The freelancer was partially visible inside the operator’s cab — a downward slice of forehead and one cheek. The noise of her descent was lost beneath the roar of the motor driving the slewing unit.
The platform lift inched lower, the operator’s cab coming up below. The freelancer’s hands were locked around two joystick-like controllers.
He threw his right fist forward.
The I-beam rocketed toward the Town Car an instant before Joey’s orange cage struck the top of the cab.
It was too late.
Evan couldn’t see anything, but he felt the rush of a forced breeze, the air shuddering as the I-beam swept for the Town Car.
Five seconds to impact, now four.
He had to go for the backup 1911 in the trunk even if it meant getting shot by Van Sciver.
He sprang up, painfully aware of the full presentation of his critical mass, and grabbed the ARES where it lay against the carpeted cargo space. Through the holes in the raised trunk, he could see Van Sciver twenty yards away, shielded by the armored door of the Tahoe.
He expected to be staring at the full-circle scope of the rifle, the last sight he’d ever see.
But miraculously, Van Sciver wasn’t looking at him. He was aiming up at the lowering platform lift, firing round after round.
His shots sparked off the edge of the lift as it crushed into the top of the operator’s cab. The freelancer leapt out of the cabin an instant before it crumpled and gave way. As the lift continued its descent, he began monkeying down the caged rungs, staying ahead of it.
Was that Joey riding the orange cage down?
Before Evan could react, the I-beam swept in, a massive blur in his peripheral vision.
He snatched the backup gun from the trunk and whipped down out of sight.
One instant the Town Car was at his back, solid as a bulwark.
The next it was gone, Evan alone on the open stretch of dirt.
The mass of metal had hurtled close enough to him that its wake spun him around onto one knee.
He achieved a single instant of clarity.
The freelancer at the base of the tower, jumping free of the rungs, a second or two away from being able to aim his rifle.
Van Sciver twenty yards away, his SCAR rotating back to lock on Evan.
In an instant Evan would have two targets on his head from two angles, a 7–10 bowling split.
Evan got off the X, throwing himself to the side, hitting a roll, elbows locked, ARES extended before him. He had nine shots to spend — eight in the mag, one in the spout.
Upside down, Evan aimed at the space beneath the Tahoe’s door. One of Van Sciver’s rounds flew past his ear, trailing heat across his cheek.
Evan kept rolling, lining the sights, the target spinning like a vinyl record. He fired one, two, three, four shots before a round clipped the back of Van Sciver’s boot, tearing free a chunk of durable nylon and Achilles tendon.
Van Sciver grunted but kept his feet, cranking off another round that buried itself in the dirt two inches from Evan’s nose, blowing grit in his eyes.
Evan shot at the armored door. The impact drove the door back into the frame, hammering Van Sciver with it. The blow disoriented him, the rifle joggling in his hands.
Evan used the pause to flip himself into a kneeling position.
The freelancer now stood in a sniper’s standing pose, feet slightly spread, right elbow tucked tight to the ribs to support the rifle, butt held high on his shoulder to bring the scope into alignment.
Evan fired through the scope atop the rifle and blew out the back of the man’s head.
He quick-pivoted to Van Sciver, who was hauling his weapon into position again, still protected by the armored door.
Evan advanced and shot the door again, slamming Van Sciver backward into the truck. The rifle spun free. Evan pressed his advantage, firing again into the door. Van Sciver banged into the Tahoe once more, this time spilling partially out from his position of cover.
Van Sciver’s head was protected by the armored door, but his body, made bulkier by a Kevlar vest, sprawled in full view. Night was coming on, but Evan was close enough that visibility was not a problem.
He had one shot left.
He lined the sights on the gap in the body armor where the arms usually hung. Van Sciver’s tumble had twisted the vest around his torso, the vulnerable strip pulled toward his belly.
Evan fired his last round.
The fabric frayed as the bullet entered Van Sciver’s abdomen.
A clod of air left him.
Blood poured from the hole.
Evan kept the pistol raised, images spinning through his mind.
Jack leaning back in his armchair and closing his eyes, letting the opera music move right through him. Young Evan at his feet, soaking it in by osmosis, these strange and beautiful sounds from another life that was now somehow his as well.
Van Sciver fought himself up to a sitting position against the Tahoe.
Evan cast his empty gun aside and advanced on him. The fallen rifle lay between them. He could pick it up, stave in Van Sciver’s skull with the butt.
Firelight playing across Jack’s face in the study as he read Greek mythology out loud to Evan, his excitement contagious, the stories coming to life, winged horses and impossible labors, Gorgons and demigods, underworlds and Elysian fields.
Van Sciver pressed his hands to his stomach. He’d been gut-shot, the bullet entering the mid-abdominal area north of the belly button and beneath the zyphoid, where the ribs came together. Judging from the rush of bright red seeping through Van Sciver’s hands, the bullet had severed the superior mesenteric artery. He was held together by the Kevlar vest and little else. The vest just might prove sufficient to hold him together long enough to get to a surgical suite.
Which was why Evan would beat him to death with his bare hands.
Jack stepping off into the black hereafter, not a trace of fear in his eyes. What could have filled him with such peace as he’d spun to his impact?
Van Sciver’s permanently dilated pupil stared out, glossy with hidden depths, a bull’s-eye waiting for a round. Evan pictured his thumb sinking through it, scrambling the frontal lobe.
Evan closed to within ten yards of him when something stopped him in his tracks.
Van Sciver was smiling.
With some effort he raised his arm and pointed behind Evan.
As Evan turned, Joey stumbled off the lowered platform lift onto the dirt, both hands locked around her thigh just above the knee.
She wobbled on her feet.
Bleeding out.
74
Brightness Off Her Skin
Evan froze between Van Sciver and Joey, his body tugged in opposite directions. A few strides ahead was the man who had killed Jack. And fifteen yards behind, Joey stood doubled over, the life draining from her body.
A feeling overtook Evan, that of free-falling through the night sky just as Jack had. There were no bearings, just a spin of sensation and the pinpoint light of distant stars.
He stared at the butt of the fallen rifle ahead, the dilated pupil beckoning his thumb.
Van Sciver was breathing hard. “Looks like I clipped her superficial femoral artery.”
Evan glanced back at Joey. She gasped, her legs nearly buckling.
Evan tore his gaze away, took another step for Van Sciver.
“She’s gonna die,” Van Sciver said. “You wanna be with her when she does.”
Evan halted again, teeth locked in a grimace.
He thought about Jack plummeting through a void, his willingness to step off a helicopter to protect Evan.