Then he jumped.
Ava acted reflexively, reaching out with both hands to grab him by the shoulder and upper arm. She took hold of him and leaned back instantly, trying to counteract the pull of gravity.For a moment, it worked. Fairfax stumbled back along the beam toward the opening back into the building. But then, in the last moment, his right foot missed the beam and found open air. He went pitching over to the side, and the sudden shift also pulled Ava.
She was falling, too. And as the open air yawned before her and the city streets waited twenty-one stories below, Ava knew she had to make a decision: let him go, or fall with him.
Gritting her teeth in frustration and feeling her heart about to burst with terror in her chest, Ava made her decision.
CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT
In the sickening moment Ava decided to let Fairfax fall, she felt an incredible pressure latch on to her shoulders. The shock of it loosened her grip on Fairfax but when she realized it was a set of steady, stabilizing hands at her shoulders, she gripped him even harder.
Ava was pulled back hard and fast—so hard that when she was back in the hallway and her feet were on solid ground, she collided with one of the temporary walls behind her. Her shoulder and left foot slammed into the wall, knocking holes in it. Plaster and dust puffed out almost comically.
Fairfax was at her feet, having collapsed to the ground in a sobbing mess. Standing just behind him and taking a very cautious step away from the exterior access point within the wall, Pawlowski looked like she was about to be sick.
“Thank you,” Ava gasped. The totality of what had almost happened hadn’t caught up to her yet. She’d almost died and, even if she’d managed to make it out, would have been responsible for Fairfax falling. But Pawlowski had prevented all of that from happening.
They both looked down at the floor at the sobbing mess that was Henry Fairfax. Ava realized she had no cuffs, but watched as Pawlowski got hers out.
“I got a confession,” Ava said. “He’s under arrest.”
As Pawlowski did her best to cuff him, Ava attempted to help but realized that her entire body was trembling from what she’d just experienced. She did what she could to help while also noticing that the blow Fairfax had dealt out to Pawlowski on his way out of the conference room.
“You okay?” Pawlowski asked, looking at Ava.
“Yeah, I just need a second.”
“Apparently, he does, too,” she said, nodding to a still-sitting Fairfax. Ava wasn’t even sure he knew the cuffs were on him.
As she gathered her wits and nerves again, Ava started to consider what may have led Fairfax to do what he’d done to Alfred Perkins. She supposed he could have been looking for people that might have some stake in the Race to the Sky to sabotage the construction of the Chrysler Building. After all, Perkins’s death had comeverysoon after that spire had been placed on top of the building. Maybe there had been an argument between them and it had resulted in Fairfax pushing Perkins off. It made some sense, though not a lot, but it was all she could think of in that moment.
After a minute or so, she trusted her legs to walk again. Fairfax had come around a bit, too, but was looking back and forth between Ava and Pawlowski as if he had just woken up from a particularly bad dream.
“Come on,” Ava said, grabbing him beneath his left armpit. “Up we go.”
“I’m sorry…so…sorry,” he said. “For you, for Perkins…for…”
Pawlowski took him beneath the other armpit and he managed to find his feet. He didn’t fight them as they led him back to the stairwell. And even though he was still dazed and half-crying in itching breaths, he was actually of some help by the time they’d reached the stairwell landing on the seventeenth floor.
“The elevator…on this floor…”
He was even speaking like a man that was half asleep. As they stepped out into the finished, completed hallways along the seventeenth floor, Fairfax’s footsteps became more like shuffles. He still moved of his own accord, but it took more prodding and urging. Ava wondered if he might be slipping into some sort of shock over what he’d nearly done four floors over their heads.
Ava glanced over to Pawlowski as they led Fairfax to the elevators. The floor was empty and very quiet, giving off an overall eerie feeling. Pawlowski returned her glance and offered a tired smile. The bruise on her forehead was growing purple and starting to swell into a knot. Still, there was a look of pride and satisfaction in Pawlowski’s eyes.
Neither of them said anything as they came to the elevator. Ava called it up and when they stepped on, guiding Fairfax along with them, Ava realized how oddly comfortable the silence between them felt.
***
As Ava looked at Fairfax sitting at the table in the interrogation room, she was well aware of Miller’s presence in the room. Captain Miller was standing in the corner and had not said a single word since he’d entered. Ava wondered if he was tired from all the interrogation room juggling, having officially sent Isaac O’Hare home just twenty minutes ago when Fairfax had been brought in.
Meanwhile, Pawlowski sat down in the chair on Ava’s side of the table, holding a bag of ice to her forehead.
“You told me something while you were standing out on that beam,” Ava said, her eyes set on Fairfax. “You admitted to something. I need you to repeat that.”
Fairfax was surprisingly at ease. He’d been agreeable and mostly obedient ever since he’d stopped crying up on the twenty-first floor. There were still signs of that slight daze in his eyes and the way he moved.
He did repeat it, but he also went into more detail. And, in doing so, he proved Ava’s theory to be partially correct—but mostly wrong.