Last to Die

“Justine,” the man said. “Pull the kid back. Now.”

“Jesus Christ.” The woman yanked Teddy back over the railing and set him down. Then she aimed at her partner and fired.

The force of the bullet sent him flying backward. He collapsed against the desk and slid off, his head thudding to the floor right next to where Claire was cowering. She stared down at the hole above his left eye. Saw blood streaming out, soaking into Dr. Welliver’s rose-colored rug.

She killed him. She killed her own man.

Justine bent down, scooped up her dead colleague’s weapon, and tucked it into her waistband. Then she tossed aside Teddy’s headset and spoke into her own com unit. “Where the fuck are you? The target’s on his way up to the turret. I need you here now.”

Footsteps were moving up the stairs.

Instantly the woman hauled Teddy to his feet and held him in front of her, a human shield against the man who now stepped through the doorway. The same man whom Claire had earlier thought was the enemy. But nothing made sense anymore, because Claire had thought this woman was their rescuer. And she’d thought this man who’d tied her up, with his black-smeared face and camouflage clothes, had come to kill them. Which one is my friend?

The man advanced slowly, his weapon trained on the woman. But Teddy stood in the line of fire, pale-faced and trembling in the woman’s grip.

“Let him go, Justine. This is between you and me,” he said.

“I knew I could make you finally surface.”

“These kids have nothing to do with it.”

“They’re my trump card, and here you are. Still looking fit, I see. Although I liked your old face better.” She pressed the barrel of her gun harder against Teddy’s temple. “Now you know what to do, Nick.”

“You’ll kill him anyway.”

“But there’s always the chance I won’t. As opposed to a sure thing, which you’d have to watch.” She fired and Teddy screamed, blood trickling from his bullet-torn ear. “Next time,” she said, “it will be his chin. So drop it.”

Teddy sobbed, “I’m sorry, Dad. I’m so sorry.”

Dad?

The man dropped his gun and now stood unarmed before her. “Do you really think I’d walk into this without a fail-safe, Justine? Kill me, and it all blows up in your face.”

Claire stared at the man, searching for any resemblance to the Nicholas Clock she’d seen in the photo with her father. He had the same broad shoulders, the same blond hair, but this man’s nose and chin were different. Plastic surgery. Hadn’t Justine said it? I liked your old face better.

“You’re supposed to be dead,” Claire murmured.

“I thought for certain you’d show yourself after Ithaca,” said Justine. “That you’d make some move to save Olivia’s boy. But in the end, I guess it all came down to saving just your own flesh and blood.”

Claire understood suddenly that this woman had ordered the murders of Bob and Barbara. She’d killed Will’s aunt and uncle, all to make Nicholas Clock come back from the dead. Now this woman would send him back to the dead. She’d send them all.

Do something.

Claire looked down at the man Justine had just shot. The woman had taken his gun, but he’d also had a knife. Claire remembered it dangling from his belt as she’d followed him up the stairs. Justine wasn’t watching her; her complete focus was on Clock.

Claire leaned over the dead man’s belt. Tunneled her hand under his body, feeling for the knife.

“If you kill me,” said Clock, “I guarantee you’ll go down. Every major news agency will find a video file in their in-box. All the evidence I’ve been collecting against you these past few years, Justine. Everything that Erskine and Olivia and I managed to pull together. The Company will shut you in a black hole so deep you’ll forget what the sky looks like.”

Justine kept her grip on Teddy, the gun at his jaw, but uncertainty made her hesitate. By killing him, was she about to set off a disastrous chain of events?

Claire gripped the knife handle. Tried to pull it from the belt, but the dead man’s weight pinned it against the floor.

Nicholas Clock said quietly, reasonably: “You don’t have to do this. Let me take my boy. Let us both disappear.”

“And I’ll spend the rest of my life wondering when you’ll pop up and start talking.”

“The truth will certainly come out if I’m dead,” said Clock. “How you helped Icarus escape from prison. How you raided his accounts. The only unanswered question is, Where did you dump his body after you tortured him for his access codes?”

“You have no proof.”

“I have enough to make it come crashing down on you. We finally put it together, the three of us. You killed your own people, Justine, all for the money. You know what happens next.”

From the stairwell came the sound of running footsteps.

Do it now. It’s your last chance.

Claire yanked the knife free and lunged. Aimed for the closest target she could reach: the back of Justine’s thigh. The blade sliced straight through fabric and sank deep into flesh, almost to the hilt.

Justine shrieked and staggered sideways, releasing Teddy. In an instant, Nicholas Clock was diving for the floor. For his fallen weapon.

Justine fired first. Three pops. Blood misted the wall behind Clock, bright red spray exploding from a gunshot that sent him sprawling. He collapsed on his back, awareness already fading from his eyes.

“Dad!” Teddy screamed. “Dad!”

Face white with pain and fury, Justine turned to Claire, the girl who’d dared to fight back. The girl who’d twice cheated Death, only to meet Him now, here. Claire watched the silencer lift to her head. Saw Justine’s arms straighten as she steadied the weapon to fire. It was the last image Claire saw before she closed her eyes.

The explosion rocked her back against the desk. Not a mere pop this time, it was a thunderclap that made her ears ring. She waited for the pain. For something to hurt, but all she registered was her own frantic breathing.

And Teddy’s voice screaming in desperation: “Help him! Please, help my dad!” She opened her eyes and saw Detective Rizzoli crouched over Nicholas Clock. Saw Justine lying on her back, eyes open and staring, a pool of blood spreading beneath her head.

“Frost!” Rizzoli yelled. “Get Maura up here! We have a man down.”

“Daddy,” begged Teddy, pulling on Clock’s arm, oblivious to his own pain, his own blood, still dripping from his ripped ear. “You can’t die. Please don’t die.”

Justine’s blood kept spreading, moving like an amoeba toward Claire, threatening to engulf her. With a shudder, Claire rose to her feet and stumbled to a corner, away from all the bodies. Away from the dead.

More footsteps came racing up the stairs and Dr. Isles swept into the room.

“It’s Teddy’s father,” said Rizzoli quietly.

Dr. Isles dropped to her knees and pressed fingers to the man’s neck. Yanked open the shirt, revealing the Kevlar vest beneath it. But the bullet had sliced into flesh just above the vest, and Claire saw a river of blood streaming from the wound, forming a lake where Dr. Isles was kneeling.

“You can save him,” Teddy screamed. “Please. Please …”

He was still sobbing that word as the last gleam of consciousness faded from his father’s eyes.

THIRTY-THREE

 

NICHOLAS CLOCK DID NOT REGAIN CONSCIOUSNESS.