Target Response (13 page)

He went on. “My point is that the Dog Team has reached the end of its usefulness. You served a purpose back in the day but this is a new day. You’re old-fashioned and out of date, boy. You and the hidebound Army mossbacks who sic you and your colleagues on those they deem an enemy to the republic.

“This is a new era. The republic such as it was is done. It was always more of a hope and a dream than a reality, anyway. Your handlers and fellow diehards have outlived their usefulness. The republic is dead, replaced by the corporate empire of money. Global capital beyond the nation-state.

“Simply put, the Dog Team got in the way of the real masters of the world. You tried to say no to supreme corporate interests. Dared to defy them and keep them from making more money.

“That’s a crime, son. A capital crime punishable by death. You’re attack dogs that don’t have the sense to come to heel. You’ve got to be put down. Put to sleep.”

“And that’s where you come in?” Steve asked.

“That’s right, boy,” said Jules, “us and others like us. We’re not hampered by any crazy notions like duty, honor, and country. Our allegiance is only to the highest bidder and we never double-cross the best offer.” Then he added, “Well, hardly ever.” That got a knowing laugh from some of the others at the table.

“The masters of society know they can trust us because they’re the same way,” Jules said. “It’s you crazy idealists who’re monkeywrenching the system. That’s why you’ve got to go.”

Steve’s rigid face formed a sneer. “You talk big, but you’re the real sucker. Once you’ve done the dirty work, the bosses will get rid of you, too.”

Jules waved a hand in the air, a gesture of negation. “It’s been tried. But we Morays have been around for a long, long time and we plan to be around for a whole lot longer. We’ve got a system and it works.”

“Who fingered me to you?” Steve asked.

Jules shrugged. “What difference does it make? Nothing you can do about it anyway.”

Steve tried his left hand to see if it was still workable. His fingers wriggled. They felt like they were over in another county, but some sensation, some utility, still remained in them.

He gathered his feet under him, bracing himself. His right hand still clutched the table’s edge as if to endure the pain, fingers working convulsively, clenching and unclenching, clawing at the tablecloth.

Brett noticed Steve’s unease and smiled thinly, savoring it.

A gust of wind blew up, rattling the windows. Raindrops pattered against glass panes, big fat raindrops that made wet splattering sounds. A minor distraction but—

Steve grabbed a fistful of white linen tablecloth and suddenly pulled hard on it.

Part of the tablecloth was pinned in place to the table, along with his left hand. That was on the left side of the table. Steve worked the right side, playing the tablecloth like snapping a whip.

It was a variant of the same principle as the magician’s classic trick of whisking a tablecloth off a table so fast that it leaves dishes and place settings undisturbed.

Not so Steve’s goal. He wanted the layout plenty disturbed. He threw some English into it.

The tablecloth humped up into a wave, sweeping across the near side of the table. Cake plates, cups and saucers, water and wine-glasses, silverware were all tossed topsy-turvy.

Steve’s eye was on bigger game: the coffee urn, which was set down near this end of the table between Brett and Teela.

He flicked the tablecloth with a snap of the wrist, upsetting the silver coffee urn and toppling it toward Brett.

The urn hurtled sideways, its hinged lid opening. It flew off the table and fell into Brett’s lap, dousing him with the steaming brown brew.

Brett’s shriek rose into falsetto as he threw himself back from the table, dropping his gun to free his hands to pluck the uncapped coffee urn from where it was spewing between his legs.

Steve stood up, his chair overturning behind him.

Each movement sent white-hot bolts of agony from his pinned hand lashing up the nerves of his arm into his brain. Like a dentist’s drill tearing into a raw nerve.

A wave of sick weakness seized him and he fought to keep from passing out. The pain kept him conscious, focused, intent. He made it work for him.

His mind, his senses switched into hyperdrive. Hyperalertness. It was as if time were standing still.

A roaring sounded in his ears, oceanic. He didn’t know it was his own wordless shout of rage and defiance.

He pressed his left hand flat against the table. His right hand gripped the hilt of the carving knife, fastening on it with a monkey grip. With a lurching heave he yanked it up, freeing the point from where it was planted several inches deep in the wooden tabletop.

Bellowing, he pulled the knife clear of the tabletop, wrenching it free from his maimed hand.

Adrenaline powered, Steve was irresistible, implacable. He slashed the blade at Skye, intent on cutting her throat.

She was too quick for him. Skye threw herself to the side, chair and all, away from him, overturning the chair as she tumbled sideways while still seated in it.

The knife blade slashed empty air where her long swanlike neck would have been.

Skye kept moving. With acrobatic agility she threw herself backward out of the fallen chair, somersaulting backward away from the table. Coming out of the roll, she got her feet beneath her and leaped up, plunging toward the kitchen.

Brett stood doubled over, howling, holding himself between the legs. There was a large, steaming, dark wet patch on his crotch and middle where the coffee urn had spilled its piping hot contents on him.

Teela rose, lunging, reaching across the table for the gun Brett had dropped.

Steve pivoted toward her, turning his upper body. He whipped the carving knife straight at Teela, letting it fly.

Momentum carried it straight and true. A meaty thunk sounded as it buried itself deep in Teela’s chest between her breasts, sticking out by the handle.

Olcott threw the heavy crystal brandy decanter at Steve’s head. Steve ducked and it flew over him to smash through a windowpane.

The swinging door swung back and forth, still agitated by Skye’s flight into the kitchen.

Jules’s face contorted. His body shifted—a shrugging motion. Suddenly a gun was in his hand. It happened so fast that Steve knew Jules must have been fitted with a spring-operated sleeve gun that popped the weapon into his ready hand.

Steve glimpsed something out of the corner of his eye—

Bertha bearing down on him, charging. Arms extended, oversized strangler’s hands reaching for him.

She collided with him, almost knocking him down. He fended her off as best he could with his right arm, favoring his maimed left hand. He was 180 pounds, and she outweighed him by a good forty.

Bertha slammed into him again, bulling him backward. Steve backpedaled to stay on his feet and lessen the impact of her charge.

Lillian followed Skye’s lead, darting through the swinging door into the kitchen.

Brett crawled on hands and knees, picking up the gun Teela had dropped. She lay nearby in a heap on the floor.

Gun in hand, Jules circled around the head of the table angling for a shot. Bertha grabbed Steve’s upper arms, sweeping him backward across the floor toward the windows. She stood between him and Jules, causing the latter to hold his fire as he tried to line up a clear shot.

Brett wasn’t so scrupulous. Rising shakily to his feet, mouth open and moaning, he held his gun in both hands. He fired at Steve, not aiming, not caring who he hit.

A slug tore a chunk off Bertha’s brawny left shoulder. A second tagged her in the middle of her broad back. Several other shots went wild, starring the windows in the opposite wall.

Bertha jerked forward, staggering.

“Stop shooting, you fool! You’ve hit Bertha!” Jules shouted at Brett.

Steve pressed close to Bertha now, using her for a shield. She was still going but dying on her feet, life running out of her with each step. Steve held her upright, carrying her along with him.

The windowed wall loomed up behind him. The sill bumped against his hip.

Steve sidestepped, grabbing Bertha’s arm and whipping her headfirst into one of the windows. The glass pane disintegrated with a whoomping sound, followed by the tinkling chimes of a cascade of broken glass.

Bertha was a big woman and the combination of her speed and weight knocked most of the glass out of the windowpane, spilling it on the flagstones of the terrace. Her body lay facedown, draped over the windowsill so that she lay half in, half out of the room. Her upper body hung outside, her middle was draped over the sill, and her lower body remained inside.

Bertha had served as a battering ram, clearing the glass out of the window. Contact with the jagged shards left her looking as though she’d been mauled by a tiger. She’d cleared the way for Steve.

He dove headfirst through the window, launching himself into empty air.

Brett’s gun jerked in his hands, wildly pumping rounds at Steve, none coming close.

Jules did slightly better, one of his shots nipping the corner off Steve’s left boot heel as he plunged through the empty window frame.

“Get him!” Jules shouted.

Steve hit the paved terrace, breaking the impact with a shoulder roll, still experiencing a bone-jarring thud.

The air was cold, fresh, raw. It helped revive him. Coming out of the roll, he got his feet under him and sprang upright.

He’d catapulted himself onto a flagstone terrace that aproned the rear of the house.

The terrace, long and wide, fronted south. Pieces of white-painted iron lawn furniture stood scattered on the patio. Several chairs grouped around a round-topped table, and there was a high-backed bench built for two.

It was good to be out of the death-trap room, but the outside was too open. Steve felt nakedly exposed.

He glanced back at the house. Moving figures showed behind the windows. The Moray group, moving to finish what they’d started. Moving to finish him.

The patio was thirty feet wide and stood three feet above ground level. At its far end a curved flight of stone stairs slanted down to the lawn.

Steve darted left toward the terrace’s western end, racing to get clear of the firing line from the window. A waist-high stone balustrade bordered the terrace. Steve rested his right hand on the rail as he threw his legs over it, vaulting it.

Bare thornbushes lay below, running along the terrace’s edge. They broke his fall, spilling him onto the cold, hard ground.

Bullets cut the air overhead, whizzing past.

Lillian stood with her upper body leaning out the dining room window, shooting at Steve. “There he goes! Don’t let him get away!”

Steve looked around. What next?

His Suburban was parked on the north, opposite side of the mansion. A long way off. The Morays could get to the front entrance and outside well in time to intercept him. The nearest buildings were the garage and the stable. The garage was closer to the house’s northwest corner, where Steve was. One of the bay doors was open; inside it a fancy car could be seen. A man stood there peering out at him.

Steve recognized him as Ludlow, the family’s chauffeur and handyman. Skye had introduced him to Steve earlier, when Ludlow had saddled up their horses prior to the ride.

Ludlow had been absent during the fun and games in the dining room, but considering the fact that the other household servants were all part of the Moray cabal, there was no reason to assume that Ludlow was any different.

This was the damnedest ménage that Steve had ever seen!

Ludlow ducked back into the garage, out of sight.

Steve looked back toward the stable.

A one-story shedlike structure, it had a peaked roof with light gray shingles; the wooden-frame building was painted battleship gray. A set of swinging barn doors in front was now closed. It was one of those modern show barns that looked like a real estate agent’s office.

Steve made a beeline for it. His wounded hand ached, throbbing, feeling like a second heart pounding away at the end of his left arm. It bled steadily but not profusely. Gore covered his hand, making it look as if he wore one red glove.

Steve was a realist with no illusions. He knew he was running on adrenaline. Shock, pain, and loss of blood would all too soon take their toll.

Ludlow came out of the garage, gun in hand, and started after Steve. Lillian still leaned out of the window, shouting and pointing at the fugitive.

Where were the others?

Jules, Brett, Olcott, Pyne, Margit—and Skye. They wouldn’t be sitting still waiting to see what Steve did next. They were direct actionists. They would take active measures to stop him.

The stable stood catty-corner to the northwest corner of the house, its long front side facing it at an angle. Access was also provided by the side doors, one at each short end.

Steve went around to the far side door. It wasn’t locked—the knob turned under his hand. That was a break.

Ludlow ran toward him, fast closing the distance between stable and garage.

Steve ducked inside. The stable was modern, better appointed than a lot of people’s houses. It was electrically lit and heated. There was the mixed scent of hay and horse, a not unpleasant aroma.

Three stable stalls lined the rear wall, two of them occupied by horses: the gray mare and the brown gelding.

Steve’s sudden entrance made them uneasy. They snorted, pawed the floorboards with their hooves. He looked around for something he could use as a weapon, something he knew was there because he’d seen it earlier. He found it in a corner leaning up against the wall, tines down:

A pitchfork.

Steve took hold of it, gripping it like a rifle with a fixed bayonet. He peeked out of a corner of one of the front windows, not showing himself.

A short, squat man running on stump legs, Ludlow was almost at the barn.

Steve ducked low, below the window sight line. He ran to the opposite end of the barn and opened the side door, leaving it ajar. Still crouched low, he scrambled back to the other side.

He stood to the left of the door, hunched down with his back against the wall. Holding the pitchfork across his chest bayonet-fighter style.

Ludlow opened the door, entering. He held a 9mm Beretta leveled at his hip. He cursed when he saw the open door at the far end of the barn.

The diversion gave Steve the opportunity he needed. He stepped forward. Ludlow saw him out of the corner of his eye.

Steve struck out with the pitchfork, slashing the edge of the fork hard against the wrist of the other’s gun hand. Knocking the gun from his grip. The pistol fell to the floor, not discharging.

Steve struck mostly one-handed, right hand clutching the handle, left arm bent at the elbow so he could guide the pitchfork across the top of his left forearm. He thrust the pitchfork into Ludlow’s middle, the soft belly below the breastbone. Spearing him in three places with the tines.

The sharp-pointed tines penetrated with surprising ease. Steve pinned Ludlow against the wall. He was hampered because of his bad hand. He leaned into it, putting his weight behind it.

Ludlow opened his mouth to scream but the impalement took his breath away. All he could do was make choking, gurgling noises. Blood gushed out of his mouth.

Ludlow’s legs buckled at the knees. He slid down the wall, leaving a bloody vertical smear to mark his path. He sat down hard, legs extended in front of him.

Steve bore down hard on the pitchfork, giving it a savage twist. Ludlow coughed, spasming, black blood pouring from his mouth as the light in his eyes faded away and died.

So did he.

Steve left the pitchfork sticking in him and picked up the pistol. It felt good in his hand.

The killing had spooked the horses. They stamped, pawed, whinnied, kicked against their stalls. Frantic hoofbeats clattering on the floorboards.

Steve inspected the gun, making sure that a round was in the chamber. It was. Lucky it hadn’t gone off when dropped. The piece had safety functions built in to guard against such an accident, but you never can tell….

Steve stuck the pistol into the top of his waistband so that it was securely lodged. He went to the stable’s front double doors, which were secured by a bar mounted on a pivot and dropping into open U-shaped metal staples. He raised the bar, unlatching the doors.

He eased one open a few inches and peered outside. Covering, not showing, himself.

A group was gathering on the terrace.

Jules, Lillian, Olcott, Brett, and Skye. They were variously armed with rifles, small machine guns, and pistols.

Skye held a double-barreled shotgun. She broke away from the group and crossed quickly toward the stable, well ahead of the others.

Jules was calling to her: “Wait for us, Skye!”

“No! This kill is mine!” she shouted back over her shoulder.

She hurried ahead, unheeding. Her sporting blood was up. The lure of the chase had her in thrall. She craved the thrill of the kill.

The hunt had turned interesting, taking an unsuspected twist. The prey was more resourceful and dangerous than expected.

No righteous rage at the death of Cousin Teela possessed Skye. The Morays were not that sort of family. She and Teela had hated each other since childhood days. Perhaps because they were so much alike.

The others’ calls for her to wait fell on deaf ears. They only sought to deprive her of the credit and glory of the kill, Skye told herself. It was only fitting that she take the honors.

She’d already coupled with Steve and it had been good. To liquidate him would be sweeter still. To mate, then kill—truly, was that not the Moray way?

With figurative blood in her eye and real murder in her heart, Skye closed on the stable. She was out in front, far ahead of the others.

Her eyes shone; raw wind whipped color into her face. “Steve!—”

The stable’s double doors swung outward and open, crashing against the wall.

The gray mare bolted into view. Steve was riding her. Bareback. The gun was in his right fist, the horse’s reins wrapped around his fist.

Skye was too close to evade the animal’s charge; the gray was right on top of her. Wild-eyed, the horse checked, rising on its hind legs.

The horse’s advent startled Skye, crowding her so that she was unable to swing the shotgun up in time to throw down on Steve—or do anything else. Her feet got tangled up with each other.

She recoiled, losing her footing and falling backward.

She jerked one of the triggers as she fell. The double-barreled shotgun discharged one of its loads, firing harmlessly into the air. Further spooking with its booming thunderclap the already unnerved animal.

The horse danced around on its hind legs, almost throwing Steve, who somehow managed to stay on. The gray’s front hoofs touched down.

He leaned over its right side and triggered a couple of rounds into Skye, drilling her in the chest.

It was like driving nails with a nail gun. Skye spasmed as the slugs tore into her.

“No!” Jules shouted.

Steve pulled hard on the reins wrapped around his gun fist, dug his booted heels into the mare’s sides to urge her to speed. The animal needed no urging, frantic to leave the scene of blood and thunder. It trampled Skye as it fled.

Steve turned the horse, rounding the corner of the barn.

Lillian shouldered a .30-.30 hunting rifle and pointed it in Steve’s direction, but too late; he was out of her firing line.

Steve raced the horse west across the fields toward the edge of the woods.

Riding bareback was a rough ride. Even for a horseman in full possession of his faculties. Damningly difficult for a man with one good hand.

Luckily the mare already had been haltered and bridled. Steve could never have made his getaway otherwise. He wasn’t out of the woods yet.

Rather, he wasn’t into the woods yet.

Back home in Arizona growing up on a ranch he’d mastered the art of bareback riding, like the bronco Apaches had done in frontier times. Even as a kid, he knew this: it was no fun. Easy to bust a bone in your seat or fall off. And back then it had been done with a saddle blanket between him and the horse.

This, now, was really riding bareback. He had an incentive, though: to keep from being killed. Mindful of where the rest of the Morays had been bunched, he tried to keep the barn between himself and them as much as possible.

Pops sounded. Bullets whizzed around him.

The woods neared.

With eyes going in and out of focus, he peered ahead, searching for a gap in the brush that would indicate the mouth of a trail. Spotting one on the left, he rode toward it.

His abrupt change in direction saved him from several well-aimed rifle shots that came his way. The slugs made sharp rapping woodpecker noises as they tore into the trees.

Then Steve was in the trail and riding away, its winding course putting a screen of forest cover between him and the shooters.