The Betrayer (44 page)

Haley pulled on the raincoat, tying it closed with the belt. She was barefoot and thought of taking the dark-haired woman’s boots, but there was no time for that.

With the gun in one hand, she dug through the semiconscious woman’s pockets for the skeleton key and found it.

Picking up the still-lit mini flashlight from the floor, she hurried toward the door. She was stepping in the spreading blood but couldn’t care about that now.

She’d been taught enough about emergency first aid by her father to know a fatal amount of blood loss when she saw it.

If the dark-haired woman wasn’t already dead, she would be soon.

But Haley couldn’t care about that now, either.

She paused to look down the stairs, saw no one, then crossed the hallway to the door to the other bedroom. She was able to move quietly on her bare feet — another reason she hadn’t bothered with the dark-haired woman’s boots.

Unlocking and opening the door, she hurried inside.

Light coming in through the window lit this room well enough for Haley to see by, so she clicked off and pocketed the flashlight. Cat was in bed, under the blankets and on her side, her back to the door. Haley rushed to the bedside and placed her free hand on Cat’s shoulder, shook her lightly, but she didn’t immediately wake. Haley knew by this that she had to have been drugged, so she began to jostle Cat roughly.

Cat rolled onto her back. Still out of it, she tried to push away Haley’s hand, but Haley parried her hand away and persisted. Cat’s eyes fluttered, then finally opened — halfway at best. With a bewildered look on her face, Cat grunted, “What?”

Haley whispered, “We need to be quiet.”

It took a few seconds for Cat to recall where they were and what was going on.

Her eyes opened wide then, by sheer will alone.

“We’re going down the stairs and out the door,” Haley whispered. “Okay?”

Drawing a deep breath through her nose, Cat nodded.

Haley tucked the gun into the belt of her raincoat, then grabbed Cat’s wrists with both hands, pulled and turned her so Cat was in a seated position on the edge of the bed. Sitting beside her, Haley wrapped Cat’s left arm around her neck, then stood, lifting Cat to her feet and leading her toward the door.

She paused again, looked first across the hall, saw the dark-haired woman still on the floor, then looked down the stairs.

The living room below was dimly lit, and though the rain was loud, Haley sensed that the room was currently empty.

Now or never.

Holding Cat’s wrist with one hand and the railing with the other, Haley started down the steps. Despite their bare feet, each plank creaked. The farther down they went, the more of the living room Haley could see.

It was when they were two steps from the bottom that Haley could see the entire room. Empty. At the other end of it, by the rolltop desk, was a door. Closed, with a light coming from under it.

All Haley needed was to make it to the front door with Cat — to it, then out.

What they would do from there, she didn’t know.

She was counting on a key having been left in the ignition of one of the cars outside.

If that wasn’t the case, they wouldn’t get very far.

But if anyone came after them — no,
when
they came after them — she had the dark-haired woman’s gun and could use the cars as cover.

Wait for them to get near, till there was no chance that she would miss.

Better to die fighting than be used to bait Johnny.

Cat was awake, but the trip down the stairs had made her legs wobbly. Haley had to wrap her arm around Cat’s waist and wedge herself against Cat to help keep her up. She was making a beeline for the door like this, struggling not to fall. As they got close to it, Cat was able to reach and grab the knob, opening the door.

They stepped through it but stopped immediately.

The bright floodlight on the porch lit the path that led down to the driveway. Haley saw three men making their way up — the overcoat man, followed by Smith in his leather jacket, and another man, in a raincoat, bringing up the rear.

Smith looked toward the house suddenly — at Haley and Cat, standing just outside the front door. He seemed surprised and called out, but what he’d said Haley couldn’t hear over the rain.

Though he was still a distance away, Haley could see that he had a gun in his hand.

Cat spoke then, and what she said Haley heard clearly.

“The light.”

Haley looked at her, knew what she meant, but didn’t have a free hand. And the switch was inside. Smith was calling to them again — focused on them intently — and there wasn’t time. Cat grabbed the Sig, pulled it from Haley’s belt, and quickly aimed at the floodlight mounted on the wall beside the door.

Without hesitation, she shot out the light.

The path fell into darkness, and the three men on it disappeared.

The last thing Haley had seen of them was Smith breaking into a run, moving past the overcoat man and charging toward the house.

Calling something and waving.

Cat took charge, turning Haley now, guiding her back inside.

They retreated into the living room, Cat reaching out and flipping the light switch, casting the room into darkness. Leaving the door open, they took several steps toward the middle of the room, then suddenly paused.

Running upstairs would leave them trapped, as would running down to the basement — the only two parts of the house either of them knew anything about.

Straight ahead was the doorway to the kitchen, but there was no knowing who was in there. And they could move toward the rolltop desk, then turn left and into the small dining room, beyond which was a back room.

But, again, there was no knowing…

Cat was uncertain where to go, which direction in this darkness would lead to safety, or anything resembling it.

It was at that moment that the door next to the rolltop desk opened and a figured filled it.

Moved through it, into the room, its right arm raising.

Fiermonte, lifting Cat’s own gun.

But Cat had turned and once again put herself between him and Haley.

She, too, was raising her hand — her left hand, with a stranger’s gun in it, but at this distance that wouldn’t matter.

The light from the room was more than enough to see by.

She was aiming at Fiermonte, and he at her.

Vitali heard the shot and ducked for cover again.

The shot had come from inside the house — somewhere on the ground floor, he determined.

He waited for another, and when it didn’t come, he rose again. Instead of moving toward the door to find out what that single shot meant, he peeked once more out the window.

All that mattered to him was what was — or wasn’t — out there.

He saw the two large men emerging from the cover of the woods. Moving, one in front of the other, across the backyard.

The one with the rifle was taking point. He was dressed in some kind of long black slicker. Running in a crouch, with the rifle butt tight against his shoulder, the weapon level and aimed straight ahead.

Moving fast, moving expertly.

The two men were heading for the kitchen door at the back of the house — the room next to the back room, connected by a short and narrow hallway.

Vitali’s first thought was of waiting till they were inside, then going out one of the windows and coming up behind them, but he quickly dismissed that idea.

No, all he needed to do was lie in wait, find a killing zone, and let the men walk into it.

He made his way to the door and exited the room, stopping in the connecting hallway. From there he could see part of the dark kitchen.

He crouched down, ready.

As he waited, he heard voices coming from the living room.

“Let’s just take it easy,” Fiermonte said.

Cat was shivering — she was clad only in her underwear, but she knew it was more from the adrenaline racing through her like electricity than the cold and damp air around her.

Haley was looking toward the open door. “They’re coming.”

“Where’re you going to go?” Fiermonte said. “There’s no way out.”

“It was you, not Dickey,” Cat said. “You were the one Jeremy heard. You were the one who had my father killed.”

“You only know the half of it, Cat.”

“Shut up.”

“He’s alive, you know. Your father. He abandoned you. Yet again.”

“Shut up,” Cat snapped.

Haley was still looking toward the open door. She repeated, “They’re coming, Cat.” There was panic in her voice.

“He didn’t care about you. The job was always more important. His
duty
was always more important.
I
cared about you, though. I was always there for you, and you know that.”

Cat’s mind was reeling, so she switched it to automatic pilot, said what she’d been trained to say.

“Put the gun down. Now.”

The command sounded false even to her.

“Cat, c’mon,” Fiermonte said. “It’s done, there’s no way out. You’re all alone.”

“Put the gun down!”

“You shoot me, Cat, and you’re shooting an assistant prosecutor. You’d be just like your father. An FBI agent gone bad.”

There were footsteps on the porch now.

Haley moved, placing herself between the door and Cat.

As she did this, a man suddenly appeared in the doorway.

Cat could see the shape of him out of the corner of her eye.

She saw a black leather jacket, hooded sweatshirt, raised gun.

She saw that he was in a shooter’s crouch.

She knew it was Smith, searching the dimly lit room for his target.

For her.

Cat had little time left. She watched Fiermonte, waiting for a break in his attention — for his eyes to shift away from her, for just a split second, even.

It would be all she’d need.

But what Fiermonte did when Smith entered the doorway confused Cat.

His eyes shifted from Cat to Haley.

Only then did Cat realize Haley was turning to face Cat.

More than turning toward her, Haley was rushing Cat as if about to tackle her.

Cat saw then that Fiermonte’s attention shifted to the man in the doorway.

His confusion deepened, and then a look of sudden realization crossed his face — realization mixed with panic. He quickly shifted his body, taking aim at the man in the doorway.

Haley was on Cat now, driving her sideways, one arm around her waist and the other pushing her gun hand downward.

Cat heard a shot, and then another — too close together to have been two shots fired by the same gun.

So two shots from two guns — Fiermonte’s and Smith’s.

Haley brought Cat to the floor with an expertly executed takedown. They both hit the planks hard, Haley landing on top. Cat scrambled, the gun still in her hand, to get out from under the redhead, to regroup.

But Haley had her pinned, wouldn’t let her go.

Lifting her head and straining to look toward the doorway, Cat saw that Smith was down.

Shot, lying on his side, struggling to bring his weapon to bear.

Only it wasn’t Smith’s face she was looking at.

It was Johnny’s.

And he was trying to raise his weapon because Fiermonte was still standing.

Cat looked at the man, saw a stunned, almost blank look on his face. She also saw that Johnny’s shot had grazed the side of his head.

Taken off skin and sliced through bone.

His eyes had lost focus, and he was staggering.

But then his focus returned, or enough of it did, and he looked at Cat, almost as if for her help.

Without hesitating, Cat put two rounds into his chest.

Fiermonte dropped as if a trapdoor had opened beneath him.

Those two shots were still ringing in the air as Haley rose and rushed to where Johnny lay bleeding.