My knuckles were bleeding, but functional, and my grip on the butterfly knife was solid as I brought it down on his thrusting arm, jamming it a good two inches between his radius and ulna. His knife flew into the grass, but leverage was on his side and as he fell the balisong was jerked from my hand.
He howled, staring at the handle protruding from his forearm, his entire body shaking.
“Leave it in,” I told him. “If you pull it out, you could bleed to death.”
I checked my watch. Four minutes and some change left. I hurried to the suitcase, happy to find it intact, and began to jog back to Monroe. My bottom lip was now so swollen I could see it if I looked down my nose. It throbbed with every step. I tried to find my rhythm, tried to find the cadence, but my feet weren’t moving as swiftly as I wanted them to.
I passed Buchbinder, who was wiping his hands on the grass and moaning, “I need a moist towelette,” and one of the onlookers pointed at me and screamed. I must have looked pretty bad to provoke such raw fright. But then I realized she wasn’t pointing at me, she was pointing behind me.
I chanced a look, and Tall Boy was a few steps away from me. He hadn’t taken my advice about leaving the knife in his arm. The knife was now in his hand, raised over his head like Mrs. Bates during the shower scene in Psycho, and his expression confirmed he wasn’t in a happy place.
I stopped in four steps, pivoted my hips, and swung my right leg around, planting the mother of all spin kicks into his stomach. It knocked me backward, but I stayed on my feet. Tall Boy fared worse. He fell onto all fours, retching. I was on him in five steps, kicked him squarely in the jaw, and he sprawled out onto the lawn, where he’d probably stay until he bled to death.
“Buchbinder! Tourniquet!”
Buchbinder stared at me like my nose had grown five inches. I tried a different tactic.
“This guy has antibacterial wipes.”
Buchbinder scrambled over to him, and I headed back up the footpath, toward Monroe, dragging the suitcase, two minutes to go, hearing Buchbinder cry behind me, “I crawled through vomit!”
And then a wheel on the suitcase broke.
I hefted the bag up to waist level and tugged the strap over my shoulder. Heavy wasn’t a good adjective to describe it. Impossible was better. I couldn’t run, but I broke into a kind of quick hobble. The only thing on me that didn’t hurt was my ass, but there was still time for that.
When I reached the intersection, I looked all around for the cop who was supposed to meet me.
Naturally, there was no cop. I should have expected that. I thought of Herb, sitting behind his desk at Robbery, making a few phone calls to track down his missing toilets, and felt a jealousy so intense I almost started to weep.
A car honked. The cab, with Reynolds in the backseat. He opened the door and said, “Hop in.”
Getting the suitcase off my shoulder was a relief on par with a death row reprieve. I shoved myself into the backseat after it, and Reynolds ordered the driver to Navy Pier.
I checked my watch. The fifteen minutes were up.
“Couldn’t find Rossi, but I got a Mr. SIG-Sauer for you.”
He handed me a P228, semiauto, blue finish. Cocked and locked.
“Thanks. Mr. SIG-Sauer will do just fine.” I adjusted the Velcro straps on my holster and tucked the gun inside. “You need to send an ambulance to the walkway a few hundred yards back on LSD. And make sure they have some towels.”
“Trouble?”
“A little. Lost my radio too.”
Reynolds dug around in his pocket. “Here’s an extra.”
“Any luck with Alger’s house?” I asked, plugging in the earpiece.
“It’s been booby-trapped again. No casualties, but my team can’t get to the computer.”
“Probably too late now anyway. We’ll try Plan B.”
Reynolds narrowed his eyes at me. “You gonna drop this guy?”
“I’m going to have a talk with him.”
“This asshole killed a lot of my buddies.”
I thought of Officer Sardina in Records. “Mine too.”
“Don’t be a hero. He looks at you funny, waste him. No one will shed any tears.”
“And if more people die?”
“They would anyway.”
The unibrow notwithstanding, I liked this guy. The cabbie pulled onto Streeter, and I told him to park it. Navy Pier was less than a block away, and if the Chemist was watching, I wanted him to see me walk up.
“Good luck, Lieutenant.”
Reynolds offered his hand. I raised mine, noted the bloody knuckles, and gave him a salute instead. Then I manhandled the bag out of the cab, pulled the torture strap up onto my shoulder, and walked toward the giant letters that welcomed me to Navy Pier.
CHAPTER 29
AS THE NAME IMPLIED, Navy Pier was a pier. It stretched east into Lake Michigan, three hundred feet wide and ten times as long, boasting a dozen restaurants, several theaters, fifty-plus shops, two museums, a fun house, a miniature golf course, a carousel, and a giant Ferris wheel.
I stood in front of the entrance building, known as the Family Pavilion, and watched people come and go. A minute ticked by. Then two. I was wondering if the Chemist had gotten cold feet, and then the phone rang.
“Is this a recording?” I said.
“Take Grand Avenue east, past the Beer Garden and the Grand Ballroom, to the end of the pier. Look for the tree with the red bow. You have three minutes. If you try anything, people will die.”
“Are you a psychotic bed-wetter?”
The call ended. That was definitely a recording. The Chemist was probably already in place, making sure the scene was clear. I heaved the suitcase up and headed east.
I hadn’t been to Navy Pier since it was renovated about ten years ago, and if I hadn’t been there to deliver extortion money to a mass murderer I might have enjoyed the music, the foliage, the myriad of smells, the distinct carnival atmosphere. Instead, I focused on moving as fast as I could and ignoring the many signals from my body that I should stop moving so fast.
Halfway there, I had to stop to move the strap from one shoulder to the other. My blouse was soaked with sweat, and some blood. My jeans were grass stained, my watch bezel was cracked, and my lower lip had swelled up to football size.
The three-minute time limit passed. Then four minutes. I limped onward, finally making it to the end of the pier at the five-minute mark. Beyond the Grand Ballroom building there was some outdoor seating, a semicircle of flags, and a handful of evergreens. The one in the center, next to the railing that prevented people from falling into Lake Michigan, had a red ribbon tied around the trunk.
I approached it slowly, partly out of caution and partly because slow was the only speed I had left. At the base, covered by dirt, was a white business-size envelope.
I looked around, but no one seemed to be paying any attention to me. Figuring the Chemist wouldn’t try to kill me until he got his payoff, I picked up the envelope by the corners and fished out a piece of paper.
Jack, be a good girl and throw the suitcase into the lake, directly ahead of you. Do it now. Then wait for my call.
I started to laugh. The son of a bitch had actually gotten away with it. He’d been there watching at the Daley Center, then used his auto-dialer to send me running all over the place while he put on some SCUBA gear and waited in the lake for the money to come.
“Reynolds, the Chemist left me a note. He wants me to drop the money into the lake. Where’s the police boat?”
“Burnham Park Harbor, about a mile away.”
“Do they have diving equipment?”
“I think so. Hold on.”
I waited a few seconds. Out on the lake, a tour boat glided peacefully by.