The Recruiter (A Thriller) Page 4

  Again, the crowd cheers, mesmerized by the raw grace of Beth’s movements.

  By the end of the third quarter, the opponent is in disarray. Beth’s team is up by eight points. She knows that the fourth quarter will bring yet another strategy, but she’s surprised by what that new strategy is.

  It’s a box-and-one. It’s a defense Beth hasn’t seen in a while. Four players essentially play zone, with the fifth taking the player who needs to be neutralized one-on-one. In this case, that player is Beth. The Tank will play Beth one-on-one, but the other players will be able to double team as they’re playing zone.

  Beth knows there’s only one way to really beat the box-and-one: her teammates have to step up. She needs to draw the double-team, then dish off to the player who’s free.

  The first three possessions of the fourth quarter she does just that. But her teammates don’t come through. The first shot is blocked, the second one is an air ball, the third comes up short. The tightness, the nervousness, the pressure, it’s all visible on her teammates’ faces.

  With just four minutes gone by in the fourth quarter, it’s a tie ballgame.

  Beth’s coach calls for a timeout. She tries to get the team psyched up, but Beth can read the faces around her. They’re looking at the scoreboard, looking at the point totals, at the time left.

  The buzzer sounds and the huddle breaks. Beth turns toward the court, but her coach grabs her arm. Beth looks into her eyes, and the coach says, “You can do it, Beth.”

  She understands what the coach is saying. She nods.

  At the first sign of a double-team, Beth fakes a pass, and the defenders back off her; she pivots quickly and hits a fade-away jumper. They’re up by two. The other team scores on an easy lay-in. Next possession, Beth drives into the lane, splits the defenders, and hits a jumper. She feels it. It’s a magical feeling, that she can do almost anything, score at will. It’s as if she can hear every individual’s cheer, see the court in slow motion. It’s all there for her. For the taking.

  The teams continue to trade baskets, with Beth hitting shot after shot, passing to a teammate only when it’s a gimme.

  With a minute left in the game, it’s all tied up.

  The Tank brings the ball up the court. Beth shadows her, but doesn’t go for a steal. Behind her, the players settle into formation. Beth’s mind is working fast. She knows what they’re going to do. Their big center has been hitting her baseline shots all through the game. Beth’s center, shorter and without the jumping ability, is powerless to stop her. Beth knows they will run at least ten seconds off the clock, then get the ball to the big center.

  Beth waits, sinking into the lane when the Tank doesn’t have the ball, then popping back out to keep up the defensive pressure. Suddenly, Beth sees the Tank’s expression change.

  They’re going for it.

  The ball swings around, and Beth leaves her position and sneaks through the lane. The ball is fed to the big center, who turns, pivots, and goes up for the shot. Beth, on a dead run, leaps from behind and blocks the shot. The ball comes down in the center’s hands. She loses control, and the ball goes out of bounds.

  Beth’s ball.

  She brings the ball up the court quickly. Tied up, forty seconds left. Beth works the ball around the perimeter. There’s too much time to try for a last shot. Beth fakes a pass to the right wing and drives into the lane. The defenders swarm her. She fakes a jump shot and drops a perfect bounce pass to her forward cutting to the basket. The ball comes into Beth’s teammate’s hands.

  And goes right through.

  The ball goes out of bounds, and the ref blows his whistle.

  Beth retreats, fury in her mind. She fights it off and encourages her team. They have to stop them.

  The Tank brings the ball up and Beth gauges the distance. She starts to go for the steal, but the Tank moves quickly, pivoting her body, blocking Beth’s angle of attack. Will they go to the center again? Beth drops into the lane. Will they try again? Beth watches the center post up, who holds up her hand, but it’s a half-hearted attempt. Beth can tell by the body language that she doesn’t really want the ball.

  In that instant, Beth knows it’s going to the Tank.

  The ball is on the left perimeter. Beth glances at the clock. Thirteen seconds. Beth looks back at the guard with the ball, sees her glance at the clock too. Beth’s heart shifts into hyper speed, pounding like a drum solo, but she feels strong. Her legs feel light. She feels the adrenaline pour into her body, and suddenly, she knows she will win this game.

  The guard with the ball takes a step back.

  The crowd is roaring.

  The guard raises the ball, turns her body, and steps toward the Tank.

  Flashbulbs are popping.

  The guard coils her body, gathers herself to make the pass.

  And then Beth makes her move.

  Thirteen

  Although legally intoxicated at this point, Anna Fischer still retains the ability to focus on her daughter. Despite the fact that most of the eyes in the gymnasium are concentrated on the girl with the ball on the other team, Anna is watching her daughter. She’s been watching her for most of the game. Anna is numb. The parts of her brain that aren’t awash with memories of her dead husband are thoroughly soaked with whiskey. The way Beth moves. The way she commands her team. It all reminds Anna of Beth’s father.

  But now, Anna sees Beth tense. And then suddenly, Beth explodes from her spot in the middle of the lane.

  Where is she going? Anna has time to think.

  But by the time she finishes the thought, the girl on the other team has made a bad cross-court pass. Never a good idea, Anna remembers her husband telling her.

  Beth snatches the ball from the air with one swift movement, and then she rockets down the court. Anna marvels at her daughter’s grace, her speed, her strength. The stocky point guard from the other team chases after Beth. Beth dribbles with ease, her long legs flying, but Anna can see that the stocky girl is closing the gap, running easier without the ball.

  All around Anna, people are on their feet, screaming. The noise is incredible, and for a moment, Anna almost faints. The people in front of her have jumped to their feet so she stands quickly. Too quickly. The noise, the screaming, she sways on her feet, reaching out to hold onto the shirt sleeve of the person standing next to her.

  Through the gap between the people in front of her, Anna sees Beth racing to the basket, sees Beth leap toward the basket, the ball outstretched in one hand. The moment is frozen by the pop of dozens of flashbulbs.

  And then Anna sees the stocky girl crash into Beth.

  They both fall to a heap.

  Fear rips Anna’s heart apart. She drops the big plastic cup to the floor of the bleachers. It splashes onto her shoes. She pushes her way through the people in front of her, stumbles, and falls. Someone says something to her, but she can’t hear them.

  The crowd continues to scream, but Anna’s mind is filled with white noise, a buzzing like electricity. She fights her way to the bottom of the bleachers and onto the court. She runs forward, players stepping aside for her to pass.

  The screaming is louder, growing in intensity. And then Anna realizes that her mouth is open.

  And that she’s screaming. The images pass before her eyes. She sees Beth’s father in the hospital, dying. She sees Beth, featured in hellish postcards from a place so full of pain that Anna staggers as if struck.

  She weaves her way to the huddle of people under the basket, and she can see Beth on the ground.

  She pushes through.

  Anna sees Beth’s leg.

  By the time she finishes wailing “No!” blackness has engulfed her.

  Fourteen

  Peter Forbes stands rooted to the bleachers. Next to him, Doug and the others are jumping up and down, yelling, clapping each other on the back, oblivious to the scene unfolding under the basket.

  “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” Doug shouts. His face is flushed, and a big dopey gr
in stretches across his face. He looks at Peter. “Come on, man! We won! Beth did it! We won! Woo-hoo!” Doug claps Peter on the back.

  Peter’s body is cold. His eyes are frozen to the small group of people under the basket. He wants to run onto the court. To go to Beth. But he can’t. He can only stand there. Unmoving.

  “Pete! What the fuck’s wrong with you? We won!”

  Peter watches the older woman push her way through the players. Peter recognizes her. She is Beth’s mother.

  The fucking drunk.

  Oh God no.

  “Pete,” Doug said, grabbing him by the arm. Doug looks out at the court. At Beth under the basket. He is shouting, as is everyone around them. “She’s going to be all right, man. Probably twisted an ankle.”

  All around them, the students are chanting. “Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah, hey hey hey, goodbye!”

  Peter sees Beth’s mother collapse to the floor.

  She never saw it coming, he thinks. And it’s not over yet.

  “Pete, stop looking like a fucking zombie. Your girlfriend’s going to be all right,” Doug says again.

  Peter wrenches his arm away from Doug and starts toward the court. Toward Beth.

  His legs feel like oak. His stomach roils, and he feels the Coke in his stomach churn. He wants to puke and cry at the same time.

  “No, she’s not,” he says.

  Fifteen

  Beth hears the screaming. She is short of breath, feels like a weight is pressing down on her lungs. From the fast break? The run down the court?

  No. She feels the warmth on her body. Feels the weight of the Tank on her body. Feels the sweat, the dampness of the girl on top of her.

  Beth cranes her neck to see the basket. To see if the ball went through, but it’s too late. She looks for the scoreboard, but it’s above her, and she can’t see it from that angle.

  The screaming continues. But whose fans are they?

  The Tank gets off her, and turns toward Beth, holding out her hand. Beth thinks she should reach out, take hold of the girl’s hand and get up. But once the weight is taken from her body, the signals from her leg reach her brain.

  The pain.

  It comes in a blinding flash like a bolt of lightning.

  The Tank, holding out her hand, looks down at Beth’s body, then brings her hand to her mouth.

  And starts screaming.

  Beth closes her eyes. The pain swarms her body. It attacks her leg like a thousand wasps, burying their stingers in her leg.

  No, Beth thinks. Not her leg.

  Her knee.

  She forces her eyes open. Tears are streaming from her face. Watery, indistinct images loom over her.

  She hears voices. Gasps. And more screams.

  Beth uses the sweatband on her left forearm to wipe away the tears. She tries to sit up even though hands push her back toward the court. She pushes harder and gets to a sitting position.

  And then she looks down.

  An optical illusion, she thinks.

  Her right leg, smooth and supple, is the way it always is. The quadriceps nicely defined, tapering down to her calf muscle where her shin narrows down to her white crew socks and Nike high tops.

  But her left leg isn’t…recognizable. The quadriceps, thick and strong, is there. But the knee…the knee…isn’t…

  …there…

  Beth remembers a time when she was trying to break a thick branch for firewood at a Girl Scout camping trip. The branch was too green. But she broke it, and then tried to twist it apart, the fibers and strands of wood not separating, just twisting. Beth remembers trying to break it off, but it wouldn’t, so she just twisted it and twisted it and twisted it until it was hanging there by a single strand…all mangled…

  Now it’s Beth’s turn to scream.

  She can’t bear to look at what’s left of her leg. Instead, she turns toward the faces around her. Beth sees her mother. Watches her mother’s face in the process of crumpling. Her mother falls to the ground.

  Later, in the hospital, Beth remembers that moment. Remembers her mother fainting, remembers the words that flashed through her mind:

  Useless. Absolutely fucking useless. Like always.

  Hands reach for Beth.

  She has stopped screaming and is now sobbing.

  The pain scorches its way up her spine and pounds her brain. She reels and slumps back onto the court. She thinks of Peter. Peter will help her. She imagines his strong, handsome face.

  Where is he?

  The voices and the images recede into blackness but before she joins them, two words escape her mouth like rats from a sinking ship.

  “Who won?”

  Sixteen

  Samuel stands outside the squat brick building, the palmetto leaves slapping lazily against one another in the warm breeze. He lets the sun shine on his face. Lets it warm him.

  His hotel room was cold last night, an adjustable thermostat that ignored any adjustment and simply blew cool air around the small, dingy room. He has been in many hotel rooms recently, always paying cash, always staying away from the chains and going to anonymous places on the outskirts of the cities and towns he drove through. The trip to Florida from San Diego was a slow one. Samuel was careful to follow the speed limit, not wanting any record of his trip logged in a cop’s paperwork.

  Now, the naval base at Pensacola, Florida was his new home. Where he would have to make due until his next chance for BUD/S training, eighteen months away. It was a long time, but he could do it.

  The Florida sun was hot, much stronger than southern California. In the week since he sent BUD/S instructor Nevens and his blond whore to the great boot camp in the sky, cold has always reminded Samuel of the water that night.

  Now, he pauses a moment longer, the sun’s heat intense on his face, his eyes shielded from the rays by sunglasses. Finally, when the warmth threatens to bring a line of sweat to his forehead, he turns and enters the building.

  •

  Commander Lowry’s office is on the second floor. Samuel climbs the stairs with neither anticipation nor dread. He is starting back at square one. The frustration, the depression, are gone. Because he isn’t really starting back at square one. Nevens is gone.

  The door is open and he walks in. On the walls, there are photos and illustrations of ships, but Samuel ignores them. He walks toward the metal desk directly in front of him and the woman sitting behind it. The secretary is a woman in her forties with a tired face and a pointy chin, which she uses to gesture Samuel toward the two shoddy chairs just outside the door to the CO’s office.

  Samuel takes the least flimsy chair and looks at the pile of magazines and newspapers on the cheap veneered table between the chairs. He skips the Sports Illustrated and the Men’s Health. Instead, he spies a newsletter published by the Navy, called All Hands.

  On the front page is a picture of deceased BUD/S Instructor Larry Nevens.

  Samuel’s heart shudders.

  He scans the story quickly. A brutal murder. Nevens was last seen with a woman, Rhonda McFarland, who is still missing. She looked like a Rhonda, Samuel thinks.

  There are no suspects in custody. A reward is offered for more information.

  Samuel reads on about Nevens’ background, noting there is no mention of what a cock-sucking prick he was. A small throbbing, a muffled thudding of pain builds in Samuel’s head. His hand goes above his right eye, and he rubs it while he reads.

  Finally, Samuel puts down the paper. He closes his eyes and slows his breathing.

  Suddenly, Samuel feels good. Confident.

  When he goes back to BUD/S training, he will be in better shape, mentally prepared for the ordeal ahead. But through it all, he will have one thing on his side.

  He will be the only recruit who has actually killed a Navy SEAL.

  A small smile appears on Samuel’s face.

  When he looks up, the secretary is watching him.

  “He’ll see you now.”

  Seventeenr />
  “Afternoon, Commander,” Samuel says, standing at attention and saluting.

  “At ease,” Lowry says. Samuel drops his hand and relaxes his stance. He takes in Lowry, a thin man with narrow shoulders and a thin face hidden by giant aviator glasses. He looks like an insect, Samuel thinks. He imagines squashing Commander Lowry’s head. Sees the buggy eyes pop out of the man’s skull.

  But the eyes behind the lenses are intelligent and quick. Samuel instinctively senses the man’s intelligence. Lowry’s office is neat as a pin. Not a paper out of place. Even the pens on the left side of the desk are symmetrically arranged.

  Weak, but smart, Samuel thinks. And a by-the-book kind of freak.

  “I see you almost made it through Hell Week,” Lowry says. The smile tries to tell Samuel that hey, it happens to the best of us.

  “Almost, sir,” Samuel says, keeping his voice even. The pain in his head flares up. I’d like to wipe that fucking smile off your face. You and your chicken-bone arms and bug eyes wouldn’t have lasted one minute. So come on, be an asshole, Samuel thinks. Give me shit about it.

  The bug eyes focus on Samuel. Their eyes meet and something momentarily flashes through Lowry’s before he looks back down at the folder in front of him. He briefly imagines slitting Lowry’s throat and feeding him to the sharks. A calm, peaceful feeling makes its way through his body.

  “You’re from Michigan?” Lowry asks.

  “Lake Orion, sir.”

  “All your life?”

  “Yes sir.” Samuel gives a nearly imperceptible nod.

  Lowry leans back in his chair. “I’m from Wisconsin. Don’t miss it at all. All that snow and bitter cold.” He shudders as if a blast of Arctic air has stormed through the office. “I’ll take Florida any day. Golfing in January! Can’t beat it, my man.” Lowry smiles, and Samuel notes the crooked teeth. Samuel imagines that Lowry doesn’t smile too often.

  “Yes sir,” Samuel says.

  “I’m going to assign you to ordnance. According to your enlistment papers, you expressed an interest in weapons. Does that sound good to you?”