Andrew Klavan - The Identity Man

"Oh, he'll kill you, Shannon. I don't mind making the deal, but that's what it is. He'll kill you."

"All right. But you'll make the deal?"

"I might. Is that everything?"

Shannon hesitated, pressing his lips together. He didn't like to tell this skeevy bastard any more than he had to. "Tell her how you set me up. When it's all done, tell her how I didn't know. When I came into her house, I didn't know anyone was after me. I wouldn't have brought them into it, if I'd known."

"That's right. It was my doing. I'll tell her that."

"And about Gutterson, how that happened. And how I never did Hernandez. I was never anywhere near that."

"Your last will and testament, huh?"

"Whatever. Don't be an asshole. Just tell her."

The federal agent sat still, watching him, thinking it over. "I don't think I've ever seen this before."

"The world is full of things you don't see."

"Is it? I wouldn't know." He stood up quickly. "All right."

Shannon stood up. "We're good to go?"

Foster nodded. He stretched his neck, moving his shoulders up and down in an undulating rhythm. The tics and nervous shiftings had begun again. "We're good. We'll have to move fast before Ramsey figures it out."

"That's your department. Do what you do."

Foster moved away, moved to the edge of the plywood divider. He paused there. He glanced back at Shannon.

"What now?" Shannon said. "For Christ's sake, Foster."

"All right. All right. But it's kind of out of character for you, this, isn't it?"

"I guess it's not, since I'm doing it."

"I guess that's right." But he studied Shannon another moment or two.

"We all have to take our chances, Foster," Shannon told him.

"I guess that's right," Foster said again. He walked out.

Shannon stayed where he was, alone in the little enclosure. He paced back and forth behind the plywood walls. He didn't want to go out in the loft and see Teresa. He didn't want to see Applebee or the boy, either. He just wanted them to go so he could do what he was going to do and get it over with. It would be easier without seeing them.

But the boy came running the length of the loft. Shannon heard his footsteps, and then the kid came into the enclosure.

"Hey," said Shannon, looking down at him.

"The car is here to take us to the doctor."

"That's good. The doctor'll fix you up."

"I don't even hurt anymore."

"Well, you're a tough guy."

Teresa came looking for her son. She took him by the shoulders. "Come on, Michael, we have to go."

The boy stood looking up at Shannon. "You beat the gangsters," he said.

"That's right."

"There were a lot of them, too."

"They won't hurt you anymore. You'll be safe now."

"Come on, sweetheart," said Teresa.

"Isn't Henry coming to the doctor?"

"We have to go," she told him. "The car is waiting."

"I'll see you, kid," Shannon said.

"Go wait with Grandpa," Teresa said.

She sent the boy back into the loft. She stepped into the enclosure with Shannon. She stepped close to him. Her face was swollen and lopsided, but it didn't bother him. He looked in her eyes and he was crazy in love with her. He wanted to explain that he hadn't known he was dangerous to her or he would never have come to her house in the first place.

"Listen…" he said.

She put her hand on his face and drew him toward her and kissed him. It was a good kiss. When she drew back, he couldn't find any words.

"We'll talk later," she said softly.

"Sure," he said.

"We'll figure it all out. Nothing's impossible."

He was crazy in love with her; he couldn't believe how much. "I'll be seeing you, Teresa," he said.

"See you."

She walked out of the enclosure. He listened to her footsteps, moving back across the loft. He listened to the voices. He heard the door closing. Then the loft was quiet.

He was glad they were gone. They just made it harder. Now he could do what he was going to do. Now he could get it over with. IT WAS A LONG NIGHT-a long, long night. The waiting was bad. The waiting is always the worst part, Shannon thought. He lay on the cot where the slick agent had read the girly magazine. He lay with his eyes open, staring up at the pipes zig-zagging through the shadows on the loft ceiling. He thought that this was what it must feel like to be on death row. The weird combination of suspense-as if you didn't know what was going to happen-and the sickness of inevitability. Shannon figured you felt the suspense because even though you did know what would happen, you couldn't help hoping you'd be saved from it somehow. Where there's life, there's hope-that's what makes the whole business so terrifying.

Funny, he thought, he had done all this to escape from death row and yet here he was. But then what did you expect in the long run? In the long run, it was all death row. There was only one way out of the world.

Foster and the slick agent stayed with him through the night. Mostly, they sat silently in the metal folding chairs. Once or twice Foster went into the enclosure. Shannon could hear him in there, murmuring into his cell phone, but couldn't make out what he said. After a while, Foster left the loft altogether. A few hours later, he came back and the slick agent left. Shannon figured they were going somewhere to get some sleep.

Shannon himself slept now and then. He would doze off and then wake with a start, realizing the morning was now that much closer. He figured it was just as well to sleep since the waiting was awful, but still, the end was that much closer, and the suspense and the sickness of inevitability grew worse.

Finally-suddenly-he saw blue dawn at the loft windows and figured he'd dozed off again. There was something lingering in his mind as if it had come to him while he was asleep. It was a story someone had told him a long time ago, when he was a little boy. He must've been very little, because he couldn't remember who had told him the story. He only had the sense that it had been a woman and he'd been sitting cross-legged on the floor looking up at her and she had been very kind. It was strange the things that came back to you and the things that didn't.

As for the story itself, it was about a boy who went to a magical country in his dreams. Shannon couldn't remember the details of it, only that the boy had met a magical fairy and she had given him a golden ring. Then, at the end of the story, the boy woke up in his bed and realized it had all been a dream-but when he looked down in his hand, there was the ring. It was still there. As a little boy, Shannon had been very impressed by the story and had found the ending wonderful.

He lay there on the cot for a moment, gazing out the window at the lightening sky, sick with the waiting and inevitability. He hadn't thought about that story in a long time, but he sort of understood why it had come back to him now. It was his story in some sense. What had happened to the boy had also happened to him. He had had a dream, too-a dream that he could have a new life with a new name and a new face in a new city-and now he was awake and it had only been a dream, but he had met Teresa there, and the way he felt about her was like the gold ring in the story.

Who was it who had told him that story, he wondered. It seemed to him he should remember someone who had been kind to him when he was a boy…

The loft door opened and Foster came in. Shannon had not realized he was gone. He was carrying a bag with him from a local diner. Shannon could smell coffee.

"Let's get ready," Foster said.

Shannon swung his legs over the side of the cot and sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

He was glad the waiting was over.

Now it was full day. Shannon was sitting in one of the metal chairs in the main part of the loft. He had his elbow propped on the card table to steady his arm. He was holding the handset of an old-fashioned landline phone to his ear, the kind with a coiling wire. His grip on the handset felt weak. His palm was sweaty.