The Protector (2003) (25 page)

"Nice catch," Cavanaugh said.

After setting down the pistol, Jamie picked up the magazine and inspected the holes on the side that showed how many rounds were in it. "Seems to be full, but you never know until you check, right?"

"Right," Cavanaugh said. "It can be downright embarrassing if you assume an unfamiliar pistol has a full magazine and it turns out you're a round short when you absolutely need it." Jamie thumbed every round from the magazine, counting. "Eight," she said, confirming that for the model 225 the magazine had indeed been fully loaded. Some other types of 9-mm pistols held more ammunition, but their consequently large grips made them impractical as concealed carry weapons. In addition, pistols with a large magazine tended not to fit the average-sized hands of most shooters, making aiming difficult. "Careful you don't break a fingernail."

Giving him a caustic look, Jamie reinserted the rounds into the magazine, verifying that the spring in the magazine was functional. Then she picked up the handgun and pulled the slide fully back to eject the round in the chamber. She tested the slide several times to make sure it moved freely. "Could use a little Break-free," she said, referring to a type of pistol lubricant/cleaner.

"It ought to," Cavanaugh said. "It's been in that safe-deposit box for five years."

"The family that cleans firearms together stays together."

Jamie shoved the magazine into the Sig's grip, racked a round into the firing chamber, and pressed the decocking lever on the side. That meant there were now seven rounds in the magazine. To make up the difference, she released the magazine, picked up the round that she'd earlier extracted from the firing chamber, pressed it into the magazine, and reinserted the magazine into the grip, giving the pistol its maximum capacity.

For a moment, Jamie looked as if she thought she was done, and that worried Cavanaugh, because she wasn't, but then she picked up the spare magazine from the pouch, stripped the rounds from it, said, "Eight," and thumbed them back into the magazine. "You'll notice that not only didn't I break a fingernail but at no time did my fingers leave my hands. Should I mention that we ought to get replacements for both magazines? After having been fully loaded for several years, their springs will have metal fatigue."

"An A-plus," Cavanaugh said.

Chapter 6.

"Let's go shopping."

"Great idea," Jamie said.

"You do the driving." Cavanaugh's shoulder still felt stiff.

"Where to?"

He showed her addresses and a map from the phone book. "A hardware store, an auto-supply place, and a gun shop."

"Fabulous."

At the hardware store, they bought duct tape, a hammer, a screwdriver, electrical wire, a toggle switch, gloves, coveralls, a section of plumber's tubing, and an assortment of screws and clamps.

"What's all this stuff for?" "A better mousetrap," Cavanaugh said.

At the auto-supply place, they bought an air filter, two fog lights, and four chamois cloths.

Studying the cloths, Jamie asked, "We're going to wash the car? No, that can't be right. The dirtier the car, the less noticeable."

In the gun shop, Cavanaugh took her to a rack of gun belts. "It has to look like an ordinary belt but be sturdy enough to support the weight of the pistol. The strongest kind has two leather strips sewn together, with the grain on one strip going in the opposite direction from the other. The belt should fit so the stem on the buckle goes into the second hole. Which one looks good to you?"

Jamie chose soft-looking black with a square buckle that looked silver. "Goes with the studs on my pearl earrings."

"And for an accessory"--Cavanaugh turned to the bearded clerk--"do you have any Kydex holsters?" He referred to the sturdy plastic material that his own holster was made of. He liked Kydex because it wasn't affected by rain or perspiration and because it was thin enough to be easily concealed. "What kind of pistol?" Cavanaugh told him.

"Nice." The clerk reached under a glass counter. "Here's a new model from Fist, Inc." Slightly shorter than the length of Jamie's hand, the nonreflective matte-black holster had an open top, allowing the pistol to be drawn quickly, and a tension screw at the side, which kept the pistol secure. "They call it the 'Dave Spaulding.'"

Cavanaugh recognized the name of one of the nation's best firearms instructors.

"Anything else?"

"Two magazines for the Sig," Jamie said, "and a cleaning kit."

"And a hundred and twenty rounds of MagSafe 9-millimeter," Cavanaugh added. This type of ammunition had an epoxy resin tip with shotgun pellets embedded in it. When the tip struck a target, the resin fractured and released the pellets. The destructive force was considerable, with the added advantage that the tip and its pellets wouldn't go through a target and hit a bystander. As in any good gun store, the clerk didn't ask why the customer needed so much of a type of ammunition that was never used in target practice.

Noticing fishing equipment in back, Cavanaugh told him, "I could also use a dozen lead sinkers."

Chapter 7.

At the motel, they unpacked the various purchases.

Surveying the objects on the bed, Jamie said, "Apart from the pistol equipment, none of this makes any sense to me."

"Where'd you put the scissors, needle, and fishing line?" Cavanaugh asked.

"In the first-aid kit. Don't tell me your stitches are coming loose."

Instead of answering, Cavanaugh took Jamie's blazer from a hanger at the back of the room. Puzzled, she watched him reverse the jacket so he could examine the lining along its right side.

"Hey," she objected as he used the scissors to cut the thread that attached the lining to the hem.

He took three lead sinkers and sewed them under the lining. Then he sewed one of the chamois cloths to the waist level of the lining. "Any bulges?"

"You could have been a tailor."

"I've got all kinds of skills you'd be surprised about."

After she put on the belt and the holster, Cavanaugh removed the magazine from the pistol, ejected the round in the firing chamber so there wouldn't be any accidents, and shoved the pistol into the holster.

Jamie put on the blazer.

He walked around her, assessing. "Good. I can't tell the pistol's there."

"Why did you alter the blazer?"

"Do you remember how I showed you to draw a pistol?"

"You made me practice often enough."

"Then I bet you can figure out the answer."

A patient sigh. "It's a good thing my Wellesley sorority sisters can't see me now." She flipped back the right side of the blazer and drew the pistol. As she raised it, her left hand joined her right, her thumbs over one another, pointing along the side of the barrel. Knees slightly bent for balance and leaning slightly forward, she aligned the sights, aiming at an imaginary target across the bedroom.

"Love your style," Cavanaugh said.

"The lead sinkers give the side of the blazer a little weight so it'll stay back when I flip it. The chamois cloth helps the blazer glide over the holster."

"Another A-plus." Cavanaugh picked up her windbreaker and began to modify that, as well. "I can do that."

"No, this is work I can manage with my injured shoulder. You have your own work."

Jamie eyed him suspiciously. "What work are you talking about?"

Chapter 8.

Wearing the gloves and coveralls they'd bought at the hardware store, Jamie sat behind the Taurus, attaching fog lamps to the back.

"If I could get down there and do that without pulling these stitches, I'd gladly take your place," Cavanaugh said.

"Somehow, you don't sound convincing. Fog lamps are supposed to be on the
front
. Why am I putting them here?"

"These aren't ordinary fog lamps. They're one-hundred-watt quartz halogens with a candlepower of four hundred and eighty thousand. We'll run the wires to a toggle switch we'll put on the dashboard. Once we get the lamps pointing up toward eye level, we can blind any driver coming after us."

He opened the hood and removed the air filter that had come with the Taurus. "The standard filter's okay, but this K and N improves pickup."

He used the plumber's tubing along with hose clamps to alter the intake system. "This'll get more air to the engine and add horsepower. I phoned a specialty car-parts store in Daytona Beach and ordered a high-speed computer chip to replace the one the car came with."

"Anything else we have to do?"

"Get heavy-duty shocks. Rig the ignition so we can start it easily if we don't have the key. But first, you have to crawl into the trunk," Cavanaugh said.

"What?"

"That wasn't a kinky proposal. We just need to get some measurements."

"Actually, doing it in the trunk sounds intriguing."

"Not with this shoulder."

"I wasn't planning to do it with your shoulder. What are the measurements for?"

"A half-inch plate of steel to stop bullets from going through the trunk and into the car."

Chapter 9.

"Hold still."

"Your hands are cold," Cavanaugh said.

"Quit complaining and relax. This'll be over before you know it."

"You never said
that
to me before. Reminds me of the teenaged girl in a sex-education class."

"Sex-education class?"

"Yeah, the teacher said, 'Don't ruin your life for fifteen minutes of pleasure,' and the teenaged girl asked, 'Fifteen minutes? How do you make it last that long?'"

"Stop moving," Jamie said. "There. How was that?"

"Didn't feel a thing."

"See? I'm getting good at this." Using sterilized scissors and tweezers, Jamie snipped and removed another stitch. "Looks clean. No sign of infection." She cut and took out another stitch. "You'll have a scar to add to your collection."

"Beauty marks."

After removing the final stitches, Jamie surveyed her work. "Damn, I'm good. The wound's still healing. Here's a bandage to remind you to be careful."

"Oh, I'll be careful." It had been ten days since the fire at the bunker. There had been many things to do, but mostly Cavanaugh had allowed himself to rest and heal, the effort testing his patience. Despite his banter with Jamie, which he felt he owed her, his mood had been dark. In his dreams and often while awake, he suffered vivid mental images of Roberto's bashed-in head, of Chad and Tracy being blown apart, of Duncan's bullet-mutilated face. He remembered gaping at Karen in her wheelchair, her hands clamped against her chest, her face contorted in the rigid aftermath of a death frenzy, the cause of which he was still powerless to explain. But this much Cavanaugh knew beyond question: Prescott was to blame.

"We're as organized as we're going to get. It's time to come back from the grave."

Chapter 10.

The sturdy black man rounded a curve and jogged faster along a straightaway through the suburban Washington park. He wasn't alone. At 6:30 a.m. other joggers were out preparing themselves for the day's stress. Because of a slight chill in the air, the man wore navy leggings and a sweatshirt. The white man who jogged up next to him wore a similar outfit, except the color was gray.

They passed bushes and trees and ducks in a pond. When it was obvious that the white man stayed next to him longer than was usual for a stranger, the black man looked over and almost broke his stride.

"Am I having a religious experience?" the black man asked. His name was John Rutherford. He'd been raised as a Southern Baptist. "Seeing visions? Receiving visitations from the dead?"

"Seeing's believing," Cavanaugh said.

"Yeah, but Thomas still doubted. He wasn't satisfied until he put his hand in the wound in Christ's side."

"I hate to disappoint you, but I don't know you well enough to let you get that familiar. Anyway, I don't have a wound in my side."

The almost-healed wound in Cavanaugh's shoulder ached from running on concrete, but by keeping the sway of his arms to a minimum, he avoided tearing it.

"I heard you were missing," Rutherford said. "Probably dead."