His fingers had discovered Baldwin's left eye. He closed them around the orb, pried, ripped it loose.
Baldwin shrieked again, and sank his teeth into Daniel's shoulder. Finding the wound, chewing it, enlarging it.
Daniel felt his flesh give way-he was being consumed.
Nearly blacked out from the pain, he forced thoughts of Shoshi into his mind, struggled for consciousness, plumbed Butcher's Theater memories, and went for the other eye.
Realizing what was happening, Baldwin twisted maniacally out of reach. But Daniel was pure intent now, his hand a hungry land crab, stalking its prey, undistractable. It found what it was looking for, seized it, tore it loose.
His world immutably blackened, Baldwin whipped and pitched, weeping blood from empty sockets. But his teeth remained embedded in Daniel, crushing, gnawing, the force of the bite intensified by agony.
Daniel punched at Baldwin's scarlet-washed face. His fists grazed bone, skin, gristle. Finally he managed to get the heel of his good hand under Baldwin's chin and gave a sudden, sharp push. Baldwin's jaws relaxed involuntarily. Daniel pulled himself free.
Baldwin struggled to his knees, a moaning, swooning ghost. His face a bleached-white death mask, the holes below his brow yawning, black and bottomless.
He screamed and swung his arms wildly, seeking context in the void.
Daniel retrieved the knife, clutched it in his good hand. Stepped in fresh blood, slipped, and staggered backward.
Baldwin heard the sound of the fall. He got to his feet, staggering and groping for support.
And found it. Broken fingers embraced the cold metal rim of the surgical table, then advanced with a mind of their own.
A hellish smile spread across Baldwin's face, corroding its way through pain and blindness.
His unbroken hand, huge, blood-slick, lowered itself onto Shoshi's face turned claw-like.
Now it was Daniel's turn to scream. He charged forward and up, shoving his torn shoulder into Baldwin's rock-hard torso and pushing him away from the table.
Baldwin flailed, took a drunken step forward, and embraced him, ripping his nails into Daniel's back. Blood- pinkened teeth chattered and lowered, searching for a familiar target.
Daniel struggled to break loose, felt Baldwin's grip tighten around him. Despite what had done to him, strength remained in the monster. Daniel's hand was gripped around the handle of the knife, the blade was pressed between them, flat against their torsos. Useless and inert.
Baldwin seemed impervious to the coldness of surgical steel against bare chest. He raised his hand, buried it in Daniel's hair, and yanked hard. Daniel felt his scalp separate from his skull.
Baldwin yanked again.
Daniel twisted the knife free, found the spot he was looking for just under Baldwin's rib cage.
Baldwin snaked his fingers through Daniel's hair, over Daniel's forehead, onto Daniel's eyes.
He scrabbled, placed thumb and forefinger around the eye-ball, and cried out triumphantly just as Daniel shoved upward with the knife. The blade entered silently, completed its journey quickly, passing through diaphragm and lung, coming to rest in Baldwin's heart.
Baldwin pulled back, convulsed, opened his mouth in surprise, and expelled a wave of blood. Clutching Daniel in one final spasm, he died in the detective's arms.
More whiteness, everyone in white.
They were protecting him, entertaining him. Insinuating their comfort between him and his thoughts. Standing around the bed, kind strangers. Smiling, nodding, telling him how well he was doing, everything sewed up fine. Pretending not to notice the bandages, bags of blood, bottles of glucose, tubes running in and out of him.
Gurgling when they talked. Usually he had no idea what they were saying, but he tried to look as if he were paying attention so as not to hurt their feelings.
They'd given him something to silence the pain. It worked but encased him in wet cement, turned the air liquid, made staying alert an effort, like treading water wearing sandbags.
He tried to tell them he was okay, moved his lips. The people in white nodded and smiled. Gurgled.
He treaded water a while longer, gave up, sank to the bottom.
The second day, his head cleared slightly, but he remained weak and the pain returned, stronger than ever. He was disconnected from his tubes, allowed to sip liquids, given pain pills that he concealed under his tongue and discarded when the nurse left.
Laura sat by his bedside, knowing what he did and didn't need. When he drifted off to sleep, she read or crocheted. When he awoke, she was there, holding his good hand, wiping his forehead, tilting a water glass to his lips before he asked for it.
One time, toward evening, he woke up and found her sketching. He cleared his throat and she flipped the sketch pad around, showed him what she was working on.
Still life. Bowl of fruit and wine bottle.
He heard himself laughing. Sank back in pain, then slept and dreamed of the day they'd met-a hot, dry morning, the first September of a unified Jerusalem. Just before Rosh Hashanah, the birth of a new year that promised nothing.
He was a patrolman, still in uniform, nursing a soda at Cafe Max. Winding down after a rotten day in the
