Stay focused. The cliffside here on either side of the steps was slippery limestone with some granite mixed in—a steep mish-mash of slabs and dirt, with some lichen and low plants and the occasional scrub oak. But getting off the steps would be suicide here; even if his hands were free and circulation flowing, it would take a mountain climber to deal with that slippery slope.

Kurtz hopped down another step, waited for the fireworks to quit going off behind his eyes, and dropped another.

I don't think Dr. Singh would recommend this as therapy for the concussion.

Who was Dr. Singh? Kurtz wondered dully. It was interesting how the headache pain flowed in like breakers along the surf, never stopping, never pausing, just rising and falling and then crashing down.

He dropped to another step, teetered, caught himself, stepped to the edge, and dropped to the next. Was it his imagination or were the horizontal parts of each step getting narrower? The backs of his heels scraped when he tried to put his feet down solidly, even with his toes hanging out over space. Kurtz had started down being glad that he'd worn his sneakers today, but now he wished he had his old combat boots on. His ankles felt splintered. His heels were already bloody.

He dropped again. Again. The sweat stung his eyes and burned in counterpoint to the real pain.

It can't get no worse … ran a line from some old army song. Kurtz didn't believe that, of course. If life had taught him one thing, it was that things could always get worse.

It started to rain. Hard.

Kurtz's hair immediately matted to his head. He tasted the rain and realized that blood from his scalp wound was mixing in. He couldn't blink away the water in his eyes and on his lashes, so he paused on a step. He didn't know if he was halfway down, two-thirds the way down, or a fourth the way down. His head and neck hurt far too much for him to crane his neck to look up again. And he didn't want to look down anymore.

It can always get worse.

Lightning flashed so close he was blinded. The thunder almost knocked him down. The world was filled with the stink of ozone. Kurtz's wet and bloody hair tried to rise off his head as the hillside around him glowed white from the blast.

Kurtz sat down heavily, his legs flying up. He was panting, disoriented, and so dizzy that he doubted if he could stand again without falling.

The rain pelted him like fists pounding his shoulders and neck. It was cold as hail fell and hurt his head. Cold as hail, he thought again, trying it out with a Texas accent Everything hurt his head. Why the fuck didn't that Yemeni kid aim better? Get it over with? Only it hadn't been the Yemeni kid, had it? He'd already shot the Yemeni kid by then. Then someone else shot him, Kurtz knew. The someone else who had brought the Yemeni kid there to kill… who? Peg O'Toole, he thought. Pretty Peg O'Toole, who just one year earlier had risked her job as PO to stand up for him, hell, to save his life, when a detective on the Farino's payroll had ramrodded him into county lockup on a bogus charge in preparation to send him back to prison where the D-block Mosque and a hundred other guys were waiting to get the bounty on him… Focus, Joe.

Can't get no worse…

The rain was coming down in a torrent and the hillside was turning into a thousand rivulets, but the main flood was pouring down this ziggurat stairway. The water struck Kurtz's shoulder blades and butt and threatened to wash him right off the step.

If I stand up, I'm screwed. If I keep sitting here, I'm screwed.

Kurtz stood up. The water flowed around and through his legs, geysering out in an almost comical jet Kurtz resisted the impulse to laugh.

He stepped down another step. His arms were completely dead to sensation now, just long sticks he was hauling down the hill with him like so much firewood on his back.

He dropped another step. Then another. He resisted the temptation to sit down again and let the waterfall carry him away. Maybe he'd just ride down on it like all the people in all the movies who leap a thousand feet off a cliff and then ride the rapids out of sight of the enemy, who shoot uselessly at them… Focus, Joe.

They're going to kill her anyway. Rigby. No matter what I do or don't do, they're going to kill her with my gun and blame it on me. She may be dead already if that bullet even nicked an artery. Leg wounds that high hurt like hell until you go all cold and numb at the end.

He blinked away water and blood. It was hard to see the edge of each step now. Every step was a mini-Niagara, the concrete invisible under swirling water.

Malcolm Kibunte was the name of the drug dealer and killer he'd dangled over the edge of Niagara Palls one wintry night just under a year ago. He was just asking the gang leader a few questions. Kurtz had a rope on the man—it was Kibunte who'd thought that his best chance was to drop the rope and swim for it right at the brink of North America's mightiest waterfall.

Joke him if he can't take a fuck, thought Kurtz. He stepped over the edge of this waterfall, dropped, fought the pain to stay conscious, teetered on the ever narrower step, found his balance against the flood, and stepped down again.

Again.

Again.

Again.

He finally fell. The step seemed to shift under him and Kurtz fell forward, unable to find the next step or throw himself backward.

So he leaped instead. He leaped out into space, legs as high as he could get them. Leaped away from the waterfall and into the rain. Mouth contorted in a silent scream, Joe Kurtz leaped.

And hit solid ground and crumpled forward, just twisting in time to keep from smashing his face on the wet asphalt. His shoulder struck instead, sending a blinding bolt of pain up the right side of his head.

He blinked, twisted around as he lay prone on the drive, and looked behind him. He'd been on the third or fourth step from the bottom when he'd fallen. The ziggurat stairway was invisible under the waterfall of water. The rain kept coming down hard and the flood washed around his torn sneakers, trying to push his body out along the asphalt.

"Get up," said Sheriff Gerey.

Kurtz tried.

"Grab an arm, Smitty," said the sheriff.

They grabbed Kurtz's unfeeling arms, hauled him to his feet, and half-dragged him to the sheriff's car parked there. The deputy held the rear door open.

"Watch your head," said the sheriff and then pressed Kurtz's head down with that move they'd all learned in cop school but also had seen in too many movies and TV shows. The man's fingers on Kurtz's bloody, battered skull hurt like hell and made him want to vomit, but he resisted the urge. He knew from experience that few things prompted cops to use their batons on your kidneys faster than puking in the backseats of their cars.

"Watch your head," the deputy repeated, and Kurtz finally had to laugh as they shoved him into the backseat of the cruiser.