“Stay with him! But watch yourself.”
“Twenty-two-oh-four.” It was Frank Nicolo. “Sheiner’s here. He’s down. No pulse. I think he’s gone.”
Then, suddenly, there were more shots!
Chapter 17
WE WERE UP and running again. Two officers had been shot, and an unknown number of assailants were at the service plaza. A second ambush opened up on us. A bullet streaked by my face.
Someone had fired from the roof of a tractor trailer as he ran down the length of it. I shot back and couldn’t tell if I’d hit the sniper or not. Everything was happening like fireworks – there and gone – then quiet again.
“What the fuck?” somebody shouted on radio. He didn’t explain. Couldn’t?
“Alex! Bree!” It was Sampson again. “By the pumps! To your left!”
I ran out to where I could see the main buildings. Three of the gunmen had a good fifty yards on us and were running toward the gas canopy, firing as they went. They had black balaclavas pulled over their heads.
Two were short – boys, if the height was any indication. A larger person – huge – was in the first position. Was that the gang’s leader? Ellie’s killer. It had to be him, didn’t it? I wanted to get the bastard, no matter what else happened tonight.
Innocent people ran screaming away from their cars and semis. There was too much confusion for us to fire, A woman in a red parka and baseball cap went down, clutching her stomach. The large man shot her a second time! Was he crazy?
Then he plucked the gas nozzle out of her SUV. He definitely was mad. He locked it in the on position, then left the gas running on the ground.
Then he stepped over to the next car in line and did the same thing.
His team of boys was getting clear of the area, running and shouting as if this were some kind of out-of-control sports match. His pistol was pointed at the pooling gas, and that was all the warning I needed.
“Hold fire! Hold fire!” I yelled, then pulled up short of the pumps. “Bree, take Brighton. Go around the other side. Nicolo, get somebody to shut those things off.”
The large man held a third nozzle in his hand now, just letting the gasoline flow onto the pavement. I could smell the vapors, even at this distance.
What the hell was he thinking?
“Just put it down. Walk away!” I shouted. “We won’t fire on you.”
He didn’t move, just stared back at me. No fear in him. A second later, someone shouted behind him. Then came three short blasts of a car horn.
Finally he did what I’d asked. He kept his gun pointed my way, but set the gas nozzle down. He backed away slowly, moving out of the light of the canopy.
We were clear – he was leaving!
Then several shots were fired out of the darkness. It was him – the bastard!
A wall of flame burst from the concrete. It almost seemed like a magic trick. In seconds, the forecourt was burning, flames licking under and around the empty cars.
A white Corolla went up first. It exploded right where the large male had been standing a few seconds ago. Then a black pickup on the other side of the pumps caught fire.
“Clear! Clear! Clear! Clear!” I was shouting and waving both arms over my head, trying to get everybody, civilians and police, away from there.
That’s when the first pump head blew.
And then – Armageddon in Virginia.
Chapter 18
THE PLAZA WITH its lines of gas pumps exploded from underneath, the pavement rising like a carpet being rolled. Flames shot at least eighty feet into the air, a ball of bright yellow and orange, followed by a heavy black coat of smoke. Burning vehicles rolled around like toy cars; truckers and families fled screaming from the restaurant, where the fire had already spread and with it the panic.
I was running as close to the blast site as I could. Heat singed my face, my eyes, and my hearing felt like it was half gone.
Up ahead I could see two SUVs speeding out toward Route 50. They were getting away!
I spotted Bree coming around from the far side of the building and breathed a sigh of relief. She was all right. She ran toward my car and so did I.
I got in the car and punched it up to ninety in a hurry.
For a few uneasy seconds, there was nothing ahead of us, nothing I could see.
“There!” Bree pointed at the two SUVs. They must have spotted us because just then they peeled off from each other.
The first Land Cruiser went left. The second SUV turned right. I followed the lead vehicle, hoping I had made the right choice.
Chapter 19
I BARRELED DOWN a dark two-lane road, gaining ground quickly on the Land Cruiser. A deep drainage culvert curled along our left side. I came up on the Cruiser’s taillights, and the driver appeared to panic. Suddenly it flared to the right, then cut back nearly ninety degrees without slowing. Then the Land Cruiser flew straight toward the ditch.
For a second I thought he’d make it across. The Land Cruiser had air under it, but the front end came down too fast. It crashed hard and loud, the undercarriage fracturing.
The front wheels were lodged into the far bank. The rear tires continued to spin fiercely.
Bree and I were already out of our car and crouched behind the open doors.
“Out of the vehicle! Now!” I yelled across the ditch.
Finally, I could see bodies moving inside the Land Cruiser.
The adult was in the driver’s seat. Next to him was someone barely tall enough to be seen.
The smaller figure reached through the passenger-side window. He put one palm on the roof, then the other. He started lifting himself up and out.
“Down on the ground! Now!” Bree shouted at him. “Get down, I said!”
But he didn’t! He torpedoed himself up onto the roof, skinny and cat-quick. His gun was out now, pointing our way. He slid across the roof, firing three quick shots at us.
We fired back. A round caught him and he dropped to the ground. But not before he’d given the adult enough cover to get outside. The driver’s door was open. I couldn’t see the large man, but I knew he was getting away.
Bree stopped beside the kid; I kept going. Down into the ditch, then up the other side.
I’d thought there were woods beyond the gulley, but now I saw there was just cedar screening and tall weeds.
Suddenly I heard the rattle of a chain-link fence. The large male was climbing it. By the time I pushed through the trees, he was over the top and running across the rear yard of some kind of storage facility.
I leveled my Glock against the chain link, then emptied the magazine. He was too far away. I didn’t think I’d hit him and then he turned. He waved contemptuously, then disappeared like a cat into the darkness.
I called in the location and then ran back to see about Bree. She was still crouched near the ground, right where I had left her. She’d put her jacket over the dead boy’s face. It was an odd thing for a cop in a shoot-out to do, but Bree liked to go her own way.
“You okay?” I asked.
She didn’t look up. “He was maybe twelve, Alex. Maybe that old. He ran suicide for the prick adult.”
“Was he alive when you got to him?” I asked her. Bree nodded.
“He say anything?”
“Yeah.” She finally looked up at me. “He told me to fuck myself. His last words on this earth.”
Chapter 20
I DIDN’T SLEEP more than a couple of hours that night. An officer and two civilians were dead – not to mention one of the boy killers, the “world’s youngest terrorist,” according to a Washington Post headline the next morning. On top of everything else, I had an eight o’clock psych client to see at St. Anthony’s.