by Sam Sisavath
“Good men are hard to find,” the man was saying. “I don’t know what happened to the one in the other room, but you’re obviously the last man standing. That counts for something in my book.”
She already knew the tall man wasn’t alone, because she had seen at least one more walking past her less than ten seconds ago. That same man reappeared now, this time in the kitchen behind the one on the phone. Now that she wasn’t in fear of being discovered, she took a second to identify the Uzi, complete with a suppressor, hanging from a sling under the suited man’s right arm.
“So are we doing this, Jack?” the one on the phone said. “We simpatico?”
So there were at least two in the living room, and counting the sentry outside, that was three she could be absolutely certain of. There were probably more, especially since they had brought two SUVs with them. Why bring two big vehicles when there were just three people? That didn’t make any—
A click! in front of her, startling her.
Allie stared, caught between racing back to the basement and holding her ground, and failed to come to a decision when a large figure stepped out of a room further up the hallway. He was a big man, wearing a suit like the other three, with a gun holster along his hip and another suppressed Uzi dangling lazily from a strap over his right shoulder. His head was slightly bent forward, eyes focused on his crotch as he zipped himself up, but it didn’t take very long for him to sense her standing in the shadows behind him.
He looked up, then over, and said, “Hey—”
She shot him twice in the chest before he could finish the sentence. He stumbled back and through the door, one hand trying to grab onto the doorknob to stop his backward fall. She shot him a third time, and he let go of the door and disappeared into the bathroom.
The tall man at the kitchen bolted to his feet and whirled in her direction, the hand not holding the phone already reaching for his sidearm. She took aim at him, when the man she had seen walk by earlier rematerialized in front of her like a ghost, the Uzi in his hands swinging up to fire.
Allie mouthed a curse and dropped to the floor just as the man squeezed the trigger on his submachine gun, and for the second time that night, bullets shredded the walls around her at dizzying speeds.
Her face was pressed into the floor when there was a sudden gust of cold air as something (Apollo!) rocketed over and past her head. The dog unleashed a loud, thunderous bark as he rushed headlong into the torrent of gunfire, and all Allie could think was, God, I love this dog.
Chapter 14
Jack didn’t burst out of the guest bedroom to join in on the shooting. No, that would have been stupid, and he wasn’t stupid. He’d always been smarter than the average merc; or at least, he liked to think so. The fact that Jones and Jerry had already bit the dust tonight definitely made his decision a whole lot easier.
Instead, he leaned against the wall next to the door, eyes fixed on the doorknob for signs that Monroe might be using the chaos to pull another stunt. He kept his hands busy by keeping a firm grip on his rifle at all times, and his mind occupied by wondering how long it would take whoever was exchanging gunfire out there to kill each other. After all, the less men with guns he had to deal with, the better his chances of surviving this. As long as he stayed inside with the golden goose, he was safe. It was out there that the dangers lay. With Monroe, and now, whoever he was engaged in a gun battle with.
He could hear the dog barking over the back-and-forth gunshots, which meant the stupid mutt was still alive and kicking. An injured dog wouldn’t be making that much noise. Not that Jack was a dog person, but he assumed, anyway.
The gunfire boomed back and forth, sometimes sounding a little too close for comfort and other times as if it were coming from the other side of the house. The boom of handguns and the whirring of suppressed submachine guns firing away was followed by the pek-pek-pek of bullets slamming into various parts of the residence.
One thing was for sure, Walter was going to have to redecorate after this.
It seemed to go on for a long time, but that was probably because he wasn’t directly involved. Jack wasn’t used to being an observer when bullets were flying, but there was something oddly fascinating about knowing a gunfight was going on nearby, but being able to detach himself completely from it. He wasn’t entirely sure if he was anxious or confused, or maybe a little of both—
Movement flickered in the corner of his right eye, and Jack turned just as the laptop nearly decapitated him.
Fuck!
He jerked his head back just a split second before the computer smashed against the wall, parts of it digging into the Sheetrock behind the wallpaper, other pieces flying everywhere, before the biggest still-intact chunk tumbled to the floor.
Jack spun, lifting the assault rifle, as a shoulder slammed into his sternum, and he temporarily forgot how to breathe. His attacker wasn’t done, and managed to lift him slightly off his feet before driving him back into the wall. Jack squeezed the trigger on the Sig556 involuntarily and fired a shot into the ceiling.
All the while, his mind shouted, What the fuck?
His back and chest were screaming in pain even as a fist struck him in the side of the face. Jack grunted and staggered sideways, but he didn’t get far before another fist glanced off his temple, and he couldn’t help but think, Lucky shot! because those punches weren’t being delivered by a pro. Someone who wasn’t used to throwing haymakers was getting in some lucky shots on him. It probably helped that he was out of breath and off balance, and still trying to recover from the initial blow to his sternum.
Even as he stumbled along the wall, trying to get his feet to obey and stop so he could retaliate, his hands scrambled to aim the rifle at his attacker. He was doing a piss-poor job of it, and before he could fully get the weapon around, a body crashed into him and knocked him—along with his attacker—to the floor.
Jack didn’t know when the rifle flew from his hands, but suddenly it wasn’t there anymore. His attacker got lucky, and while Jack landed on his back, the man ended up on top of him. Jack blinked up, seeing a familiar face staring down, eyes wide and face flushed red. There was a wildness about the man that should have terrified Jack, but it was so out of place that the only thing that occurred to Jack was, Shit, Walter, I didn’t know you had it in you, buddy.
Then Walter was punching him again, and again, and again…
*
He didn’t know how long or how many times Walter punched him, but by the time Jack opened his eyes he could barely see out of his left, and his right didn’t feel any better. He raised himself up from the floor, gagging on blood that had settled in his throat, and had to spit gobs of it out before he could breathe again. Which only made things worse, because his chest was on fire and he was pretty sure a bone or two was broken.
Walter was leaning against the wall on the other side of the door across from him. The Gorman and Smith executive had the Sig556 slung over his back, and Jack’s Sig Sauer dangling nonchalantly at his side.
“I think it’s over,” Walter said.
Jack stared back at him, unsure how to respond. Instead, he wiped at clumps of blood on his face, around his mouth and chin. He knew his nose was broken without having to touch it, and both eyes were puffy, but he supposed he should be happy he could still see out of the right one at all.
He punched me. After he tried to cut my head off with the flying laptop.
What the fuck?
He looked at Walter again, trying to grasp what had happened, and found it…difficult. The man he had taken hostage, whom he had forced to work on the laptop, seemed to have vanished, replaced by this new guy whose head was tilted slightly to one side as he listened to the—
Silence.
The entire house was quiet, the “it’s over” that Walter had mentioned a few seconds ago. How long ago since the gun battle outside stopped? The blood on him was still wet, so…a few minutes, tops?
From the look on his face, Walter was
n’t sure how to process what he was hearing (or not hearing), either. Jack concentrated on the gun in Walter’s hand. Did he know how to use that? It was hard to tell, but then, how difficult was it to point a gun at someone and pull the trigger? Even a monkey could do that, and it was a very, very small room.
“Who the hell are you?” Jack asked.
He had difficulty talking, maybe because he could still taste the blood clinging to the inside walls of his mouth. What he wouldn’t give for some mouthwash to cleanse it. Even filthy, unfiltered tap water would be nice.
Walter was giving him a wry look. “You were so preoccupied with the shooting, I was halfway across the room before you even noticed.”
“You nearly decapitated me.”
“I was trying to hit your head. I guess I’m a terrible thrower. Always was, I guess, since high school. Always got picked last.”
Not anymore, Jack thought.
Walter returned his attention to the door. “It’s quiet out there. I wonder who they were shooting at…”
“You don’t know?”
Walter shook his head.
“But you know something,” Jack said.
“Something…”
“Who are you?” Jack asked again.
“I’m like you,” Walter said. “Just someone trying to get what I have coming, and retire with my loved ones.”
I don’t have any loved ones, Jack wanted to say, but didn’t. He didn’t think Walter gave a damn about his love life at the moment.
His hands were sticky with his own blood, and he wiped it on his pants before trying to get up. He must have been too noisy, because Walter shot him a quick glance and shook his head, then pointed the gun at him.
“Stay down,” Walter said. “I’ve never shot anyone before, but it’s not exactly brain surgery, is it?”
Jack grunted and sat back down.
“Not so fun when someone’s pointing a gun at you, huh?” Walter asked.
“What made you think any of this was fun for me?”
“Oh, I get it, because you’re a professional,” Walter said. He sounded almost amused. “Some pro, letting me sneak up on you like that.”
“You hit like a girl.”
“Yeah, well, it’s not about how you hit, it’s how many times, right?”
“I guess so,” Jack said, grimacing at the memory of Walter’s fists flying—awkwardly, yes, but still flying—at him over and over again.
Jack noticed the remains of the laptop on the floor between him and Walter. The screen was cracked, and half of the keys were sprinkled across the room. The letter “M” was sitting next to his left leg and there, the letter “R.”
“I finished it,” Walter said, “in case you were wondering.”
“Finish what?”
“The job. It’s done.” Then he gave Jack a knowing smile before adding, “For when you call your client to update him.”
“Who the fuck are you?” Jack said again.
Walter may have been in the process of answering, when he went suddenly still and held up a finger to his lips instead, before taking a quick step, then another one, away from the door. Jack could feel it—the slight vibrations of footsteps moving toward them from the hallway outside.
Jack followed Walter’s lead and began scooting backward, while still sitting on the floor. Walter glanced over but didn’t stop him, so Jack took that as permission and kept moving away from the door until his back pressed against the far wall and he didn’t have any more space to retreat.
Walter shoved the handgun into his front waistband, then unslung the rifle and pointed it at the door. He didn’t look entirely comfortable with the long gun, but like Walter had said, it wasn’t exactly brain surgery and ol’ Walter was smart enough to play possum all this time, so he could probably work out the mechanics of aiming and pulling a trigger.
Jack focused on the nearing footsteps. He hadn’t heard the dog barking again since he regained consciousness, so he didn’t know if that was four legs coming toward them or multiple sets of two. The eerie quiet, after the loud ruckus of gunfire, was beyond unsettling.
Walter took another couple of steps back, putting more space between himself and the door. He swiped at fresh sweat dripping down his temple, and the Sig556 might have been trembling slightly in his hands.
“Why don’t you give that to me?” Jack said.
Walter ignored him.
“Two of us against whatever’s out there is better odds,” Jack continued. “That’s my rifle. Give it to me, and you keep the handgun. Be smart—”
“Shut up,” Walter snapped.
Jack sighed, just as the footsteps outside stopped on cue. Maybe they had heard Jack talking and paused to listen in, or they had reached their destination—wherever that was. He knew they were outside in the hallway, but he had lost track of where they were exactly.
“Hey!” a voice shouted from outside.
Sonofabitch, Jack thought at the sound of the familiar voice.
“Anyone still alive in there?” Monroe shouted.
“Don’t answer—” Jack started to say.
“Yeah!” Walter shouted before Jack could finish.
Monroe didn’t respond right away. After about five seconds, the man said, “Who am I talking to?”
“Walter.”
“What happened to Jack?”
“He’s still here.”
“Alive?”
“For now.”
“Sorry, Jack,” Monroe said.
“Go fuck yourself!” Jack shouted.
He thought he might have heard one of Monroe’s trademark chuckles through the wall. “No can do, buddy,” Monroe said. Then, “Glad to hear you’re still alive and well, Walter. We were worried for a moment.”
“You got a name?” Walter asked.
“Monroe!” Then, “I gave Jack something earlier. A phone. Why don’t we talk like civilized people instead of shouting back and forth through a door?”
Walter looked over and held out his hand. Jack thought about forcing him to come get it, maybe grabbing the gun when he did—
“Toss it,” Walter said.
Or not, Jack thought, and fished the phone out with a bloody hand, and tossing it across the room. Walter caught it just barely, juggling the cell phone with his left hand for a moment. Then he wiped the blood on his pants, just before the device began vibrating, followed by the familiar ringtone.
As Walter put the phone to his ear, Jack calculated the distance between them. Too far, and he was sitting on his ass. If he were on his feet, then maybe he would have had a chance to rush Walter before the man could line up and fire a shot.
As if reading his thoughts, Walter’s eyes settled on him, and Jack thought, Dammit.
“Yeah,” Walter said into the phone, one eye on Jack, the other on the door. He listened for a moment, then said, “That’s for me to know and for you to find out.”
Jack listened, but hearing the conversation from one side was aggravating.
“Gorman?” Walter was saying into the phone. “Goddammit, I should have known.”
Gorman? Jack thought. As in Gorman and Smith?
He could practically see the cogs turning in Walter’s head as the other man struggled to process what he was being told through the phone.
Then, with more confidence than Jack would have thought possible from a man in his position, Walter said, “They didn’t tell you everything, did they? Who I really am. What I’m doing here. If you knew, getting me back into the city and handing me over to them would be the last thing on your mind.”
What the hell is he talking about? What are you doing, Walter?
But of course he knew what Walter was doing, even before the man said, “Peanuts. That’s what they’re paying you. But my counteroffer is enough to retire on a hundred lifetimes over.”
Oh, dammit. Is he doing what I think he’s doing?
“You won’t have to worry about Gorman and Smith,” Walter was saying into the phone. “
Not for long. They’ll be too busy to come after you. Or anyone.” He listened, then, “We can discuss the details later. For now, you just remember one thing: If anything happens to me, you don’t see a dime of that forty million.”
Forty million? Did he just say forty fucking million?
“What’s going on?” Jack asked, when Walter turned off the phone and shoved it into his back pocket.
“I think I just came to an agreement with our friend out there,” Walter said. “I took a chance that he’d be like you.”
“Like me?”
“For sale.”
Millions, Jack thought. Shit, the things I wouldn’t do for fucking millions.
“Millions,” Jack said out loud, if just to hear the word coming out of his own mouth and prove that it wasn’t all a bad dream.
“This was never just about the money,” Walter said. “Yeah, some of it was, but the other factors…they were always more important. At least to me.”
Jack wasn’t sure if Walter was trying to convince him, or himself.
“Am I going to like this agreement?” Jack asked.
Walter shook his head. “Not one bit.”
“Saw that coming.”
Walter pursed his lips and gave Jack something that looked almost…apologetic? “It’s not your fault, you know.”
“What’s not my fault?”
“How badly everything got. Allie, the dog, those guys out there.” He shook his head. “I didn’t see any of this coming, either. But hey, I’m nothing if not flexible. Always have been. Learned that the hard way when I went to work for Gorman and Smith.” He snorted, and Jack thought there was a lot of bitterness there. “They don’t play around, those guys.”
“Who? Gorman and Smith? I thought that was just the name of the company.”
“It is. But there are people behind it…” Walter shook his head. “Anyway, it’s not important. It’s time to be flexible again. Improvise.”
Aw, man, Jack thought, when he saw how Walter was holding the gun. He’d seen that before—Walter was psyching himself up to do something he didn’t want to.