After twenty-four paces he stops, feeling for the grating. It's two feet before him. Taped to it is a flashlight.
He crouches in the concrete tube and flicks on the light, briefly. Finding the clasp, he opens the rusty gate and slips down four feet into the main line.
Now he can walk upright rather than bent over. The sewer main is wide as an alley. Filthy water runs down the center in a putrid, brown stream. Charles doesn't know how deep it is, and has no desire to find out. On either side of the flow is a ledge, a catwalk that can be treaded upon when the water level is low enough.
His smartest escape route is to follow along the right wall, down to the end of the block, and then turn left and go eight blocks over. He'll pop up in an alley, right across the street from the public garage where he keeps his second car, and far from the searching pigs overhead.
But he isn't ready yet. He still has to deal with Jack.
The lieutenant can't be allowed to live. She found him. She'll find him again. Charles doesn't want to be looking over his shoulder for the rest of his life, waiting for her to pounce.
It will end here.
The Gingerbread Man checks his bullets and switches off his light.
Noises are coming from the sub main he'd exited moments before.
He hunches down and giggles, ready for the fun to start.
Chapter 44
THE LADDER WAS MADE OF STEEL bars, rusty and slimy. Descending was a complicated ordeal where I had to hop down each step, since my bad leg refused to bend. When I finally reached the bottom, I stepped on something.
"Jesus, Jackie!"
I was on Harry's leg. He shoved me off and flicked on his key light, pointing it in my face. McGlade was on his ass, in the middle of a large slick of gunk.
No -- not gunk.
Blood.
"My God, Harry --"
"I slipped. It's not my blood."
My stomach churned. The wife.
I tried to radio Herb to say we were on the right trail, but the radio only gave me static. I played with it for a few seconds, but being underground probably put us out of signal range.
Harry stood up and banged his head on the top of the tube we were in.
"Christ! That's gonna leave a lump."
The smell was nauseating, human waste and rotting animal matter. Several rats scurried past, disappearing into the darkness.
I took the key light from Harry. The little beam barely penetrated the darkness, only allowing for a few feet of sight.
"So which way, Lieutenant? This tube goes both ways."
I focused the light at our feet. The trickle of sludge was moving to our left. "This way."
"Lead on, Jackie. You've got the body armor."
I killed the light and we shuffled forward. The muck became ankle-deep after a few yards, and the smell was so foul, I could taste it in my mouth.
I stopped twice to listen. The only sound I heard was my labored breathing, which was amplified in the fetid air and made me sound asthmatic. Walking in a crouch with a bad leg was slow going and painful. I felt down in the darkness and discovered that my pants were soaked with blood yet again. This damn wound would never heal.
But that was the least of my problems.
"I think we went the wrong way," Harry whispered.
"Shhh."
"I'm going back. Be a dear and let me borrow your vest."
"Kiss my ass."
"You want to get romantic now?"
I strained my ears. There was noise ahead, like a water cascade. We were coming to the end of the tunnel.
How far ahead of us could he be? Assuming he knew these sewers, Charles could be hundreds of yards away by now.
Or he could be just around the corner, waiting in ambush.
"Help..."
A woman's voice, weak and pleading, coming from ahead of us. Diane Kork was still alive.
I moved faster, urgency prodding me on, overriding the pain. The radio was still all static. I also tried my cell phone, but couldn't get a signal surrounded by all this concrete. We came to her twenty yards later, lying half-naked in the filth, covered with blood and muck.
"Diane. Can you hear me?" I knelt down next to her, my wounded leg stretched out behind me. Her pulse was strong, steady. I eyed her wounds; several ugly slashes across the chest, and a deep cut in her collarbone that missed her throat by a fraction. Her eyelids fluttered, and she focused on me.
"He heard you coming, and ran off."
"Diane, we're going to get you out of here."
She shook her head. "You have to get him."
"We will. First we're going to..."
"No!" The power in her voice startled me. "Don't let him get away. You have to go get him. Please."
I looked at Harry.
"Give her your jacket."
He shrugged off the blazer, draping it over Diane.
I tucked the sport coat under her arms and chin.
"He won't get away, Diane. I promise. We need to get you to the hospital. Can you stand?"
She shook her head.
"We'll have to carry her, Harry."
"You can't even walk. How are you supposed to carry someone?"
"I'll manage."
No one else dies. Even if we had to drag her to safety an inch at a time.
Harry complied, gently lifting Diane under her armpits. She groaned painfully. I positioned myself on the other side and lifted her knees, my legs trembling under her weight.
It would be tough, but we'd get her out of here.
"Jack!"
The voice came from behind us, loud and unmistakable.
Benedict.
"Herb! We're over here!"
Thirty seconds later my partner came waddling down the tube, followed by a uniformed officer. His labored breathing and the coat of sweat on his face told me he wasn't any more comfortable in the sewers than I was.
"Kork is ahead of us," I called out. "Get Diane out of here, alert the troops. We need to cover all manhole exits for ten square blocks."
"You're going after him?"
I nodded.
"With him?" Benedict jerked a thumb at Harry.
McGlade sneered back. "Good to see you too, Tubby."
"Harry's going back with you. Place him under arrest for obstruction of --"
"My ass," McGlade said. Then he took off down the pipe.
Nothing's ever easy.
"Gotta go, Herb."
"Be careful, Jack. Backup is coming."
We exchanged a tense look, and then I went after Harry. A few feet into the blackness, I stopped and listened. The falling water sound was louder, and I could hear the echo of footsteps.
"Dammit, Harry! Wait up!"
My voice sounded small, hollow, as it echoed down the tube.
"I'm a few yards ahead of you."
When I finally caught up to him, I was sweating as much as Herb had been.
"Welcome back, Jackie. You gonna read me my rights?"
"When this is over, Harry, I swear --"
I felt the bullet at the same time I heard it. It hit me in the stomach, knocking me backward. I sprawled in the filthy water, my head bouncing on cement.
The feeling was unreal, like I'd been gut-punched by a speeding car. I sucked in the foul sewer air, my breath having left me. The pain was so bad, it made me forget my leg.
The tube exploded in a muzzle flash, and thunder erupted in my ears. McGlade was returning fire. Enclosed in the concrete tube, the gun deafened us both.
A long minute passed. McGlade knelt next to me and felt along my body. He pressed on my diaphragm and I yelped. Then he reached under my vest and felt the skin. I couldn't sense if there was a wound or not.
Harry released the pressure and a moment later the little flashlight was pointing in my face.
"The vest stopped the bullet." Or that's what it sounded like. My ears were still ringing. "Can you move?"
I tried to speak. "Yeah."
He offered his hand and helped me up. The darkness fractured into pinpoints of light, stars dancing in my vision. I blinked twice and swallowed.