There’s no way out.
Hope abandoned him. He prayed that they would die from smoke inhalation before the fire took them.
“I’m sorry,” he said in a breathless whisper.
“For what?”
“I can’t save you. I failed. I failed everyone.”
She smiled down at him and chuckled. “You remind me of my husband. He always had to be the hero, and he never understood either. Winning doesn’t matter. It’s not whether you win or lose. It’s how you play the game.”
He considered her words for a moment. He sensed profound truth beneath their surface. “You’re one tough lady, you know that. I’m Marcus, by the way.”
“Emily. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.” She spoke in a hoarse whisper followed by a deep cough. “We’re gonna die here, aren’t we?”
He didn’t answer.
A strange whoosh and whir originated from the other side of the bathroom door.
What now?
At first, he couldn’t identify the noise, but then he realized.
A fire extinguisher?
The bathroom door shook as someone tried to push through it.
Oh, thank God. Firemen.
A wave of hope flooded the shores of his despair, and tears of joy cascaded down his cheeks.
“We’re in here.”
“Please, help us.”
An axe blade thrust through the door—then another strike, and another.
He laughed with delirium. “We’re gonna make it.”
Within a matter of seconds, the axe had torn through the barrier, and a shadowy form stepped into the room. Marcus and Emily Morgan gazed up through the smoke at the man who had just entered. Light from the flames danced across his face.
Francis Ackerman stood over them, an axe dangling from his right hand.
Marcus searched for some type of weapon. His hand stretched out for a nearby piece of debris, but it was just out of reach. His fingers curled into a fist, and his teeth clenched.
At least we won’t have to burn.
The floor creaked and popped beneath them. He knew that it was only a matter of time before it buckled as well.
“Come on. I’m getting you out of here,” Ackerman said to Emily Morgan as a strong arm flew underneath her body and lifted her from the floor. Then, the killer carried her through the opening into the adjoining room.
Marcus heard the distinctive whooshing sound of the fire extinguisher, and then the only sounds were the exhilarated moans of the fire and the protestations of the dying building. Refusing to surrender, he pressed up on the debris one last time. A guttural scream emanated from somewhere deep in his soul.
He pushed with the ferocity of a caged tiger sensing freedom.
His muscles quivered. He felt the debris shift.
The floor issued a disapproving pop, and he began to feel as if the fire and the building had amalgamated into some ravenous entity that sought to consume him.
He moved forward slightly. The burning in his arms made him wonder if the fire had already taken him.
He couldn’t breathe. His strength failed. The weight gradually pinned him to the floor, and he felt as if the finger of God himself pressed upon his back. His vision darkened. He closed his eyes. A rolling fear tumbled through his guts as he wondered what the next world held for him.
He felt a shaking and supposed that he was breaking through the barrier between worlds.
“Help me,” a voice said.
With great effort, he forced open his eyes and stared up with incomprehension at Ackerman’s face.
“Help me,” the killer repeated as he pulled up on the pile of debris.
Marcus searched deep inside, found a small reserve of strength, and pressed in unison with the killer. Working in tandem, Ackerman held the debris with one hand and tugged on Marcus’s shirt with the other while Marcus pressed up with his back and crawled forward.
With one last push, he tore his legs free from the debris and coughed on the smoke as his lungs sought fresh air. His body floated, and unconsciousness pressed in on his mind.
He flew from the floor and then through the bathroom and into the hall. When he reached the stairwell, he realized that Ackerman had just carried him away from the fire and out of the jaws of death.
The killer deposited him on the landing. The smoke crept through the space, but it traveled up toward the roof. Fresh air still flowed from the floors below, and he drank in greedy mouthfuls of oxygen. Emily Morgan sat next to him, doing the same.
“Can you walk?” Ackerman said.
He nodded. “I’ll find a way.” His voice came as a harsh rasp.
“Then get outta here before the place falls down around us.”
He looked up at the killer. Ackerman still stood partly in the hallway. The fire danced and rolled in the background. Soot and blood covered the madman’s face, but the flames at his back made his body seem luminescent.
“What about you?”
Ackerman looked back into the flames. “I think I’ll stick around for a while.”
A part of him wanted to shove Ackerman into the fire, and another part wanted to save him. But the killer had made his choice. In his condition, Marcus couldn’t have forced the man to do anything. Besides, the police had the building completely surrounded. There was no escape for Ackerman, and he wouldn’t deny the man a death under his own terms.
Marcus stood up onto trembling legs and willed strength into them. His arm slid beneath Emily, and he helped her to gain her feet. He braced his arm beneath hers and around her back, and they descended the stairs.
When they reached the next landing, he turned back to Ackerman. Reflections of the flames danced in the man’s eyes.
“I’ve been thinking about your question,” Marcus said.
“What question?”
“You asked me if I believed that anyone could be forgiven. I’ve thought about that a lot. And yeah, I think that no matter what you’ve done, no matter how far you’ve fallen, you can be forgiven…if you really wanna be.”
Ackerman smiled, and Marcus felt warmth behind it.
“Goodbye, Marcus.” With those words, the killer walked back toward the fire.
Marcus turned away and descended to an uncertain future. He only glanced back once. A part of him hoped that even a man like Ackerman would find peace in the next world.
Marcus had sat in the interrogation room at the Denver FBI field office for nearly two hours. He expected that at any moment some smug agent would enter and begin what was sure to be a long and excruciating process. He knew what they were doing. They were sweating him, but he had no sweat left to give. After going up against the likes of the Sheriff and Ackerman, the FBI didn’t intimidate him.
Bring it on. After the week I’ve had, this’ll be like a vacation.
He just wanted to sleep. He felt as if he hadn’t slept in a week, which wasn’t too far from being accurate. He wanted to fall into a bed and awaken two days later, refreshed and rejuvenated. But he didn’t want to dream. He wondered if the dreams would get better or worse after this. Only time would tell.
His wrists ached from the cuffs. An overzealous agent had clasped them too tightly. He supposed that he should have been in cuffs a long time ago, so he couldn’t complain.
He had accepted whatever fate awaited him. He had succeeded in what he had set out to do, and nothing else mattered anymore. He wished that he could put it all behind him. He wished that he could hold Maggie again. But he knew that wishes didn’t come true.
He could see no way out of what had happened. He had no evidence, just a string of bodies. But he had nothing left to lose either.
He wondered whether his parents would be proud of him. He wondered about the life he would have led if he had never stumbled onto the Mavros case. Would he still be a detective? Would he be married with kids by now? His mind swirled with a series of what ifs and whys. In the end, he concluded that it was all meant to be.
Maybe Ackerman had been right. Maybe his whole life had been building toward something, some realization or purpose. Had he now fulfilled that purpose? Was he meant to stop Ackerman, and now that his task had been completed, the universe would allow him some measure of peace? Or had he only just begun to walk the path? So many questions with no real answers.
He supposed that was the essence of life. People quested for answers that they were never meant to know. Maybe no one was ever meant to see the big picture or know the meaning. Maybe people weren’t prepared for the answers. Perhaps when a person finally comes to the grand realization and learns “the meaning”, death comes for them. Maybe the asking and not the knowing was the important thing.
His head ached from the flood of thoughts that flowed through him. He knew that he couldn’t save everyone, but he had played the game to the best of his abilities. If all that was necessary for evil to triumph was for good men to do nothing, then evil had not triumphed. He was a good man, and he had stood up against the darkness and refused to do nothing.
He tried to be resigned to his fate, but many questions nagged at him.
He didn’t want to think about the events of the past few days, but he couldn’t help it. There were too many things that still bothered him, pieces to the puzzle that didn’t fit together.
Using his vivid photographic memory, he relived every event, every detail. With his eyes closed, he journeyed into the past. He walked through his memories.
Then, his eyes opened.
~~*~~
The door to the interrogation room swung open, and a dark-skinned man in a black suit entered. The agent sat down across from him and laid a group of files on the metal table that separated them. The man smiled, obviously trying to gain his trust.
All part of the process.
“Hello, I’m Agent Monroe. Anything I can get you before we begin?”
He decided to play along. “Yeah, these cuffs are hurting my wrists. Would there be any way that you could take them off, or at least loosen them up?”
Monroe held the smile and nodded. “Sure.”
The agent stood up and opened the door. “Could you please unshackle the prisoner for me?” Another man entered the room and removed the restraints.
He rubbed his wrists. “Thank you.”
Agent Monroe walked back to the table but didn’t sit. The man removed the dark jacket and rolled up his sleeves. Something seemed strange, but it took Marcus a few seconds to put a finger on it. Then, he realized. The agent still had his gun holstered at his side.
He wasn’t certain, but he didn’t think that regulations allowed agents to bring firearms into the interrogation room. He also noticed that the door stood open.
Agent Monroe, seeming to notice his eyes on the door, gestured toward the opening. “My partner is going to be joining us in a moment.” Monroe shuffled through the stack of papers, his attention centering upon the documents and not his prisoner.
The agent had his gun in plain sight, and the door to the interrogation room stood open.
Is the plan for me to be killed during an escape attempt, or is this just another game?
He let out a long breath. “Why don’t we cut the crap? Tell him to come in here and talk to me himself.”
The agent seemed perplexed. “I don’t—”
“You know damn well who I mean.”
“I’m afraid that I—”
He slammed his fist on the metal table. “Just tell the Sheriff, or whoever he is, to get in here. I’m tired of playing his games.”
The sound of a familiar voice came from just outside the door. “But you’re so good at them.” The Sheriff strolled into the room with a look of triumph.
Marcus cocked his head to the side and cracked his neck. “You look pretty good…for a dead man.”
Moving with the reflexes of a cat, Marcus jumped from his chair and tossed the empty seat in the Sheriff’s direction. He spun toward the dumbfounded Agent Monroe. He grabbed the holstered weapon from the agent’s side and wrapped his left arm around the man’s neck. The gun’s barrel bore into Monroe’s temple.
With a calm, modulated voice, he said, “Why don’t you tell me what’s really going on here.”
The Sheriff chuckled and then proceeded in a reverent clapping of his hands. “Bravo,” the Sheriff remarked as he sat in the chair vacated by Agent Monroe. “You’ve never disappointed me, kid. You are all I knew you would be and more. But now is not the time to fight. This is the part when we pull back the curtain and look into the face of the real Wizard of Oz. Put the gun down, and we’ll sit and talk for a while.”
“Think I’ll hang onto the gun…for old time’s sake.”
“Suit yourself, but you should know that there aren’t any bullets in that gun.”
“Really. Then, you won’t mind this.” He aimed the gun directly between the Sheriff’s eyes and squeezed the trigger in rapid succession.
The weapon issued a benign clicking sound. Empty.
He shoved Monroe away and dropped the gun to the floor. Then, in a nonchalant manner, he walked over to where he had thrown his chair, placed it back in its original position, and sat down across from the Sheriff. “I’m listening.”
“I’ll answer all your questions, but I’m curious. How did you know that I was alive?”
“It’s hard to kill a man with a gun that doesn’t have any real bullets in it. They weren’t blanks, though, at least not like any I’ve ever seen.”
“We’ve got a great special effects team. They were blanks, but they had been specially modified. We were betting that you’d aim for the chest, so we had the blood packs ready to go. If you would have aimed at my head, I would’ve made sure that I fell backward in a way that you couldn’t see the wounds.”
“And if I would have decided to fire another through your skull at point blank for good measure?”
“Then, we would have started this conversation at that time.”
He shook his head in disdain. “I knew there was something more going on from the moment I found Maureen Hill.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that someone staged the crime scene.”
The Sheriff’s lips curled up at the corners. “Explain.”
“She had all the signs that she had been dead for a while, and yet the blood in the room was fairly fresh. It had been planted. And her hands had been nailed in place with some big spikes. Blood would have leaked out and streaked down the wall, but there was no blood behind the body. No splatter from the cuts. She had either been nailed or re-nailed to that wall after she was dead. There was also no blood pooled on the floor, as there should have been. Plus, she didn’t look right. I’m no expert, but she looked like a body from the morgue… like she had been in a freezer and then unthawed. I assume her murder took place in Colorado at her real home, and then you moved her to that house.”