Dead Harvest

by Chris F. Holm

  Though the sky was gray overhead, and the air was thick with exhaust, the cool morning breeze was like a balm to my frayed nerves. The sidewalk was cold and rough beneath my feet. The wheels of the stretcher folded upward as I shoved it into the empty, waiting ambulance.

  I slammed shut the rear door and headed for the cab. A hand grabbed my shoulder – not gently. I turned to find the cop, dark eyes glowering at me from beneath a furrowed brow.

  "Where you think you're going?" he asked. Skeptical, but not yet hostile. That was OK. Skeptical I could work with.

  "Patient transfer."

  "Where you taking her?" he asked.

  "Him," I replied. "Got a suite waiting at Beth Israel."

  "Where's your badge?"

  "Sorry?"

  "Your badge? You know staff's supposed to display it at all times."

  "Of course," I replied. I patted the pockets of my lab coat, a smile of contrition pasted on my face. My left hand dipped into a pocket, and his eyes followed. He never saw my right hand coming.

  The punch connected with the bridge of his nose. A crunch of bone, a spray of blood, and he went down. Not dead, just sleepy. Parlor tricks like the one I'd pulled on the guard upstairs are all well and good, but sometimes, you just gotta go the direct route. Besides, subtle's never been my strong suit.

  I climbed into the cab and threw the ambulance into gear. I gave it a little gas, and it lurched forward. Through the side mirror, I saw a kid of maybe ten staring slack-jawed back at me. He was tugging at his mother's arm and pointing toward the cop sprawled across the pavement, but she ignored him. The show outside the ER was still going strong, and she wasn't about to miss it.

  I gave the kid a wink and a lazy mock-salute, and then pulled out of the hospital drive, disappearing into the early morning traffic.

  5.

  "City and state?"

  Between the din of the nearby traffic and the work crew drilling through the sidewalk just a half a block away, I couldn't hear a word she said. I pressed the handset tighter to my ear and huddled closer to the payphone. "I'm sorry?"

  "City and state?" the woman repeated.

  "Uh, Manhattan," I replied. "Manhattan, New York."

  "What listing?"

  "Jonah Friedlander."

  The line hissed and clicked, and the woman was replaced by an automated voice that spat out the requested address. I was hard-pressed to tell the two apart.

  I dropped the handset back onto its cradle and hunched across the lot to the waiting ambulance. Across the intersection from where I stood, a police cruiser sat idling at a light. I watched him from the corner of my eye, thinking inconspicuous thoughts. The gas station was packed three deep with cabs waiting for a crack at the pumps, and droves of pedestrians filtered through for a paper or a cup of morning coffee – no way the cop had made me. Of course, the meatsuit didn't want to hear it. His heart was pounding a mile a minute; his palms were sweating; his mouth was dry as dust. Just once, I'd like to possess me a Mob enforcer or something. These peaceful, law-abiding sorts make this job of mine a bitch.

  Inside the ambulance, Kate was still unconscious. The question was, for how long? My stomach roiled as I recalled the bitter tang of blood and alcohol that clung to her mother's mangled corpse, and I gave her restraints a tug to ensure they were secure. Then I thumbed the ignition, and the ambulance sprang to life. I pulled out of the station and onto the crowded city street, disappearing into the swell of traffic.

  Friedlander's apartment was a third-floor walk-up in Chelsea, the kind of place a realtor might charitably call a quaint Manhattan brownstone. It was brown, true enough, but its façade was faded and crumbling, and the paint on the sills had blistered and peeled, revealing rotten wood beneath. The whole building had the look of a musty old sweater – one well-placed tug and the whole thing might come tumbling down.

  The front door was propped open with a rolled-up newspaper, and thick bacon-scented smoke poured skyward from the hallway beyond. From somewhere inside, a smoke alarm cried. I nudged the door open with my foot and carried Kate's sleeping form across the threshold. The ambulance I'd left in an alley a block north. They'd find it soon enough, but I didn't much mind – Penn Station lay just a couple blocks to the east, and they'd be expecting us to run. Either I was too smart to run, or too stupid, but either way, we'd be safe here a while.

  I was huffing pretty good by the time I got her up the stairs. My muscles burned in protest, and my eyes stung from sweat and smoke. Friedlander's door was cordoned off with police tape. I ran a fingernail along the jamb, breaking the seal, and then I tried the knob. Locked. I set Kate down and looked around, to be sure I didn't have an audience, and then I shouldered the door, hard.

  White-hot pain radiated outward from the point of impact, but nothing happened. I tried again. More of the same. Just my luck, I thought: the building is a fucking dump, but the one thing the landlord didn't cheap out on was the locks.

  Again, I slammed into the door. There was a sickening crunch as the doorjamb splintered, and then I spilled into the apartment, tumbling gracelessly to the floor. I lay there a moment, waiting for the pounding of my pulse to subside. Then I dragged my ass up off the floor and carried Kate inside. I dropped her into a threadbare old armchair, and then went back and closed the door, throwing the bolt and setting the chain.

  I stifled a yawn. My shoulder ached like hell, and I felt like I'd just run a fucking marathon. Some collection this was turning out to be. I'd botched the job, snatched the girl, and in all likelihood become the target of a city-wide manhunt. All of which paled in comparison to the world of shit I'd be in when word got out I'd disobeyed an order. Failure was bad enough; insubordination was… I didn't even know what. Far as I knew, I was the first.

  So the clock was ticking. I had to sort this shit out fast – the last thing I needed was to be made an example of. I shook my head as I recalled Lily's parting words: Do try to enjoy yourself, won't you?

  Enjoy myself. Right. Well, I thought, no time like the present.

  After all, there's gotta be something to drink in this place.

  "Hey!"

  The voice drifted toward me from someplace far away. It seemed faint and unimportant, and whatever it was, it could wait.

  "Hey! Wake up!"

  The voice was louder now, more insistent. I did my best to ignore it.

  "Wake up, you sick son of a bitch!"

  I opened my eyes. I wished I hadn't. Sunlight streamed in through the windows like an ice pick to my brain. I raised a hand to shade my eyes. It didn't help.

  Kate was awake in the armchair, struggling against her makeshift restraints. They were just a couple of bed sheets, really, twisted into ropes and tied behind the chair back, but it was the best I could do on short notice. I was happy to see the knots had held – I was pretty drunk when I tied them. I'd found a half a handle of Maker's Mark by the bathtub, along with a smattering of multicolored pills scattered across the linoleum. I'd taken a couple at random, in the hopes they'd help the throbbing in my shoulder. The results were mixed – the shoulder was doing pretty good, really, but the throbbing in my head made it a lateral move at best.

  "I see you're feeling better," I mumbled.

  "Feeling better?" Kate said. "I'm tied to a fucking chair!"

  "Yeah," I said. "Sorry about that. I hear tell you put on quite a show the other day, and I wasn't wild at the prospect of being included in the encore."

  "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "Anybody ever tell you you're a lousy liar?"

  "Anybody ever tell you it's impolite to hold people hostage?"

  I laughed. "You think that's what this is? Sweetie, I'm trying to help you here."

  "Help me. Right. I bet you say that to all the girls."

  "Just the ones I tie to chairs," I replied with a smile. "So tell me, what'd they do?"

  "What? Who?"

  "Your family – what'd they do? Your mother cut your allowance? Your little b
rother read your diary? Maybe Daddy wouldn't let you drive the Bentley?"

  "Don't you talk about my family."

  "Suit yourself," I replied. I rose stiffly from the couch and padded into the kitchen. "You hungry?"

  "What?"

  "I asked if you were hungry."

  "I – I don't think so."

  "Well, I'm starving." I cracked open the fridge. Not much there – just a half a bell pepper, a few eggs, a hunk of cheddar cheese. "Tell you what – I'm gonna make myself an omelet. You want some, you're welcome to it."

  Kate eyed me quizzically for a moment, but said nothing. I busied myself in the kitchen, chopping and whisking and grating. I found a skillet in the cupboard. A pat of butter and I was off and running. My stomach rumbled in anticipation.

  "So," she said finally, "you some kind of doctor?"

  "No," I replied.

  "Oh. I thought – I mean the clothes and all…"

  "I stole them. And so far, you're pretty much the only one I fooled."

  "You got a name?"

  "His name was Jonah. I guess that's as good as any."

  "What's that supposed to mean?"

  "Nothing," I replied. "Omelet's up."

  Plate in hand, I dragged a chair from Friedlander's dining set over to Kate's armchair and sat down beside her. The omelet was steaming, and the mingling scents of sautéed pepper and melted cheddar were intoxicating. Kate tried her best to look disinterested. I split the omelet in two with my fork and scooped up a goodly bite, offering it to her.

  She shook her head. "You think I'm eating that, you're nuts."

  "Fine by me," I replied. I stuffed the forkful into my mouth. It wasn't half bad. I chased it with another, and then another. Soon, I'd polished off half the omelet. I was about to start in on the other half when she finally caved.

  "Wait," Kate said. "Maybe just a bite." I gathered up a forkful and held it out to her. She frowned a moment, still doubtful, and then took the bite. Her eyes went wide. "It's good," she mumbled grudgingly as she chewed.

  "You ask me, it coulda used a little Tabasco, but it turned out OK. When's the last time you had anything to eat?"

  She shrugged against the restraints. "Dunno." Kate wolfed down a couple more bites, just as fast as I could feed her. Soon, fork hit plate, and I set both aside. "Water," she said. No please or anything, but still, it was progress. I filled a glass from the sink and tipped it to her lips. She lapped it up greedily, water dribbling down her chin.

  "Easy," I said. "You're not careful, it's gonna come right back up."

  "Thought you weren't a doctor," Kate said.

  "I'm not, but I'm also not an idiot. You've been out a couple days – it's gonna take your stomach a little time to adjust."

  "A couple days? What in hell did you do to me?"

  "Hey, don't blame me – you were unconscious when I found you."

  "Then how–"

  "Wait," I said, "you're telling me you really don't know?"

  "Know what?"

  I ignored her question. "Kate, before waking up here, what's the last thing you remember?"

  Her face twisted into a scowl. "I – I'm not sure. I remember coming down for breakfast. Mom was in the kitchen, packing lunch for me and Connor. Dad was on the phone in his study. Connor was at the piano playing 'Chopsticks' – Dad yelled at him to keep it down, said he couldn't hear himself think. Then things went a little fuzzy. I must have hit my head or something, because I remember smelling blood. After that, it's just fragments. My brother, crying. The scent of alcohol. Sirens, wailing in the distance. I think I might have spent some time in a hospital. I remember a bright light. Someone was screaming – I think it was me. Then I woke up here, tied to this chair."

  "That's all you remember?"

  "That's it."

  I don't know why, but I believed her. "Kate, there's something you should know."

  "What?"

  I snatched the remote up from the coffee table and clicked on NY1. No surprise, we were the top story.

  "… the hunt continues for seventeen year-old Katherine MacNeil, prime suspect in the brutal slayings of her mother, Patricia Cressey-MacNeil, her father, real estate magnate Charles MacNeil, and her eleven year-old brother, Connor. MacNeil was under guard at Bellevue Hospital Center Tuesday when she escaped with the help of an unidentified white male, age unknown. Anyone with information regarding MacNeil is urged to call…"

  The anchor was replaced with a picture of a smiling Kate, clearly taken from her family's apartment, and a sketch of me that could've been any skinny white guy in the Tri-State area. Beneath us ran a number. I turned off the TV.

  Kate stared at the blank screen for a while. Not blinking, not speaking. When she finally did speak, her voice was thin and frail.

  "I… I don't understand."

  The look on her face said otherwise. "Yes, you do."

  "There has to be some sort of a mistake."

  "There's not."

  "Why would they think I'd done such a thing?"

  "The cops found you at the scene, Kate. They saw you…" slit your mother's throat, I thought. "They saw enough."

  "But why? How?"

  I remembered the light that enveloped me as I'd clutched tight her soul. I remembered her song ringing loudly in my ears as I crumpled to the ground. "I don't know," I replied.

  "That's why you tied me up," she said. "You were afraid of me."

  "Yes."

  "Then why'd you help me escape?"

  "That's complicated."

  Kate eyed me a moment. "Yes," she said, "I imagine it would be."

  She fell silent for a while. I let her sit in peace. What could I say to her, really? Her family was dead. Dead by her hand. Words weren't going to change that.

  I set about cleaning up the mess from breakfast. I was halfway through the dishes when she found her voice.

  "This place," Kate said. "It's not yours, is it?"

  "What makes you say that?"

  "Doesn't seem like you, is all."

  I smiled. "It belongs to a friend of mine. He wasn't using it, and we needed a place to stay. I figured we'd be safe here for a while, while I sorted things out."

  "And have you? Sorted things out, I mean."

  "I'm working on it," I said.

  "Yeah," she replied. "Me too."

  6.

  "I need to use the bathroom."

  Kate hadn't said a word in hours – she'd just sat and stared at nothing. Of course, it's not like she had a lot of other options, being tied to a chair and all.

  "I'm not sure that's such a good idea," I replied.

  "I'm serious. I've really got to go."

  "Then I'll get you a trash can."

  "What's the matter – you scared to untie me?"

  "Something like that."

  "Well, it's got to happen sometime," she said. "You can't keep me here forever."

  She had a point. Of course, she'd left three solid counterpoints cooling at the morgue. Still, I'd snatched her for a reason. There was something sour about this collection, and I sure as hell wasn't going to figure out what by playing babysitter all day long. Besides, maybe I untie her and Kate tips her hand. She goes postal and my little moral dilemma gets resolved in a hurry. That happens, I finish the job, and to hell with the light show.

  Man, I hope she tries to kill me, I thought. I could use a happy ending.

  "All right," I said, fetching a chef's knife from the kitchen, "I'll let you go. But you're gonna get out of that chair and head straight to the bathroom. When you're done, you're to get back in the chair – no argument, no complaint. Those are my terms. You break them, things are gonna get unpleasant. We got a deal?"

  "Yeah," she said. "We got a deal."

  I knelt behind the chair back and cut through the makeshift restraints. As they fell to the floor, I took a big step back. The knife I kept at my side, all kinds of casual, like I wasn't figuring on how fast I could put it between us should things get ugly. Just because you're th
inking about stabbing somebody doesn't mean you have to be a dick about it.

  Kate flexed first one limb, and then another. When she was sure all four still worked, she rose, unsteady, from the chair. She limped the length of the floor to the bathroom. If I had to guess, I'd say the cops were a little less than gentle when they finally took her down.