“You know why, Luke.”
The truth was that I did not have the slightest idea why. For some reason, women are always crediting me with being way more intuitive about them than I actually am. It’s the worst of both worlds; I’ve never had a clue what they are thinking, but because they believe I do, they’re less inclined to spell it out for me.
But whatever the reason, the way she said, “You know why,” made me less eager to press the issue. I was now at the place I had no desire to be, directly in the middle of their marriage. When Bryan started screaming at me, I wanted to have as little information as possible, sort of like a POW undergoing interrogation. I wanted to be on a “need to know” basis, and I didn’t need to know any of this.
Julie and I once again agreed to contact each other if either of us heard from Bryan, and no longer able to sleep, I got dressed and headed for the office.
The media furor had not quite died down yet, as reporters were focused on delving into Steven Gallagher’s background. His life was both short and difficult, though no one seemed to have any idea that he had violent tendencies.
Those who knew him professed shock that he could have committed a murder, but that has become standard stuff these days. For every serial killer there seems to be a dozen neighbors who swear he seemed like a quiet, nice guy, the last person you’d expect to have chopped up all those people.
Media requests for interviews were still coming in, but I declined all of them. I had “been there, done that” and I didn’t want to spend the whole day refusing to answer the questions I had refused to answer the day before. Besides, it had taken me twenty minutes to remove the makeup; from now on I was going strictly “au naturel.”
I had plenty else to do. I had a bunch of recent homicides to occupy my attention, and it’s not like the citizens of New Jersey were going to stop killing other citizens of New Jersey any time soon.
So I tried as best I could to make the day “business as usual,” but in the back of my mind was Julie’s phone call, and the fact that I hadn’t heard from Bryan. His silence brought home very powerfully how hurt he must have been by what he saw as our betrayal. And the truth is that he was right, “betrayal” was the correct word for it.
Bryan was not exactly the type to shy away from verbal confrontations; he believed everything should always be out in the open and discussed to death. It was one of the many ways in which we were different; I was always on the lookout for rugs to sweep things under.
So I knew we would have the conversation, he was entitled to at least that much, and that it would be a difficult one. I always felt huge guilt about the night with Julie, and while I had obsessed over it ever since, I had done so privately. Now it would be out in the open and openly talked about.
Ugh.
But I deserved whatever grief Bryan would give me.
I just wanted to get it over with.
It was a completely disorienting feeling.
Bryan Somers woke up having no idea where he was, or how he got there. It wasn’t that he was groggy; he actually came to a state of alertness fairly quickly. Fear and confusion can do that.
He was lying on a couch in a dimly lit room. There were no windows, the walls were gray-painted cement, and light was provided by recessed bulbs in the ceiling. It seemed to be a small studio apartment; he was in a den- like area, which was attached to a small kitchen. There was a bar stool tucked under a counter, a dresser across from the couch, and a small television sitting on the dresser. There was also a small receiving box on top of the television.
The strangeness of the surroundings, and his lack of knowledge of how he got there, was horrifying enough. Worse yet was his discovery that a metal clasp on his leg was attached to a long chain, which in turn was attached to a radiator in the corner of the room.
He got up and walked around the room, checking it out. There was a small bathroom with a stall shower, and the kitchen was fully stocked with food and drink. He was not going to starve to death, at least not for a while.
The door was locked from the outside, and no amount of pulling, pushing, or shoving affected it. Screaming for help yielded nothing as well, and from the solid nature of the walls, he doubted that anyone outside could hear him, even if they were out there. There was no phone and no computer, and therefore no apparent way to get in touch with the outside world.
Bryan turned on the television, and was very surprised to see that it worked. It seemed to be satellite television, and Bryan quickly recognized the stations as all New York affiliates. Wherever he was, it was in the New York Metropolitan Area.
He tried to piece together how he had gotten there, but drew a blank. He remembered the conversation with Julie, and it brought back a wave of pain. He also remembered going to Luke’s house, and waiting for him when he wasn’t home.
But after that it was a blank. Could Luke have done this to him? Even though Julie’s revelation made him question how well he knew his brother, Luke kidnapping him in this manner made absolutely no sense.
Yet the sequence of events was troubling. Just an hour or so after an earth-shaking conversation with his wife, one in which his world was turned upside down, Bryan found himself in this situation. Was it possible that the two things were not related? Could there be a coincidence that great?
Bryan was scared to a degree he had never come close to experiencing before. He found a local news program on television and started watching it, hoping that it might shed some light on what was happening. That was unlikely, he knew, since it was a morning news program, which meant he was not gone for very long. No one would have reported him missing yet, so no one would be looking for him.
So he sat down to wait. It was not a physically uncomfortable situation to be in; the chain reached to the kitchen and bathroom, and the couch was relatively comfortable. He tried to take mental consolation in the fact that someone inclined to hurt or kill him could have done so already, and would not have provided this type of environment.
But it was small comfort.
He was a prisoner.
It was three very long hours before the door opened and his captor walked in. He was a large man, at least three inches and thirty pounds bigger than Bryan. He gave off an air of physicality and toughness, even though he had a smile on his face that in other situations might seem disarming.
“You’re up,” the man said. “How are you feeling?”
“Who are you, and what the hell am I doing here?”
“My name is Chris Gallagher. You’re here because I kidnapped you. You feeling OK? I hit you harder than I should have, and then I injected you with Sodium Pentothal. You probably don’t remember any of it.”
“Let me ask this again; why the hell am I here?” He tried to have his tone reflect his outrage, but the fear took the sting out of it.
“Your brother Luke killed my brother; his name was Steven Gallagher. So you have become what is commonly known as an innocent victim. Collateral damage, as it were. As was Steven.”
Bryan’s memory was coming back to him, and he asked, “Is this about the Brennan murder?”
Chris nodded. “That seems to be what your brother thought, but he was wrong. So he didn’t ask any questions; he just went in firing. And then he went on television to brag about it. The conquering goddamn hero.”
“This has nothing to do with me.”
“It does now.”
“What are you hoping to accomplish?”
“I’m going to be talking to Luke, and I’ll instruct him to do things. If he does them, and does them well, then you’ve got a chance. If not, you’re going to die.”
He said it in a matter-of-fact, sincere way that left Bryan with no doubt that he was telling the truth. His mind was racing for something to say that might change this man’s mind. “You think that killing one innocent person makes up for the killing of another?”
Chris shrugged. “It’s the only system of justice I’ve got.”
“And in the meantime?”
