I froze. Like an electrical switch had gone off in my heart. And then like it had been kicked off a cliff.
“Well, I guess that makes us kind of even, doesn’t it?” Charlie reached back around and seemed to unbuckle Brandon’s seat, grabbing him by the jacket, and yanked him virtually into the front. He put his gun to the side of his head, his eyes bright with rage. “Hello, young man. Now get out of the car and bring me those diary pages!”
“No.” I heard Patrick’s voice, coming from behind me. “I’m afraid I can’t let her do that, Charlie.”
“Well, well … what do you know, the police are on the scene. We can all rest easy. Charlie, huh?” He sneered. “You’ve all been busy bees. I already had a dim view of the NYPD, but you just managed to drop it a notch lower.”
I looked across at my son. “Brandon, don’t worry, honey. Don’t worry about what he says. We’re going to have you out of there in a minute.”
“Yeah, right, you just keep believing that, kid.” Charlie pressed the gun into his skull. “I know it’s past your bedtime and all, but your mom here’s gonna have you dead before the Smurfs come on.”
I held myself from lunging through the car window and putting my hands around his throat. My blood ached just knowing Brandon had to hear him say that. He must be so scared.
“It’s just a transfer of merchandise, Charlie,” Patrick said. “Give us the boy. You get the diary pages. We can all go home. No one hears from each other again.”
“Just a transfer of merchandise, huh …” Charlie pulled back the hammer. “Let’s see.”
He brought Brandon’s head up, as if to shoot him in front of me.
“No. No. No!” I screamed. “He’s only a boy.”
“Didn’t think so. Now, what I want you to do is extend your arm forward, slowly, please, and drop that gun onto the seat in front of you, and we’ll see if we can get on with things. My way. And quick now. Every vegetable truck in the city will be driving through here if we stay any longer.”
For the first time I began to feel that maybe it wasn’t just the money and the diary he was after. But me. For what I’d done to him at the yard. Or to eliminate anyone who knew what those pages meant. I looked across to the Escalade and met Brandon’s wide-stretched eyes. I couldn’t bear to think that this would be how it would end. I no longer even cared about me. I was past that. Only for my son. And for Elena, who I’d dragged into this even though she was completely innocent. Who wouldn’t leave him there.
“What’s the point, Charlie?” Patrick asked. “If we wanted the police brought in, they’d be here already. It’s clear we want to end this as much as you. Landry gets the pages. Then even if we want to say something, we can’t prove anything, right? You did your job. Everyone wins …”
“Everyone wins, eh?” I could see the intent that was in his eyes. What he was here to do. His brain ticking. Blood would spill. Definitely. I caught Patrick’s eyes in the mirror. Please, don’t let it end like this …
And then maybe Charlie seemed to finally come to the belief that, what was the point? He didn’t want to die here any more than I did, or Brandon. I saw him smile. He flashed a wink at me, like, oh, what the hell. He pressed a button and I heard the rear doors unlock.
“Brandon, get the fuck out of the car,” he said, and pushed him into the back. “You too, señora. Fun’s over. You go around and take him, por favor. Comprende?” Elena nodded. “Jeanine, hand those pages across to me.” He reached a hand out of the window, the other still pointed at my son with the gun.
Elena opened her door. Her wrists were bound with wire. She ripped the tape off her mouth and shot me a relieved but still worried look. Then she ran around the back of the Escalade to help Brandon out.
“Fast,” Charlie said. “Now.”
I glanced at Patrick. He had his gun trained on the Escalade.
“Give me those fucking pages!” Charlie said. “Or so help me I’ll hit the gas now and you’ll never see him again.”
Elena was around the side. She’d opened Brandon’s door. He was still wrapped up in the seat belt. She unbuckled him.
My gaze found Patrick’s again. This time he said, “Go ahead, give him what he wants.”
Through the window I could see Elena take hold of Brandon and slide him out of the seat. She slammed the door. Then they were running back to us.
I thrust the plastic folder into Charlie’s hand. He grabbed it while I waited for Brandon and Elena to come around. Patrick lunged forward and opened the rear door.
That’s when I saw it! What was going around in Charlie’s mind. His smirk suddenly morphing into something a lot more deadly. He raised his hand with the gun toward me, everything going in slow motion, Brandon and Elena finally reaching our car. Then it wasn’t in slow motion. It was as if time stood still. And I saw that it wasn’t me he was aiming at. But Brandon. Patrick had reached out a hand to him, pulling him in.
“Mommy!”
“Say sayonara, Jeanine,” Charlie sniffed, smirking at me.
“No!”
I heard a shot. “Brandon!” I screamed. Not one shot, but two in rapid succession. Maybe three. Like firecrackers. I looked for the spark from Charlie’s muzzle, the one that would have killed my son.
But there was none.
Patrick was shielding Brandon and Elena with his body.
Then I saw Charlie spin and grab his shoulder and side, his outstretched gun clattering onto the street. “Son of a—!”
And men advancing toward his car. Not cops—or anyone I had seen who looked like a cop. One in a dark leather jacket and jeans. Another in jeans and an Adidas-style warm-up top. No lights flashing everywhere. Or commands barked.
All I heard was “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!” And Brandon crying.
Charlie hit the gas and his car lurched forward. Just as quickly three black SUVs came out of nowhere and blocked his path. He slammed on the brakes and threw it into reverse, but there was nowhere to move and he smashed into the concrete stanchions of the overhead expressway.
He went forward again, then saw he was completely pinned in, almost parallel with me again. His eyes were like some mad cornered animal’s. “You stupid fucks,” he said to me, “I warned you not to call the police.”
“I didn’t call the police,” Patrick met his eyes and said.
Five or six men surrounded his car, carrying semiautomatic weapons. One of them kicked open the door and Charlie stopped, spun around toward them in fear, then looked back at us with a glower of anger and resignation.
The largest of them was the size of a tank and had big bushy hair. Only then did it hit me who Patrick had called. The large one seemed to be in charge and he barked out some commands. In Russian. He went into the Escalade and came back out with the garbage bag of cash, Charlie going, “Hey …!” as the big guy smacked him across his face with the butt of his gun.
Then he came over to Patrick. He grinned. “Sergei Lukov thanks you for generous interest payment on the loan.”
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Patrick said, “but I hope I never hear from him again.”
“He who has no money needs no purse,” the Russian said. “Here.” He handed Patrick something. “I don’t think he’ll be in need of these.”
It was the diary pages.
“Thank you, Yuri.”
“You better get out of here,” the Russian said. “What happens next is not a sight for little children.”
Brandon had snaked up front and I squeezed him with everything I had and smothered him with kisses, so grateful I actually had him in my arms, my cheeks burning with joyful tears.
“Hilary, we have to get out of here,” Patrick said.
I hit the gas, Brandon still in my arms, and we drove away from the underpass. Through the rearview mirror I saw the men drag Charlie out of his car.
“By tomorrow morning, he’ll probably be stuffed in an oil drum somewhere,” Patrick said, “at the bottom of Sheepshead Bay.”
I turned and said over my shoulder to Elena. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, harried, but gave me a grateful smile. “Sí, missus. I am okay.”
“Thank you” was all I could say. And then the tears started up again. I couldn’t stop them.
This time tears of joy.
A mile north on the Bruckner I pulled over. “He tried to hurt me,” Brandon said. “And Elena too, Mommy.”
“I know he did, baby,” I said, burying my face in his hair. “But he can’t hurt you anymore. Not ever. It’s okay, it’s okay now,” I kept telling him. I looked past him at Patrick. And he smiled back at me. I just kept saying, “It’s okay, baby, it’s okay.”