Haunted Air

The full meaning of the words struck Lyle like a runaway D train.

"Hey, listen, Jack, I don't think I want to be part of-"

Jack turned away. "You won't be. Not your problem. Come on. Let's bag this mutant."

Jack started down the stairs. Lyle held back, weighted down by the cold lump of lead that had formed in his stomach. But the thought of Charlie spurred him to follow.

At the bottom of the stairwell they entered a dark hallway lined with a number of doors, all closed. No light seeped around them. Cooler here. Air-conditioning doing its job. The smell of fried onions in the air. Light filtered up from a stairway at its far end, and with it the sound of ca

Jack handed the bag to Lyle and moved toward the stairs with his pistol before him. Lyle followed. At the top step he motioned Lyle to wait, then he descended the stairs one at a time with excruciating slowness, keeping his sneakered feet against the wall at the very edge of each tread. He reached the bottom and disappeared for a moment, then returned to motion Lyle down. Walking in his socks-his noisy leather-soled shoes were stowed in the gym bag-Lyle followed Jack's example, staying near the wall end of the treads.

At the bottom he looked around. They stood in a small, spare dining room. Di

Lyle jumped as a phone rang in the office. He looked to Jack to see what to do but Jack was already moving like a cat toward the living room. He reached the entrance at the same time another man dressed in gray suit pants and a white shirt with French cuffs came out. He was older, a six-footer with pale skin and dark receding hair, and he was moving carefully, as if movement was uncomfortable. This had to be the man they'd come for, the Eli Bellitto Jack had told him about.

Jack shoved the silencer under the man's chin and grabbed a handful of hair at the back of his head, yanking it back to expose his throat.

"Hello, Eli," he said in a low, harsh voice. "Molest any little boys today?"

Lyle didn't think he'd ever seen anyone more terrified. The man looked ready to collapse from shock and fear as Jack backed him into the living room.

"W-what? How-?"

Lyle, still carrying the gym bag, followed at a distance. In the living room a big Sony-a thirty-something-incher-was playing a Seinfeld rerun.

"Down! On the floor!"

Bellitto's face twisted in pain as Jack kicked the back of his knees, sending him down to a praying position.

"No! Please! I'm hurt!"

The Seinfeld audience laughed.

"That's the least of your worries," Jack said, his voice still low.

He pushed Bellitto face down on the bare hardwood floor, then half straddled him, pressing a knee into the small of his back. Bellitto groaned in pain.

Lyle kept reminding himself that this creep had killed Tara Portman and who knew how many other kids, and that Jack was closer to this situation than he-after all, he'd seen the guy snatch a kid firsthand. He was playing rough, but if anyone deserved it...

Jack pulled a short strip of duct tape from his shirt and slapped it over the man's mouth. Then he looked up at Lyle.

"Over here."

Lyle hesitated, then approached. Jack handed him the pistol.

He winked at Lyle. "He tries anything cute, shoot him in the ass."

The Seinfeld audience laughed again.

"Yeah." Lyle cleared his throat. His saliva felt like glue. "Sure thing. Which cheek?"

Jack smiled-a quick one, the first Lyle had seen tonight-and gave him a thumbs up. Then he pulled Bellitto's arms back and used the longer strips of tape to bind his hands. He stood and held out his hand; Lyle gladly returned him the pistol.

"One down." Jack looked around. "Maybe one more to go. Maybe not."

Lyle hoped not. Barely thirty seconds had passed since the phone ring, but in that brief period he knew he'd gone from flimflam man to class-A or -B felon. He wasn't made for the rough-and-tumble scene, for guns and violence. It had him shaking from his fingernails to his spine.

Jack gestured with his pistol toward Bellitto. "Help me get him up."

They each grabbed the trussed man under an arm and lifted him into a soft, cream-colored chair. Bellitto winced in pain but Jack seemed unmoved.

Lyle grabbed his shoes from the gym bag and slipped them on. No further need for stealth that he could see, and it felt good to have something on his feet again besides socks.

"Anybody else here, Eli?"

When Bellitto didn't respond Jack leaned close, grabbed his hair, and pulled his head up so that they were nose to nose.

"Where's your buddy Minkin? Is he around? You can nod or shake, Eli. Now."

Bellitto shook his head.

"You expecting him or anyone soon?"

Another head shake.

Jack shoved him back. "Right. Like I'd believe you." He turned to Lyle. "Get out your sap and stay close to him. He tries to get up, clock him down."

Lyle didn't want to be left alone here with this man. "Where're you going?"

"To check the other rooms. Just to be sure. I've got this bad feeling Minkin's hiding someplace, maybe upstairs. I don't want to leave him behind if he's here. And while I'm at it, I'll see if I can find something to wrap up this garbage." He looked around the bare living room. "Jeez, Eli. You ever hear of a rug?"

As Jack stalked away, pistol at ready, Lyle pulled the sap from his pocket and took a position behind Bellitto where he wouldn't have to see his cold eyes. He was glad the man's mouth was taped so he couldn't talk or plead. Did he have any idea this was his last night alive?

Suddenly Lyle heard a hoarse cry-Jack's voice-echo from the other end of the house.

Oh, shit, what now?

He tightened his sweaty grip on the handle of the sap as his heartbeat lunged into triple time. Damn, he should have taken that gun when Jack offered it.

And then Jack flew into the room, face white, teeth bared, the pistol in one hand, a sheet of paper in the other.

Lyle cringed at the look in his eyes. He hadn't thought a human could look like that-like death itself.

He jumped back as Jack backhanded the pistol across Bellitto's head and held the paper before him.

"What is this? Who sent it?" He dropped the sheet into Bellitto's lap and ripped the tape from his mouth, then he lowered the pistol till the muzzle was poised over one of the man's legs. "Now, Bellitto, or I start sending your knees to hell, one piece at a time till I hear what I want!"

13

"Much as I'd like to see Jack," Charlie said, "I hope he don't pop in right now. This might be just a leetle hard to explain."

Gia laughed. "I wouldn't even bother. I'd just get on his case about what took him so long."

Gia's feet rested in a foothold about four feet off the floor of their prison and her arm ached as she dug a new hole above her head in the dirt wall. Charlie was behind and below her, holding her in place by pushing against the backs of her upper thighs. He'd dug out the first four holes in record time-the ability to do something to help them out had galvanized him into a digging machine-stretching as far as he could for the last; then it was Gia's turn. Somebody needed to use the foot- and handholds to dig the next ones. Since she was smaller and lighter, it was easier for Charlie to hold her up.

"God, this dirt is hard."

She kept her eyes closed and her face averted to avoid the loose earth that rained down as she stabbed the cross into the wall. She was covered with dirt; her short blond hair was especially full of it; she felt gritty and grimy, but she kept jabbing away. They were making progress, they were getting out.