Sighting through it, he watched as the man strode up to the door and knocked.
Two beats passed and the door opened. A shaft of light from inside was freed, and Robie got a better look at the man. He was dressed all in black. There were creases where his head met the back of his neck. Tatted on one side of his head was a large swastika.
The skinheads, Robie assumed. He wondered if they were all as large as this gent, who Robie estimated was about six four and three hundred pounds, with not much of it fat.
The person opening the door was also revealed. She was petite, and looked to be in her twenties with soft brown hair and pretty features that looked familiar to Robie, though he couldn’t place them. She had on jeans and a sweater.
She stepped aside, the man passed through, and the door closed behind him.
Robie lowered his scope and tapped it against the palm of his hand.
Did the woman live there? What was the place? It might be abandoned for all he knew.
He looked at his watch. It was nearly one in the morning. Was this just a late date? But they hadn’t acted like a couple. They hadn’t hugged or kissed upon seeing each other.
Robie quickly dressed, left the hotel by a side door, bypassing the sleepy front desk clerk, and stepped into an alleyway. He got his bearings, listened and watched for anyone coming, then stole across the street.
He reached the bike, saw that it was a highway Harley, and snapped a picture of the license plate with his phone. The door the biker had entered was just ahead. But Robie decided on another entry.
Robie hung a left, skittered down a side street, cut a right, and came up on the back side of the building.
It was three stories tall with windows riding up the brick on each floor. There was a back door. Robie assumed it was locked, and when he checked, his assumption was proved correct.
He stepped back and gazed up at the building’s façade. He couldn’t see one light on in the place. When the woman had opened the door an interior light had been revealed. But no light had come through the windows.
He walked over to one and examined it.
They had been blacked out with paint.
Okay, that was definitely interesting.
Robie stepped back and again looked up at the façade.
This might or might not be connected to Blue Man’s disappearance, but it was certainly out of the ordinary, if not downright suspicious.
He flipped out his pick tools and attacked the back door. If the place was alarmed he could always run for it.
But he was faced with another dilemma when he tried to pick the lock but failed. The knob turned but the door wouldn’t open. Was it nailed shut? But the front door had been operational.
What the hell was this place?
He used a knife in an attempt to open the lower window. Again, he got the clasp to turn but the window did not rise.
Clenching his knife between his teeth he put a foot on a window ledge and boosted himself up. Finding nearly invisible handholds among the uneven bricks, he made his way to the second floor and then to the third. He figured the second-floor windows might be nailed down, but not the top floor.
He reached the window and used his knife to lever open the clasp. Then he pushed up on the window and was relieved when it slid cleanly open.
He was inside in a moment and squatted down, letting his eyes adjust to the deeper darkness in the room and listening for any sounds. He heard nothing. He straightened and placed one foot carefully on a spot on the floor and then put his weight fully on it.
There was no squeak.
He put away his knife and pulled his gun. Technically he was trespassing, and whoever lived here could lawfully shoot him.
Technically.
It was a calculated risk, but one he figured was worth taking if for no other reason than Robie was most comfortable doing inherently dangerous things. It was only the normalcy of life that tended to bother him.
He reached the door and opened it slowly, testing the quietness of the hinges.
He slipped into the hall and took a few moments to study the long passage. There were doors leading off it, but they were all closed.
He reached the top of the stairs. They were carpeted, which was good, since they would absorb sound better.
He walked down them to the second floor. It was a mirror image of the third floor.
He looked down the flight of steps to the first floor.
Lights were on there.
Harley Man and the woman were down there. Whether anyone else was Robie didn’t know.
But he decided to find out.
And that was when all hell broke loose in Grand, Colorado.
CHAPTER
18
Harley Man ran out into the hallway. He had an NFL lineman’s huge, blocky build. He had a gun in one hand. He scooted over to a front window and tried to see out.
The woman sat frozen on the bed inside the room he had just left. She had on a bra and underwear and nothing else. Her clothes were lying on the floor.
Shots rang out and one bullet pierced the front door, zipped past Harley Man, and lodged in the wall behind him. He dropped his suitcase, ducked down, and retreated. He called out over his shoulder and the woman appeared at the doorway, squatting down.
He pointed up the stairs.
She nodded and fled toward them even as more bullets pierced the doorway and thudded into the walls. Her bare feet pounded up the risers and she hit the second-floor landing.
And ran right into Will Robie.
She started to scream, but he showed her his badge and put a finger to his lips.
“What’s going on down there?” asked Robie, even as bullets continued to fly with Harley Man now returning fire through a cracked window.
“I don’t know. I just heard the shots.”
“Who are you? What is this place?”
“I’m… I’m Sheila.”
“Who’s the guy down there?”
“Luke.”
“And who is Luke?”
“Just a guy I know.”
“Luke with a swastika on his head is just a guy you know?” He looked at her state of undress. “And what’s with that? Is this some kind of brothel?”
“We — I am not a hooker!”
The firing picked up.
Footsteps pounded up the stairs and there was Luke.
“Who the hell are you?” roared the man upon seeing Robie.
He started to point his gun at Robie, who disarmed Luke with a kick to the hand.
“You son of a bitch!” screamed Luke.
He dropped into a crouch, his arms at his sides.
A brawler, thought Robie. Okay, here we go.
He hurtled at Robie, who easily sidestepped the charging man. He delivered a bent elbow strike directly against the back of Luke’s neck, rotating his hips as he struck to give the blow the entire force of his weight and thrust. Robie could feel the tip of his elbow impact the tip of the spine, and the big man moaned and dropped to his knees. Robie followed that with a knee kick to the chin, which chipped two teeth and toppled Luke onto his back. Robie bent over the fallen man and delivered a short punch directly to the man’s nose, bouncing the back of his head off the floor. Luke groaned and lay still.
“You bastard!”
The woman jumped on Robie’s back. It took exactly two seconds for Robie to pull her off, lay her on the floor, and keep her there with his boot.
“Let me up! Damn it, let me up! Luke!”
Robie ignored her cries, calmly took out his phone, and punched one key.
Reel picked up on the first ring. “You hear the gunfire?” she said.
“I’m in the middle of it.” He explained the situation in two brief sentences.
“On it,” was Reel’s curt reply.