The man, his jaw swollen, his right eye watering, held his pistol in front of him. It was at least fifteen degrees to the right of O’Brien.
“Thought you’d sleep longer,” said O’Brien. “You’ve got a choice…you can take a chance and try to point that squarely at me and get off a shot before I do. Or you can set the gun down on the floor, kick it to me, and walk to the back of the room.”
“Shoot him!” ordered Russo.
The man looked at Russo and then looked at O’Brien without turning his head. He said, “He’s got the drop on me!”
“You fuckin’ pussy!”
The man slowly lowered the pistol to the floor.
“Kick it this way!” O’Brien ordered.
The man kicked the gun. O’Brien picked it up. “I bet that if I have a ballistics test run on this, I’m wagering that this gun, or one very close to it, killed Father Callahan. What I don’t know is who fired the killing bullet…you…or Carlos Salazar.”
“Wasn’t me! Tell him Mr. Russo!”
“I don’t know, pal,” said O’Brien. “You were so very eager to take a shot at me. You could very well be the hit man responsible for three murders in the last three days. The priest was a close, personal friend of mine.” O’Brien stepped closer.
“I didn’t shoot no priest! Tell him Mr. Russo! Fucker’s crazy…gonna kill me!”
“Shut up!” snapped Russo
The sounds of sirens could be heard close to the hospital. O’Brien stepped to the window and looked out. More than a dozen squad cars were half circling the main entrance. He turned to Russo. “Here’s the plan. Russo, you’re going to call Detective Ron Hamilton. You’re going to tell him that you and Sergio are dropping all charges against me. The second thing: you’re going to pay for Barbie Beckman’s medical expenses. After she’s healed, you’re going to subsidize her college education.”
“And if I don’t.”
“I walked into your club, and I got to you. I got to you in your hospital room. I’ll get to you wherever you are. Now the last item. Where’s Carlos Salazar?”
“He calls us from time to time. He checks in when he wants to. I don’t have his number. Sometimes he drops by the club.”
O’Brien pointed the gun at the man in the corner. “Where’s Salazar?”
“Spends a lot of time at the Sixth Street Gym. Likes to shoot pool at a joint called Sticks in Little Havana, and likes to buy pussy at the high-end clubs. Take your pick.”
O’Brien placed both pistols under his belt, hiding them beneath his shirt. Opening the door to leave, he turned back to Russo. “Your time’s up. Call Hamilton.”
When the door closed behind O’Brien, Russo said to his bodyguard, “Get Salazar on the fuckin’ phone. Now!”
SIXTY-FOUR
O’Brien walked down the hospital corridor, following the signs to an operating room. He ducked in a stock room, changed his clothes, dressing as a medical orderly. He dropped his clothes, and both pistols, into a white plastic trash bag, stuffed linens into the bag, tied it, and walked down the hall to a service elevator. He rode the service elevator to the first floor.
Sitting alone in a wheelchair near the patient discharge area was an elderly woman with a suitcase by her side. O’Brien approached her, smiled, and said, “Ma’am, are you ready to be taken to where someone can pick you up?”
She smiled. “Yes I am. My husband went to get the car.”
“Hospital policy is we take you to the curb, the patient pick up areas, and see that you get in your transportation safely.”
She smiled and nodded. O’Brien picked up her suitcase, tied the plastic bag to one of the wheelchair handles, and began pushing her through the corridor toward the patient pick-up section of the building. Three police officers rushed by him, hands on their holstered pistols as they ran. O’Brien could see more officers at the front entrance.
“What’s all the excitement?” the woman asked O’Brien.
“I can’t say for sure.”
“Maybe they have a crazy person doing something, you think?”
“Maybe.”
O’Brien pushed the wheelchair toward the double glass doors that opened automatically. Other patients, all in wheelchairs, holding flowers and overnight bags, waited to be driven away.
The woman pointed toward a Buick. “There’s Harold. He’s pulling up.”
Harold, a slender man in his seventies, thin white moustache, neatly parted white hair, moved spryly getting out of the car. He smiled, popped the truck, and waited for his wife to be wheeled to the car. Harold said, “Let’s get Carolyn into the front seat.”
“No problem, sir,” said O’Brien.
They stood on either side of the wheelchair and carefully lifted Carolyn up to her feet. She walked three steps with O’Brien and her husband on each side. She eased into the front seat and said, “Take me home, I’m ready to see my roses.”
O’Brien shut the car door. “Sir, let me get your wife’s suitcase in the trunk.”
“I appreciate your help,” said Harold.
O’Brien started to close the trunk and said, “I just got off work, my friend’s car is over in lot L. He works here, in E.R. We carpool, but the lead asked him to pull a double. I’ll catch a cab home, but may I impose on you for a lift to the car? I left some of my things in it. I wouldn’t ask, but it’s been a long day in the operating room.”
“No imposition at all,” Harold said, smiling.
“Great, I’ll just toss my bag in and we’ll be on our way.” O’Brien put the bag in the backseat, and pushed the wheelchair to the sidewalk beneath the alcove.
Two police officers were walking under the porte-cochere coming toward O’Brien. He turned his back to them, knelt beside a young girl in a wheelchair holding a teddy bear, and said, “Take care of that bear, okay?”
She smiled and looked up at her mother who said, “They’re both feeling better.”
O’Brien smiled and climbed into the backseat of the Buick. “Thank you.”
“Glad to help, “Harold said. “Now where’s lot L?”
“On the other side of the hospital. You can go out of here, take a left and follow the drive around to the back.”
As Harold got closer to lot L, O’Brien scanned the parking lot looking for people sitting in unmarked cars-people talking into police radios.
“It’s the Jeep by the tree,” said O’Brien. “I won’t be but a few seconds.”
“Take your time,” said Carolyn.
O’Brien unlocked the Jeep and leaned across the seat to get his laptop and tape recorder. He looked through the rear windshield and saw it.
A wink. A small reflection of light. The sun coming off a hand-held lens. It was from the roof of a doctor’s office building next to the hospital. O’Brien didn’t know if the reflection came from a riflescope or binoculars.
He got the laptop and recorder, tossed the keys on the floorboard, and maneuvered around to keep the Jeep between himself and the reflection on the roof.
O’Brien darted as he returned to the car. He said, “You can get into traffic by going through that alley, it opens onto Tenth Avenue.”
“You sure know your roads around the hospital,” said Harold.
“You learn it.”
The old man pulled out of the lot and started down the alley.
The police sniper keyed his radio. “Subject just got out and back into a dark blue Buick. Heading toward Tenth and Newman.”
“All available units move!” barked a command from the radio.
When Harold pulled out onto the corner of Tenth, O’Brien said, “This is fine. I’ll get out at the light. You both have been so kind. I can get transportation from here.”
“Sure we can’t take you any farther?” asked Carolyn.
“No, ma’am. This is good. You go home and take care of those roses.”
“Be careful,” said Harold as O’Brien got out of the car. O’Brien jogged across the street where a city bus was about to pull away. He banged on the door. The driver slowed, opened the door, and O’Brien got in. He paid and walked past a dozen staring faces. He took a seat in the back of the bus next to an elderly Hispanic woman holding a paper bag filled with plantains.