by Todd Travis
“Johnson!”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t …”
“Shut up,” Thorne cut him off with a whisper. Music played from somewhere in the school. He looked around and then pointed at Johnson again.
“Stay here.”
“Okay.”
Thorne started to go, then stopped.
“Johnson.”
“What?”
“Draw your weapon.”
Johnson clumsily pulled his pistol out from under the snow-clothes he wore.
“Stay here, don’t make any noise and don’t wander around. You see anybody that isn’t me or Kane, don’t talk, just shoot them, got it?”
“Yeah, okay, you got it.”
Thorne looked at him hard for a moment and then carefully stalked down the darkened hallway, his weapon out in front of him. Hunting.
51
Darcy Mullens stared at Kane, eyes filled with tears and pleading. Bon Jovi wailed on the stereo. Kane strained her arms against the handcuffs behind her, testing them. Kane knew what she had to do and she wasn’t looking forward to it.
Kane took several deep breaths through her nose, positioned her right hand and made her fist as small as possible. Focusing her concentration, Kane wrenched her right hand right through the handcuff, which left skin and blood and dislocated her thumb with an audible pop. Kane screamed in pain through the tape covering her mouth.
Bringing her hands out in front her, the handcuffs still hanging from her left, Kane examined her swollen, damaged right hand and thumb.
Glancing at Darcy, Kane took a couple more deep breaths, preparing herself for what must come next, and then quickly jammed her right thumb back into its socket with another pop. Kane let loose with another muffled scream.
She took the tape off of her mouth, her breath heavy, cold sweat running down her forehead and over her entire body.
Kane untied Darcy and thought hard on how to get her out of this alive.
52
Johnson inched out of the classroom and looked down the hallway. It was long, dark and spooky. It made Johnson nervous, being in a school at night, like he was doing something very forbidden. Thorne seemed to have disappeared; one minute he was there, the next he was gone. Just like that.
Johnson tiptoed down the hallway trying to see if he could see where Thorne went. Johnson stopped to admire the holiday murals on the wall created by the school kids. The entire wall was covered with artwork.
Johnson followed the murals down the hall. It’s good stuff, Johnson thought. He didn’t remember getting to do this kind of thing when he was in elementary school. Totally engrossed in the artwork, Johnson came to a turn in the hallway and almost ran right into Gilday, coming from the other direction. Both men jumped, startled. They stared at each other for a moment, and then both laughed, embarrassed.
“Jesus, Bill,” Gilday said. “You about gave me a goddamn heart attack.”
Gilday lowered his weapon and returned it to the holster on his hip. He shook his head good-humoredly.
“You? I think I just lost ten years of my life,” Johnson lowered his gun and held his other hand over his heart. “Shit.”
“This is the kind of scare that can make a guy’s hair fall out prematurely,” Gilday said and casually walked to the small “In Case Of Fire” glass case on the wall of the hallway. He opened the door of the case.
“Yeah, tell me about it. What are, uh … what are you doing here anyway, Jeff?”
“That’s funny, Bill, ’cause …”
Gilday took the fire ax out of its glass case, turned, swung and smoothly buried it right into Johnson’s left side. Blood spattered against the hallway wall.
Johnson was too surprised to even move or cry out, he simply stood there with an ax in his side, blood flecked on his lips, and looked at Gilday in shock. Johnson dropped his weapon to the floor.
“I was about to ask you the same exact thing.”
Johnson tried to speak but was unable.
“Shh,” Gilday put a finger to his lips. He pulled his weapon back out of his holster and glanced both ways down the hall. “I want to surprise him.”
Johnson toppled to the floor, landing on his right side on top of his gun. Blood poured out of his side, as Johnson lay gasping for breath. Gilday left him lying there, ax lodged in his body.
53
Kane, Darcy in her arms, made her way out of the kitchen quietly as possible and looked for a way out of the school. Darcy sobbed, her face buried into Kane’s neck.
“Shhh, I know, honey, we have to be quiet now, shh,” Kane whispered to Darcy as she felt her way along in the dark hallway, every closed classroom door hiding a potential threat.
We need to get out and get out quick, Kane thought. Problem one, I’m not sure which way is out. Problem two, we are also both barefoot. No shoes, no parkas, we won’t last very long once we do get outside, she thought to herself grimly.
Problem three, I’m not armed. Problem four, we keep running around here we’re bound to bump back into Gilday. The school was only one story high but spread out over a large area, like a lot of schools in the Midwest where there was more land than money, with hallways that seem to circle around on each other.
Other than getting out, the only other option was finding whoever it was that had spooked Gilday. She hoped it was Thorne.
Kane spotted an exit door and ran to it as quietly as she could. The door was chained and locked. Kane pushed and pulled on it as hard as she could to no avail. She forgot about her injured hand and banged on the door with her swollen fist, sending jolts of pain up to her shoulder. Goddamn it, Kane thought, the doors should open from this side as per fire codes.
Gritting her teeth, Kane shifted Darcy to the floor and, holding each other’s hands, they quietly returned to the hallway and crept along, looking for another way out.
54
Thorne came to the kitchen and surveyed the setup before him. The grill, left on and still hot, the food preparations and the duct tape. Thorne noted the blood on the floor under Kane’s chair.
“Fucker,” he whispered to himself. Where the fuck was Kane? Thorne thought.
Thorne unzipped his winter parka to free his movements. Thorne turned off the CD player and the Bon Jovi song ceased.
“I’ll show him music,” he muttered. This was going to be a hunt, no doubt. The Iceman held the advantage, knew the environment and knew he was being pursued.
Thorne saw something standing in a corner and it gave him an idea.
55
Kane heard something and hoped it was something good. The wind howled louder down along this part of the hallway, like a door was left open. This could be their out. Kane and Darcy made their way slowly along the hall until they came to a classroom door left open. Peeking in, Kane saw the large hole in the window with a snowmobile teetering in the center. Hope jumped in her heart, hope that she just might get the girl out of this alive.
Before Kane and Darcy could enter, another classroom door two rooms down the hall opened slowly with a creak. Kane and Darcy froze, too afraid to move. The shadow of a man’s profile in a snow parka appeared in the window of the classroom door. Parka? He’s wearing a parka! Kane thought.
“Thorne?” Kane whispered.
“Kane?” Thorne answered.
Sudden gunfire erupted from behind Kane and shattered the window of the classroom door where Thorne had been standing, the shots hitting him right in the head. Thorne went down.
Kane turned. Gilday stood down at the far end of the hall, gun at his side. He stood stark still for a moment and then ran toward them. Gilday fired and the bullet bounced off of the wall. Darcy screamed. They ducked into the classroom and Kane slammed the door shut behind them.
Gilday ran to the classroom and threw open the door. Panned his weapon back and forth. He moved swiftly toward the broken window with the snowmobile lodged in the center. Peering out into the storm, he saw no one.
Gilday put his hands on the window and
pulled himself up, balancing carefully on the heavy snowmobile. Gilday started to climb out of the window but stopped himself. He stepped back down quietly and slowly backed away, looking at the row of desks to his right, listening.
He stopped beside the third desk down. Gilday tipped the desk over with a quick sudden motion. Darcy, hiding underneath the desk, screamed in terror as Gilday grabbed her by the hair.
Kane exploded from her hiding spot in an opposite locker. Gilday got a shot off, nicking her shoulder. Kane hit him full on with her body before he could fire again. Gilday stumbled backward. He didn’t let go of Darcy or his weapon.
Kane grabbed his weapon hand and they wrestled for it, falling through the doorway of the classroom and out into the hallway. With a scream, Kane drove Gilday into the opposite wall. She elbowed him in the face twice and he released Darcy.
“RUN!” Kane screamed.
Darcy fell to the floor, only able to crab away backwards. Kane grabbed Gilday by the hair and brought his head down right into her knee. Gilday’s nose broke wetly and his weapon flew from his hand, landing a few feet away.
He punched Kane in the gut, grabbed her damaged hand and squeezed. She screamed. Gilday threw her into the wall and backhanded her across the face. Weak and dazed, she fell to the ground.
“You know what I’m gonna do to you? I’m gonna cut off parts of your own body and make you EAT THEM!” Gilday screamed. He kicked her. Kane lay there, bleeding and beaten.
“Stick a fork in her, Jeff. She’s done.”
Gilday spun around.
Thorne stood in the hall, not even fifteen feet away, pistol pointed at Gilday. Thorne’s snow parka, wrapped about a coatrack, lay on the floor in front of the classroom door with the shot-out window. Thorne had used it as a decoy.
“Very clever,” Gilday said. “I should have known better.”
“You got that right, sport.”
Gilday eyed his own weapon just a foot away on the floor.
“How’d you find me?”
Kane crabbed away from Gilday in the opposite direction until she came to the turn in the hallway. Thorne’s pistol didn't waver from Gilday.
“Where else does one go to be taught?”
“Caught that, did ya?”
“Pathetically easy.”
“Are gonna take me in, cowboy?”
“Nope.”
Kane almost ran into Johnson, still alive and crawling toward her at the hall intersection, a trail of blood behind him, ax still stuck in his side. He looked at Kane, his face white and drawn, and tried to speak.
“So all that you said about how taking the guy in as the only way to let him know that you won, that was all bullshit?”
“You already know that I’ve won.”
“Don’t you want to know why I did it?” Gilday was careful not to move an inch.
“I already know why.”
Thorne pulled the trigger on his pistol, but it wouldn’t fire. He tried again.
“You’re not used to cold weather, are you?” Gilday chuckled. “Subzero temperatures can cause the slide on a Glock to stick, it’s a real bitch,” Gilday suddenly made a move for his weapon.
Thorne lowered his pistol and frantically worked the slide with his left hand. Gilday reached his weapon on the floor and knelt down to pick it up.
Thorne finally got the slide to move and chambered a bullet. Gilday got his hand on his weapon.
He looked at Gilday and Gilday looked at him.
They both brought their weapons up, drawing like the westerns of old, and fired. Gilday, kneeling on the floor, was just a little faster. Gilday shot Thorne in the upper left part of his chest. Thorne’s bullet whizzed by Gilday’s head an inch too far to the right.
Thorne dropped his weapon as he hit the ground, bleeding. Gilday sauntered over to where Thorne lay on the floor, his back against the wall. Thorne struggled to reach his weapon. Gilday kicked it away and pointed his gun right at Thorne’s face.
“You’re no Shane,” he said to Thorne.
Gilday chambered a round.
“Hey, Jeff.”
Gilday turned. Kane buried the fire ax right into his chest.
Gilday stumbled back into the wall opposite Thorne, blood spraying everywhere, and slid slowly down the wall. Kane kicked his weapon away.
She knelt down in front of Thorne, who struggled to sit up.
“I can’t believe this, I’m losing it, I must be really losing it,” Thorne mumbled.
“Hold still, be quiet,” Kane said to him.
“I must be getting fucking old.”
“It’s better than the alternative. Hold this here.”
Kane took the stocking cap off of Thorne’s head and put it on the wound to his chest. She took Thorne’s hand and put it over the cap. They looked at each other for a moment. Thorne winked.
Gilday gurgled. Kane turned and stood before him. He tried to speak but couldn’t, blood bubbling out of his mouth. Kane leaned in close.
“I already knew blood came out hot,” she whispered quietly to him.
Darcy suddenly appeared right beside Kane, startling her. Darcy took Kane’s hand into hers.
“Was he a bad man?” Darcy asked.
“Yes, honey. He was a real bad man.”
Just to make sure it was over for good, Darcy and Kane both watched as Gilday slowly and painfully died.
Epilogue
Kane sat on a couch in the den of Thorne’s cozy and very secure house up in the woods of Virginia a few weeks later. It was a very nice den, wood panels and comfortable couch, bar in one corner. A lot more style to his place than she would have originally guessed, Kane thought, at least judging by the way he dressed.
Old school rat pack type of vibe, that’s what it was, she decided. If he ever decided to stop dressing like a caustic English Lit professor, he might be worth considering.
Thorne, his shoulder bandaged and his arm in a sling, set a chessboard down on the coffee table in front of her and a box of carved chess pieces. Thorne had slowly regained the use of his arm and didn’t really need the sling, but was under doctor’s orders to take it easy and not to overtax the arm.
Kane had gotten out of the hospital with a cast on her right wrist and hand, various bruises on her body and a complete sense of satisfaction.
Kane dug the pieces out of the box and started to set the board up. Thorne moved to his vast and expensive stereo system. He’d decided that the best song to start this evening off with would be Sarah Vaughan’s “No ’Count Blues.”
“Pete was telling me how fortunate I am to get invited to the great Jacob Thorne’s house, he said you never let anyone come up here,” Kane said.
“Nobody he knows, anyway.”
“By the way, Johnson’s gonna make it; he won’t able to walk but he’s gonna pull through.”
“Who?”
“Johnson. Bill Johnson. The cop on the snowmobile with you. Jesus Christ.”
“Oh yeah, him. Hey! Be careful! Those pieces are valuable antiques, you can’t just bounce them around like it’s your diaphragm on a Saturday night.”
“So listen, Jake …”
“Jake?”
“After all we’ve been through, I can’t call you Jake?”
“No,” Thorne sat down comfortably opposite Kane.
“I saved your life.”
“And I can’t tell you how disappointed I am with myself in that regard.”
Thorne grabbed the queens off of the board and turned away from Kane in order to hide them. He presented both closed fists to Kane. She picked his right hand. It held the white queen. Kane took the queens and put them in their places.
“So listen, Jake,” Kane continued after a moment, “is Pete going give you another crack at Kevorkian and the Mercy Killings?”
“Eventually.”
“You going to catch him?”
“Eventually.”
“Can I work the Mercy Killings with you?”
“Nope.”
“You got the shakes.”
“Not anymore. And not when I’m holding an ax,” Kane raised her eyebrow at him and smiled. “You know what happened?”
“Let me guess. No shakes.”
“Not a one. They’re gone.”
“How nice for you.”
“So can I work Kevorkian with you?”
Thorne studied her a moment. He leaned forward.
“Answer this question.”
“What?”
“How did it feel, the day you shot and killed those piece of shit rapists in the van?”
“The same as it felt when I killed the Iceman.”
“Describe this feeling.”
“You want to know what it felt like?”
“I want to know what it felt like for you.”
“Good,” Kane said after a moment. “It felt good.”
“It felt good.”
“It felt REAL good,” Kane leaned back, remembering. “Too good, even.”
“And that’s what scared you, how good it felt?”
“It was scary. I liked how good it felt. I liked it so much that it scared me.”
Thorne looked at her for a moment and then broke into a large smile.
“What?” Kane asked.
Thorne stood, went behind his bar and grabbed a couple of glasses. He brought them back to the table and returned to the bar.
“What? Why are you looking at me with that big shit-eating grin on your face?” Kane asked.
“I got a bottle of twenty-five-year-old scotch back here. I am going to pour the two of us a big stiff drink of world-class hooch.”
Thorne took a key from his pocket and unlocked a cabinet. He took a bottle of scotch out of the cabinet and set it on top of the bar. He stared at Kane for another moment, still grinning.
“Does this mean I’m working Kevorkian with you?”