Wait for them to get near, till there was no chance that she would miss.
Better to die fighting than be used to bait Johnny.
Cat was awake, but the trip down the stairs had made her legs wobbly. Haley had to wrap her arm around Cat’s waist and wedge herself against Cat to help keep her up. She was making a beeline for the door like this, struggling not to fall. As they got close to it, Cat was able to reach and grab the knob, opening the door.
They stepped through it but stopped immediately.
The bright floodlight on the porch lit the path that led down to the driveway. Haley saw three men making their way up — the overcoat man, followed by Smith in his leather jacket, and another man, in a raincoat, bringing up the rear.
Smith looked toward the house suddenly — at Haley and Cat, standing just outside the front door. He seemed surprised and called out, but what he’d said Haley couldn’t hear over the rain.
Though he was still a distance away, Haley could see that he had a gun in his hand.
Cat spoke then, and what she said Haley heard clearly.
“The light.”
Haley looked at her, knew what she meant, but didn’t have a free hand. And the switch was inside. Smith was calling to them again — focused on them intently — and there wasn’t time. Cat grabbed the Sig, pulled it from Haley’s belt, and quickly aimed at the floodlight mounted on the wall beside the door.
Without hesitation, she shot out the light.
The path fell into darkness, and the three men on it disappeared.
The last thing Haley had seen of them was Smith breaking into a run, moving past the overcoat man and charging toward the house.
Calling something and waving.
Cat took charge, turning Haley now, guiding her back inside.
They retreated into the living room, Cat reaching out and flipping the light switch, casting the room into darkness. Leaving the door open, they took several steps toward the middle of the room, then suddenly paused.
Running upstairs would leave them trapped, as would running down to the basement — the only two parts of the house either of them knew anything about.
Straight ahead was the doorway to the kitchen, but there was no knowing who was in there. And they could move toward the rolltop desk, then turn left and into the small dining room, beyond which was a back room.
But, again, there was no knowing…
Cat was uncertain where to go, which direction in this darkness would lead to safety, or anything resembling it.
It was at that moment that the door next to the rolltop desk opened and a figured filled it.
Moved through it, into the room, its right arm raising.
Fiermonte, lifting Cat’s own gun.
But Cat had turned and once again put herself between him and Haley.
She, too, was raising her hand — her left hand, with a stranger’s gun in it, but at this distance that wouldn’t matter.
The light from the room was more than enough to see by.
She was aiming at Fiermonte, and he at her.
Vitali heard the shot and ducked for cover again.
The shot had come from inside the house — somewhere on the ground floor, he determined.
He waited for another, and when it didn’t come, he rose again. Instead of moving toward the door to find out what that single shot meant, he peeked once more out the window.
All that mattered to him was what was — or wasn’t — out there.
He saw the two large men emerging from the cover of the woods. Moving, one in front of the other, across the backyard.
The one with the rifle was taking point. He was dressed in some kind of long black slicker. Running in a crouch, with the rifle butt tight against his shoulder, the weapon level and aimed straight ahead.
Moving fast, moving expertly.
The two men were heading for the kitchen door at the back of the house — the room next to the back room, connected by a short and narrow hallway.
Vitali’s first thought was of waiting till they were inside, then going out one of the windows and coming up behind them, but he quickly dismissed that idea.
No, all he needed to do was lie in wait, find a killing zone, and let the men walk into it.
He made his way to the door and exited the room, stopping in the connecting hallway. From there he could see part of the dark kitchen.
He crouched down, ready.
As he waited, he heard voices coming from the living room.
“Let’s just take it easy,” Fiermonte said.
Cat was shivering — she was clad only in her underwear, but she knew it was more from the adrenaline racing through her like electricity than the cold and damp air around her.
Haley was looking toward the open door. “They’re coming.”
“Where’re you going to go?” Fiermonte said. “There’s no way out.”
“It was you, not Dickey,” Cat said. “You were the one Jeremy heard. You were the one who had my father killed.”
“You only know the half of it, Cat.”
“Shut up.”
“He’s alive, you know. Your father. He abandoned you. Yet again.”
“Shut up,” Cat snapped.
Haley was still looking toward the open door. She repeated, “They’re coming, Cat.” There was panic in her voice.
“He didn’t care about you. The job was always more important. His duty was always more important. I cared about you, though. I was always there for you, and you know that.”
Cat’s mind was reeling, so she switched it to automatic pilot, said what she’d been trained to say.
“Put the gun down. Now.”
The command sounded false even to her.
“Cat, c’mon,” Fiermonte said. “It’s done, there’s no way out. You’re all alone.”
“Put the gun down!”
“You shoot me, Cat, and you’re shooting an assistant prosecutor. You’d be just like your father. An FBI agent gone bad.”
There were footsteps on the porch now.
Haley moved, placing herself between the door and Cat.
As she did this, a man suddenly appeared in the doorway.
Cat could see the shape of him out of the corner of her eye.
She saw a black leather jacket, hooded sweatshirt, raised gun.
She saw that he was in a shooter’s crouch.
She knew it was Smith, searching the dimly lit room for his target.
For her.
Cat had little time left. She watched Fiermonte, waiting for a break in his attention — for his eyes to shift away from her, for just a split second, even.
It would be all she’d need.
But what Fiermonte did when Smith entered the doorway confused Cat.
His eyes shifted from Cat to Haley.
Only then did Cat realize Haley was turning to face Cat.
More than turning toward her, Haley was rushing Cat as if about to tackle her.
Cat saw then that Fiermonte’s attention shifted to the man in the doorway.
His confusion deepened, and then a look of sudden realization crossed his face — realization mixed with panic. He quickly shifted his body, taking aim at the man in the doorway.
Haley was on Cat now, driving her sideways, one arm around her waist and the other pushing her gun hand downward.
Cat heard a shot, and then another — too close together to have been two shots fired by the same gun.
So two shots from two guns — Fiermonte’s and Smith’s.
Haley brought Cat to the floor with an expertly executed takedown. They both hit the planks hard, Haley landing on top. Cat scrambled, the gun still in her hand, to get out from under the redhead, to regroup.
But Haley had her pinned, wouldn’t let her go.
Lifting her head and straining to look toward the doorway, Cat saw that Smith was down.
Shot, lying on his side, struggling to bring his weapon to bear.
Only it wasn’t Smith’s
face she was looking at.
It was Johnny’s.
And he was trying to raise his weapon because Fiermonte was still standing.
Cat looked at the man, saw a stunned, almost blank look on his face. She also saw that Johnny’s shot had grazed the side of his head.
Taken off skin and sliced through bone.
His eyes had lost focus, and he was staggering.
But then his focus returned, or enough of it did, and he looked at Cat, almost as if for her help.
Without hesitating, Cat put two rounds into his chest.
Fiermonte dropped as if a trapdoor had opened beneath him.
Those two shots were still ringing in the air as Haley rose and rushed to where Johnny lay bleeding.
John Coyle had reached the back door as those final two shots rang out.
From behind him Dickey said, “I’ve got this.”
John Coyle stepped aside. Dickey raised his right foot and stomp-kicked the rotted door with all his weight, landing his foot just below the lock.
The door flew open and off one hinge.
Stepping over the door, connected by only its now-twisted bottom hinge, Dickey rushed in. John Coyle was behind him, lowering the M4, which was strapped to his shoulder, and removing a Colt .45 from the pocket of his mackintosh.
A better weapon for close-quarters combat.
He pulled back and released the slide, chambering a round. He was still only one step behind Dickey, following him as he bolted through the dark kitchen toward the door straight ahead.
Fearless — but that was Dickey. As fearless now as he had been when they were boys running wild through Hell’s Kitchen.
Beyond the door there were voices, a number of them — shouting, some pleading, some ordering.
A woman was saying, “Call an ambulance.”
John didn’t recognize the voice. Its tone was more urgent than angry.
Another woman was shouting, “Put the gun down. Put it down.”
This one he recognized immediately. It was Cat’s voice.
Commanding, full.
The third voice was a male’s — Smith’s, saying calmly but cautiously, “It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m on your side, I’m with your father.”
John picked up his pace, placed his hand on Dickey’s back to signal for him to pick up his.
They were feet from the door to the living room when the first gunshot sounded.
It was quickly followed by two more.
These weren’t coming from behind the door, but rather from just feet to their left.
Dickey grunted hard, as if he’d been hit by a baseball bat, and immediately crumbled. John Coyle dropped into a crouch and spun in the direction from which the shots had come.
All he saw was a dark, narrow hallway.
He got off three shots, then three more, heard the instant he paused the sound of running — heavy footsteps all but stomping upon the plank floor. This was followed by a door closing.
His Colt still trained on the dark hallway, and still in his crouch, John Coyle moved to Dickey.
A pool of blood was already spreading on the floor, but Dickey was still conscious.
He was looking up at John Coyle, gasping for air, his eyes blinking.
John skimmed his free hand over his friend’s torso and found the entrance wound on the man’s left side, between the third and fourth ribs. He searched Dickey’s right side for an exit wound but could not find one.
“Shit,” he whispered.
“Go,” Dickey said. It took all he had to speak.
But he locked eyes with his old friend, then nodded.
Go.
John told him to hold tight, then stood and went after the shooter.
The Colt’s magazine capacity was seven rounds, and he had fired six, so as he made his way to the dark hall, he stuffed the Colt into his belt and reached for the M4 hanging at his side.
Raising it, he headed down the hall, found the only door, kicked it open, and took cover beside the door frame.
When he looked inside, he saw that the room was empty.
But one of its three windows was open.
He approached it, briefly took cover beside it before peeking out.
The shooter was bolting for the woods.
John Coyle pulled the M4 tight against his shoulder and took aim.
He waited till he had the running man square in his sights, then squeezed the trigger, holding it just long enough to get off a three-shot burst.
The man dropped just as he reached the woods.
The way his arms had jerked up as he fell told John Coyle that he had hit his target between the shoulder blades.
Exiting the back room, John made his way toward the front of the house, where the voices were coming from.
Where the exchange between Cat and Smith was getting more heated, on the verge of flying out of control.
John moved through a dining room and entered a living room, saw Fiermonte right away, on the floor.
Flat on his back, dead.
John saw Cat, too. Her back was to him, the gun in her left hand aimed at Smith, who was standing in the doorway.
Standing over someone who had fallen.
Someone who was bleeding.
John looked and saw that it was Johnny. Unconscious, with a redhead in a raincoat kneeling beside him.
Smith was holding his hands up in a calming gesture, gripping his weapon, aimed at the ceiling, with just his thumb and forefinger.
Smith’s eyes went past Cat to the man behind her.
Catching that shift in attention, she half-turned immediately, putting her right shoulder toward Smith and her left toward the man Smith was looking at.
And then she cautiously stole a look at that man.
And saw her father.
John Coyle raised one hand as he lowered his M4, then raised the other.
“It’s okay,” he said, nodding. “It’s okay.”
Cat stared at him, unable to move.
Still looking at Cat, John Coyle said to Smith, “How bad is Johnny?”
Smith had lowered his arms and was kneeling at Johnny’s other side. “Bad.”
“Where’s Morris?”
“He’s cuffed, right here on the porch.”
“Dickey’s been hit. Get his vehicle, drive up to the door. Don’t let Morris out of your sight.”
Smith nodded, rose, then was gone.
Cat still hadn’t moved, still had her gun raised.
John Coyle stepped to her side and eased her gun hand down till the weapon was pointed at the floor.
“It’s okay,” he repeated. “It’s okay.”
Cat was trembling — from the cold and adrenaline, yes, but from the shock, too.
Unslinging his M4, John Coyle removed his mackintosh and draped it over his only daughter’s shaking shoulders.
Her eyes remained locked on his face.
It took Cat a moment to speak, and when she did, what she said sounded as much like a gentle recrimination as a sincere inquiry.
“Where the hell have you been?” she said.
John Coyle smiled.
“Waiting,” he answered.
She looked at him as if to ask, waiting for what?
Reading her expression, he said, “For this day to finally come.”
There were tears now in Cat’s eyes.
Her father pulled her close, embracing her.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Smith had maneuvered the Mercedes SUV up the incline to the door of the farmhouse, and he and John Coyle quickly carried their wounded out — first Johnny, and then Dickey — and placed them inside the vehicle.
There was no time to sweep the house for the countless pieces of evidence tying all of them to it. Nor was there time to check on the dark-haired woman Haley had told them was upstairs.
And no one gave a second thought to the assistant federal prosecutor lying dead on the living room floor.
They’d deal with all that later.
>
All that mattered now was their fallen.
Still, prior to their leaving, John Coyle had run back inside and hurriedly emptied Donnie Fiermonte’s pockets of their contents.
Intelligence-bearing contents.
Just as he’d done to every enemy combatant he had killed four decades ago.
Killed behind enemy lines as a member of the legendary LRRPs.
He found a wallet, compact digital camera, and not one but three cell phones, two of which were cheap, disposable.
He also found two sets of house keys — to this place and Fiermonte’s apartment, he assumed. He found, though, no car keys.
Taking both sets of house keys, he ran back to the Mercedes. Cat was in the backseat with Dickey, holding a makeshift compress to his wound, silent. Haley was in the back compartment with Johnny, doing the same but talking to him in a soft voice, telling him to hang on, just hang on.
Johnny was unresponsive, but Haley kept her fingers on his wrist, tracking his pulse.
A dangerously slow pulse — slow, and getting slower.
As he drove down the gutted road, Fiermonte’s possessions on the seat beside him, John Coyle made a call on his own cell phone.
“We’re on our way with two more,” he said.
He identified the injured and their wounds — Dickey with a gunshot through the ribs, and Johnny with a gunshot to his abdomen.
No exit wound for Dickey, but a clean one for Johnny.
It seemed, though, he added, that Johnny had lost a lot of blood, and fast.
Too fast.
Ending the call, John Coyle checked the rearview mirror to make sure that Smith’s vehicle was following.
It was, Smith behind the wheel and smoking, Morris lying down in the backseat, handcuffed and blindfolded.
Twenty minutes later John Coyle was pulling into the well-lit gravel driveway of a large house.
Tree-lined, leading to a large circle at the house’s front entrance.
Cat saw Richter and several men waiting for them in the rain. They came rushing toward the SUV even before it came to a stop.
One of the men was carrying a shopping bag. He handed it to Smith, who handed it to Cat. It contained two pairs of running shoes, for her and Haley.
Johnny and Dickey were carried inside by Richter’s men, John Coyle close behind them and Haley and Cat behind him. He was greeted just inside the door by an athletically built man with longish gray hair. Cat didn’t recognize him, but it was obvious that he and her father were friends.
The Betrayer Page 43