand.

  “Hi Alex, I’m Doctor Weinstein.” He shook my hand.

  “Will Linda be okay?” I asked nervously.

  He stared impassively at me. “‘I’m hopeful, but it’s touch-and-go at this point. The bullet collapsed her lung and caused a large amount of internal bleeding. She’s lucky the EMTs got to her when they did.” He pointed to her chest tube. “We drained her chest cavity to help the lung reinflate, but it’s going to take time.”

  “Could you give me odds?”

  He grimaced and shook his head. “It’s just too early, but we’re doing everything we can.”

  I nodded somberly. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. We’ll have a better idea tomorrow. Why don’t you try to get some sleep and come in first thing in the morning. There’s nothing more you can do right now.”

  I nodded again. “Do you have the time?”

  “Yeah,” he glanced down at his watch, “it’s ten ’til nine.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Thanks for everything.”

  I wanted to see how Steven was doing before visiting hours ended, even if it meant another confrontation with Hillary, so I steeled myself and headed for the elevator. When I reached the fourth floor, I walked down a long hall, past a nurses’ station and into a wing of patient rooms. Steven’s was 401, the first door on the right. I knocked softly.