Strangled - Brian McGrory [19]
I could feel my body going completely numb, to the point that I wondered if I would eventually be able to swim for shore. I could sense my head going woozy, as if I might pass out, in which case I knew I wouldn’t be getting to shore. I thought of the time I dove into the frigid waters of Boston Harbor after an intruder, as well as the afternoon I had to paddle through a Florida swamp to get away from an attacker who preferred me dead. I spent more time in the damned drink than a trainer at SeaWorld. I made a mental note to bill the Record for some swimming lessons if I ever got out of this mess alive.
Finally, I could hear the outboard engine sputtering slowly just a few feet away, causing little ripples as it circled the scull.
I heard one of my would-be killers say, “He’s in the drink, and he’s not surviving more than five minutes in those temperatures.”
No kidding.
I heard the second man say, “Let’s get out of here.” The engine roared, and then quickly faded from earshot. I ducked back underwater, surfaced again in the open river, and thrashed slowly toward the shore.
What seemed like five days later, I made it. I staggered across some large rocks, up onto the grassy expanse, and collapsed onto my knees. I didn’t know much about hypothermia, but I did know this: Do not fall asleep. I’d be a goner. So I forced myself up and plodded onward, across a field, along a paved, lighted path, and toward a footbridge over Storrow Drive. The one advantage of being this cold was that I had reached a point of not being able to feel a thing. It was as if I was watching myself amble onward rather than actually doing it.
Finally, I made it over to the other side of the bridge into Back Bay. I lurched down an alley, got to Beacon Street, and began frantically waving at traffic. Within two seconds, a car, a cab no less, screeched to a halt. I fumbled with the door handle. Truth is, my hands were so cold that I had lost any refined motor skills. It took both hands to finally pry it open, and I slumped into the seat with a mix of abject fear and absolute relief.
“Mass General Hospital,” I said. I tried saying it firmly, but the words came out as if I was being violently shaken, which I suppose, in a way, I was.
The driver, I noticed through my hazy vision, had a long, gray ponytail. He turned around and gave me a suspicious look, maintaining complete silence. He pulled back into traffic while muttering into the rearview mirror, “I knew you were up to no good.”
Then why the hell hadn’t he told me?
6
When the telephone rang, I was having a dream about trying to swim across the frigid waters of the English Channel, where my dog, Baker, my wife, Katherine, and my unnamed daughter all awaited my arrival on the other side. I would have liked to have stayed asleep long enough to have our reunion.
“Hello,” I muttered into the receiver. It was pitch-black out. My head ached. I was unspeakably tired. My body still felt freezing from the river, especially my farthest extremities.
“You’re not answering your cell phone.”
It was Peter Martin. I didn’t have the wherewithal at the moment to explain that my cell phone was drying out on a radiator next to various articles of clothing, all of them soaked by a pair of men who had tried to kill me on the high seas the night before.
Instead I said, “Long story.”
He ignored that, obviously not interested in a narrative of any length. I looked at the red digits of my alarm clock, which told me it was 5:30 a.m. I had only gone to bed about three hours earlier, after persuading the nice doctors in the Massachusetts General Hospital emergency room that I wasn’t in any need of further observation and was fine to go. In the age of managed care, they seemed a little too fine with that.
“I just had an idea. We’ve got to get together and talk. I need you and Mongillo in here as soon as possible. I want him on this story with you.”
I cleared