Страница 63 из 68
The trunk was empty, but Harper ran his fingers the width of it once, twice, then stopped, pressed, and lifted his fingers toward A
'How do you know?'
'Why take her out if she's dead?'
A
'I was afraid. What's that?'
A
'Car coming up the hill,' she said. A
Ten seconds later, a pickup pulled into the yard, and a woman hopped out and stormed toward the porch. They could see her face when she first opened the truck door, and her figure as she hurried under the yard light to the porch.
'That's Daly,' Harper said.
'Jeez, do you think she knows?' A
'She looks mad about something.' The woman fumbled at the door, unlocking it, then pushed inside and flicked on a light. She slammed the door behind her, but before she did, they heard her shout, 'Steve?'
'Wonder what happened?' Harper asked.
'I don't know, but if he's still in the house, and we want to move up, this is the time. If he's in there, it sounds like he'll have his hands full,' A
They crawled back out through the garage door, circled back around the barn, into the darkness of the brush, and came up behind the house, near the corrals. An animal made a spitting sound as they passed: 'What the hell was that?' Harper whispered.
'I don't know; I hope it doesn't bite.'
They stopped at the side of the corral, and looked across the intervening fifty feet at the house.
'Go
'Whatever's in the corral. Probably the llama. I don't think they're dangerous,' A
'Maybe I oughta make the ran.'
'No. You've got the rifle, I've just got this thing,' A
As she said it, she slipped under the lowest rail of the corral. Whatever was in the corral stayed at the back. She could here it stomping nervously, maybe the Llama, maybe a pony, as she moved to the gate.
Taking a breath, she glanced back at the spot where she'd left Jake, and stuck one leg through the gate.
BAAAAAZZZZZZZZ.
The buzzer sounded like the end of the world, as loud as a jet plane, fifteen feet overhead.
In a half-second, she knew exactly what had happened: the gate was alarmed, just like the gate at the bottom of the hill. A light beam or movement sensor was probably buried in the gatepost, out beyond the gate itself, so an animal inside the corral couldn't set it offbut she'd put her leg right through it.
She'd been so occupied with the thought of closing on the house that she hadn't thought to look. And she didn't stop to think when the buzzer went. Instead, she scrambled sideways, across the corral, to the far corner, holding tight to the pistol.
The buzzing went on for three or four seconds, and then, just as abruptly, stopped. For another twenty seconds, nothing moved inside the house, and A
'A
'A
A
'A
'Are you out there? I know you're out there.' The straggle on the porch started again, and A
'A
He moved back toward the door, reached inside, and clicked on a yellow porch light.
'I know you're out there. You like to make movies? Make a movie of this.'
He suddenly kicked the straggling woman's legs from beneath her and she went down. At the same moment, he let go of his grip on her neck. She landed on one thigh and her hand, twisted, head down: the man pointed his hand at her head and there was a sudden crack, and an arrow of flame, and the woman flattened.
Shot in the head.
A
But at the same instant, she was through the door. To her left, the back of the man, turning to look at her just as he went through an internal doorway.
Steve Judge, but strangely different than the animal rights raider she remembered: he seemed older, thi
Belatedly, she went down, now holding the pistol out in front of her. And from behind, Harper was suddenly there with the rifle. He knelt beside her, and she saw that he was feeding fresh shells into the magazine.
'He's through there,' A
'For Christ's sake, rush him in a dark house? He'd take both of us.'
'We gotta.'
'No. What we gotta do, is look at the woman on the porch.'
A
'I didn't have time to look, but lots of times, people don't die.'
'Keep the gun on the door,' A
'Is he still inside?'
'I didn't hear the front door go. I think so.'
Harper braced the rifle against the wall as A
A
Harper shrugged, got halfway to his feet and whispered, 'Yell something at him. A threat, anything.'
A
As she screamed, Harper pushed to his feet, did a quick tiptoe across the door, hesitated just an instant at the far door where A
Then A