James Patterson: Kill Me If You Can

I was in pain, but I was grateful. The bullet that Chukov fired at my chest was lodged in my body armor and not in my body. But the force of the concussion had knocked the wind out of me, and I felt like I had a couple of cracked ribs.

The bullet in my shoulder was what the medics casually refer to as a flesh wound . But it’s impossible to be casual when it’s your flesh that’s wounded. I struggled to get up.

“Matt, Matt, are you okay?” Ty said.

“Where’s Katherine?” I yelled.

Zach jumped in. “Shaken but safe. Are you okay?”

“No. And I won’t be okay until we get Chukov.” I stood and looked around. “Where is he?”

“Running up the south ramp,” Adam said. “I don’t have a clean shot from the balcony. Matt, how bad were you hit?”

“Enough to really piss me off. I’m going after him.”

I could see Chukov barreling his way up the ramp through the frenzied crowd toward the 42nd Street exit.

My shoulder was burning as I headed toward the ramp. Chukov looked back and saw me. Then he looked at the bottleneck in front of him. Hundreds of people were screaming in terror as they fought to squeeze through doorways that were designed to handle one person at a time.

Ten more seconds and I’d have him.

There was a second ramp — one that went down into the subway. It was wide open because nobody wanted to go down there. The lessons of 9/11 were still fresh in people’s minds. Grand Central was under attack. Get out of the building. Don’t risk being trapped underground. Only a crazy person would head down there.

The mob kept clawing at the front doors. One crazy person broke off from the pack and raced down the ramp toward the spiderweb of subways below.

Chukov. He had realized he’d never make it out the narrow door.

A second person, bleeding, in pain, and probably just as crazy, followed.

Me.

THE GRAND CENTRAL subway station is a labyrinth of uptown, downtown, and crosstown options. Along with its sister station under the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Times Square, it is one of the busiest stations in the entire system, so it’s easy to get lost in the subterranean maze, even if you don’t want to.

Chukov definitely wanted to.

By the time I made it down the ramp, he was out of sight.

There were dozens of subway riders who had just gotten off a train and were walking through the passageways oblivious to the chaos going on above them.

I stopped the first man I saw. “Did you see a short, fat guy? He was probably running—”

“Whoa, man,” he said. “You’re bleeding real bad.”

I hadn’t realized what I looked like. “I’m okay,” I said. “Did you see—”

He held his hands up and backed away. “Didn’t see anyone. You better get to a hospital, dude.”

There were half a dozen staircases and at least that many passageways that Chukov could have taken.

I tried to weigh the pluses and minuses using the same logic he would have used. The passageways would eventually lead him to a street exit. But the streets would be clogged with cops responding to the bomb blasts and the gunfire. The stairs would take him to a subway. He could be miles away in minutes. That was the best option.

But which subway? Uptown? Downtown? Local? Express? Flushing line? Times Square shuttle?

I was headed for the downtown staircase when I heard the scream.

A woman came running up the opposite stairwell, shouting, “Run! There’s a man down there with a gun!”

I charged back to the Lexington Avenue uptown and took the steps three at a time.

The platform was deserted. No passengers. No cops. No Chukov. He had just been here, but the screaming woman had sent him running again.

The tracks. Chukov was a madman. Would he be crazy enough to try to escape through the tunnel?

I stepped to the edge of the platform and looked into the semidarkness. There was enough light to navigate the tunnel, and I realized that if he was smart and careful, he could make his way uptown to 51st Street this way.

“Turn around.”

I froze. The madman was behind me. My gun was tucked in my belt. Even without looking, I knew where his gun was — aimed right at my back.

I turned slowly, and there he was, pointing a semiautomatic Marakov PM at my chest.

His eyes were on fire, and I could hear the asthmatic rattle in his lungs as he breathed. I knew what was coming next — the diatribe, the rant, the blistering harangue cataloging every injustice I had inflicted on him, followed by threats of retribution he would bring down on me and everyone connected to me. And then, one last negotiation. He still wanted the diamonds, and even though I had duped him on the exchange, he still believed I had them.

Scream at me all you want, I thought. I need as much time as I can get to figure a way out of this.

But I was wrong. He didn’t utter a word. He just aimed the gun at my heart and squeezed the trigger.

The bullet slammed into the shock plate of my body armor and blew me backward off the platform onto the tracks. The pain was unbearable, but once again the vest under my sweater had saved my life.

But only for a few seconds. Chukov stepped up to the edge of the platform and pointed the Marakov at my head.

“ Do svidaniya, modderfocker,” he said.

BULLETPROOF VESTS SAVE lives, but they don’t do much for bones. I have twenty-four ribs, and it felt like every one of them was broken.

Chukov aimed at my head. Every ounce of my training told me to roll before he pulled the trigger, but I could barely breathe, much less dodge a bullet.

I was a dead man.

I heard the gunshot and saw the muzzle flash, but I wasn’t dead. The tile wall behind me shattered and a mighty bellow from Chukov echoed through the tunnel as his body flew off the platform.

Someone had hurtled down the stairs and slammed into Chukov from behind, sending the bullet wide and pitching his fat Russian ass onto the tracks.

It wasn’t a miracle. God bless Adam, Zach, and Ty, I thought. I sat up to see which one had saved my skin. But it wasn’t any of them.

“Matthew, get his gun, get his gun!” It was Katherine.

Chukov’s gun had skittered along one of the rails when he landed. My adrenaline surged. I managed to get to my knees and dig for my own gun. Chukov was already up. He swung his foot into my jaw. That hurt. Plus, it raised hell with the hole in my shoulder.

I went sprawling, and Chukov grabbed for the gun in my hand. He dug his fingers into my face with one hand and yanked at the weapon with the other.

The pain was blinding. I almost lost consciousness. I did lose the gun.

“You stupid piece of shit,” he screamed, pointing the muzzle at my face.

I was out of strength. And I knew that as soon as Chukov finished me off, he would shoot Katherine. I had to get her to run. I looked up at the platform.

And there she was, hoisting a New York City Transit Authority trash can high over her head with a strength that must have been born of fear and red-hot anger. She hurled it at Chukov.

It hit him square in the face and knocked him off balance. The wire mesh left a bloody grid on his cheek.

Totally enraged, he pressed his palm into my shoulder, pushing himself up and once again sending waves of agony through my body.

And then I heard it. The number 6 train.

Chukov heard it, too. After a darting glance between me and the platform, he decided to save his own ass and let the train take care of me.

With my gun still in his hand, he leaped toward the platform like an overweight mountain lion.

Katherine screamed.