The Narrows - Michael Connelly [133]
THE 911 OPERATOR TOLD RACHEL to stay on the line but she couldn’t drive fast and well and safely with the phone to her ear. She dropped it on the passenger seat without disconnecting. When she came to the next stop sign she stopped so short that the phone was hurled into the foot well and out of her reach. She didn’t care. She was speeding down the street checking to her left at every intersection for the next bridge crossing the channel. When she finally saw one she sped to it and stopped the Mercedes right on top of it in a traffic lane. She jumped out and went to the railing.
Neither Bosch nor Backus was in sight. She thought she might have gotten ahead of them. She ran across the street, drawing a horn blast from a motorist but not caring, and went to the opposite rail.
She studied the roiling surface for a long moment and then saw Bosch. His head was above the surface and canted back, his face to the sky. She panicked. Was he still alive? Or was he drowned and his body just moving in the current? Then almost as quickly as the fear had grabbed her she saw movement as Bosch whipped his head, as swimmers often do to get hair and water out of their eyes. He was alive and maybe a hundred yards from the bridge. She could see him struggling to move his position in the stream. She leaned forward and looked down. She knew what he was doing. He was going to try to catch one of the bridge’s support beams. If he could grab it and hold on, he could be extracted and saved right here.
Rachel ran back to the car and threw open the rear hatch. She looked in the back for anything that might help. Her bag was there and almost nothing else. She yanked it out to the ground without caring and lifted the carpeted floor panel. Someone stuck behind the Mercedes on the street started honking. She didn’t even turn to look.
I HIT THE MIDDLE PIER of the bridge so hard that I lost all of my breath and thought I’d broken four or five ribs. But I held on. I knew this was my shot. I held on with everything I had left.
The water had claws. I could feel them as it rushed by me. Thousands of claws pulling at me, grabbing me, trying to take me back into the dark torrent. The water backed up on me and rose into my face. Arms on either side of the pier, I tried to shimmy up the slippery concrete but every time I gained a few inches, the claws would grab me and pull me back down. I quickly learned that the best I could do was hold on. And wait.
As I hugged the concrete I thought of my daughter. I thought of her urging me to hold on, telling me I had to make it for her. She told me no matter where I was or what I did, she still needed me. Even in the moment, I knew it was illusion but I found comfort in it. I found the strength to hold on.
THERE WERE TOOLS and a spare tire in the compartment, nothing that would work. Then, beneath the tire, through the design holes in the wheel, she saw black and red cables. Jumper cables.
She put her fingers through the holes in the wheel and yanked it upward. It was large, heavy and awkward but she was not deterred. She pulled the wheel up and out and just dropped it on the road. She grabbed the cables and ran back across the road, causing a car to slide sideways as its driver hit the brakes.
At the railing she looked into the river but didn’t see Bosch at first. Then she looked down and saw him clinging to the support beam, the water backing up against him as it grabbed and pulled at him. His hands and fingers were scratched and bloody. He was looking up at her and had what she thought might have been a small smile on his face, almost like he was telling her that he was going to be all right.
Not sure how she