He blinked and coughed blood when he saw me. He said, “Hatcher?” having difficulty getting the word out.
I looked at Hatcher’s body, looked back and shook my head.
“Get the hell out of here, Blake,” he said, closing his eyes.
I ignored him, busying myself with reaching inside the thin man’s jacket. My fingers closed around a leather ID case. There was no time to examine it, so I slid it into my pocket. I looked up at the window with its single neat bullet hole. I heard more shots from outside, but not from a rifle. A pistol this time, maybe more than one. I looked back at the hallway. The shadows of flames danced along the wall. The middle door had to be the master bedroom, the one Hatcher had talked about.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Don’t be. You need a tissue, asshole?”
“No,” I said. “I’m sorry because this is going to hurt like a son of a bitch.”
I grabbed Castle under the armpits and dragged, knowing I was stretching his wound as I pulled him across the floor, keeping low and out of line of sight of the window. He kept screaming at me to leave him until I reached the door; then he passed out.
The corridor was ablaze, the flames having advanced to within a couple of feet of us. Beyond was an inferno. I dropped Castle long enough to touch the handle of the middle door; it felt cold. I got the door open. The flames behind us lit up a large bedroom that might well have been the last area of the house untouched by fire. Directly across from us was a boarded-up French door. It had to lead out to the deck Hatcher had mentioned. I dragged Castle into the room, one leg of his suit catching fire as the flames reached us, and slammed the door shut to give us another minute or so. I kicked out the flames on Castle’s leg and made for the boarded-up door. Three good tugs ripped the board loose from its screws and now the door handle was accessible. Locked, of course. I picked up a small armchair by the window in both hands and swung it. It splintered into firewood against the double-glazed door.
I heard a crackling behind me as the varnish on the bedroom door began to bubble and peel. Reaching into my shoulder holster, I drew my Beretta and fired six rounds in a wide circle as I walked back toward the glass door. Six neat holes appeared in the double glazing, but it held. I kicked the middle of the circle and both panes of glass gave way. The cold night air flooded into the room like the breath of an angel. I ran back to where Castle lay, grabbed him under the arms, and started dragging him toward the outside world.
47
The big house on the lake was dying.
The heat on Banner’s face was uncomfortable even twenty yards distant from the house. The blaze vaporized the rain above and around it, creating a fog that drifted out from the building. God only knew how much more quickly the building would have burned without the rain. The scene reminded her of a painting of hell she’d seen years before, in the Louvre on her honeymoon. Watching the flames dance in every window, the intermittent explosions of glass and metal, it seemed difficult to believe she’d ever see Castle or Blake again. And then, of course, there was the danger outside.
Banner tore her eyes from the flames to take in the surrounding area. It wasn’t easy; the incandescence of the blaze made everything surrounding it darker. The personnel who’d been inside the house were all outside. The ones who’d made it, anyway. There hadn’t been a lot of time: The fire had begun and spread with a vicious enthusiasm. There were around forty agents forming an even semicircle around the entrance at the closest distance bearable. Banner guessed the tac teams were holding their positions around the perimeter. Not that it would do any good, because the perimeter had manifestly been breached. Banner was suddenly aware that the agents watching the blaze presented a target even easier than the crowds on Main Street earlier that day.
She unholstered her Glock and fired three quick shots in the air. That got everyone’s attention, reminded them of the other clear-and-present danger.
“People, we are in a shooting gallery right now,” she yelled. “Fall back to the trees.”
The agents surrounding the blaze snapped out of it, started moving quickly toward the greater shelter afforded by the woods. If Wardell was on this side of the building, he could pick any of them off any old time he wanted.
Where the hell is he? The question returned with renewed intensity as Banner reached the tree line and backed up against the trunk of one of the pines, watching the blaze. Wardell had slipped through the net, flushed them all out. Was he really going to wait around and see if Hatcher appeared before he made any kind of move? It was starting to look that way. But where would he be? How could he be sure of being in a position to see Hatcher? She scanned the faces of the agents around her, hoping Blake or Castle might be among them, that they’d found another way out, but to no avail. Not everybody had retreated as far as the trees. The mobile command center was still parked on the gravel driveway, thirty yards from the house’s front entrance. She could see a couple of men silhouetted in the vehicle’s cab; another had scaled the side and was crouched on the roof, probably doing the same thing she was: looking for a sign of life.
Something about that thought brought Banner up short. She pushed off the tree, at first walking briskly, then jogging, and then flat-out running toward the command center. She opened her mouth to address the man on the roof, and then she saw the muzzle flash as he fired into a room on the second floor.
“Son of a bitch,” she said to herself. Then “Drop your weapon” loud, as she leveled her own piece. The gunman didn’t miss a beat, didn’t even swing the rifle around to point it at her, the way she’d been half expecting. Instead, his left hand dropped from the barrel of the rifle, brushed his side, and came back up with a pistol. It looked impossibly instinctive, like breathing in and out.
Banner saw more muzzle flash even as she felt her own gun kick. She felt the slipstream as a bullet passed within an inch of the side of her face. She ducked and kept firing. There was a grunt of pain and the figure dropped to the roof and slid off on the opposite side. Banner kept the gun level, watching both ends of the command center as she moved toward it. They had him now; no way he could outrun—
That was when the second fire broke out. This one was in the cab, where she could still see the two agents. She ran for the door, gun still in her right hand, and tugged at the handle. It was locked. Two agents caught up with her and wasted another second trying the handle again.
“It’s locked. Wardell’s on the other side. Go!” she yelled, directing one of the agents. He looked confused, but only for a second, then moved away from the burning cab. Banner could see the two men inside writhing as the flames leapt around them. She could smell burning flesh and hair. The other agent punched through the side window, bare-fisted. The flames lit up his face, showing an expression of panic. He reached in and got the door open. Burning gasoline ran out over the sill like lava. Banner and the other agent leapt back. The man in the driver’s seat toppled out as the heat contracted the muscles in his body again, shifting his position. The burning body landed faceup on the grass. There was a dark entrance wound in the center of his forehead. Banner felt something almost like relief for the dead man.