There are many things in life I regret; having you as a son is not one of them. I am very sorry for the circumstances, and how I wasn’t able to raise you. But I want you to know that I never once stopped thinking about you, the sweet smell of your skin as a baby, the way you looked into my eyes as I nursed you. It tore my heart out to give you up for adoption. Not one day after I kissed you goodbye did I not think about you, to whisper my love for you, and pray that God would always hold you in his arms as I have held you in my heart. I wish I could have met your wife, Sherri. From what you told me, she was a remarkable woman. Take care of the little dog she gave you. Max will love you unconditionally, as do I. I have some property in Ireland I leave to you and Courtney equally. The sunsets are marvelous there.
When you see a sunset, please think of me. Because it was in the twilight of my life when I found you, Sean. I hope each sunset through the remainder of your life will be beautiful, that you will know peace and love. Maybe when you see the colors of a day's end and its fleeting beauty you’ll think of me … as I will always think of you.
I love you forever,
Mom
As I finished her letter, a tear rolled down my face, splashing on the paper. I felt a sense of deep loss that wrapped itself around my heart. I played back our last four hours together — the conversations, her gentle laughter through pain, the light still in her eyes, the love bottomless in her weak heart. When Sherri died, it was different. I’d felt an unending sense of despair — a loneliness that crept into my pores like cold water and never receded. I was thankful for the thirteen years we shared together, angry at the robber — the cancer who stole time from our bottle.
The time thief had returned. I was given four hours in forty-three years, bothered by the lack of time, but yet grateful for the four hours. I had some quality time in the end with the woman who was there in my beginning. She was my mother.
And I was her son.
I raised the windows and started the Jeep. As I glanced toward the river, I caught a tiny reflection. Under a tree. In a rural place where there should be no manmade objects to reflect the sun.
The windshield exploded.
The bullet tore through my side window and the passenger window. High velocity. A rifle. I dropped as far over toward the passenger side as possible, shards of glass in my hair, my forehead and face cut, blood dripping onto my mother’s letter.
I reached up to the rearview mirror, quickly adjusting to see it, then I put the Jeep in reverse. I backed down the road, in the center of the park, found a clearing and made a turn. I sat up and drove straight out, circling the perimeter, driving around trees and bushes, and heading back toward the sniper by the river.
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In less than a minute I was almost there. Driving with a lap full of broken glass, I warily pulled up near where I saw the wink from the sniper’s scope. He was gone. No one in sight. I grabbed my Glock, got out, and searched the area. I knew I wouldn’t find a spent cartridge, but I thought I might find something else.
And there they were. In the river mud. Boot prints. Not just any, but rather combat boot prints. I knelt down for a closer look, sampled the soil between my fingers. Panama soles. I bet they were identical to the prints I found in my yard. I snapped a picture with my phone for comparison. I could still smell the cordite in the motionless air. I stood and followed the boot prints down to the river. There were indications that a boat had come close to shore, the boot prints vanishing in the water, the mud on the bank bearing the gouge of a boat.
Now I knew why the high-speed cigarette boat was here.
Which way had they gone? To the right was Interstate 20 crossing the river a few miles north, beyond that, small river communities. To the left was the Port of Savannah a hundred-fifty miles away, and the Atlantic Ocean — and lots of marinas in between.
Also, there were bridges. I needed a map, and I needed it immediately. I put the battery back in my phone. It didn’t matter anymore. They knew where I was, and they found me. As I started to look at a map of Augusta and the river, a text message arrived. It was from an unknown source. The message read: O’Brien, consider that a warning shot fired over your bow — provide us with all copies of the video or you’ll receive the same fate as the girl …
I keyed in a map, found what I was looking for, memorized directions, and removed the phone battery. I raced out of the park, headed in the direction of the Savannah River near the 5th Street Bridge. It was less than ten miles away. I didn’t know if I could make it before the cigarette boat blew through, but I’d break every speed limit and rule to try.
Within a few minutes I was turning off Sandpit road onto East Railroad Avenue, an industrial mixture of warehouses, woods, broken fences, and clapboard homes. The hard-packed dirt and gravel road went under a railroad trestle. I pulled off the road next to a drainage ditch, got my.12 gauge shotgun out of the back seat, locked the Jeep and ran up the embankment. I turned left and ran down the tracks toward the river. I had a least a hundred yards to go. I did it flat out. Knees and legs pumping. Glock tucked under my belt. Shotgun gripped in both hands.
I came to the railroad bridge across the Savannah River. It was long, expanding the river. The trestle was painted black, the sun’s heat causing the metal structure to groan, the odor of creosote thick in the air. I straddled a very narrow catwalk, running the length of the bridge. I was heading for the center, and the best spot to catch boat traffic. The cigarette boat may have beaten me. Gone. I looked to the south, all the way to the 5th Street Bridge, about a mile away. I spotted a houseboat and a Boston Whaler with one fisherman at the motor.
And then I heard the unmistakable guttural power of the cigarette boat engines. Two big V-8’s cranking. The boat came around a bend in the river. A Donzi high-performance boat, close to forty feet long, spraying a large rooster-tail wake behind the stern. From the middle of the trestle, I tried to estimate exactly where the boat would pass beneath me. I had seconds to decide. I ran another fifty feet to the west.
The boat was screaming. I chambered a round of buckshot and stood on a small ledge near the tracks and overlooking the river. The wind was picking up speed. If I was lucky, very lucky, I might get off two shots. I waited for the right second. Following the boat through the gun-sight. Both passengers were male. Both wearing wrap-around sunglasses. Neither looking up. They never do.
I fired the first shot. Directly into the bow. Fired the second smack in the center of the big engines and fuel tanks. The boat made a thrashing noise as it passed under the bridge. Then the engines sounded like they’d thrown rods. Metal against metal. A NASCAR wreck on water.
Inside of five seconds, the Donzi exploded in an enormous orange fireball. I could feel the heat from up on the bridge. As fire and smoke belched over the Savannah River, I ran back across the bridge, ran down the tracks because it was easier and faster than tiptoeing the outside catwalk.
Because of the explosion and noise, I never heard the train coming.
It was right behind me. Fifty feet and barreling down. I had a second to react. The train engineer sounded the horn as I jumped off the tracks, barely able to hold the shotgun and balance myself on the narrow gangplank. The freight train surged by me with the kinetic force of a tornado moving on steel tracks.
The wind from the passing train raked across my perspiring and bloodied face. I was breathing hard. I hoped no one in the locomotive recognized me. I continued running down the gangplank as the freight train roared by, the slight gap between the boxcars allowing the late afternoon sunlight to catch me in fast staccato bursts of light.