Marathon

by Brian Freeman

  “You thought wrong,” Ralston said. “You’re my employee, Travis. You work for me. That’s our relationship, kid. Maybe if you’d remembered that along the way, things would be different.”

  Travis pointed a finger at Ralston and then shouted at Maggie. “The whole thing was his idea! He said God saved me for a reason. God wanted me to do it!”

  “Yeah, like me and God are so tight,” Ralston replied, chuckling.

  “Mr. Baker, get on your knees,” Maggie repeated. “Right now.”

  Behind his bluster, Travis was used to taking orders. He did what he was told. He slid to his knees on the dirty floor. He put his hands over his head. Maggie came around behind him, her cuffs in her grip. She grabbed one of Travis’s wrists, yanked it behind his back, and snapped the cuff tightly around it. She did the same with his other wrist.

  “On your feet,” she said.

  Awkwardly, Travis stood up. She kept her fist around the belt on his jeans. The heat in the tight space felt like the blast of a furnace. She could see Ralston, who hadn’t moved from where he stood beside one of the filing cabinets. There was something odd about him. He watched her and Travis with a strange, self-satisfied look. The dying fluorescent light made his face flicker in and out of darkness.

  Travis’s hair spilled across his face. “Is this about Joni, Wade? You knew, didn’t you?”

  Ralston didn’t say a word, but Maggie saw the man’s expression mutate into a hatred that he made no effort to hide.

  “Let’s go, Travis,” Maggie said, but pushing on the kid from behind was like shoving the trunk of a tree. He didn’t move.

  “Say it, Wade!” Travis demanded. His voice grew louder as he threw his words into Ralston’s face. “You knew I was screwing Joni, didn’t you?”

  Maggie felt the danger in the room. The silence between the two men crackled with electricity. When Ralston finally spoke, his voice was low and venomous, like poisonous sulfur boiling out of a hot spring.

  “You’re fucking right I knew.”

  Travis bellowed like a warrior and attacked. He ripped himself from Maggie’s grasp and lurched across the dark space toward Ralston. He was fast. Ralston didn’t have time to react, and neither did Maggie. Travis crossed the room in two steps and hurled the weight of his body against the smaller man, knocking him away from the filing cabinet and upending him onto his back. The filing cabinet crashed down, spewing drawers and papers. Paint cans spilled onto the floor and bounced, and their lids popped open and rolled away.

  Travis planted his weight on one foot and launched a vicious kick toward Ralston’s head. Seeing the blow coming, Ralston rolled clear, and Travis, off-balance, skidded backward. He lost his footing, banged his skull against the stone wall, and swayed like a drunk. Blood leaked from his mouth where he’d bitten his tongue.

  “Knock it off!” Maggie shouted at both of them. She yanked Travis’s tank top with two hands and pushed him face-first to the wall. “Don’t make this any harder on yourself, Travis.”

  She spun him around and pushed him forward.

  “Both of you, let’s go!”

  Ralston was on his feet again, watching her closely. His hands were in his pockets. Between Maggie and Ralston was the fallen filing cabinet. Two of its drawers had slid out, leaving the frame looking like an open mouth. The concrete floor was littered with debris from inside the old paint cans. The light flickered on and off over her head, as if they were in a disco.

  It took a moment, with the light blinking, for her brain to register what her eyes were seeing.

  The stone floor was strewn with ball bearings and nails. Round silver balls, no bigger than marbles. Sharp, one-inch nails.

  Shrapnel.

  Fine powder spilled from inside one of the paint cans. The black dust looked like coffee. It wasn’t.

  One of the cabinet drawers had overturned, spreading its contents at her feet. She saw coils of copper wire. Sticks of fireworks and rockets. Circuit boards. Half a dozen rubber athletic fitness trackers, cut open to reveal electronic components. Everything the homegrown terrorist needed to build a bomb and construct a remote-control trigger was on the floor in front of her.

  It was only a second before the reality of this place caught up with her. Automatically, her hand dove for her holster, but she was too late. Looking up, she saw Wade Ralston pointing a gun at her head.

  * * *

  Dawn Basch sipped ice water as she stared out at the Duluth panorama through the restaurant’s tall windows. The motion of the revolving floor was almost imperceptible, but even so, she felt the slightest nausea. Right now, the window faced northeast, where the land hugged the giant lake on its way into the arrowhead that ended at the Canadian border.

  Her menu sat in front of her, unopened, as she composed her latest tweet. She always considered it a challenge, fitting pearls of wisdom into 140 characters. It was like changing the world one little sound bite at a time.

  Her long fingernails made it difficult to type on the phone’s keyboard.

  @dawnbasch tweeted:

  Another Muslim suicide bomber. As expected.

  When will we face the truth about the Religion of Peace?

  #islamismurder

  #noexceptions

  Dawn put her phone faceup on the table. A few seconds later, it began to vibrate again and again. Retweets. A tiny smile played across her bright red lips. Word was already spreading. More deaths meant more anger, but anger was essential if anything was going to change.

  She mourned the deaths of the innocent. The spectators at the marathon. The police. However, sacrifice made people understand the stakes. Injustice led people to take up arms.

  “What can I get you, ma’am?”

  Dawn looked up into the smiling face of the waitress standing beside the booth. She was young, in her early twenties, probably a college student at UMD. Pretty girl. Dark skin, dark eyes, thick eyebrows. Her black hair made a V on her forehead. She wore the restaurant’s uniform, but she also had a scarf wrapped around her head and pulled back around her neck.

  Dawn smiled back. “I’m sorry?”

  “I said, what can I get you, ma’am?” the waitress repeated.

  Dawn looked down at the phone on her table. She was getting a phone call, and she saw on the screen that the caller was Lieutenant Stride. Another policeman, blind to the threat in front of his eyes. Another government stooge who invariably chose peace over freedom. She had no interest in talking to him.

  With the tap of a finger, she declined the call. The phone kept vibrating. More retweets. More patriots.

  “What can you get me?” she said to the Muslim girl. “Well, first of all, dear, you can get me a different waitress.”

  53

  Maggie stared into Wade Ralston’s eyes, and she knew the truth. This was never about terrorism. This was murder, evil and simple.

  She put her hands up slowly. As she did, she measured the distance between herself and Ralston, gauging the likelihood of his getting off a good shot or of her being able to take him down before he fired. The fluorescent light gave her a flicker of darkness every second, but it wasn’t much.

  Next to her, Travis’s face was blank. He still didn’t get it. “What are you doing, man? What’s with the gun? What’s this about?”

  “I think this is about Wade killing his wife and her lover,” Maggie said, never taking her eyes off Ralston. “He tried to blow you and Joni up, Travis. Is that right, Wade? Was that the plan?”

  Ralston blinked through his sweat. “Yeah. That was the plan.”

  Travis looked back and forth between them. “What? What are you talking about? What is she saying, Wade?”

  “She’s saying I was the one who blew up the marathon, you moron,” Ralston told him.

  Blink on. Blink off. Light. Dark. In the next flash of shadow from the flickering fluorescent light over her head, Maggie took a quick step forward.

  Travis shook his head in disbelief. “No way. No way, man. You killed Joni?
How could you do that, you son of a bitch? And Shelly? She’ll never walk again. All because of you?”

  “Maybe you should have thought of that when you were sticking your dick between my wife’s legs,” Ralston fired back. “The two of you, acting like I didn’t know. Throwing it in my face. Did you really think there wasn’t going to be some kind of payback?”

  “You wanted me dead, too,” Travis murmured, his eyes wide.

  “Damn right I wanted you dead. The bomb was supposed to blow both of you to ribbons. The two of you gone, and me on my way to Key West with half a million dollars in insurance. I couldn’t believe it when I woke up, and there you were, barely a scratch on you. Like I said, you’re a lucky man, Travis, but your luck is about to run out for good.”

  Darkness.

  Another step forward.

  “You built the bomb here?” Maggie asked, stalling for time, trying to get close enough to jump across the space and grab the gun.

  Ralston grinned. He was proud of himself. “Yeah. If some teenager in Boston could build a bomb, I figured, how hard could it be? And nobody would ever be looking for a runner, right? All I had to do was rewire my athletic tracker to send the signal. Soon as I got close, soon as I saw Joni and Travis, I pressed the button. I wanted to see their faces right before the end. Boom.”

  “You’re sick, man!” Travis shouted. “You’re a sick, sick bastard!”

  “You think you’re so innocent, Travis? You burned up that building. You killed those people.”

  “You said I had to do something!”

  Ralston laughed. “Yeah, I knew if I pushed you, you’d do something stupid. Stupid is your middle name, Travis. I figured, having you rot in prison for the rest of your life, squeezing your ass cheeks shut, that might be okay. But no, it’s not enough. I missed you once with the bomb. I’m not going to miss again.”

  Flicker, flicker, flicker. Maggie inched forward.

  “What about Eagle?” she asked. “Why was he involved?”

  “You know about him?” Ralston’s eyebrows nudged upward in surprise. “One crazy homeless guy gets popped, I didn’t think anyone would make the connection.”

  “You sent him into the shop and paid him to distract the staff. That’s when you planted the bomb.”

  Ralston cocked his head. “Yeah, I knew I could set the bomb off in the middle of the race, but obviously, I couldn’t plant it. It had to be ready to go before the marathon ever started. And I didn’t want Eagle around to talk about what he did. Even a shit-faced drunk like him might have put two and two together after the bomb went off.”

  “And the marathon camera?” Maggie asked.

  The light went off. It stayed off a fraction of a second longer this time. She assessed the distance. Assessed how far she could jump.

  Ralston shrugged. “The marathon people like to show off their camera. I’ve known about it for years, ever since we started zapping their bugs. I figured I’d wear a disguise on Tuesday to plant the bomb, but I didn’t want anybody getting curious and taking a close look at the pictures. The safest thing was to make sure the camera went down. So I stopped by the marathon offices on Monday evening and left a little present behind. Mice. I knew they’d be calling the next day, soon as one of the little guys took a run across somebody’s desk. And they did. So I crawled around the office on Tuesday afternoon, and it was easy enough to disable the cable to the camera.”

  Maggie shook her head. “And you didn’t care about murdering total strangers when the bomb went off?”

  “Collateral damage,” Ralston replied, “but necessary. If you take out a big insurance policy on your cheating wife, and she and her lover boy are the only ones who die, the cops and the insurance company take a long, hard look at you. But a terrorist attack? They just cut you a check.”

  He chuckled to himself, as if he couldn’t stop admiring his perfect plan.

  “So what are you gonna do now, Wade?” Travis bellowed. “You gonna shoot me? Is that how this works?”

  “No, the sergeant here is going to shoot you. But too bad for her, you’ve got enough left before you kick it to land a shot between her eyes. Of course, no one will know that she actually took the bullet in her brain first.”

  Maggie knew time was running out.

  Ralston squinted at her, and his gun arm tensed. The barrel was aimed at her head. He wouldn’t miss.

  Light on. Light off.

  Maggie ducked and jumped. The gun exploded over her head, deafening in the enclosed space. She could feel the burning passage of the bullet grazing her hair. She hit Ralston low, ramming his thighs, bringing both of them down. Another bullet fired, this one wild, and it banged against a metal pipe, throwing off fragments that shattered the single lightbulb and bathed the subbasement in total darkness.

  She heard Ralston getting up. She crawled away, just in time, as he fired blindly. And then another shot. And another. And another, raking the underground. Nearby, she heard a puff of breath from Travis, like a whimper of surprise. He collapsed, like dead weight falling, and never made another sound. Maggie crawled faster. Nails on the floor cut her hands. Dirt and dust filled her face. She bumped against something heavy and metal and realized it was one of the old filing cabinets. She squeezed herself behind it, her back against the stone wall, and she pulled her own gun out of her holster.

  The world was black.

  She heard footsteps. Boots crunching on rock.

  Ralston was coming for her.

  * * *

  Khan was sure that everyone was looking at him as he got off the service elevator and marched through the JJ Astor kitchen. The cooks. The dishwashers. The waiters. Someone on the hotel staff would realize he was a stranger, and they would shout at him and block his path. They’d stare into his eyes and recognize him and tackle him to the ground.

  Instead, in the tumult of lunch service, no one paid attention to him. People shouted orders. Meat sizzled on the flat-top grill. Dishes clattered. He crossed the kitchen and pushed through the swinging door into a curving hallway that led past the guest elevator, the hostess desk, and the bar. The tables of the restaurant were in front of him, winding in a circle around the building, overlooking Duluth, the lake, and the northern wilderness. His eyes hunted for Dawn Basch, but he didn’t see her in the outer ring of booths that was visible from where he was.

  Behind him, a waiter flew through the swinging door, nearly colliding into his back with a full tray of food. The man whispered in annoyance, “Out of the way, you fool! Don’t stand there!”

  Khan mumbled an apology and let him pass. He spotted a pitcher of water on a tray near him and grabbed it. He walked slowly around the circle, studying each person at each table, searching for Basch. He pasted a smile onto his face. He tried to swallow down his terror, and he was sure that the smell of his sweat trailed after him. Some people asked for water. His hand shook as he filled their glasses.

  Where was she?

  “Are you all right, young man?” an elderly woman asked. She was at a table with a teenage girl, and they were both eating shrimp salads. The older woman had a sweet, puzzled smile.

  Khan blinked. “I’m sorry?”

  “Well, you’ve been standing there for a minute, not moving. I wanted to make sure that nothing was wrong.”

  “Oh. Oh, no. Sorry. Do you want some water, ma’am?”

  The woman pointed at her glass, which was full to the rim, and the tablecloth underneath it was wet. “You already filled it.”

  “Yes, I’m very sorry.”

  The teenager at the table watched him as if he were under a microscope. She had her phone in her hand. Her eyes darted from the screen to his face and then back to the screen. Khan felt his legs begin to cave beneath him. He took a step, tripped, and took another step. He waited for the shout from the girl behind him. That’s the man! That’s the terrorist! Get him!

  She didn’t say anything. Maybe he was safe.

  Khan walked a little farther, and then he took a ris
k and glanced over his shoulder. The girl was still staring at him. Her eyes glittered. As he watched, she leaned forward and whispered something to the old woman across from her, and she turned around, too, her face pale. They were both staring at him now.

  He went faster, although his legs barely supported him. He studied each table. Dawn Basch wasn’t there. Maybe she’d left. Beneath his feet, the slight motion unsettled his stomach. The chatter in the restaurant sounded like a thousand annoying birds in his ears. He couldn’t stop blinking. The gun behind his belt ground like a screw into his spine.

  “Hey, how about some water?”

  Khan looked down. A man in a suit held up his empty glass and stared at him impatiently.

  “Yes. Sorry.”

  He tried to fill the glass, but his hand shook violently. Water went everywhere. The man cursed at him, and Khan apologized, but his eyes were drawn back to the table behind him. The older woman and the teenage girl were talking to a manager now and pointing around the circle. Pointing at him.

  Khan left the pitcher of water on the table. The man protested loudly, but Khan walked away, fast. He felt eyes following him. When he took a look back, he saw the manager, a large man with a white shirt and a tie, heading his way. Their eyes met, and the man called out across the restaurant.

  “Excuse me!”

  Khan turned away. He was halfway around the circle now. The manager’s voice grew louder behind him.

  “Excuse me! You!”

  Khan put his head down and charged forward. They would all know who he was soon. They’d be coming for him. He passed more tables and booths. More diners. More strangers. He saw the city spread out beyond the windows.

  And there she was.

  Dawn Basch.

  Her head was down as she ate her lunch. Her fingers, tipped with long red fingernails, tapped the screen of her phone. He knew what she was doing. Spreading hate. Spreading poison. Getting people killed. She didn’t look up as he drew closer. He was nothing to her. He didn’t matter at all.