got closer.
‘Don’t you remember what I said?’
‘All of it.’
‘And about death being an escape?’
A rustle of fabric. He didn’t need to lower the beam to her hands to know she was reaching down for the metal contacts which would trigger the explosive bound around her torso. She’d used her time in the tunnel well, re-rigging the detonator attached to the cell phone so that it once again linked to those hand-held contacts.
‘There’s no escape this time, Mareta.’
He lowered the beam of the torch to her stomach. Her left hand was rigid by her side, the contact wire pinched between index finger and thumb. Her right hand was clenched into a fist, inching its way down to retrieve the other contact wire which dangled from her waist.
‘Stop,’ Lock said, the Sig trained on her.
She complied.
‘OK, that hand there’ — he nudged the centre of the beam at her right hand — ‘bring it up again.’
She began to raise it, away from the wire, her fist still bunched, hard enough that her knuckles showed white. Then, as her right hand came level with her shoulder, suddenly she whipped her arm back, and up. A sudden flash of steel as she launched the knife hidden in her hand at Lock.
The burst of light reflecting off the whirling blade proved enough to put him off as he took aim. His shot cannoned high and wide as the blade found its target, embedding itself high in his chest, a few inches in from his left shoulder.
Lock stumbled forward and fell, the knife thumping in an inch deeper as he hit the tracks, the Maglite rolling from his grasp.
He felt his grip on the Sig weaken. The pain in his chest was intense. Each pulse of agony stronger than the last.
The gunshot brought shouts from both ends of the tunnel. He picked out Ty first.
‘Ryan?’
He could hear the fear in Ty’s voice when the echo of the question met with no reply.
‘Ryan!’
The cavalry was on its way. Lock felt it. But it was nowhere near close enough to save him now.
He heard Mareta step towards him, looked up just in time to catch her right foot square in his face. His neck juddered back.
‘Why don’t we escape together?’ she said, her right hand fumbling for the other metal contact wire.
‘Ryan!’
Ty’s voice again, one among many. Lock wondered why it sounded more distant when Ty had to be getting closer.
Lock tightened his grip around the butt of the Sig as Mareta’s hand went lower, then suddenly reappeared with the other contact wire. Inches between the two wires now. The circuit almost complete.
He took a breath and tilted his gun wrist up as far as the joint would take it.
His finger forced the trigger.
The recoil jolted down his arm so hard that tears sprang in his eyes from the pain that spread across his chest.
The round caught Mareta square in the face, obliterating her nose, cartilage splintering across her cheeks. She rocked backwards on the balls of her feet, her arms splaying out to the side as she tried to regain her balance.
She fell on to her back and lay there. No flailing. No death throes. Arms outstretched, and legs together, in a curiously Christlike pose.
Ty was first to her. He took no chances, firing once into her forehead then once through the bottom of her throat, the angle of the bullet enough to sever the top of her spinal column but stay clear of any explosives. With grim satisfaction, he turned to Lock.
Lock pushed himself slowly to his feet. Ty did his best to push him back down.
‘Help me up, you asshole,’ Lock grunted.
‘You’re hurt.’
‘Yeah, and you’re ugly.’
Ty pulled Lock to a standing position as JTTF agents swarmed in all directions.
‘Back the hell up, for Chrissakes! Let the bomb unit guys through!’ Frisk shouted.
Ty regarded Mareta’s corpse without a hint of emotion. ‘Pretty smooth wet work.’ Then he saw the colour dissolve from Lock’s face. ‘Dude, you need some attention. I can live with ugly, but you’re gonna struggle with that shiv sticking out of you.’
Lock held on to his friend for support. ‘One more thing to do.’
‘They’re both dead,’ said Ty, exasperated. ‘We’re done.’
Lock fixed his gaze back down the tunnel, towards the light. ‘One final thing.’
‘You don’t come all this way on New Year’s Eve and miss this, do you?’ Lock asked Ty as both men stood in the centre of the triangle that formed Times Square.
Two paramedics hovered close by. Their repeated attempts to give Lock all but the most basic attention had earned them only a snarl and a demand for some morphine to tide him over. ‘And not that weak-ass shit I had before.’
The ball descended in silence from a pole mounted on the One Times Square building. Save for law enforcement and other emergency personnel, the place was empty. Everyone stopped what they were doing to watch its progress. As the mass of crystal reached the end of its journey, signalling the passing of one year and the birth of another, Lock slumped against Ty’s shoulder, barely able to keep himself upright.
‘Happy New Year, brother.’
Epilogue
At the edge of the group of mourners who had gathered for Janice Stokes’ funeral, Lock spotted Carrie. No microphone, no camera, here only to pay witness to a life lived and lost. Nearby stood John Frisk and a couple of other agents from the JTTF.
As Janice’s coffin was lowered into the ground next to her parents, he reached out and touched Carrie’s hand.
She half turned, and smiled at him. ‘They finally let you out then.’
‘Got the all clear this morning,’ Lock reassured her.
In truth, he’d spent most of the time since it all went down being briefed and debriefed by an array of government agencies. He’d quickly worked out the reason it was taking so long: they wanted to be assured of his silence on certain matters.
They needn’t have worried. Bio-terrorism was as much about inducing fear as death, and the way Lock saw it, fear wasn’t something people were short on. Not these days, anyway.
Carrie leaned into him. ‘Is it OK if I. .?’
‘Hundred per cent safe.’
She nestled her head in between his neck and shoulders, breathed in his smell, then kissed him gently on the lips. It made his heart thump inside his chest. Her hand fell into his.
He gave it a little squeeze and leaned in even closer to her. ‘I’m not sure people are supposed to make out at funerals. It may be considered inappropriate.’
They turned back round to face the graveside, still holding hands. On the other side of the grave, Lock caught sight of Don Stokes, sandwiched between two burly correctional officers. Don acknowledged Lock with a nod, handcuffs precluding a wave.
Don had pleaded guilty to his part in the exhumation of Eleanor Van Straten and was looking at two years. Cody Parker was staring down five and assured martyrdom status.
