“The anger. Coming from the concussion as much as from Mulch. You need help. You see that, don’t you?”
“Of course he does, John,” Mahoney said. “He knows the statistics.”
“Gun and badge, Detective,” the chief said sadly, holding out his hand.
CHAPTER
19
THE FIGHT WENT OUT of me then, like a liquid draining from my core in a matter of seconds. I handed my badge and gun to Chief Wallace, said, “Appreciate your concern.”
“We’ll get these back to you as soon as the doctors say it’s okay,” Wallace reassured me. “You’re an incredible asset to this department and we know it.”
I nodded, stood, went to my desk, and picked up a framed picture of my family and some mail. But I also managed to palm something valuable from the back of my department-issue laptop.
With the photograph in my right hand and the mail and flash drive in my jacket pocket, I headed for the plastic sheeting. Sampson and Mahoney fell in on either side of me.
“I’m not going to tip over, you know,” I said as we went back through that demolition site.
“Just making sure you go to the GWU hospital,” Sampson said.
“See the neurologist,” Mahoney added.
I shrugged, said, “You’re right.”
We rode the elevator in silence. Sampson and I got out on one. Mahoney went to the basement to retrieve his car.
“Can I take a leak without you peeking over my shoulder?” I asked.
My partner thought about it, said, “I wouldn’t put that duty on my worst enemy.”
I managed a laugh and then walked around the corner and into a hallway that ran back toward the crime lab. I pushed the door to the men’s room open loudly, kicked off my shoes, picked them up, and jogged down the hall in my socks, taking several turns before the staircase that led to the parking garage.
I opened the basement door in time to see Mahoney’s taillights as he went up the exit ramp. Pete Koslowski, a sergeant and head of the motor pool, was an old friend. When I told him I needed a ride, he flipped me the keys to an unmarked car.
They were right, I thought as I climbed into the car. I probably did need to see a neurologist. But that would mean at least an overnight stay for observation, maybe two or three. I didn’t have that much time to waste. Whatever was going on inside my head was going to have to wait.
My phone started ringing two minutes later.
Sampson called, and then Mahoney. I kept clicking the ringer off and headed for the house. I was going to need a few things. As I drove, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the phone screen lighting up every few seconds.
It lit up again while I was idling at a red light on New York Avenue, and I reached over to shut the phone off altogether.
Then I saw the caller ID.
It said
Mulch
.
When I answered, I heard shallow, raspy breathing, as if someone were trembling with excitement, and then an electronically altered voice said, “So good of you to take my call, Dr. Cross.”
CHAPTER
20
“DO YOU UNDERSTAND?” MULCH asked two minutes later.
Each and every word of my first direct conversation with the man who’d taken my family and butchered my wife was seared on my injured brain, and I couldn’t reply.
“Do you understand what you need to do to see the surviving members of your family alive again?” Mulch asked insistently.
I couldn’t answer him. My mind kept flashing on vague images from some movie I’d seen where each of a man’s four limbs was tied to a different horse, all of them facing in different directions.
“Cross?”
“I can’t, I …”
“Too late,” Mulch said, sounding cold and hard through the static that camouflaged his voice. “Another one bites the dust. Look in your backyard and then call me back.”
The static and connection died.
I stared at the phone, and then dug out a blue light from the glove box, opened the window, and stuck it on the roof. Shaking from head to toe, I flipped on the siren and floored the accelerator.
Six minutes
“Of course he does, John,” Mahoney said. “He knows the statistics.”
“Gun and badge, Detective,” the chief said sadly, holding out his hand.
CHAPTER
19
THE FIGHT WENT OUT of me then, like a liquid draining from my core in a matter of seconds. I handed my badge and gun to Chief Wallace, said, “Appreciate your concern.”
“We’ll get these back to you as soon as the doctors say it’s okay,” Wallace reassured me. “You’re an incredible asset to this department and we know it.”
I nodded, stood, went to my desk, and picked up a framed picture of my family and some mail. But I also managed to palm something valuable from the back of my department-issue laptop.
With the photograph in my right hand and the mail and flash drive in my jacket pocket, I headed for the plastic sheeting. Sampson and Mahoney fell in on either side of me.
“I’m not going to tip over, you know,” I said as we went back through that demolition site.
“Just making sure you go to the GWU hospital,” Sampson said.
“See the neurologist,” Mahoney added.
I shrugged, said, “You’re right.”
We rode the elevator in silence. Sampson and I got out on one. Mahoney went to the basement to retrieve his car.
“Can I take a leak without you peeking over my shoulder?” I asked.
My partner thought about it, said, “I wouldn’t put that duty on my worst enemy.”
I managed a laugh and then walked around the corner and into a hallway that ran back toward the crime lab. I pushed the door to the men’s room open loudly, kicked off my shoes, picked them up, and jogged down the hall in my socks, taking several turns before the staircase that led to the parking garage.
I opened the basement door in time to see Mahoney’s taillights as he went up the exit ramp. Pete Koslowski, a sergeant and head of the motor pool, was an old friend. When I told him I needed a ride, he flipped me the keys to an unmarked car.
They were right, I thought as I climbed into the car. I probably did need to see a neurologist. But that would mean at least an overnight stay for observation, maybe two or three. I didn’t have that much time to waste. Whatever was going on inside my head was going to have to wait.
My phone started ringing two minutes later.
Sampson called, and then Mahoney. I kept clicking the ringer off and headed for the house. I was going to need a few things. As I drove, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the phone screen lighting up every few seconds.
It lit up again while I was idling at a red light on New York Avenue, and I reached over to shut the phone off altogether.
Then I saw the caller ID.
It said
Mulch
.
When I answered, I heard shallow, raspy breathing, as if someone were trembling with excitement, and then an electronically altered voice said, “So good of you to take my call, Dr. Cross.”
CHAPTER
20
“DO YOU UNDERSTAND?” MULCH asked two minutes later.
Each and every word of my first direct conversation with the man who’d taken my family and butchered my wife was seared on my injured brain, and I couldn’t reply.
“Do you understand what you need to do to see the surviving members of your family alive again?” Mulch asked insistently.
I couldn’t answer him. My mind kept flashing on vague images from some movie I’d seen where each of a man’s four limbs was tied to a different horse, all of them facing in different directions.
“Cross?”
“I can’t, I …”
“Too late,” Mulch said, sounding cold and hard through the static that camouflaged his voice. “Another one bites the dust. Look in your backyard and then call me back.”
The static and connection died.
I stared at the phone, and then dug out a blue light from the glove box, opened the window, and stuck it on the roof. Shaking from head to toe, I flipped on the siren and floored the accelerator.
Six minutes
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