The Select

'Do it!' Elliot's voice cracked on the first word.

Southworth's face looked more annoyed than anything else as he removed his revolver from the holster and placed it on the counter.

'Take it, Chief,' Elliot said, then he glanced at Alston. 'And now I want to know what's gone down here. When I went up to Fifth a little while ago, everything was under control. I come back down and there's a dead guy in Monitoring'—Cleary moaned and began to cry on Crawford's shoulder—'and I find Kurt on the stairs with a chewed up ear and a broken neck. What the fuck's happening?' He glanced back at Verran again, then at Southworth's .38, still on the counter. 'Go ahead, Chief. Take the gun.'

'I don't want it.' As Elliot stared at him wide eyed, Verran said, 'It's over, Elliot.'

'No way!' he said, shaking his head violently. 'I'm not going back inside! We can...'

And then he ran out of words as he finally realized what Verran had known the instant he'd seen Quinn Cleary dash into the lobby.

'No,' Verran said softly. 'We can't.'

Alston was moving. He reached around Verran and picked up the .38 by the barrel.

'Louis is right, Elliot,' Alston said. 'The dominoes have begun to fall.' He turned to Southworth and lifted the gun. 'I'm going to borrow this, deputy. You may have it back in a few minutes.'

He strolled to the stairway door and made his exit.

Fright and confusion swirled across Elliot's face.

'What's he—?'

Verran jumped as a single gunshot from the other side of the stairway door answered his question.

'Oh, shit!' Elliot said.

And then he was running for the front doors.

Before Elliot was through them, Southworth had his radio in hand and was calling for back-up, emergency medical assistance, and putting out an APB on Elliot. As he returned the remote to his belt, he jabbed an index finger at Verran.

'Stay put.'

Verran could only nod. His whole world was falling apart. He wished he had the guts to end it like Alston, but knew he'd never be able to pull that trigger.

Strangely enough, his stomach didn't feel so bad right now.

*

With Matt at her side, Quinn crowded close behind Deputy Southworth as he headed for the stairwell.

'We've got to get to Tim,' she said.

He couldn't be dead. She didn't care what Elliot had said, Tim was alive. He was alive.

She kept repeating the phrase, hoping that would make it true.

The deputy opened the door, looked into the stairwell, then closed it again. His face was a shade paler as he turned to them.

'We'd better take the elevator.'

Quinn clung to Matt as the deputy used her security card to take them down to the basement. A residue of the overwhelming joy she'd felt upon finding a familiar face in the Science Center lobby still trickled through her anguish for Tim. She couldn't get over Matt's being here. How had he managed to come so quickly? Not important now. She'd find out later. Right now she had to get to Tim.

'How was he when you left him?' Matt said.

'He...he wasn't moving.'

Deputy Southworth's expression was grim as the car stopped and the doors began to slide open.

'Maybe you'd better let me—'

Quinn slipped through the doors as soon as the opening was wide enough to let her pass. She wasn't waiting for anybody.

She ran to the room where she'd been a prisoner and skidded to a halt at the door. Tim lay huddled against the angle of the wall and the floor, his back to her, one arm splayed out at an unnatural angle. He was perfectly still. She couldn't see his chest move. There was blood...

She screamed. 'Tim!'

The body jerked, the limp arm stiffened, the thumb and pinky finger straightened, and waggled back and forth.

Quinn didn't know whether to laugh or to cry as she knelt beside him and slipped her arms around him.

'Oh, Tim.'

TWENTY-FOUR

'Just a couple more questions,' Deputy Southworth said.

Quinn fidgeted in her seat behind the counter. The police had taken over the security desk as a command center.

'Okay, but just a couple.'

She was anxious to get over to the hospital and see Tim. The EMTs had wheeled him out of the basement on a gurney. He'd looked awful. She wondered how his x-rays had turned out.

Matt had gone along with Tim, and after they were on their way, the people from the morgue had removed the two bodies from the stairwell. The State Police led Louis Verran away in handcuffs. New nurses were brought in to care for the patients in Ward C. Things were settling down. Quinn had wanted to go with Matt and Tim but the deputy needed a statement.

'Now...is there anyone else you can think of who might be directly involved in this?'

'Only one.' Quinn's throat constricted as the thought of him. 'Dr. Emerson. He's over in the faculty building. Or at least he was.'

She told him what had happened in his office.

Deputy Southworth stopped writing.

'Dr Emerson...first name Walter? Old guy?'

'That's him. Why?'

'He came through here shortly after we arrived. Took the elevator. Does he have an office upstairs?'

'A lab. On Fifth.'

'I wonder why we haven't seen him. We've had people all over the fifth floor.'

'He's probably locked in his lab.' With the other rats. 'But...' Quinn fished in a pocket for her key ring, then held it up. 'I have the key.'

She rose from her seat and started for the elevators.

'Wait a minute,' Deputy Southworth said. 'I'll take those.'

Reluctantly, Quinn handed over the keys.

'All right,' she said. 'But I'm going with you. I want to be there when you arrest him.'

Southworth smiled as they stepped into the elevator. 'You've really got it in for him, don't you.'

Quinn nodded grimly. She saw nothing amusing in his betrayal. She had put her life in Dr. Emerson's hands, and he'd handed her over to her executioners.

On Fifth, she led the deputy down the hall to Dr. Emerson's lab. The Christmas decorations on the walls and doors seemed hollow now, devoid of any warmth or meaning, almost sacrilegious. She stood close by Southworth's shoulder as he unlocked the door, and edged in behind him as he stepped through.

'There he is,' she said as she saw the familiar figure sitting at one of the computer consoles. 'That's him.'

She slipped past Southworth and approached Dr. Emerson from the side. He didn't look up.

'It's all over, Dr. Emerson,' she said, fighting the tears that sprang into her eyes, angry at her voice for teetering on the rim of a sob. She was supposed to be angry, vindictive. Why did she feel so sad? 'It didn't work. I'm still around.'