“ You’re dead, bitch!” He screamed it, a mournful wail that might not wake the dead, but the neighbors were getting an earful. Old Thelma Prescott, her nosey neighbor on the left, had surely called the police by now.
She reached into the bookcase, got another book, tossed it across the room. He didn’t fire.
“ Not gonna fool me again.” He had six rounds left, leaving them even. But his were deadlier. And if he wasn’t going to shoot off into the night anymore, she had a problem, because eventually, if he was any good at moving around in the dark, he was going to find her. And since he’d managed to get into the garage without making a sound, she’d have to assume he was good at it.
If she just knew where he was. She needed an edge, otherwise she was going to die in the dark. Then she had an idea. How to get her edge.
She felt for the wall behind her, then breathing quietly as possible, so that her breath was silent even to God’s ears, she inched her way up the wall, till she was standing next to the breaker box.
She steadied herself, back against the wall, reached to her side, felt the breaker box, eased her hand down to the main, took a deep breath, held it.
She flipped the switch.
And the garage filled with light.
Lundgren was facing away from her, but he was lizard quick in his reaction, turning fast. But she was already firing. One, two, three rounds into his side as he turned. Four, five and six, she stitched into his chest. Shock and horror filled his face as he glared at her for an instant, then fell forward.
Out of ammo, she shoved the wallet gun back into her pocket. She looked for the Glock, but he’d fallen on it. She was about to push the body aside and get it when she heard sirens off in the distance.
Time to go.
She started for the back, heard sirens in the park. She ran for the front door, grabbed a breath and stepped out into the cold.
“ Don’t move.” It was Shaffer and he had a gun stuck in her back. “This is a forty-five automatic. It may be World War II vintage, but it’s very deadly. So if you want to stay alive, we are going to calmly walk down to my car, you’re going to drive.”
“ No,” she said.
“ I’ll shoot you where you stand.”
“ I don’t think-”
A roar that sounded like it came from the bowels of Hell filled the night and from out of nowhere Hunter sprang, grabbing Shaffer by the gun arm, pulling him down. Shaffer tried to fight him off, flaying at the dog with his other hand, but the dog was too strong.
The forty-five went flying, landing on the lawn. Izzy ran for it, grabbed it, then turned toward Shaffer, who was on his back, limp under the dog.
“ Let him go,” Izzy commanded.
Hunter released, growled, stepped back as Izzy went to her knees. Shaffer lay still, eyes wide. His face spoke of a torturous agony.
“ My heart,” he said. Then nothing.
Izzy checked the carotid. No pulse. He was gone.
“ Fuck.”
“ What’s going on?” It was Thelma Prescott, her noisy, old, drunken neighbor. “That man’s hurt!”
Sirens filled the night. Getting louder.
“ Time to go.” Izzy started for the end of the street at a run, the dog at her heels, when a squad car came screeching around the corner, siren blaring.
Izzy stopped, caught in the black and white’s headlight.
Two cops got out of the car, doors open, shielding them as they trained their guns at her.
“ Drop the gun! Drop the gun!” one of them shouted.
“ On the ground, on the ground!” the other one was shouting, too.
Then they vanished.
One second they were there, the next they were not.
“ Come on!” Izzy said to the dog and they took off at a dead run.
Chapter Eight
Lila Booth parked on Ralston, across the street from a two story yellow house. The university was a couple blocks away and most of the neighborhood looked like it housed students, but a few of the homes looked upscale and this was one of them. According to her tracker, Amy Eisenhower’s vintage Volkswagen was in the garage.
Lila usually tooled around town in a flashy 1966 E Type Jag. She loved her little Darth Vadar black XKE. It was showroom perfect, would do a hundred and fifty without batting an eye, and it was a convertible. But when she was working, she used a bland Crown Vic, the same car preferred by police departments nationwide. It had a big trunk and was reliable and nondescript. The car was, of course, black.
It was 4:00 AM straight up. The sky was overcast and it was cold. A breeze was blowing from the north, promising even more cold to come. Lila loved Reno in the summer, but not so much in the winter. She was well off and usually took long winter vacations to the islands, both the Caribbean and the Hawaiian, but this year she’d stayed home, as Manny was worried about Tucker, afraid his son wasn’t thinking clearly, afraid he was making bad decisions. In short, Manny had been afraid he’d need Lila to clean up after his son.
She’d tried to reassure him that Tucker was a big boy, that he’d had his head screwed on straight. But Manny had insisted she stay close and she owed him, so no tropical sun for her this winter. She’d thought Manny was erring on the side of paranoia, but as it turned out it was caution, not paranoia that Manny was erring on the side of.
She got out of the car, slung her backpack over her shoulder, went to the front door, like she belonged. She was a pro with the picks and the lock surrendered to her expertise in seconds, but even though the doorknob turned, it didn’t open as the door had been bolted shut.
She saw a side gate, used it and at the back door she again tried her picks and again the lock gave up to her and again the door had been bolted from the inside. Damn. People were just a touch too security conscious these days.
Nothing for it but to use a window. But she soon discovered they were barred. Motherfuck. Now what?
The garage. She went to the side door and would wonders never cease, it was unlocked. She stepped inside, saw there was a bolt on the door, but someone had forgotten to throw it. The door had been left unlocked, unbolted. Big mistake.
She eased the door closed after herself, smiled when she saw Amy Eisenhower’s VW and Dr. Eisenhower’s Dodge Raider. Jackpot. She turned her eyes to a red Beemer sports car. Those weren’t cheap. She wondered what the person who owned it did for a living. She also wondered if he or she had just moved in, because there was a ton of stuff stored in new looking cardboard boxes.
Taking her eyes away from the cars and boxes, she saw the door to the house, was afraid for a second it might be locked and bolted, but it wasn’t. The door led into a well appointed kitchen and Lila gasped. Whoever lived here had her stove. The Grand Palais made by La Cornue. Two ovens, one gas, one electric, both with airtight seamless doors. The ovens cooked with radiant heat, Lila knew, because she was a gourmet chef when she wasn’t out killing people. The stove cost over forty thousand dollars. Only a true gourmet would have one. A gourmet with plenty of discretionary cash. This stove was yellow, which matched the kitchen, Lila’s was, of course, black.
Lila decided she had to know whoever owned this stove, man or woman. Like Lila, this person had taste. She hoped Mansfield Wayne wasn’t going to harm this woman. She had to be a woman, Lila decided and she wondered if she had brown eyes, if she was the brown-eyed version of Amy Eisenhower, Manny was so interested in.
With her eyes still on the yellow stove, Lila set her backpack on the kitchen counter by the sink. The sinks were granite and they looked like they were molded into the counter. This lady had class, easily as much as Lila herself, much more than the Waynes, Mansfield and Tucker.
With the backpack open, Lila took out the dart gun, almost regretting what she was about to do. That wasn’t like her. She had no feelings; that’s what made her so good at what she did.