by Alex Gates
“There’s no time!” He grabbed my hand. “We’ll get out once the water fills the whole car.”
I’d have groaned if I wasn’t already stretching as tall as the seat allowed, clinging to the disappearing pocket of air.
No, no, no. I had my first responder training. I knew what happened when cars slipped over bridges and fell into creeks and rivers. Once the car sunk too much, once the frame was mostly covered in water, the pressure made it impossible to open the door.
Until the water filled the car.
Until the pressure equalized.
Until your lungs threatened to burst without air.
If we were getting out of here, we’d have to wait as the murky, polluted water filled the entirety of our car. The merciless bubbles had to surge, inch-by-inch into the last available breath of air. Only once the water swirled and vortexed, paralyzing us in unforgiving, frigid pinpricks, would we have a chance to open the door and swim to safety.
I wouldn’t let him wait while the car groaned and the frame popped. Maybe if I was alone? Maybe if it had just been me holding my breath and counting the heartbeats until the water forgave the trespass and allowed me to burst out of the car and to the surface. Maybe then I’d accept this ridiculous plan.
But not in a million years did I wish that terror upon myself.
And I refused to let James suffer alongside me.
“You’ve got to go!” I shouted, pushing him away. “Swim back to the parking lot. Call for help!”
“I’m not leaving you!”
“I’ll get out!”
The lie wasn’t believable as the water lapped at my chin. “James, please. You can’t risk your life. Don’t wait for me.”
“I will never leave you.” He stopped pushing, pulling, beating at the door pinning me to take a breath of air. A pity he wasted it on me. “Listen, the water is filling up quick. Take a couple deep breaths. Hyperventilate yourself. Then sit perfectly still. Got it? Don’t move. Don’t panic. Stay calm so you don’t waste the oxygen. I’ll swim out and get your door open, okay? I’ll get you out of here.”
And have him risk his life swimming around a sinking car? What if he got hurt? What if the man who pushed his into the river waited for us to surface?
What if James died?
“Please, James. Don’t do this. Just get yourself to safety. Please.”
I tore at the door, beating against the bent frame with tiring arms. A helpless rage burned through my muscles. Was I mad at him? Myself?
I’d been face-to-face with guns, a bomb, an open fucking grave…
But nothing terrified me like the thought of James’s life in danger. That it was my fault he sucked his last breath of air. My fault he’d trapped himself in the car and held my hand as the river consumed us in darkness.
The water burned my eyes. I closed them tight. This was it. The last breath. The river clutched at my chest, squeezing as I struggled to inhale enough to quench a greedy thirst this water would only steal.
The coldness slipped over my cheeks, my chin, and the last bit of my nose and mouth struggling to suck in just a little bit more.
Then it was done. We’d been swallowed. The water surged over our heads, swirling us into an icy blackness. My heart pounded. Lungs ached. The fear would consume every bit of air I’d managed to save.
A rush of bubbles tickled over my cheek. My ears popped, but then silence. Muffled and dark, the water pressed in around us, devouring the entirety of the car and pulling us down, down, down into the unknown depths of the river.
James squeezed my hand three times. I couldn’t see him, but the water churned. He’d tried the door.
It didn’t budge.
Too early. The pressure wasn’t equalized yet.
Panic did nothing. I fought the hysterical, uncompromising instinct to thrash and fight, to rip my leg through the debris pinning it in place and peel through the metal preventing my escape from the sinking coffin. The still, desperate seconds passed.
One. Two.
Ten. Eleven.
Twenty? Twenty-one?
How long could we last?
A final bumble of air hissed from the trunk. James hit his door again. A new rush of water shadowed his movements. And then his hand was gone.
And I was alone—trapped within the submerged car.
I pushed my door. It didn’t budge.
I’d never make it out without his help.
I couldn’t slam against the door. My shoulder hit the glass, but I didn’t have the momentum to drive it harder. Once. Twice. Three times.
Too much movement. Panic and determination clawed through oxygen worse than resignation and submission. The honest agony in my chest was a dire warning. My head roared. A darkness beyond the night’s misery and the mystery of the water threatened to wash me away.
Not like this.
Not here.
Not with James fighting to save me.
I pushed against the metal, twisting my body and bracing myself with my free leg against the center console. The door inched open, but the broken frame jammed hard.
A thunk slammed against the window. Twice. I couldn’t see, the water plunging me into confusion and disorientation, but James’s shadow battled the water. A dull thud smacked the window. I struggled, but the burst of strength depleted everything I had. One last heave against the door. The instinct to breath ravaged my chest.
A second thud earned a reluctant creak. The sound muffled my frantic heartbeat. The door popped open.
And my body floated free.
I didn’t have the strength to swim. James looped his arm around my chest and pushed off the car. We rocketed to the surface.
The air was a sharp slap to my face. I didn’t care. Greedily, desperately, I sucked in gulp after gulp, seizing my fill before treading the water away from the tugging current. James guided me to the cement landing of the wharf, helping me to climb up and over as I collapsed on the side of the river.
My body shook, but I was alive. Breathing. Freed of that watery tomb. I coughed, but nothing had ever felt as good as that sharp inhale that cleared my nose and throat of the murky water.
“Are you okay?” James panted.
“I…I’ve been through worse.” Not much, but close.
“Are you hurt?”
The cold water had numbed me. I shook my head, but I knew the slice on my leg would be a problem.
“I’m good.” I welcomed his sudden embrace. He pulled me close to him, kissing my forehead, letting me rest against his chest. “Just promise me one thing?”
“Anything.”
I sniffled, gasping for the plentiful air. “I’ll do those things you said. Go out for the date nights. Dress up. Do all the normal couple things. But if you agree…”
“Yeah?”
“We’re leaving the car in a parking garage.”
At least then I’d have a chance next time someone tried to kill me.
14
“You’re resilient.
I think that makes you my favorite.”
-Him
The responding officers gave me a blanket to keep warm. I refused it.
The last time someone had wrapped me in a blanket like that, I’d just escaped hell, broken and bleeding. I’d clutched it during the FBI interview, reliving the nightmare for hours on end with the kind, compassionate, and gorgeous Agent James Novak.
Now? Blankets just brought back memories—moments of weakness and a time in my life I longed to forget.
I hobbled through the police department—shoeless, saturated, and shaking. Not exactly a look that screamed respect me to my colleagues.
I’d never been so angry with myself. One mistake, one moment of obliviousness when I wasn’t aware of my surroundings, and I’d ruined their perception of me. For eight years, I’d fought to convince them that I was not a victim anymore. Not the girl who got away but Detective McKenna.
All it took was one dip in the Mon to undo years of work.
&nb
sp; They didn’t hand me a mug of hot chocolate with tough mini-marshmallows like at the FBI, but the coffee was on before I’d reached our department. Riley and Falconi waited in Adamski’s office, each of them rushing to my aid as I limped to my desk, James in tow.
“Jesus Christ, London.” Adamski nearly hugged me. It’d take six months of genderless conversation to earn back his confidence. “What are you doing here? Go to the hospital! James, damn it, talk some sense into her!”
“I don’t need a hospital.” Or James answering for me. “I just want to find the son of a bitch who did this.”
It might have sounded more confident if my voice wasn’t trembling. My teeth chattered too. Great. The only thing worse was how my slinky black dress stuck to my skin in all the wrong places, revealing more of me than anyone in the department had a right to see. I took the blanket and held it in front of me. At least it’d shield the goods.
“London, seriously.” Riley gave a nod to James as if asking permission to be inappropriate. It’d never be granted, but it wouldn’t stop Riley. “That cut goes any higher, and you’ve got a gash on your gash. Probably should have it looked at.”
I couldn’t bend to open the bottom drawer of my desk for the first aid kit. Too achy from the crash, too bloody from the cut hastily patched with gauze and tape, and too modest to let the dress creep up while I knelt. Instead, I used the toes on my left foot to hook the handle and tug on the drawer. It worked, but I’d never be able to apply a butterfly band-aid with my feet.
“Someone tried to kill us,” I said. “I am not going to the hospital until I can sit that bastard in the interview room and find out just what the hell he was doing.”
Falconi offered his help with the bandage, but he let James approach my leg. I knocked them both away.
“Just get some guys out there. Find out what car was at the wharf.” I blinked. The world took a minute to refocus. “I don’t need…I’ll work from here…”
“London.” James’s voice had returned to normal, the gentle caress of satisfaction that came from always being right. “You have whiplash from the impact. Probably a concussion too.”
I scoffed. “A fender bender gave me a concussion?”
Adamski disagreed. “You need a doctor. That fender bender pushed you into the goddamned river.”
He didn’t need to remind me. I still stank of river water. I could count on my hand the number of nut jobs who actually swam in that muck. Most sane people had the barrier of a boat between them and the mine-runoffs, gas and oil retention pond overflows, and accidental sewage leaks that spilled into the Monongahela. If that wasn’t a bad enough mix, the EPA didn’t know how many cars and shopping carts littered the bottom, not to mention the abandoned electronics and the rumored wreckage of a 1956 B-25 bomber.
“I don’t need a doctor…” My balance wobbled. “I’ll take a shower. It’ll clear my head and warm me up…and get rid of the smell.”
Adamski could live with that. “Fine, go home. We’ve got patrols out now—”
“Home hell. If they knew I was in James’s car, they know where we live.” I wasn’t wasting time arguing. I headed to the locker room. “I’ll shower here and give you my statement.”
“London.” James took my hand, squeezing it in the middle of the department, where everyone could see. I should have batted him away, but I liked the warmth. “I think you should at least sit down. You’ve been through a lot.”
“And what about you? You were in danger too.” I might have been soaked to the bone, but the catch in my voice wasn’t from the shivers. “And I can’t…I won’t…”
Damn it. I wasn’t going to lose it now. Here. With everyone watching.
James understood. He always understood. “Okay.”
“I want a shower.”
“We can do that.”
“Riley, Falconi.” I didn’t wait for them, just assumed they followed. “Grab a pen. Let me go over the events while they’re fresh.”
I’d never liked showering at the station, especially as the impromptu female locker room had grown a bit too cramped in the past few years. More women on the force meant a better diversity, but I missed the space. I grabbed a towel and a pair of mismatched workout clothes from my locker, and I followed James to the men’s room.
The guys didn’t say anything but Falconi raised his eyebrows and snickered.
“So, she’s like this all the time?” he asked. “I thought she’d calm down after hours.”
I flipped him off and did my best to slam the curtain to the stall.
“She tends to get irritable when she nearly dies.” James started his shower first. His voice lowered. “Hell, so do I.”
I peeled the dress off. The material was bloody, muddy, and probably ruined. Forget dry-cleaning. I’d never wear it again. I’d learned long ago that the best way to heal from a traumatic event was to pretend it never existed in the first place. Once the dress was gone, I’d never have to remember the hopeless panic that had overwhelmed me in the car.
Riley hollered over the rushing water. “Hey, I ain’t nobody’s towel boy, and I’m not going to sit here while you shave your legs, London?”
I forced the tremor from my voice. “Lucky for you, I shaved before the attempted murder.”
“Always be prepared. This is why your momma says to wear clean underwear.”
Yeah, cause my thong had really saved the day.
I waited until the water steamed, searing hot, before ducking under the stream. Mistake. My heart lurched, and I gripped the walls of the stall to keep from panicking. A tense heartbeat passed as I willed the memory of the frigid river and dark threat from my mind. Too bad I couldn’t ignore the burning pain torturing the cut.
But I’d be damned if I never enjoyed a hot shower again. I forced my head back under and didn’t move until the trembling stopped.
Fortunately, James was already relaying his version of the events to Falconi.
“We parked the vehicle at the Mon Wharf, in a space directly across from the river. We left the party before eleven o’clock, possibly at ten forty-five. We arrived at the vehicle at eleven ten.”
“Twenty-five minutes to get to the car?” Falconi asked. “What the hell took you so long?”
I’d swim back to the wreckage, retrieve my heels, and shove them where the sun didn’t bless Falconi. James tended to be more patient and diplomatic. His shower turned off.
“London was wearing heels,” he explained. “They’d blistered her feet, so we took our time. We sat in the car for a minute before attempting to reverse from the spot. As she cut her wheels, we were rammed on the driver’s side by another vehicle. The vehicle didn’t stop, and the momentum propelled us forward, twisting the car into the river.” His voice darkened. “London was pinned, so we had to wait until the cabin filled with water. I swam out first, broke the surface for air, and searched the debris near the wharf for a sturdy tree branch. I used it to pry her door open so she could be freed.”
“See, James…” Falconi laughed. “If you only rode a noble white steed like the rest of the heroes, you wouldn’t have gotten caught in the river.”
“I’ll have to pull him out of the stable.”
Why couldn’t I warm up? I poured shampoo twice over my head, scrubbing until I couldn’t hear the conversation and my world muffled under the suds. I forgot conditioner. Didn’t matter. I’d need another shower as soon as I got home.
If I got home tonight.
“What did the other car look like?” Riley asked.
James hesitated. “I didn’t get a visual. Even if I had, it was dark, and my vision…”
I spoke for him, turning the water off with a shudder. “It was a pickup truck. I saw the headlights behind us in the lot when we first got to the car. They were tall, higher than my window. The high beams were on. Couldn’t get a good look.”
“And then?”
“He rammed me at full speed.” I didn’t remember much after that, and they didn’t ne
ed to know that I’d blacked out. “We hit the water, and he sped off.”
“The steel chain from the barrier was gone,” Riley said. “Lost in a flood?”
Not a chance. I toweled off and changed into a pair of leggings and sweat-shirt. “Someone cut it. The same person who barreled us into the river.”
I emerged from the shower, dressed but more naked than ever. No bra, no panties, no makeup. Hell, I could have been one of the guys. Except without my foundation, I had freckles. Draped in an oversized sweat-shirt, I looked tiny.
All three men shared the same unfounded concern that I’d fought against for years.
I couldn’t change the past, but I could at least act strong now, for the sake of that twenty-year-old girl in my memories who had once let a single trauma nearly define her.
“Someone tried to kill us tonight—me, more than likely,” I said. “James was collateral damage.”
Falconi gave a shrug. “Why?”
“Because of my work on the Amber Reynolds case.”
Riley tossed his pencil away. “Oh Christ. Don’t even go there, McKenna. I thought that got shut down.”
“Yeah. And guess why?”
“Because it’s insane?” Falconi suggested.
“Because it implicates the wrong people. I know something shady is happening at Grayson House. Amber Reynolds was abused. Hannah Beaumont is missing. Fifteen other girls have disappeared, all with connections to the facility, all sentenced there by the same judge.”
“So, what’s the connection?” Riley passed me another towel. I patted it through my hair. “You spent days searching for the other girls and connecting the dots and found nothing.”
“Because I didn’t want to consider the possibility at the time.” I lowered my voice, damning the echo that blasted through the locker room. “Judge Reissing is at the center of all of this.”
Falconi’s smile faded. Too much for station’s class clown? “Doc, talk to me buddy. You can’t believe this.”
James crossed his arms, the borrowed jersey from Falconi too small and the sweats from Riley too short. Not his greatest look, but when he spoke, they listened.