JULY 14, 1977
BROOKLYN, NEW YORK
After they’d patched up his shoulder—although it was only a graze, his arm ached like the bullet had gone right through it—Hopper sat on the tailgate of the ambulance and, with a wince, pulled the blanket around his shoulders just a little tighter. The night hadn’t gotten any cooler, but he felt a chill from somewhere.
His imagination, most likely.
The area around the Rookwood Institute was packed with vehicles—ambulances, fire trucks, and at least a dozen police cruisers, their lights strobing the street in a maelstrom of blue and white that made Hopper’s head spin. The drugs still hadn’t quite worn off, and once again he felt a little disconnected, like he’d been sitting on the tailgate for a thousand years, and what had happened inside the Rookwood Institute had taken place in some kind of dream, long ago.
He slipped off the tailgate and got to his feet. He waited, making sure he really could stay upright, then walked over to the next ambulance. Inside, Delgado was sitting up on a stretcher, answering the rapid-fire questions from the attending paramedic as he inflated a blood pressure cuff strapped to the detective’s upper arm. As Hopper appeared, she met his eyes and smiled, giving a small nod before sinking her head back into the pillow.
She was alive.
As was Leroy. Hopper moved to the next ambulance—here, the young man was laid out on the stretcher, a paramedic examining his pupils with a penlight while another filled out a checklist on a clipboard. Leroy lifted an arm, but the medic with the light pushed it back down; he was conscious, but still under the influence of whatever the hell Saint John had dosed him with.
But he was alive.
Hopper turned back to the street. Of the army of Vipers, only a handful remained, and they were all in police custody, sitting in the backs of cruisers, the uniforms already trying to get them to talk. The rest had apparently fled before the first federal agents—a small section of Gallup’s task force—had even arrived.
As two police cruisers moved away from the curb, another vehicle appeared, a dark, unmarked car with a magnetic light flashing over the driver’s side. It pulled up at an angle and the front doors flew open, Martha and Special Agent Gallup piling out. Hopper ditched the blanket and joined the pair in the middle of the street.
Martha looked him up and down. “Are you okay? What the hell happened?”
Hopper glanced down at himself, still soaked in Saint John’s blood.
“I’m okay, I’m okay,” he said. “I’m guessing you didn’t find a way down here after all.”
“Yeah, well, you can blame this fool for that.” Martha threw a glare at Gallup. “Said he could give me a car, then damn well locked me in it!” Then she turned in a circle, looking around at the gathering of emergency vehicles. “Where’s Leroy? Hopper, was he here?”
Hopper pointed to one of the ambulances. Martha took off, almost falling over her feet. She ducked into the ambulance, ignoring the surprise of the paramedics, and fell on Leroy as she hugged him. Hopper could just see Leroy lift his arms, embracing his sister weakly.
“It’s over, Detective.”
Hopper rubbed his face, and turned to Gallup. He took a deep breath, pulling himself together. His body ached and he felt so very, very tired.
Gallup patted him on the shoulder.
“It’s over,” he said. “Go home. Go to your family.”
Dawn was breaking as Hopper ran up the stoop in front of his building, the lights of the police car he had been driven in beginning to be washed out by the brightening morning sun. Before he got to the top, the front door opened and Diane appeared, Sara cradled in her arms, the young girl sleeping with her head tucked under her mother’s chin.
Hopper paused, two steps from the top. Diane laughed, a reaction to the intense relief she must have felt, her face wet with tears.
Hopper joined her, his own eyes streaming. He and his wife stood in the middle of the building’s lobby and hugged. The pressure on Hopper’s injured arm, trapped between their bodies, was painful, but Hopper happily ignored the discomfort.
Ensconced safely between them, Sara blinked awake, and lifted her head. She looked up at Diane, then at Hopper. She rubbed one eye with the back of her small hand.
“Is that you, Daddy?”
“It’s me, darling, it’s me.” He kissed her cheek. “I’m home.”