The front door opened into a shabby-genteel lobby with sixteen brass mailboxes.
Carson read the names on the boxes. 'Harker's on the fourth floor. Top of the building.'
Not convinced of the wisdom of this but caught up in Carson's momentum, Michael went with her to a door beyond which lay stairs that led up through a shaft too long in need of fresh paint.
She started to climb, he followed, and she warned: 'Deucalion says, in a crisis, wounded, they're probably able to turn off pain.'
'Do we need silver bullets?'
'Is that some kind of sarcasm?' Carson asked, mimicking Dwight Frye.
'I've got to admit it is.'
The stairs were narrow. The odors of mildew and disinfectant curdled together in the stifling air. Michael told himself he wasn't getting dizzy.
'They can be killed,' Carson said. ?Allwine was.'
'Yeah. But he
'Remember, Jack Rogers said the cranium has incredible molecular density.'
'Does that mean something in real words?' he asked.
'His brain is armored against all but the highest caliber.'
Gasping not from exertion but from a need for cleaner air than what the fumy stairwell offered, Michael said, 'Monsters among us, masquerading as real people-it's the oldest paranoia.'
'The word
'What's that-some Zen thing?'
'I think
At the landing between the third and fourth floors, Carson paused and pumped the shotgun, chambering a shell.
Drawing his service piece from the paddle holster on his right hip, Michael said, 'So what are we walking into?'
'Scary crap. What's new about that?'
They climbed the last flight to the fourth floor, went through a fire door, and found a short hallway serving four apartments.
The wood floor had been painted a glossy battleship gray. A few feet from Harker's door lay keys on a coiled plastic ring.
Michael squatted, snared the keys. Also on the ring was a small plastic magnetic-reader membership card in a supermarket discount club. It had been issued to Jenna Parker.
He remembered the name from the mailboxes in the public foyer on the ground floor. Jenna Parker lived here at the top of the building; she was one of Harker's neighbors.
Carson whispered,
He looked up at her, and she pointed with the shotgun barrel.
Closer to Harker's door than where the keys had fallen, an inch from his threshold, a dark spot marred the glossy gray planks. The spot was glossy, too, approximately the size of a quarter but oval. Dark, glossy, and red.
Michael touched it with a forefinger. Wet.
He rubbed forefinger to thumb, smelled the smear. Rising to his feet, he nodded at Carson and showed her the name on the supermarket card.
Standing to one side of the door, he tried the knob. You never knew. Most killers were far short of a genius rating on the Stanford-Binet scale. If Harker had two hearts, he still had one brain, and if he was responsible for some of the murders attributed to the Surgeon, a lot of his synapses must be misfiring. All murderers made mistakes. Sometimes they did everything but post a sign inviting arrest.
This time the door proved to be locked. Michael felt enough play in it, however, to suggest that only the latch was engaged, not the deadbolt.
Carson could have destroyed the lock with one round from her 12-gauge. A shotgun is a pretty good residential-defense weapon because the pellets won't penetrate a wall and kill an innocent person in the next room as easily as will the rounds from high-power handguns.
Although a blast to the lock wouldn't risk deadly consequences to anyone inside, Michael wasn't keen to use the shotgun.
Maybe Harker wasn't alone in there. Maybe he had a hostage.
They had to use the minimum force necessary to effect entrance, then escalate as developments required.
Michael stepped in front of the door, kicked it hard in the lock zone, but it held, and he kicked it again, kicked it a third time, each blow booming almost as loud as a shotgun, and the latch snapped. The door flew open.
Quarter-crouched and fast, Carson went through the door first, the shotgun in front of her, sweeping the muzzle left and right.
Behind her, over her shoulder, Michael saw Harker crossing the far end of the room.
'Drop it!' Carson shouted because he had a revolver.
Harker squeezed off a shot. The door frame took it.
A spray of splinters peppered Michael's brow, his hair, as Carson fired at Harker.
The primary force of the blast caught Harker in the left hip, the thigh. He reeled, crashed against the wall, but didn't go down.
As soon as she fired, still moving, Carson chambered another round and simultaneously sidestepped to the left of the door.
Coming behind her, Michael moved to the right as Harker fired a second shot. He heard the keening lament of a bullet cleaving the air, a near miss, inches from his head.
Carson fired again, and Harker staggered with the impact, but he kept moving, plunging into the kitchen, out of sight, as Carson chambered a third round.
CHAPTER 72
Standing with her back to the shared wall between the living room and the kitchen, Carson fished shotgun shells out of a jacket pocket.
She had the shakes. She handled the fat shells one at a time, afraid of fumbling them. If she dropped one, if it rolled under a piece of furniture
Outside at the open trunk of the car, when she had loaded the 12-gauge, she almost hadn't pocketed any spare rounds. This was a finishing weapon, useful for bringing a quick end to a dangerous situation; it wasn't a piece you used for extended fire-fights.
Only twice before had she needed a shotgun. On each occasion a single shot-in one instance, just a warning; in the other incident, intended to wound-had put an end to the confrontation.
Apparently Harker would be as hard to bring down as Deucalion had predicted.
She only had three spare shells. She inserted them in the tube-style magazine and hoped she had enough to do the job.
Skull bone as dense as armor plating. She might blind him with a face shot, but would that matter, could he function anyway?
Two hearts. Aim for the chest. Two rapid-fire rounds, maybe three, point-blank if possible. Take out both hearts.
Across the room, Michael was staying low, using furniture for cover, moving deeper into the living room, angling for a line of sight into the kitchen, where Harker had taken cover.
Harker was only part of their problem, Jenna the other part. The blood in the hallway suggested she was in the apartment. Hurt. Maybe mortally wounded.
Small apartment. Probably three rooms, one bath. He had come out of the bedroom. Jenna might be in there.
