with a half-jump, she spun around so that she was facing the wall with the handle of the shears clutched in both hands behind her.
Ross never saw the danger or, if he did, the warning came too late for him to check his headlong attack. Momentum carried him forward and onto the upthrust blades of the shears. The force of the blow to her back sent Joanna smashing face-first into the wall. The other tools hanging there crashed to the floor around her. Meanwhile, as Ross fell back, Joanna felt something hot and sticky ooze onto her hands.
“Why, you bitch!” he howled, rolling on the floor and clutching his bleeding abdomen. “You incredible bitch!”
Joanna tried to move out of the way, but hopping on both feet together didn’t make for maneuverability. He caught her by the leg and pulled her down on top of him.
“You’re going to help me,” he hissed. “You’re going to help me get up and out of here.”
Somehow, though, through it all-through being knocked down and then dragged on top of him-Joanna had managed to keep hold of the shears. Twisting in his grasp, she plunged the shears into him a second time. This time the blade went deep into his thigh. As Ross squirmed and howled in pain, Joanna managed to roll away from him and go slithering across the cold cement floor.
Joanna had heard Ross say that help was on its way. All she had to do was keep him there and keep herself out of harm’s way until the promised backup units arrived. Unable to regain her feet, Joanna scooted out of the garage and onto the driveway. The cold and rough cement tore through her nylons, rubbing her legs raw. With every inch of forward motion, Joanna kept looking back over her shoulder, expecting him to come lunging after her once more.
Joanna moved past the Lexus without stopping, but when she reached the Concorde, she used the car’s fender as a brace and hauled herself up into a sitting position. There, she dropped the shears and wrested the Glock out of her holster. It wasn’t a matter of taking aim. She simply held the barrel of the gun against the rubber tire and pulled the trigger.
Then, after retrieving the shears and with both them and the Glock in hand, she made her way back to the Blazer. There was always a chance that Ross Jenkins’ vehicle was equipped with those new expensive tires, the ones you were supposed to be able to drive on for fifty miles even if they were plugged full of holes. Joanna knew it would be a long time before Frank Montoya would agree to buy them for the sheriff department’s fleet of vehicles.
When she finally reached the front of the Blazer, she did the same thing to the right front tire there, shooting it twice for good measure and sighing with satisfaction as the confined air came rushing out.
“Lady,” a voice directly behind her said. “What are you doing? Are you crazy or something? And what’s on that shears? It looks like blood.”
Joanna turned. There, scowling at her from the seat of a bicycle, stood a young boy of eleven or twelve. “I’m not crazy,” she said. “There’s a killer loose in there-a killer with a gun. Here. Take the shears and cut my hands loose before he comes after us.”
The boy hesitated, but for only an instant. Dropping his bike, he grabbed the bloody shears and snipped through the tape. First he freed Joanna’s hands and then her legs, not without nicking her in the shin. In the distance Joanna heard the welcome swell of a siren announcing the arrival of at least one patrol car.
“Thank you,” she said. “Now go. Get out of here before you get hurt.”
The boy scrambled for his bike.
“What’s your name?”
“Andrew,” he said. “Andrew Styles.”
“Where do you live?”
He pointed. “Two houses down,” he said.
“Go!” Joanna ordered. “Get inside the house and stay there. Don’t come out until I come and tell you it’s okay.”
“But what about you?”
“I’m okay now. I’ll be fine.”
She slipped into the Blazer and was reaching for the radio. Just then, as Andrew Styles went wheeling away, two people emerged from the garage. With one hand, Ross Jenkins leaned heavily on a rake handle. His other arm was wrapped around the supporting shoulder of Dena Hogan.
“Stop right there,” Joanna ordered. “I’m placing you both under arrest. Put down your weapons.”
Dena raised her hands. “Don’t try to stop him,” she warned. “He’s got a gun. He says he’ll shoot me if you do.”
By then Joanna could see that her Colt 2000 hung loosely in Ross’ hand, inches from Dena Hogan’s right ear. And now the arriving sirens-two of them at least-were that much closer. The patrol cars couldn’t be more than a block or two away, far too close to be outrun by a Blazer with a flattened tire. And the blood on Ross Jenkins’ trousers had its own tale to tell. It was possible he still had no idea of how badly he was hurt, but Joanna knew exactly where the blades had plunged into his body. Without swift medical help he was likely to bleed to death. Even then, it would take all the skill of modern medicine, along with powerful antibiotics, to keep the wounded man from succumbing to the ravages of peritonitis.
With that understood, it was easy for Joanna Brady to be gracious-as long as no one stooped to inspect the tires. “All right,” she agreed. “I don’t want anyone else to get hurt. I’ll get out. I’m stepping away from the vehicle. Here are the keys. I’ll leave them right here on the seat. But you’re not going to get far, Ross. You’re going to need a doctor.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Ross said to Dena. “Help me get in. You drive.”
They hobbled as far as the Blazer’s passenger door. Ross moaned in pain as Dena helped him up onto the seat. Then she closed the door. But instead of walking to the driver’s door, Dena Hogan left Ross Jenkins sitting in the car and walked straight over to Joanna.
“Can you help with a plea-bargain?” she asked.
“I’ll do whatever I can,” Joanna replied.
“I surrender then,” Dena Hogan said. “Ross is on his own.”
Joanna grabbed Dena and propelled her around the corner of the garage just as the first arriving Sierra Vista patrol car roared through the intersection on Ramsey and came barreling down Kino. That was when a blast from Joanna’s Colt shattered the still autumn air and sent a cloud of safety glass blowing out of the Blazer’s windshield.
“Damn you, Dena!” Ross Jenkins raged. “Don’t you dare do that. This was your idea, remember? It was all your idea.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Dena countered. “You don’t believe him, do you?”
“I don’t have to,” Joanna told her. “That’ll be for the prosecutors and courts to decide.”
By then one of the Sierra Vista officers sprinted around the back of the house and arrived at the spot where Joanna was fastening Flexi-cuffs on Dena Hogan’s wrists. Joanna pulled out her ID and flashed it in his face. “Are you all right?” he panted, gasping for breath.
“We are, but he’s not,” Joanna said nodding toward the Blazer. “He’s wounded. In the gut and the leg both. You take her, and I’ll see what I can do about him.”
The arriving officer took charge of Dena. “You heard her, Ross,” Joanna called to him. “Dena wants to make a deal. If you don’t want her to have first dibs, you’d better throw my Colt out the window and come out with your hands up.”
There was a long silence after that. In the background there was some radio chatter as two sets of dispatchers tried to make sense of what was happening. Joanna waited. Time seemed to stand still. What she really expected to hear was another roar of gunfire. What she heard instead were two distinct clicks as the Colt misfired-twice. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the Colt came whirling out through the driver’s window. It spun across the browned grass like a deadly metal Frisbee and landed some fifteen feet away.
“Help me,” Ross Jenkins said. “It hurts real bad. I need a doctor. Now.”
“Right,” Joanna said, moving forward and wrenching open the door. “We’ll get you one right away.”
