“What about the people who never get that chance?” Jimmy said. “Kids who die before they can form a thought or a kid who goes to war and kills people before he’s even a teenager. Has to live with that on his mind for the rest of his life. Huh? God is a hoax, and you’re a fucking sucker, Steel.”
“I don’t know how it works for sure, and neither do you, Jimmy. Life’s mystery for a reason, for faith, I guess. I’m not God. But I know people feel better when we have love surrounding us, not evil, like when we’re around family at the holidays, or working together for a good cause, it’s a soulful feeling, and that proves God is good, benevolent…provides a touch of heaven on Earth. And how can God be a hoax if the world is so detailed. Look at our bodies, it’s too meticulous…it’s a machine that sometimes lives for a hundred years with little upkeep. Our eyes can see up to ten million colors. Semen leaves a man’s body and enters a woman’s and creates another human life. There has to be a God, or a Creator…it’s just too well designed. But I know that when we hate and do evil, our bodies tense up and our soul knows it’s wrong, but when we feel love our bodies feel light because we’re living from the soul.” Steel sighed, tucked the phone under his chin, and looked back at the officers. No one could hear him, and all units were focused on the building. “Did I satisfy your question? Can you let those innocent people go?”
Jimmy laughed for a good minute. “Hey, Detective, wrong answer. What a sap. There’s no meaning to life, no God, no consequences. And that means I can do whatever the fuck I want without punishment.”
Jimmy hung up.
Steel’s pores widened as though fire shot through the holes and burned his skin. He couldn’t breathe. His vision blurred.
45
S
teel dialed Jimmy. “You have to stop hanging up on me, Jimmy,” he said, collecting his senses, his eyesight focusing steady and straight again, the anxiety lessening.
“Fuck you,” Jimmy said.
Steel clenched his jaw, and a hard lump bubbled and pressed against his Adam’s apple, as if a cough drop was lodged down his throat. Anxiety picked up and squeezed and gnawed at his chest. He scratched his neck so hard his fingernails sliced open his skin, the wound wet, bloody and raw.
“Man to man, Jimmy, what do you want from me?”
“Nothing from you…you’re just a pawn for the world to hear my story.”
Steel cleared his throat, scratched his cheek. “Let me ask you something, Jimmy.”
Jimmy screamed away from the phone, his voice fading in and out on Steel’s end. “Everybody shut the fuck up with your crying and sit still or I’ll shoot you in the face! One more fucking time I hear it, I swear to fucking God!” Jimmy talked back into the phone. “It’s hard having control, you should know, being a man who gets paid to control people. What a fucking joke the police are.”
“Hey Jimmy,” Steel said, “You loved her, didn’t you?”
“Who?”
“Desiree. You killed her because you loved her?”
“You got the wrong guy there, Detective. My asshole boss, John Fratt, loved her.”
Steel knew this but also knew the only way to pry information out of Jimmy was to play dumb, to make him feel in control and smarter than him.
“So, you were jealous of them?” Steel said.
“Wrong again, Detective.”
“Why’d you kill them then?” Steel said sharply, but quickly regretted his directness, knowing he was dealing with a deeply disturbed and mentally unstable man.
“Because life’s bullshit and they fucked with me and I could, that’s why, because I could. I wanted to cause pain. Plain and simple. Most people don’t have the balls. You do the right things and get fucked in the end. That’s what I did. And I was tired of it. I got even.”
“By killing people?” Steel said and his words turned harsh and quick and snappy. “Violence doesn’t change anything. The world goes on without you. People forget about you or loath you. You don’t get respect from it, you piece of shit. You’re remembered as someone to ridicule, to despise, not admire.” He slammed his eyelids shut, squeezed his lips tight, realized he’d let his anger get the best of him.
“Fuck you. Don’t patronize me,” Jimmy said.
“You failed with Desiree, so you kill her?”
Jimmy yelled, his voice defensive, “I didn’t fail! I wasn’t involved with her! John Fratt was! Look, I played by the rules, went to college, was the good guy, got married, had my family, and busted my ass every day! And for what? My cunt wife left me and took my money and my kids!” He yelled louder. Steel pulled the phone from his ear. Jimmy continued, “She took my kids! And then I got stepped over for partner when I deserved it because Desiree was fucking the boss! Desiree told me that Fratt told her not to tell anybody the day he told her about making her partner, but she told me anyway. And I blacked out and snapped. Followed her home and shot her in the head. I was planning to kill her for a while before that and knew it was time…I was waiting for the right moment. I knew she would get promoted over me. My life went to shit almost overnight so I made others’ lives go to shit.”
“Correction. You ruined a lot of lives because yours was temporarily messed up. You had options to do other things. You chose to play the victim instead of moving on with your life. We’re never ruined Jimmy. There’s always ways to turn negatives into positives, losses into gains, instead of negatives into more negatives. When life wounds us, we treat the wound until it heals, then get up and move again.”
“You don’t know what it’s like to feel hopeless,” Jimmy whispered, almost as if deep down he knew Steel had a point.
Steel lowered his head, thought for a few seconds of his own bouts of depression, but snapped back into the conversation. “I know what it’s like to feel hopeless, but I don’t go killing people because of it. I try to find the good in the world and ride out the temporary bad times. That inspires hope, every time. I bounce back up. Your way spreads hopelessness and evil and pain.”
Jimmy said, “And my wife is lucky I can’t find her because she was on my list. She fucking moved away to another state, and I can’t find her or my kids. Just up and left.” Jimmy chuckled. “Tell you the truth. I wanted to get back at Fratt for stepping over me, so I got to his precious Desiree. Didn’t even really care about her. Then I had fun fucking with you, killing the rest of those people, just for fun. Leading you along. Get my picture I sent you? I took it from a photo album the night I killed Jeanette Jones…a picture of Desiree as a young girl and her father.” He laughed.
Steel’s stomach dropped and his hand not holding the phone clenched into a tight fist.
“Jonathan Herns and Jeanette were just to fuck with you, Detective,” Jimmy said. “I felt powerful. Still do. Still have more fuel for my power in this room with me.”
“And Kevin Johnson? He was involved somehow, wasn’t he?” Steel said.
“I tipped him off that Desiree was cheating on him, so we planned her murder together. That’s how it all started. He couldn’t take her with another man, so I pumped his head up, convinced him to help me…he got me the gun from somebody he knew. Then I killed him to cover my ass and, again, to fuck with you.” He laughed again.
Steel blinked several times, his stomach flipped like waves in the ocean at Jimmy’s pure evil. Vomit burned his throat and left an acidic film on his tongue, but he forced it back down and burped each time the thick bile lumped and moved through his esophagus. “Jimmy. Please. Release. Those. People. Before. You. Ruin. More. Lives. We’ll get you the help you need.”
Jimmy yelled into the phone, “Don’t patronize me, I said! Fuck you! I’m not insane! I know what I’m doing!”
“I’m not, Jimmy, you don’t want to hurt those people. I know you don’t, and deep down, you know you don’t. You got your revenge. There’s no more to do.”
Jimmy grunted, as if he was thinking that statement over, and said, “Theoretically no, but the way I’m feeling, you’re wrong. I have
n’t done enough.”
“Jimmy, let’s just end this.”
“Tell you what, Detective, one more deal.”
“One more and that’s it,” Steel said.
“I’ll release all the people in this office one by one if you send up your partner, the woman to your left.”
Steel’s heart froze to stone, stopped beating. He coughed and caught his breath. “Out of the question.”
“Okay, then they all die.”
“Wait a minute. I’ll come up.”
“I said your partner. Turn to her right now and tell her, or I kill every person in this office and throw a grenade out this window.”
Now Steel’s heart was a basketball in a constant dribble against his chest. He had to take this man seriously. He turned to Marisa.
Jimmy said, “I’m watching you, don’t look up. Ask her.” He yelled, “Now!”
Steel told her.
Marisa listened, didn’t blink, put on bravado even if she was shaking internally. “I’ll do it.” She finally blinked. “Yeah, send me up.”
Steel slightly shook his head no, just enough as not to be detected by Jimmy. He wanted to cry his eyes out like a child or punch something from being a helpless human being, from losing his own control over the situation, but had to remain calm and relaxed as a law enforcement officer.
“I’ll do it, Benny,” she said.
Steel knew that Marisa only called him Benny when she was serious or nervous.
“There are twenty-five people in that building,” she said. “Mothers, fathers, innocent people. I’ll be fine. This is what we train for. It’s the job.”
Steel spoke through tight lips as if he were controlling a ventriloquist dummy, “No. I’m not letting you do this.”
“Well, Detective, what’s it going to be?” Jimmy said in his ear.
Steel inhaled until his lungs were full, slowly exhaled.
Marisa snatched the phone from him. “I’m on my way up, Jimmy.”
“Good. Drop your weapons and come on up, Miss Detective.”
46
M
arisa inched forward, her shoes scraping the ground, but Steel laid his hand on her forearm, squeezed the skin until he hit bone. “You’re not going in there. Not while I’m here.”
The officers hunching over their cruisers glanced at them and back at the building several times, watching the exchange, trying to figure out what was going on.
Marisa said, “It’s the only way.”
“No,” Steel said.
She didn’t put up much of an argument, and Steel loosened his grip and cupped her forearm and it trembled against his palm.
His phone rang.
“She’s not coming up there,” Steel said. “End of story, Jimmy. Make another demand.”
A chill dashed down Steel’s spine as if someone had dropped an ice cube down his shirt. He was prepared to call Jimmy’s bluff, even though he knew he was risking the lives of over twenty people. He wished these situations came with a manual of guaranteed outcomes so he could choose the one that caused the least damage. But he also figured that Marisa’s odds of making it out of that building were slim. Maybe he was acting selfishly, but something told him they could save those people without resorting to sending her up. Or maybe it was just hope. Hope was all he had. He hoped that was the right decision.
Steel heard sniffling on the line.
Jimmy sobbed and cried. “I told you it was my way, Steel, and you’re fucking with me. I fucking warned you.” He cried, shrieked louder.
Steel snapped his head back toward the officers listening in on the phone call, and each held headphones to their ears and tapped at a laptop. The sergeant in charge of hostage situations, who Steel didn’t know, raised his right hand, his first finger wiggling toward the building. Steel took it as a cue to speed up this process or they’re going in, so he nodded at the sergeant, pressing the phone to his ear, bouncing his elbows, holding up a finger for an extra minute.
“Jimmy, just relax. You’re in charge. Come down here, and I’ll make sure you’re taken care of. Anything you want.”
“You know, Steel, you’re right, I chose this. I chose to do this,” he sobbed, “now I’m going to finish it, my way. And if I see the slightest movement on your part, they all die…and so do you and all your fellow officers.”
He hung up again.
47
T
he sergeant yelled from behind Steel, his voice hard and echoing in the wind. “Steel, we’ve gotta go in! This is far too long now, far too long!”
Steel turned his head in the direction of the voice, saw the sergeant standing next to Lieutenant Williams, a radio in his hand, a thumb on the other hand curled over his belt loop. Williams nodded and sided with the sergeant, a tall, stocky man with white hair, clean shaven red face, and stone blue eyes that could pierce through the body with a single stare. Steel didn’t dispute it, knew the man was serious.
“Send em’ in!” Steel yelled back.
The lieutenant power-walked through a few rows of police cruisers and up next to Steel. He extended his hand. “Raynes, by the way.”
“Benjamin Steel.”
Raynes threw up his arms, bent his elbows and swirled his fingers, directing SWAT and other units on when and where to go and how to charge in, putting to use his rank and skills and education in these types of situations. Steel stared in Marisa’s warm eyes for a good minute to feel love in the middle of so much evil.
Raynes spun in a circle, his shoes tapping the black street, his white dress shirt displaying his higher rank opposed to the patrol officers in blue. “On three, we do as I just said.”
The environment tensed up, a subtle wind cooled Steel’s neck. Police officers adjusted their shoulders and weapons and the crowd in the park behind gasped. Helicopters circled in the sky—the flying machines’ motors purring and cutting through the air above. He looked up and noticed a couple of snipers dressed in all black hunched over the edge of the roof, their rifles against their chests, both squatting and pointing their guns at the entrance, ready to fire. SWAT inched closer, their rifles aiming at the door and their bodies arched over, ready to barrel in and swarm their prey like a pack of hungry wolves gathering for a fresh catch.
Suddenly, the front doors of the building flew open and shattered from violent impact. Jagged shards of glass spun on the cold payment. Steel froze, thought he was daydreaming, his calves tightened into hard balls. A stampede of people charged out and bolted in all directions, arms and legs flailing.
“Son of a bitch!” Steel screamed, his tongue cutting through the air.
The officers and SWAT scrambled, confused, looking over to the sergeant for guidance. They stopped whoever ran in their direction, pressed them down against the ground by the shoulders.
People yelled and gave the play-by-play from the park across the street, officers shouted “Get down” and “Don’t move,” and the helicopters rumbled in the skies. Steel couldn’t make out a single word in the chaos, hysteria, his eyesight faded and blurred from head-shifting. Everything moved so fast as if he were too drunk at a club with twenty strobe lights flashing by him at once. The scene looked like an old painting of a riot at Five Points in New York.
His ears fell mute when he turned around toward the building. His heart slammed and halted to a stop like a car realizing it had almost blown a stop sign. Warm terror invaded his body from his scalp to the balls of his feet.
Jimmy curled his bicep under Marisa’s neck, a gun dug into her temple. He must have had slipped past in the momentary madness. Steel couldn’t believe he’d let Jimmy get by him. He couldn’t believe Marisa didn’t pick up her gun off the ground after she had dropped it to go into the building at Jimmy’s request.
Jimmy backtracked, taking wide strides, until his back slammed against the building. Steel heard his bones thump the stone. Jimmy made sure no officers were behind him and that he was out of range from the snipers, hidden in a corner. The hostage
victims stayed in place, pressed face-down against the ground, some crying, some stone-faced from shock, some wide-eyed, some sneaking a peek, watching how this nightmare would end.
Every officer stood with his or her gun pointed in Jimmy’s direction, finger around the trigger.
Not again, not Marisa, Steel thought, and his throat tingled; he swallowed hard but couldn’t muster up any saliva, as if his mouth were stuffed with cotton balls.
He locked eyes with Marisa, and she stared straight into his own, her body twisted and contorted, her fingertips gripping Jimmy’s forearm, the barrel of the gun indenting the soft skin of her temple. She looked stoic, save for her eyes that didn’t blink since Jimmy had grabbed her, but Steel knew she was terrified. He angled his gun toward Jimmy, both hands around it, his back slightly bent over, finger on the trigger. His body trembled from anxiety but he shook it off.
“Drop your weapon, Jimmy!” he yelled.
Steel’s chest heaved, so he sucked back air, closed his mouth, wanted Jimmy to think he was composed. His eyesight got fuzzy and a flashback of the body on the ground and the EMTs slamming ambulance doors and the mangled human remains at the bottom of the highway from last summer circled in his mind in quick, sharp images and sounds as if he were watching a movie in fast forward mode but with sound. His heart pounded in hard, warm thuds. Sweat swept over his body. He blinked, shook his head. But he was reliving it. His legs got wobbly and he wanted to vomit but squeezed his eyes shut and swallowed hard, flipped open each eyelid, the day’s natural light causing pain behind his eyeballs.
“Let her go,” Steel forced out in a low, jumbled voice. “She didn’t do anything to you. I’ll put a bullet in your fuckin’ head right now you son of a bitch.”
Jimmy’s eyeballs were red and icy and crazy and tears trickled down his face and sank into his beard. “How does it feel, Steel?” Jimmy said, crying hysterically. “To be powerless, to get fucked in the end?”
Divine (A Benny Steel Novel) Page 24