The Thrill of the Chase (Mystery & Adventure) (19 page)

Through the naked snarls of an oak tree's branches, I studied a window on the second floor of the hotel – a window I had picked out as potentially being number six. The curtains inside had been drawn, so I couldn't tell whether or not I had picked out the right room. I could have pulled up to get a closer look, but I didn't want to run the risk: if either Harris or Thawyer spotted me and got suspicious, the operation could be done for.

Roughly ten minutes later, a squad car cruised up behind my Anglia, crunching ice beneath its tires, and I leapt out of my car in a state of great impatience. Kevin Slyder climbed out of the passenger side of the car; an officer armed with a shotgun exited driver's side. Both wore Kevlar beneath their unbuttoned police coats.

"Sorry about the delay, Stikup," Slyder apologized, drawing his handgun from the holster at his hip. "You didn't give me much time to get a warrant together. Dempsey was beside himself."

I had been ready for action the moment I had seen the cop cars approaching in my rearview mirror, and I waved this apology away. "Yeah, yeah," I said impatiently. "Save the admissions of guilt for later. Let's just pull this bust. You did
get
the warrant, right?"

He held up a slip of yellow paper, so I unbuttoned the chest holster and led the way down the sidewalk. A squad of ten more officers met us at the front steps of the hotel – coming from the opposite direction – and I led the way inside.

The same four people were in the lobby as we thundered into the room, but their talking ceased the moment the front doors banged. A startled mother clutched her baby to her chest, and the two men conversing in the aisle hurried to get out of our way. Silence filled the room as we paraded in towards the receptionist station. The girl with whom I had spoken and an elderly man – perhaps the hotel's owner – were waiting behind the counter, watching us approach.

"Stay calm, folks," Slyder said loudly, addressing everyone in the room. "Stay calm and remain where you are." He directed two officers to remain stationed downstairs, and then nodded at me to begin the ascent to the second floor.

I led our troupe into the stairwell. We emerged in a decorated hall above the lobby – short with a low ceiling, lit with wall–mounted lamps and carpeted with Victorian rugs. A smell of cleanliness was in the air, and the very aura the place created was one of royal finery, the antithesis of the external décor.

Slyder and I led the way down the hall until we reached number six. The big police Chief banged a beefy hand on the door, rattling it on its hinges. "
Open up
!
Police
!"

When no one responded, I pushed past Slyder and slammed my shoulder into the door. The lock held, so instead I plugged it with two bullets. Wood splintered and I heard the high–pitched ring of metal as the bullet shredded the deadbolt on the other side.

Slyder kicked the door open, and his cops thundered past me into the room, weapons ready –

– and met no resistance but the curtains fluttering in the frigid breeze from the open window. The cops quickly dispersed into the suite, checking the closet and adjacent bathroom. Two officers even checked under the beds but I had already disproved that notion. The route the crooks had taken was immediately obvious.

Must have heard the commotion downstairs, saw us coming –

"They went out the window!" Slyder snapped, pounding a fist against his own thigh. "God
dammitt
, we're not losing them now!"

Chapter Nine

"Right you are, Chief," I said.

Shouldering past Officer Vadder, I swung my lower body out the window. There wasn't much purchase for my feet, save a rain drainage pipe that didn't feel quite secure. I took quick surveillance of my surroundings and propelled myself away from the wall. The alley floor rushed up at me, and I bent my knees to land in a crouch. It hurt like hell – even from a mere fifteen feet – but I bounced upright almost immediately.

The back way of the alley was blocked by a brick wall, although a dumpster provided a way up and over. However, the trash appeared undisturbed and there were no blemishes in the snow that coated it. In fact, countless sets of footprints led out the other way –

Swearing, I took off out the alley mouth, skirting a large patch of ice situated there. Once out of the small corridor, a whole plethora of new options presented themselves to me in the forms of buildings, restaurants, back ways, homes, streets, department stores, alleys, vehicles –

– and all of them were eliminated as I spotted fleeing figures to my right, headed down Clement's Bridge, shoving pedestrians aside as they went.

I took off, legs and arms pumping.

The man in the lead (head and shoulders above anyone else in the crowd, long red hair blowing out behind him) craned his neck to see if he and his companion were being pursued. He must have spotted me threading my way through the throng of Christmas shoppers, because he pointed backwards, shouting something to the other man – Thawyer. That individual turned to look, shouted something to Harris in return, and they flew with renewed effort.

I flashed past the parking lot where Mendoza's red sedan was still parked with barely enough time to notice the two police cruisers effectively barricading the exit –

The chase went down two blocks, then around a third. I had no time to check and see if Slyder or Vadder were following, but with Slyder's girth, I doubted he could have kept up.

People fell away in shock as the goons tore their way through the ranks of hapless bystanders, scattering their purchases in the snow. Shouts followed me as I followed
them
, breathing hard, muttering brief apologies to those folks whom I nearly bowled over.

Up ahead, I watched my quarries duck down a side street between a pet shop and an abandoned, graffiti–covered apartment complex. I grimaced at the pain in my cramping side and forced myself to speed up.

Slyder, where the hell
are
you?

I tore around the corner, following Harris and Thawyer's route and –

The blow from what could only be a two–by–four clocked me upside the head, showering my gaze with fireworks more brilliant than those from last Fourth of July. The blow was as effective as running into a clothesline. I sprawled backwards into the snow and my elbows hit the pavement hard. Snow instantly soaked through my coat, and blood trickled down the side of my face from a torn scalp. My vision flickered sickeningly and my body didn't seem to be responding to what commands my brain was giving.

I licked the blood from my split lip, gasping for breath. All I could see was the narrow strip of iron sky overhead, framed by the encroaching buildings.

I heard wood clatter as the broken board was discarded, and then a harsh voice muttering close to my ear. Hands grabbed me roughly by my shoulders and pulled me upright, shoving me painfully up against the brick wall of the pet shop, and I felt the nose of what was undoubtedly a gun jam into my ribs.

Suddenly I was sitting in a pile of snowy trash bags and the smell was fantastic; Harris must have deposited me there.

I blinked to clear the mist from my eyes. A blurry face framed by a shoulder–length tangle of red hair swam in and out of focus. The mouth, a lopsided gash across his gaunt face, was set in a grim line.

"How'd you find us?" Red–Hair demanded, pushing the gun painfully into my side.

I grinned, causing blood to dribble down my chin. "A little birdie told me," I heard myself say.

No one likes a smart–ass.

My jaw popped audibly with Harris' punch, but it was lost in the raucous the Philadelphia Orchestra was pounding out in my head – practice for their Broadway debut. The pain, however, was incredible, and I had to work my jaw to get it moving again.

Harris straightened me up again because I couldn't seem to do it myself, jamming my back against the cold brick again. "Who ratted us out?" he demanded, pushing the gun painfully into my guts. "That prick, Sheldon? The boss?"

"No – the dead lady's ghost," I said thickly, speaking through a jaw which didn't want to form words. "Paid me a visit last night to tell you to go to hell –"

"Shut the fuck up and answer the fucking
question
!" the other crook interjected, somewhere to my right – outside the ragged scarlet edges of my vision.

"Listen, man, I'm through playin'!" Harris warned.

"So am I."

I worked up a gob of saliva and blood and spat the mixture into his face. My aim was unerring, and the gob smacked him on the left cheek, splattering into his eye. His face went the shade of his hair as he dashed his sleeve across his cheek, and then he grabbed me roughly by the lapels of my trench coat, probably intending to do me some serious harm –

"Red, people are watching!" Thawyer hissed, still outside my line of sight. I caught a glimpse of him as he brushed past his fellow and hurried towards the mouth of the alley. "Hey –
get the fuck away
! Get out of here!"

Red smeared my blood from his face and barred his teeth at me, his misshapen nose dangerously close to mine. He had the gun at my temple now, jammed painfully into the bloody mess streaming from my scalp.

"Lissen, shithead, you better tell me what I goddamn want – and fast, or I'll –"

"Cops are here!" Thawyer shouted, his voice hitting a definite note of panic.

Thank God,
I thought.

Harris released me and whipped around. "
Shit
! Let's split, Fin!"

In the split second that my assailant looked away, I reached into my coat and pulled the gun from my chest holster. Now, as he turned back to me, I pointed it straight at his face, concentrating to keep my hand from trembling.

Harris' eyes found the nose of the 9mm, and he forced a grin. "You can't even see straight." But he had raised his hands in a non–threatening manner; his eyes were trained unerringly on the gaping mouth of the pistol. His own gun now dangled harmlessly on his trigger finger.

"
Red
!" Fin Thawyer yelled from the alley entrance.

Harris' bloodshot eyes rolled over to look back at the alley entrance, but he didn't move anything else. "Fin,
look
."

"Don't move or he gets it," I spat at Thawyer as he turned and saw the situation his companion was in. I pushed myself into a more upright position atop my garbage bag throne, the gun trained unerringly between Harris' widely set eyes. "One more step and I'll put both his goddamn eyes out, I swear –"

"You can't
see
right, man –" Red said again, frantically looking back and forth from me to the mouth of the alley where his companion waited anxiously in a cat–stance.

I arched an eyebrow at my captive. "Wanna find out?" In truth, I could see a lot better now, although my head was still pounding, spinning. However, the short distance between us made that weakness negligible.

"
Hold it right there! SPD!
"

Both Harris and I turned in time to see two officers slam into Fin from behind and manhandle the murderer into the far alley wall. The big man put up a ferocious struggle, but the two officers' combined strength was too much for him to cope with alone.

Harris chose that moment to act.

He bolted for the back of the alley in the second I had turned away. There wasn't a dumpster close enough to the wall to provide him access overtop, but there were several smaller trash cans and the lip of a windowsill that would serve just fine –

Assuming he could get there.

I forced myself upright, fighting off trash physically – waves of vertigo mentally – and raised my pistol to shoulder–height. The weapon leapt lightly in my gloved palm as I pulled the trigger; fire gouted from the nose.

Simultaneous with the sharp report, Red stumbled and fell, his gun flying away into a snow bank. He screamed in pain and writhed in the snow, clutching his right hamstring with both hands. Scarlet ribbons flecked the snow around him.

I spat a mixture of phlegm and blood onto the ground and stuffed the 9mm back into the chest holster. Nausea spitted my guts suddenly, and I was obliged to plant a hand against the wall to steady myself.

Across the way, the two officers had forced Thawyer's hands into cuffs and were currently restraining him by bodily forcing him against the wall. Beyond the alleyway, more cops were shooing away curious onlookers and creating a perimeter.

A thick hand fell onto my shoulder and spun me around. "That was one hell of a shot, Stikup," Kevin Slyder said, almost impressed. In the background, one of the officers reminded the enraged Thawyer of his right to remain silent, although he obviously didn't care to keep his mouth shut.

Swallowing a mouthful of bile, I ran my fingers tenderly over the massive bloody lump that underlay part of my scalp and right temple. I couldn't see it then, but my right eye was bruising over as well, bloodied by the runoff from my scalp.

"Only a few feet between us, Chief," I said weakly.

He shrugged. "One bullet, perfectly placed. As good a shot as any. Good hustle too, by the way."