Phoenix Heart (30 page)

The building had stretched since Andrew and I had first
walked its length that morning. At that time the hall had seemed no more than
perhaps 200 feet long. Now it stretched at least a quarter of a mile, perhaps
more. As I ran, I calculated. Let’s see, I run a nine minute mile, that means
it’ll take me more than two minutes to get to the end, and since they’re no
more than fifteen seconds behind me, that means I’m going to die and I never
told Andrew I loved him. And that, as I ran, seemed to be my only regret.

I heard the door of the stairwell slam open while I was
still in the open hall. I heard the szthwiz, then felt a burn on the surface of
my upper arm, a pull on the sleeve of my t-shirt, then the THWACK, and a puff
of plaster burst out of the wall ahead of me. Then I was around the corner, out
of the line of fire, and the front door was in sight. I didn’t even slow, but
crashed into the cross-bar and ran straight into the arms of a startled San
Francisco policeman just as I had run into the arms of an equally startled
playground supervisor so many years before.

“Stop! What? Who?”

“Behind me,” I gasped. “Gun.”

The policemen pushed me to the left, behind a pillar, where
the brick walls formed a small corner. Another policeman crouched behind the
pillar on the right.

He trained his gun on me. “Stay there!” he hissed. “Don’t
move.”

I nodded as my mind cried, Safe Place! and I shrank down
into it. I stared at the door. It was closing slowly, swinging shut
ponderously. I could hear footsteps pounding up the hall, growing louder.

“How many?” the policeman near me whispered.

“At least two,” I gasped.

“Two,” he said into the microphone on his shoulder and simultaneously
to his partner just as the door crashed open and Beer Belly ran out followed
closely by Short Blond.

“Stop!” both policemen screamed, guns leveled at the pair. “Police!”

Beer Belly skidded to a stop and Short Blond slammed into
his back. They both almost went down in a heap, and at the look of shock on
their faces, I could feel an hysterical giggle welling up.

“Drop ‘em!” screamed the cop near me. Beer Belly and Short
Blond flung the guns away as if the policemen’s cries had sent a flash of fire
through them.

“On your knees! On your knees!” screamed the other officer. They
dropped so quickly that they and the guns reached the ground at nearly the same
time. “Hands on your head! Interlace your fingers! Cross your feet at the
ankles! Do it!”

One of the policemen stood in front of them, his gun held
straight out in front of him in both hands. His partner moved up cautiously and
began to pat them down. I looked up and saw the door swinging closed again. I
pushed away from my corner and ran on wobbly legs, and slipped through the door
just before it would have closed and locked.

“Hold it!” screamed the policeman with the gun. “Stay where
you are!”

“Fourth floor,” I panted. “Front. There’s a man hurt, and
one of them is still up there.”

“Get back here!”

“No,” I threw back over my shoulder as I let the door click
into place and ran back toward the stairs.

My hair had come loose from the braid in my flight down the
stairs, and now, climbing back up, it kept falling in my face and getting in my
eyes. I tried to twist and fling it back, but I had nothing to hold it there
and it kept slipping forward again. I reached for the rubber band holding what
was left of the braid and noticed for the first time the blood on my left hand.
Small drops of red splattered across the steps near my feet. And then I noticed
that my hand was beginning to pulse like an infected tooth. When the bullet hit
the wood banister it had sent splinters slashing across my hand, some cutting
it, some becoming lodged in the muscle. I looked at it dripping blood, figured
there was nothing I could do, and so tried to ignore it.

When I reached the fourth floor, I stood on the landing in
the light from the security lamp, listening at the door, breathing through my
mouth, then eased open the door a crack.

The hall was empty and silent. The door of J.P.’s laboratory
was wide open, and a flood of light lit the end of the hall. The echo of a
voice floated down the hall, but the words were indecipherable. But if there
was one voice, I figured that it had to mean two people were alive. It had to
mean that. I edged out the door and skimmed along the surface of the wall,
bumping over a fire extinguisher and a drinking fountain, this time glad of the
shadows and the darkness, feeling now a part of that dark substance that I had
feared before.

“A minor set-back, my lad. Just a minor setback,” J.P. was
saying as I crept close to the lab. “Mr. Sheldon and Mr. Demming are quite good
at what they do. They’ll be back in just a few moments to confirm that they
have the book and that your little friend, Melanie did you say her name was? That
Melanie is dead and gone.”

“J.P.” The voice was weak, ragged, but it was Andrew’s. I
closed my eyes for a moment and sent a prayer of thanks heavenward.

“The audacity of the girl. Calling me--J.P. Harrison--a son
of a bitch!” He laughed. “Spunky. I can see why you liked her.”

“J.P. If you hurt her.”

I shivered at the sound of his voice. As low as it was, as
difficult as it was for him to speak, if I had been J.P., I would have run at
the sound of those words and not looked back.

J.P., it seemed, did not hear well. “My boy, my boy. Please.
Save what little energy you have left. The deed is done. You know she didn’t
have a chance against those two, just as you don’t with me. I hold all the cards…”
he paused and giggled, “as well as the gun. Hah!”

“No,” Andrew whispered. “No. She’s not dead. I would know.”

I crept closer to the door until I could just see around the
corner. J.P. stood with his back to me. A large man, bordering on fat, he still
carried his weight well. I had always sort of liked the way he looked in the
photos and talk shows I had seen, because though he looked the part of an
academician, it was a likable, harmless, fun-loving, one-of-the-regular-guys
academician. But looking at him now, looking from his red suspenders and
expensively casual clothes to his prematurely white, curling hair that he wore
rather too long, it was clear that he worked a little too hard to cultivate
that image.

I bet the s.o.b. plays Kris
Kringle at the country club every year.

“No, I’m quite sure she must be dead by now. I heard at
least two gunshots, and believe me, Mr. Sheldon and Mr. Demming don’t miss too
often. They didn’t miss you, did they?”

“She’s not dead.”

I shifted so that I could just see the corner of the island
counter past J.P., but I still couldn’t see Andrew. From the sound of his voice
he was somewhere behind that counter.

J.P. rocked back on his heels and waved his arm out. In his
hand was a revolver. “Now, don’t argue with me,” he said.

While carefully watching his movements, I slipped just
around the door jamb into the room and moved to the left around behind J.P. Andrew’s
arm came into view. From what I could see, he sat on the floor, leaning back
against the drawers under the counter against the far wall.

“The girl is history by now. But don’t worry. When Mr.
Sheldon and Mr. Demming get back, they’ll arrange for you two to see each other
again, real soon.” He looked at his watch. “I don’t know what’s keeping them.”

He started to turn toward the door, pivoting with his back
to me. I had no time to think, just to move, to leap for the island counter, my
heart beating in my throat, sure that he would see me, there was no way I could
make it, he would hear me, but he merely turned and craned his neck out the
door as I slipped down on the floor and pressed back against the drawers under
the counter, out of his line of sight.

“Your boys not back? Trouble J.P?” Instead of from around
the end of the counter, I could hear Andrew’s voice coming from my left. I’d
forgotten the pass-throughs under the island counter. Designed for storage,
they also formed tunnels to the other side. I began to inch toward the one
nearest me.

“No trouble,” J.P. said heartily. “After all, they’ll have
to clean up the mess after they take care of your little girlfriend.”

I eased back into the space, carefully lifting a cardboard box
of petri dishes to one side, wincing and nearly groaning out loud as the
fingers on my wounded hand tried to work.

“That is what she thought she was, wasn’t it? Thought she
was your girlfriend?”

I lifted another box—thankfully empty—and set it next to the
box of petri dishes.

“Isn’t that how you always do it Andy? Find these little
women and just wink in their direction and they just do anything old thing for
you?”

I shifted forward and Andrew’s hand, lying palm up on the
floor, came into view. I leaned until I could just see his face. He was looking
up toward J.P. with such a look of hatred and pain that it made me shiver. The
side of his face toward me was red and swollen where they had hit him. A cut on
his lip had bled down onto the brown shirt. Another cut on the left side of his
forehead had turned his sideburn red.

“Just do any little thing at all? In fact, they’d just die
for you, wouldn’t they?” He giggled again. “Get it? Die for you?”

Andrew’s eyes closed and he turned away. He opened them
again and looked straight into my eyes and I shivered again. He blinked,
blinked again and shook his head.

I placed my finger to my lips.

He started to move toward me, to say something, but
restrained himself with an effort that made him shudder.

“Can’t take the truth, huh Andy?”

Andrew didn’t take his eyes from me. He shifted around,
turning his head further away from J.P. and just stared at me. His lips curved
upward in the slightest smile. Thank god, his lips said.

I smiled.

“I said, can’t take the truth?”

Andrew ignored him.

“You listen to me.”

“I’m tired of you,” he said. He didn’t take his eyes from
me.

I made a circle with my thumb and forefinger and mimed a
badge on my chest and then pointed downstairs. Police, I mouthed.

“Where are they?” J.P.’s voice was getting higher pitched. “They
should have been back by now.”

Andrew ignored him.

“What are you doing? What are you looking at?” Andrew’s eyes
dropped to the floor and I backed quickly into the pass-through.

“You getting paranoid J.P.?”

“Shut-up. Just shut-up. This is all your fault. You had to
come up here, butt into my life. Try to ruin everything.” I could hear him
walking up and down, up and down. “Everything is perfect. Everything. I have
friends. Important friends. I have the clone; I have that company eating out of
my hand. They think I’m god, you know that? They treat me like royalty. Then
you’ve got to come up here and try to screw it up. Screw it up!” His voice rose
in volume. “Where are they?”

“J.P.,” said Andrew, “give it up.”

“No,” he shouted. “No! I won’t give it up. I won’t let you
win! You. You’ve always had everything you’ve ever wanted. Everything handed to
you--looks and brains and women falling all over you. You’re not going to beat
me this time.”

A new note in his voice, an hysterical, desperate note, sent
a chill over my skin. I pushed backward under the counter, eased out the other
side, and began to frantically look around for a weapon of some kind.

“I don’t think I’ll wait for Mr. Demming any longer.” J.P.
was trying for his old tone of nonchalance, but his voice had risen to such a
high pitch that it broke on the last word.

I reached up, twisting my arm up and over the edge of the
counter. My fingers closed on a small glass flask and I lifted it down and
began to awkwardly crawl toward the front of the room, my injured hand leaving
a smear of blood.

“No, I don’t think I’ll wait for Mr. Sheldon, or Mr.
Demming. I think I’ll just take care of this little matter myself.”

I rose. J.P. stood at the corner of the counter, the gun
pointing at Andrew. I could see his finger begin to tighten. I hurled the small
flask across the room. It exploded with a satisfying crash into a shelf of
glassware on the opposite wall.

J.P. turned toward the crash, swinging the gun away from Andrew.
I picked up a large, gooseneck flask and swung it at the back of J.P.’s head.

Somehow J.P. must have seen or heard something, because he
swung his arm up at the last second and the flask shattered on his elbow. He
turned on me. His face was scarlet, his eyes puffed to slits, sweat dripped
down the sides of his face. “You bitch!” he screamed and brought the gun
around. I tried to leap forward around the counter to grab the gun before he
could aim it at me, but that only worked in movies. I came to a trembling halt
as the gun stopped dead, aimed at my stomach.

J.P. grinned and his hand tightened. “Bye-bye,” he whispered
and the trigger moved back a fraction.

“No!”

We both jerked. Andrew stood on the other side of the
counter, leaning heavily against it. The flow of blood from the cuts on his lip
and face had dripped down leaving a long stain of dark red on the light brown
flannel of his shirt. I took an involuntary step forward. J.P. jerked and his
finger tightened on the trigger again. I froze, staring at the dark hole at the
end of the barrel.

“J.P., no,” Andrew gasped. “Don’t. You want me, not her. Let
her go.”

J.P. backed toward the open door. He began to shake his head
and the white curls surrounding his red face swayed back and forth until they
stuck in the sweat dripping down his cheeks. “I don’t think so.”

Andrew took an unsteady step forward and the gun swung from
me to Andrew. “Yes. Think, J.P. You can kill me and get away with it. I’m a
madman who blew up my own lab. I came up here for revenge. You shot me in
self-defense. But if you kill her, you’ll never get away with it. She’s an
innocent.” He took another step. “Let her go.”