He told Amanda, “She was driving the car.”
She looked up from her purse.
“When they left, Sara was driving. They didn’t have to knock her out or—” He shook his head. “She told them to kill her. She wasn’t going to go with them. But she went with them. She drove them away.”
He looked down. Amanda had wrapped her hand around his. Her skin felt cool. Her fingers were tiny. He always forgot how small she was.
“I haven’t—” Will was an idiot to confess anything to her, but he was desperate for absolution. “I haven’t felt scared like that since I was a kid.”
Amanda rubbed his wrist with her thumb.
“I keep thinking of all these things I could’ve done, but maybe—” He tried to stop himself, but he couldn’t. “Maybe I did the wrong thing because I was scared.”
Amanda squeezed his hand. “That’s the problem with loving someone, Will. They make you weak.”
He had no words.
She patted his arm, signaling that sharing time was over. “Pull up your panties. We’ve got work to do.”
She bounded up ahead of him.
Will followed more slowly. He tried to wrap his brain around what Amanda had said. He couldn’t tell whether she’d meant it as a condemnation or an explanation.
Not completely one or the other.
He took a deep breath at the top of the next landing. The stabbing pain in his rib had turned into a dull ache. Will became aware of minor improvements as he moved his body, like that his head had stopped throbbing and the rolling lava in his gut was starting to smother itself out. He told himself it was good that his vision was no longer wonky. That the balloon of his brain had re-tethered itself to his skull.
He used the relief to plot ahead, past the interview with Hurley. He was certain the man wouldn’t give them anything. Will needed to go home to get his car. He would try to find Nate for a lift. Will had a police scanner in his hall closet. He would take it with him and look in the places that no one else was looking. Will had grown up in the middle of downtown. He knew the bad streets, the dilapidated housing, where criminals laid low.
The door opened to the sixth floor. Will followed Amanda down another long hallway. Two cops at each end. One across from the elevator. Two more guarded a closed sliding glass door.
Amanda showed them all her ID.
The glass door slid open.
Will looked down at the threshold, the metal rails recessed into the tiles. He took as deep a breath as he could. He couldn’t make himself forget that Sara had been abducted by a convicted rapist, but he could make himself appear calm enough to do whatever Amanda needed him to do in order to get information out of Hurley.
He stepped into the hospital room.
Hurley was handcuffed to the bed. There was a sink and toilet out in the open, a flimsy curtain for privacy. Sunlight filtered through the open blinds. The fluorescent lights were off. The glowing monitor announced Hurley’s steady heartbeat.
He was asleep. Or at least pretending to be. Sutures Frankensteined his face. His broken nose had been straightened, but his jaw hung crookedly from his face.
His heartbeat was steady, like a lazy pendulum swinging back and forth.
Amanda cracked open another ammonium ampoule and shoved it under his nose.
Hurley jerked awake, eyes wide, nostrils flaring.
The heart monitor sounded like a fire alarm.
Will looked at the door, expecting a nurse to come running in.
No one came.
The cops hadn’t even turned around.
Amanda had her ID out. “I’m Deputy Director Amanda Wagner with the GBI. You’ve met Agent Trent.”
Hurley looked at the ID, then back at Amanda.
She said, “I’m not going to read you your rights because this isn’t a formal interview. You’ve been given morphine, so nothing you say can be used in court.” She waited, but Hurley didn’t respond. “The doctors have stabilized you. Your jaw is dislocated. You’ll be taken to surgery as soon as the more critical patients have been helped. For now, we have some questions about the two women who were abducted.”
Hurley blinked. Waited. He was making a point of ignoring Will. Which suited Will, because if the man looked at him wrong, he wasn’t sure he could keep his shit together.
“Are you thirsty?” Amanda pushed aside the curtain around the sink and toilet. She unwrapped a plastic cup, turned on the faucet.
Will leaned against the wall. He shoved his hands into his pockets.
“You were a cop.” Amanda filled the cup with water. “You know the charges. You’ve murdered or participated in the murder of dozens of civilians. You aided and abetted the abductions of two women. You were part of a conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction. Not to mention healthcare fraud.” She turned around, walked to the bed with the full cup of water. “These are federal charges, Hurley. Even if by some miracle a jury deadlocks on the death penalty, you’re never going to breathe free air ever again.”
Hurley reached for the cup. The handcuff clanged against the rails.
Amanda paused long enough to let him know that she was in charge. She held the cup to his mouth. She pressed the tips of her fingers below his jaw to help his lips make a seal.
He made an audible gulp with each swallow, draining the cup.
She asked, “More?”
He didn’t respond. He leaned back in the pillow. He closed his eyes.
“I need those women home safe, Hurley.” Amanda found a tissue in her purse. She wiped out the cup before tossing it into the trashcan. “This is the only time in this entire process that you’ll have any bargaining power.”
Will stared at the cup.
What had she given him?
“On average, it takes fifteen years for the federal government to administer the death penalty.” Amanda dragged over a chair and sat by the bed. She crossed her legs. She brushed lint off her skirt. She looked at her watch. “It’s a bit ironic, but did you know that Timothy McVeigh was caught on a traffic violation?”
The Oklahoma City Bomber. McVeigh had set off a truck bomb outside of the Murrah Federal Building, murdering almost two hundred people, injuring almost one thousand more.
Amanda said, “McVeigh was sentenced to death. He had four years at Florence ADMAX before he petitioned the courts to bring forward his execution date.”
Hurley licked his lips. Something had changed. Her words—or maybe what she’d tricked him into drinking—were chiseling away at his calm.
Amanda said, “Ted Kaczynski, Terry Nichols, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Zacarias Moussaoui, Eric Rudolph.” She paused in her list of domestic terrorists serving out their multiple life sentences on what was called Bomber’s Row. “Robert Hurley could be added to those names. Do you know what it’s like inside an ADX?”
She was asking Will, not Hurley.
He knew, but he said, “What’s it like?”
“Inmates are confined to their cells for twenty-three hours a day. If they’re allowed out, it’s only for an hour, and then it’s at the pleasure of the guards. Do you think the guards are kind to people who blow up people?”
“No,” Will said.
“No,” Amanda agreed. “But your cell has everything you need to survive. The toilet is your sink and your water fountain. There’s black-and-white TV if you want to watch educational classes or religious programming. They bring you your food. The window is four inches wide. Do you think you can see much of the sky through four inches, Will?”
“No,” he repeated.
“You shower in isolation. You eat in isolation. If you’re lucky enough to get yard time, it’s not really a yard. They have a pit, like an empty swimming pool. You can pace it off in ten steps, thirty if you walk in a circle. It’s fifteen feet deep. You can see the sky, but you can’t write home about it. They stopped giving inmates pencils because they kept using them to rip open their own throats.”
Hurley’s eyes were open. He stared up
at the ceiling.
Amanda looked down at her watch again.
Will checked the time for himself.
3:18 p.m.
“Hurley,” Amanda said. “I don’t care about your other charges. I care about returning those two women to safety. So this is what I’m offering.”
She waited.
Hurley waited.
Will felt his stomach tighten.
“You’ll die in prison. I can’t do anything about that. But I can keep your identity out of the news. I can give you a new name, a new rap sheet. The marshals oversee plenty of prison inmates in witness protection. You’ll be in gen pop, maximum security, but you won’t be caged like an animal while you slowly lose your mind.” She paused. “All you have to do right now is tell me where to find those women.”
Hurley sniffed. He turned his head to look out the window. Blue skies. Sun on his face. His heart had returned to its slow, lazy beat. He was calm because he felt like he was in control, the same way he’d been back at the car accident.
At least until Michelle Spivey had opened her mouth and started talking about Hurley’s father.
He’s your hero … you wanted to make him proud.
Will said, “Your father’s sick, right? That’s what Michelle said—that he was going to die.”
Hurley’s head had swiveled around. His eyes burned with fury.
This was the way into him. Hurley didn’t care about the people he’d murdered. Whatever cause had driven him to commit an act of terrorism was not going to be compromised in a few minutes. Every man had a weak spot. For a lot of men on the wrong side of the law, that weak spot centered around their father.
“Was your old man a cop?” Will asked. “Is that why you joined patrol?”
Hurley glared at him. The monitor started throwing off quick beats as his heart rate increased.
“I bet he was proud when you joined up. Took the oath, the same as he did. His. Son.” Will said the words individually, the way he had heard so many old timers on the force talk about their kids. Not as individuals, but as extensions of themselves. “I bet he’s not going to be so proud when he hears that you helped a convicted rapist abduct another woman.”
The silence between the beeps shortened.
Will said, “I remember what it was like when my father died. I was with him in the hospital when he drew his last breath.”
Amanda said nothing. She knew that the first time Will had seen his father’s face was when he’d identified the man’s dead body.
Will said, “I’d never held my dad’s hand before. Maybe when I was a little kid and I needed help crossing the road. But never as a man. He was just so—so vulnerable, you know? And I felt vulnerable, too. That’s what it’s like when you love somebody. You feel weak. You want to take away their pain. You’ll do anything you can to keep them safe.”
A tear slid from the corner of Hurley’s eye.
Will said, “Toward the end, Dad’s hands and feet were cold. I pulled on his socks for him. I rubbed his skin. Nothing could warm him. That’s what the body does. It diverts all of the heat to the brain and the organs. They can feel you holding their hand, but they can’t hold you back.”
Amanda had vacated the chair. Will sat down. He pulled it closer to Hurley. He fought the revulsion as he held the man’s hand.
This was for Sara.
This was how they found her.
He said, “You can’t erase what you did, Hurley, but you can try to make up for it.” Will felt Hurley’s fingers clench around his own. “Save those two women. Don’t let them get hurt. Give your dad something that makes him proud of you again.”
Hurley gulped.
“Tell us how to find the women,” Will said, trying not to beg. “It’s not too late to protect them from what you know is coming. Let your dad’s last thoughts be that his son was a good man who did some bad things. Not a bad man who couldn’t do good.”
Hurley’s eyes were closed again. Tears soaked the pillow.
“It’s all right.” Will looked down at their hands. Hurley was squeezing so tight that the broken skin on Will’s knuckles was bleeding again. “Just tell us how to save them. Be the man your father knows you can be.”
Hurley stuttered in a deep breath. His tears ran unabated. He looked not at Will, but at Amanda. His mouth moved. There was a clicking in his jaw.
“Guh—” Hurley’s face creased with exertion. He couldn’t use his lips to form the word. “Guh—”
“Gilmer? Gwinnett? Gordon?” Amanda gave up on naming counties and searched her purse. “I have something you can write on.”
“Nuh—” Hurley shook off Will’s hand, frustrated. “Fuh—” he tried again.
Will leaned forward, straining to hear.
“Fuh—” He grabbed the rails of the bed, gave them a violent shake. “Fuck off.”
6
Sunday, August 4, 2:13 p.m.
Faith’s tailbone rattled against the plastic seat in the rear section of the helicopter. Her sense of helplessness was becoming more overwhelming with each passing second. Will was down there somewhere—probably feeling just as hopeless, while she was trapped inside an overloaded washing machine. The sun baked the metal skin of the Huey. To her left were six very large men wearing SWAT uniforms and carrying AR-15s. Their legs were spread wide. Their arms were the size of tree trunks. Their expressions were hard. They were angry, ready to do battle.
But for now, they were stuck in a holding pattern. The air ambulances had priority over the hospital’s landing pad. The interior of the Huey had taken on the stench of prolonged agony. They were ready to spring out of the cramped space the moment they touched down. The pilot’s silence in the chunky headphones was excruciating. Still, Faith’s ears strained against the static. Only Maggie and Amanda had taken theirs off, choosing to keep their conversation private by shouting into each other’s ears. Amanda looked furious, which was understandable unless you knew Amanda. She never looked furious. She was usually the calm in the middle of the storm.
There was a lot to be angry about.
Will was in the emergency room. There was no word on Sara. No idea who had taken her, why they had set off bombs, what they were going to do next.
Fifteen confirmed dead. Thirty-eight wounded. Cops murdered. Security guards murdered. A sheriff’s deputy who had died on the operating table.
“They’ve cleared fifty percent of the campus buildings.” Maggie was back on the headphones. Her voice echoed as if she was using a tin can. “The first bomb was on the fifth level of the Lowergate East parking deck. It brought down the roof. The second bomb was bigger, the rainmaker. Sub-level one, strapped to a major support column. Strategically planted to take the whole thing down.”
“This wasn’t an escalation,” Amanda yelled. “This was an opportunity.”
Maggie pointed to the headphones. The line was not secure.
The pilot said, “We’re clear for landing.”
The helicopter made a sharp dip before hurtling toward the campus. Faith’s stomach dropped—not from the sudden loss of altitude, but from the sight of the cratered parking deck.
Smoke fogged the air. Faith counted six fire trucks battling separate blazes. Broken glass and chunks of concrete littered the ground. Cars had been blown out of the deck, scattered onto the street, shot like missiles into the adjacent buildings. The sky bridge across Clifton Road had a van on top of it, wheels up like a dying cockroach. She saw shoes, papers, metal bent like paperclips. It reminded Faith of when her son was little and he’d steal items from her desk to play with his toys.
“The Porsche driver.” Maggie had gotten another update on her phone. “He’s a doctor from the children’s hospital. They think his neck was broken after the crash. They wouldn’t want to leave any witnesses. Wrong place, wrong time.”
Faith thought about the randomness of the car accident. The poor man had probably been thinking about slipping into bed when the truck rear-ended him.
“
The students are being bussed out.” Amanda pointed down at the line of kids with backpacks and suitcases. There were white tents for triaging patients. Uniformed law enforcement swarmed over the broken concrete. Firemen and civilians were moving away debris, passing buckets from one person to the next.
Maggie told Amanda, “Press conference is in fifteen minutes. Do you want to be in on it?”
“No, but I’ll draft some language.” Amanda took out her notepad and started writing.
Faith tried to orient herself as the helicopter approached the landing pad. They were directly above what was called the Clifton Corridor. The bombed-out parking deck was on the opposite side of the road from the hospital. Behind the three clinic buildings and the Winship Cancer Institute. A block away from Egleston Children’s Hospital. Even farther from the student dormitories and libraries on the other side of Clifton.
Of all the places the terrorists could’ve detonated the bombs, the parking deck was the one that offered the least awful outcome. They had killed some people, but they could’ve killed a hell of a lot more.
This wasn’t an escalation.
The helicopter touched down with a bone-jarring bump.
“Go-go-go!” the SWAT leader yelled.
They moved quickly so that the Huey could make space for the next air ambulance. Faith jumped out with the help of a hospital orderly. They jogged into the building. The roof access door was already open. A patient was strapped to a gurney, waiting for the next chopper to arrive. The SWAT team disappeared down the stairs, rifles clutched in their hands.
Faith’s eyes were watering so badly that she could barely see. She coughed. The air was thick enough to eat. She didn’t want to know what she was breathing. She squinted her eyes onto the back of Amanda’s navy blue suit jacket and followed her down the stairs.
The air had cleared by the next floor. They kept going down. Faith used the tail of her shirt to wipe the grime out of her eyes. Maggie was already on her satellite phone. It was the same as before. She rapid-fired information over her shoulder as she bolted downward. “The man that Will shot at the car accident. They scanned his fingerprints. He’s not in the system.” She listened again before continuing. “Robert Hurley’s Android phone is a wash. He only called one number, a burner phone. We’re trying to track it down.”
The Last Widow: The latest new 2019 crime thriller from the No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling author Page 11