The Jake Helman Files Personal Demons (30 page)

That can’t be, he thought. Then he shifted his eyes to the camera and picked it up again. He turned on the camera’s power and its LCD screen lit up. Switching the screen to
VIEW,
he pressed an arrow button below the screen. Sheryl stared back at him. She stood petrified beneath the viaduct in Carl Schurz Park, wearing her black raincoat with her purse slung over her right shoulder. Jake saw the fear in her eyes. Why hadn’t she used the pepper spray he had given her? A teardrop splashed the screen.

Stop it! There would be time to grieve later, he hoped. He switched off the power, reached into his coat pocket, took out a tissue, and wiped the tear from the screen. Then he carried the camera into the kitchen, where he opened the cupboard beneath the sink, removed a bottle of cleaning solution, and sprayed the back of the camera. He wiped the photo with a fresh tissue, stuck both tissues back into his pocket, put the cleaning solution away, and returned to the living room. He did not want to leave behind any genetic evidence of his visit; Edgar Hopkins had proven himself to be a very thorough Homicide detective.

Sitting on the sofa, Jake examined a bag of cleaning rags. Then he picked up a long knife and raised its deadly blade to the light. Rotating it with his fingers, he saw no trace of blood. Still, he knew that the Cipher had used this knife to kill Sheryl. He set it down and picked up the final item, a strange-looking oxygen mask with a clear vinyl bag attached to it. A twist-valve separated the mask from the bag.

He laid the items out across the table, forming a literal chain of evidence, and looked at his watch: 2:05. He had been inside the apartment for forty-five minutes. Leaning back against the sofa, he faced a flat screen TV mounted on the wall. The same model he had in his unit back at the Tower. He reached inside his coat and removed his Glock and a black metal cylinder. Screwing the silencer into the barrel of the gun, he stared at his reflection in the dark face of the TV.

Tower remained unconscious, but his breathing had returned to normal with the aid of additional oxygen. He wore a hospital gown, and a blanket had been pulled up over the lower half of his body. Kira stood beside him on the platform, surrounded by Gavin, two other doctors, and three nurses. An IV bottle fed a solution into his arm, and several pieces of medical equipment had been stacked on top of the platform.

“He’s stabilized,” Dr. Jonas said in a Haitian accent. The tall black man wore thick-rimmed glasses.

“He’s in remarkable condition for a man his age,” Dr. Maloski observed, the island of scalp on the crown of his head as pink as his cheeks.

Gavin said nothing, grateful to have someone else around to take Kira’s heat.

“Yes, he is in remarkable condition,” she said. “No thanks to you three wise men.”

They stared at her with blank faces.

“When will he regain consciousness?”

Jonas shrugged. ‘“Where’s Old—’” Catching himself in mid-speech, he changed his tone. “Who knows? But I don’t recommend waking him. Rest is critical at this juncture.”

“Is all of the equipment you need to care for him on the platform?”

Maloski nodded. “Yes, I believe so.”

“Then I want him back in his room.”

“I think that’s a very bad idea,” Gavin said. “If you won’t let us transport him to a hospital, he should at least stay right where he is for the next twenty-four hours.”

“I only want to raise the platform to the next level. You’ll be observing him around the clock.”

Before Gavin could argue his point further, a buzzer sounded and Kira pressed a button on an intercom mounted on the wall. “Yes?”

Graham’s voice came out of the speaker: “Your guests have arrived.”

“Have Russel show them to the conference room. I’ll be right there.” “Copy that,” Graham said.

Kira gestured to the doctors. “All aboard, gentlemen. This platform is going up.”

The doctors looked down, making sure they stood on the platform.

“What about our nurses?” Jonas asked.

“We’re going to a restricted area,” Kira said. “There are three of you now. Surely one of you is capable of taking Nicholas’s temperature?”

None of the doctors responded. Kira pressed a switch on the side of the bed and the hydraulic lift raised the platform toward the corresponding space in the ceiling. Looking displeased, Jonas kept silent. The platform raised into Tower’s bedroom and came to a rest at its floor level. Kira stepped off the platform first as the doctors looked around the enormous room in wonder. A walk-in closet, sitting room, and bathroom extended from the walls facing the four-post bed in the enormous hexagonal-shaped room. An original Monet hung on one wall, overlooking a golden telephone.

“It’s like Xanadu,” Maloski said.

“You can take turns resting in the sitting room,” Kira said, pointing at a set of double doors. “I have to attend a meeting now. While I’m gone, you’ll be sealed inside this suite. If you need me, call Graham. I expect Mr. Tower to still be alive when I return.”

Kira and Russel sat facing Fortaleza and Villanueva at the large conference room table as Fortaleza signed a stack of contracts. When he had finished, Kira separated the contracts into three shorter stacks and handed one stack to him.

“How soon can you begin production?” Fortaleza said.

“We need ten days to incorporate some new design elements that I’m sure you’ll appreciate,” Kira said. “After that, we can start producing seventy Biogens a week. You’ll have your full order before Christmas.”

“Excellent. You’re positive shipping won’t be a problem?”

Russel said, “Exportation has already been arranged.”

Fortaleza smiled. “President Seguera will be most pleased.”

Russel returned the smile. “That’s what we’re here for.”

“Will it be possible for Mr. Villanueva and I to meet Mr. Tower before we return to our country?”

“I’m afraid not,” Kira said. “Mr. Tower is feeling a little under the weather this afternoon.”

“Nothing serious, I hope?”

She smiled. “Nothing that a little time won’t cure.”

M
arc Gorman returned to his apartment at 4:30. Disarming the alarm, he switched on the living room’s overhead light. He took off his coat and reached for the closet door. But as his fingers closed around the doorknob, the door burst open and he jumped back with a cry, dropping his coat on the floor. A man leaped out at him in a blur of motion, and the word cop flashed through Marc’s mind. Before he had time to react, the intruder brought the grip of a handgun down on his head, sending waves of pain through his brain. The man stepped to one side of him and kicked him in the ribs, propelling him across the living room. Marc sprawled out on the floor, and his attacker shoved the barrel of a gun in his face.

“Get up,” the man said.

Marc’s glasses had fallen off, but he didn’t really need them. He had perfect vision. Looking up at his assailant, he recognized the man holding the gun. The man the Widow had warned him about when she had assigned him his last mission, the man she had called dangerous. The same man he had seen looking down from Sheryl Helman’s apartment window shortly before Marc had killed her. Her husband. How had the cop learned his identity?

Gorman stared up at Jake with frightened eyes. Five pink lines striped his left cheek: fingernail scratches.

Good
, Jake thought. Sheryl had given her attacker something to remember. “Get up.”

Swallowing, Gorman got to his feet. He wore a short-sleeved polo shirt that revealed taut arms.

“Now turn around.”

Gorman faced the windows, his back to Jake.

“Lower the blinds.”

Gorman obeyed, darkening the room.

“Hands on your head.”

Gorman folded his hands behind his head.

“Move into the kitchen.”

Gorman hesitated.

Why did the cop want him to enter the kitchen? He kept nothing important there.

Helman shoved him with his left hand.
“Now.”

Marc moved forward, Helman close behind him. He heard the flip of a light switch and the overhead light came on, illuminating the ruptured remains of his briefcase on the counter by the stove.

“Turn around.”

Stopping short of the counter, Marc turned. Helman gripped the gun in both hands now, aiming it at Marc’s head.

“You’re making a mistake,” Marc said. “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“Bullshit. You’ve been a wrong number ever since you whacked your mother.”

Shock spread through Marc’s body, numbing his limbs. “What do you know about my mother?”

“I know that you strangled her with your bare hands.”

Where had Helman gotten his information? “It was a mercy killing.”

“Is that what you told yourself while you hacked her body to pieces and buried them under the swing set in your backyard?”

Marc said nothing. He had closed off the memories of his mother’s dismemberment years ago, at the Payne Institute. Now they came flooding back.

“You spent three years in an experimental institution owned by Tower International and now you’re Old Nick’s Soul Catcher.”

Marc’s eyes widened. Helman knew far too much about him. “I want a lawyer.”

Helman shook his head. “You won’t need one where you’re going. But I bet there will be plenty of them there.”

Marc stared at the gun’s silencer, sweat forming on his brow. His left eye twitched.

“My name’s Helman. Does that mean anything to you?”

Marc shook his head. “No. Should it?”

Releasing the gun with his left hand, Helman reached into his coat pocket and took out the oxygen mask with the vinyl bag attached to it. “Did you use this on my wife after you murdered her last night?”

A muscle leaped in Marc’s cheek. “You have to arrest me.”

Helman smiled, his expression remaining grim. “I’m not a cop. Not anymore, anyway. I turned in my badge days ago.”

Shit
, Marc thought. Why had the Widow put him in this situation?