JASON STARR - Panic Attack

“The right thing?” Marissa said. “He fucking shot me.”

“He was trying to save your life.”

“Yeah, and he did such a great job of it.”

“You’re alive, aren’t you?”

“No thanks to him.”

“He was scared, he panicked. And if he didn’t go up there that Xan, I mean Johnny, might’ve killed you.”

It had come out in the news that Xan had actually been a career criminal named Johnny Long. He’d grown up in the same orphanage as Carlos Sanchez, and the police believed that Johnny had been the second intruder in the robbery and that he’d killed Marissa’s mother and Gabriela. Marissa knew it was her fault for letting Xan into their lives, but everything else had been her father’s fault.

“I know what your father did was wrong,” her grandmother said, “but imagine, just imagine, what the last seconds of his life were like, how awful that must’ve been for him. He had to die, thinking he’d killed you, thinking he’d killed his daughter. That’s the last thing he thought, the last thing he saw…”

Her grandmother was sobbing. Marissa gave her a couple of minutes to get hold of herself, then said, “Look, I know it’s hard for you to accept, Grandma, but my father made a huge mistake, okay? I wish he’d been a better man, I really do. I wish I could defend him, I wish I could justify what he did, but I can’t. panic attack 323

He was a selfish asshole who went around like he was wearing a red cape and he didn’t care about me or my mother or anybody but himself. If he’d called the police they might’ve saved me and I might not’ve gotten shot, and if he’d called the police when our house got robbed maybe my mother would still be alive and I wouldn’t’ve had sex with that son of a bitch Johnny Long. Don’t you see? My father caused it all, and I don’t care what you say, I’ll never forgive him for that, ever.”

The day of Marissa’s discharge, Grandma Ann returned to the hospital. She looked extremely frail, like she’d lost ten, maybe fifteen pounds since Adam’s death.

“Are you okay, Grandma? I’m really worried about you.”

“I’m fine,” she said flatly. “Are you ready to go?”

The plan was for them to ride in a Town Car to the Mansfield Hotel in midtown, where Marissa had booked a suite. Marissa intended to never set foot inside the house in Forest Hills again. It was already up for sale, and at some point she’d arrange for someone to sell off all the furniture and clothes and move everything else into long- term storage. Her parents’ life insurance policies, the proceeds from the sale of the house, and their other assets would make her a multimillionaire. She didn’t know what she was going to do with her life, but she sure as hell wasn’t going to waste it working. She was planning to move to Prague after all of the financial details were worked out. She’d live there for a while and then maybe move to Paris or Barcelona or some other city. She just wanted to get away- from New York, from America, from everybody who’d ever heard of Adam Bloom. The thought of having to live the rest of her life as Adam Bloom’s daughter disgusted her so much that she’d already started doing the paperwork to legally change her last name to Stern. It was her mother’s maiden name and she thought it would be a nice tribute.

She got out of the bed and into a wheelchair. She could walk fine, but it was hospital policy that all patients, no matter what their condition, had to be wheeled out when they were discharged. The orderly wheeled her very slowly so Grandma Ann, next to them, could keep up.

At the hospital doors, Marissa stood and walked next to her grandmother toward where the Town Car was waiting at the curb.

Reporters rushed them. One of the loudest shouted, “Ms. Bloom, how does it feel to be a hero?”

Marissa stopped for a moment, glared at the guy, a little older than her, and said,“I’m not a hero, and my last name isn’t Bloom, it’s Stern. I’m Marissa Stern. You got that?”

They moved on toward the car. Now the reporters were shouting, “Ms. Stern! Ms. Stern! Ms. Stern!”

Marissa helped her grandmother in and then got in after her. As they drove off down Fifth Avenue, she could still hear the reporters screaming.

“I swear to God,” Marissa said, “I better not see the name Marissa Bloom in the papers tomorrow morning.”

Her grandmother, looking away, didn’t say anything.

For their enormous impact on this novel and my career I’d like to thank Ken Bruen, Bret Easton Ells, Lee Child, Kristian Moliere, Shane McNeil, Charles Ardai, John David Coles, Sandy Starr, Brian DeFlore, Nick Harris, Marc Resnick, Sarah Lumnah, Andy Martin, Matthew Shear, Matthew Baldacci, and everyone at Minotaur Books.