He patted Simpson’s hand and then squeezed it. “Of course, Jack. You know you can count on me.”
Simpson’s gaze faded to a blank stare. For a moment, Parker thought he was gone.
Simpson’s hand and arm moved underneath his side. He pulled out his gun. He’d been lying on it. He quickly aimed it over Parker’s left shoulder.
A deafening explosion from the revolver made Parker flinch and his ears ring. He heard a yelp and turned to see cardboard boxes shifting fifteen feet away. He turned back to Simpson.
“Here, take this,” Simpson said, placing the gun into Parker’s hand. “You might need it.” Simpson coughed and winced.
Parker hadn’t fired a gun since Vietnam and didn’t ever want to again, and he knew Simpson was well aware of it.
Parker looked deep into Simpson’s eyes. The life was running out. He wanted to stop it, to put it back into his friend’s body. But the life leaked from too many wounds until it emptied from his body.
Simpson was dead.
In a stupor Parker looked down at the gun in his hands. He was still dizzy from the concussion or from something much more horrifying. The fever still blazed. Hot flashes surged through his body, joints ached. His stiff neck stung with the wound afire. He looked about. The surroundings were surreal. Like a dream, a nightmare. His head became light and began to spin. He felt ready to faint. Steadying himself with one arm, he tried to maintain control of his consciousness.
A snarl came from behind.
Adrenaline shot through Parker’s body. His back straightened. The pain disappeared. He had no thought of fear. This time, revenge.
He turned to see a single Doberman with a red gash parting the hide on its forehead where a bullet had glanced off. The animal that was preparing to attack Parker was instead about to be attacked. Parker eased toward the dog to get into a better position to murder his prey. The dog seemed startled by the look in Parker’s eyes. It lowered its head and licked its chops, licking some of its own blood that had rolled down its head to the corners of its mouth.
Parker sprang. With one quick movement, he slammed the side of the revolver down across the top of the dog’s skull.
The dog gave a short yelp.
Parker stood to his feet, picked the stunned animal up by its collar and one hind leg and raised it high in the air above him.
It was all coming to a head. The frustration, the anguish. It exploded inside him.
“Aaaaah!” he yelled, bringing the dog down hard, back first, across his knee.
The dog’s spine gave way with a snap like Alvarez’s wooden pencil. Parker raised the dog over his head once more. He faced the window and then hurled the dog’s body through it. It struck some of the broken shards of glass hanging down from the aluminum window frame as it passed through.
CHAPTER 37
Sarah Hill ran down the two flights of stairs to the next floor. A noise came from the stairs below. It was the police coming to rescue them, maybe. She paused at the door into the twenty-second-floor elevator area. The sound came closer, maybe one floor below. She realized what it was. The dogs. They must have started their way down the stairs, then when they heard Hill, turned and now raced back up.
She swung the door wide and ran to the elevator controls. Fortunately, one opened quickly. She stepped in and pushed the lobby button and then frantically pushed the door close one. Four dogs got through the stairway door before it closed. As the snarling killers charged in and came up to within a few feet of the elevator, its door closed, and the dogs jumped against it.
*-*-*
On the street, the police weren’t letting the media in the building. The news crews set up outside in the rain. Channel Two was on the northeast side, and Henry Haskins stood facing the camera with umbrella in hand.
“Here we are, bringing you live coverage from the Epic Center of the tense standoff between six Doberman dogs and the Wichita police and Sedgwick County animal-control officers. Thus far in this horrible drama unfolding on the city over the last four days, the police and animal-control officers have been completely impotent in their battle against these vicious beasts. Today we have six very dangerous and deadly Doberman dogs, trapped with an unknown number of officers and civilians on the top floors and roof of this, Kansas’ tallest building.”
Suddenly, the body of a dead Doberman crashed onto the sidewalk directly behind Haskins amidst shards of chiming window glass.
Haskins ducked. He turned to look at what had taken place.
A faint roar came from far atop the building.
Haskins turned back to the camera. “And as you can see it’s raining glass and dogs out here.”
The cameraman shook his head and frowned.
*-*-*
Parker glared out the window, panting with drool stringing from his mouth. To the side, Roary Rapids still clung to the same girder he had earlier. He stared at Parker, not saying a word. Parker wiped his sleeve across his face and then bent down to Simpson. It was a struggle, but finally, he picked up Simpson’s large, limp body, cradled his beloved friend in his arms and turned and walked toward the door. He paused, glancing at Rapids, his lip curled in a sneer. Let someone else help him. Rapids looked back with surprise.
*-*-*
In the first-floor lobby, Lt. Hardessy finally had his gear on and situated. He had a 10mm, Smith and Wesson semi-automatic pistol in one hand and Hero’s leash in the other as he stepped onto the elevator.
He and Hero stood ready when the elevator hit the twenty-second floor and the door slid open. The four remaining Dobermans were also ready.
They snarled and growled as they rushed in, taking a supposedly prepared Hardessy off guard. He hadn’t had a chance to fire a shot. The dogs were all over Hero and him. With his pistol knocked to the floor, the only thing Hardessy could think of to do was to push the button to the first floor.
*-*-*
Parker opened the door from the stairway to the twenty-second floor elevator area. He saw the dogs rush inside and the slaughter begin before the elevator door closed. He hurried to the elevators, still carrying Simpson, and poked the button several times for another car.
*-*-*
Hill stood back in the far corner as at least two-dozen police officers milled around in the lobby on the first floor, waiting for instructions from Lt. Hardessy. Several of them stood around the elevators. One of the cars was coming down already.
Outside, a fretting woman pushed through the police line. She was a tall woman in her mid-forties, wearing a bright orange pantsuit.
“My daughter is in there. She’s a receptionist on the twenty-second floor,” she yelled, shoving her way to the revolving door.
A bell announced the arrival of the elevator to the lobby. The door opened to the floor full of anxious police officers.
The Dobermans bolted out with great surprise to all.
They seemed to realize they were greatly outnumbered and ran to escape. Lt. Hardessy lay in what looked like a pile of bleeding gunnysacks, trying to get to his feet. His dog lay beside him, dead and bloody.
The officers cleared a path, and the dogs ran toward the revolving door. The cops drew their guns. What followed sounded like a battle.
As the dogs ran down the gauntlet of police on both sides, the guns thundered. Shot after shot rang out.
The last three dogs were nearly ripped apart by the volley. Red spots appeared on their backs, necks, and legs as they fell separately and slid across the floor, ending their desperate run. An officer on each side of the line fell to the floor. Poorly aimed bullets had hit one in the shin and the other in the foot.
The fourth dog made it to the revolving door and was trapped opposite the lady concerned for her daughter. A tall officer with sergeant’s stripes walked over and held the door in place with his foot to ensure no escape. He held his hand up to stop the frightened woman and pointed his revolver at the dog, now snarling back up through the glass panel.
The gun reported with a pop,
and the tempered safety glass fractured into a million pieces but held its place in the door as blood splattered and drew into the cracks. He moved his foot out of the way and pushed the door to allow the woman in without looking over to her. She slid down to the floor, fainting.
A bell announced yet another elevator car’s arrival. The officers lined up again.
The door opened. Amongst a multitude of pointing pistols, Parker staggered out lamely with Simpson in his arms. He stood cut, bruised, and bleeding. Hill rushed to him. This seemed to snap the trance, and the officers holstered their weapons.
The lobby was a mess of bodies, blood and dogs. A gurney lay by a glass door next to the revolving one, and Parker laid Simpson on it. He patted Simpson’s hand and then pulled a folded sheet from under Jack’s legs and placed it over his friend.
Parker found new strength and walked briskly from the building and Hill had to run to catch up.
“Well, if it isn’t Tony Parker, the animal control director,” Haskins said. “Care to say anything to our viewers at home about the slaughter you allowed inside?”
Hill was closer to Haskins and saved Parker the trouble. A swift kick placed squarely between Haskins’ legs sent him bent over to the ground and was sure to leave him wordless for the rest of the evening.
“Did you get it?” Hill asked the cameraman.
The cameraman smiled back. “I got it!” he said, giving her a thumbs up.
“Here, Tony, I’ll drive,” Hill said, taking the keys from Parker’s hand when she noticed him stagger. “I’ll take you where you want to go but, after that, it’s straight to the hospital.” She knew where Tony was going, and nothing would stop him. She drove straight to Sadie Simpson’s and waited outside.
*-*-*
The doctor wanted to keep Parker, but as soon as Julie showed up, he told them he was leaving. The dizziness, stiffness, and hot flashes had subsided some and could have been contributed to the nasty bump on the head. It couldn’t be rabies. It couldn’t be.
Parker had to promise he’d not go to work for the rest of the week, though, and he would check in the next Monday. Sarah and Julie’s eyes met as Tony and Julie started to leave. For the first time since they’d met, neither of them glared.
With the medication the doctor gave, Parker went right to sleep when he hit the bed, and nothing would disturb him. Nothing outside his head, that is.
CHAPTER 38
Harold Burke’s heroic effort to save Tricia Carpenter had been much like a soldier jumping on a live hand grenade and produced similar results. The dogs had attacked the mailman, giving Tricia time to scamper behind the master bedroom door to temporary safety once again.
Tricia had sat up in her grandparents’ big bed with the covers pulled up to her nose as she listened to the savagery on the other side of the door. Soon after Burke’s blood oozed from the threshold, she heard more dogs join in. She heard their arguing growls as they fought over prime pieces. The growls seemed to diminish and she knew it was because they were dragging the mailman’s body away, down the hall and then down the steps. She heard the dogs, at least two of them that stayed behind, lap up the blood on the floor. She even saw their greedy tongues as they tried for every drop of spilled blood under the inch-and-a-half gap under the door.
Several hours passed. Tricia Carpenter now found safety in the master bedroom closet. She ran there after the dogs renewed their aggressive pursuit of the only living prey left in Sand Creek. The thin plywood panel in the lower half of the door had given in to repeated scratching. As soon as Tricia could see Dawg’s paw come through the panel, she streaked for the closet.
She huddled in the far corner of the closet, tired and hungry and thirsty, and needed to go to the bathroom. She had found a water glass beside Grammy’s side of the bed earlier and guzzled down the meager three gulps that it held but that wasn’t nearly enough.
Right now the most urgent matter was that she had to pee, real bad. After considerable thought, she crawled to the opposite corner of the closet and relieved herself. How naughty, she thought. What would Grammy think? But now, at least, she was only tired and hungry and thirsty.
A wood breaking, cracking noise came from the other side of the door. She heard the pounding paws of several excited dogs entering through the hole they had made in the bedroom door.
Tricia hugged herself, holding her knees close to her chin. She trembled with fear, but there were no tears. None were left.
The dogs sniffed and bounded around in their hunt. A dog sniffed very close to the closet door and a shadow passed underneath. Now the shadow came back and sniffed at the crack at the bottom. It pawed once. It sniffed. It pawed again. Suddenly, a lot of pawing and scratching erupted on the door. It rattled loosely in the jamb as if it were going to open.
Tricia wished she still had Raggedy Ann.
CHAPTER 39
Sarah Hill sat, parked in front of the animal shelter, taking a moment’s breather. She watched as Tommy Chin pulled in beside her. It was a quarter till four, and Chin had just finished eight hours’ rest after pulling a double shift and was coming back for another one.
The rain stopped and the sun shot columns of bright gold through a sieve of gray and black thunderheads. As he pulled to a stop, Hill heard a news bulletin come over Chin’s car radio concerning the battle taking place at the Epic Center.
“Uh-oh!” Chin exclaimed. He bailed out of his light blue Honda Civic and ran for the office, without seeing Hill.
“Hey, Chin, what’s the rush?” she called out her open window.
“There are six mad Dobermans loose inside the Epic Center,” he panted.
“That’s old news. Slow down.”
Chin walked over to Hill as she slipped out of Parker’s Truck. “What happened?”
“A lot.” Hill clinched her teeth to hold back the tears. “Nothing good. Jack Simpson was killed. Tony’s been hurt, but he’s going to be okay. All the dogs are dead.”
“Damn, what…?”
“Look, Chin, I’ve had a tough afternoon. I’m going to call it a day. I’ll have to tell you the whole story later.”
They walked to the door together.
“Are you all right?” Chin asked.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine. I just need some rest.”
“Tommy, a lady wants to talk to Tony. You want to take it?” one of the women officers behind the front counter asked as the two came through the door.
Chin nodded and reached for the phone.
“This is Officer Tommy Chin, ma’am. Mr. Parker is off duty right now, can I help?”
Hill turned in the Jimmy’s keys, grabbed her purse and started for the door to go home. On her way back by the counter, Chin took Hill by the arm. He nodded to her, one of those “hold up” sort of nods, and turned on the speakerphone for her to hear.
“Yes, Mrs. Crane, what can I do for you?”
“Well, Mr. Parker asked me to call him if I saw Jezebel.”
“You mean you saw her? When?”
“Last night. I’ve heard howling every night, but I never saw her. Last night I thought I saw a rabbit in my garden in the back yard, so I went outside. It was midnight. There wasn’t a rabbit, but I heard a noise coming from the side of the house, next to Mr. MacGreggor’s. When I looked through the fence, I saw Jezebel, and she was acting real strange.”
“How do you mean, ma’am?”
“Well, it was hard to see her very well in the dark but she was running back and forth and jumping. She had a stick in her mouth, like she was playing fetch—or maybe, remembering. She always loved to play fetch with Mr. MacGreggor.”
“So what happened, did she see you?”
“No, not at first. She just played for quite a while. Then, something came over her, and she just stopped dead still and dropped the stick out of her mouth. All of a sudden, she let out the most blood-curdling howl you ever heard. It surprised me so much that I screamed right along with her. She looked over and saw me. I was scared for a min
ute, but she just up and jumped over the fence on the other side of the yard and ran off.”
“Why didn’t you report this last night?”
“It was so much like a dream. I had to ask myself if it was really her. Anyway, she would have been long gone by the time anyone got here. Besides, I felt sorry for her.”
“And why did you call now?”
“I guess because I decided it was the right thing to do. I’d hate to think someone else got hurt and I could have prevented it.”
“How’s that, Mrs. Crane?”
“Well, you see, I think she’s been here every night. I’ve been leaving food and water next to the fence for her. I don’t think she’s taken much, if any, of it. It looks like she’s just nosed the dog food around. I’m thinking she climbs over the fence and goes in the house. At midnight—well, that’s when I hear the howl. There’s been a couple of officers in a police car out in front at night, but they come and go and probably couldn’t tell if she was there or not from the street. I don’t think they’ve heard her. Anyway, if I was a betting woman, and I’m not, I’d bet she’ll be over there tonight.”
“All right, Mrs. Crane. Thanks for the tip. We’ll check it out. You stay inside tonight, okay?” Chin turned off the speakerphone. “Well, what do you think?”
Hill blew out an exhausted breath, making her cheeks puff and lips vibrate. “I think I’d better go get some sleep and meet you at MacGreggor’s at eleven,” Hill said, her eyes half open.
“No, that’s okay. I’ll get one of the other guys.”
“No big deal, I’m pulling a double shift starting midnight, anyway. I just want to catch this big bitch and get it over with. We’ve rounded up all the other dogs that have had rabies shots from the bad batch. She’s the last one.”
Hill stepped toward the door but paused and turned back. “Hey, Tommy, how about getting a couple of people to take Tony’s truck back to his house? He won’t need it for a couple of days, but it’ll be there for him when he does.”
“Sure, Sarah,” Chin said, “I’ll take care of it. You get home and get some sleep. See you tonight.”
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