Marathon

by Brian Freeman

  The truth screamed at her, like a monster baying for blood. She hated this man. She hated him; she wanted him dead. She wanted all of them dead. Every single one of them who had killed her brother, who’d killed hundreds, thousands, who cut off people’s heads, who threw people off buildings, who sent children to die.

  She hated them.

  And even if she couldn’t kill all of them herself, she could start here, with this one man. Pull the trigger. He dies. It wasn’t much, but it was something. Ron would never forgive her if she did nothing at all. If she let him go unavenged. If he was in Paris in a million pieces of dust, and she simply accepted it without striking back.

  Right?

  This is what Ron would want her to do.

  “Durkin.”

  She heard the voice beside her, calm and quiet. Her eyes didn’t leave Khan Rashid, but she knew who it was.

  Stride.

  “Durkin. Put your gun down. I’ve got this.”

  * * *

  Stride ran through the now-empty restaurant with his gun in his hand. His officers had cleared out the guests and staked out positions on both sides of the semicircle where the confrontation was taking place. He saw the three of them, in and near the window-side booth. Dawn Basch, Khan Rashid, and Gayle Durkin.

  As he got close to them, he slowed to a walk. One step at a time. He could feel the electricity in the air. One wrong word, one wrong motion, and they would all burn. His focus was on Khan Rashid, with his arm outstretched, pushing a gun into the face of Dawn Basch. He could see that Rashid was torn and exhausted. He didn’t know whether Rashid would really pull the trigger, because the man clearly didn’t know himself.

  Then Stride looked at Gayle Durkin and realized he had a more immediate problem.

  Durkin’s face was a stony mask of loathing. She didn’t see Rashid at the end of her gun. She saw something else, and whatever it was, she was going to kill it. Her arm was as rigid as a steel pipe. Her fingers were tight enough to crush the butt of her Glock. Stride read her face and knew that she was a millisecond away from pulling the trigger.

  “Durkin.”

  He extended his gun at Rashid and edged close to the FBI agent, feeling the aura of violence from her body like a black cloud.

  “Durkin. Put your gun down. I’ve got this.”

  “No.” Her voice was robotic.

  “I have Rashid. Stand down. Lower your weapon.”

  “He’s going to fire.”

  “No one is going to fire,” Stride said.

  “He’s a terrorist.”

  “This man? He’s a taxi driver. He didn’t blow up the marathon. He didn’t blow up our officers. He’s a man whose wife and child were murdered, and he’s out of his mind with grief.”

  He wanted Durkin to hear him, but he wanted Rashid to hear him, too.

  “He’s not going to put the gun down, Stride. I tried that. He’s going to shoot her.”

  “Rashid isn’t going to shoot anyone.” Do you hear me, Khan?

  “You don’t know that. Let me do my job.”

  “Gayle. Listen to me. Officer Kenzie’s death was an accident. You’ll learn to live with it. But if you pull the trigger now, that’s it. You’re done. There’s no going back. And if Ron were here right now, he’d be saying the same thing. You know that.”

  Stride’s eyes were focused on Rashid, but he could sense Durkin turning her head toward him. He’d broken through. Ron had broken through.

  “Come on, Gayle,” he went on. “Help me. Talk to him.”

  Her Glock, which was at the corner of his vision, sank toward the floor. Durkin holstered her weapon.

  “He’s right, Rashid,” Durkin said. Her voice took on a quiet urgency as she pleaded, one human being to another. “He’s right. This isn’t the answer. Don’t listen to Basch. You’re not a terrorist. Put down the gun.”

  Stride saw tears in Rashid’s eyes.

  “I can’t,” the man said.

  “Think about what you told her about Ahdia,” Durkin went on. She squatted beside the table. “Your wife was a good woman. A good mother. An American. She would tell you to put the gun down. This isn’t you. This isn’t who you are.”

  “Khan, the man who murdered your family is dead,” Stride told him. “My team found him. You don’t have to get justice. You have justice.”

  Hesitation flickered on Rashid’s face. “Is that really true?”

  “It is. I got the call coming over here. His name was Travis Baker. He set the fire. And he’s dead. We know who killed the people at the marathon, too. He’s on the run, but we’re going to get him. It’s over, Khan. It’s a tragedy, but you don’t have to make it any worse.”

  “This woman . . .” Rashid murmured.

  “This woman wants you to kill her, but if you do that, you become exactly what she says you are. And I know you. Haq told me about you. Right from the beginning, he said you could never turn to violence. Never. That’s why you called me about Malik, isn’t it? You didn’t want him to hurt anyone. You knew that was wrong.”

  Khan blinked. His body began to shake. “But Ahdia is dead. Pak is dead.”

  Stride kept his gun trained at Rashid’s head, but he lowered his voice, and he tried to catch the man’s eye. To make him turn his head.

  “I know. They’re gone. So is this agent’s brother. So are good people at the marathon and good police officers who were friends of mine. We’ve lost too many people already. It’s time to stop. It stops right now with you, Khan. Put the gun on the table. Please.”

  Time seemed to stand still.

  The silence was complete.

  He could feel the movement of the rotating floor under his feet, slowly going in circles.

  He didn’t know what Khan would do, but he was ready either way.

  Tears fell down the man’s cheeks. His body convulsed in sobs. He lay the gun on the table and pushed it with a fingertip toward Gayle Durkin, who scooped it up and secured it. Rashid put his hands up. Stride took out his cuffs and helped Rashid out of the booth and cuffed the man’s hands behind his back. Rashid continued to cry, as if there would never be an end to his tears.

  Before Stride could lead him away, Rashid leaned over and spoke to Dawn Basch, whose face was as pale and motionless as a museum statue.

  “There is a hell,” he told her quietly. “It exists, and I’m sorry for you, because someday, you will see it.”

  56

  Wade Ralston heard the throb of the helicopter.

  He squinted through the windshield of the Cadillac and saw it floating over the evergreen trees not even a half mile ahead of him. It was an FBI helicopter, black, with its logo painted in huge white letters on the side. They’d found him. It hadn’t taken long. The chopper was low enough that they could broadcast a message that blasted through the windows of the car.

  “Pull over and stop.”

  Like hell. That wasn’t going to happen. Wade accelerated, taking the engine of the Cadillac up to seventy miles an hour. He was on the old scenic highway, the marathon route, two miles south of Two Harbors, heading toward the Boundary Waters wilderness. Railroad tracks paralleled the road, both of them arrow straight. Lake Superior was just beyond the trees, but he couldn’t see it.

  He had survival gear in the trunk. He always did. His plan had been to take refuge in the wilderness and hike his way into Canada. The trouble was, he wasn’t going to survive. He knew that. His leg continued to bleed where the cop had shot him. Blood pooled and soaked into the front seat and dribbled down to the floor. The blood was turning dark, and that was a bad sign. It didn’t hurt or burn anymore. He didn’t feel anything.

  His breathing had become heavier, as if he were dragging air into his lungs. His vision was blurry. Even so, he drove faster, reaching eighty miles an hour, as if he could run from the police and run from death at the same time.

  “You don’t have much time left, Wade.”

  He glanced over at the passenger seat and saw a ghost. Travis sat t
here. Travis, who was already dead under the Third Avenue building, with a bullet hole in his skull.

  “Go away,” Wade murmured. The blood loss was playing tricks on his mind. “Go away. You’re not real.”

  He looked again, and Travis was gone. The seat was empty.

  He swooped past the FBI helicopter hovering above the highway, but it rose up and kept pace with him effortlessly. There was nowhere to go. He looked in the rearview mirror, and he could see the lights of police cars behind him. As fast as he went, they went faster. They were closing in on him. In less than a minute, they’d roar around the Cadillac and run him off the road.

  They could probably save him if they caught him now. Tie off the leg. Put him in an ambulance. And for what? So they could put him on trial and convict him and send him to rot in a hole for the rest of his life? So some gangbanger could pay off a guard and shove a knife into his gut during the one hour per day the prisoners were allowed outside?

  That was no life. That was torture.

  He went ninety miles an hour, but the police still kept getting closer.

  “You know I never loved you, right?”

  Wade looked at the passenger seat, and there was Joni. Another ghost. Joni, in a tank top and shorts, with the amazing body and the tattoos and the piercings and the supersized breasts that no one but him was supposed to touch. Joni, who’d been humiliating him ever since they got married.

  “I hung around for the money,” Joni said. “I mean, you figured that out, huh?”

  “Yeah,” Wade said. “I figured that out.”

  Then she was gone, too. He was alone.

  “Pull over and stop,” the FBI said again.

  He looked northward on the highway. Coming toward him on the opposite side of the road was a semitruck, one of the big rigs, thundering toward the city. It was going fast, and so was Wade. They’d pass each other in seconds. He would feel the vibration in its wake, nearly blowing him off the road.

  Wade tapped his brakes.

  Behind him, the police slowed, too. They saw his brakes and figured he was pulling off the highway. Instead, Wade undid his seat belt. The truck stormed closer, loud enough that its thunder reached him. He had to time it just right. He had to be in the other lane at the perfect moment. He didn’t want the truck to brake; he wanted the impact at full speed. He’d fire as fast as a bullet, as fast as a rocket, and be gone.

  Travis was back in the passenger seat next to him. The kid sang a chorus of “Rocket Man” and began to laugh. Wade laughed, too. Rocket man—that was funny. The two of them laughed and laughed.

  The helicopter was right there ahead of him, like a crow in the sky. The police were right behind him. They thought they had him. They thought he had nowhere to go. The truck barreled down the opposite lane, and the driver was probably wondering what the hell was going on.

  They were so close. They were about to pass, car and truck.

  Right.

  Now.

  Wade flicked the wheel of the Cadillac and lurched into the other lane. The truck was on top of him, horn blaring.

  Travis stopped laughing.

  EPILOGUE

  Khan answered the door at his Woodland home. He had a wedding picture of himself and Ahdia in his hand as he did.

  He hadn’t done much else in recent days, other than look at family pictures and talk to his lawyers about a plea deal that would keep him free despite his pointing a gun into the face of Dawn Basch. Around him, the house was still a mess from the search the FBI had made. He hadn’t had the energy to clean up. He’d slept on the sofa, rather than going into their bedroom. Eventually, he would have to decide about Duluth and this house. Stay or go. But Haq had told him not to rush anything, and Haq was right.

  He opened the door, but he didn’t recognize the man on the porch. He appeared to be in his forties, with a muscular build and shaved head. At first, Khan assumed the man was a reporter, but he wore a suit and tie, which ruled out most of the journalists he’d met lately. Beyond him, on the street near the woods, Khan saw a pretty blond woman waiting in the man’s car. There was a little boy in the backseat.

  “Mr. Rashid?” the man said.

  “Yes.”

  “My name is Michael Malville.”

  Khan shook his head in confusion. “I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are. Are you a reporter? Or a lawyer? Because I already have plenty of both.”

  “No.”

  Oddly, the man on the porch began to cry. It was strange, seeing a strong man break down so completely in front of him. He realized that the man was staring at the photograph that Khan carried in his hand.

  Malville wiped his face and tried to form words. “I’m—I’m the man who destroyed your life.”

  “What?” Khan asked.

  “I made a mistake. I thought—I was sure—that you bumped into me on Superior Street during the marathon. I was tired, I was angry, and I was just wrong. And I—I told the world about it. And now you’ve lost your wife and son, and you’ve been through so much pain, and it’s all my fault. So I needed to come here, to see you face-to-face. I need to apologize. To tell you I am so, so sorry. If I had ever dreamed—”

  Khan held up a hand to stop him. His face clouded over. He tried to find something to say, but he had nothing. No words. He had to brace himself against the doorframe to stop himself from falling.

  “It was you?” Khan said finally.

  “Yes.”

  He thought about the night in the Woodland grocery store, the night when it had all begun. Someone had thrust a phone in his face. Is this you? Because it sure looks like you. One photograph had turned his life upside down. One photograph had destroyed his family. One photograph, sent around the world by the man standing in front of him.

  “You can do whatever you want,” Malville went on. “Scream at me. Hit me. Sue me.”

  “I want nothing from you, Mr. Malville,” Khan told him brusquely.

  He closed the door; he didn’t slam it. Malville waited on the porch, but then, a few seconds later, he walked away with his head down. Khan turned around and leaned against the glass, and soon he was crying, too. Crying for everything that was lost. Crying for his empty house. He wished he could blame Michael Malville. He wanted to feel hatred for this man, but he realized he didn’t. He couldn’t. Hatred was what had killed Ahdia and Pak. Hatred didn’t solve anything. He had already made a vow to himself never to hate again.

  Khan opened the door quickly. “Wait,” he called.

  Malville was halfway down the walk. He stopped as he heard Khan’s voice. Khan joined him in the warm summer afternoon and saw the man’s face twisted in tears and pain, like his own.

  “Why did you come here, Mr. Malville?” Khan asked.

  “To tell you I’m sorry.”

  “Do you want me to forgive you? Is that what you expect?”

  Malville struggled with his words. “I don’t expect anything. Believe me, I’m not asking for anything from you. I just felt I needed to tell you in person that I was the one who wronged you and that I’m sorry.”

  Khan took a long, deep breath. He gestured at the car in the street. “Is that your wife?”

  “Yes. Alison.”

  “And your son?”

  “Evan.”

  “How old is he?”

  “Twelve,” Malville said.

  “A handful?”

  That brought a smile. “Oh, yes.”

  “I imagine they are your life,” Khan said.

  “They are. And not long ago, I came very close to losing them. So for me to be responsible for what happened to you is more than I can bear—”

  Khan stopped him again. “You’ve apologized, Mr. Malville. You don’t need to do so again. I was wrong, though. I do want something from you.”

  “What is it? Anything.”

  “I’d like to tell you about Ahdia and Pak,” Khan said. “I’d like you to know who they were. All of you. Your wife and son, too. Would you do that for me?”


  Malville drew himself up to his full height. He was a big man, and he had his voice back. “It would be an honor. Thank you.”

  Khan waved at the people in the car to join them. He saw them both getting out. Alison Malville was smiling, her pretty eyes rimmed in red. Evan’s eyes were drawn to the soccer ball in the front yard. Children were all the same.

  “Have you ever been to a Muslim home, Mr. Malville?” he asked.

  “No,” the man replied. “We haven’t.”

  “Then come inside,” Khan said.

  * * *

  “How’s the truck driver?” Cat whispered into Stride’s ear. The noise of the crowd in the brewery almost drowned out her question.

  “Don’t worry, he’s out of the hospital and doing fine,” Stride told her.

  “Wow, that’s great.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  Stride hoisted a glass of Derailed Ale in his hand and stood up at the table, where he was surrounded by Serena, Cat, Maggie, Troy Grange, and Gayle Durkin. He used a loud voice to make sure they could all hear him. “Let it be known, to all of you who think I am incapable of change, that we are here at Thirsty Pagan in Superior and not at Sammy’s. I did not protest. I did not complain. I am willing to acknowledge that there are other pizzas in the world.”

  Durkin giggled. They were on their third pitcher of beer and most of the way through their second deep-dish pizza. “Yes, but that’s only because he had Sammy’s delivered to the DECC every single day we were there.”

  “I didn’t hear complaints,” Stride said.

  “No, no, no complaints.”

  They all laughed. It felt good to laugh. One week after the marathon tragedies, the city was slowly making its way back to normal. It was a new weekend, a new summer festival, a new crowd of tourists. Dawn Basch was gone; she’d cancelled her free-speech symposium after hundreds of Duluthians sent back their tickets. The FBI was out of the DECC, and Gayle Durkin was spending the weekend with her parents and then returning home to the Twin Cities. The evening at Thirsty Pagan Brewing was her going-away party.

  “You guys are great,” Durkin told them. “Really. Duluth is lucky to have you.”

  “You’re not so bad, either, Gherkin,” Maggie replied, laughing so hard that she snorted and nearly slipped off her chair. She’d been anesthetizing her shoulder with beer, which seemed to help.