“Gently, child,” she said in a tender voice, “I’m not as young as I used to be.” She smiled a warm smile and patted Kaylin.
Kaylin pulled back and held the woman at arm’s length. “It’s so good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you, too. Can I come in?” The woman gave Kaylin a motherly pat on the shoulder and stepped through the doorway. After Kaylin introduced Dane and Bones, the four of them made their way to the kitchen, where they sat down around a stout oaken table in front of a wide bay window.
“Bernice took care of me when I was little, after Mom died,” Kaylin explained. “I call her Bernie.”
“I’m so sorry about your father,” Bernie said. “I’ve been in Mississippi visiting family for a few weeks. I went to your apartment as soon as I heard, but you weren’t there.”
“I’m glad you found me,” Kaylin said. Her smile underlined the sincerity in her words.
“So am I. There’s something I have to give you.” The woman fished into her bag and produced a large, manila envelope with something thick and rectangular inside. Dane could see that it was one of the packing envelopes used for mailing delicate items. “Your father gave me this a few months ago. He made me promise to keep it a secret. He said that I should give it to you if anything should ever happen to him.” She shook her head. “I never thought it would be so soon, if ever. Your father always seemed indestructible.”
Dane turned his head toward the window, giving the two a modicum of privacy to share this painful moment. Outside, a solitary boat drifted lazily down the Cooper River.
Kaylin nodded to Bernie, her eyes misty, and carefully undid the clasp on the envelope. Reaching in, she carefully withdrew a battered, old bible, the leather cover worn with age.
Dane leaned forward, his heart beating faster. This had to be it.
After a moment’s pause, Kaylin opened the old book, and gingerly flipped through the pages. The writing was French! In various places, someone had written notes in the margins in a bold, ornate hand. The ink had faded with time, and was, in parts, nearly invisible. Beside her, Bones whistled, and leaned closer. She turned back to the inside cover. There, on the front page, in the same flowing script, was the name: Louis Domenic de Rienzi.
“Rienzi’s personal bible,” Bones marveled, his tone near reverential. “This is what the priest was after.”
As Dane sat staring at the ancient volume, something drew his attention. The boat had stopped drifting. A solitary man stood on the deck, and appeared to be pointing in their direction. Immediately, Dane realized what was happening, and he sprang to his feet.
“Down!” he shouted, grasping the edge of the table and upending it toward the bay window. The others fell to the floor as bullets shattered the glass and ripped into the heavy tabletop. An instant later, the sound of rifle fire drifted across the water, echoing hollowly through the house. Dane drew his Walther with the futile knowledge that boat was too far away for him to have any hope of hitting the shooter.
“Out the front,” he ordered. He did not have a clue who was shooting at them, but he had an idea why. In any case, they had to get Kaylin and the bible out of there right away. He reached up over the table and fired blindly, the report of the Walther loud in the small space.
“Come on, Granny!” Bones yelled to Bernie. His pistol in his right hand, he wrapped his left arm around the woman’s waist and pulled her toward the door. Her eyes were wide with fright, but she did not argue.
Dane followed behind, snapping off two more hasty shots at the boat in hopes of slowing the sniper’s fire. He turned to see Kaylin rummaging through a drawer. “What are you doing?” he shouted. What could she possibly need from the kitchen that could not wait?
She turned back toward him, a .380 automatic and two reloads in her hand. “Dad kept guns everywhere. Let’s go.” She nodded toward the door.
He was impressed by her lack of panic, but there was no time to remark on it. He rushed to the front door where Bones and Bernie waited. He nudged the door open and looked up and down the deserted street. Behind them, the sniper continued to rain bullets on the house. From the sounds of shattering glass, Dane determined that the shooter was methodically firing into each room, working his way across the back of the structure. They needed to get away immediately.
“Bones, you take Bernie in her car. Kaylin and I will go in mine.”
They hurried to the vehicles, weapons at the ready. Dane threw open the door of his rented green Tahoe and fired it up. He glanced at the rear-view mirror and saw a silver Taurus whip around the corner and come barreling down the street toward them. The passenger side window was down, and the man opposite the driver reached out the window and opened fire. Kaylin, bible clutched in one hand, returned fire with her .380 before joining Dane in the SUV. Dane floored it, hoping to stay ahead of the attacker’s vehicle.
He looked in the rear view mirror in time to see Bones make a u-turn in Bernie’s cream-colored Lincoln and tear down the street, headed on a collision course with the Taurus. Bones thrust his pistol out the driver’s window, blazing away left-handed with his nine as he charged their assailants.
“He’s crazy,” Kaylin whispered in awe. She climbed into the back seat, 380 still at the ready, and watched out the back window.
“You have no idea,” Dane said. In his rear-view, he saw the windshield of the Taurus shatter. The driver yanked the car hard to the right as Bones flashed by, still shooting. The silver car fishtailed as it drifted into Maxwell’s front yard, but the driver recovered quickly and continued the pursuit. Dane groaned. “Are you all right using that thing?” he asked, tilting his head toward Kaylin’s pistol.
“Please,” she said. “You knew my father.” She turned back toward the rear of the vehicle, her .380 trained on the pursuing car.
He took a hard right, nearly bringing the Tahoe up on two wheels. He stepped on the accelerator and weaved through the sparse afternoon traffic heading into downtown Charleston. Behind them, the Taurus whipped around the corner, tires screeching. Dane cursed as he watched the other drivers move out of the way of the speeding silver vehicle. How were they going to get away?
“Maybe they won’t shoot at us with witnesses around,” Kaylin said. Her hope proved in vain as shots rang out, and spider webbed cracks spread around a bullet hole in the bottom corner of the rear window. “Okay, forget I said that.”
“Gotcha,” Dane said as he whipped the wheel back-and-forth, zigzagging as he sped along, but trying not to slip into a pattern that would make them easy targets. He heard the rear driver’s side window roll down, then the report of Kaylin’s pistol as she squeezed off rounds, maintaining a slow, steady fire at their attackers.
“Where are the cops when you need them?” he growled. The light ahead turned red. He pressed the pedal to the floor and veered into the oncoming lane to pass the traffic that had stopped for the light, narrowly avoiding a collision with a cab that was crossing the intersection. The cab screeched to a halt, and he heard the cabbie shout a physically impossible suggestion as they shot past. Once through the light, he yanked the Tahoe back onto his side of the road and continued on.
“They’re through,” Kaylin called to him, snapping off another shot. Unfortunately, the light traffic worked in both drivers’ favor.
A quick glance in the rear-view mirror showed the Taurus again narrowing the gap between the two vehicles.
“How can they possibly keep up with us when they’re driving with a broken windshield?” Kaylin grumbled.
Dane did not answer. It was further confirmation that whomever Maxie had run afoul of, they were good. He turned a hard right onto Market Street, the Taurus now in close pursuit. Kaylin exchanged a few more shots with the passenger in the pursuing car.