The Survivor

Except one.

Number Six, the smallest of the crew, stood perfectly still, his head on a slight tilt, those patches of mesh staring directly up at the security camera. Staring directly, it seemed, at Nate.

Beneath the crisp folds of his T-shirt, Nate’s skin went clammy. The man’s quiet poise. No suggestion of what was to come. He might have been riding the elevator up to see a movie or visit a friend. That slender, compact build. The faint accent. He will make you pay in ways you can’t imagine. The threat recalled sent a blade of ice up Nate’s back. He was already dead, ready and willing to find the next opportunity to pull the plug himself. So why be scared?

Maybe because he sensed the promise hidden in that calm voice, the promise that whatever he would deliver would be worse than death.

Nate swallowed dryly and pointed at Number Six.

Riding down in the elevator, Abara said, “We’re gonna need you at the press conference outside.”

“Press conference?” Nate said. “So you’re gonna help ID me for the guys who want to kill me?”

“The media’s already dialed into the story. There’s a picture circulating the Web of you walking out of the bank carrying that little girl-looks like a Bruckheimer one-sheet. If we don’t trot you out, you’ll have media crawling up your ass for weeks. Smile pretty for the cameras, satiate everyone’s appetite, and no one’ll remember you by tomorrow.”

“The guy threatened me. Face-to-face. And I believed him. Whoever his boss is, I killed five of his guys and screwed up his robbery.”

“I doubt they’ll come after you. Bank robbers and cold-blooded murderers fit different profiles.”

“A comforting factoid.”

“I’d imagine not.” Abara removed a business card and handed it to Nate. “My cell’s on the back. Something freaks you out, anything you need, call me. And I’ll make sure LAPD has a squad car drive by your place at intervals for a few nights until the scare wears off.” Abara took note of Nate’s expression and said, “What do you expect? A Secret Service detail?”

“Nah,” Nate said. “If I get killed, I get killed.”

Abara’s smooth forehead wrinkled a bit at that one. They hit the ground floor, their footsteps ticking across the lobby. Abara spun them through the revolving door, and a wave of noise and heat hit them. Bodies and news crews everywhere. In the middle of a small clearing stood a podium. Before Nate could get his bearings, he was ushered forward to the bouquet of microphones, a police captain stepping aside. Nate blinked and gazed out. Above all else there were lights-bright lights that hid the faces of his interlocutors. Questions sailed out of the white blaze.

“When you took them on single-handedly, what were your thoughts?”

Nate moistened his lips. “I was just reacting to what was in front of me. I guess it took me thirty-six years not to think for once.”

“Did you have a mission plan in mind?”

There was a particular chagrin, Nate realized, in being taken more seriously by others than he took himself. “Point and shoot?” he offered.

A feminine voice from the back: “Were you scared?”

“No, not really. I was angry.”

“At what specifically?”

“They killed three people. Kicked a woman in the face. Seemed on the verge of shooting a little girl.”

Bass voice in the front row: “So you think they all deserved a death sentence?”

Nate said, “I think if I hadn’t shot them, they would’ve killed more people.”

“Yes, but still. There are laws.”

Clearly, the reporter intended to goad him. Nate thought about how in the past he might’ve responded with something appropriate. He sorted through all the replies he’d ordinarily think to make, the placating gestures, the tempered assurances. But then that feeling returned, the sensation he’d encountered as he’d floated through the teller gate, bullets carving the air around his face. Liberation. And he replied, “You want laws? Here’s a law for you. Don’t fucking rob banks and kill innocent people.”

A hush descended. A reporter reached over to her cameraman’s gear and clicked off the live feed. A firm hand hooked Nate’s waist, politely conveying him to the side, and then the police captain replaced him in front of the microphones. “I think that’s enough questions for the time being.”

Biting off a smile with perfect white teeth, Abara led Nate off. Once they were clear of the crowd, they nodded good-bye, and Nate went to find his trusty, rusty Jeep Wrangler where he’d parked it an eternity ago this morning. Climbing into the driver’s seat, he realized that he felt neither embarrassment nor regret over his final reply at the podium. He had said exactly what he’d wanted to. Just as this morning he’d done precisely what he’d needed to. No fear. No capitulation. No paralyzing self-scrutiny. He had-literally-nothing left to lose. He pulled on his seat belt, set his hands on the wheel, and the thought hit him: What a trite goddamned shame that he had to be dying to learn how to live again.

Chapter 9

Plan B: Nate would drive home and kill himself. Handful of Vicodin, some alcohol, a languid drift into the sweet hereafter. Given the press conference, news of his fake hero stint would spread quickly, complicating matters, making him answer questions he’d rather not. It would be best to handle business before opening up the whole can of worms with Janie and Cielle, especially since he’d managed to keep everything from them for this long.

After months with depression gnawing at his skull, he’d settled on a plan and had felt energized. Foot on the accelerator, a last burst of gas to take him over the cliff edge. He had to see it through now before he ran out of steam.

To fortify himself for what was to come, Nate stopped off at a diner for another last meal. The middle-aged waitress had tired eyes, crayon marks on the hem of her uniform, and a pale band of skin around her ring finger. “Triple-scoop hot-fudge sundae?” she asked. “That’s it?”

He smiled up at her. “That’s it.”

He savored each bite and left her a $207 tip-all the money in his wallet. Where he was going, he wouldn’t need it.

He was lurching between red lights on Wilshire on his way home when a dark Town Car pulled up beside him. It rolled forward, nosing dangerously into the intersection to bring a tinted back window even with him. He glanced across, sensing a presence behind it. Someone watching. A sheen of perspiration sprang up on his arms, the nape of his neck. He looked at the streetlight. Glanced back over. Menace emanating from that square of black glass. The tint was darker than standard, illegally so. The Town Car was too far forward for him to make out anything of the driver save a sliver of ear and an old-fashioned cap. He drifted up to get a better look, but the Town Car matched his movement precisely, pushing farther out into the red light, making a passing car honk and swerve.

He stopped. The Town Car stopped. That tinted rear window so close now he could reach across and knock on it. He rolled down his window and was proceeding to do just that when the tinted glass moved as well, lowering two inches. A hand emerged, a cigarette stub poking from between the index and middle fingers. A tattoo branded each knuckle, and yet the nails looked manicured, and three stripes showed at the wrist-pale flesh, cream French cuff, dark suit. The smoke reached Nate’s nostrils. The cigarette burned down, and the hand adjusted, a quick pulse, and pinched the cherry between the two knuckles. A wisp of black smoke-burning flesh-then the hand let the dead stub fall.

An echo from the bank vault played in Nate’s head, that accented voice: He will make you pay in ways you can’t imagine.

Numbness spread through his body, a stand-in for fear. Slowly he became aware of a cacophony of bleating behind him, the din of horns, and he realized that the light had changed to green sometime ago. He stood on the