you and your spic pals or somethin’?”
“I don’t like the feel of this,” the first twin said.
“Something’s wrong,” the second twin said.
“
“Come on, he’s just a drunk!” Buchanan said.
“Crawford!” Big Bob Bailey yelled.
I don’t have another choice, Buchanan thought.
“Shoot him,” the first twin told the bodyguard.
(I’ve got to-!)
“I’m talkin’ to you!” Big Bob Bailey stumbled. “Crawford! By Jesus, answer me!”
“Shoot them both,” the second twin told the bodyguard. But Buchanan was already in motion, lunging from the plastic chair, diving toward the left, toward the first twin and the Browning pistol he’d set on the table, his hand spread over it.
Behind Buchanan, the bodyguard fired. With the sound suppressor on the barrel, the guard’s Beretta made a muffled pop. The bullet missed the back of Buchanan’s head.
However, it didn’t miss Buchanan entirely. As he rose and lunged, his right shoulder appeared where his head had been, and the bullet sliced, burning, through the muscle at the side of that shoulder. Before the bodyguard could shoot a second time, Buchanan had collided with the first twin, toppling him over his chair, simultaneously grabbing for the first twin’s weapon. But the first twin would not let go of it.
“Shoot!” the second twin told the bodyguard.
“I can’t! I might hit your brother!”
“Crawford, what the hell’s goin’ on?” Big Bob Bailey yelled.
Rolling in the sand, Buchanan strained to keep the first twin close to him as he fought for a grip on the pistol.
“Move closer!” the second twin told the bodyguard. “I’ll shine my light!”
Buchanan’s shoulder throbbed. Blood streamed from the wound, slicking the first twin and himself, making it hard for Buchanan to keep a grasp on the twin and use him as a shield. As he rolled, sand scraped into his wound. If he’d been standing, the blood would have streaked down his arm to his hand, causing it to become so slippery that his fingers wouldn’t be able to wrench the pistol from the first twin’s hand. But he was prone, and his hand stayed dry as he struggled in the sand. He sensed the bodyguard and the second twin rushing toward him. He heard Big Bob Bailey again yell, “Crawford!” And all at once, the first twin fired his pistol. Unlike the bodyguard’s weapon, the twin’s Browning did not have a sound suppressor. Its report was shockingly loud. The bodyguard and the second twin cursed, scrambling to get out of the line of fire. Buchanan’s ears-already ringing from when the bodyguard had slammed his hands against the sides of Buchanan’s head-now rang louder from the proximity of the shot. Buchanan’s right eye still retained a harsh afterimage from the glare of the penlight that the second twin had aimed at the eye. Relying more on touch than on sight, Buchanan rolled and struggled with the first twin to get control of the pistol. His shoulder ached and began to stiffen.
The first twin fired the pistol again. As much as Buchanan could tell, the bullet went straight up, bursting through the palm fronds at the top of the shelter. But Buchanan’s already compromised vision was assaulted by the pistol’s muzzle flash. “Jesus!” he heard Big Bob Bailey yell. Despite the ringing in his ears, he also heard distant exclamations from the hotel’s outside bar. He sensed the bodyguard and the second twin surging toward him once more, and suddenly he managed to grab the first twin’s right thumb, twisting it, yanking it backward.
The thumb snapped at the middle joint with a sound that was soft, gristly, not so much a crack as a crunch. The first twin screamed and reflexively loosened his hold on the pistol, needing to relax his hand, to reduce the stress on his thumb. In that instant, Buchanan wrested the pistol away and rolled, sand sticking to his bloody shoulder. The bodyguard fired. As Buchanan kept rolling, the bullet struck next to him, and Buchanan shot four times in rapid succession. His vision was still sufficiently impaired that he had to rely on other senses-the touch of sand that the bodyguard scattered while he rushed closer to Buchanan, the sound of the muffled pop from the bodyguard’s sound-suppressed Beretta-to help him estimate the bodyguard’s position. Three of Buchanan’s bullets struck the bodyguard, knocking him backward. Buchanan immediately twisted, aiming to his left, firing twice, hitting the second twin in the stomach and the chest. Blood spurting from between his unbuttoned silk shirt, the target doubled over and fell.
But the bodyguard was still on his feet, Buchanan realized. The man had been hit three times and yet seemed only dazed. Buchanan abruptly understood that all three bullets had struck the bodyguard’s chest and that the Hispanic had seemed so unusually large-boned because the bodyguard was wearing a concealed bullet-resistant vest. As the bodyguard straightened and aimed yet again, Buchanan shot him in the throat, the left eye, and the forehead. Even then, he feared that the bodyguard might spastically squeeze off a shot. Buchanan tensed, desperate to squirm backward. But instead of firing, the bodyguard rose as if trying to balance on his tiptoes, leaned back as if balancing now on his heels, and toppled across the table. At the same time, Buchanan felt thrashing to his right, twisted onto his side, and shot the first twin through his left temple. Blood, bone, and brain-hot and sticky-spattered over Buchanan’s face.
The first twin shuddered, dying.
Buchanan, in turn, inhaled deeply and trembled, overwhelmed by adrenaline. The repeated shots from the unsilenced Browning had intensified the agony of the ringing in his head. Due to years of habit, he’d mentally counted each shot as he’d pulled the trigger. Four toward the bodyguard. Two toward the second twin. Three more toward the bodyguard. One toward the first twin. Earlier, the first twin had fired twice. That made twelve all told. Buchanan hadn’t worried about using all his ammunition because he knew that the Browning was capable of holding thirteen rounds in the magazine and one in the chamber. Normally, he wouldn’t have needed to shoot so many times, but in the darkness, he couldn’t guarantee precision. But now his remaining bullets would not be enough if the shots had attracted the twins’ other bodyguards. In a rush, Buchanan crouched behind the table, aiming toward the gloom of the beach, the glow of the lights at the outdoor bar, and the gleam of the lights at the hotel. A loud, nervous crowd had gathered on the sidewalk that flanked the beach. Several men were pointing in Buchanan’s direction. He didn’t see any armed men rushing toward him. Quickly he made sure that the bodyguard and the first twin were dead. While stopped at the first twin, he searched the body, retrieving his belt, his keys, and his pen. He didn’t want anything associated with him to remain on the scene. In a greater rush, he checked the second twin, groped inside his suit coat, and pulled out the list of names-Buchanan’s pseudonyms-that the second twin had read to him. He left the other list, the names of supposedly disloyal associates that he’d given the twins. The authorities would investigate those names and try to implicate them in these killings.
Or so Buchanan hoped. He wanted to accomplish at least
Buchanan suddenly froze.
“Crawford?” an unsteady voice murmured from the darkness.
Buchanan strained his vision to study the night, his eyes now less impaired by the glare of the penlight and the strobelike flash of the shots.
“Crawford?” Bailey’s voice sounded oddly muffled.
Then Buchanan realized-Bailey had been stumbling toward this table the last time Buchanan had seen him. When the shooting started, Bailey must have dropped to the beach. His voice was muffled because he was pressed, facedown, against the sand.
“Jesus Christ, man, are you all right?” Bailey murmured. “Who’s doin’ all the shootin’?”
Buchanan saw him now, a dark shape hugging the beach. He shifted his gaze toward the crowd on the sidewalk near the hotel’s outdoor bar. The crowd was larger, louder, although still afraid to come anywhere near where guns had been fired. He didn’t see any bodyguards or policemen rushing in his direction. They will, though. Soon, he thought. I don’t have much time. I have to get out of here.
The pain in his shoulder worsened. The wound swelled, throbbing more fiercely. Urgent, he used an unbloody section of his shirt to wipe his fingerprints from where he’d touched the top of the table and the sides of a chair. He
