Run for Your Life - James Patterson [78]
“So all that stuff you wrote about society was bull?”
“I believe most of it, I suppose. But it was mainly just smoke to cover my tracks. There were a lot of people on the list. I needed time. I needed you to think my targets were random. Screw with the enemy’s head: Tactics 101. It was working, too, until you came along and stumbled between me and the last two people left on my brother’s note.”
He gestured with the gun for me to stand.
“Which brings us to why I’m here, Mikey. You got in the way of my taking out Erica’s parents. You’re going to have to make that up to me. Fortunately, I’ve come up with an alternate plan, and you’re going to help. So drink up that beer of kings, pal. Last call. We’re going for a little ride.”
Chapter 86
THANK GOD, was my first thought. If we got out of here, my family would be safe. That was all I wanted.
At gunpoint, he walked me out of the kitchen, back into the living room. But then with his free arm he scooped up Chrissy, still in her Barbie pajamas, off the couch.
“No!” I yelled. I managed to restrain myself from lunging for him, afraid he’d start shooting.
But Eddie screamed, “Get off her!” and jumped from the couch, trying to tackle Meyer. He went flying backward even faster as Meyer kneed him in the chest.
“Get your rug rats under control, Bennett, or I will,” Meyer snarled at me.
“Guys, stay where you are,” I ordered the kids, then turned back to the killer. “Billy, relax. I already said I’d help you. We don’t need to bring her. Besides, she’s sick.”
“Her condition’s going to get a lot worse if you don’t do what I say. That goes for all of you. I see a cop car, this family is going to be short two place settings at breakfast tomorrow.” Holding my squirming little girl under his arm, Meyer gestured me back toward the kitchen with his pistol. “Come on now, Mikey. We’re going down the freight elevator.”
I hesitated for the briefest second as we passed the knives, but then kept walking.
“Wise decision, buddy,” Meyer said, jamming the gun barrel against my ear. “I knew we’d start to grow on each other, me and you.”
We went down the back elevator and came out the side entrance of my building on 95th Street. Not a soul was in sight as I led him to my unmarked Impala. He put me behind the wheel and took Chrissy into the backseat with him.
“She’s not wearing a seat belt, Mikey, so I’d drive carefully if I were you. Go to Broadway and head uptown, and do me a favor. Turn that police band up.”
We rolled uptown to Washington Heights.
“Make a left up here,” he said when we got to 168th.
Over the building tops, I saw the steel lattice tower of the George Washington Bridge.
“Find an on-ramp for the outbound side,” Meyer said in my ear. “We’re going across.”
Why were we heading to Jersey? Not to load up on cheap gas, that was for sure. Was this his escape plan? It was impossible to guess what was going on in that crazy mind.
I managed to make eye contact with Chrissy in the rearview mirror. She looked scared, but she’d settled down, and was holding up more incredibly than I could have imagined. I love you, Daddy, she mouthed. I love you, too, I mouthed back. Don’t worry.
I didn’t know much, but I was certain of one thing as I piloted us carefully onto the bridge. This sick bastard wasn’t going to harm my daughter. No matter what.
Chapter 87
WHEN MAEVE AND I had first brought home our oldest daughter, Juliana, I used to have this terrible recurring nightmare. In it, I’d be feeding Juliana in her high chair, and all of a sudden, she’d start to choke. I’d put my finger in her mouth, give her the Heimlich, but absolutely nothing would work. I’d wake up sweating and gasping, and I’d have to go to her room and hold a mirror to her tiny nose and see it fog with her breath before I could let myself go back to sleep.
Because that, without question, is a parent’s greatest fear. To be helpless, not able to do anything, when his child is facing harm.
I glanced in my rearview mirror at Meyer, sitting next to my daughter. At the heavy, oiled