Seven Seconds

Seven Seconds

After six weeks on the run, a journey that spanned over three thousand miles, Josh parked his stolen Hummer at the entrance to Dead Man’s Rock. This was it. The last stop.

Beside him, Fiona gazed out the window, her finger twirled around a stray curl. She looked more frightened now than when she played her piano for an audience of thousands, more frightened than the night she shot her stepdad. Screw the suicide pact. Josh had to save her.

He threaded his fingers into her hand. “Helluva way to spend your eighteenth birthday. You sure about this?”

Fiona gave him a tight smile. “Yeah. Are we high enough?”

Josh head-bobbed to a viewing platform, some fifty yards away. “See that bench over there? Dad used to bring me here on weekends. We’d toss rocks over the ledge and count how long it took to hit the trees.”

“How long?”

“Six seconds. Seven, if you threw really hard.”

Fiona lowered her window. The October breeze wafted in, lifting a lock of her recently dyed hair off her shoulders. “Think I hear them.”

Josh studied the rearview mirror. The single-lane road behind them was flanked by rhododendrons and hollies. Dappled light sprinkled through their branches, splashing onto the blacktop in patches of reds and yellows. The scene would’ve made a great calendar cover or a billboard for South Carolina state parks…until the first police cruiser appeared.

The lead car stopped twenty yards away, blocking their exit. The officer flung open his door and crouched, gun raised. “Get out with your hands in the air.”

Fiona’s eyes flicked to the ignition. “Should we go?”

“Nah. In a minute.” Josh removed his Glock from the glove compartment and fired two rounds out of the open sunroof. A crow squawked and winged away.

Fiona yanked on his arm. “What the hell are you doing? They’ll shoot back, you know?”

“Not with you in here. Your safety is the most important thing. Besides, they’ve got the whole world watching.”

Channel Seven’s traffic chopper crisscrossed the sky. The pilot must be having a blast chasing bad guys instead of five o’clock snarls on I-85.

Fiona scissored her arms to her chest. “This is so not fair.” She was eighteen, valedictorian of Westmont High School and winner of last year’s Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, but when she whined, she sounded like a child.

“What’s not fair?”

“The whole thing. You’re gonna go down as one of the worst villains in history. I’m talking Adolf Hitler bad.”

Fiona was exaggerating, but not much. Josh’s photo was in every post office from New York to L.A. He’d even headlined last week’s episode of America’s Most Wanted. “If the shoe fits, wear it,” he said.

She slapped his shoulder. “Would you shut up? I’m the murderer. Not you.”

“Doesn’t matter. The gun was registered to me. The police have a guy with a bullet in his brain and a witness who saw a twenty-two-year-old fleeing the scene with a minor.”

“But you didn’t do it. If you just tell the truth, maybe they’ll—”

“The truth? Should I mention you’re pregnant while I’m telling the truth?”

Fiona’s blue eyes bulged. “What?”

“I’m not an idiot. I heard you puking in the bathroom this morning.”

“I’m stressed. Get over it.”

“Have you been stressed every morning this week?” When Fiona didn’t respond, he added, “Are you late?”

“Can we not fight right now?”

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

Fiona slumped into her seat. “It’s not gonna matter after this, anyway.”

A megaphone crackled behind them. “Mr. Freed, this is Agent Fredrick Stone, FBI. You need to call my cell.” Agent Stone recited his phone number. “No one needs to get hurt. We can work this out.”

Fiona looked over her shoulder. “What’s he trying to do?”

“Negotiate. As far as he knows, this is a hostage situation.”

“What’ll happen if you don’t call?”

“He’ll wait.”

“Doubt he’s gonna be very patient. Not after that stunt you pulled in Gatlinburg.”

A smile tugged at Josh’s lips. Posing two wax dummies in their hotel room had been a stroke of genius. “My guess is they’ll try to force us out of the car and separate us.”

“How long do you think we have?”

Josh checked the mirror again. Officers were scurrying around Agent Stone, a SWAT truck idling behind them. “A few minutes, maybe.”

Fiona pulled her knees to her chest. “Always thought I’d die in a hospital. Like in movies where an old woman is surrounded by her kids and grandkids—everybody’s crying—and her soul drifts up to heaven. Sounds nice, you know?”

“Do you believe in God?”

She shrugged. “I dunno. Used to think the whole idea was stupid. Kinda like Santa Clause for adults. But look at that sky.” She leaned on the dashboard, her face pinked by the setting sun. “You know how long it took Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel? Four years! And that was just a ceiling. This is, like, the whole world. No way something as insanely beautiful as this could just happen.” She settled back in her seat. “What about you?”

Josh lifted her hand to his lips. “I believe in God every time I see your face.”

Fiona squeezed her eyes shut. She hadn’t cried as long as Josh had known her. Even that son-of-a-bitch stepfather of hers hadn’t brought her to tears. Only now, at the end….

Agent Stone’s megaphoned voice broke the silence. “My patience is running thin, Mr. Freed. You have one minute.”

“One minute.” The words limped out of Fiona’s mouth. “What should we do?”

The vague outline of a plan began to take shape in Josh’s mind. “Kiss me,” he said.

“Are you serious?”

“Sure. Why not?”

Fiona crawled into Josh’s lap. Her body felt weightless as she pressed her lips against his.

Josh pulled away. “I want to play something for you.”

He’d given a great deal of thought to his exit music. (Six weeks in a car gave a man plenty of time to think.) Frank Sinatra’s “I Did it My Way” or Van Halen’s “Jump” would be fitting, but he didn’t want to check out with a musical middle finger. Instead, he’d chosen a song that reminded him of Fiona.

Before they’d met, before he’d even known her name, Josh would lower his bedroom window, turn off the lights, and fall asleep to the sound of his neighbor’s piano. One of the songs Fiona used to play was Debussy’s “Clair de Lune.” Josh didn’t realize then that the piano was her only refuge from her alcoholic stepfather. All he knew was that her music expressed something true, something real, something that couldn’t be contained by words.

Josh inserted a CD he’d picked up at Walmart—Debussy’s Greatest Hits—and pressed play. The piece started slowly. Delicately. Like an angel testing its wings. As the music crescendoed, Josh rolled down his window and cranked the volume.

“Are you taunting them?” Fiona asked.

“Maybe.” Josh didn’t mind serenading Agent Stone with some piano music. If the man was like most cops, he could use a little culture in his life. But Agent Stone wasn’t the person Josh needed to distract. He leaned into Fiona’s body, his lips caressing hers, while his fingers pulled the door handle.

Josh squeezed her one last time. “Forgive me.”

“Forgive you for what?”

Without answering, Josh pushed Fiona off his lap and slung her out of the car. She landed onto the pavement, screaming “NO!” as Josh sped away. The speedometer read fifty mph by the time Josh reached the viewing platform. The Hummer barreled through his old rock-tossing bench, ripped through the railing, and catapulted over the edge.

For one weightless second, Josh glided through the air. The view was glorious. Rolling hills stretched into a cloudless horizon, tree tops tinged scarlet by the sun’s dying light. As Josh floated over Dead Man’s Rock, he turned for one last look of Fiona.

She was on the platform, while a man—presumably Agent Stone—fought to restrain her. If someone hadn’t been there, Fiona would’ve followed Josh’s car off the cliff. Maybe now she could go to college with her friends, play piano all over the world, find a good husband, have kids, and die in that hospital bed like she’d always dreamed. Who knows, her oldest child, the life growing inside her, might hold her hand and whisper, “I love you, Mama,” as her soul lifted into the sky.

Josh smiled at the thought, then closed his eyes and counted to seven.