The 13th Hour

CHAPTER 6

3:00 P.M.

SULLIVAN FIELD WAS A large stretch of land two miles outside the center of town. A mix of various sporting fields, it had been donated to the town by International Data Systems six years earlier in exchange for generous real estate tax incentives for their sprawling headquarters nearby. They not only provided the land but hired the architects, construction crews, and landscapers to build one of the best public sporting facilities in the state whose sole purpose was to provide a venue for the athletic endeavors, passions, and entertainment of school-age children.

There were baseball fields with dugouts and bleachers, soccer and lacrosse fields, tennis and basketball courts. There were football fields, a full track, an outdoor hockey rink that was open November through March. There was a central building with lockers, bathrooms, and a nursery for young children whose parents wanted to watch their older siblings kick, smack, or just throw a ball around.

The grass was as good as that of golf course, with a full sprinkler system throughout, while landscaping crews saw to the upkeep of lush bushes and flowers that ran about the perimeter.

The fields lay just two miles northwest of the airport and provided a perfect vantage point from which to watch the planes coming and going on their daily journeys to and from Westchester Airport.

Finding a silver lining to a tragic event, an incident involving the deaths of 212 people, would seem an impossibility, except that it was a Friday in summer. School was out. The local camp was on the other side of town. The fields were mercifully vacant as eighty tons of jet slammed into the soccer fields, cratering a hole ten feet deep, the devastation of the tumbling and twisting aircraft dragging on for half a mile through the baseball diamonds and the football fields, finally stopping a quarter mile short of the locker facilities.

Intended for far more joyous purposes, that building had become the staging area for the recovery and cleanup effort of Flight 502.

Fire trucks from all over the county formed a wagon train-like corral around the wreckage. Thousands of gallons of water steamed off the still-hot, smoldering ground. Firemen sat on the running boards of their trucks physically and emotionally exhausted from their efforts, devastated that all their actions couldn’t save a single life.

A small contingent of National Guard stood watch over the site, never having imagined their stateside service would entail such tragedy.

The plane had been torn to shreds, as if some creature had sunk its teeth into a soda can and ripped it apart. The white tail section seemed to rise out of the ground at the edge of the woods, the North East Air logo unblemished by the flames, its registration number, N95301, still legible. It was the only piece that would give any indication that the objects in this debris field had once been part of a passenger jet.

The acrid smell of death hovered in the air, the odor of burned flesh, molten metal, and scorched earth enough to induce sickness if the images hadn’t already taken one down that path. With a full load of highly flammable jet fuel, the aircraft was a fireball as it hit the ground, the heat of the initial blast scorching trees and plants a quarter mile away. The fireball rose in a great mushroom cloud visible for miles, while the black smoke darkened the sky, blotting out the sun for hours, only to be replaced by the steaming white smoke of the flames’ watery defeat. Oddly, while much of the wreckage was burned beyond recognition, some had escaped untouched

Shards of aluminum skin lay twisted about the muddy earth, luggage was open and scattered. The sight of women’s blouses and children’s sneakers laid bare the magnitude and human devastation of what had happened.

And there were the bodies, over two hundred. Men, woman, and children. None recognizable, no one whole. Hundreds of white sheets, their edges muddy and wet, dotted the area, the grim reminder of the death that lay beneath them, the death that comes without warning.

Grieving family members were held back by townsfolk and family. Shrieks of agony, of loss echoed the air, the only sound besides the hissing, steaming ground. No one spoke. Eye contact was avoided.

Nothing was moved while the NTSB examined the wreckage and secured the black boxes, the recorders of life up until the moment of death.

Small yellow flags, bar coded and numbered, were placed next to every piece of debris, cataloguing the destruction so computer models could be formulated, enabling experts to analyze the cause of the incident. While the NTSB’s combing of the debris, their meticulous reconstruction of the moments leading up to the point of the crash, was intended to solve a mystery, their directive, as always, was to prevent future occurrences, to help with the implementation of new guidelines so the particular yet-to-be-determined cause would not lead to another such event.

AS NICK DROVE toward Sullivan Fields there was no way of avoiding the sight of the crash. The access road descended into the sunken, almost valleylike field, circling the perimeter and revealing the tragedy in all of its devastation. Over one hundred ambulances lay in wait, the EMTs’ and paramedics’ job now simply being the transportation of remains to the morgue.

Cars and trucks of volunteers lined the road, intermixed with army jeeps and several off-road vehicles. People walked by on their way out with hunched shoulders and tear-streaked faces.

Nick had rounded the bend of the final corner before the entrance to the field proper when he was abruptly stopped by a National Guardsman in full army greens, an M-16 rifle slung over his back. He circled his hand in the air, indicating Nick should turn around and leave, all of which Nick ignored as he rolled down his window.

“Sir,” the Guardsman said as he approached. “Got to get out of here.”

“I need to see the police,” Nick said, talking over the younger man.

“What seems to be the problem? Maybe I could help.”

Nick looked at the young blond reservist. He couldn’t have been more than twenty-five, surely educated with the help of government loans that required years of service to your country in return.

“I need to see the police and I need them now.”

“You’re going to have to explain it to me,” the young and eager soldier said, clearly enjoying his first taste of authority. “You’re not allowed in there.”

Nick stuck his finger out the window, curling it toward himself, bidding the solider to come close enough so he could read the name on the left side of his chest, and spoke in a soft, even tone, “Private McManus?”

“Yes, sir?”

“What’s your first name?”

“Neil.”

“I suppose you know how to use that weapon, Neil?”

“Top of my class in riflery.”

“Well, good for you.” Nick nodded. “Someone is trying to kill my wife, Neil, and I really need to see the police about it.”

Seeing the sincerity in his eyes, McManus quickly waved Nick into the crash site. “They’re stationed at the locker house.”

IF THE PREVAILING impression out on the access road was one of death, then what greeted him as he inched into the main parking lot past the scores of emergency vehicles was nothing short of hell.

Stepping from the car and looking about, Nick momentarily forgot his own situation. He had never been to war, but he now knew what it looked like as he stared at the charred remains that scattered the once-pristine playing fields.

Hundreds of people swarmed the crash site, looking like ants on the blackened landscape. Some hovered over bodies, pulling back the white sheets to examine the charred remains, trying to figure out if they were looking at an adult or a child, male or female. Others marked debris, looking for clues, while still others photographed and videotaped the devastation.

Nick walked through the sea of people, past the news trucks and the temporary generators that provided power to the response team, past the flatbeds containing enormous halogen lights that would illuminate the shattered earth as the night fell, allowing the nonstop operation to maintain its twenty-four-hour vigilance.

Nick finally arrived at the command post set up under a series of tents that adjoined the brick locker house building. Card tables and metal chairs were set in an orderly fashion along the wall, temporary phones and computers had been hastily assembled, brought in from businesses and the local school to supplement the desktop and notebook units brought by the National Guard.

Nick found the table where a hastily scribbled sign read Byram Hills Police. A broad-shouldered older man sat behind the table, his gray hair desperately trying to hold on to its last bit of original black color. Nick recognized him at once as the man who interrupted his interrogation six hours from now.

“Captain Delia?” Nick asked.

“Yes.” The captain looked up with weary eyes. “How can I help you?”

“I…” Nick paused, unsure how to start. “I know this a difficult day for you and everyone but I have a situation that requires immediate attention.”

The captain gave a half nod for him to continue.

“There was a robbery this morning, a pretty substantial robbery. Over $25 million in antiques and jewels were stolen, from Washington House over on Maple.”

“I heard nothing of this.” Delia tilted his head in surprise.

“My wife is one of the owner’s attorneys; she was notified of the robbery and has confirmed its occurrence.”

“Of all days. Dammit!” The captain stood up, looking around, the weariness falling from his eyes, to be replaced with frustration. “I don’t know who I can send over there. We’re already stretched thin. Has the place been secured?”

“Yes,” Nick said. “But that’s not why I’m here.”

“You here to confess?” He paused, wiping a sweaty strand of hair from his face, immediately regretting his statement. “Sorry, it’s been a long day.”

Nick looked away for a moment, debating crossing the point of no return before finally turning back. “Whoever committed this crime is after my wife.”

“What do you mean ‘after your wife’?” The captain grew suddenly serious.

“To kill her.”

“And how do you know that?”

“They’ve already destroyed her office.”

Delia took a moment. “Any idea who?”

Nick pulled out the printed picture. “This man is involved, but I’m not sure how, nor do I know who he is.”

“What’s this from?” the captain asked as he studied the picture.

“Security feed. The other faces didn’t show up before video interference obscured everything. And I do believe the security company may be involved.” Nick stopped, hoping the captain was convinced. “It’s a start, right?”

The captain said nothing as he continued looking at the picture.

“There’s a blue Chevy Impala that has circled our house,” Nick lied about the car he had seen in the future, the car carrying the men who came to kill Julia. “Its license plate traces back to Hertz, and it was rented by a man named Paul Dreyfus. His firm handled part of the security for the building that was robbed.”

“And you’re a detective?” Captain Delia asked skeptically.

“No.”

“Then how do you know all this so quickly?” There was suspicion in his voice.

“If someone was trying to kill your wife, you’d be amazed at how resourceful you’d become.”

Delia digested Nick’s words and nodded. “Where’s your wife now?”

“She’s with friends.” Nick wasn’t actually sure where she was in this hour, but he thought it best to not say too much until a trust had developed.

The captain picked up the walkie-talkie from the table and thumbed the button on the side. “Bob?”

“Yeah,” the voice came back, overly loud and static-filled.

“Get your ass up here,” the captain barked before laying the radio back on the table and turning back to Nick. “I’ll tell you now, being as honest as I can be, we’ve got no men to spare. If a gun isn’t being held to your wife’s head, it’s hard to assess whether the danger exists at all. I understand your concern, but whoever committed the crime-something we will investigate and solve-they’re probably long gone and won’t risk hanging around to be caught.”

The captain sat back down, resumed filling out paperwork, and picked up the phone.

Nick turned and looked around. The door to the locker building swung open, the sound of grieving poured out. They had the building set up for the relatives of the deceased, a diverse collection of people from around the county who never imagined the day they would be facing as they woke up. Nick understood their pain, their agony, having endured the death of Julia, having stood over her violated body.

When faced with the sudden death of a loved one, the mind runs in all directions: rage, anger, self-pity, guilt, sorrow, finality, and even to the impossible: the what-ifs, the if-onlys. What if he got stuck in traffic and missed his plane? What if I just said she couldn’t go and waited until Monday? What if I didn’t make him change his flight to today so I could go to the shore next week?

… what if she was suddenly called off the plane for a business matter?

Nick knew himself lucky, blessed. He could be standing alone in that building, sharing his grief with strangers with no chance of Julia ever coming back. She had been on the very jet that lay twisted in the distant field, checked in, her carry-on stowed, her seat belt buckled, on the aircraft whose destination was death.

But Julia was saved, plucked from destiny, pulled off to survive…

… for all of seven hours. Seven hours of life given back by a twist of fate, by a crime of greed that she never would have the opportunity to understand. Shot down in the end by the very people whose actions saved her life.

As Nick heard the sobbing of children whose fathers wouldn’t be coming home as they promised, of wives left to face the world alone, he thought of the watch in his pocket and wondered why he was in the middle of this twisted daydream trying to pull Julia from her grave. Was it all a fantasy, a dream of hope that he couldn’t escape? He had watched as the hours flowed backward, as the unexplainable embraced him. He had seen Julia dead on the floor only to see her alive in the kitchen moments later-moments that existed in his time of reference, in his current flow of living, running contrary to that of everyone else around him.

As the door to the locker facility slowly closed, trapping the sounds of mourning within, he brought himself back to his current reality. He would shut out all of the illogic, all of the pain he had experienced. Against the laws of physics so elegantly stated by Einstein, he would bridge the gap of time with his heart. He would pull Julia from the jaws of fate for the second time this day. He would make the what if happen.

With full resolve, Nick turned to find the captain talking to a tall, muscled man in a tight-fitting black shirt, his badge and gun worn on the belt of his blue jeans. His hands were darkened by soot, streaked with sweat. His tousled black hair told the story of his day.

“Mr. Quinn,” the captain called him over.

Nick approached the detective, hoping he finally had an ally who would listen and help him stop Julia’s killer.

“Mr. Quinn, this is Bob Shannon.”

Nick turned around and looked straight into Shannon ’s slate-blue eyes, and a wave of panic fell upon him as he realized who he was looking at.

“Bob Shannon.” The detective held out his hand in greeting.

Nick’s world spun. For standing before him was the man who had arrested him in the future, who had treated him as something less than a rodent. The man who in the interrogation room had wielded a billy club; who had screamed and accused Nick of murdering Julia; who had held a gun to his head with every intention of pulling the trigger.

The look in Shannon ’s eyes was one shared by most of the volunteers Nick had seen today: exhaustion, devastation, and hopelessness.

“What’s up?” Shannon asked.

Nick’s eyes fell to Shannon ’s neck, his tight-fitting black shirt unbuttoned in the heat, exposing his well-muscled chest. There was no St. Christopher medal there, which eased his mind a little about trusting the police.

Nick didn’t know where to start, finding it hard to shake the fear that the man would somehow recognize him and shoot him for his escaping the interrogation room. Reminding himself that that was yet to happen, he said, “Someone is after my wife.”

“What do you mean ‘after’?” There was a weariness in Shannon ’s voice.

“Trying to kill her.”

“Shit,” Shannon said with surprising concern. “Okay, what’s your name?”

“Nick Quinn.”

“And your wife’s?”

“Julia.”

Shannon led him over to a corner of the tent, pulled up two folding chairs, and took a seat, indicating Nick to follow suit. “Can I get you a drink: water, soda, or something?”

Nick shook his head as he sat down.

“Why don’t you tell me what’s going on?” Shannon said.

Nick told him of the robbery, of Julia’s computer’s being swiped from her office. He explained how the thieves were erasing their tracks, each word out of his mouth carefully chosen so as not to indicate anything from the future.

“May I ask where she is now?”

“She’s…” Nick paused. Though Shannon didn’t appear like the animal he had been in the interrogation room, he had yet to earn Nick’s trust, so he thought it best to hold back some truths. Though he didn’t know exactly where she was, he lied. “She’s with friends.”

“Alone?”

“She’s with some coworkers at one of their homes in Bedford.”

“Why didn’t she come with you?”

“She’s scared, she didn’t want to leave. And she said she couldn’t bear coming down here.”

“I understand that,” Shannon said, looking out at the mayhem.

“Yeah, she was supposed to be on that plane.”

“Whoa.” Shannon ’s eyes went wide with surprise “Okay, you failed to mention that.”

“She got off because she got a text message about the robbery in progress.”

Shannon sat there, his face registering the irony. “Fate is so unpredictable. She must be a mess, thinking she lived only to be in the gun sight of some maniac.”

Nick begin to see sympathy in Shannon. There was more to him than the single-note man who arrested him. “Are you married?”

“I was. My wife couldn’t handle being married to a cop. She didn’t think the pay matched the risk.”

“Sorry.”

“Her loss,” Shannon said quickly. “She just doesn’t get it. Life’s not about money, its not about getting paid for risking one’s life for others. You do it because it’s the right thing to do.”

Nick began to see the world a bit from Shannon ’s point of view. When Shannon had interrogated him, he had thought he was interrogating a killer, a husband who murdered his wife. While his intensity had been intimidating, it was part of his process, part of getting to the truth of a murder, and when Nick grabbed the other detective’s gun… Well, Shannon reacted as anyone would have.

“Listen, I know you think your wife is in danger,” Shannon said. “And I believe you. If I was in your shoes, I’d come right to us. It’s the right thing, the best thing to do.

“Even with the information you mentioned on the people who own the security company, you’re asking for us to track down these individuals on a day where minds can’t possibly think straight, and electrical power is haphazard at best. Now, I’ll tell you, I’m good, we’re good, but not that good. From the security you described, these people knew exactly what they were doing, they’re well informed and intelligent, and if they’re that good, the evidence they left behind is minimal. Not to say there isn’t any, but it’s going to take manpower, something we’re sorely lacking in.”

Nick knew Shannon ’s words to be true; he had drawn the same conclusion in his mind. The chances of finding Julia’s killer were slim, but then again, what were the chances of being called off a plane just before it crashed? The last six hours he had experienced were impossible, beyond the imagination, yet they had happened-it was a day where odds could be beaten and he was not about to give up so easily.

“I printed this out from the security tapes,” Nick said as he handed Shannon the picture of the dark-haired thief from the video feed.

“I’d like to see the rest of this tape.” Shannon studied the man’s face before finally looking up. “Let me ask you a question. You said the security system at Washington House was disabled and that the backup in your wife’s office was stolen. If that’s the case, you’re not telling me something.”

Nick silently berated himself for his foolishness. He had wanted to keep the information on Julia’s PDA private, as he knew that was her killer’s ultimate goal. “She had the info backed up from her computer,” Nick admitted, knowing that if he appeared secretive suspicions would rise.

“Well, I definitely need to see that. Where is it?”

“In my car,” Nick said. It was actually in his pocket but the walk to his car would give him a few minutes to decide whether he was making the right move.

“There’s also a blue Chevy that drove by my home. A rental car leased by Paul Dreyfus. His company did the security for the building where the robbery took place.”

“Okay, well, between the security video backup you have, the car, and this guy Dreyfus, we’ve got some pieces to work with. I’ll tell you what, let’s take a ride over to Washington House, you never know, we may just get lucky.” Shannon rose from his chair.

“There’s nothing to find,” Nick said.

“There’s always something to find,” Shannon said confidently as the captain came over, hearing the end of the conversation.

“Why don’t you take Dance with you as backup?” Delia said, more as a statement than a question.

“I’ll be fine,” Shannon said, more than a little annoyed.

“I don’t recall giving you the option. I’ll have him meet you down by your car.”

“THIS IS JUST the worst nightmare I’ve ever been in. Nothing prepares you for this,” Shannon said as they walked down the road that wound about the fields where the wreckage scattered the grounds. “We all have those morbid thoughts of how we’ll die. They’re few and far between but I can guarantee 90 percent of the world fears death in an airplane above all else. Helpless, trapped inside a metal tube, your heart in your throat as you’re tossed about, catching glimpses of the ground rushing toward you out the porthole windows. Don’t let your wife come down here-seeing this will send her over the edge.”

Nick couldn’t pull his eyes from the blackened ground, from the white sheet-covered bodies that seemed to lie everywhere. “No one should ever have to see something like this.”

“Makes you wish you could stop it,” Shannon said. “Ease all of this suffering.”

“Over forty thousand people are killed in the United States in car accidents every year. That’s like 120 a day. Yet we don’t react to that. But something like this happens, it haunts us for the rest of our lives.” Nick shook his head. “Do they know the cause?”

“Does it matter?” Shannon said. “I’ve heard rumors, but it’s not going to change a thing, it’s not going to bring these people back.”

They walked silently for the remaining half mile past the host of emergency vehicles, red lights uselessly spinning and flashing. Fourteen news cameras focused on fourteen slick, talking-head reporters conveying death with collagened lips and perfect hair, each hoping to top the other in the evening’s ratings.

“Shit,” Nick said, seeing his car boxed in by two fire trucks and an ambulance treating an overcome, hysterical relative of one of the victims. He wasn’t about to press anyone to unblock him.

“Don’t worry about it.” Shannon said. “I’ll drive. Why don’t you get the backup security file out of your car. I’m the black Mustang up there.” Shannon pointed at the slick muscle car fifty yards up the crowded road.

Nick nodded as he opened his car and feigned grabbing something from his glove compartment, pretending to place it in his breast pocket where Julia’s PDA already rested. He hoped he wasn’t creating a greater jeopardy than Julia was already in but knew if Shannon was to help him, he would need to see and know almost everything.

“You can’t handle this on your own?” a man in a cheap blazer and bad tie said on approach.

“Nick Quinn?” Shannon said. “Say hi to Detective Ethan Dance.”

Nick extended his hand but Dance didn’t even bother to look his way.

“We’ve got 212 victims here, I’m sifting through wreckage and death, and I have to come and hold your hand?” Dance said as he stormed right by them. “I’m in no mood to go to some compromised crime scene. I’m going to the station to change. If you want my help that’s the only place you’re getting it.”

Nick thought this was not the “good cop” that had arrested him, that had interrogated him with charm and a smile. Sweat was gathered at his temples, running down his cheeks, as he huffed and puffed from carrying his worn-out body up the road. Aggravation burned in his drooping, bloodshot eyes, his cheap loafers covered in mud, his gray pants caked halfway up his calves.

“Listen.” Shannon pulled Nick aside as Dance kept walking. “Dance is an asshole but he’s a really good detective. Go with him to the station. Let him take a look at your video file. This guy can spot water in the Sahara, plus he can get more info on this Dreyfus guy. I’ll go by Washington House and your wife’s law firm. See what I can find.”

Nick nodded and jogged up to Dance, who took off his JC Penney jacket and threw it in the backseat of his green Ford Taurus. The underarms of his white shirt bloomed with large perspiration stains. Nick opened the passenger door, silently getting in next to Dance, who slammed the driver’s-side door in anger.

Without a word Dance started up his car and spun out of his mud-filled parking spot. He cut off two exiting cars and drove out of the disaster response staging area.

Streams of volunteers, municipal workers, and National Guardsmen flowed in and out of the area, marching silently up and down the access road that had, up until this morning, only known minivans and SUVs filled with kids and soccer moms en route to fun.

As they drove out, the parked cars thinning out, Nick couldn’t believe his eyes as they drove past the blue Chevy Impala. He caught sight of the license plate and confirmed it was Dreyfus’s rental.

“Stop,” Nick said.

Dance ignored him.

“Stop. That’s the car I was telling Shannon and your captain about. The son of a bitch is here.”

Dance said nothing to Nick as he picked up the walkie-talkie on his seat and thumbed the talk button. “Captain?”

“You got to be kidding me, Dance,” Captain Delia shot back. “You’re gone all of three minutes and there’s an issue?”

“Send a Guardsman out to the side road where all of the local volunteers parked. Blue Chevy. License plate-” he turned to Nick to finish his sentence.

“-Z8JP9.”

“Tell him to unobtrusively watch the vehicle. Make sure he knows what that word means. When the guy shows up to leave, have him detained until we get back.”

“Gotcha,” Delia said.

“Relax.” Dance finally spoke to Nick. “If that guy is here he won’t get out.”

“Why would he come here?”

“That’ll be the first question you can ask him when we get back.” Dance said as he wiped his sweaty brow with the sleeve of his white shirt and pushed his moist brown hair back off his face.

They drove out through the slow-moving traffic, Dance didn’t bother to throw on his siren or lights; it wouldn’t move anyone along any faster.

“Sorry about being so short with you,” Dance said. “ Shannon ’s kind of an asshole, he’s got a tendency to piss me off, and this is the fourth time today.”

“It’s okay, this is a bad day for everyone,” Nick said.

“Your wife’s okay though, right?”

Nick nodded.

Dance loosened his tie, taking it off and throwing it in the back. He unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt and directed the a/c vent at himself, sighing as the cool air hit his body.

“The captain told me everything you and your wife have been going through today. When something like this happens, we get blinded to the rest of the world, forgetting it’s still moving despite the tragedies we face.”

As Nick listened to Dance’s short speech, he couldn’t help looking at the detective’s exposed neck, looking for the St. Christopher medal, before admonishing himself for his paranoia.

They finally emerged from the long access road back onto Route 22, finding it eerily empty, in sharp contrast to the chaos behind them.

“So, they said you have a copy of the security video?”

“Yeah.” Nick nodded, patting the breast pocket of his blazer.

“Did you look at it?”

“Just parts, but I saw one face. I’ve got a printout, if you want to take a look. But there’s a lot of snow, they seemed to have disabled the cameras at some point.”

“All right. We’ll check it out at the station. You don’t mind if I shower first, do you?”

Nick shook his head, instantly regretting it, knowing that the clock was ticking. His time with Dance was limited. He needed to glean as much info as he could before the hour was up.

“I feel like I’m covered in death.”

“What time do you have?” Nick didn’t want to pull out the watch.

The car approached a green-railed bridge, a quarter-mile span that rose fifty feet above the Kensico Reservoir, one of the most peaceful sites in all of Byram Hills.

“Three-forty-five,” Dance said.

“I hate to ask this, but… do you think, maybe, we could… it’s just, my wife-who knows where…”

Dance looked at him, his face unreadable, before he finally nodded. “Sure, I didn’t mean to be insensitive. We’re only a minute from the station. We’re on a generator, we’ll dive right in.”

“Thanks.” Nick smiled, regretting not turning to the police earlier. He could have been much farther along in finding Julia’s killer.

“Do you me a favor?” Dance tilted his head toward the rear of the car. “On the backseat is my gym bag, can you grab it?”

“Of course,” Nick unbuckled his seat belt, turned around, and awkwardly twisted around to grab the small canvas bag that was just beyond his fingertips’ reach.

Without warning, Dance slammed on the brakes, the wheels locking up, the antilock system working overtime to avoid a skid as the car ground to a halt in the center of the bridge. Nick was hurled back into the dash, half his body thrown to the floor. A nine-millimeter Glock came to rest on his forehead.

“Hands on the dash,” Dance yelled.

“What’s the matter?” Nick said as he climbed up from the floor back onto the seat and complied, his hands shaking from the sudden change of events and the cold barrel pressing into his flesh.

Dance held the gun in his right hand as he used his left to pull out his cuffs and snap them over Nick’s wrists, binding them together.

“What the-?”

Dance pushed Nick forward and snatched Nick’s Sig-Sauer from the waistband under the rear of his jacket, throwing it in the back of his car.

“Why are you carrying a concealed weapon?” Dance yelled. “

Relax-”

“Open your door, slowly. Step from the vehicle. And don’t be an idiot.”

“Relax.” Nick gave a relieved smile. “I have a license for it. God, you scared me.”

“Out now!” Dance flipped on his police lights, the overly bright red strobes disorienting as they flashed.

“Come on, I have a license for it,” Nick said as he awkwardly opened the door with his bound hands and stepped from the car. Dance slid out right behind him.

“Hands on the bridge rail,” Dance yelled as he walked to the rear of his car, popping open the trunk.

“Dance, please. What’s the matter? I was carrying it for my wife’s protection.”

Nick couldn’t see what Dance was doing but suddenly felt something wrap his lower legs as two large plastic ties were secured around his ankles.

“Come on, don’t you think you’re overreacting?” Nick said as he looked at his now-secured legs.

Dance spun him around, reached into his jacket pocket, and pulled out Julia’s PDA.

“Dance, now you’re pissing me off. What the fuck are you doing?” Nick tilted his body to the left and looked into the open trunk and everything made sense.

The trunk was filled with duffel bags, one of them half open, and protruding from it, gleaming in the afternoon sun, was the gold pommel of a sword.

“You’ve got to be kidding me? You?”

Dance opened the rear door of his car, grabbed Nick’s gun off the seat, took him by his collar, and shoved him in. Slamming the door, leaving Nick alone, locked inside.

Nick sat there staring over the seat at the ticking clock on the dashboard, the LED reading 3:50.

Everything began to make sense. Why he had been arrested, why Dance was running the investigation: He was controlling it all, involved in the robbery, Julia’s murder, the cover up, his frame-up.

As bad as the situation had just gotten, Nick now knew the man responsible for Julia’s death. He knew now who he had to stop.

For the next few minutes, it was all about staying alive. He needed to survive until the top of the hour.

The clock read 3:52. Nick had never felt time move so fast and so slowly at once.

Dance opened the rear door and, with his gun, motioned Nick to get out.

“You stay the hell away from my wife or so help me God-”

Nick fell instantly silent as Dance rested the barrel of the loaded gun against his lips to quiet him.

“Great thing, those PDAs, found your home phone number along with everyone she works with, friends, neighbors. Thought I’d give her a call, tell her to come on down to the station. Maybe tell her you’ve been injured-” Dance drew back his fist and punched Nick square in the mouth, drawing blood, sending his head snapping back. “That’ll make her hurry. Of course, now we’ll have to figure out who else knows, what friends you’ve involved.”

Dance hoisted a large metal plate out of the trunk of his car, a heavy bicycle cable threaded through its center. With great difficulty he waddled forwarded, carrying it to the edge of the center span of the bridge, and dropped it with an enormous clang on the roadway.

“We were going to wait until this evening,” Dance continued talking, “kill her at home, blame it on you, but seeing you’ve chosen to stick your nose in things, we’ll just have to go kill her now.”

Nick’s heart fell. He hadn’t saved Julia, his incompetence had actually moved up her murder. “ Shannon ’s going to figure out what you’ve done.”

“Screw Shannon, he couldn’t think his way out of a paper bag.”

Dance slid the hundred-pound plate underneath the green guardrail. He reached over and grabbed hold of the bicycle cable, holding it tightly in his left hand. Standing up, he pressed the gun to the back of Nick’s head, urged him forward and, with his left hand, clipped the cable to the center chain of Nick’s handcuffs.

“Did you ever have that feeling of déjà vu? Like you’ve done something before, been somewhere before? Like time is all upside-down?” Dance asked.

Nick couldn’t believe what he was asking.

Dance pushed the plate with his foot, guiding it toward the edge, half of its iron weight hanging out over the reservoir.

And that’s when Nick saw his chest. Dance’s shirt hung wide open to his waist, the exertion of carrying the weight having popped open the three lower buttons. As dark as this man was, as much as he talked about killing Julia, he was not the man he had chased down and tackled. His neck was empty, there was no St. Christopher medal hanging against his chest.

Nick stood there, his belly pressed up against the green rail, looking out over the enormous lake, peaceful and still, in contrast to the horrific goings-on just a mile away, in contrast to the happenings on the bridge above. Dance was part of the robbery, he in fact may have been the one calling the shots, working directly with Paul Dreyfus, but he wasn’t the trigger man, he wasn’t the man who had killed Julia.

Nick turned and looked at Dance with hate-filled eyes. He might not have pulled the trigger that killed her, but he was an accomplice, someone who wanted her dead. And as Nick continued to glare, if he could have reached out, he would have ripped the man’s throat out right on the spot.

“Good-bye,” Dance said with a smile as he tapped the plate with his foot, the edge of the bridge acting like a fulcrum as it teetered a moment before slowly rising up and tipping into space.

It fell for all of two feet before it was jolted to a stop. The cuffs dug into Nick’s wrists. He tried to grab hold of the cable to alleviate the pain but found it to be too thin. It was one hundred pounds, a weight that was difficult for Dance but less than average in Nick’s workout routines. Though the pain throbbed into his constricted wrists, he easily lifted the plate upward using his shoulders and back, finally leaning back to try to pull it up and over the rail…

When all at once Dance grabbed him by the plastic ties about his ankles and lifted his legs in the air. Nick’s stomach fell upon the metal bar. Like the edge of the bridge, the green rail acted as a fulcrum. He wasn’t happy that he paid such close attention in Mr. Stout’s physics class, the disproportionate weight of the iron plate making it easy for Dance to lift Nick up and over the bridge.

And in the blink of an eye. Nick tumbled over into midair, the iron plate leading the way to a watery grave.

Fifty feet, headfirst. Nick hit the water as if hitting a concrete pavement, the water exploding out around him. The weight pulled him instantly under, his body descending into the darkness. The lake’s depth varied from twenty to three hundred feet, but at this point under the bridge it was sounded at only twenty-five. Not that the depth would have any bearing on his chances for survival.

Lungs burning, the pressure in his ears growing with every foot of his descent, Nick was pulled toward his death.

And the weight hit bottom. Nick floated upside-down like a sunken buoy. Stars danced in the periphery of his watery vision. Shafts of light glistened and broke the surface above, refracting about the depths, lighting the rocky, silt-covered lakebed.

Being a swimmer, Nick could hold his breath for far longer than most, but he had no idea of the time, nor how long his lungs could truly hold out.

But it wasn’t his pain he dwelled upon, not the suddenness of his inevitable death. It was Julia. Everything that was good in his life, everything worth living for, had been taken. He felt a crushing shame that he couldn’t save her from her fate. He had been so easily deceived, so gullibly accepting in the help of strangers, only to be thrown to his death by those who were paid to protect.

Nick was upside-down, steadily exhaling a very small amount of air to keep his nostrils from filling up and drowning him prematurely. With the glow of the surface light above, he finally caught his bearings when something bumped up against his upward-facing legs. Nick jerked his body around and stared into the vacant eyes of the dead.

There was a body, floating upright, bobbing about, his wrists cuffed together, his legs tied, with the plastic ties wrapped about a similar iron plate. And there was another body ten feet behind it. Nick couldn’t see it well, but there was no mistaking the uniform on the skinny, redheaded man. It was a police officer. And through the white shafts of light that cut down through the water, he saw the shadows of a third, dressed in a blue shirt, his long dark hair wafting in the shifting currents. He was in a graveyard, an assassin’s underwater dumping ground.

Seeing the corpses, Nick instantly understood why Dance had mentioned déjà vu.

The man immediately next to him was freshly dead, his half-mast eyes revealing rolled-back pupils, his right eye was swollen, black and blue, his mouth slack-jawed, the left side of his lower lip distended as if someone had danced on his face before killing him. He had gray hair that drifted about his face like wind-whipped grass.

Nick’s lungs began to burn, his air running low. He knew it had been a minute. Another forty-five… maybe sixty seconds and he would pass out.

He grabbed the bicycle chain that tethered him to his death anchor and pulled himself slightly deeper. He grabbed hold of the belt of the man adjacent to him, reached into his pocket with his cuffed right hand, and pulled out his wallet, holding it tight as if it would somehow save him.

But it was a useless final act. His lungs were on fire, his head throbbing with the final pulsing of his oxygen-deprived heart. It had been over two minutes, there was no doubt he would die, surrendering to the seductive call of death.

And as the last bit of oxygen fed Nick’s thoughts, he dwelled on Julia, her beauty, her kindness, and how the world would be robbed of her presence because…

Because he had failed her.