She ducked behind a car — too late. They had spotted her.

She lurched to her feet and began to run again. Her legs still didn't work right. She was stumbling as she dodged between parked cars.

Her pursuers' footsteps pounded closer, moving in from two directions at once.

She turned left, between two parked cars.

They surrounded her. One guard grabbed her left arm, another her right, She kicked, punched. Tried to bite them.

But now there were three of them, and they were dragging her back to the Emergency Room. Back to Dr. Wettig.

'They'll kill me!' she screamed. 'Let me go! They're going to kill me!'

'No one's going to hurt you, lady.'

'You don't understand. You don't understand.t'

The ER doors whisked open. She was swept inside, into the light and lifted onto a gurney. Strapped down, even as she kicked and thrashed.

Dr. Wettig's face appeared, white and taut above hers. 'Five milligrammes Haldol IM,' he snapped.

'No!' shrieked Abby. 'No.t'

'Come on, I want it given STAT!'

A nurse materialized, syringe in hand. She uncapped the needle.

Abby lurched, trying to buck free of the restraints.

'Hold her down,' said Wettig. 'Goddamn it, can we get her immobilized here?'

Hands clamped over her wrists. She was twisted sideways, her right buttock bared.

'Please,' begged Abby, looking up at the nurse. 'Don't let him hurt me. Don't let him.'

She felt the icy lick of alcohol, then the prick of the needle plunging into her buttock.

'Please,' she whispered. But she knew it was already too late.

'It will be all right,' said the nurse. And she smiled at Abby. 'Everything will be all right.'

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

'No skid marks on the pier,' said Detective Carrier. 'The windshield's shattered. And the driver's got what looked to me like a bullethole over the right eye. You know the drill, Slug. I'm sorry, but we're going to need your gun.'

Katzka nodded. And he gazed, wearily, down at the water. 'Tell the diver he'll find my gun right about there. Unless the current's moved it.'

'You think you fired off eight rounds?'

'Maybe more. I know I started with a full clip.'

Carrier nodded, then he gave Katzka a pat on the shoulder. 'Go home. You look like shit warmed over, Slug.'

'As good as that?' said Katzka. And he walked back up the pier, through the gathering of crime lab personnel. The van had been pulled out of the water hours before, and it now sat at the edge of the container yard. Streamers of seaweed had snagged on the axle. Because of air in the tyres, the van had turned over underwater, and its roof had sunk into the bottom ooze. The windshield was caked with mud. They'd already traced its registration to Bayside Hospital, Operations and Facilities. According to the Facilities manager, the van was one of three owned and operated by the hospital for the purpose of shuttling supplies and personnel to outlying clinics. The manager had not noticed any of his vans were missing until the police had called him an hour ago.

The driver's door now hung open, and a photographer was leaning inside, shooting pictures of the dashboard. The body had been removed half an hour ago. His driver's licence had identified him as Oleg Boravoy, age thirty-nine, a resident of Newark, New Jersey. They were still awaiting further information.

Katzka knew better than to approach the vehicle. His actions were being called into question, and he had to keep his distance from the evidence. He crossed the container yard to where his own car was parked, outside the fence, and slid inside. Groaning, he dropped his face in his hands. At 2 a.m. he'd gone home to

HARVEST

shower and catch a few hours of sleep. Shortly after sunrise, he'd been back on the pier. I'm too old for this, he thought, too old by at least a decade. All this running around and shooting in the dark was for the young lions, not for a middle-aged cop. And he was feeling very middle-aged.

Someone tapped on his window. He looked up and saw it was Lundquist. Katzka rolled down the glass.

'Hey, Slug. You OK?'

'I'm going home to get some sleep.'

'Yeah, well before you do, I thought you'd want to hear about the driver.'

'We have something back?'

'They ran the name Oleg Boravoy through the computer. Bingo, he's in there. Russian immigrant, came here in '89. Last known residence Newark, New Jersey. Three arrests, no convictions.'

'What charges?'

'Kidnapping and extortion. The charges never stick because the witnesses keep disappearing.' Lundquist leaned forward, his voice dropping to a murmur. 'You ran into some really bad shit last night.

The Newark cops say Boravoy's Russian mafia.'

'How sure are they?'

'They ought to know. New Jersey's where Russian mafia has its home base. Slug, those guys make the Colombians look like the fucking Rotary Club. They don't just make a hit. They chop off your fingers and toes first, for the fun of it.'

Katzka frowned, remembering the panic of last night. Treading water in the darkness as men ran on the pier above, shouting words in a language he didn't understand. He was having visions now of dismembered fingers and toes, of Boston streets littered with random body parts. Which made him think of scalpels. Operating rooms.

'What's Boravoy's connection to Bayside?' he asked.

'We don't know.'

'He was driving their vehicle.'

'And the van' s full of medical supplies,' said Lundquist. 'Couple thousand dollars' worth. Maybe we're talking black market. Boravoy could have partners at Bayside siphoning off drugs and supplies.

And you just caught him delivering the goods to their freighter.'

'What about that freighter?You talk to the Harbourmaster?'

'The ship's owned by some New Jersey firm called the Sigayev Company. Panamanian registry. Her last known port of call was Riga.'

'Where's that?'

'Latvia. I think it's some breakaway Russian republic.'

The Russians again, thought Katzka. If this was indeed Russian mafia, then they were dealing with criminals known for pure and bloody viciousness. With every legitimate wave of immigrants rode a shadow wave of predators, criminal networks that followed their countrymen to the land of opportunity. The land of easy prey.

He thought of Abby DiMatteo, and his anxiety suddenly sharpened. He hadn't spoken to her since that 1 a.m. phone call. Just an hour ago, he'd been about to call her again. But as he was dialling her number, he realized that his pulse had quickened. And he'd recognized that sign for what it was. Anticipation. A joyful, aching, completely irrational eagerness to hear her voice. They were feelings he had not experienced in years, and he understood, only too painfully, what they meant.

He had quickly disconnected. And had spent the last hour in a deepening depression.

He gazed off towards the pier. By now the ship could be a hundred miles out to sea. Even if they located it, there would be a jurisdiction problem. He said to Lundquist, 'I want everything there is on the Sigayev Company. I

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