Gregg Hurwitz - The Survivor

At first light, Nate emerged from the depths of a slumber, his cheek buried in the bare pillow. Despair washed over him, magnified by aches. Stab wound in his shoulder. Freeze burns on his legs. Chafe marks on his wrists. Concerned that his fingers were still weak, he sat up and tested his grip around his own forearm. Not great.

Trudging through the living room, he tapped the photos of Cielle and Janie as was his morning ritual. No matter how unpleasant it would be, he’d have to update them now in some fashion. He owed them the truth, but he’d rather not do it during the morning rush to school and work. This afternoon, then.

Reaching the kitchen, he confronted the puddle of bourbon and half-dissolved pills he’d spit on the floor last night when he’d decided not to go through with it. A pathetic postscript ensued-him on his hands and knees, wiping the mess off the linoleum with a dishrag. There’d be no easy way out now. Sitting, he took his pills, properly this time. Fifty milligrams, twice a day, on an empty stomach. Because deteriorating from Lou Gehrig’s wasn’t unpleasant enough, he had to forswear alcohol and caffeine while taking riluzole. Sober, tired, and dying-a cheery little triad. He downed some Keflex-antibiotics for the stab wound-and sat, rubbing his eyes, trying to ratchet himself fully awake without the benefit of coffee.

The situation was surreal, beyond nightmarish. Had he really, ten hours prior, been ensconced in a Volkswagon-size block of ice? Had a Ukrainian thug actually threatened to murder his daughter if he didn’t break into a safe-deposit box? He tried to formulate a next move, but his brain couldn’t find traction.

When it came to robbing a bank, where did one start?

He grabbed the morning paper and read the account of yesterday’s events. “Local Man Foils Heist.” There he was in grainy black and white at the press conference, mouth ajar as if in mid-belch, being steered aside by the police captain. His current job was listed, Professional Crisis Responder for LAPD, and he was described as a former soldier. An Upstanding Citizen, brave and newsworthy. He wondered how the article might have read had the reporter known he’d slunk out onto that ledge to give up the ghost. No mention was made of his family. With that in mind, he flipped back a few sections. The obits were thin today. Henry Vivian White, global head of corporate development for a Century City-based investment bank, had died due to complications of a malarial infection he’d contracted while on safari.

Henry leaves his beloved wife, Beatrice (Poundstone), and sons Robert (24) and Michael (22).

Atta boy, Henry.

After disabling the fire alarm, he retrieved his suicide note from the coffee table and burned it in the kitchen sink over the disposal. The words curled and vanished into black.

The ringing phone jarred him from his quiet desperation. A chirpy front-office woman was on the line, confirming his dental appointment for next week.

“Oh,” Nate said, staring at the dying embers, “no thank you.”

“Would you like to reschedule?”

“Nah. I’m gonna be dead soon, and one of the great benefits is not worrying about plaque.” He thanked the puzzled silence and hung up.

Then he called to check in on Erica and Sean O’Doherty, the parents to whom he’d served the death notification yesterday. One advantage to still being alive was that he could do his job another day. Reaching voice mail, he left his information again should they need anything.

Into the shower, blasting the heat, flexing that left hand beneath the stream. Leaning into the burn, he thought, I can still feel this. My nerves still function. My muscles still work. Little victories. Little defeats. Breathing the steam, he contemplated his first step in dealing with Pavlo Shevchenko. He’d go into the office. What better place to gather information than at LAPD headquarters?

Given that the funeral for Flores Esposita, the bank manager, was in a few hours, he pulled his suit from the back of the closet, brushing dust off the shoulders. His gaze caught on the gun safe buried beneath a pair of kicked-off trousers. Squatting, he twirled the dial, inputting Cielle’s birthday. The safe clicked open for the first time since he’d lugged it into the apartment. With some hesitation he peered inside. There the pistol sat. An M9, the same model he’d toted around the Sandbox. Chewing his lip, he considered. What was he gonna do, gun down mafiya in the street? If it came to it. But not today. Today he had to go through a metal detector at LAPD headquarters. He kicked the door closed.

The suit still fit well, a pleasant surprise. Sitting on the bed, he leaned over to lace up his shoes, but his left hand had gone weak again, and he stared at it, willing it to clench, to obey. If it couldn’t do this, how the hell could it grip a gun, pull a trigger, protect his family? His fingertips chased the laces around until he sat back up, winded with exasperation. He sat for a time, breathing.

Then he got up and retrieved his loafers from the closet.

* * *

When Nate stepped off the elevator at the Police Administration Building and entered the bull pen, the detectives and clerks rose and clapped-a tradition to recognize officers who’d closed tough cases. He literally stepped aside and glanced behind him, not getting it until Ken Nowak shouted out, “Look at Hero Boy all dolled up. You goin’ on Oprah today?”

Nate moved into a sea of handshakes and backslaps, noting how odd-and enjoyable-it was to be recognized as an equal here on this floor, where, by dint of his unusual job, he’d never quite fit in. The only person seemingly unimpressed was Jen Brown, who remained hunched over her desk in her private office. Her center-part haircut had not been updated since he’d known her-nor, he suspected, for sometime before that. When he darkened her doorway, she did not look up from her paperwork. As a sergeant, she was tasked with overseeing the ever-diminishing Crisis-Response Unit, an added responsibility which bore little upside for her.

“So,” she eventually said, not yet giving Nate the benefit of her gaze, “you shot a bunch of thugs. Good work, Overbay. And here I thought you only did touchy-feely.”

“Look at you, getting all emotional.”

She looked up finally, trying to stop a smile from forming. She liked him, he knew, no matter how much she tried not to, and he felt the same way about her. “Why are you here?” she asked. “No one died today. Yet.”

“I wanted to do some more follow-up for the O’Doherty family. From yesterday.” Telling a lie here, in the heart of LAPD headquarters, felt perilous. The first step onto a slippery slope. Jen was staring at him blankly. Or was that suspicion? “Remember?” he added. “Nineteen-year-old? Car crash?”

“Right. I forgot. Mr. Research. If my detectives did half the legwork you put into holding people’s hands, we’d have a ninety-percent close rate.” She pulled off her eyeglasses, ducked out of the chain, and set them on her desk. Shoving back in her chair, she pinched the bridge of her nose. Her white blouse, as close to feminine as her wardrobe allowed, was tucked into severe wool pants. “Parents take it all right?”

“About as expected.”

“Nineteen years old. What a thing.” She sighed. Then her sergeant face snapped back on, and she waved him out. “Whatever you need for them. Just keep out of my hair. Oh-and, Nate?”

He leaned back through the doorway.

“The bank. Seriously. Didn’t know you had it in you.”

Nate went to his desk, a ledge of pressed wood floating above a swivel chair. If the half-partition walls hemming him in were more ambitious, he could call it a cubicle. Despite the cramped quarters, he couldn’t complain about the work space or the building.