Patient Zero

Chapter One Hundred Twenty-Four

The Liberty Bell Center / Saturday, July 4; 12:21 P.M.

HIS BREATH WAS as hot as the wind from hell and I recoiled from it, twisting in his grip, turning my hips as hard and fast as I could. I drove my knee up into his crotch and at the same time drove the stiffened tips of my fingers up under his jaw, crushing tissue and cartilage above the Adam’s apple. Another killing blow that I knew couldn’t kill him; but it jolted him so that his head jerked back just enough for me to hit him right over his left ear. Once, twice, three times, rocking his whole body with each shot. I could hear his neck bones grind with the third shot and then El Mujahid suddenly flung me away from him. Maybe when he felt his vertebre start to shift he realized his one vulnerability.

I landed hard and tried a back roll but I didn’t have the room and crashed into a filing cabinet so I ended up nearly standing on my head. My own neck sent a lance of pain through my shoulder and back, but I bit down on it, planted my palms on the floor, and hopped backward onto my feet. It wasn’t gold medal gymnastics but it got me right side up and I pivoted fast as El Mujahid rushed at me again.

The First Lady shot again and missed and then the slide locked back on the gun.

I knew I couldn’t keep this up. I was getting tired and I was getting hurt and this son of a bitch was immortal. He was a monster who couldn’t feel pain. Sooner or later he was going to wear me down and then he’d go to work on me with his teeth.

Across the room I heard someone howl in pain and couldn’t tell if it was Skip or Top, and I couldn’t spare the second it would take to look.

I crabbed sideways to circle him, but he lunged forward to cut the line. That was fine because as he dodged in I jumped sideways to pass him on his left. His sweeping grab clipped my ear and though it rang my chimes it didn’t stop me. I used the impact to spin into a sloppy pirouette that sent me halfway across the office toward one of the artist’s tables. At the far end of the table I’d seen what I wanted, but El Mujahid was already coming at me, his face almost black with rage and his teeth snapping as he rushed forward.

Rage, in an opponent, is a very useful thing. It makes smart people do stupid things. If you backpedal from the enraged attacker you simply get smashed against a wall and then he proceeds to beat you to a pulp-or, in this case, tear you apart with his teeth. So I didn’t backpedal; instead I went forward to meet him. Not chest to chest like a pair of bulls. I lunged in and down and tucked myself into a cannonball and rolled hard at his lower legs, hitting him full onto his left shin and clipping his right. With his greater upper-body weight and my two hundred pounds of rolling mass he went flying forward and smashed facefirst into a row of metal cabinets.

I came out of my roll, pivoted, and leaped back toward the artist’s table, grabbing at the item I’d seen: a big paper cutter that was bolted to the metal tabletop. I yanked the cutter arm up, grabbed the handle with both hands, and surged my weight to my right. The bolt that hinged the big blade to the cutter board was not designed for sideways resistance and the whole cutter arm tore off with a loud snap of broken fittings. I whirled and El Mujahid was already in motion, coming hard and fast, deadly and fearless, completely unhurt by the collision with the cabinets.

Again I rushed to meet him in the middle of his lunge, but this time I swung the big cutter like a sword, the curved blade whistling through the air. I caught him square, right on the left side of his neck, and the edge of the blade bit deep. The impact jerked El Mujahid to an abrupt stop and he goggled at me, his eyes and mouth gaping in shock. His fingers reached up to feel the heavy blade buried into muscle and tendon. It hadn’t cut all the way through his neck, but the very edge of the blade must have buried itself in the big man’s spinal cord.

Half an inch was enough.

His immense strength immediately began to melt away as his muscles lost all order and control. He dropped to his knees like a supplicant preparing to abase himself. Gasping for breath, I braced one foot against his body and then ripped the handle free in a spray of blood.

“You can’t stop the will of God ” he said with a throat that was filled with blood.

“This was never about God’s will, you stupid bastard!” I growled as I raised it above my shoulder and then with a scream of pure rage I swung the blade again.

The blade sheared all the way through what was left of his neck and the force of the swing tore the cutter from my hands. It buried itself point first in the linoleum floor and stood there, quivering.

El Mujahid’s head bounced and then rolled to a stop, his wild eyes staring with infinite shock up to the heavens.

I staggered back and almost fell.

The First Lady screamed.

Then I heard another cry of pain and turned, my body tingling with nervous tension, my mind reeling from what I’d just done, and I saw Skip Tyler coming toward me, a bloody knife in one hand. He looked at me, and then down at the terrorist. He smiled with bloody teeth.

“Well,” he said hoarsely, “aren’t you the goddamn hero.”

And then his eyes rolled up in their sockets and he fell flat on his face.

There were half a dozen pencils jammed into a tight grouping in his back, buried deep into the right kidney.

A bloody, trembling shape climbed up from behind the desk. Top was covered with cuts and painted with blood.

“Tough little son of a bitch,” he said. He coughed and slumped down to his knees, catching himself with one arm on the desk. The First Lady and I both rushed to him. She got there first and she helped him down into a sloppy sitting position. Her face was as flushed as his. I wobbled toward them and then my legs gave out and I almost fell. Top waved me off. “I’ll live, Cap’n. But gimme a second to catch my breath.” He lowered his head and sat there, dripping blood onto the floor. The First Lady stroked his hair and held on to him, both giving and taking comfort.

“Did you get him?” a voice asked, and I turned to see Ollie Brown peering up at me with one half-opened eye.

I tottered over and sank down beside him. He was in bad shape. I looked at Top and shook my head. Top winced and hung his head.

“Hey, kid,” I said, putting my hand on Ollie’s shoulder. “You hold on now.”

“Bastard blindsided me. O’Brien son of a bitch was the-” he began and then coughed bloody phlegm onto the floor. “I should have figured it out. S-sorry for letting you down.”

His voice was almost gone. I took his hand and held it just as I’d held Roger Jefferson’s, and like Jefferson, Ollie held on tightly as if through it he could cling to life.

“He fooled us all. It wasn’t your fault. If anything, Ollie,” I said, “it was mine.”

He shook his head. “Was it Skip? Was he the one?”

“Yeah.”

“You get him, too?”

“Top did.”

“He had that baby face.” He smiled weakly. “Guess guess it was easier to think it was me.”

“I’m sorry I ever doubted you, Ollie.”

He coughed. “Shit happens, Cap.” He tried to turn his head. “I can’t hear gunshots. Is it over?”

I listened and he was right. There was only silence from the Bell Chamber. I turned to look down at Ollie, wanting to give him some comfort, but for him it was already over. His eyes were open but he was looking into a whole different world.

I bowed my head and held his hand.

Behind me, down the hallway, I could hear new sounds. Running steps. Voices. It took a lot for me to raise my head and look as several figures rushed into the room. Bunny was first, his face streaked with blood and his pistol in a two-hand grip. Gus Dietrich was right behind him. And then she was there.

Grace.

Alive. All of them, alive.

“Joe!” she cried and rushed to me and I pulled her to me, down on the floor.

“We stopped it, boss,” growled Bunny, who was bending over Top, his face lined with concern.

Grace wrapped her arms around me and I held Ollie’s hand-a man I’d mistrusted and wronged-and I wept for all of us.