They heard the sound of the car as soon as they exited the clinic, and seconds later a black Buick shot from the lot to their left and prepared to turn onto Gerritsen Avenue. A streetlight caught the face of the woman as she glanced toward them. It was Will who reacted first, firing three shots as the woman responded to their presence, turning left instead of right so that she would not have to cross in front of them. The first shot took out the driver’s window, and the second and third hit the door. The Buick sped away as Will fired a fourth time, running behind it as Jimmy raced for their own car. Then, as Will watched, the Buick seemed to wobble on its axles, then began to drift to the right. It struck the curb outside the Lutheran church, then mounted it and came to a rest against the railings of the churchyard.
Will continued running. Now Jimmy was at his side, all thoughts of their own vehicle abandoned when the other car had come to a stop. As they drew nearer, the driver’s door opened and the woman stumbled out, clearly injured. She glanced back at them, a knife in her hand. Will didn’t hesitate. He wanted her dead. He fired again. The bullet struck the door, but by then the woman was already moving, abandoning the car, her left foot dragging. She dived left onto Bartlett, her pursuers closing the distance rapidly. As they turned the corner, she seemed frozen beneath a streetlight, her head turned, her mouth open. Will aimed, but even injured she was too fast. She stumbled to her right, down a narrow alley called Canton Court.
“We have her,” said Jimmy. “That’s a dead end. There’s just the creek down there.”
They paused as they reached Canton, then exchanged a look and nodded. Their weapons held high, they entered the dark space between two cottages that led to the creek.
The woman was standing with her back to the creek bank, caught in the moonlight. The knife was still held in her hand. Her coat was slightly too long for her, and the sleeves hung over the second knuckles of her fingers, but not so far as to obscure the blade.
“Put it down,” said Jimmy, but he was not talki R qas not tang to her, not yet. Instead, while his eyes remained fixed on the woman, he laid the palm of his hand on the warm barrel of Will’s revolver, gently forcing it down. “Don’t do it, Will. Just don’t.”
The woman twisted the blade, and Jimmy thought that he could still see traces of Caroline Carr’s blood on it.
“It’s over,” she said. Her voice was surprisingly soft and sweet, but her eyes were twin shards of obsidian in the pallor of her face.
“That’s right,” said Jimmy. “Now drop the knife.”
“It doesn’t matter what you do to me,” said the woman. “I am beyond your law.”
She dropped the knife, but at the same time, her left hand moved, the sleeve of her coat pulling back to reveal the little pistol concealed by its folds.
It was Jimmy who killed her. He hit her twice before she could get a shot off. She remained standing for a second, then tumbled backward into the cold waters of the Shell Bank Creek.
She was never identified. The receptionist at the hospital confirmed that she was the same woman who had claimed to be Caroline Carr’s sister. A false Virginia driver’s license in the name of Ann Carr was found in her coat pocket, along with a small quantity of cash. Her fingerprints were not on file anywhere, and nobody came forward to identify her even after her picture appeared on news shows and in the papers.
But that came later. For now, there were questions to be asked, and to be answered. More cops came. They flooded the clinic. They sealed off Bartlett. They dealt with reporters, with curious onlookers, with distressed patients and their relatives.
While they did so, a group of people met in a room at the back of the hospital. They included the hospital director; the doctor and midwife who had been monitoring Caroline Carr; the NYPD’s deputy commissioner for legal affairs; and a small, quiet man in his early forties, Rabbi Epstein. Will Parker and Jimmy Gallagher had been instructed to wait outside, and they sat together on hard plastic chairs, not speaking. Only one person, except for Jimmy, had expressed her sorrow to Will at what had occurred. It was the receptionist. She knelt before him while he waited, and took his hand.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “We all are.”
He nodded dumbly.
“I don’t know if—,” she began, then stopped. “No, I know it won’t help, but maybe you might like to see your son?”
She led him to a glass-walled room, and she pointed out the tiny child who lay sleeping between two others.
“That’s him,” she said. “That’s your boy.”
They were called into the meeting room minutes later. Those present were introduced to them, all except for one man in a su R q man in ait who had followed the two cops into the room, and was now watching Will carefully. Epstein leaned toward Will and whispered, “I’m sorry.”
Will did not reply.
It was the deputy commissioner, Frank Mancuso, who formally broke the silence.
“They tell me you’re the father,” he said to Will.
“I am.”
“What a mess,” said Mancuso, with feeling. “We need to get the story straight,” said Mancuso. “Are you two listening?”
Will and Jimmy nodded in unison.
“The child died,” said Mancuso.
“What?” said Will.
“The child died. It lived for a couple of hours, but it seems that there was some damage caused by the knife wound to the womb. It died as of”—he checked his watch—“two minutes ago.”
“What are you talking about?” said Will. “I just saw him.”
“And now he’s dead.”
Will tried to leave, but Epstein grabbed his arm.
“Wait, Mr. Parker. Your child is alive and well, but as of now, only the people in this room know it. Already he’s being taken away.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“Why? He’s my son. I want to know where he is.”
“Think, Mr. Parker,” said Epstein. “For a moment, just think.”
Will was silent for a time. When he spoke, he said, “You believe that someone is going to come after the child.”
“We believe that it’s a possibility. They can’t know that he survived.”
“But they’re dead. The man and the woman. I saw them both die.”
Epstein looked away. “There may be others,” he said, and, even amid his grief and confusion, the cop in Will wondered what Epstein was trying to hide.
“What others? Who are these people?”
“We’re trying to find that out,” said Epstein. “It will take time.”
“Right. And in the meantime, what happens to my son?”
“Eventually, he’ll be placed with a family,” said Mancuso. “That’s all you need to know.”
“No,” said Will, “i R qll, ldqut isn’t. He’s my son.”
Mancuso bared his teeth. “You’re not listening, Officer Parker. You don’t have a son. And if you don’t walk away from this, you won’t have a career either.”
“You have to let him go,” said Epstein gently. “If you love him as a son, then you have to let him go.”
Will looked at the unknown man standing by the wall.
“Who are you?” Will asked. “Where do you fit into all of this?”
The man didn’t answer, and he didn’t flinch under the glare of Will’s anger.
“He’s a friend,” said Epstein. “That’s enough for now.”
Mancuso spoke again. “Are we all singing from the same hymn sheet, Officer? You’d better tell us now. I won’t be so good-natured if this matter raises its head outside these four walls.”
Will swallowed hard.
“Yes,” he said. “I understand.”
“Yes, sir,” said Mancuso.
“Yes, sir,” repeated Will.
“And you?” Mancuso turned his attention to Jimmy Gallagher.
“I’m with him,” said Jimmy. “Whatever he says goes.”
Glances were exchanged. It was over.
“Go home,” said Mancuso to Will. “Go home to your wife.”
And when they passed the glass-walled room again, the cot was already empty, and the receptionist’s face was creased with grief as they passed her desk. Already, the cover-up had begun. Without words to convey her sympathy for a man who had, in one night, lost his child, and the mother of his child, she could only shake her head and watch as he disappeared into the night.