I focus on my breathing for a moment to compose myself.
Yet again, someone has taken the time to find a new way of pissing me off. The door keeping my Inner Satan at bay was blown off its hinges with the school bus full of kids. Now, Pellaggio has just walked inside and slapped him across the face.
Enough is enough.
“Okay, here’s what’s going to happen. Your official methods got us this far, and it’s been a great team effort to figure out where this bastard was hiding. But I only stick with a plan until it gets me blown up. Now, we do things my way.”
“Adrian,” Johnson begins. “This is still an FBI invest—”
“I’m not asking,” I say, interrupting him. “I’m gonna get out of this water, hunt that sonofabitch down and put a bullet in his fucking head. That’s what’s going to happen next. Whether I end up in prison afterward or not when all this is over is up to you. But I’m done playing nice.”
Johnson looks over at Chambers, as if expecting her to back him up, but she’s too busy trying to control her breathing and deal with the shock, and she simply shakes her head.
I swim over to the edge of the pier, where there’s some rope netting tied to one of the wooden struts. I pull myself up and climb slowly back to the pier. I look down to make sure they’re both behind me.
I reach up and place both hands flat on the pier. With a final push of my legs, I heave myself up and over, resting on all fours. I need a minute to catch my breath.
I’m getting too old for this shit…
I look behind me at what’s left of the warehouse. The blast has blown the roof almost completely off, as well as most of the wall that’s facing the Bay. Debris is scattered everywhere and the heat coming from the building is intense.
I look back up the pier, to see if there’s been any collateral damage to neighboring buildings. That empty white van is still parked outside the next warehouse over.
Wait a minute…
It’s not empty. There’s a head poking out of the passenger side window, staring at me. I can’t quite make out the exact features, because of all the smoke around, but I can see the smile on their face. It’s a sick, evil smile.
Danny Pellaggio.
15
“Hey!” I shout, scrambling to my feet and running toward the van. I reach behind me to draw a Beretta. “Pellaggio, you piece of shit!”
He laughs as he disappears back inside the van. It quickly speeds off; its tires screeching as people who have gathered at the far end of the pier, near the entrance, scatter to avoid getting ran over.
“Fuck!”
Chambers and Johnson appear next to me, confused.
“That was him,” I say, setting off running back to our sedan.
“Pellaggio?” asks Chambers.
“Come on! I’m not letting him go now!”
We all run back to our car. I jump into the passenger side. I much prefer shooting than driving. Johnson takes the wheel and Chambers clambers into the back seat behind me. We shoot off in pursuit, following them up The Embarcadero and left on Lombard Street. Johnson hits the sirens. I lean out the window, yelling and gesturing at people on the sidewalk and crossing the street to move out of the way, as we speed past. Behind me, I can hear Chambers on her phone, calling for back up.
“See if we can get close enough to ID the plates,” she shouts to Johnson.
“Doing my best,” he replies tersely as he navigates the busy streets at high speed.
The van is a few cars in front of us.
“Adrian, did you get a look at him?” she asks, her hand covering the mouthpiece of the phone.
“I didn’t get a good look,” I shout back. “But I know it was him.”
Johnson moves sharply to the left, narrowly fitting into a gap in the outside lane, causing the nearby drivers to beep their horns.
“Jesus, Johnson! Who taught you how to drive?” I ask.
He sighs. “Just trying to get you near enough to shoot the bastard, alright?” He throws me a sideways glance and I can see he’s not happy about it, but knows what has to be done. I nod in acknowledgement.
“We’ve got another thing to consider,” I say over my left shoulder to Chambers. “Pellaggio was in the passenger side.”
“Shit,” she says, realizing what I mean. “So who’s driving?”
“Hang on, I’ll go ask,” I reply, with sarcastic frustration.
We’ve gained a few places thanks to Johnson’s adventurous driving, and we’re only a couple of cars behind the van. We’re driving through the Russian Hill district, and we’re gaining ground on Pellaggio as we hit the 101.
“You’ve almost got him,” I say to Johnson.
The van is just ahead, but he’s goes through a red light causing two cars coming across us at the junction to crash. Johnson just manages to swerve and avoid the collision, but we fall behind again — stuck behind a car that’s slowing down to view the accident.
“Get out of the goddamn way!” yells Johnson, beeping his horn.
We manage to get through the congestion and back on the trail, but he’s way out in front. We converge on Richardson Avenue and follow the 101 as it becomes the Presidio Parkway.
“Christ, he’s heading for the bridge,” says Chambers. “If he gets on there, we won’t be able to stop him without causing complete chaos on the roads and endangering a whole lot of innocent people.”
I lean out the window again. We’re doing fifty, which is no mean feat in this much traffic. But we’re still not gaining enough ground to catch him.
It’s time for a more direct approach, I think.
“Line us up behind him,” I shout.
“What for?” asks Johnson. “There are seven cars between us!”
“Just do it!”
Johnson takes another tight gap and gets us in the same lane as Pellaggio, albeit some way back. With my Beretta in my right hand, I reach over with my left and grab the edge of the roof, pulling myself out of the window further, until I’m practically sitting on the doorframe.
“What are you doing?” yells Chambers from the back seat, but I ignore her. Mostly because I don’t have an answer she’ll want to hear.
I’m lucky, in that there are only cars in between us, so I have an unobstructed view of the larger, taller van.
Using my left hand to steady myself, I take aim with my gun and fire. The first bullet misses the mark, as does the second. But the third hits the wing mirror of the passenger door, which makes the van swerve sharply left. They fishtail back and forth, eventually regaining control, but we’ve been able to make up some ground and we’re now only one car behind them.
The back doors of the van fly open and I see him — Danny Pellaggio! He’s stands holding onto the roof with one hand, and holding an M4 Carbine assault rifle in the other, aiming directly at us.
Oh, shit…
I don’t remember anything about him from when I’d shot him a year ago. I didn’t know who he was, so paid no attention to which of the men he was that I shot or what he looked like. He was just another target back then. But now, as I look into his empty, brown eyes, I can see exactly who he is. He’s quite thin, almost gaunt, but wiry and with some muscle on his small frame. He’s wearing a dark gray jumpsuit and black boots. His skin is a light olive color, as you’d expect from someone with a Mediterranean background.
I look quickly ahead of us, seeing the tollbooth for the Golden Gate Bridge approaching fast. Then I look back at Pellaggio, but before I can aim my gun at him, he flashes me a wicked smile and opens fire.
“Look out!” I yell as I quickly duck back into the car, narrowly avoiding the hail of bullets that pepper our hood.
I crouch down as low as possible behind the dashboard. I look quickly back at Chambers — she’s flattened herself across the back seat. Johnson’s doing the best he can, but he has to keep looking where he’s driving, so can’t afford too much cover. I stick my arm out of the window and fire a few rounds blind, trying to deter Pellaggio from shooting, but don’t succeed.