Fortnoy and Millbray shouted with him even though they didn’t understand. Wasn’t Moses Grace in the building behind them? But there was no return gunfire.
No one hesitated. Nerves on hair triggers from the terror in the club made them scatter fast. Detective Millbray grabbed Savich’s arm. “Why do you think there’s a bomb there? Your wife and the police have been shooting up at that building. What’s happening, Savich?”
Savich heard the roar as his Porsche exploded into a ball of flame. There was an incredible concussion and a wave of heat that sucked up all the air. The power of the blast flung the dozen people closest outward, forcing them to the pavement or hurling them into one another. Savich heard screams, and a policeman yelling for everyone to stay down and remain calm. Savich, flanked by half a dozen cops, ran toward them. He fell to his knees in front of a young woman lying motionless on the sidewalk, and touched his fingertips to the pulse in her throat. Thank God, she was alive. He yelled for a paramedic. After an eerie moment of quiet, firemen started to rush toward the burning Porsche, some pulling their fire hoses, others pulling people to safety, carrying those who couldn’t walk. It was a nightmare landscape—the screams, the moans, the weeping, the roaring orange flames that gushed into the night air, the struggle to control panic and fear.
Savich whirled around, yelling Sherlock’s name. He’d seen her for only an instant when she ran toward him, looking up, firing her SIG. He saw her then. Her wool cap was gone, her hair streaming about her shoulders looking like it was on fire in the surreal glow of the orange flames. Then she was there, right in front of him, her face black, her heavy coat ripped. “I thought I saw him up in a window on the second floor. He was aiming down at you. Some of the cops went up there to look.”
She hugged him close, her hands patting him all over. “You all right?”
He nodded against her hair.
She pulled back, studied his face. “He blew up your Porsche. He wanted me to go out with it. Do you think he could have detonated it from that window up there?”
“We’ll find out soon.” For a moment, he couldn’t speak. It had been so very close. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you saw someone up there. It saved your life.” That actually sounded calm, he thought, as he stared down at the most important person in the world.
Then she grinned up at him, filthy and beautiful. “You were the psychic about the car bomb. Where do you think Moses went?”
“Millbray and Fortnoy have half the cops in Washington on it.”
After fifteen minutes of chaos, people began to sort themselves out, growing calmer once their loved ones were close and safe. Many simply left, grateful to be alive, afraid of more explosions. Paramedics went from group to group, leading the injured to waiting ambulances. Television cameras were everywhere, the spectacular footage of the explosion’s aftermath already on the airwaves.
“Savich!”
Savich looked up to see Ben Raven running toward them, Callie Markham behind him, her coat flapping around her boots. “I’m here with Sherlock. We’re okay.”
Ben was panting, sweat running down his face. “All right. Good. What an unholy mess. I just put a man, probably with internal injuries, into an ambulance. A kid, here to check out the scene, got hit in the head with a piece of metal. I think he’ll be okay. Damn, Savich, your Porsche. Your beautiful Porsche.”
“You sound like you’ve just lost your best friend,” Callie said and punched him in the arm. “Get a grip here, Ben, it’s only a car. What’s important is that Dillon and Sherlock are okay. I’ve never seen anything like this, but the cops are dealing. It’s amazing how well they’re dealing.”
“But I never got to drive it.”
Savich said, “Moses Grace and Claudia might still be close by, but I doubt it. Too risky. He had to be close enough to set up the Porsche, and Sherlock spotted him up in that window. He must have picked the moment to drop the bomb in the car and walked away, not that difficult with all the people milling about. He must have been waiting for me to walk back to it. Until Sherlock spotted him.” It hit him again, a cold shot to the gut. He looked at Sherlock, pulled her so tight against him she couldn’t breathe. Her coat was still warm, and her hair smelled like dirty smoke.
“I’m all right,” she whispered. “Really, I’m okay.” She relaxed against him, stroked her hands up and down his back.
“I’m an idiot. We shouldn’t ever have come here. You were right, it was a setup. If you hadn’t seen Moses and run toward me, you would have been killed, you and those cops with you.”
Ben and Callie looked at each other. Slowly, Callie pulled out her tape recorder and began speaking into it quietly.
“Please, Callie, off the record,” Dillon said.
He watched her until she nodded and turned off the recorder.
Savich turned to look at the smoldering ruins of his Porsche, his pride and joy since his dad had given it to him on his twenty-first birthday. Now it was nothing but twisted metal and black smoke. He saw a plate-size chunk of red metal sitting askew at the edge of the sidewalk.
“I’m sorry about your Porsche, Dillon.”
“Don’t be an idiot.” Savich pulled her close to him. He felt something wet under his right hand, and his heart dropped to his feet.
“Sherlock, what’s wrong, what’s—”
“Oh dear,” she whispered, swallowing hard. “I guess maybe I didn’t clear the minefield.”
Savich jerked off her coat, saw blood staining her right arm.
Savich picked up his wife and carried her to the paramedics, who were packing their medical supplies away in the back of an open ambulance. John Edsel, not a day over twenty-five, tall and buff as a surfer, immediately snapped to. “Hey, what’s this? Hold on, Gus, we got more business.” John motioned for Savich to ease Sherlock down on a gurney. He lifted her legs.
“No, please, Dillon, let me sit up. The last thing I want is to be flat on my back.”
Savich sat her on the edge of the gurney, held her against him as he spoke to the paramedic. Edsel nodded. “Agent, you’re going to have to let her go. Take two steps back, that’s all the room I need. Let me take a look. You said she’s been wounded in this arm before?”
Savich nodded. “Yeah, a knife wound a few years back when she didn’t move fast enough.”
“Why didn’t you move fast enough?” John asked her as he cut away her sweater to see the wound. Sherlock knew he was trying to distract her, but sudden throbbing pain hit her so hard she nearly passed out. She’d forgotten how pain like this could slam down like a hammer on bone. She tried to keep focused on the present. “I guess I didn’t work out enough so I was slow. Dillon was really angry, took it out on me at the gym when I was well enough, worked me so hard I sweated off my eyebrows. Now I’
m so strong I could lift that ambulance. Don’t worry, I’m not going to pass out.”
“Oh I see, you’re an FBI agent, too. You guys sure lead exciting lives. Was that your Porsche that got blown up? Okay, this isn’t too bad, Agent, your coat really protected you. Whatever hit you wasn’t flying too fast. You’re going to need a couple of stitches. Let’s get you to the hospital.”
John paused to look over at the twisted, smoking ruin. “A real pity about your Porsche. Okay, you ready to lie down, Agent?” John turned her on the gurney and helped her to lie down, but he was looking over at the Porsche carcass, shaking his head.
CHAPTER 32
WASHINGTON, D.C. LATE FRIDAY NIGHT