Time to Run (22 page)

With a growl of rage, Garret slung her aside. Her face hit the door. She rolled as she fell, striking her hip against the desk by the door. The pain that knifed through her was stunning.

The German shepherd, penned outside, two trailers down, began to bark.

Rachel lost consciousness, but only for a second. She was aware of Garret raging away from her. She heard him kick her purse over; heard her keys tumble out. She cracked an eye and saw him stooping down to snatch something else that had fallen out—the accordion-style address book where she kept a record of her closest contacts.

Outside, the German shepherd barked again.

Over the ringing in Rachel's ears, she heard him riffle through the names. "Don't know where she is, hmmm?" he gloated, finding Sara's name with ridiculous ease. "As I said, all women are liars."

She expected him to shoot her. The pain in her hip was so excruciating, she half anticipated the relief that oblivion would offer.

The air shifted. Then, out of nowhere, came a bone-shattering kick to Rachel's ribs. It knocked the air from her lungs, stifling the scream that tore from her throat.

With the dog now barking stridently, Garret turned and slunk out of her home, so quietly that she couldn't hear him over the roaring in her ears.

She lost consciousness again.

She roused to pain many minutes later. It took a moment to recall why she lay on her living room floor, her body broken and uncooperative.

Oh, God, Sara's husband came looking for her! He left with her address.

Rachel had to warn her!

But she was paralyzed. She couldn't move without causing herself unbearable agony.

"Help!" Her feeble voice drove home the extent of her isolation. No one was going to hear her, not even the German shepherd who'd stopped barking.

The only way to warn Sara was to crawl for the phone on the other side of the room.

Digging her nails into the carpet, Rachel pulled. She almost fainted again as her ribs screamed in protest. Determined, she repeated the movement again . . . and again, inching across the room, swimming in and out of consciousness.

I
will not give up my baby a second time.

That determination kept her trying.

It came as both a relief and a distraction to be summoned to the BAPD headquarters to await orders in anticipation of the skinheads' demonstration. Chase occupied an inconspicuous seat in the corner of the lobby, next to a potted plant, where he chafed to get under way, only the target had yet to be revealed.

Even after exhaustive measures, the police were reduced to responding to the threat rather than preventing it.

Chase still considered himself an outsider. His partner, a fellow by the name of Robison, had tossed him a load-bearing ballistic vest with pockets full of ammunition, radio, and flash bangs. But beneath the vest, Chase's fatigues were Navy issue with a different camouflage pattern than the fatigues worn by the SOT team. He was content to remain low-profile, as long as he felt that he was avenging Jesse's death.

The team leader, Captain Lewis, paced between Dean Cannard's office and the Information desk, where the phones rang nonstop. Civilians were responding to the wanted posters dispersed throughout town by the uniformed division.

But even now, eight hours into Columbus Day, the police had few solid leads. The skinheads were still at large, and their target was a big fat question mark.

Hannah stood over the fax machine, arms akimbo. Wearing FBI-issue battle dress, including a Magnum holstered to her chest, web belt loaded with ammo, and calf-high boots, she looked like a redheaded version of Laura Croft. Tapping an impatient toe, she waited for the fax machine to spit out paper. At last, an employee at the IRS was sending the requested copies of Willard Smith's tax returns.

Chase recognized the exact moment that Hannah noted something of interest in the returns. She reached for her briefcase, snatching out the papers that she'd copied the other day. She took a second to compare the two. "Captain," she called, causing Lewis to join her in a hurry. "This may be coincidental, but Will Smith and Tim Olsen both worked as landscapers at Indian Springs Golf Course. They either quit at the same time, or they were fired."

The captain shrugged as if to say, So what?

"If their jobs were given to minorities, that'd be an incentive to strike back, wouldn't it?" she proposed.

Lewis frowned skeptically. "A country club seems like a pretty unlikely target," he replied.

A memory popped into Chase's mind, prompting him to speak up for the first time. "What's a duffer?" he asked.

Hannah, the captain, and fourteen SOT members looked over at the seemingly random question. He asked it again.

"What's a duffer?" They all looked at each other. No one knew what a duffer was.

Right then, Dean Cannard popped out of his office, coffee mug in hand. "Duffer? That was in yesterday's crossword puzzle. It's slang for bad golfer."

Chase stood up and tightened his ballistic vest. "They're gonna target the country club," he announced with absolute conviction. "Willard Smith told Sa—Serenity that he was going to teach those liberal duffers to look after their own."

For a second, nobody moved.

Dean broke the silence. "Well, hot damn," he said, glancing at the captain. "That's the break we've been looking for."

Captain Lewis narrowed his eyes at Chase. "You'd better be right about this, McCaffrey," he warned.

Chase just headed for the double doors and the van parked outside.

"Okay, let's go," Lewis shouted, making his decision. "Into the van," he ordered. "Let's stop this thing before it starts."

Chase held the doors for the fourteen other members to file through. Hannah caught up to him, hefting her briefcase. "I'm coming, too," she informed him.

Chase thought of the five hundred pounds of ANFO that the skinheads were purported to have at their disposal. "Keep your distance," he warned. God forbid anything happened to Hannah on his watch. Luther'd never forgive him.

Dean Cannard caught up with them. "Mind if I catch a ride with you, ma'am?" he asked Hannah.

She slanted him a frown. "Aren't you in the criminal investigations division?"

His smile was sheepish. "Yeah, but I get bored sitting behind a desk all day."

"I can relate to that," she muttered. "Sure, come on." With a nod at Chase, she struck out toward her Mustang, leaving Chase to clamber into the SWAT van with the other scouts, snipers, and entry experts. Given their closed looks, they weren't at all convinced yet that the country club was the target area.

Chase eased onto the narrow bench and donned the headset that Robison passed to him. The rear doors clanged shut, and they were off.

His thoughts drifted to Sara. It was his last full day in Broken Arrow. He couldn't stop regret from stitching through him. At the same time, he was grateful for the day's distractions. They prevented him from taking her to bed again, which was all he could think about. Why was it that making love with Sara could terrify and satisfy him at the same time?

It made him worry that he just might be in love. On the heels of love came empathy, then remorse. Moreover, love hurt—more than knife wounds, bullet wounds, or sleeping on mangrove roots. Falling in love would be suicide.

Yet no woman ever deserved to be loved more.

It put him in an awful quandary. He couldn't save her this time and still save himself.

The radio crackled in his ear, returning his thoughts to the present.

"Heads up, men. We have a situation at the country club. At least one shooter is firing at golfers on the green. There's a man down on the fourth hole."

Fourteen pairs of eyes swiveled toward Chase, who raised his eyebrows just a tad.

The team leader quickly assigned their tasks. Chase and his partner, Robison, along with one other sniper pair, would flush the shooters from the trees. Scout teams one and two would determine the status of the clubhouse, keeping an eye out for the truckload of ANFO. The five entry guys would remain on standby. In the event that the bomb was pinpointed, Flint and Sievers would be sent in to disarm it.

Chase felt the van veer off 131st East Avenue and bounce into the long drive that led to the clubhouse. It came to a halt.

"Go, go, go!" the team leader shouted.

The snipers and scouts jumped out to find themselves just down the lane from the clubhouse. Chase swept a gaze over the lush terrain. A hardwood forest framed the golf course, providing adequate cover to the shooters.

He signaled to his partner that they would cut through the woods, taking out hostiles as they came across them. Robison nodded.

Chase had been here only once before, as a boy. He waved Robison ahead of him. Together they penetrated the woods at a stealthy run.

They hadn't covered fifty yards when the sound of a gunshot rang out, followed by a woman's scream, then another gunshot. Then silence.

Chase pinpointed where the shots had come from. In his earpiece, he could hear the scouts giving a head count on the number of civilians rushing for the safety of the clubhouse. "Oh, shit," one of them breathed. "There's a closed truck with no plates parked at the food services entry."

The unwelcome news made Chase draw his gun. He sprinted past Robison, who was heavy on his feet, determined to take out the shooter with the least amount of time wasted.

Keeping ten yards between them, they swept the area from which the shooter had fired. On this side of the golf course, vegetation was thick, with plenty of ground cover. On the other side, the woods had been thinned to provide golfers a better view of the glinting Arkansas River.

Chase was the first to spot the shooter. The man was crouched behind a bush, gun pointed toward the green. With a silent leap, Chase tackled him. In the next instant, the man's rifle was ten yards away, his nose shoved into the moss at the base of a tree, and Chase was securing his wrists with a black nylon tie-tie.

Robison snatched up the rifle and emptied it of ammunition.

"Who's out here with you?" Chase demanded in the man's ear. "Where're your friends?" He wondered if this was Timmy or Les. Bearing down on the pressure point on the man's shoulder, he quickly got the answers he was seeking.

There were two other shooters, positioned at forty-five-degree angles around the clubhouse, a hundred yards out.

Chase secured the man's feet so that he couldn't get away.
Let's go,
he signaled to Robison, who left the familiar-looking Remington propped against a tree.

As they went to stalk the others, news floated over Chase's earpiece that Flint and Sievers couldn't get close to the bomb. An invisible sniper, location unknown, was keeping the entry guys at bay. He'd also shot three civilians trying to leave the clubhouse.

Chase altered direction. Thumbing his mike, he requested Sniper Team Two to pursue the skinheads on the golf course. He was going after Willard Smith, because that was who the shooter had to be.

And chances were it would take a Navy SEAL to catch an Army Ranger.

With Robison crashing through the woods in his wake, Chase raced toward the clubhouse at a silent run. The single-story, brick structure stood in an open area with no other buildings around it, other than an outdoor changing facility at the far end of the swimming pool.

Keeping his squad mates apprised of their location, he and Robison took cover behind an ornamental wall, a brick job that flanked the driveway. Peering around it, Chase immediately spied the three bodies on the clubhouse steps.

Shit.
At least one of the victims—a small child—was still alive, making time critical. Not to mention that the fuse in the stockpile of ANFO was probably set to ignite at any moment.

A mental timer started ticking in Chase's head.
Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.
Chase's heart was beating twice that fast.

He put himself in Willard's position. Where would he be, if he wanted a view of both clubhouse doors, as well as the delivery bay for the restaurant?

He'd be high up in a tree, above it all.

There were only four large trees within range of the clubhouse. Chase scanned them all, his gaze settling on a large oak. He waited, his pulse bouncing off his eardrums. He watched.
Come on, bastard.
And then a branch moved.

It could have been a breeze but... no, there it was again. The shooter was propped along a branch about thirty feet up. Chase could just make him out, covered in a green mesh that camouflaged him almost perfectly.

"Sniper located," he said into his mike. "Permission to take him out, sir."

"Request confirmed," the team leader replied, with relief in his voice.

Even though he'd been the spotter, Chase didn't give the shot to Robison, who was the designated shooter. He whipped the SIG from its holster and flicked off the safety, favoring it over the MP5 which would destroy a good portion of the tree. Chase was angling for a little more finesse than that.

He broke from the cover of his hiding place and sprinted in a zigzag fashion toward the oak. He had to get close enough that he wouldn't miss. One shot, one kill was the motto he'd abided by for sixteen years.

Braced for the impact of a bullet slamming into him, he sprinted toward the oak. A round of pellets punched into the soft soil at his feet, letting him know that Smith had seen him coming.

He accelerated in panic, reaching the safety of the oak's broad trunk where he paused, catching his breath. He had the advantage now, and Willard knew it.

What goes up
—he thought, preparing to spin around the trunk and fire—
must come down.

He dodged left, praying that Willard expected him to come out the other way. He fired with his body still in motion.
Bang!

An abbreviated roar assured Chase that he'd hit his mark. Willard rolled off the limb where he lay and dropped. He was probably dead before he hit the ground.

With all the skinheads believed to be accounted for, the entry team burst out of their sundry hiding places and swarmed the building.