Hack, p.16
Hack, page 16
41.
It was still dark. I wasn’t running. I was sitting on the ground, my back against the front tire on the driver’s side of the cab, my legs straight out. The dented taxi, its lights and engine off, ticking, was parked in a woody spot, on an asphalt walking path, not a road. My head was pulsating with pain. I reached up to the back of my skull with my left hand and felt wetness on my palm. Blood. My Houdini from the moving cab had ended with me thumping my head into something hard. If Molloy had shot me, I wouldn’t be waking up. But, unlike with Leslie, I had no element of surprise and no chance to move fast. I started to seriously re-evaluate my no-gun pledge, as I slowly drew my legs in and braced my left hand on the pavement.
“Don’t fucking move, asswipe!” Molloy said in a hushed voice from the dark. “And keep your voice down.”
I froze. I didn’t remember saying anything, loud or otherwise. He had me. He was visible as an outline against the moonlight coming through the trees. In the distance a skyline of high-rise buildings glittered, a horizon of black teeth studded with diamonds.
Matt was scared and he was pointing his gun at me. For some reason, he was afraid of noise. With his other hand he held his crotch and jogged from one leg to another, obviously in pain.
“Sorry about toasting your balls but you’d do the same thing if somebody tried to kill you,” I said loudly.
“I said keep your voice down or I’ll fucking blow your brains out!”
“That would be even louder,” I explained.
“Shut up. Who said we were going to kill you? We wanted to talk to you, get you to tell us what you’re doing. Now you’ve screwed everything up. Everything. You got no fucking idea, asshole.”
“Tell me.”
“I’m asking the goddamn questions, dickwad. What are you up to? Tell me now or I’ll fucking murder your ass.”
I detected sniffling. Was he crying? For Leslie?
“Sorry I had to kill your friend Jack,” I tried.
“You fucking bastard! How did you do it? You moved so fast I couldn’t see what happened. He was good. How did you turn his own gun on him?”
“I didn’t. I had a composite blade in my tie. I stabbed him once in the heart. It was quick. He didn’t suffer. Sorry, self-defense.”
“You had a knife? And a fucking firebomb? Where?”
“No. The knife burns. That’s what I threw on your lap.”
“A burning knife? I didn’t find no fucking knife.”
“Because it burned.”
“They were right, you’re not a dog dork. You’re some kind of Special Forces killer, right?”
“Actually J-SOC. Not Delta. Working to keep America safe. Who are they—Badger and Edgar?”
“You didn’t have to kill him,” Molloy sniffed. “We weren’t going to kill you.”
“You mean not right away,” I corrected him. “Not until after I talked.”
He didn’t deny it.
“Anyways, now I gotta kill you.”
“That would be incredibly stupid, Matt.”
“Don’t call me stupid.”
“Okay. Since you’re not stupid, you know you were seen, Matt,” I told him, improvising, hoping it was true. “You were caught on camera. Long lenses, night vision, the whole deal. They know who you are and are looking for you now. Remember the picture in the Daily Press of me with the fed? They’re waiting outside your place right now. Maybe inside, too.”
“Fuck,” he groaned, massaging his groin.
He believed me. I wished it were true.
“You and Leslie sent the text to me, pretending to be Aubrey.”
“Duh. And you called the cops? We didn’t see them.”
“I told the feds. Was NYPD there, too?”
“Yeah, I bounced off one marked blue-and-white car and one unmarked one. Fuckers shot at us. With a hostage. That’s not right. This has been so sweet for so long, I can’t believe it. I’m totally boned.”
“What about the other ones, Molloy?”
He was silent.
“The smart move is to walk away. Take off or get a lawyer. Blame it on me.”
“That’s what I’m doing,” he giggled. “This here’s Jack’s gun. I put it back together. He shot you, not me. I didn’t know you guys was gonna kill each other.”
“Molloy, you didn’t kill anybody. You can say you thought the cops were drug dealers or something.”
“I can still say that. Don’t need you.”
“But they will know you fired a gun. The forensics will be all screwed up and they’ll come down on you. You can’t kill an undercover and get away with it.”
“I knew it. You’re working for the cops.”
“Yes I am,” I lied. “Agent Shepherd. Put down the gun and we’ll work this out.”
His gun hand wavered and slowly lowered halfway, like it was very heavy.
“I’ll make you a good deal, Matt.”
“I can’t go to jail again.”
“No jail. You just lay out the whole thing and you’re good to go,” I told him, standing.
“The whole thing?” he asked, suddenly suspicious. “You mean all of them? Everywhere?” Damn.
“Forget that for now. Let’s just start with the Joyce case and worry about anything else later,” I assured him. “No problem, we’ll just—”
“No fucking way! If I rat they’ll kill me. He’s got billions. You have no clue. These people are serious as a heart attack. NO!”
“The Witness Relocation Program is…”
The gun came up again. I rambled on but he wasn’t listening. I reached into my left pocket and felt the lighter. My thumb moved the butane setting to high.
“On your feet.” His weapon was centered on me. “Move to the back of the cab.”
I saw he had the trunk open. I almost flicked the butane onto steady flame and tossed it into the open driver’s window but I hesitated too long.
“Get in.”
“No.”
“Get in or I’ll shoot you.”
“That would be very loud, and a very big mistake.”
“I just want to put you in there, so I can get away. I won’t shoot, Agent Shepherd. Really. Get in and pull it closed. You’ll see.”
I didn’t believe a word but my only choice was to rush him and that option would probably end with him putting at least one round into me before I could get to him. I left the lighter in my pocket, ducked into the open trunk, pulling it closed by the dangling glowing open-the-trunk cord. Even darker inside. No air. I fired up my lighter. I was in a deep box lined with dark felt-like material, the trunk rug. There was a horizontal ledge above me, under the rear window, that held a full-sized spare tire. I sat up and leaned toward it. The inflated tire was held in place by a steel rod secured by a steel plate, itself held over the metal center rim with a large wing nut. Excellent. I put the lighter away and worked in the dark. I spun the wing nut off and put it in my other pocket and put the metal plate aside on the shelf. I had to shift the tire to unhook the steel rod because it was hooked to the shelf underneath to hold the heavy steel belted radial in place. I hit my light again. The steel rod was about nine inches long and solid, a weapon.
The trunk thumped loudly. Molloy was kicking the outside of the trunk hard, over and over, laughing about how I should try to get out of that. He was deforming the area around the lock, so I couldn’t open it. Why? I could think of at least one bad reason. I ignored his ranting and got busy. While he was denting the trunk shut, I pulled the tire off the shelf and curled into the fetal position in the main trunk well under it. Thank God for a full-size American spare tire, not some tiny donut spare. I got as much of my head under the center metal rim as possible and worked my way as far to one side as I could. I had to bow my head painfully to get it under the rim and I couldn’t tell how much of me fit underneath. The thumping stopped. Then Molloy tried to open the trunk. It was jammed solid. I wondered how long I could stay this way.
“You hear me, Agent Asshole?”
I didn’t answer. Why give him a better idea where my head was.
“Okay, play dead. First, I’m already in Witness Protection. Second, fuck your deal! Fuck you! This is for Jack.”
I felt the first shot hit the tire and me like a hot hammer, the steel belted radial screaming and howling like a banshee as its air escaped. Or was that me? The shots came fast and loud. I could feel the rounds impacting, one after the other as they perforated the trunk more than a dozen times, half of them slamming me, some clanging the metal rim over my head like a bell, blowing me away.
42.
I was fuzzy all over, crushed in the dark, wet, dripping with pain. My head and arms and legs were slimy. I tasted blood coming out of my nose and mouth. My eyes burned, which is what happens when blood gets in your eyes. Not good. Some jerk was making noise, ranting, hooting, hurting my head. I wasn’t supposed to talk to him.
“Still got ears, Agent Asshole?” the jerk demanded.
Shit. Molloy. Trunk. Jammed. Bullets.
“Who’s stupid now? Who’s dumb enough to bring a knife to a gunfight?”
Molloy waited for an answer but I kept my mouth shut. I began to choke on blood and I quietly opened my mouth to breathe. I began moving my body carefully under the dead, deflated tire. It was hard to separate me from the tire; it clung like a porcupine, quills dug into my flesh. Everything hurt. I was hit in both legs, one arm and the head and no medic in sight. I slowly shuffled off the treaded tire and rim with my good right hand. I felt it rip my skin, like it was part of me. I painfully pulled out the lighter and flicked it on. It was like a blowtorch in a casket. My pants from both knees down were shredded and bloody, as was the skin of my left arm below the elbow. I could feel new wounds on my face and head. I tried wiggling both toes, which resulted in surges of hot pain that took my breath away. My left arm had two holes with a spider pattern of cuts radiating outward for a few inches, all oozing blood. I tried touching it with my right fingers. It was wet, sticky, and ripped up, like a shrapnel wound. Damn. Maybe Matt was using exploding ammo. When I rolled my head for a closer look, everything spun, including my stomach. I smelled something sharp and familiar. Gasoline.
I stopped moving and shut off the flame but held tight to the lighter, waiting for the spinning to stop. I closed my eyes. The bullets had hit the gas tank under me. I was curled on top of fifteen gallons of flammable, dripping 87-octane gasoline. I could see it in my mind’s eye, dribbling onto the asphalt, pooling under the car, ready to burn. If he was using exploding rounds, why didn’t they ignite the tank? I opened my eyes in the dark. A ghostly green man swung back and forth in front of my eyes. I reached out and grabbed him. It was the florescent plastic tag hanging from the trunk release cable. Not a ghost. I wanted desperately to yank on it and open the trunk and get out but I remembered Molloy kicking in the trunk surface. It wouldn’t work. Also I was playing possum. Bleeding possum. I let the green ghost go.
I took a deep breath and nothing got worse. I took another. The pain lessened when I didn’t move. Okay. Concussion, wounds on lower legs, left arm, head. Still breathing, heart still pumping. The clock was running. I had to get out of this tomb and I had to get to a hospital. I held my breath as I flicked the lighter into flame again but I didn’t blow up. The only way out was through the trunk wall and into the back seat. But not until Molloy was gone. Otherwise he’d just have a clear shot at me. How long could I wait until I bled to death? The vertical trunk wall was covered with a fake gray felt board and did not look too hard to break. But what was behind it? A steel frame and the back of the back seat, probably. I shut the lighter off and rested in the dark again. My green friend returned, floating still and silent. He seemed to be pointing at something. The way out of the trunk. I ripped my pants legs off and wrapped them around my bleeding leg wounds. I pulled off my shirt and did the same bandaging thing to my left arm.
That was when I smelled smoke.
“Still with me, asshole?” Molloy yelled outside, giddy. “Check it out, bro. You like fire so much, I used your fancy tie in the gas tank. Burns real good. Gonna toast your balls now, fuckwad. How you like that? Then I got more fun for you. Hold on, war hero!”
Smoke was seeping in. It was getting hot.
Time to go. I crawled up into the three-foot deep horizontal shelf that had held the tire. I used the metal rod to rip at the wall between the trunk and the back seat. It quickly came apart. Behind it was a framework of solid metal, steel beams. I ripped at it with the rod. Nothing. I banged the steel, used the rod like a crowbar to bend the bars of my cage. I punched it. Nothing. It was broiling and I began choking on the smoke. I could hear Molloy laughing beyond the flames and smoke. I kicked at the wall. Nothing. Then I sensed motion. The car was rolling, picking up speed. But I could still hear Molloy cackling behind me. He wasn’t in the car, which was on fire and rolling downhill. Toward what? The speed fed the flames under me, the floor of the trunk as hot as a skillet. I wanted a fire extinguisher but I already knew there wasn’t one in my trunk world. I continued my attack on the wall. Then I floated, like the car had taken flight. Everything flipped over upside down, banging me around in the trunk. It righted just before smashing into something. The hissing cab bobbed and began a gentle spin. It was cooler.
The fire was out.
Before I could celebrate, the front of the cab nosed lazily down and I heard and felt cold water cascading in from all sides. The cab was floating in water but not for long. I was locked inside a steaming two-ton boat with a heavy engine and open windows. Titanic Taxi. I tried to think. Panic was bad. I tried my lighter. The cab headed down. I felt a shower on my head, extinguishing my lighter. Cold water was squirting in through Molloy’s bullet holes. I felt blindly around the edges of the back seat wall, Houdini looking for a way out. I tried left and right and front and down. I was so tired. Think. What haven’t I tried? I dove desperately for my glowing green man and pulled his trunk release cable for all I was worth.
Nothing.
I let him go. Now, my green buddy seemed to be pointing toward the back seat.
What else? There’s always something else. Up. I didn’t try up. I sloshed water up to my knees and crawled into the tire shelf again. This was it. I punched up, behind the rear seat, behind the rear window. Nothing gave. But it sounded different, hollow. I slammed my fist up into the rectangular panel. Was it giving or was I nuts? I had no leverage, no time. I painfully crawled my whole body into the small shelf space, bracing my back up against the top of the space. I pushed against the bottom with all the strength in my arms and legs, screaming with pain. The water was now lapping against me. Then I felt it on my back and I was drenched. I jumped up and was completely underwater. Something gave way and my head and shoulders popped up. I felt jagged glass and fought and kicked and twisted. My knees hit steel and I pushed off with my wounded legs.
I broke surface and grabbed air. I was out.
There was a ring of dark trees and fuzzy spots of light, tall buildings behind branches. A lake in Central Park. I tried to swim but my arm and legs hurt too much, the wet clothing bandages dragging me down. My shoes were gone. I dipped under the surface several times but kept going. Can’t be far. A half-assed dogpaddle worked, until my shoulder hit a rock. I stood up in a muddy shallow and immediately fell down. I crawled until I was on solid ground. It stank of slimy duck droppings. Drowsy dark birds on either side of the shore muttered, edging away from me, gossiping about the large bleeding guy who had no bread. Slowly I sat up. On the hill above me, dark shapes. A predatory van with no lights on and a shadowy someone standing next to it.
* * *
Shit. Molloy was still there. My metal rod was gone. Maybe he couldn’t see me in the dark. Why didn’t he leave? All that shooting, cops should have come. But they didn’t. Maybe this happens every night in Central Park. I froze. The figure did not move. If it wasn’t Molloy I should yell for help. But if it was him, he’d come down and finish the job. I had nothing left. While I debated what to do, the figure got into the van and vanished into the dark. I waited for Molloy to take another crack at me but he didn’t come. Run, motherfucker.
“I’m alive,” I said out loud. I sounded strange. Overkill, that was Molloy’s mistake, I decided. He could have just shot me or he could have burned me or drowned me but the jackass did them all together. Overkill led to underkill. Right.
I crawled achingly toward the light.
43.
My ghostly green buddy was gone and I was bathed in bright light in a hospital bed, pale faces hovering above me. I was bandaged and ached everywhere except my torso. Actually, that hurt, too. Mary Catherine moved closer on one side, Izzy on the other. Both began talking at once. They stopped and each apologized and invited the other to speak. I couldn’t wait.
“Did you get him?” I asked Mary Catherine.
“Matt Molloy?” she asked.
“Who else?”
“No. Your friend Jack Leslie was behind the wheel of the cab at the bottom of the reservoir. Not surprising he drove off a cliff, him being so dead.”
“Molloy is in the wind,” Izzy continued. “We’re looking.”
I asked how long I had been out.
“A day and a half,” Mary Catherine said. “They kept you doped up while they removed about ten pounds of metal from you, bullet fragments and shredded steel belting and rubber. You lost a lot of blood. You’re a tetanus test case.”
“I have to ask,” Izzy interrupted. “Matt Molloy did this to you, right?”
“Fuck, yes,” I answered. “He fired through the closed trunk. Thank God for American-made steel belted radials.”
“Not a very good bulletproof vest,” Izzy observed. “Really ripped you up.”
“Best I could do on short notice. Now the rest of me matches my face,” I said to Mary Catherine, gesturing to my facial skid marks. “Tell me you got the bastards.”
