by John Lutz
“Ho, boy!” Pearl said, pointing ahead through the windshield.
They both saw the dark figure of a man kick open the front door and enter the house, carrying a rifle or shotgun.
“Let’s go into the kitchen where we can sit down and talk about this,” Westerley said. He kept his voice calm while his mind darted this way and that. He had to defuse this situation. “We can have us a couple of beers.”
“I don’t fancy one of my beers,” Link said.
He racked the shotgun’s mechanism and a shell popped out of the breech, bounced on the floor, and rolled in a half circle.
“I got more in the magazine,” he said.
“Don’t make a move,” a man’s voice said behind Link. It was an authoritative voice speaking slowly and carefully. “There are two guns aimed at your back, and we’re too close to miss.”
Link didn’t move. The shotgun remained pointed directly at Westerley.
Westerley gave him a level look and said, “Stand down, Link.”
Link said, “Get in here, Beth.”
Quinn heard shuffling on a bare wood floor, then saw a frail-looking woman with a pretty but haggard face walk stiff-legged with fear from the bedroom. She was wearing only a nightgown and a pair of oversized fuzzy pink slippers.
Link Evans hadn’t moved a muscle since Quinn and Pearl had entered the house. He remained still. “Come to me, Beth. Come to your husband.”
“I wouldn’t do that, Beth,” Westerley said.
Link laughed. It sounded like a dog’s single, guttural bark. “She doesn’t do it and I’ll blow your heart clear out through your back.”
“I think you’re gonna do that anyway,” Westerley said. So calm and easy it made Link want to kill him right then.
“This isn’t a walk in the park, asshole!”
“We all know that, Evans,” Quinn said. He kept his tone even, almost casual. Evans was revving up for something. On the keen edge.
Evans still hadn’t turned and looked at Quinn and Pearl. In a way, he was dismissing them. In Link’s mind they were part of the game but predictable and controllable. He was ready to lose his life, if that’s what it came down to. Quinn knew that. Knew how dangerous Link Evans was right now.
Beth kept her gaze fixed on her husband and moved softly and slowly, as if she didn’t want to wake something lightly sleeping, until she stood only a few feet from him. She was obviously trying not to tremble. Cold with terror.
“Got your car keys in one of those pants pockets?” Link asked Westerley.
Westerley nodded.
“Pull ’em out so I can see for sure.”
Westerley did, holding the keys at waist level away from his body.
Smoothly and so fast it surprised everyone, the shotgun barrel moved to aim at Beth.
“We’re gonna leave the back way, out through the kitchen,” Link said. “You, me, and Beth. You lead the way, Sheriff.”
Quinn and Pearl watched as the three of them went single file into the kitchen, the shotgun barrel steady and aimed at Beth Evans. Where she moved, it followed. It was a compass needle and she was magnetic north.
As soon as they were in the kitchen, Link Evans glanced quickly back at Quinn and Pearl. He actually gave them a thin smile as he pushed the kitchen door closed behind him.
Quinn heard the metallic cluck of a lock and what sounded like a chair being shoved beneath the doorknob.
He and Pearl were locked out of the kitchen.
Pearl looked at Quinn and silently mouthed an obscenity.
He motioned for Pearl to follow him, and they went out the front door fast and hurried around toward the back of the house, toward where he remembered Westerley’s SUV was parked. He figured Evans would make Westerley drive, with Beth in the passenger seat. Evans would sit in back with the shotgun, making sure the two up front didn’t misbehave.
As they crept cautiously along the side of the house, Quinn had that much figured out.
All he needed now was some kind of plan.
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Link motioned with the shotgun for them to leave by the back door. It was such a small but unmistakable movement of the long barrel that the opportunity to jump him was here and gone in an instant, before Westerley could respond.
Beth was gripping Westerley’s right arm now. Squeezing hard. That didn’t help the sore elbow.
Link gave her a shove, and her hand fell away from Westerley. Link’s effort made the shotgun barrel momentarily drop. Beth was fumbling nervously with the chain lock on the back door, momentarily diverting Link’s attention from Westerley.
This time Westerley seized his opportunity. There was nothing to lose by rolling the dice. Link had come into the house to kill them. Now they were only alive because they had temporary value as hostages.
Westerley dived for the kitchen chair, where his holstered nine-millimeter dangled from its black leather belt draped over the chair’s wooden back. The belt came free even though the chair toppled. Westerley rolled, trying to be as difficult a target as possible while he wrestled the heavy Glock handgun from its holster. He was vaguely aware of Beth screaming, of Link shouting something at him, but it all seemed to be happening dreamlike and at a distance.
He was in a pocket of time and place that moved slowly as he slid the gun from its holster and began raising his arm to take aim at Link.
Westerley’s arm was still throbbing where he’d banged his elbow against the floor in the bedroom. His heart plunged as he realized he was raising the Glock slower than Link was swinging the shotgun around to point at him. Westerley fired a shot, but he was too eager and the bullet went into the floor. The arc of the shotgun barrel was as inexorable as fate.
There was an explosion and a blast of light. Something like a train crashed into Westerley’s chest and right shoulder. The floor hit him in the back, and he was staring up at the ceiling and kitchen light fixture. The ceiling wouldn’t stay still; it was like the underside of a floating rectangular object in a heavy sea. Westerley turned his head to the side and watched Link Evans get the back door to outside open and shove Beth through it ahead of him. He didn’t bother glancing back at Westerley as he rushed out into the night.
Westerley suddenly realized that his head, which he’d raised slightly so he could watch Link and Beth leave, was incredibly heavy. He let himself go limp, and the back of his head struck the floor. The kitchen, which had been dim to begin with, was now completely black.
Westerley understood why Link Evans hadn’t bothered glancing back at him as he was leaving. Link had already mentally subtracted Westerley from equation of what was happening this dreadful night. For that matter, probably so had Beth.
They think I’m dead or dying.
I think they’re right.
Quinn was ahead of Pearl when he heard the roar of the SUV’s big engine. The vehicle skidded around in the gravel in reverse until it was pointed down the driveway. Quinn dropped to one knee, holding his vintage police special with both hands and aiming carefully. He was aware of Pearl doing the same beside him, on his right side and back about a yard.
The SUV’s knobby tires threw gravel as it sped down the driveway and past them. A few small pieces of rock struck Quinn’s right cheek, stinging and causing him to squint.
It didn’t matter anyway. The angle was bad. There’d only been a second or two when Quinn or Pearl had even a difficult shot at Link Evans, who was on the far side of the SUV and crouched low behind the steering wheel. Beth Evans was in the passenger seat, between them and her husband. If they had managed to fire over her and hit Link, his frantic return fire with the twelve-gauge might have struck Beth. She was sitting forward, braced with both hands on the dashboard so hard that her elbows were locked. Not having her seat belt buckled was the least of her concerns.
The SUV had passed Quinn and Pearl so fast it left only what seemed a still photo in their minds: the speed-blurred vehicle, the driver bent over the steering wheel, the rigid figure of Beth, her m
outh open wide in a silent scream. A study in speed and desperation.
Quinn remained kneeling but deftly switched positions and got off three shots at the SUV’s rear tires. He heard Pearl’s Glock bark twice. She was also trying to hit a tire, lying on her stomach in the dirt and gravel, keeping down so her bullets would follow a low trajectory.
The SUV didn’t seem affected by their gunfire. When it was near the end of the driveway, brake lights flared, as Link slowed to turn onto the state road.
Quinn and Pearl were already up and racing toward the parked Taurus.
Not that they’d be able to catch Westerley’s SUV, which doubtless had the police package and could outrun any rental.
They piled into the car. Quinn drove down the rutted driveway. Pearl dropped her gun and had to bend down and retrieve it where it was bouncing around on the floor. As she straightened up, she bumped her head painfully on the dashboard.
Quinn made a right turn out of the driveway, behind the SUV.
Once on the county road, it became obvious that the rental didn’t have the horses to catch the SUV. Quinn could see its taillights ahead like amused red eyes watching the Taurus recede.
The SUV took a curve and disappeared, then reappeared up ahead when Quinn followed in the Taurus. He lost control when the rental car’s tires broke contact with the road, and the car might as well have been on ice. Quinn wrestled with the steering wheel and mashed his foot down hard on the accelerator, powering out of the skid and causing the car to swerve from one side of the road to the other. Pearl had slid forward and was out of her seat.
He stole a glance over at her. “Put on your damned seat belt, Pearl!”
She scooted back into the seat, tucked her Glock beneath a thigh, and managed to buckle up. When she looked over at Quinn, she saw that he hadn’t fastened his seat belt.
Finally he regained full control. Beside him, Pearl was bone white, but she said nothing.
The state road straightened out where it began its approach to the Interstate highway, but the SUV’s twin red eyes were farther ahead and pulling away. Quinn kept the accelerator pedal flat to the floor, and the Taurus’s speed began to edge up. They were doing over ninety now. They couldn’t catch the SUV, but they might manage to stay reasonably close.
Red and blue flashing lights appeared up ahead. Something coming in the opposite direction. And coming fast.
Quinn figured that would be the state police, speeding toward the Evans house.
Quinn began flashing the Taurus’s headlights.
The state cops caught on fast. They had to. Westerley’s SUV passed them going the other way at over a hundred miles an hour. As Quinn watched, two state patrol cruisers made sweeping U-turns and gave chase.
Another showcase of dancing red and blue lights exited the ramp from the interstate. Another highway patrol cruiser. It was headed directly for the oncoming SUV. The two vehicles would pass or collide within the next twenty seconds.
The patrol car suddenly went into a skid and stopped so that it formed a roadblock in the narrow county road. To get around it in the SUV, Evans would have to leave the pavement.
As they neared the scene, Quinn sized up what was happening. He saw the uniformed highway patrol cop jump out of the cruiser, leaving it with its lights on and angled across the center line, and dash from the car toward the side of the road as Westerley’s SUV approached.
The SUV’s brake lights flared and it slowed. Quinn and Pearl were closing fast. Then the SUV built up speed, and Quinn knew Link Evans was going to try driving around the roadblock.
Link sped toward the parked highway patrol car. He left the pavement to drive around the cruiser, and chose the side of the road where the uniformed patrolman had run to take cover and wait.
Bad choice.
As Quinn and Pearl watched, the SUV veered off the road and around the parked cruiser. Quinn saw what appeared to be muzzle flashes, and the SUV made it back onto the road but was swerving drastically. What looked like chunks of tire flew into the night.
The other state patrol cars, and Quinn and Pearl in the Taurus, were closing fast when the SUV left the road on the opposite side.
“He’s lost it,” Pearl said.
The SUV bounced off the shoulder and sailed into the dark woods. Its headlight beams went crazy among the trees.
The scene ahead came at them even faster, and then they were a part of it.
“Stop this damned thing!” Pearl yelled.
Quinn was already standing on the brakes.
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Quinn brought the Taurus to a halt at a steep list toward the passenger side, its two right wheels off the road. He had to climb up out of the car. Pearl opened her door and simply tumbled out.
Around them were half a dozen parked state patrol cruisers with lights flashing. Moving figures crossed the blocked highway and ran into the woods.
Quinn hurried around the front of the Taurus and helped Pearl to her feet.
“Still got your piece?” he asked calmly.
Pearl held up the Glock and showed him.
“Ready?” Quinn asked.
But Pearl was already running with the others toward the woods. Jaws were clenched. Everyone was intent. There were sounds of heavy breathing, but no one spoke. If the state cops were giving orders, they were using hand signals.
Broken branches and crushed underbrush marked the SUV’s path, making it easy to find.
No one knew exactly what would happen when they found it.
Beth was aware that her left side hurt. Then she realized she was lying in an awkward position on top of Link.
Westerley’s SUV lay on its side. If Beth wanted to exit, she’d have to climb up to the broken-out window on the vehicle’s right side. If she could force the door open, maybe she wouldn’t have to climb through the window and risk being cut by remaining glass shards.
She remembered the SUV leaving the road, then rolling over and over. Link, belted in, was still in the driver’s seat, but he was flopping around, unconscious or dead. Beth had been bounced back and forth violently. She had no idea how seriously she was hurt.
She moved her body parts tentatively and tried to take inventory. No doubt she was badly bruised, and there was a painful bump above her right ear. It was the pain in her left side that was intense. Every move made her suck in her breath in agony. Maybe a broken rib. Maybe it had pierced her lung.
She managed to change position so she had one leg beneath her and could gain some leverage. She clutched the cushion of the bucket seat above her and tried to pull with her arms.
Something was in her way, blocking her left arm.
Link’s shotgun.
It posed no danger now. She gripped the barrel and shoved it away.
A little more room. She got her foot braced on the steering wheel, gripped the seat cushion, and started to raise herself so she could squeeze out through the window. She smelled smoke. She could hear fluid dripping and could also smell gasoline. Any second now, the SUV might catch fire. Burst into an orange fireball the way wrecked cars did in the movies and on television. She had to get out of here before that happened. She thought about Link. Maybe he was dead. Beth found that she didn’t care, not considering what she knew about him now. What he’d done. And he’d killed Wayne.
My God! He killed Wayne!
She drew a deep breath and found the strength to elevate herself. The pain in her side flared, but she made progress. She actually managed to close her hand around the door’s padded arm rest. Something to grip, to use to wriggle higher and see if the door handle worked.
Link’s hand closed like a trap on her ankle.
The overturned SUV hadn’t exploded. Not yet, anyway. But it was burning. Oil or gas in the engine compartment was sending out gray smoke that disappeared quickly among the canopy of leaves and the dark sky.
Quinn and Pearl stopped advancing with the contingent of state police, when Beth Evans staggered around from behind the big vehicle lying on i
ts side. She dropped to her knees.
Quinn nudged Pearl and motioned with his head. They moved to the side as the state patrol advanced cautiously on Beth. It took only a moment to determine that the overturned SUV was unoccupied.
Pointing to a glimmer of blood on a dark leaf, Quinn struck out in a continuation of the way the vehicle must have been moving when it rolled onto its side.
“They always keep going the way they were moving,” he said.
“That Quinn’s law?” Pearl asked, keeping up with him.
“Link’s gotta be shaken up, not thinking straight. But one thing he knows, even if he hasn’t admitted it to himself, is that it’s over. His mind’ll clear and he’ll get tired enough or ache enough that he’ll stop running. It won’t be worth it to him to buy a few more minutes, or even hours. He’ll be played out.”
“Then what?” Pearl asked.
“He’ll stop. He’ll turn around. He’ll give himself up, or he won’t.”
Another siren yowled to silence nearby. Link had to know he was sewn up tight. There was no escape.
Quinn kept leading the way through the trees, his clunky black shoes crunching and snapping undergrowth as he cleared a path for Pearl. Mosquitoes started to bite. Branches started to scratch faces and bare hands and arms. Even though he was soaked with perspiration, Quinn found himself wishing he hadn’t left his suit coat in the car. A mosquito tried to fly into his ear. He slapped at it and it tried to fly up his nose.
A sound he recognized made him stop. He stood still, other than to slowly extend an arm to his side as a signal for Pearl to stop beside him.
“He’s got a pump shotgun,” Quinn whispered. “I heard him rack a shell into the breech.”
Pearl said nothing but stood stock still. She even ignored a mosquito drawing blood from her right arm.
They stood near the edge of a small clearing. Quinn figured Link Evans was concealed on the other side, and his running was over.
There was a lot of noise, and small branches snapped behind Quinn. The state police keeping up. One by one they appeared along the line of trees, on either side of Pearl and Quinn.