Hellhound (17 page)

“Oh, no,” she whispered.

She felt the mastiff’s hot breath on the back of her legs a second later. She didn’t know how it had gotten behind her, but there it was, its teeth inches away.

“Bones?” she said, as calm as she could muster.

The German shepherd slowly got to its feet and turned towards Becca. The way its jaw hung down, its tongue lolling out between its bottom teeth, Becca thought the dog looked downright rabid.

“Come on, Bones,” she said, tears welling up into her eyes. “Not you, too.”

The shepherd moved up close and, when it was only a few feet from Becca, it began barking, its teeth bared. The little girl started to tremble as the shepherd stamped its front feet and lowered its head, clearly getting ready to pounce. Becca raised the gun and pointed it at the dog.

“Please don’t make me do this, Bones,” Becca begged. “I don’t want to shoot you! Come on, boy. Don’t come any closer!”

But the angry shepherd inched ahead, causing Becca to back up, her body pressing up against the mastiff. As she felt its weight on her skin, something changed in her mind, a synapse fired, a connection made where one hadn’t been before. She’d seen Bones try to fight the dog before and it hadn’t worked. The shepherd hadn’t been able to get so much as a tooth into the other animal’s thick hide.

She turned and faced the mastiff, looking into its soulless eyes. It stared back at her as dully as the night sky, without concern. She pointed the gun directly between the mastiff’s eyes only to feel a slight shift in her vision. Everything looked the same, but it was that same warped perspective, the same feeling that what was in front of her was an optical illusion.

Even more indicative was the subtle shift in the direction from which Bones’s barking came. He should be behind her, shouldn’t he? Then why did it sound like the barks were coming from something mere inches from her gun?

She turned back around and the optical illusion seemed to fall away. She was now facing Bones, but the sound of his barking was still coming from directly in front of her.

She turned and looked over the side of the bridge to where she thought the mastiff had been looking. Directly under her, she saw something black deep within the water. At first, it appeared to be moving, but then she realized it was an optical illusion. She moved her head one way or another, and the shape disappeared. Then she’d find it again, a large patch of darkness like a shadow at the bottom of the river.

“What is that?”

She turned from the angry shepherd to the impassive mastiff, but then back to the water. Everything about this was wrong. She ran through her options, finding little to recommend. But then a new one appeared. As Bones continued to inch forward, she tumbled over this new idea in her mind and finally made a decision.

“I’m sorry, boy,” she said to the shepherd.

And jumped.

•  •  •

Though the bridge was hardly the highest in New York, when Becca hit the surface of the water, it still felt like she’d been in a car crash. Her head shot back, all the air was forced from her lungs, and her legs felt as if they’d been torn off her body. The fact that the water was frigid was something she only noticed after a few seconds had passed and she’d clawed her way back up to the surface.

She had only been up for a moment before she came face-to-face with Bones, hurtling downward from the bridge, his snarling jaws aimed directly for her throat.

She took a deep breath and forced herself back under the dark waves.

Come on, Bones
, she thought.

She swam towards the dark shadow on the riverbed below. Even as she got closer, she still couldn’t tell what it was. There was a part of the river bottom that she could just make out, rocks and ridges, mostly, and then a part she couldn’t: a gaping maw with ill-defined edges, albeit vaguely in the shape of a circle.

She pushed herself deeper and deeper, feeling the burn in her lungs not unlike what she’d so recently encountered in the smoke-filled stairwell. She glanced back and saw the German shepherd still coming towards her, a trail of air bubbles floating away from his clenched jaws.

Even in the lowlight, she saw the fire in his eyes. She was his target. He wouldn’t stop until he’d killed her.

Keep coming
,
boy
.
Keep coming
.

She was within a few dozen yards of the black pit when she began to feel lightheaded, her arms and legs going to jelly as her strength began to ebb. She tried to see into it, but saw only darkness. Nothing lay beyond its mouth but black.

But still she pressed on. She forced her fingers to claw forward, raking the water aside as she went deeper. Her vision began to blur as well. She knew it wouldn’t be long now.

She turned and saw Bones approaching, but similarly running out of steam. He stretched his neck as if trying to take a bite out of her leg. She kicked a little harder and moved ahead, but that was the last of her energy. She was almost to the shadow when she felt herself going limp. Her momentum slowed as her body gave up. It was a welcome feeling, a weightlessness that swept all cares away.

She curled around and tried to see Bones one last time, but her eyes failed her.

That was okay
, she thought.

Then nothing.

•  •  •

“Kid!
Kid
! Wake up! Come on!”

There was a distant light, there was blue, there was a sick feeling, and then Becca threw up. Her eyes opened as water belched out of her lungs. She tried to hold herself up with one arm, but the strength wasn’t there and she collapsed back down, only to vomit again.

“Oh, my God!” cried a panicked woman’s voice. “Oh, my God!”

Becca felt a hand go under her back and lift her into a seated position. Her eyes finally began to focus, and she saw a woman in running clothes staring back at her.

“Oh, my God,” the woman repeated a third time, Becca having the presence of mind to think it a bit much. “Are you okay?”

Becca tried not to scowl. She thought this a ridiculous question.

“I saw you go into the water. Do you fall off the bridge?”

“Bridge?” Becca asked.

The woman pointed. “The Hell Gate. The train bridge.”

Becca stared at it for a moment before everything came back to her at once. “A dog! Did you see a dog?”

“Yeah! It jumped in after you. Tried to save you. I saw it when I dove in to fish you out. It was swimming for you. But then I lost track of it. Was that your dog?”

“Yeah,” Becca said.

“I’m really sorry,” the woman said. “He was a really brave dog.”

Becca nodded before looking back up to the bridge.

“You didn’t see a second dog, did you?”

B
ones was found a week later in Queens. He’d been skulking around behind a row of restaurants on Roosevelt, eating rats and garbage, when one of the local business owners finally had enough and called animal control.

It took a couple days, but a sharp-eyed veterinarian’s assistant who volunteered at the local shelter had heard from a friend about a police dog who’d been stitched up after a dog fight a couple of weeks before in the exact same area where this animal had been. She made a couple of calls and the presumed-dead shepherd was brought back to Manhattan. Once his identity was confirmed, he was put on the next plane back to Pittsburgh.

“Jesus Christ, Bones!” Sergeant Youman said upon picking up his partner at the airport. “You look like shit. That’s the last time I entrust you to the NYPD. Hope you slept on the flight. Got a guy downtown who claims he buried a couple of bums in Point Park. Pretty sure that’ll kill most of the morning.”

Bones just stared up at the sergeant until the officer sighed, jammed a fist into his pocket, and brought out a half-eaten bag of pretzels.

“How the fuck did you know?
Prick
.”

Bones licked his lips. Billy tossed him a couple. Bones swallowed these without chewing, so Billy poured the rest of the bag into his hand.

“Here.”

The shepherd scarfed them up then followed his handler out of the airport to where Billy had parked his truck at the curb.

“I dare airport security to give a ticket to a K9 officer. Seriously, you’ll bite their balls off if I ask you to, right?”

Bones glanced up at him expectantly.

“Ah. You’d do it for more pretzels. Well, let me see if I’ve got any in the glovebox.”

A minute later, they were on the Penn Lincoln Parkway, making good time back to the city.

•  •  •

“What happened to the dog?”

“I don’t know.”

“You didn’t see it?”

“No. It was on the bridge when I jumped off. It was gone when I came back.”

Ken sighed. “And you didn’t see it in the water?”

“Not at all.”

Ken nodded from his bed only a few hundred yards from the exact spot Becca had been pulled out of the river by one of the nurses at the hospital for the criminally insane that was currently housing the young man. It had taken two weeks of petitioning by social services to get Becca in to see him. It wasn’t until the threat of certain deviations from policy in Detective Leonhardt’s handling of her and her family coming to light were made that the police relented and allowed this one visitor.

“They said that you’re probably never getting out,” Becca said quietly.

“Do you know how many died because of me? Worse, you know that I killed two police detectives, right? They’ve got me dead to rights on both of those. Oh, yeah. That maintenance guy, too. Used the same thing on him as I did the detective.”

“Stop it!” Becca protested.

Ken shrugged. “What? Should I feel sorry for myself? I’ll have plenty of time for that when they put me in Riker’s or wherever they stuff folks like me. Right now, my entire focus is on finding you the right home.”

“Did you talk to Mrs. Drucker?”

“I did. She said all the right things. Just like you’d think she would.”

“And that’s a bad thing?”

“Did I say that?”

Becca went silent. There was only one thing she’d wanted to bring with her to show Ken in the hospital, the
New York Post
cover story on the discovery of Bones, a banner headline reading:
Drowned Hound Found!
She thought it would make Ken laugh, but the social workers who had driven her there said that it would be confiscated, so she should leave it in the car.

“What matters to me is what
you
think of living with your principal for the next few years?”

“I guess it’s okay,” Becca said. “I’ve been there a few days now. It’s all right.”

“Where is she?”

“Down in Chelsea.”

“She rich?”

Becca shrugged.

“What do you want me to tell her?”

“That you’re okay with me living there. I think she’s afraid of you.”

Ken snorted. “Maybe it’s better that way. She won’t fuck with you as much.”

Despite every doctor, orderly, social worker, and cop telling her she wasn’t allowed to do so, she reached over and hugged her brother tight.

“Excuse me, miss?!” one of the officers growled.

Becca hugged Ken for a second longer as if she hadn’t heard, but then broke away. “I’m sorry. I forgot.”

•  •  •

“Can we swing by the bridge?” Becca asked as the social worker’s car pulled out of the hospital parking lot.

“You really want to do that?”

“I think it would help with the healing process, don’t you?”

The social worker scowled, but took a right instead of a left out of the parking lot.

The actual bridge wasn’t accessible by road, so they had to park and walk over to it. Becca moved to climb onto the tracks, but the social worker shook her head.

“It’s dangerous up there.”

“Yeah, I know. I’ve been.”

“You can’t go up there!”

But Becca was already hurrying along the tracks at a deliberate pace. The sun was high in the air as she walked, reaching the bridge just as the social worker stumbled up onto the tracks behind her. Becca broke into a jog until she reached the center of the bridge. Once there, she stared down into the water.

“Wait!” cried the social worker, already panting. “Don’t jump!”

Becca tried in vain to see the dark spot under the waves, but she couldn’t see an inch below the surface. The sun was angled in such a way that the black of the river worked as a mirror, reflecting the bridge, the shore, the sun above, and Becca’s tiny silhouette.

The social worker reached the little girl and grabbed her shoulder so awkwardly that she almost pushed her over the side.

“Jesus,” the woman muttered. “What’re we doing here?”

Becca eyed the water one last time before turning away.

“Nothing,” she whispered. “We can go.”

With that, she turned around and began walking back down the tracks. The social worker stared after her, hopelessly confused, but could do little but follow her back to the shore.

Becca reached the car and waited, the woman unlocking the doors with a remote key. Without a word, Becca climbed into the backseat. As they drove away, Becca stared out the window at the passing trees.

“Why’s it called the Hell Gate?”

“I actually know that,” the social worker replied proudly. “It’s Dutch.
Hellegat.
Only, it has two meanings.
Helle
in Dutch means ‘bright’ and
gat
is ‘hole’ or ‘tunnel.’ But, of course,
helle
is also ‘hell,’ so it’s either a passage to hell or a passage to bright light, like heaven. When the first explorers discovered it, they didn’t know what was down that river. Eventually,
Hellegat
became Hell Gate.”

“That’s really messed-up,” said Becca. “Why don’t they change it?”

The social worker shrugged. “Do you know how many maps they’d have to change? How many street signs? Sometimes, people just let it go.”

Becca nodded idly, wondering how people could just “let go” of a place in the river named after an entrance to hell, but then thought,
Yeah, New York
.