Dead Wrong

by Allen Wyler

  Cunningham’s jaw muscles cramped. Goddamned locals, always underfoot, demanding cohesive collaboration yet never coming through when the ball’s in their court.

  Sikes added, “I told him this is a national security issue. But he’s not listening. That’s why I you need to lay down the law with his superiors soon as we hang up.”

  Made sense. Nothing trumped national security. What did it take for a bunch of hicks to understand a simple concept. Cunningham jerked a ballpoint and piece of paper from his breast pocket. “Give me Lange’s first name again.” Top down, chain of command, was the only way to deal with his kind. A few well-placed calls and Lange would hear loud and clear: Back The Fuck Off.

  “James.”

  “He’s a detective? What department?”

  “Yes, sir. Homicide.”

  “And he’s with you now?”

  “Affirmative, sir.”

  Cunningham’s irritation intensified while he mentally rehearsed the words he’d use. “I’ll call his CO immediately and make damn certain we have an unambiguous understanding. In the meantime, you tell Lange the official government stance is that McCarthy’s a terrorist. There is to be no confusion on this. Our government has an unfaltering policy: We do not negotiate with terrorists. And for good reason. That simple principle should be easily understood. Make certain Lange does.”

  “And Davidson?”

  “What about him? All the more reason to get this over with quickly. McCarthy is in possession of Washington’s gun, isn’t he?”

  “Roger that.”

  “Well then, your course of action should be obvious. The man’s armed and dangerous. Kill him before Davidson has an opportunity to make a big deal out of this. Especially if he intends to involve the media. Which is something those glory-hogging assholes inevitably do. We can deal with Davidson later.”

  “Yes, sir. Understood, sir.”

  WYSE DIDN’T DARE leave his office for fear of missing an update from Cunningham. With his luck, the phone would ring the moment he stepped out of earshot. There was nothing on his schedule this afternoon other than paperwork and rounds. Fuck rounds; this trumped it.

  The phone rang. Wyse had it to his ear before it could ring again. “Wyse here.”

  Someone with a familiar voice, Cunningham, said, “You know of a lawyer named Palmer Davidson?”

  A lawyer? Why would … “No. Why? Should I?”

  “He represents McCarthy now. Supposedly he’s got the reputation of being one difficult hombre.”

  Well, fuck the bad-ass reputation. No fucking lawyer was going to stand in his way of having McCarthy dead and out of the picture. “What are you saying, McCarthy’s still out there?”

  “Not exactly. We have every indication he hasn’t escaped the medical center. But in the unlikely event that he does, we need a strategy for finding him. What I’m asking is, do you have any idea who he might ask for help? Other than this Davidson character.”

  Wyse kicked the wastebasket. “How the fuck should I know?”

  “Because you know him a hell of a lot better than I do.”

  True. They did have a history back to medical school.

  Cunningham added, “The other thing you need to know is a local cop—Detective James Lange—is now involved. Apparently SPD agreed to work with Sikes’s crew, so if you can think of anything that might help find McCarthy, call Lange. But call Sikes first.”

  Wyse thought about that a second. “Call Lange? I don’t get it.”

  “We’re giving SPD every appearance of full cooperation because it’s possible they might find him first. We need to be on their good side.”

  Wyse tightened his grip on the phone. “McCarthy’s still on the loose? What the fuck are you guys doing?”

  WYSE STOOD AT the north window staring out at the city, sorting through every bit of information about McCarthy he could dredge from memory. Problem was, since medical school, he’d emphatically ignored the prick, leaving him nothing substantive to pass on to Lange.

  Then it clicked: Originally McCarthy had consulted on the Baker woman because of a psych resident. Her name was included on the request for medical records. Might they be in on this together? Would she know where he might be? That was a long shot, for sure, but at this point anything was worth a try.

  What the fuck was her name? He glanced at the desk but realized the request was long gone, balled up and thrown in the trash weeks ago. Hmmm …

  Wait a minute, the name was like a president: Jackson? Washington? Hamilton? Hamilton! Could it be?

  He grabbed the phone, dialed Doctors Hospital, and was connected with the paging operator. “I’d like to speak with a psychiatry resident, a Dr. Hamilton I believe is her name.”

  “That would be Dr. Sarah Hamilton. One moment and I’ll page her.”

  Smiling, Wyse disconnected and dialed Detective Lange’s number.

  21

  MCCARTHY PIVOTED RIGHT, swinging the pipe like a baseball bat, connecting with Lewis’s shin in a sickening crunch, the force of the kick knocking McCarthy backward. Both arms windmilling, McCarthy stumbled but managed to stay upright without dropping the pipe.

  Lewis screamed in pain. His supporting leg buckled and he crumpled to the floor but immediately began to scramble back up on his feet.

  Tom yelled, “Don’t!” and raised the pipe overhead in a two-handed grip.

  Lewis raised his arm to ward off the blow and stayed down.

  For a moment they remained like this, Lewis warding off what would be an arm-breaking blow, Tom fighting back an adrenalin-fueled urge to kill the bastard.

  “They’re going to get you, McCarthy. And when they do, believe me I’ll be first in line for payback.” Lewis slowly lowered his arm. “You’re one dead motherfucker, you know that.”

  Tom backed up a step but didn’t turn away. “Assuming you catch me.”

  Grimacing, Lewis tried to glower but couldn’t mask the agony of what had to be a broken bone. He shifted weight off his injured leg.

  Tom transferred the pipe to his left hand, reached behind his back, pulled out Washington’s gun, and aimed at Lewis. “Your gun. Pull it out slowly and slide it over here.” He tossed the pipe aside.

  Lewis did as instructed.

  McCarthy squatted, set down the pipe, retrieved Lewis’s gun, and, using only his left hand, ejected the clip into a large garbage bin, and dropped the gun into the sink Lewis just urinated in. He opened the door and scanned the hall, saw no one coming.

  He heard movement from behind, turned to see Lewis reach for the gun, another clip in his left hand. “I’m going to fucking kill you, McCarthy.”

  McCarthy sprinted across the hall, rammed his hip into the horizontal push bar on the fire door, threw it open, then went flying down stairs.

  Enough of this. The longer he remained in the building, the more he risked being captured. Why not just take a chance and make a break for it? He thought about a side door two floors down—it opened onto the shipping dock where they transferred tanks of gases—oxygen, nitrogen, and such. The area wasn’t all that heavily used or known, so, odds favored it’d be unguarded. And if someone were there, why not just blow past and run like hell? What would they do, open fire on him? Doubtful, especially when surrounded by full tanks of pressurized gas. Maybe he could get in a couple blocks before security or the cops could respond.

  His plan sounded better every second.

  Once clear of the building, he could call Davidson. He might even get lucky and flag a cab. For that matter, Davidson could drive over and come pick him up. The point was: get the hell out of the building. Simple enough.

  He had the route clearly in mind now: Take this stairwell to a first-floor door and from there a short hall to the exit. He hit the first-floor landing, threw open the door, and stopped dead. An armed cop guarded the exit.

  The noise from the door caught the cop’s attention. He looked directly at McCarthy, sized him up a split second before recognizing who he saw. “Hey, y
ou. Stop! Police!” The cop started toward him.

  McCarthy took off, running back up the stairs, taking two at a time, gasping for air. He stopped on the fourth floor to listen but heard no activity below him. Surely the cop had radioed his location. Meaning cops were converging on the stairwell now. He tried to think of a nearby hiding place but came up blank. He looked around frantically, now confused about which halls connected to this floor. Just then the door opened. He raised Washington’s gun and aimed.

  Eyes wide, fingers to her mouth, Sarah Hamilton gasped.

  McCarthy looked past her through the open door, saw nothing but empty hall. “Quick. Close the door.” He took her arm he gently pulled her into the stairwell and closed the door. “Did you find something?”

  Mouth still open, she stared at his hand.

  He looked down, realized he was aiming Washington’s gun at her. “Aw shit, sorry,” and stuffed it back into his waistband. “You frightened me.”

  “I frightened you!” She clutched her blouse over her heart. “Jesus, you just scared the crap out of me.” She took a longer look at Tom. “Your clothes, what happened?”

  “Later. Right now I have to get out of here. Did you find anything?”

  “We’re in luck.” She paused to draw a deep breath. “I just checked the call rooms and psych’s free. It’s only three doors down.”

  Made sense. He hadn’t even thought of using a call room, probably because he hadn’t used one since residency. Come to think of it, he’d never seen the ones here. “Show me.”

  She poked her head out the door to check both ways. “Coast’s clear; just stay on my heels,” and took off at a brisk pace.

  DELEON FRANKLIN ENJOYED a rush of paradoxical relief from the news that McCarthy remained trapped within the medical center. They didn’t have him yet, but they soon would. Better yet, he’d just been sighted in the west wing, an area easily contained with the available manpower. Franklin possessed an uncanny ability to get into his quarry’s mind, so he asked himself, where would I hide? For starters, he’d be encouraged by reaching ground level. It was a small victory not easily relinquished because it was closer to the exits. Meaning, instead of heading upward, he’d most likely continue down to the first basement. From there he’d look for a way out. With this in mind, he immediately redeployed the SWAT team to the first-level basement.

  THE SINGLE WORD, PSYCHIATRY, was engraved in white capital letters on a black plastic plaque screwed into a plain wooden door. Below it, a similar, but removable plaque, read VACANT. Sarah slipped it out, flipped it over to OCCUPIED, and reinserted it.

  The room was a six-by-ten-foot no-frills rectangle just like every other one he’d seen when taking call as a resident: bare beige walls, one wall phone, one wall-mounted gooseneck reading lamp above the head of a single bed. No furniture, no closet, no sink. Residents weren’t expected to bring a wardrobe, and if they had time to wash, they could use the toilet at the end of the hall.

  They piled in, Sarah locking the door immediately. They stood in the cramped space looking at one another, both breathing hard. After a few seconds Sarah sat on one end of the bed and patted the space next to her. “Sit down and tell me the whole story.”

  McCarthy put a finger to his lips, “Shhh, keep it down,” and pointed at the wall. Call rooms were notoriously cheap construction, with walls nothing more than plasterboard or plywood separated by two by fours. You could usually hear neighbors snore. Too tense to sit, he stayed standing and would’ve paced had there been enough room. Instead, he had to do with shifting weight from one leg to the other. He quickly summarized events starting with Sikes appearance in his office.

  When he finished she asked, “Have you called Davidson back?”

  He shook his head. “Haven’t had the chance.”

  She pointed to the phone. “Call him now.”

  The first thing McCarthy asked Davidson was, “Find out anything?”

  “Not good news, I’m afraid. But first of all, you still safe?”

  Tom sat on the bed, phone angled from his ear so Sarah could hear. She scooted next to him, her hip against his. “For the moment.”

  “I notice your phone number’s different but the same prefix. You still in the same general area as last time?”

  McCarthy wondered if Davidson was being purposely vague in case their call was monitored, and decided be careful to not say anything to disclose his location. “In the general area.”

  “Any idea of when we might be able to meet? Any time soon?”

  “Not yet, I’m working on it. There’s a friend who might be able to help me.” He raised eyebrows at Sarah.

  She nodded and mouthed, “Can he come here?”

  Tom shook his head and waited for Davidson’s next question.

  “I see. Okay then, next subject. Not good news either, I’m afraid. For starters, Sikes is on record with some very serious allegations. The first of which is—and this is the tail wagging the dog—you’re in possession of highly sensitive classified information. And that you came by this information illegally. Apparently Sikes isn’t the only one to claim this. A Pentagon colonel backs his story. Furthermore, the colonel claims the case is a matter of national security.”

  “That’s nuts!”

  “That may be, but for now it’s a huge problem. This colonel claims to have evidence that shows you have ties to a terrorist organization. The net result is no matter which law enforcement agency you surrender to, they’ll have to turn you over to the feds. In other words, Sikes.”

  McCarthy felt as if his every bit of breath had just been sucked out of him. Sarah put her hand on his shoulder.

  Davidson asked, “You still there?”

  He closed his eyes and tried to think. Nothing made any sense. “But these charges … what evidence is there?”

  “At this moment with the situation so tenuous, that’s irrelevant. We’ll deal with that later. Our biggest issue is that right now, every law enforcement agency in the world is looking for you.”

  Davidson stopped talking as if expecting an answer. Mc-Carthy didn’t know what to say.

  “And the story doesn’t get any better,” Davidson finally added. “Sikes claims you overpowered his partner, took his gun, shot him, and in the scuffle killed your receptionist.”

  How could anyone believe that? “That’s nuts!”

  “Take it easy. I didn’t say I believe him. In fact, I don’t. The story is simply too preposterous to be believable. But at the moment it’s what’s out there and what people believe. Sikes claims the crime scene supports his story. And, I suspect, that’s part of the reason the cops buy it. They don’t like it when another cop is killed, and their natural tendency is to believe the story fed to them by someone else in law enforcement. And they’ll go on believing Sikes unless we can prove otherwise. You still with me?”

  McCarthy was leaning over, elbows on knees, his head spinning. Sarah started rubbing his back to comfort him. What did he do to deserve being thrown into such a crazy situation? Was this some sort of karmic retribution for an injustice from a past life? This couldn’t possibly be happening to him.

  “McCarthy?”

  Sarah nudged him and pointed at the phone.

  He straightened back up. “I’m here.”

  “Right now our biggest concern is that Sikes has laid down a very convincing foundation for the use of deadly force, if needed, to apprehend you. That coupled with resentment for cop killers, you’re fair game to a lot of people. Until we can come up with a convincing argument to keep Sikes away from you and put you in protective custody with some agency like the marshals we need to do everything possible to keep you safely hidden. Are we in agreement on this?”

  He looked at the walls of this tiny room, felt the warm air close in on him. How long until security searched this floor? He asked, “What we talking about? A few hours?”

  “I don’t know. I have to continue calling people.”

  He thought about the three-day weeke
nd. Wouldn’t judges and lawyers take off early because of it? A wave of despair washed over him. He started to say something but realized it would serve no purpose. Davidson would everything possible to keep him safe, for which he was grateful. He said, “Thanks for believing me. I have no idea why you should.”

  “Like I said, Sikes’s story just doesn’t make sense. Now here’s what we need to do. I don’t want you on the phone any longer than necessary. We can limit talking until you’re in a safe location and can talk in person. Right now our highest priority is to get you out of there. Now that I officially represent you, they’ll be watching me and my office, so if I try to come to you, they’ll be all over me. What are the odds you can escape from there?”

  Good question. “Don’t know, but I will.” You damn well better.

  “Good. As soon as you do, contact me and we’ll meet some place you’re comfortable with. While you work on that, I’ll continue trying to build a firewall between you and Sikes. Okay, now, we have a plan?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Call me back as soon as you’re out. Just be damn careful how you do it. I have a feeling you only have one shot at this. There’s no room for error.”

  Oh, great. McCarthy hung up, already thinking through the maze of halls and stairways, sorting out which combination might be safest. But any carefully planned route could be blown by a chance encounter with one wrong person.

  Sarah said, “A good start would be to get you some new clothes. Everyone’s looking for a man wearing those,” pointing at his pants. “I’ll get you some scrubs and a hat, and as long as I’ll be in the halls, I’ll check out a few exits.”

  Made perfect sense. Why hadn’t he thought of it earlier? “Thanks.”

  She pushed off the bed, put a hand on the doorknob. “I’ll be as fast as possible. Keep the door locked.”