Fuzzy Navel (12 page)

I
OPEN MY EYES and wonder where I am. I try to lift my hands, and see I’m chained under a sink. My body hurts all over.

I must have been a bad girl. Father punishes us when we’re bad. He calls it Penance. I’m afraid of Father, afraid of his punishments. I feel like crying.

Then my mind clears. I’m not ten years old anymore. I’m all grown up. And this isn’t our house. It’s Jack’s.

I’m in the kitchen, all alone.

Anger replaces fear.

My eyes sting. I rub my face on my shoulder, wipe away some blood. My forehead is cut. My head aches. My right hand still stings from when the gun was shot from my grip. None of the damage is serious.

I test the pipe I’m chained to. It’s cold, metal, two inches thick. A drain trap, under the sink. I give it a hard yank. Then another. It’s solid.

I scoot up closer, rest my head on the bottom of the cabinet. It smells like dish soap and moldy sponges. I can’t see very well – so I work by feel, palpating the U pipe, seeking the joint. I think
righty tighty, lefty-loosey,
and lock both fists around the octagonal coupling. It isn’t a pipe wrench, but it’s all I have.

I twist. My hands are strong, from thousands of fingertip pushups while in Heathrow. My arms are bigger than most guys’. But the pipe doesn’t want to cooperate. It refuses to turn, preferring instead to dig a nice trench of skin out of my palm.

I twist and twist until it feels like my veins are going to burst out of my temples. The joint won’t budge.

I stop, then spend a few minutes trying to use my handcuff chain as a tool, levering and turning and pulling.

My efforts leave me with sore wrists, but no closer to escape.

I close my eyes, let the solution come to me. I broke out of a maximum security prison for the criminally insane. I should be able to get out from under a stupid sink.

Voices, elsewhere in the house. I make out a few words, but they don’t interest me. I’m not the only one trying to kill Jack and her family. But I don’t believe those jokers outside pose much of a threat to my plans. If they had any skills, everyone would already be dead. They’re jackals. I’m a lion. Lions don’t fear jackals.

I feel the pipe, higher up, where it meets the sink. The joint here is plastic, bigger, the size of a peanut butter jar. And it has nubs on it, to grip when attaching the drain to the pipe. I form my fingers around them and twist.

Red and yellow spots form in my vision, and my head begins to shake. I strain and strain until my entire world is reduced to five square inches of force and pain.

I release it and forcibly exhale. My hands are trembling.

But it moved a fraction of an inch.

I crack my knuckles, then go at it again, a smile enveloping half my face.

I
’M GRATEFUL I CAN’T REMEMBER being shot, because that might have made me reconsider my actions. Though I’ve never used a night-vision scope, never even saw one in real life, I’m familiar with how they work, thanks to Tom Clancy movies. The hallway is pitch-black to me, but to the snipers I am an easy target, glowing bright green.

Thanks to Mr. Clancy, I also have an idea how to mess with their aim.

I stick out my left hand, reaching for the wall. When my fingers graze it I run forward four steps. I lift the flashlight up to chest level, switching it on and pointing it through my bedroom door, out the window. Then I immediately dodge right.

The light will temporarily blind anyone peering through a night-enhanced scope, causing a bright flash. If someone has a bead on me, they might reflexively shoot when the light goes on. Hence the change of direction.

The shot doesn’t come.

I toss the flashlight into the bedroom, toward the far corner, and jog toward the window in a crouch. I duck down, beneath the pane, safe. Then I feel around the floor. I find my dropped Kimber.

Hurt
isn’t strong enough a word for the feeling in my head, and my stomach isn’t happy with the bottle of water I chugged. I rest for a minute, slowing down my breathing, picturing what I need to do next.

Unlike my Colt, the Kimber is bigger, badder, and more accurate. This is the gun I use in marksman competitions. I need to get outside, locate the bastards, and get within a hundred feet of them. Once they’re within range, my handgun is more effective than their long guns. They’re using bolt action, single fire, and it takes a few seconds to load each bullet. My.45 holds seven rounds, and it shoots as fast as I can pull the trigger.

If I can get close enough.

Originally, I intended to sneak out the bedroom window. Getting shot in the head made me think about other possible exit points. My house is built in an L shape, but that still means four right angles. There are only three snipers, so they can’t completely cover all four sides.

The trick is to find an exit they aren’t covering.

The front door won’t work. The large bay window in the living room offers too good a view inside. Mom’s room has a window, but it’s on the same wall as mine, and a shooter can easily watch both. The kitchen patio doors lead into the backyard. Again, they’re big and offer a full view, but I can get through them quicker than climbing out a normal window. The garage has a window, but it’s behind an endless stack of boxes that we never unpacked after moving in. The bathroom window is frosted, and no one has shot through it yet, but it’s decorative and doesn’t open. If I break it, that will leave Mom and Harry exposed.

Life would be so much easier if I’d just bought a house with a basement. I could have crawled up a window well, gotten out at ground level, and come at them low, under their noses. I’m sure these guys are amateurs. They’ll sweep left and right, but won’t know to sweep up and down.

My concentration shatters when the window above me does, glass shards sprinkling my hair and shoulders. Something thumps to the floor in front of me, and I recover from the startle and extend my arm, pointing the.45, pulling the trigger halfway before stopping myself.

It isn’t a person in the room with me. The flashlight in the corner is pointing in this direction, and it silhouettes a familiar shape, nestled in the broken glass on my carpeting.

A rifle.

I stand up and stick my gun through the hole in the window, looking left, then right, for the person who threw a rifle into my bedroom. I catch a dark shape turning the corner into the backyard, but it’s gone before I can squeeze off a shot.

I don’t pause to think. I use the butt of my gun to brush away the jagged glass still jutting out of the pane, lift my knee up, and climb through the window frame. I hear my mother calling my name, but don’t want to answer, don’t want to give my position away.

I’m dizzy, winded. I touch the brick wall, use it steady myself. Then I half run, half stumble toward the backyard, to the corner the man disappeared around. I pause, my back against the house, both hands on my Kimber. The evening has cooled off, and there’s a strong enough breeze that I feel it through the bandage on my head. The lawn is cold and tickles my bare toes. I hold my breath and listen.

Night sounds. Leaves rustling. Crickets. The faint whistle of the wind. Just your average autumn night in the suburbs.

I count to three, then spin around the corner, gun pointing in front of me. I can’t see much in the dark. I make out some low shadows on my patio, chairs and a table. My lawn goes back about twenty yards, and beyond it is the tree line. Enough cover for me to disappear into. If I can’t find the snipers, I’ll go into the woods and come out the other side, to a major highway, and bring back help.

Before I take a step forward the ground spits up dirt and grass a few feet to my right.

“Go back inside!”

A man’s voice, coming from deep within the same woods I want to enter.

I backpedal, firing blindly into the trees, wasting two bullets. I press my back against the wall, not too far from my bedroom window.

The next shot eats into the brick less than a foot in front of me, digging out a chunk big enough to stick my hand into.

“I told you to get back in the house!” the man yells. “Go get your rifle, or I’ll shoot you where you stand! I ain’t asking again!”

I think about running in the opposite direction, toward the front of the house. Less cover there, but maybe I can make it to my neighbor, up the road.

Probably not smart. My shooting has assuredly caught the attention of the other two snipers. They’ll be waiting for me.

Not seeing any other choice, I go back to my bedroom and climb through the window, careful not to step on any glass.

“Jacqueline!” Mom.

“I’m okay!” I call back.

My eyes trail down, to the rifle. Why did the sniper give it to me? Some kind of trick or trap?

I reach over slowly, like it’s a rattlesnake ready to strike, and wrap my fingers around the barrel. I pull it close, see a piece of paper rolled up in the trigger guard. I unroll the note and read the semi-legible words scrawled on it:

There are three of us.

You have three bullets.

Let’s play.

These assholes actually think this is a game.

I holster the Kimber and check the rifle. It’s a Browning, bolt action, walnut stock, a twenty-inch barrel, weighing about seven pounds. No scope, no sights. I open the ammo tube and find three.22 LR hollow point rounds. Much smaller than the ammo the snipers are using, but still potent enough to drop a deer. I roll them between my fingers, shake them next to my ear, give them each a sniff. They seem like the real thing. I feed them back into the tube, yank the bolt, and chamber a round.

If they want to play, I’m happy to oblige.

M
UNCHEL WATCHES the split-tail climb back through the window, and he feels every hair on his arms stand at attention. He isn’t tired. He isn’t scared.

He’s electrified.

This has been the greatest day of his life. And when that cop returns fire, it will take everything up to the next level. He imagines this is the desert, hot wind blowing in his eyes, sand in his teeth, his platoon pinned down by enemy fire, and Private Munchel – no,
Sergeant
Munchel – is called to take them out with extreme prejudice. But the insurgents have a sniper of their own, a famous Taliban bitch who’s a dead shot at a thousand yards, and only Sergeant Munchel has the skill to-

“Where in the hell are you?”

The radio startles Munchel, jolting him out of his reverie. He swears, unclips the radio, then presses the talk button.

“What’s the problem now, Swanson?”

“The problem is that you disappeared for an hour, and when you come back there’s gunfire.
Loud
gunfire, not our silenced rifles.”

“They’re suppressors, not silencers.”
Pessolano, cutting in.

Swanson sighs like a drama queen.
“I don’t give a shit what they’re called. Tell me what’s going on.”

“The woman cop,” Munchel says. “She had a gun in the house, shot at me through the window.”

“I already killed her,”
Pessolano says.

“You must have missed, because she was shooting at me just a minute ago.”

“You sure it was her?”

“’Course it was her. Looked just like her.”

“Could of been her twin.”

“Her what?”

“Her twin sister. Like that Van Damme movie.”

“It wasn’t her goddamn twin, Pessolano. You just goddamn missed.”

“Enough!”
Swanson cuts in.
“Her gun is too loud. Someone is going to hear it and call the cops.”

Munchel grins. “Well, it’s about to get even louder, boyo, because I gave her a rifle.”

He pictures Swanson’s face turning bright red with anger. It amuses him greatly. Ever since they first got together, Swanson has been playing leader. But he sucks as a leader. He’s too scared of everything, and has zero creativity.

And what is this shit Pessolano is talking about twins? That guy has been bragging and boasting about his war record nonstop, but he can’t even confirm a kill.

Munchel knows that he’s the alpha male of the group. He proved it earlier, in Ravenswood. And he’s about to prove it again.

“What. Did. You. Say?”
Swanson probably thinks pausing between each word makes him sound tough.

“I gave her Pessolano’s Browning, and three bullets. Make this a little more interesting.”

“I better get that gun back,”
Pessolano says.
“Or you owe me seven hundred bucks.”

“You’ll get it back.” Munchel laughs. “Might have to wash the blood off it first.”

Another sigh from Swanson.
“We need to finish this shit up, and get out of here before more cops come.”

“How?”
Pessolano asks.
“Everyone is hiding. We can’t get any shots.”

“Then we get closer.”

Munchel nods. That’s the first thing Swanson has said all night that he agrees with.

He clips the radio to his belt, picks up the rifle, and creeps closer to the house.

T
HE FIRST THING I need to do is minimize my disadvantages.

And there are many.

They’re three people. I’m just one.

They have cover. I have people to protect.

They have unlimited bullets. I have three.

They have scopes, both normal and night vision. I have a head injury.

But I do have one advantage. Never underestimate a woman fighting for her life.

I stick my head into the hall and shout.

“Latham! We’re going to get you in the bathroom with Mom and Harry. It’s the safest place in the house.”

“Don’t risk it, Jack. Too many windows.”

“I’ve got an idea about that. Be ready to move when I get there.”

I crawl over to the flashlight in the corner of my room, then get into a crouch. The Tylenol has kicked in, taking my headache from excruciating down to merely agonizing.

Don’t think. Just act.

I point the flashlight out the window and run out the door, through the hall, into the laundry room. I tug open the fuse box door, hit the main breaker, and the house lights come back on. I assume the snipers still have their night-vision scopes on. Now they’ll be all lit up.

I hurry back into the hall, flipping off lights as I go.

“Hold this,” I tell Harry, passing up the bathroom. He takes the rifle.

“Santa come early this year?”

“Scissors,” I say.

Mom hands me the scissors.

I squeeze past the fridge, run into the living room, catch a quick glimpse at Latham still by the sofa, but head straight for the front door instead. I turn on the outside lights – front porch, garage light, driveway lights – and kill the lights inside the room. I also kill the flashlight. That leaves only one light on in the house. The kitchen.

I creep over to it, reach for the switch while keeping my eyes on Alex. She’s still on the floor, handcuffed to the pipe under the sink. She regards me.

“I’m a better shot than you,” she says. “Let me go and I’ll take care of those snipers.”

I flip the kitchen light off. Then I jog over to Latham, kneeling next to him, seeking out his face in the dark.

“How you doing?” I ask.

“Some guys say the excitement goes out of a relationship after the first year. I’m not one of those guys.”

I give him a quick peck, missing his mouth and hitting his cheek.

“This is going to hurt when the circulation comes back.”

I go to work on his duct tape, cutting, peeling, ripping, until his hands come free.

He groans, and my heart breaks. I do his legs next.

“Think you can move?”

“I’ll do my best.”

I help Latham up, try to get his wounded arm over my shoulder. He cries out, so I switch sides.

“Lean on me,” I tell him.

We make it three steps, then he collapses.

“Legs,” he says. “Having some problems.”

I check the front window, look out onto the lawn, and have a clear view. The combination of darkness inside and lights outside will make it hard for the snipers to see us using either regular or night-vision scopes.

“Keep going,” I grunt, trying to pull him to his feet.

Latham manages one step before falling.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

He’s breathing as heavy as I am.

“Legs not working?” I’m referring to the residual paralysis from his bout with botulism.

“Not working.”

This time I find his mouth, press my lips against it.

“It’s okay,” I say. “I have legs for the two of us.”

I prod Latham to his feet once more, then have him stand behind me and put his arms over my shoulders.

“Piggyback?” he says into my ear.

“Just hold on tight.”

His good arm locks around my chest. I lean forward, taking his weight, and manage four staggering steps.

“I kind of like this position,” Latham says.

I stop, lowering him down, catching my breath.

“Don’t like it too much,” I say between puffs. “I can only concentrate on one thing at a time.”

The
BOOM
of a gunshot, and the room gets a hair darker. I glance out the window.

The snipers are shooting the outside lights.

I focus ahead, down the hallway. Maybe fifteen feet to the bathroom. I pick Latham up and go five more steps before losing my footing. We fall, Latham on top of me. My head feels like it has exploded, and I can’t take a breath.

Another shot. Another outside light winks out.

There are only four lights left. Then Latham and I will be completely exposed.