The pro shop exploded first. A sudden burst of orange-hot light bloomed in the eastern side of the resort and expanded into the night sky. The sonic boom reached her ears a moment later. Thick, black smoke curled into the night sky, obscuring the moon shining down on them. The detonation was ear-piercing, even from where Lucy was standing. Her ears felt like they were stuffed with cotton balls.
WHOOSH!
The second building exploded, and chaos ensued. Three more explosions followed, one after the other, like a galaxy of stars unexpectedly going supernova. Even though they weren’t synchronized, the effect of the sequential explosions was quite dramatic.
Haven residents began reacting to the sudden attack on their home base, pouring from the various residences in droves. As the size of the crowd grew, Lucy used the chaos to emerge from her hiding spot. She bolted straight for the hotel. In the confused darkness, no one paid her a second look. It was what she was counting on. She ran hard, the stress and exertion threatening to fracture her heart. She was dizzy with adrenaline.
One hundred yards became fifty. Then twenty. Then she was there.
She hid near the front door, behind a large, potted plant, as a steady stream of people exited the building. She quickly lost count of the number, but there were dozens, perhaps as many as a hundred people who flowed by her. She kept an eye peeled for Simon; he might be the type of leader to be the first on the scene. If he was, then she would be ready.
No sign of Simon, just a consistent flow of his underlings. She hazarded a peek into the lobby. The traffic had slowed considerably. A few more men were loitering in the lobby; they were armed, they looked nervous, their grips on their weapons tight. It was dark at this hour but for a single lantern flickering at the check-in counter.
Where was Jack?
Perhaps something had happened to him after setting the last charge. Perhaps he had been caught in the blast. It was not out of the question. The success of this gambit was far from guaranteed. She began sketching out a plan to storm the lobby by herself. If she timed it just right, if she targeted the men in the right order, she would have a chance.
She would wait another minute before making her move. One more minute for Jack to make it to the rendezvous point. She gritted her teeth and began counting to sixty, one Mississippi at a time.
She got to fifty-six Mississippi when a hand fell on her shoulder. It took all she had to stifle a terrified cry. She turned, her gun up, and found herself staring right into Jack’s face. He pressed an index finger to his lips. She breathed a shaky sigh of relief and then punched him in the arm.
“You scared the shit out of me,” she whispered.
“Sorry.”
“Four of them inside.”
Jack studied the scene, forming a plan of attack; as he did so, an idea occurred to Lucy.
“Follow my lead,” she whispered.
She calmly stepped clear of the shadows of the planter and opened the front door to the lobby.
“Hey, you!” she called out as firmly as she could, drawing the attention of the four gunmen. They immediately responded with weapons up. She could only hope the darkness would conceal her identity.
“They’ve got them pinned down by the first tee,” she yelled. “They want all hands on deck!”
“We’re supposed to cover the hotel,” replied one.
“This is straight from Joshua,” she said. “They’ve got heavy weapons and he wants them neutralized ASAP.”
This galvanized the group. As Lucy turned to lead them to the front lines, the one closest to the door motioned with the barrel of his weapon for the others to move; they started for the door, one at a time, right into the Jack’s kill zone. With Lucy safely behind him, he burst from the cover of the planter and opened fire. The men were too stunned by the sudden attack to mount a response. It was over in seconds. They didn’t even have time to duck. As ambushes went, it could not have gone better.
Jack took the point as they entered the now-unguarded lobby. It was large and spacious. To their left was the reception desk. To the right had been a high-end steakhouse called Tony’s. There was a bar fronting the dining room, still stocked with bottles of liquor. Beyond was a long corridor leading to the elevators and the stairwell.
“Next stop, penthouse,” she said.
Jack nodded.
They quickly crossed the lobby, moving deeper into the belly of the beast. Outside, the chaos generated by the explosions was still in full swing, but in the corridor, it was disturbingly quiet. The stairwell was pitch black. Jack quietly opened the door and gave Lucy cover as she stepped onto the first-floor landing. She froze, listening for sounds of activity. None.
“It’s gonna be a black hole in there,” he said. “Be careful.”
She nodded.
She pressed her back against the handrail and edged her way upstairs, one step at a time, Jack trailing her. Behind them, the door quietly clicked shut. The stairwell was silent but for their quiet breathing and footfalls. There was no light. It was an absolute void, more than just darkness, an absolute absence of light.
She slowed at the first landing, carefully curling around and reaching out a toe for the next set of steps. Jack was just off her hip. She slid across the stairwell, again leaning up against the handrail, keeping her gun pointed upward. They reached the second floor landing without issue. One more floor to go. As she placed her foot on the first step, a door above them slammed open. Dim lantern light spilled into the stairwell. She froze, waiting for her eyes to adjust.
“McDowell should’ve checked back by now,” a voice said. This speaker was in the frame of the door, silhouetted by the light of his lantern.
Indistinct chatter in reply. A deeper voice, although unidentifiable. Lucy could not tell if it was Simon’s voice. It had been five years since she’d last heard it.
“Find out and report back.”
“You got enough guys up here?”
“I think we can handle it,” the voice said. “Now go see what the hell is going on and report back. Three quick knocks.”
The door shut, but the dim light remained as the sentinel made his way down the steps, carrying his own lantern. Jack gently pushed Lucy into one corner and crouched low in the other. In his rush, the man likely would not see them until he was almost on top of them. He took the steps two at a time, lantern in one hand, the gun in the other.
Jack pounced just as the man reached the landing and turned to head down the next flight of stairs. He grabbed the man’s head and wrenched it violently counterclockwise; the man’s body instantly went limp. Jack caught him under his arms and eased him to the ground, grabbing the lantern on his way down. The gun clattered harmlessly onto the steps and bounced down the steps behind them. Jack started to go up the stairs but doubled back and retrieved the dead man’s gun.
Lucy set the lantern in the corner, but she did not extinguish it. It was important their eyes adjust before they exited the stairwell onto the third floor. They finished the ascent without further incident. Jack reached for the door lever, but Lucy grabbed his hand midflight.
“Remember, this door might open directly into the penthouse,” she said. “When we go in, we have to be ready to boogie.”
“I’ll go first,” he said. “You cover me.”
Lucy hesitated.
“Listen,” he said, gesturing toward her abdomen. “You’ve got to make it out of here. It was dumb for you to come on this little adventure. I mean, I get why you did it, but it was still dumb.”
He hugged her quickly.
“Let’s get it on,” she said.
He held the lantern up over his head and studied the doorframe.
“Door swings in,” he said, gesturing toward the lack of hinges on this side of the door. “Small miracles.”
They waited a few minutes. Enough time for the man to make a quick round trip.
Jack rapped sharply on the door three times.
She held her breath.
The door o
pened.
Jack fired four times directly into the chest of the poor bastard unlucky enough to open the door. He barreled into the room, wrapping his arm around the bullet-ridden body and careening to the ground. He kicked his way free of the body and opened fire again to his left. Then, keeping low, he rolled across the corridor and took cover behind a large island counter separating the entrance foyer from a galley kitchen.
Lucy stole a peek down the weak side corridor to her right. Fortunately, the corridor ended just a few steps on the other side. It was a dead end, terminating at the penthouse’s exterior wall, meaning they would only have to fight this insane battle on one front.
“Lucy, now!”
She barrel-rolled across the narrow hallway and scampered around to the safety of the island as Jack continued to return fire. Lucy crept around to the far side of the long counter and risked a peek while the shooters focused on Jack’s latest fusillade. The corridor ran about twenty feet long and opened up on a large living area. There was no way to make it down the hallway without being cut to pieces.
There was a second hallway behind Lucy’s position, running perpendicular to the main corridor, and bracketing the far side of the kitchen. It ran away from them into darkness. There appeared to be no activity on that side of the penthouse.
“Keep them busy,” she told Jack.
He flashed her a quick thumbs-up, trusting her judgment. Staying low, on her hands and knees, she crawled out from her hiding spot, exposing herself for a brief moment. But the shooters were still focused on Jack. She ducked back out of range and down the far corridor. The hallway led to another wing of the penthouse; she counted three bedrooms here. It was quiet and appeared devoid of activity.
Jack’s battle raged on. She needed to come up with something soon, as his ammunition would not last forever. Their opponents would wait a bit before making a move on him, but they wouldn’t wait forever. She had five minutes to make something of this at most. She climbed to her feet, her heart pounding, the gun trembling just so. Two of the doors were open. The third one in the center was closed.
She touched her hand to the knobs of the two open doors. They were cool to the touch. She touched the knob on the closed door. It was warm and slick to the touch. Someone had just opened this door. She dove for the floor just as the door opened and a barrage of gunfire erupted; the rounds went right over her head. She returned fire, catching the unseen assailant in the legs. He fell to the ground, writhing in pain and howling. She fired once more into his head, and he went silent.
The master bedroom.
A lantern burned atop the chest of drawers, giving her a decent look at the massive room. A fireplace anchored one end of it. An extremely large television was still mounted on one wall. There was a small bookcase built into the opposite wall. A sliding glass door on the far side of the bed opened up onto a balcony. She slid the door open and stepped outside. It wrapped around the entire perimeter of the penthouse. She moved silently down the balcony, carefully negotiating the corner, and following it back down the east side of the building. It led her directly to the far side of the room where the remaining attackers had hunkered down. Down below, half a dozen fires continued to burn thanks to Jack’s handiwork.
She had outflanked them.
There were three of them, each hiding behind one piece of furniture or another. The one in the middle drew her eye; her stomach fluttered. It was Simon. Excitement rippled through her. They might make it out of here after all. She checked her weapon. She had five more rounds left. Enough to take them all out.
Quietly, she crept to the sliding glass door and pulled it open, ready to face her destiny.
32
She took aim at the closest target and fired. The bullet struck him in the back; the other shooters were unloading their weapons down the hallway and did not notice the new fly in their ointment. That wouldn’t last long, however. Quickly, she took aim at the second man and fired again. This bullet missed, shattering a television screen over their heads and drawing their attention.
Shit.
She fired again. This round killed the second man, laying him flat on his back.
The surviving bandits now understood a new front had opened up behind them.
“Jack, now!” she screamed, hoping he would make a move in the lull.
A howl that could only be described as a war cry filled the penthouse. Jack was charging the hallway now. Simon and the other man abandoned their positions, making a beeline for a doorway in the corner of the living room. She gave chase as Jack fell in behind her.
“That door, that door!” she yelled.
Jack kicked the door open but paused before venturing any farther. He ducked his head quickly in and back out again.
“Another staircase,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.
“Roof?”
“Maybe,” he said. “Possibly a fire escape.”
Commotion back at the front door. Reinforcements, almost certainly. By now, the bodies they’d left in their wake would have been discovered. Footsteps down the hallway.
“Simon!”
They were pinned in.
“Hang on,” she said, looking around the room. She grabbed a vase that had survived the gunplay from the table and tossed it into the stairwell, waiting for a response. It shattered, filling the stairwell with a tinkling cacophony. But it quickly fell silent again.
“Nothing,” she said.
“They may be trying to escape,” she said. “They don’t know how many of us there are.”
He winked at her.
She poked her head into the stairwell. Empty.
She bolted up to the steps. Jack was hot on her heels. A sign reading Roof Access was mounted at the top of the steps.
“You cover me this time,” she said.
“Not a chance,” he replied.
They posted on either side of the door, plotting their next move. Down below, there was more commotion, but Lucy’s barrier was holding. The door cracked open, but not enough for anyone to squeeze through. Lucy fired a shot down the stairwell, pushing their pursuers back. The door slammed shut, leaving them alone for the moment.
“Only way out is through,” he said. He kicked the door open, blazing through his last few rounds as he did so.
She followed him, trying not to think about how insane all this was. Smoke from the fires had enveloped the rooftop in a hazy fog. Directly across from the door was a rooftop bar centered right in the middle of the roof.
The attack came from the left, a hard roundhouse right to Jack’s chin. It staggered him, but he quickly regained his bearings. A massive specimen of a man, Simon’s sole remaining guardian, drove his shoulder into Jack, taking both men to the ground.
With Jack occupying the big man, she focused her attention on finding Simon. The fires from the Jack’s bombing attack continued to burn, coloring the scene in a smoky orange. Visibility was poor and worsening by the minute.
“Simon!” she called out, keeping an eye on Jack’s tussle with the larger man.
Silence for a moment.
Then his voice, still familiar and recognizable after all this time.
“So it is you,” he replied from the smoky darkness. “Small world.”
She stepped carefully, keeping her gun up at the ready. The smoke was her friend now, keeping her concealed. She just needed one look, one glimpse of his perfectly chiseled face, and she could put an end to this. Around her, the sounds of Jack’s desperate struggle filled the night air. Grunts of pain and exertion.
“Never thought I would get this chance,” he said. “I’ve literally dreamed about it. Dreamed about peeling the skin from your body. And then your friend here mentioned you losing your daughter. I remember when you told me that back in Arlington. Weird how certain things just stick with you.”
“Come and get me, you asshole.”
A deep, bellowing scream filled the air; its tone was strange, like the sound of a car passing by.
“I
got’em, Luce!” Jack called out. “You hear that, Simon? Your buddy just took a dive off the edge. You’re all alone.”
Silence fell over the rooftop again. The smoke continued to thicken. Lucy had drifted near the large HVAC system that lay dormant like a sleeping beast. She poked her head around the edge, looking for movement in the swirl of smoke. She made a complete loop of the large duct feeding into the building.
She was back near the long bar top, unable to see more than a few inches in front of her face. A flash of movement back near the ductwork caught her eye, and she hesitated. She did not want to hit Jack. She tracked the movement, trying to identify it, before it disappeared back into the smoke. She eased up her pressure on the trigger of her gun.
The cat-and-mouse game continued for another minute; then she heard a loud thwack, followed by the sound of a heavy load hitting the floor. Either Jack had gotten Simon, or vice versa. She held her breath.
“Jack?”
Silence.
“Jack?” she called out again.
Nothing.
She struggled to keep her focus on Simon while dread about Jack’s fate poured into her like concrete, threatening to paralyze her. She stayed low, under the line of the bar. Her knees cracked and popped as she crab-walked along the wooden paneling. Near its edge, she stumbled over something. It was Jack, down for the count, lying on his side. He was breathing, but he was not conscious. She would have to leave him for now.
It was just her and Simon now.
It had all come down to this.
Months under his boot. She was so close to throwing off the Haven’s yoke. Already, the Haven lay in ruins below them. This could be the death blow.
Careful now. Don’t blow it right at the goal line.
She curled back around the front of the bar, the HVAC system now to her right. She moved slowly, praying she had at least one more round in her weapon. In the chaotic fracas of the last few minutes, she had lost count. Her breathing was shallow and ragged. It was hard to hear anything over the din from the ground level as the Haven residents struggled with the multiple fires burning.
American Midnight | Book 2 | Nightfall Page 24