“You’re not getting tired, are you, Doctor?” He started to close in again. Judd knew that his body could not take much more punishment. He had to keep talking. It was his only chance.
“DeMarco…” He gasped.
DeMarco feinted and Judd swung at him. DeMarco ducked, laughed, and slammed his fist squarely between Judd’s legs. Judd doubled over, filled with an unbelievable agony, and fell to the ground. DeMarco was on top of him, his hands at his throat.
“My bare hands,” DeMarco screamed. “I’m going to tear your eyes out with my bare hands.” He dug his huge fists into Judd’s eyes.
They were speeding past Bedminster heading south on Route 206, when the call cracked in over the radio. “Code Three…Code Three…All cars stand by… New York Unit Twenty-seven…New York Unit Twenty-seven…”
McGreavy grabbed the radio microphone. “New York Twenty-seven…Come in!”
Captain Bertelli’s excited voice came over the radio. “We’ve got it pinned down, Mac. There’s a New Jersey pipeline company two miles south of Millstone. It’s owned by the Five Star Corporation—the same company that owns the meat-packing plant. It’s one of the fronts Tony DeMarco uses.”
“Sounds right,” McGreavy said. “We’re on our way.”
“How far are you from there?”
“Ten miles.”
“Good luck.”
“Yeah.”
McGreavy switched off the radio, hit the siren, and slammed the accelerator to the floorboard.
The sky was spinning in wet circles overhead and something was pounding at him, tearing his body apart. He tried to see, but his eyes were swollen shut. A fist smashed into his ribs, and he felt the agonizing splinter of bones breaking. He could feel DeMarco’s hot breath on his face, coming in quick, excited gasps. He tried to see him, but he was locked in darkness. He opened his mouth and forced words past his thick, swollen tongue. “Yous-see,” he gasped. “I was r-right… You can—you can only hit a man—when he’s down…”
The breathing in his face stopped. He felt two hands grab him and pull him to his feet.
“You’re a dead man, Doctor. And I did it with my bare hands.”
Judd backed away from the voice. “You’re an—an a-animal,” he said, gasping for breath. “A psychopath.…You should be locked up .. . in an…insane asylum.”
DeMarco’s voice was thick with rage. “You’re a liar!”
“It’s the t-truth,” Judd said, moving back. “Your…your brain is diseased… Your mind is going to…snap and you’ll be…like an idiot baby.” Judd backed away, unable to see where he was going. Behind him he heard the faint hum of the closed pipeline, waiting like a sleeping giant.
DeMarco lunged at Judd, his huge hands clutching his throat. “I’m going to break your neck!” His enormous fingers closed on Judd’s windpipe, squeezing.
Judd felt his head begin to swim. This was his last chance. Every instinct in him screamed out to grab DeMarco’s hands and pull them away from his throat so that he could breathe. Instead, with a final tremendous effort of will, he put his hands in back of him, fumbling for the pipe valve. He felt himself beginning to slide into unconsciousness, and in that instant his hands closed on the valve. With a final, desperate burst of energy, he turned the handle and swerved his body around so that DeMarco was nearest the opening. A tremendous vacuum of air suddenly blasted at them, trying to pull them into the vortex of the pipe. Judd clung frantically to the valve with both hands, fighting the cyclonic fury of the wind. He felt DeMarco’s fingers digging into his throat as DeMarco was pulled toward the pipe. DeMarco could have saved himself, but in his mindless insane fury, he refused to let go. Judd could not see DeMarco’s face, but the voice was a demented animal cry, the words lost in the roar of the wind.
Judd’s fingers started to slip off the valve. He was going to be pulled into the pipeline with DeMarco. He gave a quick, last prayer, and in that instant he felt DeMarco’s hands slip away from his throat. There was a loud, reverberating scream, and then only the roar from the pipeline. DeMarco had vanished.
Judd stood there, bone weary, unable to move, waiting for the shot from Vaccaro.