by Brian Drake
Dane leaned out with the .45 in his left hand as the back-seat passenger from the chase car popped out with his own weapon. The wind slammed hard into Dane’s back and made it hard to steady his aim. He didn’t bother aiming at the gunman. He fired twice into the windshield, the glass sprouting spider web cracks, then twice into the hood. His one shot at the front tire missed and whined off into the night.
The passenger slammed a hand to his left shoulder, the driver hitting the brakes to drop back. The gunman in back fired, but his shots came nowhere near Dane.
“Steve!”
Dane dropped back inside as Nina took a sharp left. Only another mile or two before they could get lost in downtown traffic.
“Where to?” she said.
“We need to get to Len,” Dane said, digging for his phone. “Now that we’ve hit them, he’ll be a target.”
Nina kept driving as Dane dialed.
HAL MILLER braked hard and pulled off the road into a turnout.
Gun Monkey One, beside him, clutched his bloody shoulder and moaned, rocking his body from side to side. His shirt was soaked, the .45 slug having punched through his shoulder to embed itself in the back seat. Gun Monkey Two tore a piece from his own shirt and made Monkey One stop long enough to tie a crude tourniquet. Monkey One still groaned.
Maybe they weren’t so dumb after all.
Miller took out his phone and started to dial.
“Anybody got morphine?” Monkey One said.
“I can hit you over the head and knock you out,” said Monkey Two.
“Okay, why not?”
Monkey Two reversed his grip on his automatic and bashed Monkey One with the butt. The blow glanced off, and Monkey One screamed. Monkey Two hit him again. Monkey One screamed.
“You hit like a girl!”
Monkey Two said, “Quit moving,” and brought the butt down one more time. This time Monkey One slumped against the door and stopped moving. Monkey Two quickly felt for a pulse in his compatriot’s neck.
“Well, I didn’t kill him,” he said.
Miller shook his head and withdrew his previous assessment.
The other line picked up.
“Yes?”
“Moligoni’s dead and they’re heading your way.”
“We’re ready.”
DANE PUT away his phone.
“No answer?” Nina said.
“No answer,” he said, “and that’s bad.”
Nina made a left turn. “We can be there in twenty minutes.”
Dane looked behind them. Why hadn’t the other car stayed with them? A knot of tension lodged in his stomach. He didn’t like how this was playing out so far.
9
Death Stare
NINA JERKED the car to a stop in front of Lukavina’s house.
The spotlight hit them as soon as they left the vehicle.
The light blazed from an open window. They dived and rolled as pistol fire whined overhead. Dane fired a three-round burst. Glass shattered and the light went out.
Nina jumped up and raced forward. She kicked open the door, entered and rolled left. Dane, on her heels, swept the Uzi right to left.
They were in the front room, with couches, chairs and a piano. Hallway straight ahead. A gunman near the piano rose with a pistol; Dane pinned him to the wall with another burst. The gunman fell and got tangled in some curtains, leaving a trail of red as he hit the ground.
Another gunman fired twice from a doorway along the hall. Dane fired back, only to miss and tear chunks out of the wall.
The gunman emerged again, this time to fling a smoke grenade their way. The living room filled with smoke. It stung Dane’s eyes and went up his nose. He coughed, dropping low.
Dane ran forward into the smoke only to collide with the hallway gunner. He might as well have tried plowing through a brick wall. He saw enough of the man to know he was not only huge but wore a gas mask. The collision had sent the man’s gun flying, but he was still ready for a fight.
He slammed Dane against the wall. Dane exhaled sharply. The gunner tried to wrench the Uzi from Dane’s grasp, but Dane held tight, pulling the gunman closer. He raised a knee but missed the thug’s privates. The gunman kept one hand on the Uzi and grabbed a fistful of Dane’s shirt with the other. He kicked one of Dane’s legs out from under him and shoved Dane to the floor, landing on top. Then his beefy hands grabbed Dane around the neck. He squeezed hard. Dane choked, his airway cut off as he tried to inflate his lungs, his eyes still hot and wet from the smoke. He tried to buck off his attacker, but he might as well have been trying to move a ton of marble.
He heard Nina’s Uzi crackle from somewhere in the house.
The open front door and the breeze from outside began clearing some of the smoke. Through the plastic front of the gas mask, Dane watched the gunman’s unblinking eyes go wide as he squeezed harder.
Dane was running out of options. He let go of the Uzi and grasped the gas mask, yanking it aside, exposing one eye and obscuring the other.
The remaining smoke hit the gunman hard. That one big eye took the brunt of it and he recoiled. He tried to adjust the mask, but Dane pressed the index and middle finger of his right hand together, then blasted a two-finger strike into the gunman’s throat.
The gunman let out a squeal and rolled away. Dane rolled to his knees, gasping for air. The gunman tossed the mask and started to charge again.
The Buck knife snapped open in Dane’s hand. He met the gunman halfway, plunging the knife into him. Dane stabbed him again and again, leaving the thug a dead weight against him. He shoved the gunman away, wiped the bloody knife on the man’s pants, stowed it and picked up the Uzi.
Only residual smoke from the grenade hung in the air. Dane leaned against the wall for a moment. The fight had taken almost everything out of him.
An engine roared and something crashed outside.
“Nina!”
A gun blast roared somewhere.
“Nina!”
No answer.
NINA SHUT her eyes and clamped her free left hand over her nose and mouth as the room filled with smoke. The last thing she saw before the smoke engulfed the room was the doorway to the kitchen—straight ahead, past the piano and corner dining table.
She ran that way, catching a foot on the leg of a dining chair. She fell face first onto the carpet. Somebody screamed from the kitchen. Nina jumped up and ran through the doorway.
A fourth gunman hauled a middle-aged woman from the laundry room adjacent to the kitchen. Mrs. Lukavina. Nina realized she didn’t know the woman’s name. The man kept the woman close, but then she twisted out of his grip and for a split second Nina had a kill shot. But as she tightened on the Uzi’s trigger, the gunman pulled the woman to him again. Nina raised the muzzle at the last instant and fired her blast into the ceiling.
Plaster rained down on Nina as the gunman hauled Mrs. Lukavina across the tiled floor to a patio door.
The gunman fired at Nina, missed and opened the door, dragging the woman outside. Nina started to follow but the gunman fired into the house, Nina hitting the floor as the stingers shredded the cupboard and refrigerator.
Nina jumped up and ran outside in time to see the thug carry Mrs. Lukavina around the corner.
Nina stopped and peeked around the corner. A shot from the gunman hit the outer wall and spit bits of shrapnel into Nina’s face. She yelled, ducking back. A doorway to the garage was midway down the walkway. The door opened with a squeak. She turned the corner and advanced.
A motor started.
Nina ran.
As she cleared the doorway, she watched a black SUV plow backward through the garage door, whole pieces clinging to the back of the SUV.
Nina fired, flame licking from the Uzi’s muzzle. The SUV sank forward on two flat front tires, half out of the garage. Nina’s next blast shattered the windscreen and took off part of the gunman’s head. The SUV idled in reverse, the steel rims of the front wheels screeching on the concrete.
<
br /> Nina ran to the driver’s side, opening the door. She reached across the dead gunman, threw the vehicle into Park, and looked at the frightened lady on the floor of the passenger side.
She pointed over Nina’s shoulder.
“Look out!”
Nina waited for bullets to hit her as she spun around.
“It’s me!” Dane shouted, holding up his Uzi. Len Lukavina, tearing remnants of rope from his wrists, followed him. His wife bolted from the car and into her husband’s arms.
DANE DROVE this time, scenery flashing by, Nina beside him on the passenger side and the Lukavinas in the back seat.
“What happened, Steve?” Len said.
“We hit Moligoni,” Dane said, adding a brief description of the fight.
Lukavina’s wife grabbed her husband’s arm with both hands and squeezed tightly. “The girls!”
“Are they local?” Dane said.
“California and Arizona,” Len replied, his wife loosening her grip.
“Better call them just in case.”
“There’s a local safe house we can use for now,” Len said.
“Just tell me how to get there.”
AT THE safe house, Dane and Nina sat with steaming mugs of tea on a couch with a coffee table in front of them. The table was as bare and antiseptic as the rest of the house, which resembled a model home in a real estate development rather than any living space.
Mrs. Lukavina sat away from them while her husband paced near the dining table and spoke to DCI Figg over the secured landline. Both still wore their pajamas.
Dane looked at Nina. “I forgot to ask if you were okay.”
“No holes I wasn’t already born with,” she said, swallowing some tea.
Dane grinned but straightened his face when he caught Mrs. Lukavina’s death stare.
Her name was Angie, and this was only the second time in his life that Dane had seen her. The first was at Bethesda, where her husband had been treated after nearly burning to death.
He didn’t blame her for being angry.
Lukavina put down the phone and found another chair, which he pulled close to the coffee table. “We’re gonna have some explaining to do for the cops, but the agency will cover it.”
“What about you two?” Dane said.
“We’ll hang here till further notice, probably another forty-eight hours or so.”
Angie Lukavina started to protest, but Len held up a hand. “We’ll have personal items brought here by a security team, hon, don’t worry.”
“This is insane,” she said.
“I know.”
Lukavina turned to Dane. The two friends didn’t say anything for a few moments. Dane wondered if Len wanted to help finish the mission. If their places had been reversed, Dane knew he’d ask to tag along. Len had as much personal investment in the outcome as Dane had. But as much as he might want his pal fighting beside him, he knew, and suspected that Lukavina knew as well, that he was more valuable at headquarters.
And then there was Angie in the equation. She was pissed now; she’d be furious if he even brought up the idea as a hypothetical question.
“And now I need to know about you two,” Lukavina finally said.
“We go see Royce,” Dane said.
WAVES CRASHING on the beach usually calmed Perry Royce, but not tonight. An anxiety like he’d never known before filled him. Moligoni was already gone. Dane was on the warpath and not letting anything stand in his way.
The ocean stretched ahead of him to infinity, the dark sky making the normally blue water look black, and from the patio where he stood it looked like an abyss inviting him to his death. There was still a chance for escape, though, if the chopper arrived in time. He’d built a wooden dock a long time ago for his own boat, and it sat anchored on the left side, but escaping by boat wasn’t a good option. Too many things could happen on the water. It was also too slow. Even if he escaped before Dane’s arrival, Dane could muster a search team and end Royce’s plans before the sun rose again.
He checked his watch and looked upward into the sky. No sign of the chopper. He’d at least see the lights. The waves would drown out the sound of the rotor blades until the chopper came close.
A voice behind him. “Mr. Royce.”
He turned. The tip of his cane scraped the patio. Hal Miller approached, his boots sinking into the soft sand as he walked. “We’re all set.”
Royce nodded. Miller and his two gun monkeys had arrived minutes before. One wasn’t in very good shape, it seemed, but he could still shoot, and the pistol on Royce’s hip was another gun on their side. Miller had said Dane had only the Talikova woman with him.
“Good.”
Royce followed Miller back inside. They’d turned off the lights and navigated the interior via flashlight. It was the one time Royce regretted having so much glass on the lower floor. He’d wanted to be able to see the ocean from any room on the first floor, a choice that might prove fatal.
The gun monkeys had placed a couch before the front window as a barricade. On their knees behind it, they held weapons ready. Miller moved upstairs to another window, a pair of binoculars in hand, to get the high view. Royce took out his pistol and found a chair to crouch behind, his cane to one side. He checked his watch. Where was that damn chopper?
10
Smile for the Camera
DANE AND NINA left their car on the side of Bayview Road and stomped through the forest. The splashing waves guided them to the shore. When they reached the edge where sand met foliage, they stopped. Royce’s home sat about twenty-five meters to their left.
“Still have some grenades?” Dane said.
“All of them.”
“Let’s go.”
They ran low across the sand, grunting with effort from the lack of traction, having to raise their feet higher than normal to keep moving, Dane almost losing his balance as they neared the structure. The darkened house filled Dane with a sense of foreboding. Had Royce already fled? Only one way to find out.
He shouldered the Uzi and fired a string of silenced shots into a side window. The glass dropped from the frame, the crash of pieces loud despite the competing ocean. Nina tossed one grenade and then the other. The explosives sailed through the opening, and somebody let out a panicked scream. Both explosions shook the ground. Dane led the way with Nina behind him, the Uzi up and his eyes scanning for targets. He leaped through the opening and pivoted left. Two men near a couch. The Uzi bucked. One man dropped. The other fired once before Dane stitched him stomach to chest.
“Steve!”
A lone figure ran for the rear doors. He fired over his shoulder, the bullet slicing the air beside Dane’s head. Dane and Nina lined up and fired, the patio doors shattering, the figure ducking through unscathed. The man limped into the night.
“The stairs!” Nina shouted.
Dane pivoted again. Another man slid down the banister and hit the ground in a roll, coming up to open fire as Dane and Nina scrambled for cover. Nina returned fire as Dane changed magazines.
“Take him!” he said, cutting across Nina’s line of fire. More shooting behind him as he cleared the shattered doors and charged after the man running along the beach.
HAL MILLER slithered forward across the tile to the carpet, stopping beside the wreckage of Royce’s furniture. One had gone; one remained. He sensed movement and fired a shot. Nothing. He rolled right and crawled to the body of one of the gun monkeys, taking the man’s pistol, a firearm in each hand now.
A bump across the room. Miller shot both guns twice. A figure broke cover as the last flash of flame left his weapons. Miller jerked as a salvo cut through him, blood filling his throat. With his last ounce of strength, he lifted both guns once again and fired randomly until the actions locked open. Then his arms dropped and he moved no more.
NINA STAYED low as the last shots smacked into the windows behind her, more glass falling, shards nipping at her legs. She rose as soon as the shooting stopped, hustled o
ver to the figure and shot him once more in the head.
She ran for the patio doors, dodging debris, and raced after Dane.
THE RUNNING man was fifteen yards ahead, stumbling in the sand.
Dane stopped, took aim and squeezed the trigger. Sand sprayed around the man and he dropped. Dane ran, his lungs bursting, legs sore, but he had the quarry he wanted.
Perry Royce scrambled for his fallen gun, grabbing for it as Dane reached him. Dane kicked the gun away. Dane kicked him in the stomach, and Royce doubled up.
The helicopter roared overhead, flying low. Dane ducked instinctively. Royce wasn’t beaten yet, and lashed out with a kick that sent Dane tumbling into the sand. Royce jumped up and ran for the chopper, waving his arms. The chopper stopped and rotated, turning back to land. A door gunner leaned out and fired. Dane rolled away as the shots ripped into the sand. He took out the .45. Royce was only a few feet away from the flying machine. Dane fired once, twice. The door gunner responded and Dane rolled toward the ocean and the firm, water-packed sand. He fired again. Royce didn’t fall but instead jumped into the helicopter, which quickly began to rise.
Dane gained his feet and ran after the chopper, ocean water lapping at his feet. He fired as he ran, his shots scattered, but the chopper didn’t waver. His last round left the muzzle, and the slide locked open. Dane threw the gun and screamed as the helicopter soared over the ocean.
He dropped to his hands and knees, gasping. Soon he heard the chopper no more, just the rhythm of the waves. Royce had escaped. Dane pounded the sand.
Nina found him there.
IT WASN’T a long flight to Atlantic City, and when the pilot announced their final descent, Dane tightened his seat belt and woke Nina. She’d slept during the whole flight. She stretched and yawned.
“I’m finding it hard to take seriously,” he said to her, “the place that Monopoly was based on.”
“Look at it this way. If we fail here, we do not pass Go or collect two hundred dollars.”