SURVIVORS: a gripping thriller full of suspense (Titan Trilogy Book 2) (25 page)

“Where is she?”

“Where is who?” But Heilshorn’s face revealed that he knew where she was.

“Jennifer Aiken.” Brendan’s lips felt waxy and numb. “The woman from the Justice Department. She found out about you, and you took her.”

“She’s dead by now.” No remorse in the old man’s face.

“Where?” Brendan thumbed back the hammer on the revolver.

Heilshorn didn’t flinch.

“You own buildings in the city,” Brendan said. “She’s in one of them. Probably one that’s empty; maybe under construction. That’s your M.O.”

“You won’t do it,” Heilshorn smirked. He looked down the barrel of Brendan’s gun.

Brendan squeezed the trigger. One more shiver of pressure and the weapon would fire.

Sloane huddled against the door.

“Get out of here, Sloane.”

But she didn’t move.

Heilshorn remained stony-faced, his features contorted in a hideous grimace, but a runlet of sweat coursed down his temple. He swallowed. “She’s on Second Avenue. Second and Eighty-second. I wish you were dead. Just like them.”

Brendan leaned over the desk and put the gun to Heilshorn’s head.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN / Monday, 4:28 PM

She had seconds to live. She remembered hearing that the smell of a dead body was something a person could recognize even if they had never experienced it before – something deep and limbic within the system. An ancient knowledge.

There was another primordial experience like it; knowing you were going to die. The air became thinner, somehow, the skin oily, senses sharpened to crystalline points.

She struggled to use the tools she had developed throughout her life. She had her words, she had her knowledge. They were her only defenses, and they were now failing her. It was hard to think with an automatic handgun pressed to your head.

She’d offered Apollo what she knew about both Alexander Heilshorn and Brendan Healy. Yet there was still some connection Apollo had been relentlessly fishing to see if she had made – and if her department had made it, too.

Lebenslüge
.

She wracked her brain for what Agent Petrino had dug up on Healy. She knew his father had made some controversial moves at the end of his medical career. He’d become a kind of convert; his life had followed the standard trajectory of a cardiologist until the end, when he’d started publishing on the web about heart disease and preventative healthcare and alternative medicines. Was that it? Was Gerard Healy entangled with Alexander Heilshorn?

She had still been uncovering the records, but her instincts now told her that Gerard Healy had partnered with Alexander Heilshorn on investments, probably in medical companies like Titan Med Tech.

Titan Med Tech specialized in the types of medicines and procedures which treated the symptoms – putting its money into stents and arterial bypass research. Dr. Healy’s outspoken views late in his career would’ve no doubt rocked the boat.

The poisonous chemical that was winding its way through her body, causing dark spasms of pain in her arms and legs, stiffening her joints, making the back of her head – where she’d been struck by her captors – feel like it was a growing mass of needling insects, looking to burrow into her brain.

“Please,” she said to Apollo. She had come to the end of her resources. “Hurting me, killing me, won’t help you.” She nearly choked on the words, her throat was so parched, her tongue felt like it had been swabbed with wire wool. “It will only alert everyone. If I go missing, they’ll know why. There is a whole task force coalescing around Titan.”

A new expression broke over his emotionless features, and Apollo grinned hideously.

“You people just don’t get it. All that shit from history? Now there are real gods. This is not some myth, or whatever you want to call it, these are the realities, the predictions coming true. The Bible, Nostradamus; the Mayans. The Kali Yuga. The Titans? Part of life now. It all comes around. The shit I seen out there? It’s not just drones; it’s machines – terminators, man – invisibility cloaks. No shit. The Chinese made an invisibility cloak. These are the times, now. Revelations is upon us.
Lebenslüge
. You don’t know? Look me in the eye and tell me you don’t know.”

Some part of her which was still able to observe and think critically responded. It was absurd, having some sort of philosophical conversation under these conditions, yet here she was. She tried to conjure some spit. Her whole body ached and trembled. He held his weapon on her.

Lebenslüge
. It was a German word. She didn’t know what it signified.

“I don’t know. I’ve never heard that term. What I know is that the Olympians, the younger gods, overthrew the Titans in the Titanomachy.”

He narrowed his eyes and his grin widened. “Who do you think we are?”

“I think you’re poor suffering men who have been institutionally corrupted. I think you need help.”

Apollo threw his head back and laughed. In doing so, he pulled the gun away from her head. She could feel the indent it left. Then he straightened himself up and said more conversationally:

“You all say the same thing. You react the same way. You can’t stop it. No one can change it, no one can stop it. You fight with your Right and your Left, and it’s all mixed up. Oh yeah, you got your rednecks out there with their own TV channel, building underground bunkers and stockpiling weapons. We have machines more powerful than any soldier. We have total surveillance of everyone on the planet. What good are shotguns and freedom of speech going to be against drone strikes? You’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg. That’s all. One picture in the slide show. If I let you live, you’ll slip back into the life of denial that everyone else lives. Everyone who chalks this up to conspiracy, paranoia, whatever. Kill you? Would be doing you a favor. You should be thanking me.”

Her mind worked feverishly. She had goose bumps, her limbs throbbed. She was on her knees before Apollo, his gun pointed at the floor now. It was something. It was progress. “If you believe that, then what does any of this matter? Why does this coming of the end need your help? What does it matter what I know? What does it matter what Brendan Healy knows? If what you describe is inevitable, if the entire world is on its way to being one giant, fascist global market, why bother? Why do anything?”

Apollo grew somber. “Because there is no choice. You serve, or you die.”

“Why live? Why live in a world like this? Why would you go on?”

For a moment, Jennifer felt a tiny glimmer of hope. Apollo looked away from her and stared out the window, over the tops of the neighboring buildings.

“Because,” he said softly, “that’s
Lebenslüge
, in a way. Now you know.”

And a second later she heard it. It was faint, and it could have been for any number of reasons, but Jennifer thought she heard the sound of police sirens.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT / Monday, 4:35 PM

Brendan tossed Sloane his cell phone. He kept the gun inches from Heilshorn’s head.

“Dial 911. Give them that address. Tell them a federal agent is being held hostage.”

Sloane did as she was told. He listened as she spoke into the phone. There was a tremor in her voice, but she was efficient and clear. Brendan felt another surge of emotion for her, something like love, and then it was gone, drowned in the darkness that enveloped him.

“Do it,” said Heilshorn. Some of the menace had gone, but he still spoke in a growl. “Pull it.”

Brendan aimed the .38 at Heilshorn’s head. He felt the pulse of the scar on his face, as if the wound had come alive and were writhing beneath the surface of his skin.

He breathed. In and out. The air in the room was thick and still, recalling that hot summer two years ago when all this had begun with Heilshorn’s own daughter, dead in a farmhouse.

He leaned closer to Heilshorn, and pushed the tip of the .38 against his forehead.

Brendan had killed this man’s son, Kevin Heilshorn, who had grown up seeing God knows what. A kid so screwed up he hadn’t known who to trust, or where to turn. Law enforcement that couldn’t be relied on, leaders and politicians that couldn’t be believed. There was no telling the good guys from the bad guys.

Brendan pulled the gun away. The tip of the barrel left a red crescent on Heilshorn’s temple.

Brendan holstered the gun and stepped away from the desk. He backed toward Sloane, never taking his eyes off of Heilshorn, or moving his hand too far away from his weapon. Heilshorn could have his own firearm.

Brendan backed up until he was next to Sloane. He didn’t have to tell her to open the door. The two of them slipped out, leaving Heilshorn there, a small man with glaring, coal-pit eyes, behind that large oak desk.

* * *

Staryles weaved through traffic on the Henry Hudson Parkway, doing his best to drive tactically and not just start ramming the Cutlass into these stupid meat-bags all around him. He missed being in-country, and driving with a gunner riding up top, able to just pick off the people in the way. Things were a lot simpler like that. Staryles liked simple. He looked forward to a simpler future.

Heilshorn’s bodyguard had called to report that Heilshorn had gone into his top-floor office with Healy and the girl. Fine. Staryles was sure that Heilshorn had instructed the bodyguard to stay out of sight before bringing them up from the waiting room. The old man wanted to have a chat, Staryles could understand that – it had been a long time coming. Probably wanted to tell the detective about his wife and kid. Staryles hoped that would be enough for Heilshorn. Sometimes the old man didn’t know what was good for him. But that was Staryles’ job, to step in, to clean up; that was what the organization had hired him to do.

He told the bodyguard to grab them as soon as they came out of Heilshorn’s office. It was all offices on the top floor, and usually quiet. It would be the perfect time to take them, and wouldn’t make a scene. The bodyguard just needed to hold them long enough for Staryles to get there and deal with them both once and for all.

Staryles dodged left into another lane, and then back right, moving around an SUV that was hogging the road. In another world, he would’ve just had Parnell or Jackson thump that thing full of 50 cal BMGs, and watched it flip off to the side into whatever dusty pile of disgorged concrete was lying there alongside the road.

That world wasn’t so far off from this one anymore.

* * *

Two large hands clamped around Brendan’s neck and shoulders, grabbing him from behind, as he exited Heilshorn’s office.

A nurse and a doctor stood down towards the end of the hall, and an orderly was just stepping off the elevator when the bodyguard put Brendan in a hold.

“He’s got a gun,” boomed the voice of the bodyguard.

The woman at the end of the hall shrieked, and both she and the doctor dropped into a crouch. The orderly froze, looked around, and then stepped back into the elevator just before the doors closed.

The bodyguard’s hold was vise-like. His forearm around Brendan’s neck immediately cut off the air flow, and Brendan gagged. The bodyguard’s other hand clamped over the wrist of the hand that held his weapon. The cinch of the bodyguard’s mighty fingers tightened, and Brendan’s grip on the gun loosened. With his free hand he reached up and clawed at the forearm slipped like an iron noose around his neck.

His police academy training felt like a lifetime ago. Brendan remembered enjoying those days – working up a good sweat, learning a few moves; defensive holds, evasive maneuvers, and striking stances were part of it, but mostly he had benefitted from the cardiovascular fitness, feeling himself grow stronger and increase his endurance on mornings he would have ordinarily been slinking around inside the wasteland of another hangover. He hadn’t graduated top of his class – had only wound up somewhere in the middle of one hundred and twenty-two other candidates – but he’d appreciated the physical conditioning. The past two years, however, he’d let himself go, spending most of his time in front of the computer, subsisting mainly on junk food and soda. He was as out of shape as a flat tire, and he was no match for the bodyguard.

The revolver fell from his grip and hit the carpeted floor with a muted thud. Brendan’s wide eyes found Sloane, who was still standing in the doorway, not quite cowering, but certainly keeping her distance from the two men. Heilshorn appeared, standing just behind her. Brendan could see the mark on the old doctor’s forehead where he had pressed the cold steel of the revolver. It was already fading, but it was there. Heilshorn’s eyes shone with nothing but antipathy.

Brendan struggled, but the more he tried to break free of the bodyguard’s hold, the more the grip tightened around his neck. The bodyguard was sliding Brendan’s hand, behind his back, up towards his shoulder blades, wrenching the arm far out of its natural range of motion, threatening to snap the bones. Brendan stopped struggling. He was having trouble getting any air into his lungs. Spots, like confetti spinning at a New Year’s party, appeared in his peripheral vision. He was going to pass out.

Heilshorn pushed past the girl. She stood still, staring into Brendan’s eyes, panic-stricken. Brendan felt a surge of guilt that he had dragged her here – that he had pulled her into the middle of all of this.

Heilshorn stepped in front of him. He was shorter, so he looked up at Brendan.

Brendan had never been more aware of who – or what – he was. This man with his dead children, Rebecca and Kevin Heilshorn. This man who had once confided in Brendan how he felt God’s presence in his life though he was a man of science. This man who had a young girl – five years old – at home, his granddaughter, Leah, Rebecca’s little girl, who Heilshorn himself had delivered.

Heilshorn had managed to hide in plain sight, and then his daughter – maybe even in an unconscious act of rebellion – had gone and jeopardized the whole thing. Because when you thought about it, this whole thing had begun with that poor dead girl in the farmhouse outside Remsen. If it hadn’t been for her – or for her brother, Kevin – he wouldn’t be here right now, would he? And who knew; Argon might even still be alive.

But Argon was dead, and this man was to blame.

Brendan’s wife and child were dead – and, if he were to be believed – Heilshorn was to blame for that, too.

Heilshorn looked at the bodyguard. He jerked his head towards the office. Once inside Heilshorn’s den they would kill him. The bodyguard would break his neck, Brendan had no doubt.

He felt pinpricks of sweat form on his forehead and temples. His fingers were growing numb as the blood was cut off to his pinioned arm. The bits of confetti turned to a snow-storm of the stuff, chrome and silver twinkling, swarming everything in his vision as he began to lose consciousness.

Then Heilshorn turned and took the girl by the shoulder, trying to push her back inside.

But Sloane, who had been standing there in a kind of shock, immobile, expressionless, regained some life.

She slapped Heilshorn’s hand away and jumped away from him.

Unable to turn his head, Brendan tracked her with his eyes as Sloane ran down the hallway and toward the elevator.

“Goddammit,” said Heilshorn. He started after her, but he was slow.

Sloane saw him coming. She gave up on the elevator and headed towards the stairwell door, past the doctor and woman still crouched on the floor. The woman had her arms wrapped over her head, but the doctor was stealing furtive looks at what was going on. Heilshorn stiffly pursued Sloane.

The phone rang in Heilshorn’s office.

Brendan heard the first ring clearly, but the second ring seemed different, as if someone had submerged the phone in water. His consciousness was turning dark. He had only a few seconds left.

Mercifully, he felt the grip of the bodyguard loosen. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to draw a ragged, much needed breath, in a long, slow gasp.

Brendan heard the unmistakable bang of a heavy fire-exit door as Sloane entered the stairwell. Heilshorn stopped pursuing her near the corner of the hallway. The bodyguard’s grip gave way a little more, and Brendan took in another shuddering, grateful breath. His arm was numb behind his back. One more ounce of pressure and it would break. The pain was excruciating, but the air was ecstasy.

“You want me to . . . ?”

Heilshorn returned. His head was down, his eyebrows knitted together, his mouth silently working, as if chewing. “No,” he said, and raised a hand as he walked.

The phone continued to ring in his office. It started to sound more like a phone again, that low office-phone-tone, a kind of
bluhluhluhluh
. Brendan figured that the orderly had reported what he’d seen and someone was calling to check in, maybe even on their way.

Heilshorn shot a look at the people crouched on the floor. “Alright, alright,” he said, and he beckoned with his palms up, telling them to get up.

Brendan felt like laughing. The oxygen filling his starved lungs was making him high.

Brendan watched the people in the hallway tentatively start to rise, and he felt the arm around his neck tightening again, like a boa constrictor around its prey. The sense of giddy relief disappeared.

Heilshorn swept past, and back into his office. The bodyguard shoved Brendan forward into the same room. A clattering noise indicated the bodyguard was kicking Brendan’s revolver away. Then he closed the door behind them with a heavy thud.

* * *

Heilshorn snatched up the phone, catching it mid-ring.

“Hello.”

He was silent for a moment, listening. Brendan noticed that every line on the man’s face, every fold in his skin was showing. “Uh-huh,” he said into the phone. “No, we’re fine. My personal assistant has him subdued.” Heilshorn’s eyes found Brendan again, boring into him with bitterness and hate. “His name is Brendan Healy. Uh-huh. That’s correct. A private investigator; he showed me his ID before he took out his gun and put it to my head. He was with someone else – Sloane Dewan. Right. On her way down the stairs. She made some crank call to 911 while she was in the office. I think they’re both drunk or on drugs. Okay. That will be fine.” Heilshorn hung up.

The old doctor gave him a hawkish look. “We’ll deal with him,” he said, as if still talking to the person on the other line.

As Brendan’s vision swam again, his hearing becoming muffled, he found himself hoping for Sloane, hoping that she had gotten away. She was a smart girl, and she was resourceful. Still, Brendan didn’t know how many other goons Heilshorn had around the building. He was probably the most prominent doctor here, no doubt giving generously to the hospital’s charitable funds each year, smiling at all the glitzy ceremonies where the wives wore pearls around their wrinkled necks, and everyone sat around huge saucer-shaped tables in places like the Sheraton and Waldorf Astoria banquet rooms, with someone holding up a plaque, shiny and gold beneath the incandescent lights.

This was virtually his hospital, Brendan thought with a sinking feeling. Sloane might not get anywhere, and Heilshorn could do with Brendan whatever he wanted. Kill him right here in cold blood and claim it was self-defense and no one would argue. He even had eyewitnesses – the two people in the hallway would be able to testify that they’d seen a man come out of the office wielding a gun, and that Heilshorn’s “personal assistant” had been there just in time to subdue him. But, he wriggled loose, Heilshorn would say, and went for his gun again, and that’s when we had to stop him for good.

Brendan’s eyelids fluttered as his consciousness waned. Maybe the end was meant to come like this, with the life literally choked out of him. Or, maybe Heilshorn would shoot him, just because the old man wanted to feel the steel kick in his hands, watch the blood soak into his expensive carpet.

As the darkness closed in this final time, Brendan thought back to all the mornings of the past two years. Mornings he’d woken up with nothing to live for. Remembering the smell of the exhaust, that sharp gasoline scent, that metallic odor of the carbon monoxide. That smell somehow lingered each morning as he finally got out of bed and made coffee without sparing a glance at those goddamned snowcapped peaks of the Medicine Bow Mountains.