“I’m Stride,” he said. “Don’t move. Stay right here.”
“There was blood,” she murmured.
“What?”
“On his hands.”
Stride swore. He risked a glance through the windows of the truck and didn’t see anyone. The people in the lot had disappeared, as if they had been lifted off the planet, some hiding in the rows of cars, others heading for the Boulder Strip. There was still a sea of potential hostages.
“Stay here,” he told her again.
He slipped between the cars and darted across the open row without drawing fire. He recognized the red Caprice in front of him as a Metro undercover vehicle, and he rose up high enough to look inside. A body was slumped in back, half off the seat onto the floor of the car. Stride pulled the door open, and blood dripped out, puddling on the ground and staining his pants. He grabbed the man’s wrist, feeling for a pulse, but there was nothing.
Stride backed away. He heard footsteps behind him, running for the opposite side of the lot. When he twisted around, he caught a glimpse of Serena, just as another series of gunshots exploded from the rear of the lot. He watched her dive behind the cars and saw sparks as the bullets bounced on metal.
“Serena!” he screamed.
There was an excruciating pause. “I’m okay, I’m okay!” she shouted back.
Stride felt his heart start beating again. He ran to the next car in the row and rose up behind the hood in firing position. He spotted Blake three rows away and got off two shots before the man ducked under cover. His bullets took out the windshield of a Cadillac.
Sawhill would chew out his ass for that.
He moved again, using a minivan for cover. When he tried to cross the next row, Blake spotted him, and another flood of bullets chased him across the open space of pavement. Just as he reached safety, he felt a stinging pain in his chest and looked down to see a two-inch tear in his shirt that was oozing red. He tore his shirt open and concluded that he hadn’t been shot, just cut by a metal fragment ricocheted off one of the cars. Even so, it hurt like hell.
He heard the muffled chiming of his cell phone in his pocket. He retrieved it and heard Serena’s voice. She was whispering.
“Are you all right?”
“Slightly damaged, but nothing serious,” Stride said.
“Backup’s on its way. We should have ten cars here in two minutes. If we can keep him pinned down, we can surround him.”
“We’ve also got a shitload of civilians.” Stride listened to the silence and didn’t like it. “Can you get over to Claire?”
“I think so.”
“Do it I’ll cover you. Then stay with her. I don’t want this guy doubling back on us.”
Stride scooted to the end of the Grand Am he was crouching behind. He came up in firing position, wincing as the skin on his chest tore further. He balanced his elbows on the trunk of the car. Behind him, he heard Serena running across the middle lane, and he saw a flash of movement a few rows ahead of him. He couldn’t tell if it was Blake, so he fired high in the air. The person went down again.
Serena shouted, “Clear!”
Stride ran, dodging between the cars, his body bent over as he sped through three rows. Blake couldn’t be far away.
Blake was low on ammunition, and he could hear sirens in the distance. Lots of sirens. In another minute, the Limelight would be overrun with police, and even though he knew he could escape in the confusion, it would be ugly and violent.
He saw the female detective, Serena, bolt for the opposite side of the lot, where Claire was hiding. Stride gave her cover. Blake didn’t have a shot, and he knew tonight’s plan was a bust. Claire was out of reach.
Time to fold.
He heard running footfalls and knew Stride was making his move, creeping closer.
Blake silently slipped back into the last row, where his brown sedan was waiting. He came upon a couple huddled by the side of a Toyota RAV4. The woman, overweight with curly black hair, stared at him and his gun with terrified eyes and buried her face in her husband’s chest. The man put on a brave face, staring angrily back. He had a round face and a double chin.
“Not a sound,” Blake hissed. He extended his arm and pointed his SIG-Sauer into the man’s face.
The sirens were almost on top of them. The first police car fishtailed as it swerved into the parking lot. The people who had been hiding in the rows began running for the protection of the squad car.
Stride jumped when he heard another explosion, then realized it wasn’t a gunshot but a car backfiring. Two rows ahead, at the far back of the lot, a car engine roared to life. His heart lurched-he knew what it was.
He started to run again and saw a brown sedan leap the shallow landscaping that divided the lot from the Boulder Strip. He squatted, preparing to fire and aim for the car’s tires. Then he realized that the car’s dome light was on, and he could see two silhouettes inside. He couldn’t risk taking the shot.
“He’s got a hostage!”
The sedan headed north at extreme speed. Stride gave up on cover and sprinted for the highway. He waved his arms, flagging down three of the police cars converging on the casino, and pointed them toward the sedan. Its taillights were already disappearing as it weaved around the other traffic on the road.
The chase began.
Stride jogged back to the other end of the parking lot. Cordy was there, along with half a dozen uniformed officers and another two police cars that had blocked the exits. They were taking names and phone numbers from the people still lingering in the lot, but Stride knew the scene was blown. Most of the people had melted away.
He asked about Serena, and Cordy jerked his thumb inside. The two women were back in the casino, well away from the shattered window, with several armed police officers standing watch around them. Claire had both arms around Serena and her head on Serena’s shoulder.
He came up to them. Serena pointed at his chest. “You need a doctor.”
“It’s nothing. A Band-Aid, that’s all.”
“What about your legs?”
Stride studied the splashes of red on his pants and frowned. “Not my blood.”
“Blake?” Serena asked.
Claire looked up, expectant, waiting for his answer. “Did you get him?”
Stride shook his head.
Wearing a baseball cap, a Running Rebels T-shirt, and gym shorts, Blake strolled out of the Limelight parking lot No one tried to stop him. His other clothes were stuffed into the backseat of a Mustang convertible. He waited for the traffic to clear before crossing the highway and scanning the streets for a cab.
He could still vaguely hear the distant sirens. They’d be catching the brown sedan soon, running it off the road. He hoped the round-faced man and his overweight wife would be smart enough to keep their hands in the air and not draw fire.
It had been easy-hand the man his keys, tell him to drive as fast as he could and not stop for at least ten minutes. He also told them there was a bomb in the trunk that he could detonate by cell phone if they stopped early for the police. Complete nonsense, but people will believe anything when there’s a gun in their face and someone is giving them a chance to stay alive.
So off they went.
He could have driven the sedan himself, but he put the odds of surviving the chase at no better than fifty-fifty.
Not good enough. He still had work to do.
THIRTY-FOUR
Stride lay naked on their bed. The ceiling fan spun above him, circulating the stifling air that crept in through the open window. It was three in the morning. They had finally come home from the crime scene at the Limelight to find the power out in their town home. The bedroom was pitch black and hot as he lay there, eyes open, seeing nothing.