?I told you,? Nikki said. ?They want me dead.? The man with the voice had sent his killers. She would never be safe. They would hound her to the ends of the earth.
?It has nothing to do with me,? Foley said.
The old man?s voice had moved. He was shifting in the darkness, trying to find a spot for himself. He was an old veteran. She could tell. But he was long in the tooth. Most didn?t last so long in this business. Time to see what Mike Foley was made of.
?We can help each other, Foley.?
?I told you. Not my concern.?
?They won?t see it that way,? Nikki said. ?They?re going to come in here any second and sanitize the place, including you, whether you feel involved or not.?
A pause. ?What do you want from me?? Foley asked.
?Kill anyone downstairs that?s not me. My mother is upstairs. I have to go.?
?How will I know if it?s you or not in the dark??
?I?ll say, Don?t shoot me, Mike Foley you son of a bitch. How?s that??
?Fair enough.?
?Okay,? Nikki said. ?I?m going. Good luck.?
She ran quickly out of the library, through the dark house, down the hall to the stairs. The furniture had not been moved in years. She had that much over her assailants at least. She could navigate the house with a bag over her head. No problem.
Nikki had a split second of warning before she saw the tiny penlight hovering in the dark, then the fist smacked into her face, bells shrieking in her ears, fireworks behind her eyes. The world spun. Nikki flew in the air. Her feet couldn?t find the floor.
* * *
After the lights went out, Sprat waited thirty seconds, steeling his nerve.
He pulled a knife, held it loosely, poised to toss should he see a target. He took a step back and a deep breath and kicked open the French doors just as a blinding flash of lightning lit up the Garden District.
* * *
Mike flinched when the French doors flung open with a loud crack, the rain and wind roaring into the library.
The lightning filled the doorway with blue-white light. Standing in contrast was the shape of a man. He could have been a cardboard cutout from a police shooting range. The outline of this guy holding something up near his head. It was right there for a fraction of a second, the duration of a lightning flash, and then this outline vanished back into the darkness in the same heartbeat that Mike swung the shotgun and blasted buckshot.
Mike heard the intruder yell. Immediately, Mike knew it wasn?t a pain yell. It was a surprise yell. Another lightning flash, and Mike wasn?t sure what he was seeing. The man seemed to spring onto a set of bookshelves like a spider monkey, something flying toward Mike, spinning and glittering metallic in the lightning flash.
It struck Mike in pitch-darkness, stabbed medium deep into his leg. The monkey guy had tossed a knife at him. It stuck in his leg, and Mike was afraid it would bleed too much if he pulled it out.
He gritted his teeth, pumped the shotgun, and caught a glimpse of the guy leaping to the floor in the next lightning flash. He fired, buckshot spraying, but the monkey man had slunk under a desk. The guy was cat-fast, a twitchy lizard. The way he moved, Mike couldn?t get a bead on him. He pumped, fired the shotgun, pumped and fired again, trying to follow the little man?s jerky movements in the white-bright lightning strikes.
Mike circled, pumped, blasted. The tinkle of broken glass. The French doors flapped in the wind. Thunder cracked. The shotgun hammered away at the interior of the library, but it was like trying to shoot a ghost.
Mike pumped and pulled the trigger again.
