The Jigsaw Man (30 page)

How much time did I have? Junie had been killed

about ten minutes ago. It was about a thirty minute

long and winding walk out to this part of the woods, so

I had another twenty minutes before Drake even started

to worry. Say, another ten or fifteen minutes after that

before Drake went bat shit and started screaming. A

few more minutes to rally the troops and then I'd be

public enemy number one around here again. All in all,

that gave me about thirty-five minutes, which was loads

of time to get to the edge of the forest and find some¬

where to hide. I hurried anyway, not wanting to take

any chances.

I made it back to where the path exited onto the field

beside the castle without seeing anyone. Good, luck

was still on my side. N o t wanting to be seen by anyone

who might be watching from out of possibly a hundred

windows on this side of the building, I stayed back

from the opening and set off on a course through the

woods that would allow me to stay hidden when the

guards arrived, but also stay close enough that I could

keep an eye on what was going on. I walked a safe dis¬

tance off the path, dropped to the ground, then wormed

my way toward the edge of the forest on my belly. Just

shy of the tree line, I scooped leaves over my legs and

back, lay as still as I could and waited for whatever

came next.

It felt great to lie down and rest. I was exhausted and

j u s t about every square inch of my abused body was ach¬

ing, screaming out for my daily dose of painkillers. That

thought made me think about Junie and how she'd never

be bringing m e — o r anyone else—any more pills to

make them feel better. A few tears ran down my cheeks,

tough guy that I was, and as I lay there crying I started

to have second thoughts about this wild vigilante cru¬

sade I was about to undertake. I mean, who the hell was

I to take on Drake and his entire security staff? I'd

killed Jackson in self-defense, but would I really have

the guts to kill again j u s t ibr the sake of justice? If the

answer to that was n o , I'd better turn tail and get the

hell out of Dodge.

Drake walked out of the castle, his eyes scanning the

forest and seemingly looking directly at me. I knew he

couldn't see me from where he stood, and was probably

watching the m o u t h of the forest path for signs of

Jackson's return. He kept glancing down at his wrist,

checking his watch, then shaking his head. Even from

this distance I could see how agitated the chief of secu¬

rity was, pacing back and forth and working himself

into a slowly simmering rage. Another few minutes

and j u s t as I'd called it, Drake was screaming into his

walkie-talkie and looking like he was ready to breathe

fire.

Good on you, you bastard. Hope you have a heart seizure

right in front of me.

Eive minutes later, seven security guards were zip¬

ping up their jackets against the cold and loading

identical guns to the one I was holding, while Drake

barked orders at them. I couldn't hear what was being

said, but it didn't take a genius to figure it out. They

were being informed about Jackson and told to find

me as fast as they could. All of them were in big trou¬

ble if I made it out of the forest and found my way to a

police station. There was no way Drake was about to

let that happen. I'm sure he even gave the guards some

sort of incentive—cash or time off,
something
—for

whoever put the first bullet in my head. By the time

Drake sent his men after m e , they were r u n n i n g like a

pack of mindless bloodhounds trained to follow the

scent of raw meat.

I'd expected as much, but Drake surprised me by

pulling out his gun and r u n n i n g off into the forest after

his men. Either he didn't trust them to get the j o b done

right, or he had worked himself into such a frenzy he

wanted to make the kill himself. Whatever the reason,

it was an unexpected bonus for me. I'd worried how I

was going to get past Drake and into the building if he

had j u s t stood there and waited for his men to return.

Now, there was no one to stop me from slipping out of

the woods and getting inside. There was always the

chance more guards were waiting inside the building,

but my gut told me all of them were in the trees with

Drake, all anxious to be the one to make their deranged

boss happy.

I waited until I couldn't see or hear any of them any¬

more, then j u m p e d to my feet and started j o g g i n g

across the field to the castle. My body ached too much

to run, but I covered the distance fairly quickly and

without incident. If everything went as I figured, I

should have at least an hour, maybe as many as three or

four. They'd find Junie and Jackson's bodies easy

enough, probably within twenty minutes if they ran

the whole way, but after that they'd have no idea where

I went.

I was counting on them searching farther into the

forest, thinking I was r u n n i n g through the trees in a

blind panic to get as far.away as possible. There was no

way they'd think I'd doubled back to pull a one-man

Rambo on t h e m — n o t even Drake would think me ca

pable of that. So they'd be forced to split up and search

the woods, maybe form a line fifty yards apart and look

for me that way. That could take a long time. The best

part was, for every step they took deeper into the

woods, they'd eventually have to take every one of those

steps again to get back here once the search was called

off.

W i t h my back pressed against the brick wall, I moved

to the end of one side of the building and checked around

the back to see if the coast was clear. It was, and I

dashed around the corner, breathing a small sigh of re¬

lief to be out of the line of sight of anyone that might

return from the forest path. There were several win¬

dows and one door that I could have tried to enter the

castle, but I'd already spotted the place I wanted to go

and made my way over to the small basement window a

third of the way along the wall.

I dropped to my knees and took a second trying to

peek inside but it was dark in the basement and there

was n o t h i n g to see. I took that as a good sign no one was

down there, so without hesitating I broke the pane of

glass with the handle of Jackson's gun. The glass shat¬

tered easily and with less noise than I'd expected, but I

had to waste several minutes clearing glass away and

making sure I got rid of any shards left sticking up in

the frame. The last thing I wanted to do was slice my

wrists or neck open trying to clumsily crawl through a

half-broken window.

I spun around, slipping in the window feet first and

slithered backward until
I
was hanging off the inside

wall with only a four-foot drop down to the floor. This

was the point of no return and truthfully I wasn't sure

I should let go.

In for a penny,
I thought, having to rely on cliches to

find some courage within me. W h a t was that other one

Dr. Marshall had teased me with?
Out of the frying pan,

into the fire.
Shit, I'd gone way beyond that. This wasn't

into the fire—this was going straight to Hell.

I took a deep breath, and dropped to the floor.

1

C H A P T E R T H I R T Y - F I V E

Let's face it, any way you sliced it I made a woefully

pitiful James Bond. I'd also misplaced my jazzed up

Aston M a r t i n sports car, my Rolex watch that doubled

as a laser torch, and my attache case filled with all my

other neat superspy gizmos; so with only my brain

and what limited brawn I could summon from this de¬

crepit monster suit I called a body, I was forced to

keep my plan simple. I had neither the t i m e , skill, am¬

bition, nor the luck required to pull off anything too

complicated.

With those thoughts in mind, I pulled out the small

penlight I'd recently taken off Jackson and set to work.

The beam of light, was surprisingly bright for such a

small flashlight, easily illuminating the path ahead.

"Nothin' but the best for Drake's
boys,"
I muttered,

using even the little things to fuel my anger into what I

hoped would give me the required adrenaline boost to

carry my abused body through whatever tasks lay ahead.

I started looking for the furnace. It was cold outside,

but comfortable in here, so obviously Dr. Marshall's

medical facility had an adequate heating system. W i t h

a place this size, I was sure there had to be an immense

furnace tucked away somewhere down here. W i t h i n

minutes, I'd found it. The rusty metal furnace was mas¬

sive, as I'd pictured it in my head, but there was one

problem. A
big
problem. It was an oil furnace.

Shit! An old place like this, 1 should have known.

I could try tipping the oil reservoir over, or discon¬

necting the lines to spill the sticky black fuel over the

basement floor, but all that would do was allow me to

start a fire. I had the Bic lighter in my pocket, and a fire

would do a lot of damage, sure, but not enough. Know

ing Dr. Marshall, this place surely had a state-of-the-art

fire control system with water sprinklers everywhere.

All I'd end up doing was making a mess of the basement

and tipping off Drake that I was back inside the castle.

N o t good enough. I was after
grand-scale
destruction

here.

Think, Mike.

It was while wandering around trying to come up

with a plan B that I found the second furnace. This one

was smaller, newer, and in much better shape, but it was

still an oil furnace, which left me in the same boat as

before. It got me t h i n k i n g , though. A place this size

probably needed several furnaces, right? If there were

t w o , chances were there might be t h r e e — o r five—right?

Were they all oil furnaces, or would they have newer,

more modern types to complement the old? Maybe.

Maybe not. W o r t h checking out, anyway.

I found the third furnace hiding in plain sight right

in the middle of the basement under a set of cobwebstrewn wooden stairs leading up to the main floor.

This one was quite tall, but considerably smaller than

the last two. A bird named hope started beating its tiny

wings in my chest and I held my breath as I moved in

for a closer look. This furnace was relatively shiny, looked

fairly new, and there was no bulky oil reservoir any¬

where to be found. Ill be damned—this one operated

on natural gas.

Yes!

Make a big bang. That was my master plan. Crude,

lacking imagination, and had only taken seconds to

dream up, but like it or lump it, that was it. It would ei¬

ther work, or it wouldn't.

Walking around the three sides I had access t o , at

first I couldn't see where the incoming gas line was.

This sucker was getting its fuel from somewhere, but

where? Then I looked up. The gas line, black and as new

as the furnace itself, snaked down from the ground

floor attached to the bottom side of the staircase and

entered into the top of the furnace way above my reach.

N o t good. Discouraged but far from defeated, I started

looking for the pilot light. It had to have one of them,

and usually they were near the floor.

It was, but hidden behind a removable metal panel

that took me a few seconds to find, and many more to

figure out how to open. Once I ripped the panel free, I

knelt down and peered in at a tiny flame and a series of

open tubes that ran into the heart of the furnace. I'm

no expert on gas furnaces, but I understood the general

principal. Gas fills these chambers, is ignited by the pi

lot light; then a fan kicks in to blow the heat up through

the vents into the building.

Obviously, I had to get rid of the pilot light. I didn't

want any gas getting ignited around here until I was

good and ready. No need to complicate things, so I just

leaned my head in and blew the flame out. It was harder

to extinguish than a birthday candle but required the

same basic task—two big puffs and it was out.

Okay, now what?

A tiny amount of gas would leak out now, but no¬

where near enough to cause the big bang I had in mind.

N o , for that, I'd have to cause a free flow of gas straight

out of the main pipe. Remove the regulator to open the

gas line wide and let it flood the basement for as long as

possible before someone figured out what I was doing.

Then I'd pull the Bic lighter from my pocket and kiss

all our asses good-bye in a shower of fire and exploding

bricks.

If only I had a pipe wrench.

But I didn't. I had a gun, a flashlight, a switchblade, a