"Reloaded!"
Jay took a deep breath and readied his last shot.
Sure enough, Bascomb-Coombs was still there in the study, waving his hands around, wiggling his fingers, and directing some unseen computer wizardry. Peel glanced up and down the hall. No one around. He slipped into the room. He pulled the small Cold Steel Culloden boot knife from the sheath on his belt. The knife was short, pointed like a stiletto, with a hard, rubbery handle that gripped well. He stepped up behind the computer scientist, reached out, caught his forehead with his left hand, then drove the knife into the base of his skull with his right. Bascomb-Coombs stiffened.
The monster opened its toothy mouth, flashed fangs the length of a man's forearm, and screamed that terrible scream again. Then it froze in that position, jaws agape.
"What is it doing?"
Jay shook his head. "Hell if I know. But there's my target." He lined the crosshairs up on the thing's open gullet, held his breath, and pulled the trigger.
Bascomb-Coombs jittered a few times, then collapsed, his suddenly dead weight more than Peel could hold up. He bent and pulled the knife out of the man's hindbrain, wiped it on the dead man's shirt, and put the blade back into the sheath.
"Sorry, old man, but you mess with the bull and sometimes you get the horn."
The knife was the way to go, all right. He didn't want to attract any attention. Once he was done in here, he would use his gun to do Ruzhyo. He didn't want to get too close to that one.
Now, let's see. There was Goswell, the maid, the cook, and old Applewhite left inside, then Ruzhyo. Huard he could save until last, the boy would never have a clue. Then pop the safe — whose combination he'd had for months — take whatever cash and baubles were there, and a lively stroll through the rainy fields and away. A long and hard day, and it wasn't over yet, but there it was: You did what you had to do, and God save the king.
He went down the hall toward the dining room to have a word with his lordship.
This time, when the rocket exploded, so did the monster's head. Ersatz brain and bone and blood sleeted in all directions, some of it hitting Jay and Saji, but neither of them cared.
"You got it! You got it!"
"You seem awfully joyful for a Buddhist, under the circumstances."
Saji hugged him. "What, for shutting down a computer program? That's all you really did, isn't it?"
"All I did? Hey, this was no ordinary computer program, woman!" But he hugged her back. He had done it. He had redeemed himself. And it felt better than pretty damned good, it felt absolutely great.
Jay Gridley was back!
Chapter 40
The entry team made it to within a few hundred meters of the house without any trouble. Michaels had expected to hear shooting from the perimeter team when it got to the gate, but either they were too far away, or things had gone better there than expected.
In the headset, Howard said, "See anything, E4?"
Fernandez was on point. "Negative, I — wait. There's one just passed under the light by the back door. Looks as if he is walking patrol."
"Copy. Let's move in."
Michaels waited until Howard passed him before he got up from the wet ground where he'd been prone and started moving in a low crouch. Stay low, move slow, that's what Howard had emphasized.
Toni and Cooper followed him, and the tight feeling in his bowels was not altogether from his worry about being shot.
Ruzhyo caught the movement in the field during a lull in the rain. It wasn't much, just a dark shape outlined against the distant outdoor light from a neighboring farm, but it was enough to gain his attention.
A few seconds later, he caught another glimpse of something. Could be a lost sheep, maybe. A calf that had wandered away from its mother. But he didn't believe that. Dark shapes coming across the field in the rain? British assault team was more likely. And sooner than he — and Peel — had expected. Since he hadn't heard any gunfire, Ruzhyo had to assume they had gotten past the guards. Not a real surprise. Peel's men were good soldiers, but the estate was too big for them to cover properly.
Ruzhyo moved deeper into the overhang's shadows, circled away from the house, and headed toward the building that Peel used for an office. He could use that for cover until he saw how many of them had come. Then, if he was lucky, he could still slip away. There could be a dozen or a hundred of them, and without knowing where the gaps were, it would be risky to try to run.
Goswell wiped his lips as Peel came into the room, wearing a rather smug smile. Ah, well. Here we go.
He had sent Applewhite upstairs with the maid and Cook and told them to lock themselves in the upstairs office and stay there until he personally told them to come out. The office door was steel, with a stout lock and a policeman's bar behind it, installed as part of a security room under Peel's aegis. Rather ironic, that.
Now he could finish this unpleasant business. He put his napkin back into his lap and left his hands there with it.
"Do have a seat, Major."
"I think I'd rather stand, if it's all the same to you, Geoffrey."
Ceoffrey? Good God, Peel has gone round the bend. Somewhat flustered at the overly familiar tone, Goswell sought to collect himself. "Did you see Bascomb-Coombs, then?"
"Ah, yes, that I did. I just left him in the study. Quite dead."
"Dead, you say?"
"Yes. A sudden attack of brain fever. Brought on by this." Peel pulled a wicked-looking little dagger from under his jacket and held it up. The bright steel glittered under the lamps of the electric chandelier.
Goswell considered that. "Killed him, did you?"
"I'm afraid so."
"A pity. He was quite brilliant."
"And he was also a psychotic willing to do your bidding and who also tried to have me killed." Peel turned the knife this way and that, looking at the steel almost as if hypnotized.
"Did he? Well, apparently his assassins fared no better than mine, then."
Peel frowned. "Yours?"
"Yes, of course. I'm afraid perhaps you've made a mistake and poor Bascomb-Coombs has been made to suffer for it. It was I who had people trying to kill you, sir."
"But — why?" He seemed genuinely perplexed.
"Really, Peel. For conspiring with that very same Bascomb-Coombs you have slain in my study. Did you think me such a fool that I wouldn't remember that someone must watch the watchers?"
"Ah, so it was you having me followed. And that fellow in the bookstore."
"I am sad that it was necessary. Your father would be most unhappy with you. I thought you were made of better stuff, Major."
Peel laughed. "Well, I've got to hand it to you, Your Lordship, I never tumbled to it being your doing. I stand corrected. And it's not as if Bascomb-Coombs was some innocent who didn't deserve his fate. Though I must say, you are awfully calm for man who is about to have his throat cut. A gentleman to the end, eh?"
"I should hope so. Although I confess that I don't expect that end to occur this evening."
With that, Goswell brought his Rigby double up from his lap and pointed it right at Peel's heart.
The old man was slow and half-blind, and there was a moment there if Peel had moved quickly that he could have gotten around the point-blank line of sight and stabbed Goswell. But such was his shock at seeing the gun come up, so unexpected was it, that he froze. By the time he recovered, Goswell had him covered. He might not be able to hit a rabbit hopping about in his garden fifty feet away, but at ten feet, he'd play hell missing a man-sized target. And a load of even birdshot would be fatal in the right spot.