He leaned forward. “Now that’s interesting. What do you mean, disguise?”
She described the woman and the boy.
Pat said, “I think I’ve seen her around. Kind of spooky looking?”
“That’s her. But when she bought the truck, she was dressed up. Dress, heels. She wore a wig. And the boy was with her.”
Pat said, “Tell you what. I’ll talk to my pal at Yavapai County and see what he can find out.” He stood up. “Later, though. Right now I have to see a man about an assault and battery.”
MAX HAD TWO cars to choose from. Sam P.’s vintage Cadillac, parked out front with a “4Sale” sign in the window, or Luther’s ride, an ancient Saturn. Max chose the Saturn. It wouldn’t attract attention like Sam P.’s car would. He’d come out through the kitchen door, which opened out onto a carport with four bays separated by spindly posts. Across the carport, he heard a washing machine running inside the storage room attached on the opposite side. The Saturn was closest to the storeroom. He stood by the driver’s side, sorting keys.
That was when he heard a car engine. Loud, muscular—Corey’s Chevelle SS.
Max crouched down behind the hood of the Saturn, close to the back wall of the carport. He pulled the 9 mm from behind his back and checked it. Just in case.
The muscle car pulled into the bay closest to the kitchen door on the opposite side, engine reverberating. Max duckwalked around to the Saturn’s passenger side, keeping low. He expected Corey to get out and go into the house through the kitchen door. When Corey was inside, he’d take off in the Saturn.
Corey let the Chevelle roar one more time before shutting down. Max eased up and peered through the windows of the Saturn as Corey’s driver’s side opened.
After that, it all went to hell.
Corey must have caught sight of him through the car windows, because he whirled and stared across the roofs of the Chevelle and Saturn. For a second Max froze (his mind screaming, move-move-move!) but everything stood still, and although he had the gun leveled across the roof in a two-handed grip, he could barely feel the trigger guard. He might have yelled “Freeze!” but he wasn’t sure because his throat felt locked up and there didn’t seem to be any sound. But his finger must have moved of its own volition—he realized he’d fired over the roof of the Saturn—and everything abruptly exploded in dust and noise. With the gun’s kick, adrenaline took over, cascading down through his chest. He kept his finger on the trigger and shot half the magazine.
Corey ducked, then popped up and shot across the car so quickly that Max felt the bullet zip by his ear before he heard the sound. His reflexes were slower—it took him almost a second to get down, the sting to his ear a shock. He clapped his hand to his head. No blood. Still amazed at how quickly Corey reacted—was still reacting, because suddenly a hole blasted through the passenger window of the Saturn above him, glass flying.
Choices: get into the storeroom and close the door, crawl under the car, or shoot back through the window. He shot through the window. Indiscriminately.
Blind.
Corey screamed.
Max heard a bang and a thump.
Max didn’t wait to see if Corey was hit or faking. He was running on pure instinct now, and that instinct was screaming for him to get away. He threw himself headfirst into the storage room and scrambled behind the wood frame. And that was when his brain hit the slow-motion button. He flashed on a hot afternoon eating Sonoran hot dogs in a Tucson eatery with a cop who had worked with him on a picture, the cop saying that if you were in a firefight you looked for three things: cover, concealment, and an escape route. The flimsy plywood of the storeroom would offer no such cover, but it would conceal him.
Close enough.
He crouched by the edge of the door. The cop had also told him always to stay low when hiding. Most people emptied their weapons at the face or the upper body.
The last thing the cop had told him: shoot first, and shoot to kill. Max followed that advice, shooting at the cars, a good three or four shots. Had to resist emptying the weapon from pure adrenaline overload.
Then he got down again.
Nothing.
Nothing since the scream.
Had he killed Corey? Was Corey lying out there dead, or injured? Max remained in place. It was unbearable in here. The washing machine ground on. Wished he could stop it, wished he could listen to the silence. For the sound of movement. But with the washing machine he could hear nothing.
Wait. Tried to get his mind to work, and finally was able to go through the possible scenarios. Corey could be wounded. Or dead. The neighbors could be calling the police even now. He listened for sirens, but heard nothing but the damn washing machine cycling on and on.
Corey could be playing dead, waiting for him. When Max was a kid, they had a cat like that. The cat would sit near a ground squirrel hole. Just sat back and waited. Eventually, the ground squirrel would get curious and pop its head out—and then, snap!
Max didn’t want to be like the ground squirrel. So he waited.
The washing machine finally stopped.
The heat was unbearable.
He was dripping with sweat.
He listened.
Finally, he got down on his stomach and inched along the storeroom floor. Craned his head around the door frame.
Nothing.
The place felt empty.
The only sound was the tick of the Chevelle’s cooling engine. Glass littered the carport’s concrete surface.
If he moved forward, he would crunch on the glass or at least scrape on it and give himself away.
And so he withdrew, back into the storeroom.
Gun in both hands.
Shaking with adrenaline.
A HALF HOUR went by, maybe more. Max was beginning to relax, and he knew that wasn’t good. He’d been around enough cops, taken enough courses to know he shouldn’t take anything for granted. He’d done the Citizen’s Academy, the FBI course, a slew of them, just to get a feel for his character in Gawker—had been around them long enough to know that you had to remain alert and plan for trouble.
Corey might be dead. Or perhaps he’d made it inside the house. Maybe he’d found Luther and Sam and gotten them out of the bomb shelter…
No movement. No sound.
Max could call and get help; he had both Luther’s and Sam P.’s phones. The sheriff’s deputy—she might come. His mind stuttered again, and stuck on the vision of the deputy setting her fingers on the place mat. Something about that small movement got to him. That was the moment he thought about, not her mental gymnastics and encyclopedic memory. Not even the way she’d handled those guys in the limo.
He could call 911.
But what if Corey was dead? Max knew he’d be arrested. Even if it was self-defense, he’d still end up in jail—at least until they sorted it out. He could see the headline now.
Max sat cross-legged on the floor of the storeroom, weapon still in both hands, resting on his lap. Tried to decide. Sometimes his mind just wouldn’t cooperate, and he’d be frozen, unable to do anything at all. Another parting gift from Gordon White Eagle—
The son of a bitch.
Max heard a scrape. He held tight to his gun and peered around the door.
The man in the shower cap and pink sunglasses stood back a couple of paces, close to the Saturn. He grinned. Max noticed he had few teeth. “What do you want?” Max asked him.
The man pointed to the car tires.
Max slithered out a little farther, so he was level with the floor, and stared at the tires. He could see all the way to the kitchen door.
Were those legs? They were legs, attired in jeans and desert boots, stretched out on the ground near the kitchen door. The rest of the body was hidden by the Chevelle’s tires.