Blindsight (42 page)

continued on to the security office. Dashing inside she called out to the sleeping guard.
"Help me!" she cried. "You've got to help me. There are two men--" When the guard did not move, Laurie desperately reached out and roughly grabbed the man's shoulder, yanking him to an upright sitting position. But to Laurie's shock, the man's head flopped back like a rag doll, dragging playing cards with it. With horror she saw the bullet hole in his forehead, his unseeing eyes, and bloody froth oozing from his mouth. Where his head had been on the desk was a pool of partially dried blood.
Laurie screamed and let go of the guard. He collapsed backward in the chair, his head hyperextending, and his arms limply dangling with his fingers just brushing the floor. Laurie wheeled around to flee, but it was too late. The shorter of the two men came flying through the door, his gun held out in front of him, a demonic smile spread like a gaping wound across his face. He pointed the gun directly at Laurie. At such close range she could even see a short distance up the barrel of the silencer.
The man advanced toward her as if in slow motion until the tip of the gun was a mere inch from Laurie's nose. She didn't move. She was paralyzed with dread. "Don't shoot her!" cried the other, taller man, who suddenly appeared over Tony's shoulder. "Please don't shoot her!"
"It would be so rewarding," Tony said.
"Come on," Angelo urged. "Gas her!" Angelo put the black doctor's bag on the corner of the desk. With his foot, he gave the desk chair a shove to get it out of the way. The dead guard rolled out of the chair and fell to the floor. Then Angelo stepped into the corridor to look in both directions. He'd heard voices.
Tony lowered his gun. It had been all he could do to keep from firing it. Placing it in his jacket pocket, he opened the black bag and took out the gas cylinder and the plastic bag. After inflating the bag, he stepped over to Laurie, who'd backed up against a table. "This will be a nice rest," Tony said.
Wide-eyed with terror, Laurie was shocked when Tony crammed the bag over her head. The force bent her back over the table. Both hands splayed out to support herself. As they did, her right hand hit up against a glass paperweight. Clutching it, Laurie swung it underhand, hitting Tony in the groin. Tony's grip on the plastic bag released as he reflexively grabbed his genitals. After their recent run-in with the briefcase, they were particularly sensitive. Laurie took advantage of his pain to tear the plastic bag from her head. The smell inside it had been sickeningly sweet. Pushing off the table, Laurie dashed by Tony, who was still doubled over, and then Angelo, who'd been standing guard outside. "Goddamn it!" Angelo shouted. He started after Laurie. Tony, partially recovered, limped after Angelo, carrying the black bag, the plastic bag, and the gas cylinder.

Laurie ran out the way she'd come, passing the stack of Potter's Field coffins and the walk-in
refrigerator. She was hoping to run into some of the custodial staff--anyone who might be able to help her.
When she saw the light in the main autopsy room, she was encouraged. She went through the swinging doors at a full run. Inside, Laurie was thrilled to find a man mopping the floor. "You've got to help me!" she gasped.
The janitor was shocked by her sudden appearance. "There are two men chasing me," Laurie cried. She dashed to the sink and snatched up one of the large autopsy knives. She knew it wouldn't be much help against a gun, but it was the only defense she could think of.
The confused janitor looked at her as if she were crazy, and before she could say anything else, the door burst open a second time. Angelo entered at a run with his gun drawn. "It's over!" Angelo snarled between harsh, winded breaths. Behind him the door opened again. Tony came charging inside, clutching the black bag and the gas paraphernalia in one hand, his gun in the other. "What's happening?" the janitor demanded. His shock had changed to fear with the sight of the guns. He gripped his mop in both hands as if he were prepared to use it as a weapon. With no further provocation, Tony raised his gun and shot the man in the head. The janitor staggered and collapsed. Tony stepped over to shoot the man a second time. "It's the girl we want," Angelo yelled. "Forget the janitor! Gas her!" As he'd done in the security office, Tony inflated the plastic bag and approached Laurie. Paralyzed with shock from having seen the janitor killed in front of her, Laurie was temporarily incapable of resisting. The autopsy knife slipped from her hand and clattered to the floor. Tony went behind her and pulled the bag over her head. After taking a few breaths of the sweet gas inside the bag, Laurie reached up as if to pull the plastic off her. But her efforts came too late. Her knees gave way and she sank to the floor, unconscious. "Run out and get one of those pine coffins," Angelo said. "Make it quick!" A few minutes later Tony returned with a coffin, nails, and a hammer. He put the coffin down next to Laurie. With Angelo at her head and Tony at her feet, they lifted her into the box, then pulled off the plastic bag. Tony put on the lid and was about to nail it shut when Angelo suggested putting more of the gas inside.
Tony held the cylinder under the lid and tried to fill the coffin. Quickly he smelled the gas. Pulling his hand out, he closed the lid.
"That's about all I can get in," Tony said. "Let's hope it holds her," Angelo said. "Get one of those wagons over here." He pointed to a gurney pushed against the far wall.

Tony wheeled the gurney over, while Angelo nailed down the coffin's lid. Then they both lifted the coffin
onto it. Tony threw the plastic bag and gas cylinder into the doctor's bag and set the bag on top of the coffin. Together he and Angelo wheeled the gurney out the door. They headed for the loading dock. Moving at a run, they passed the mortuary office, then turned and passed the security office. While Tony waited on the lip of the loading dock and made sure the gurney didn't roll away, Angelo went to check inside the mortuary vans. In the first one he found the keys in the ignition. Running back to Tony, he told him they'd use the truck. As quickly as possible, and using the keys to unlock the rear doors, they loaded the coffin containing Laurie into the back of the van. Angelo dropped the keys into Tony's hand.
"You drive her," Angelo said. "Go directly to the pier. I'll see you there." Tony climbed into the front of the van and started the engine. "Move it out," Angelo yelled. Frantically waving, he guided Tony as Tony backed up into Thirtieth Street. Again Angelo could hear voices within the morgue. "Get moving," Angelo said as he slapped the side of the mortuary van. He watched until Tony had turned onto First Avenue, then he sprinted over to his own car, started it, and followed. As soon as Angelo caught up to the van, he gave Cerino a call from his cellular phone. "We got the merchandise," he said.
"Beautiful," Cerino said. "Bring her to the pier. I'll call Doc Travino. We'll meet you there." "This wasn't a clean operation," Angelo said. "But we seem to be clear. No one is following us." "As long as you got her, it's OK," Cerino said. "And your timing is perfect. The
Montego Bay
departs tomorrow morning. Our little lady doc is due for a cruise."
16
8:55 p.m., Monday
Manhattan
Lou pulled into the morgue loading dock and parked his car to the side. There was only one van in the drive instead of the usual two, so he could have pulled right up to the entrance, but figuring the other van would be back soon, he didn't want to be in the way. He put his police identification card on the dash and got out. Lou could have kicked himself for pushing Laurie as he had on the phone. When was he going to learn to back off? Criticizing Jordan was sure only to make her more defensive about the man. He must have really set her off this time. He could understand why she hadn't picked up the phone when he'd called back, but even if she was mad he would have thought she'd have called him back. When she hadn't gotten back to him after half an hour, Lou decided to head over to the medical examiner's office to talk to her in person. He hoped she hadn't

left.
Lou passed the security office and glanced in through the window. He was a little surprised to see that no one was there, but he assumed that the security guard was making his rounds. Farther down the hall, Lou checked the mortuary office, but it was empty as well. Lou scratched his head. The place seemed deserted. It was dead quiet, he thought with a laugh. He checked his watch. It wasn't that late, and wasn't this place supposed to be open around the clock? After all, people died twenty-four hours a day. With a shrug of his shoulders, Lou walked to the elevators and rode up to Laurie's floor. As soon as he stepped off the elevator he could tell that she wasn't there. Her door was closed and the room was dark. But he wasn't about to give up. Not yet. He remembered her having said something about some laboratory results. Lou decided to see if he could find the right lab and maybe then Laurie. He took the elevator down one floor, unsure of where to find the appropriate lab. At the end of the fourth-floor hall he saw a light. Lou walked the length of the hall and peered in the open door. "Excuse me," he said to the youthful man in a white lab coat stooped over one of the room's major pieces of heavy equipment.
Peter looked up.
"I'm looking for Laurie Montgomery," Lou said. "You and everyone else," Peter said. "I don't know where she is now, but half an hour ago she went down to the morgue to look at a body in the walk-in cooler." "Someone else been looking for her?" Lou asked. "Yeah," Peter said. "Two men I'd never seen before." "Thanks," Lou said. He turned back toward the elevator and hustled down the hall. He didn't like the sound of two strangers looking for Laurie, not after what she'd said about two alleged plainclothes policemen coming to her apartment.
Lou went straight to the morgue level. Exiting the elevator, he was surprised he still hadn't seen a soul besides the guy in the lab. With growing concern, he hurried down the long hall to the walk-in cooler. Finding its door partially ajar only added to his unease. With mounting dread he pulled the door the rest of the way open. What he saw was far worse than he could have imagined. Inside the cooler, bodies were strewn helter-skelter. Two gurneys were tipped on their sides. Several of the sheets covering the bodies had been pulled aside. Even after a few days' experience in the autopsy room, he still didn't have the stomach for this. And whatever had happened to Laurie, this body-strewn battleground was hardly an auspicious sign. Lou spotted a purse among the wreckage. Pushing gurneys aside, he picked it up to check for ID. He snapped open the wallet. The first thing he saw was Laurie's photo on her driver's license. As he rushed from the cooler, Lou's concern turned to fear, especially if his current theory about all the gangland-style murders was correct. Frantically he looked for someone, anyone. There was always someone available at the morgue. Seeing the light in the main autopsy room, he ran down to it and

pushed open the doors, but no one was there either.
Turning around, Lou dashed back to the security office to use the phone. Entering the room, he immediately saw the guard's body on the floor. He knelt down and rolled the man over. The man's unseeing eyes stared up at him. There was a bullet hole in his forehead. Lou checked for a pulse, but there wasn't any. The man was dead.
Standing up, Lou snatched up the phone and dialed 911. As soon as an operator answered he identified himself as Lieutenant Lou Soldano and requested a homicide unit for the city morgue. He added that the victim was in the security office but that he would not be able to wait for the unit to arrive. Slamming the phone down, Lou raced to the morgue loading dock and jumped into his car. Starting the engine, he backed up with a screech of his tires, leaving two lines of rubber on the morgue's driveway. He had no other choice than to head directly for Paul Cerino's. It was cards-on-the-table time. He slapped his emergency light on the car's roof and arrived at Cerino's Queens address after twenty-three minutes of hair-raising driving.
Racing up the front steps of the Cerino home, he reached into his shoulder holster and unsnapped the leather band securing his.38 Smith and Wesson Detective Special. He rang the bell impatiently. Judging by all the lights blazing, someone had to be home. Lou knew that he was operating on a hunch that depended on his theory about the gangland slayings being correct. But at the moment it was all he had, and his intuition told him that time was of the utmost importance.
An overhead light came on above Lou's head. Then he had the feeling that someone was looking at him through the peephole. Finally the door opened. Gloria was standing there dressed in one of her plain housedresses.
"Lou!" Gloria said pleasantly. "What brings you here?" Lou shoved past her and into the house. "Where's Paul?" he demanded. He looked into the living room, where Gregory and Steven were watching TV. "What's the matter?" Gloria asked.
"I have to talk with Paul. Where is he?" "He's not here," Gloria said. "Is there something wrong?" "Something's very wrong," Lou said. "Do you know where Paul is?" "I'm not positive," Gloria said. "But I heard him on the phone with Dr. Travino. I think he said something about going down to the company."
"You mean at the pier?" Lou asked.
Gloria nodded. "Is he in danger?" Gloria asked. Lou's distress was infectious. Lou was already half out the door. Calling over his shoulder, he said, "I'll take care of it."

Back in his car, Lou started the engine and made a sweeping U-turn in the middle of the street. As he
accelerated he caught sight of Gloria standing on her stoop, anxiously clutching her hands to her chest.

Laurie's first sensation was nausea, but she didn't vomit, although she retched. She woke up in stages, becoming progressively aware of movement and uncomfortable bumps and jostling. She also became aware of dizziness, as if she were spinning, and a terrible sense of air hunger, as if she were smothering. Laurie tried to open her eyes, only to realize with a terrible shock that they were already open. Wherever she was, it was pitch black.
When she was more awake, Laurie tried to move, but when she did, her legs and arms immediately hit up against a wooden surface. Exploring with her hands, she quickly determined that she was in a box! A wave of frightful claustrophobia passed through her like a cold wind as she realized she'd been sealed into a Potter's Field coffin! At the same time the memory of what happened at the medical examiner's office flooded back with searing clarity: the chase; those two horrible men; the dead guard, the poor janitor murdered in cold blood. And then another horrid thought occurred to her: what if they were planning to bury her alive!
Gripped with terror, Laurie tried to draw up her knees, straining against the top of the coffin. Then she tried to kick, but it was all to no avail. Either something extremely heavy was on the lid or it had been nailed firmly down.
"Ahhhh," Laurie cried as the coffin jarred severely. It was then that she realized she was in some sort of vehicle.
Laurie tried screaming but only succeeded in hurting her own ears. Next she tried pounding the underside of the lid with her fists, but it was difficult in the confined space. Abruptly the jarring stopped. The vibration of the engine also stopped. Then there was the distant sound as if the doors of the vehicle had opened. Laurie felt the coffin move. "Help!" Laurie cried. "I can't breathe!" She heard voices, but they weren't speaking with her. In a wave of desperate panic, Laurie again tried to pound the underside of the lid as tears came. She couldn't help herself. She'd never been so terrified in her life.
Laurie knew she was being carried for a time. She hated to think where they were taking her. Would they really bury her? Would she hear the dirt raining down on the lid? With a final thump the coffin was put down. It hadn't hit ground. It sounded like wood. Laurie gasped for air between sobs as a cold sweat appeared on her forehead.