A Smudge of Gray: A Novel Read online

  “What do you think you’re doing!?” a burly voice pierced Brian.

  Brian slowed as he felt a claw clutch his back. He turned and saw the frame of a 6’4” uniformed security guard towering over him like a linebacker ready to tackle.

  “Watch it, asshole. Police!” Brian lashed back as he flicked off the man with his left hand while his right flashed his badge.

  Brian poured onto the main waiting platform. He looked to his left, and then to his right as people consumed the subway’s belly like bacteria. He saw a sign reading “Northbound” and another displaying “Southbound.” Brian stood without a clear direction, without even a guess to the location of one man amongst ten thousand. His breathing intensified. Sweat formed on his brow. As he waited, watched, and writhed, he felt a pulsing in his chest. Brian clutched his heart, but the throbbing transferred to his hand. He realized it was his vibrating cell phone in his shirt pocket; its ringer dwarfed by the noise. Brian answered it.

  “What do you got?” he yelled.

  Lt. Foster stood over the techs as the three men stared at one of the flat-screen monitors. It showed the live image of Brian.

  “Boise. What the fuck’s going on?” Lt. Foster demanded.

  “Do you have him?” A train stopped displaying “Southbound.” “My gut says to go south.”

  “Have…lost… Get…precinct!” Lt. Foster’s voice broke up in Brian’s ear.

  The crowd swarmed the stopped train. Brian looked around for an answer, but his gut brought his eyes to the train. “You’re breaking up! Where is Malloy!?”

  The doors started to close. Brian moved closer. He decided to go for it. The detective muscled on, but the doors clamped shut on his trailing hand, the hand still holding his cell phone. He wrestled the door. It finally yielded and opened a few inches, but then slammed shut again, this time smashing his cell phone into pieces.

  “Shit!” Brian snapped.

  Even though there were people everywhere, he was now all alone. Brian pushed his way to the front of the car. All of a sudden, Brian’s brain clouded. A migraine gripped him. He was lost inside his own mind. He saw a sign marked “Official Entry Only!” Brian opened the door and saw three rooms just big enough to change clothes. The conductor peered out of one of them.

  “I need this space,” Brian said without thinking as he flashed his police badge.

  Chapter 26

  Subway Central Station bustled at the heart of the city. Chaos filled the dwelling, yet everyone had some sort of plan, some reason for lining the underground. The synchronized clocks all showed four minutes after seven in red digits. Then the clocks ticked to five. A train stopped near one platform. As the brakes ground it to a halt, the doors thumped open and the crowd spilled out. Several people waited to embark, but just as it seemed everyone had exited, a pair of charcoal gray shoes stepped from the train. Trevor strolled to an awaiting bench under a television as he waited to meet a particular female. Even though disorder plagued the subway and a random meeting appeared impossible, the businessman in black seemed to know more than any other member of his species did.

  * * *

  Brian waited inside the casket. Although he had only been on the train for seven minutes, it felt like seventy. He stood motionless. He couldn’t reach his pistol or his badge. Brian was stuck with only his thoughts as his mind filled with the image of the businessman, the image of evil.

  Several people grabbed their belongings and readied to disembark. Brian sensed that he was close as he read the signals of those who had done this commute morning after morning. The detective pushed his way to the door. He tried to shift around a woman with a Kentucky Derby-ready hat, but she wouldn’t let him pass.

  “Hey, watch it!” Brian said, but she didn’t move.

  “Next stop, Subway Central Station. This train returns Northbound and all connecting passengers should disembark at the next stop,” the announcer explained.

  This was it, the main event. Brian could feel his heart pounding. The train slowed. The crowd shifted. Brian gripped a metal pole. A howl spewed from the train. Brian jostled around. He grabbed at something, at anything to prevent falling. A yuppie unintentionally took off the lady’s hat as her chemo-provoked bald head reflected the overhead lights. She barked. Brian tried to move to the front, but it was as if he weren’t even there.

  The train finally stopped, and then there was silence. Everyone waited.

  “What the fuck!?” the yuppie yelled vocalizing the thoughts of everyone on the train.

  Then the doors thrust open as the crowd ruptured from the train like a broken blood clot. Brian finally escaped the confined crowd. He gripped his holstered gun still resting under his untucked shirt. The detective scanned his new environment, scanned the area for the suspect, for the killer, but all he saw were thousands of people. He felt insignificant, a grain of sand at the beach. Brian knew he had to look not at the tree, but at the apples. He saw a beggar holding a change cup, a custodial worker in a red uniform collecting the trash, and televisions hanging everywhere showing the morning news. The detective was lost with too many paths, too many apples, but then he realized he had something that no one else had—his instinct.

  A sudden shriek filled the underground space. Brian turned as the beggar was harassing a woman who had tried to avoid his change cup. Two men in suits invaded as the bum sat down and the people continued.

  Brian’s body told him the killer was here. It all felt too real, too raw to the detective. It was as if he were seeing everything from two different angles, two different perspectives. Brian looked to his left, but even his 6’2” stature was too short to see over the mess. The detective ran ten feet to his right, which provided a slight incline, enough to see over the washed faces and styled hair of the horde of humans. Some thirty yards away, he saw two figures sitting on a bench. One wore black and had coolness about him as he stared at his fellow occupant, a blonde. Brian shifted his focus to the woman, the woman wearing a Burberry-patterned scarf, the woman ready to meet death. He knew it was April, the female fawn who had wandered into a lion’s grasp.

  “How did he find her?” Brian said aloud, but no one heard him.

  A screech jolted Brian’s attention. He glanced at a stopping train labeled with “Northbound” in red letters. Brian returned his eyes to the couple on the bench. He pondered waving his badge, or even his gun, but he knew more chaos was not what he needed. He had to play his cards right, and he only had one chance to stop the mastermind’s plan, one chance to save the woman from the front page of the newspaper.

  Brian saw Trevor stand and help April up. The detective looked at the train and the open door next to him. Should I enter? What are they doing?

  Brian watched the couple strolling toward the train, but he couldn’t be sure whether they were going to enter. He knew he had to be certain. Suddenly, a passing body cut through Brian. He lost his footing and spun around. The detective tried to look back, but he lost sight of Trevor. He stood on his toes. The doors started to close. Brian moved closer, and then saw the black trench coat leading a blonde into the next train car. The detective dove through the door.

  Brian tumbled on as a sparse crowd of passengers sat without even looking at him. He stood up and felt the train accelerate. He looked through the windows at the passing crowd and saw a flat-screen television above another bench displaying the picture of a deceitful man, a killer—Trevor Malloy.

  Brian inhaled two deep breaths of choked air as a tunnel inhaled the train. He unbuttoned his holster and grabbed his badge. Only about a dozen people filled the forty-passenger car. Brian realized that he was now only twenty feet away from the man who had kept him up all night, the man who had tormented his mind and had driven his family away. Brian removed his badge from his belt, took his 9mm out of the holster, and cocked it.

  “Everyone remain calm and in your seats. I’m a police officer,” Brian said, but no one looked at him.

  “Everyone, listen,” Brian said a little l
ouder, but ignorance prevailed.

  Brian clapped his hands, pounded his feet, whistled. It was as if he were not even there, a spectator in a nightmare. He questioned his self, his family, his life. Who was he? And who was the man he had been stalking? The weight of a thousand bricks hit Brian inside that train car. He realized that his life could all be a lie. There were moments in his mind that were black, moments that lacked any sort of memory, moments that started ever since his father had killed himself. Perhaps he was already dead and perhaps these people were lost souls on a train entering the confines of hell. But there was one thing he knew he had to do, one thing he could only do—keep moving.

  The detective continued to the end of the car. The door had a large Plexiglas window with a sign overhead reading, “Keep Door Closed!” Brian stopped and looked through the two scuffed glass windows between train cars, the windows with a view into a place housing evil. As his eyes rack-focused from scuff marks, he saw the next train scattered with humans. Most seemed innocuous like grazing sheep—one man read a newspaper, a woman read a book, a yuppie listened to an iPod. But a wolf hid amongst the animals, a wolf who was bred from the darkest breed of beast. Brian saw the back of Trevor Malloy, who sat nonchalantly next to the woman in white. April had a glow about her, which radiated beyond the clouded glass. Her smile glimmered as she sat in conversation with her seatmate—the wolf. She was a touchy-feely woman, the kind who tapped a man on his arm playfully when he wooed her with his wit. She seemed under Trevor’s spell as she played with her scarf while she talked. It was a scene out of a romantic comedy, a seemingly chance meeting that had brought the two together, but the movie that Brian was watching was not from the comedy section; it was from the horror section.

  Brian grabbed the handle, but the door wouldn’t budge. He knew it shouldn’t be locked, but why was he not able to open it? As Brian panicked, a man with a beanie walked through him and opened the door. Brian wavered, the sound of speed filling his ears. He leaned over the gap between the racing cars as acrid air blew over him. He stumbled forward, his badge falling to its demise, and followed the man into Trevor’s train car. Brian regained control in the corner of the car, but now he was just another crazed man on the train with a gun. He tightened his grip on his 9mm, but as he did, something gripped his gut. The knot inside him resurfaced. It clenched like cancer. He suddenly felt weak. He was losing his grip. But Brian knew the darkness that controlled the constriction would never leave him. He knew he had to think of a motivation, so he thought about Anne Marie and Jonathan, but the devious image of death quickly devoured them. Brian was in a trance, a moment of truth. He had to do this right, and he had to do it quickly. He knew he had only one chance—one chance to attack an attacker. The element of surprise was on his side and that was exactly what he planned to exploit. But Brian hoped that unlike inside the previous car, he would be real inside this one.

  Brian clutched his gun as he felt blood rush to his hand. He knew he was alive; he had to be. In one quick motion, he lunged forward toward Trevor’s back and extended his gun.

  “Freeze!” he blurted.

  No one looked at him. The man still read his newspaper, the woman with the book didn’t flinch, the yuppie bopped his head to his music, the man with the beanie tied his shoelaces. Even Trevor kept his back toward the detective.

  “What’s going on!? Someone look at me!” But Brian’s words were useless; everything seemed to be useless.

  As Brian felt his heart pounding, he looked at the window in front of him. He saw gouges and smudges, marks and smears, dirt and grease, but what he didn’t see terrified him beyond that train car; he didn’t see his own reflection.

  Brian heard Trevor clear his throat. The detective focused on the businessman, his black trench coat, his combed hair, his erect posture. And as Brian looked at his suspect, he saw him turn his head slightly. Brian knew Trevor had heard him.

  Brian moved closer as April stared at the man, the creature, next to her.

  “I know you hear me, Trevor. Now turn…slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them.”

  Brian was close enough to smell Trevor’s cologne, the same cologne that had entranced most in its path, but it was useless on the enraged detective. Brian stood six feet away from the unresponsive man holding his briefcase on his lap. Brian kept his sight planted firmly on the black fabric of Trevor’s trench coat. The businessman was still, but Brian knew that Trevor was aware of the gun planted on his back.

  “Turn, asshole!”

  Then like a soft sweep of a Rolex second hand, Trevor rotated. With every degree of movement, more and more of Trevor’s familiar face filled Brian’s eyes. The image that had plagued him finally materialized. Brian studied Trevor’s freshly shaven face and his styled hair. Then, he locked eyes with the beast. Trevor stared at him with a smirk of arrogance. Brian felt the knot in his stomach rupture as pain traveled everywhere inside him.

  “Ma’am. I’m a police officer,” Brian explained to April without removing his eyes from Trevor. “This man is wanted for the murder of three prosecuting attorneys and you, ma’am, would’ve been his fourth.”

  April remained still as Brian questioned whether she heard him. But then, he saw April spring from shock.

  “No! Stay put!”

  She clamored. Brian flinched as Trevor scooped her up. The briefcase hit the ground sending vibrations through Brian’s backbone. Brian watched the 5’5” shield now protecting Trevor.

  “No! Get off me!” April exclaimed, but she was already right where Trevor wanted her.

  The dozen passengers screamed. The man dropped his newspaper, the woman holding the book froze, the yuppie yanked the earbuds from his ears, the man with the beanie fell to the floor.

  Brian looked for a shot, but the flailing woman in the businessman’s arms prevented any action. Suddenly, Trevor reached into his trench coat and unearthed a silver PPK pistol. He dug it deep into April’s blonde hair, and then like that, she froze.

  “Very impressive, Detective Brian Boise. How did you know where to find me?” Trevor asked with confidence.

  “Your shoes leave a trail.”

  “Ah, I see. Well, not all trails lead out of the woods.”

  “Cut the flowery shit!”

  “So, how’s this going to end? We seem to be in a bit of a strange situation here,” Trevor reasoned.

  “Put the gun down and let her go,” Brian replied matching Trevor’s coolness.

  “Ha, you think you can negotiate with me? Business is my middle name,” Trevor chuckled.

  The train suddenly jolted. Everyone lost control for a moment, except for Trevor. He threw his shield aside, ducked, and then squeezed the trigger. A blast belted as a lead bullet hurled toward Brian and impaled his leg. Brian fell; his back bashed into a metal seat and the gun flew from his hand.

  Conversely, the passengers in the train car heard the blast, but they saw Trevor shoot at the empty seat across from him.

  Trevor towered over Brian. The businessman grinned as he pointed his pistol between Brian’s green eyes. Through the confusion, April crawled to the back of the train.

  “You see, you and I are not that different,” Trevor said.

  Brian gripped the seat trying to get up, but pain shot through his leg, pain that he had never felt before. Trevor used his teeth to remove his left glove, and then tossed it at Brian’s tormented body. Then, he placed the gun in his left hand and did the same to his other glove.

  “We both are family men. Have a great wife and loving children. Actually, you seem to be having trouble in that department, haven’t you?” Trevor teased. “If you think about it, we really are the same. Perhaps, we are the same person.”

  Brian felt his body shut down. Any movement twisted his nerves and sent excruciating pain throughout his body. Blood poured from his leg and drenched his hands. Brian tried to lift himself up, but he kept sliding in the pool of his own blood.

  Trevor stood over him. He held his weapon loosel
y as he controlled the situation like a board meeting. Then, he reached deep into his trench coat. His hand held for a moment, and then he removed it as his bare fingers held a picture of Laura, Katie, Kevin, and the keystone of the Malloy family—himself.

  “Do you know what today is?” Trevor asked.

  “The day they put on your tombstone,” Brian lashed back.

  “Today is a very special day. We actually have it in common. It’s the ten year anniversary of our father’s death.”

  “How do you know about my father?”

  “I know all about him. I know how he blew his brains out inside a hotel room from the pressure. I know that was the day that you knew you had to be a cop. You see, I was there too inside that room, and that was the day that I knew I had to be a businessman.”

  “Who are you?” Brian asked as he looked up into Trevor’s eyes.

  “You still don’t get it, do you? Or perhaps you do get it, and you don’t want to admit it.” Trevor smirked. “Look in the mirror! You’re not here. I’m you, Brian.” His green eyes were now red. “And there’s one more thing that I remember our father saying, his last words. You know them. They torment you every day; they hold you back from kissing your son; they taunt you when you sleep; they make you go soft when your wife wants it. Go on, Brian, say them.”

  Brian froze. His mind screamed. Brian knew he was sleeping; he had to be, and he had to wake up from this nightmare.

  “I have to get them out of my head. You remember our father saying that, right? He suffered just like we are suffering now.”

  Trevor leaned down and pierced Brian with an evil glare. The demon in Trevor’s eyes burned into the clamoring detective, and no matter how Brian tried to regain his composure, he couldn’t escape the demon’s grasp.

  Trevor clutched the silver gun in his right hand. He gripped it tighter than he had with Dante, Max, and even Janice. He eyed Brian’s greasy hair, the covering to the detective’s control unit.