Edge of the Heat 3 (7 page)

He looked out the window, and mercilessly switched his thoughts to what needed to be done now.

“Once we get out of town, we’ll need to stop at a mall or a Target or something and pick up some things. I’ll need clothes and a computer and some food and cell phones.”

“OK, but I have a computer at the cabin. A nice one.”

“Perfect.”

The drive took almost 6 hours. The silences became more and more uncomfortable. By the time they got to the cabin, Hawk was ready to jump out of his skin. It was after 3 in the morning, so there was nothing for them to do but get some sleep. After they brought in the groceries and bags, Vivian showed Hawk to the guest room. He was careful not to touch her or look at her.

In the guest room, Hawk lay awake on the bed, unbidden images of Vivian on a bed just a door away filling his brain. He did his mental trick of destroying the thought, but it didn’t work. When he finally slept, his sleep was uneasy, filled with dreams of a soft, beautiful woman dancing just out of his reach.

C
raig hit 75 mph on the freeway and turned on his cruise control. He loved long drives. They were a great time to think. He let his mind wander. It knew what it needed to think about.

He was on his way out to see Norman Foster. It had been three days since Hawk and Vivian had taken off. The day after they had left, a Special Agent Donahue had come to Headquarters, alone, and asked to speak to Hawk. Craig’s guard had been up, but not too far up. At this point he had no idea if Donahue was a bad guy, or just following orders. So he was friendly. They spoke outside in the parking lot.

“He’s not here,” Craig had told him.

“When do you expect him back?” Donahue asked.

“Not sure.”

“Isn’t that his truck?”

“Yep. Maybe he’s driving our work truck.” Craig knew the work truck was in the hospital parking lot; he hoped Donahue didn’t know that.

“What’s he doing?”

“I don’t know. He doesn’t usually tell me what he’s doing. Sometimes he doesn’t come in to headquarters for days. I just come in and do my job. If he wants me to do something he calls me.”

“What is your job?”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you.”

Donahue’s eyes narrowed. “Why not?”

“Our current investigation is classified.”

“I could get a court order and you’d have to share it with me.”

Craig smiled easily. He didn’t care one way or the other, unless, this guy was working for Oberlin. “Yeah, well, if you do I’ll share it with you. So why are you looking for Hawk?”

Donahue didn’t smile. “Also classified.”

Craig nodded brusquely. “I gotta get back to work.”

He had turned on his heel and pushed in the building, leaving Donahue staring at his back.

Hawk, you’re a lucky bastard
, he thought as his truck barreled down the road. Lucky that he and Vivian had left when they did.

Craig had talked to Hawk last night. They had both bought pay-as-you-go cell phones in case either one of their phones had a wiretap. Craig smiled to himself at Hawk’s ingenious plan to get him the new phone number, without having to text his phone. Hawk had gone onto an image sharing website and uploaded an obscure image of the flagpole in front of the DEA building, knowing it would be completely ignored by the regular users. The caption was his new phone number. Craig searched the submissions for the image and sure enough, there it was. He called Hawk and Hawk then deleted the image. That was just the kind of clever thing Hawk was good at thinking up. If he wanted to, he could be a great criminal, but luckily Hawk was one of the good guys.

Hawk had meant to head out to the prison hospital to see Foster himself two days ago, but obviously he couldn’t, being on the run. Craig hadn’t been able to get to it until today. He needed to see how general population was treating Foster and if Foster was ready to talk yet.

As he pulled up to the gate he was waved away by the guard. Craig ignored him and pulled forward.

The guard stuck his head out of the bunkhouse and yelled “No visitors today, we’re on lockdown!”

Craig pulled out his badge. The guard looked at it and made a phone call. After a few minutes he waved Craig through.

Craig hadn’t been out to the prison hospital yet. Hawk had always come before. He wasn’t sure what it usually looked like, but today it was full of frenetic activity. There were guards with rifles patrolling the parking lot and the perimeter and guards with guns strapped to their hips standing in groups and walking around. Idly, Craig wondered if they’d had an escape.
That would suck
, he thought.

He entered the front door, showed his badge and ID and was buzzed through the first large, clear door. A guard met him in between the two doors. “I’m sorry Agent Masterson, but an inmate escaped last night. Security is at it’s highest level today. Everyone entering gets patted down. Can you face the wall please.

Craig shrugged his shoulders. “I’m carrying.”

“You’ll have to check your piece with the desk.”

Craig pulled his gun out of the shoulder holster under his jacket, checked the safety, and slid it in the small window under the bulletproof glass. He received a token back. He pocketed it and turned around, spreading his arms and legs and placing his hands against the wall. The guard did a thorough pat-down, then gave a signal to the man behind the glass. The inside door buzzed open.

Craig walked in, checked the sign, and headed left, towards the neurology unit. He spotted the desk and addressed the first person he saw there, a dark-haired man wearing green scrubs. “Hi, I’m Agent Masterson, here to see Norman Foster.”

The man’s eyes widened. “Hold on sir,” he said, and grabbed the phone.

Craig’s stomach dropped as if he were on a roller coaster.
Oh shit
, he thought. His hands squeezed into fists. For a moment he couldn’t think of anything. His thoughts deserted him. Then, they slammed back into his head with the force of a ton of bricks.
If they let Norman Foster escape, so help me
-

Craig’s thoughts were interrupted by a guard in full brown uniform practically sprinting down the corridor towards him. Craig turned to him.

The guard extended his hand. “Agent Masterson, Hi I am Sergeant Coleman. Could you follow me to my office please?”

Craig searched his heavily-lined face for clues. 

“Did Norman Foster escape?”

Sergeant Coleman bowed his head slightly, his eyes never leaving Craigs’.

“Yes, last night, sometime after 1 a.m. He was discovered missing at 6:10 a.m. We hope he never left the grounds. They are searching for him now.”

Craig’s blood pounded in his ears. “How? How could a paralyzed man escape?”

“That’s the thing. He’s not paralyzed anymore. He must have recovered his mobility sometime in the last 5 weeks, but played possum and not told anyone.”

Craig had heard enough. Suddenly he was on autopilot, and the only program playing in his brain was
Emma, Emma, get to Emma
. The need to see her safe was so great that he felt he would die if he stood here for one more second. He took off at a dead run back the way he had came. He buzzed through the doors, got the heavy, satisfactory weight of his gun back, and ran for his car.

They didn’t even search his truck on the way out. Craig shook his head, knowing Norman was long gone already. He just prayed Norman wasn’t in Westwood Harbor.

C
raig had a dozen phone calls to make, but he didn’t dare make any of them while he was pushing his truck over 100 mph back to Westwood Harbor. He slowed down long enough to call Emma, who didn’t answer, so he called dispatch, who said she was at a vehicle accident on the Westwood Bridge.

Craig’s mind showed him horrible images of Norman grabbing her in a dozen different ways. Or worse, just driving by and filling her body with bullets. Craig debated calling her boss and trying to have her pulled off of work detail after the car accident but he never did do it. He just kept praying.

The road flew by for over an hour, and when he reached the foothills of town he tried her cell again, and again it went right to voicemail. He turned on his scanner, hoping to catch her voice. Voice traffic on the radio was heavy. The accident had been a bad one and multiple units had been called to the scene for extrication and transport. Cars heading on the bridge in both directions were at a standstill and no foot traffic was allowed on the bridge, so that meant Norman couldn’t to get her if she was still there. Craig called dispatch again and she was still at the accident.

He wanted to head right to where she was and stand guard over her for the rest of the day, but he knew it would take forever for him to get through the backed up traffic on the bridge, so he drove to a point where he knew she’d have to drive past to get to the hospital when she was done, and found a parking lot to park in where he could see the road.

Then he started making his phone calls.

Call one was to Hawk, who answered on the first ring. “Hawk, you’re not going to believe this. I went out to see Norman Foster today and he escaped.”

“What?” Hawk roared, and Craig heard something clatter in the background.

Craig pinched his forehead right between his brows and squeezed his eyes shut. “They let him escape. I don’t know much more than that right now. I drove back into town to make sure Emma was OK. I’m going to call out there and find out the details now. I’ll call you back. I wanted to call you so you could get that brain working on where he might go or what his plan might be.”

“I’m on it.” Hawk’s voice was gruff, solid, dependable.

Craig nodded, still squeezing his forehead, leaving nail marks on his skin. “Bye.”

Call two was to Sergeant Coleman at the hospital. “Sergeant Coleman, I’m sorry I left like that. I needed to make sure the woman who shot Foster and put him in the hospital was safe. Now, give me the details.”

Sergeant Coleman laid out everything they knew. Norman had been put in general population several days ago, but in a room that housed other paralyzed or neurological patients. Two days before there had been an actual attempt on Norman’s life by a prisoner from a different ward who was on a work detail in that ward. Norman had been sliced on the neck with a makeshift knife but the wounds the assailant had made before guards got to him had only been superficial. Somehow Norman had ended up on the ground, but guards just thought he had fallen or been pulled out of the bed. The assailant had been put in solitary confinement and wouldn’t say why he had done it. Coleman had interviewed the man himself, and was convinced he was going to try again if he got a chance. Coleman didn’t think it was because Norman was a cop, but rather because someone had bribed the guy to do it.

After that incident, they had to move Norman back into a private room, but his old room had already been taken. Because of overcrowding they had nowhere left to put him and so they put him in a nonstandard room. Meaning one that wasn’t meant for prisoners. There was no camera watching him and the room wasn’t secure. The desk Sergeant who made the decision didn’t think it would be a problem because Norman was paralyzed. A guard was supposed to check on him every 30 minutes, but there had been a riot in another area of the hospital and all guards had been called to the riot, leaving only a desk guard to watch the cameras. The desk guard didn’t even know anyone was in that little room. Basically, it was a communications breakdown and a logistical nightmare.

He had gotten out of his room through the ceiling. When they did finally check on him, his bed was empty, his restraints were cut through, and a sturdy plastic shelving unit had been pushed into the corner. A guard climbed up the shelving unit, pushed aside the ceiling tile, and peeked in, seeing no Norman, but a large open area that led all over the hospital. Basically, he could have gone anywhere.

Coleman tried to assure him that Norman must still be on the grounds though, because there was no way for him to get outside the fence. Craig sneered silently. What a royal fuck up this was. Craig was convinced Norman was long gone.

Coleman was droning on about how there was no way Norman had “breached the grounds”. Craig interrupted him.

“Have you notified the state police?”

“Yes, it’s standard protocol for an escapee.”

“How about the Westwood Harbor police?”

“No.”

“When does protocol say you start searching for him outside of the grounds of the prison hospital?”

“A team is being assembled now. I am not sure when and how they will start.”

“I want the name of that team leader.”

Coleman assured Craig he would immediately call him if any new information was discovered and that he would get him the name of the team leader. Craig hung up. He sat there for a second, idly watching the traffic go by, feeling defeated. Norman could be anywhere by now.

Craig called Hawk back and gave him the details.

“That doesn’t give us much to go on at this point,” Hawk said.

“Don’t I know it.”

“Someone should go talk to his buddies at P.D.”

“Yep, I will, but not until I take Emma somewhere.”

Craig hung up, and started making the rest of his phone calls. He was mostly done when he heard Emma clear the scene. He watched for her ambulance and followed them to the hospital.

He sat in his truck in the parking lot and watched her and Jerry unload their patient. He watched her come back outside and clean up the ambulance. He saw her finally check her phone and then heard his phone ring almost immediately.

“Hey babe.”

“Hi, how're you?”

“Emma, is your shift almost over?”

She sat silent for a second. “What’s wrong?”

Craig’s heart hurt at the words he had to say. “Norman’s escaped Emma, I’m afraid you are in danger. Can I pick you up after your shift?”

Emma sucked in a breath. “Escaped? How? Why?”

“They think he’s not paralyzed anymore and he just didn’t tell anyone. He got out of the room through a ceiling tile but they don’t know anything after that.”

“Oh my God.”