Jeffery Deaver - The Bone Collector

Sachs snagged her pistol and was after him in an instant, scrabbling through the tunnel. She burst out to see the wounded animal sprinting straight toward Pammy and the medic, who stood frozen as the Doberman leapt into the air.

Sachs dropped into a crouch and squeezed off two rounds. One hit the back of the animal’s head and the other streaked into the brick wall. The dog collapsed in a quivering pile at the medic’s feet.

“Shots fired,” she heard in her radio and a half-dozen troopers rushed down the stairs, pulled the dog away and deployed around the girl.

“It’s all right!” Sachs shouted. “It was me!”

The team rose from their defensive positions.

Pammy was screaming, “Doggie dead… She made the doggie dead!”

Sachs holstered her weapon and hefted the girl onto her hip.

“Mommy!”

“You’ll see your mommy soon,” Sachs said. “We’re going to call her right now.”

Upstairs she set Pammy on the floor and turned to a young ESU officer standing nearby, “I lost my cuff key. Could you take those off her please? Open them over a piece of clean newspaper, wrap ’em up in the paper and put the whole thing in a plastic bag.”

The officer rolled his eyes. “Listen, beautiful, go find yourself a rookie to order around.” He started to walk away.

“Trooper,” Bo Haumann barked, “you’ll do what she says.”

“Sir,” he protested, “I’m ESU.”

“Got news,” Sachs muttered, “you’re Crime Scene now.”

Carole Ganz was lying on her back in a very beige bedroom, staring at the ceiling, thinking about the time a few weeks ago when she and Pammy and a bunch of friends were sitting around a campfire in Wisconsin at Kate and Eddie’s place, talking, telling stories, singing songs.

Kate’s voice wasn’t so hot but Eddie could’ve been a pro. He could even play barre chords. He sang Carole King’s “Tapestry” just for her and Carole sang along softly through her tears. Thinking that maybe, just maybe, she really was putting Ron’s death behind her and getting on with her life.

She remembered Kate’s voice from that night: “When you’re angry, the only way to deal with it is to wrap up that anger and give it away. Give it to somebody else. Do you hear me? Don’t keep it inside you. Give it away.”

Well, she was angry now. Furious.

Some young kid – a mindless little shit – had taken her husband away, shot him in the back. And now some crazy man had taken her daughter. She wanted to explode. And it took all her willpower not to start flinging things against the wall and howling like a coyote.

She lay back on the bed and gingerly placed her shattered wrist on her belly. She’d taken a Demerol, which had eased the pain, but she hadn’t been able to sleep. She’d done nothing but stay inside all day long, trying to get in touch with Kate and Eddie and waiting for news about Pammy.

She kept picturing Ron, kept picturing her anger, actually imagining herself packing it up in a box, wrapping it carefully, sealing it up…

And then the phone rang. She stared for a moment then yanked it off the cradle.

“Hello?”

Carole listened to the policewoman tell her that they’d found Pammy, that she was in the hospital but that she was okay. A moment later Pammy herself came on the phone and they were both crying and laughing at the same time.

Ten minutes later she was on her way to Manhattan Hospital, in the back seat of a black police sedan.

Carole practically sprinted down the corridor to Pammy’s room and was surprised to be stopped by the police guard. So they hadn’t caught the fucker yet? But as soon as she saw her daughter she forgot about him, forgot the terror in the taxi and the fiery basement. She threw her arms around her little girl.

“Oh, honey, I missed you! Are you okay? Really okay?”

“That lady, she killed a doggie -”

Carole turned and saw the tall, red-haired policewoman standing nearby, the one who’d saved her from the church basement.

“ – but it was all right because he was going to eat me.”

Carole hugged Sachs. “I don’t know what to say… I just… Thank you, thank you.”

“Pammy’s fine,” Sachs assured her. “Some scratches – nothing serious – and she’s got a little cough.”

“Mrs. Ganz?” A young man walked into the room, carrying her suitcase and yellow knapsack. “I’m Detective Banks. We’ve got your things here.”

“Oh, thank God.”

“Is anything missing?” he asked her.

She looked through the knapsack carefully. It was all there. The money, Pammy’s doll, the package of clay, the Mr. Potato Head, the CDs, the clock radio… He hadn’t taken anything. Wait…”You know, I think there’s a picture missing. I’m not sure. I thought I had more than these. But everything important’s here.”

The detective gave her a receipt to sign.

A young resident stepped into the room. He joked with Pammy about her Pooh bear as he took her blood pressure.

Carole asked him, “When can she leave?”

“Well, we’d like to keep her in for a few days. Just to make sure -”

“A few days? But she’s fine.”

“She’s got a bit of bronchitis I want to keep an eye on. And…” He lowered his voice. “We’re also going to bring in an abuse specialist. Just to make sure.”

“But she was going to go with me tomorrow. To the UN ceremonies. I promised her.”

The policewoman added, “It’s easier to keep her guarded here. We don’t know where the unsub – the kidnapper – is. We’ll have an officer babysitting you too.”

“Well, I guess. Can I stay with her for a while?”

“You bet,” the resident said. “You can stay the night. We’ll have a cot brought in.”

Then Carole was alone with her daughter once more. She sat down on the bed and put her arm around the child’s narrow shoulders. She had a bad moment remembering how he , that crazy man, had touched Pammy. How his eyes had looked when he’d asked if he could cut her own skin off… Carole shivered and began to cry.

It was Pammy who brought her back. “Mommy, tell me a story… No, no, sing me something. Sing me the friend song. Pleeeeease?”

Calming down, Carole asked, “You want to hear that one, hm?”

“Yes!”

Carole hoisted the girl onto her lap and, in a reedy voice, started to sing “You’ve Got a Friend.” Pammy sang snatches of it along with her.

It had been one of Ron’s favorites and, in the past couple years, after he was gone, she hadn’t been able to listen to more than a few bars without breaking into tears.

Today, she and Pammy finished it together, pretty much on key, dry-eyed and laughing.

AMELIA SACHS FINALLY WENT HOME to her apartment in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn.

Exactly six blocks from her parents’ house, where her mother still lived. As soon as she walked in she hit the first speed-dial button on the kitchen phone.

“Mom. Me. I’m taking you to brunch at the Plaza. Wednesday. That’s my day off.”

“What for? To celebrate your new assignment? How is Public Affairs? You didn’t call.”

A fast laugh. Sachs realized her mother had no idea what she’d been doing for the past day and a half.

“You been following the news, Mom?”

“Me? I’m Brokaw’s secret admirer, you know that.”

“You hear about this kidnapper the last few days?”

“Who hasn’t?… What’re you telling me, honey?”

“I’ve got the inside scoop.”

And she told her astonished mother the story – about saving the vics and about Lincoln Rhyme and, with some editing, about the crime scenes.

“Amie, your father’d be so proud.”