“We can’t bring Bridget back, but we can help make things right,” Lewis said, reaching into his jacket and taking out his gun.
He spun around, pointed it at Nicole, and pulled the trigger. I was expecting a louder bang, but the gun was equipped with one of those silencer things on the end of the barrel.
What made noise was Nicole being thrown up against the shelves, the back of her head banging into them, then dropping facedown onto the floor. Two shelves gave way and an avalanche of toys crashed to the floor. A Super Ball bounced in tall arcs across the room.
“I was going to get around to it sooner or later, anyway,” Lewis said.
SIXTY-FOUR
THE room was as still now as it had been when I’d first mentioned Bridget. Morris Sawchuck looked disbelievingly at Lewis, at Nicole on the floor.
“What in God’s name have you done?” he asked him.
“What I always do,” Lewis said. “Take care of problems for you and Howard.”
Suddenly, Morris reached into his jacket and now there was a gun in his hand, too. I guessed, when you were the attorney general, you packed heat. Lewis seemed to know instinctively what Morris was going for, so by the time Morris had his weapon pointed at Lewis’s head, Lewis had his pointed right back at Morris’s.
They stood there, frozen, guns pointed at each other.
“Let’s all try to calm down,” Howard said.
Morris, not taking his eyes off Lewis, said, “No one kills for me. No one does this kind of thing on my behalf.”
“It’s already been done,” Howard said softly, standing behind Morris. “This isn’t going to get better if you shoot Lewis. We need him.”
“Jesus, Howard, just shut up.”
Lewis had his arms locked, his finger on the trigger, the gun still pointed straight at Morris’s head. His stance, his posture, suggested he was more used to doing this than Morris, but the attorney general looked equally committed, ready to shoot if he had to.
“No,” Howard said. “You have to listen. Things have already been done on your behalf. Bad things. Ugly things. Things that, if they come out, you’ll never be able to distance yourself from, never be able to convince people you didn’t order yourself. Morris, listen to me. They’ll put you away forever. Not just me, not just Lewis, but all of us. You may not be able to see it, but there’s blood on your hands.”
Morris and Lewis kept their guns trained on each other.
Howard continued, “It gets worse. The whole world will believe you killed Bridget. They’re going to think you had her killed, Morris. I know you want to do the right thing here, but we’re too far past that. And things will come out about her. About Bridget. Although…” His voice trailed off. “They hardly matter now.”
Morris was breathing through his nose. In and out, in and out, his nostrils flaring with each agitated breath. Then, as suddenly as he’d raised his weapon, he lowered it and looked down at the floor, an admission of defeat. He tucked the gun back into his jacket.
Lewis slowly put his arm down, but kept the gun firmly gripped in his hand.
Even though Morris shooting Lewis might have been in my interest, I breathed a sigh of relief along with everyone else. I looked over at Thomas, expecting him to be a nervous wreck, but he had his eyes closed. I was guessing he’d had them closed through most of this.
“Thomas,” I said. “You can open your eyes.”
He did, looked briefly at Nicole’s body, then at me. He said nothing, but his eyes were pleading. They were asking me to get us out of here. My eyes didn’t have a reassuring answer.
Morris was shaking his head. Lewis and Howard watched him warily, unsure of what he’d do next.
Morris turned, brushed past Howard, threw back the curtain, and started walking toward the front door.
“Morris?” Howard said.
“What the hell’s he going to do?” Lewis said. “Goddamn it.”
Howard went after him. I could see that Lewis wanted to, as well. He gave Thomas and me a quick look, figured we weren’t going anywhere, and followed the two other men.
I heard the door open, but it closed almost immediately, suggesting to me that Morris had tried to leave but one of the other men had slammed the door shut before he could. The three of them began arguing, talking at once. I didn’t know what they were saying, and right now, I didn’t care.
I figured if Thomas and I were ever going to have a chance, this was it.
I leaned forward in the chair so that my feet were planted firmly on the wood floor. They hadn’t taped my legs to the chair so I actually had limited mobility.
“What are you doing?” Thomas asked.
“Shh,” I said.