Al Sarrantonio - Cold Night

"Steppen found a couple of Hollywood leeches named Izzy and Mona to do the actual snatchings. He had pictures taken of various children that fitted the description of what Jane Grumbach wanted, and then she picked the photos of the babies she wanted and Izzy and Mona stole them. She wanted three daughters, and she got them, in 1962, 1965 and 1968."

Kopiak looked around for his scotch bottle, located it on the floor and picked it up. There was enough unspilled Chivas in the bottle for a two-finger drink. "And I did the paperwork. Steppen provided the documents, I did the rest. I knew the right people, Jane Grumbach knew anyone I didn't, and the job got done." He drank the last of the scotch. "I didn't win my election that first year I met the Grumbachs, but my law practice thrived. I became the Grumbach family's lawyer. I watched the three girls grow up. I went to their high school graduations." He put the empty crystal glass down, next to the picture of his wife and sons. He looked at it wistfully. "I sent them presents each Christmas."

"Did the girls know about it?" Paine asked.

"No," Kopiak said dreamily. "Not until just before their mother died, about a year ago. Rebecca found these pictures of yours and confronted her father; he was drunk and feeling guilty and he told her everything. Her mother just laughed, told them they were better off and that she'd done them a favor. It must have been terrible for them. ."

"Who killed everyone, Kopiak?"

Kopiak stood. "I don't know. ." he said. He paced to the window, turned his back and assumed the position Paine had seen him in when he came in. He stared down through the glass into nothing, into the river, perhaps.

Suddenly he seemed to peer closely at something, and his body tightened and he said, as if in revelation, "Oh-"

Paine heard the shot. The window had a two-foot hole in it where Kopiak's face had been. Imploded fragments of blood-tinted glass showered the room.

Paine crouched his way to the corner of the window, stepping over Kopiak's nearly beheaded body, and glanced cautiously outside. He saw nothing: street, low buildings, river. Keeping low, he ran for the door of the office and down to the street. He still saw nothing.

As he got into his car and headed north a tan Ford immediately settled in behind him. Paine drove a couple of blocks and the Ford kept its distance. When Paine next glanced in his rearview mirror the driver of the tan Ford had put a red flasher on the roof and a siren began to wail.

"Shit," Paine said.

He came to a stop at the curb and the tan Ford pulled in behind him. Paine watched in the rearview mirror as the driver got out, keeping his head down. It looked like he was studying his ticket book.

Paine glanced away and when he looked back the driver was not there anymore.

"Move over, asshole."

The driver was behind him, and Paine saw the.38 before he heard the voice. The voice was Dannon's. Dannon opened the back door of Paine's car and slid across the seat.

"Drive," he said.

The round cool mouth of the.38 kissed the back of Paine's neck.

"Where do you want me to go?"

"The old beat, Jackie-boy."

Paine drove slowly. He took each turn cautiously, keeping his hands in view on the wheel.

"Did Jane Grumbach own you long?" Paine asked.

The mouth of the.38 bumped his neck as Dannon laughed. "I don't know what you're talking about, fuckhead."

"The way I figure it, you took care of the local police for Kopiak and the Grumbachs. The thing I can't figure out is why you killed Kopiak and the rest-why derail the gravy train?"

"Kopiak is dead?"

"His brains are all over his office."

"I was on the way to his office when I saw you. I didn't kill anybody," Dannon said angrily, jamming the gun into Paine's neck.

"Did-"

"Just drive," Dannon snapped.

"Any special place you want me to go?"

"You know where." Paine's hands tightened on the wheel. In the back seat, Dannon was solemn. After a moment he asked, "Kopiak's really dead?"

"Yes."

"Drive," he repeated.

Paine drove.

When they got to the end of the street by the railroad station, Dannon told him to slow down. "You know where to park," he said. Paine pulled the car over to the curb in front of the bench where he'd found the man with the wedge out of his neck. That had been night, and this was day, but the sky was gunmetal gray and the buildings were high and blocked the sun. It might as well be night.

"Get out of the car."

Paine got out. The day became night for him, and the other, earlier night began to unreel in his head like a spool of shadowy movie film. He saw the man with the wedge out of his neck on the ground, face down; he heard Dannon's running footsteps ahead of him, saw the man in the leather jacket running, saw the two of them turn a corner and disappear.

"Walk."

Paine walked. He followed each invisible step as he had then. Dannon's.38 was in his back but he didn't feel it. In his mind he was running, in his mind he went to the corner, stopped, listened in the night for the sound of running men.

"Keep moving, asshole."

In his head, he heard Dannon shout for him, turned, saw movement in the alley, followed.

"That's the way, asshole, I see you remember."

Paine's mind fogged. The movie film unreeled. There was a groaning, thick ache in his stomach. He couldn't see clearly. He heard movement behind him. Dannon. Ahead, under the sloping high sides of apartment buildings, the spiderworks of rusting fire escapes, the tattered flags of wet wash and, up high, the twisted praying metal hands of television antennae, under all this, in the dim walkway scattered with a maze of cartons, broken furniture, the broken innards of a television separated from its praying hands above, he saw movement -the boy in the leather jacket? — saw a figure step out of the deep dream of the night and point something at him…

"Paaaaaaaaaine!"

He remembered, but it was no better; the night was the same, his mind a foggy mess, his arm raised next to him, feeling like it didn't belong to him, like his finger had that night when Ginny walked in on him with that bullet in the chamber of his.38 staring at him, his finger becoming apart from him, thinking for him, and the night became bright with light and the figure in the leather jacket became one with the ground and the flash from the thing the boy pointed at him did not go out like the blinding flash he saw next to him-

"I have a present for you, Paine."

The film spooled onto the ground, the movie was over and he still didn't understand the ending.

Dannon stepped back away from Paine. "I'm going to give you a present before I blow your fucking head apart."

He brought his gun to eye level, sighting along the barrel at Paine's face. "The way I see it, you killed Kopiak and the rest of them. At least, for my purposes you did. And the way I see it I had to shoot you during apprehension. But before I do that I'm going to tell you what happened that night. You didn't kill that kid. I did. The little fucker was running numbers for me, and he'd started skimming. The guy with the briefcase was another of my problems. So were you. So I decided to get rid of all my problems at once.

"I drugged you that night, asshole. Just enough to make you punchy without putting you out. I set up a meeting between the briefcase man and the little shit, and told the bastard that if he took care of briefcase he'd be even with me. Then I told him to wait for me in this alley with a flashlight. Then I called you in. You would have seen Martians if I'd told you to. I told the kid to turn on the flashlight, slipped your.38 out and did him, then put the.38 into your hand. It was easy."

Dannon took careful aim along the barrel of his gun. He moved it up a fraction of an inch, to the center of Paine's temple.