“Torchie, stop the bleeding.”
Bowdler shuddered again as Torchie cauterized his nose.
“So, what do we do with him?” Flinch asked.
“I don’t know.” I couldn’t kill him. It’s one thing to lash out in anger. It’s another to become an executioner. I couldn’t turn him over to the police. There was no way I could testify against him without revealing my own secrets. I couldn’t let him go. If he ever got his hands on me, or the guys, he’d do far worse to us than snap a bit of bone and cartilage.
“We have to make sure he never has a chance to hurt any of us again,” I said.
“I’ve got the video,” Flinch reminded me.
“We’ve got a lot of documents,” Martin said.
“That’s good, but it’s not enough,” I said. I’d seen it on the news. People did all sorts of bad stuff and never got punished. I had to find some way to show that Bowdler had been behind my fake death. And we had to deliver him to the right place, in the right way. I needed to cover him with so much dirt that he’d never get clean.
“We have to take him to Washington,” I said.
“All right!” Martin said. “Road trip!”
“No way. You’re not driving any of us anywhere until you get your license.”
“Then how?” Flinch asked.
I looked over my shoulder and shouted, “We could use a hand.”
“Who are you talking to?” Cheater asked.
“You’ll see.” Earlier, when we were walking across the field, I’d caught the tiniest motion out of the corner of my eye. He wasn’t being sloppy. I figured he wanted me to know he was there.
A moment later, someone came shuffling out of the shadows.
Torchie yelped when he recognized Thurston. The rest of the guys gasped. I wasn’t surprised, but I was glad.
“He’s dead,” Torchie said. “I saw it myself.”
“You think we’re the only ones with a hidden talent?” I asked.
It had to be that way. No normal person could have survived what I did to him. When I first saw him alive, back when we were locked in those cells, I’d been so happy to learn he wasn’t dead—to learn I wasn’t a murderer—that I hadn’t let myself think too much about it.
“You are a tough old coot,” I said when Thurston got close enough so we could speak without shouting.
“But a careless one,” he said. “I should have searched our captive more carefully for weapons. If I’d found the other knife, he wouldn’t be dead, now.”
“At least you’re alive.”
He nodded. “A stab wound heals a lot quicker than a chest full of broken ribs. But I wouldn’t recommend either one.”
“Sorry about that,” I said.
“No hard feelings. We all strike back when we’re attacked.”
I pointed past him. “Were you just going to stand there in the dark and watch?”
“You seemed to be doing fine.” He pulled a plastic strip from his pocket, then walked over to Bowdler and fastened his wrists behind his back. “Douglas, we need to rethink our partnership.”
He patted Bowdler down, pulled a knife from a sheath on his ankle and a gun from a holster on his hip, then said, “I’m not making that mistake again. Fool me once …”
“I think I know what to do.” I told him my plan. “What do you think? You’re the expert.”
“I like it. Our friend with the knives lived near here. I’m sure I can find some evidence of his part in faking your death. Guys like that always dream of writing a novel or a film script. He’ll have left a paper trail. On a happier subject, this afternoon my contacts in Belgium put your parents on a plane back here. They’ll be landing at Philly in about two hours, overjoyed at the news that you’re alive.”
Thurston led us to the side of the school, where a large, dark car was parked. He popped the trunk and pushed Bowdler toward it. “You don’t get to ride with the cool kids.”
Bowdler, for once, was silent.
We got in the car with Thurston. “You don’t mind dropping him off?” I asked.
“It would be my pleasure. As for you, back to Chinatown?”
“Yeah. Thanks.” I didn’t bother to ask him how he knew where we’d gone. “Are we really safe?”
“For now. Until you slip up again.”
“Maybe I won’t. You’ve kept your secret, right?”
“Mostly. The time or two when someone found out about it, they never got a chance to spread the news.”
I didn’t follow up on that. I’d had enough espionage and death for the moment. But I could just imagine the surprised look on some bad guy’s face when he discovered how hard Thurston was to kill.