Dead Run (12 page)

"That's on hold for a while. They're not there yet."

Bonar looked up. "What do you mean?"

"Just that. They haven't showed up, haven't called. They're two hours late."

Bonar's fingers froze over the buttons. "That doesn't sound like Sharon. That woman would be ten minutes early for her own execution."

"Apparently, it doesn't sound like Grace or Annie, either. Harley Davidson already called Green Bay a while ago, all hot and bothered."

Bonar pushed the disconnect button and just stood there a moment, lips pushed out almost as far as his gut, his thick brows coming down like a couple of furry blinds. "Do you have Davidson's number? Maybe Grace checked in with him since then. They're a pretty tight crew."

"No. But Magozzi can probably reach him." Halloran picked up the phone, thinking he hadn't made this many calls to the Minneapolis detective since the Monkeewrench case. Something about that gave him a bad feeling.

WHEN MAGOZZI saw the Wisconsin area code on his caller ID, he nearly put his thumb through the talk button answering it. He was more than a little disappointed to hear Halloran's voice on the other end instead of Grace's, but it was a call he was about to make himself anyhow-the Sheriff had just beat him to the punch.

When he hung up ten minutes later, he felt like an injured deer in a pack of wolves. Roadrunner and Harley had mobbed him during the conversation, straining to hear what Halloran was saying. He caught beer breath from Harley on one side and lime breath from Roadrunner on the other, which seemed peculiar, although nothing really surprised Magozzi anymore when it came to the odd man-child with the mind of a super-computer. For all he knew, the guy subsisted on an all-citrus diet. Gino was taking it all in from a big leather office chair, with Charlie at his feet, head lifted in rapt attention. It was the perfect portrait of a country gentleman and his loyal dog, sans the smoking jacket and hunt prints.

"Okay, Halloran just got off the phone with Green Bay before he called me, and they're still not there. But you probably already figured that out."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Harley said impatiently. "Jump to the good part where you asked if he could help us out and then you were really quiet for a long time."

"He's going to do what he can."

"Which is?" Roadrunner asked.

"He'll get out a statewide APB on the Rover ASAP, plus he's going to make some personal calls to the counties they'd drive through and ask for some extra pairs of eyes out on the roads looking. I guess they have a pretty tight Sheriffs' Association over there, and according to him, they all owe him favors." He stood up slowly, as if he didn't completely trust the ability of his legs to hold him, and looked at Gino. "You want to come along?"

"Give me a sec." Gino patted Charlie on the head, then pulled out his cell phone and pushed a single button. "Hey, Angela . . . Jesus, what's that noise? Oh, yeah? Well, it doesn't surprise me. I had that kid pegged as Satan's spawn years ago. Listen, the thing is, I'm probably not going to make it home tonight. You know that strip bar near Marshfield you never let me stop at? Hell, no, we're not going to bust them, we just want to watch, maybe get a lap dance or two. ... Of course we'll be careful, don't worry, Magozzi told me all the women are behind glass." Gino clicked off, ruffled Charlie's ears one last time, then pushed himself up out of the chair.

Roadrunner and Harley were staring at him. "You're going to a strip club inMarshfield?" Harley asked.

Gino rolled his eyes. "Christ, of course not. We're going to Wisconsin to find the ladies."

"Just like that?"

"Just like that."

Magozzi was already halfway to the door when Gino caught up to him. "I'm probably jumping the gun here, Gino."

"Probably."

"You talked to Angela earlier, right?"

"Yep. Called her after Roadrunner told me what was going on. Figured you'd want to head over there."

"What'd she say?"

"She wanted to know why we hadn't left yet."

Magozzi smiled. "I love Angela."

"Me, too."

"We don't even know which road they took."

Gino shrugged. "We're detectives. We'll figure it out."

Roadrunner and Harley were right behind them before they got to the elevator. "We can all go together in the rig," Harley said.

"Actually, we'll need the radio in the unmarked-" Gino started to say.

Harley slapped him good-naturedly on the shoulder and nearly knocked him down. "My friend, we got more communications in that rig than you've seen in your life, police band and any other band you can think of. You can call the goddamn space station if you want."

Gino raised his brows. "No shit?"

"No shit. Besides, the computers might come in handy."

Having all of them in the elevator at the same time was tight, and Gino looked worried. "You got a payload limit on this thing?"

"Damned if I know," Harley replied, and pushed the down button.

TWILIGHT HAD LEACHED the color from the town of Four Corners. It lay silent and still in the deepening shadows, like an old black-and-white photograph. The street was empty, the buildings were starting to disappear into their own darkness, and the silence was total.

Inside the little house behind the cafe, Annie turned the bathroom faucet a fraction of an inch and washed her hands under a trickle of water. They had to be careful, Grace had said. The pump had already kicked in once when they'd washed their hands after handling the dead dog, and the noise had sounded like an explosion in the unnatural quiet. If they used too much water, it could happen again. Annie frowned, remembering the long list of things Grace had warned them to be wary of-things Annie wouldn't have thought of in a million years.

She bent her head over the sink and pressed some cool water against her eyes. Damnit. After more than ten years of full-blown paranoia, every sense on high alert at all times, Grace had started to get a little better. Closing the books on the Atlanta horror had helped, so had her relationship with Magozzi, but all that progress had been erased in a few hours, as if it hadn't happened. The old Grace had settled in for another long stay.

It was almost fully dark already-time for them to leave the house-and they were each taking a turn in the bathroom while the other two watched the windows, front and back.But don't flush. Anddon't use the toilet paper roll. It's wooden and loose and might clatter. Take some sheets off the fresh roll on the back of the can.

Even Sharon had raised her brows at the thought process that pulled that little detail out of the murky realm of possibility. Grace wasn't leaving anything to chance anymore.

Annie could barely see herself in the tiny medicine-chest mirror, and she decided that was a good thing. She'd caught a glimpse earlier, before the woods had swallowed the sun, and had barely recognized her own reflection. It wasn't the grime on her face or the running mascara or even the disheveled hair, as much as that distressed her. What Annie had inside could shine through all things superficial- but there was something in her eyes that made her look like a stranger, something she hadn't seen there since her seventeenth birthday, on the night she'd discovered what knives could do.

When she was finished in the bathroom, she went to stand next to Sharon at the kitchen window. She wrinkled her nose at the faint odor coming from the pilot lights of the old-fashioned gas stove. "Your turn," she murmured.

Sharon nodded absently, still staring at the dark backyard and the black woods beyond. She looked a little brittle to Annie. "How long have we been in here?"

"About forty minutes. Too long, according to Grace."

"She's right. It's starting to feel safe."

"It isn't. Too easy to get trapped in here."

"I know." Sharon stepped away from the counter, then stopped and looked down at the old wavy linoleum beneath her feet. "When I was little-five or six, maybe-our barn caught fire one night, went up so fast there was no time to get the cows out. But the horses had an outside door of their own, always open, so they could run in and out and get away from the bugs. So the timbers were falling and the cows were bawling and starting to cook and you could look through the big open door into where the horses were all bunched together in the smoke and the flames, screaming, kicking at each other, looking right out the door they ran in and out of a hundred times a day."

Annie just stood there as Sharon walked away, looking out the window at the darkened backyard, at the clothesline over in the corner, at the zinnias someone had planted around the poles, feeling a little silly for watching for armed soldiers coming to kill her. Suddenly, it just seemed too surreal, and she could feel her mind slipping, telling her that this was simply too preposterous to be believed. Surely there wouldn't be soldiers in a place with zinnias and clotheslines, and even if there were, surely they wouldn't be bent on murder. They were panicking, jumping to conclusions, following Grace's paranoia when they were really perfectly safe here. .. .

And then she closed her eyes and saw a burning barn and wanted desperately to get out of the house.Right now.

Three minutes later, they were all huddled around the front door, peering through the glass panel at the top. There was nothing out there, just a hint of light at the top of the trees that towered around the town, advertising that somewhere beyond their view, the moon had risen. Apparently, it was high enough to start painting the shadow of the cafe on the grass between it and the house.

And then part of the shadow moved.

Grace froze, afraid to look away, afraid to blink, but everything was still. Maybe her eyes were tired, playing tricks, or maybe an errant breeze in this breathless air had moved a single leaf on a bush.

But Annie and Sharon had seen it, too. They were already moving toward the basement door, down the steps without a sound. Grace followed, turning on the top step and starting to close the door. Had it squeaked when they'd opened it? She couldn't remember.

Outside the house, two shadowy figures crept up to the front door and immediately dodged to either side, flattening their backs against the siding. A shower of loose paint chips crackled softly, then fluttered down to the cement stoop.

Grace froze at the top of the basement stairway, the door an inch from closing. In this too-quiet town where the absolute silence had been ruptured only intermittently-by gunfire and jeeps and soldiers unconcerned with making noise-the faint shussing she'd just heard outside was menacing in its subtlety. Seconds passed, almost a minute, but she heard nothing more. She released her breath slowly, then took another step down and closed the door behind her. The latch engaged with a soft click.

Outside on the front stoop, one head jerked, cocked an ear toward the door. His partner looked over at him and lifted his brows in a question.Did you hear something?

They both listened, eyes narrowed on each other, palms wet on their rifle grips. After a sixty-second count, they entered the house quietly, the muzzles of their rifles swinging in a deadly double arc.

Down in the basement, Sharon and Annie waited for Grace on either side of the wooden door that led up the back concrete steps and through the storm door to the backyard. Neither of them made a move to open it. Maybe they were waiting for the last possible second before they risked making noise, or maybe they were just terrified of what might be waiting for them on the other side.

Grace reached past them for the metal knob, then froze when she heard a floorboard creak overhead.

The three women were rigidly still, their eyes rolled upward to look at the basement ceiling. Not one of them doubted the cause of

that long creak above their heads. Even though there hadn't been another sound for almost a full minute, they all knew. Somebody was upstairs.

A few seconds later, Grace felt a breath of air, the soft pulse of a baby's exhale touching her face.Air exchange! Air exchange! The thought screamed like a Klaxon in her head.

Someone had opened the door at the top of the stairwell.

The women stood motionless in the black basement while beads of silence gathered on the string of time. Grace was looking over her shoulder in the direction of the stairwell, listening, waiting. The Sig felt heavy hanging in her right hand.

They're up there. Men with guns a lot bigger than this one are standing up there at the top of the stairs, wondering if the treads will creak under their weight, listening for sounds from down here before they risk the first step. . . .

When it finally came-the barely audible tap of a rubber sole against the wood of the first riser-it was almost anticlimactic.

First step.

Grace's hand began to turn the knob . . .

Tap. Second step.

. . , farther to the right in perfect, beautiful silence . ..

The third riser creaked faintly just as the latch eased free of its housing and Grace pulled the door open slowly, not too far, just a crack, just big enough for Sharon to slip through silently, silently . . .

Grace never heard the next step, but she knew when it happened, because she felt the weight of that oh-so-silent boot coming down, as if he were treading on her chest instead of the fourth step down . . .

Sharon slipped through the doorway like a floating shadow. She rounded her back and went up the first few concrete steps bent in half, then squeezed to one side. The presence of the slanted overhead door bore down on her like a great, invisible weight. A few of her hairs brushed against its splintery underside and pulled free from her scalp.

In what had to be the most graceful movements of her life, Annie followed like water flowing uphill. She squeezed next to Sharon, every muscle in her body screaming with tension.

Grace felt the mass of their three bodies crowding the small space as she took a silent step after Annie, then turned and pulled the door closed behind her.How many steps have they come down now? Are they at the bottom, on the dirt floor? Can they see the door yet? She gritted her teeth and started to ease the knob back to its resting place, a millimeter at a time.