Then gravity claimed it. Loose hundreds confettied out the open flap, and the whole thing turned a slow half spin before landing with a crash of glass and a splat in a tray of gourmet potato salad three stories below. He stared. Unbelievable. Four hundred grand soaking in mayonnaise. He tried to picture himself vaulting the railing and dropping the distance. Leaned over to check. Jackie Chan, maybe. A forty-three-year-old Polack, no.
Fine. The stairs. They’d scoped the whole place yesterday. The stairwell nearest him stopped at the ground floor, but the far one went all the way down. He started running, taking in the scene as he did. Marshall was flat on his ass, one hand behind, the other trying to bring the gun to bear. The black guy had bowled him over. Jack raised his Colt and fired as he ran, lousy snap shots that shattered glass windows and prompted another round of shrieks. The black guy looked at him, then at Marshall, then turned and ran. Jack reached his partner, ducked down to haul him upward.
Marshall tried to sight in on the guy who’d knocked him over, but Jack shoved him into motion, yelling, “Come on!” The money was the only priority.
The two of them hit the stairwell door, started thundering down. No telling exactly how long before the cops got here, but this was Lincoln Park, a nice, white doctor-and-lawyer neighborhood. It wouldn’t be long. He squeezed the grip of the pistol.
The stairs were clean and smelled of paint. Bare bulbs flooded each flight. He had a hand on the railing and was hauling himself around, more jumping than running. When he reached the bottom, he didn’t even slow, just spun, raised a foot, and kicked the emergency exit door. An alarm screeched as they burst into the grocery store. A Mexican in an apron huddled behind the sushi counter. Wine to the left, imported cheese to the right. Jack charged through, knocking over a display of salsa, jars spilling and smashing. A server stood in the center of a broad octagon of cases filled with precooked entrées and sides. The duffel bag had broken through the glass to spatter potatoes and couscous and sautéed broccolini in all directions. A dozen hundred-dollar bills had settled amid the food like garnish. The server was staring at the bag, one hand half out like he was trying to work up the courage to touch it. Jack pistol-whipped the base of his neck, then pushed past the falling body to claim what was his. “Let’s go.”
“Which way?”
“The back.”
Marshall spun. An employee’s-only tunnel led out to the rear of the mall, into a dingy concrete space littered with cigarette butts and broken glass, loud with the buzz of generators. They burst into the rain, hearing sirens now, close. Jack slung the bag over his shoulder, then hit a low wall moving, grabbing the top with his free hand and hoisting himself up. The move opened up the slash on his arm, but the pain felt far away.
There was a cop on the other side, hurrying down a short alley from a group of three-flat apartments. For a moment, they looked at each other. Then the cop reached for his gun and started yelling to freeze.
Jack had been in before, wasn’t going back. Without removing his left hand from the wall, he brought his right up.
The gun was quieter out in the open space. The cop staggered. His legs gave, and he fell to his knees in a puddle. Water splashed murky and silver.
“Jesus,” Marshall said from beside him. “Jack.”
The cop rocked back and forth. He looked at his hands, bloody and shaking. Jack raised his pistol again. Took time to aim.
18
EAST WAS AS GOOD AS WEST. It didn’t seem to much matter. Moving was the point, staying mobile. Driving minute after minute, mile after mile, with no goal but keeping away from everyone, from the whole world, while they figured out what to do. How to make this right.
The thought almost made Tom laugh. Make it right? What would that look like, Einstein?
He shook his head, filled with a terror and loneliness he’d never known. The world he used to believe in had imploded, and the new one was a horror show inhabited by monsters. Everything he loved was at stake. And there was no one they could trust. They were all alone.
Anna shivered in the passenger seat, arms clutching her chest, and Tom leaned forward to turn up the heat. He punched back and forth between AM 720 and 780. A commercial for volunteer teachers, an overdubbed voice saying that positive role models could dramatically lower drug usage amid blah blah blah.
Nothing so far. It wouldn’t be long now, though. It couldn’t be. Your average shooting didn’t make the news in a city like Chicago, but a firefight in a Lincoln Park mall would. How had things gone so wrong? He still couldn’t understand it, couldn’t wrap his head around what had happened.
An announcer came on and they both held their breath. Waited to hear their own names, that they were fugitives. Prayed that they might hear about a known criminal, Jack Witkowski, gunned down by police while fleeing the mall. Instead, the announcer started in on the economy, the expected fall in the real estate market. People had been talking about how Chicago was overbuilt for a year or two, and coupled with a shaky mortgage industry, it seemed a recipe for imminent disaster. Once, that had really worried them.
From up ahead, Tom heard sirens. His fingers tightened on the wheel. In a blur of red noise, an ambulance blew past.
“Do you think-”
“I don’t know.”
There was a gap, dead air, and then the anchor came back on, his voice different, harried. Tom leaned forward to turn up the volume.
“-early reports of a shoot-out in a Lincoln Park mall. According to our information, at approximately ten o’clock this morning, shots were reported at Century Mall. Witnesses say that perhaps as many as ten people were involved, with gunfire wounding several and possibly killing others, including, it is currently believed, at least one police officer. We, ahh…” He stalled, and Tom could picture the host trying frantically to read. “We understand that police have evacuated the mall and may be in a standoff with the shooters. The identities of the men involved are currently unknown, as is whether they have been captured. There are only preliminary details at this time, but we will obviously be keeping you posted as more information becomes available on this story. Again, this took place at the Century Mall, an upscale center in Lincoln Park, not an area known for…”
Tom turned the volume down.
“Do you think they know we were there?” Anna clicked her thumbnail against her teeth.
He blew a breath, shrugged. His cheek itched, and he went to scratch it with his left hand, caught himself, reached around awkwardly with his right. “If they do, they’ll be after us.”
“Along with Malachi, and Jack, and the cops that work for him.”
“Yeah.”
They rode in silence. Lightning blew the sky like a bulb. Eventually she said, “What are we going to do?”
A light turned red ahead of them. He braked. Sat with the rain bouncing off the roof, the radio announcer muffled in the background. After a moment, he turned sideways. “Baby,” he said, “I don’t have the first clue.”
HALDEN HAD BEEN turning down Tom and Anna’s street when the reports started coming over his radio. Like most detectives, he let the thing run when he was in the car, just kept the volume low and listened subconsciously. Chicago was a big city, with plenty of badness. You got used to the rhythm, the steady call and response of mayhem and tragedy.