“Got it,” I said. I grabbed the shotgun and strode for the elevator power box. Fortunately neither elevator was moving just then, so no one was going to be trapped between floors when I killed the power. One was on the lobby level, the other on nine. I hit the switches to turn off the power, closed the door to the box, then turned off the basement lights and ran up the stairs to the lobby.
“Here they come again, comin’ slowly.” Willie was excited. For that matter, so was I.
I shot out the main door and threw myself on my back behind a bush, holding the shotgun in front of me.
This position was terrible, and I was a fool to be here — but Grafton wanted the wheelman, and I had to be outside to get him.
“Still rollin’… rollin’… goin’ on by.”
I was so keyed up that I almost collapsed when he said that. I lay there frozen, looking up at the side of the building, the little balconies sticking out, the lit windows… Just then I had the oddest thought, wondered what someone up there would do if he or she saw me lying here.
“He’s acceleratin’, goin’ on up the street. Be right back, I figure. And Tommy, there’s five heads in there.”
“Got it.”
“Robin copies.”
I got up, took off my coat and wrapped it around the shotgun, then crossed the street. There was an office building entrance there right off the sidewalk, two steps up to the door. The sign out front said the thing was full of doctors’ offices. They were all gone for the night — not a light showed.
I sat on the steps and leaned sideways, as if I were about to pass out, with the shotgun on my lap.
The waiting was getting more and more difficult. I kept watching the street toward the subway stop to my left. They would come from that direction, I suspected; just turn around and come straight back. On the other hand, maybe they would go around the block. I forced myself to look in the other direction, too.
No pedestrians this time of night. The good folks were all home in bed.
When I looked at my watch I was surprised to find that only three minutes had passed.
Here came a set of headlights, up from the subway stop. The driver was moving right along.
“It’s them,” Willie said.
The driver turned into the alley that ran behind Grafton’s building, and four men piled out. They ran off down the alley. The car’s backup lights illuminated. They were suiciders. Oh, Lord!
I tore the coat off the gun, sprinted toward the car. The driver never saw me coming. He backed into the street and stopped. As he shifted gears I jerked open the passenger door and dove into the car. He put it in motion. I reached for the keys, turned off the ignition. Couldn’t get the keys out one-handed, so I didn’t try.
He decided I was his biggest problem, so he hit me. Hit me with surprising force, considering that he was seated and belted in. He was scared, pumped with adrenaline. So was I.
I got my knees under me and elbowed him in the face as hard as I could. He was still struggling, so I did it again and again and again. Until he went limp.
I patted him down as fast as I could. No weapon. I jammed the transmission into park and removed the keys from the ignition. Took the keys with me.
Ran into the building and listened at the stairwell door. Maybe a minute had passed since the four guys ran down the alley.
“You want me to call the cops, Tommy?” That was Willie.
“Not yet. First shot.”
I figured they would just use a pipe wrench on that personnel door, so was surprised when I heard a muffled thud. The idiots had blown the knob.
If they had any sense they would ignore the elevators. If they didn’t, they would try the elevators first, and when they didn’t work, come up the stairs. Either way, they were using the stairs.
I waited, my ear against the door.
And heard their feet pounding on the steel stairs.
I waited, tense as a spring.
With his cell phone in his hand and his coat collar pulled up around his ears, Willie Varner was seated on a stoop beside a leafless bush about a hundred feet north of the Saturn, which sat nosed into the curb, blocking half of one lane of traffic. Not that there was much traffic. Just one car passed after Tommy ran into Grafton’s building.
Willie looked around carefully. If there were any more terrorists around, his job was to tell Tommy about it. He didn’t see anyone.
Now the guy behind the wheel of the Saturn stirred. Willie saw his head move. Then the driver’s door opened and he tried to get out. Ended up falling. Picked himself up slowly and leaned against the car with his head against his arm.
Willie adjusted his baseball cap and scanned up and down the street.
I heard them running in the stairwell, their feet pounding on the steel steps. They came up from the basement and charged by the lobby door and kept going up.
When the last one seemed to be above me, I eased the door open. They disappeared around the upper landing and kept climbing.
I started up two stairs at a time, as close to the outside wall as I could get, the shotgun ready and the safety off. The rumble of their feet filled the stairwell.
As we passed the third-floor door, I had closed the gap. I saw legs between the steps on the flight above me. I used the shotgun. One shot. Two. The reports were like cannon shots in that concrete box.
Two men fell, screaming. I kept climbing. One was down, lying on the stairs, so I gunned him. He took the ounce and a quarter of buck in the back. I kept going, worked the slide, and let the second one have it in the gut. Blood erupted; he crumpled and lay still.
A bullet spanged off the steel beside me.
I paused to shove more shells into the magazine.
Another shot, this time from higher up. He was still climbing, shooting to discourage me.
I stepped over the corpses and kept climbing, looking up for feet to shoot at.
The guy stopped climbing, fired off four shots. He aimed them at the walls so the bullets ricocheted. One of them kissed me on the top of the shoulder. The damn thing burned and I almost dropped the shotgun. Held on to it and aimed for the wall, gave him a load of buckshot, just to see if I could bounce some his way.
He fired again, so I adjusted my aim and gave him another ounce and a quarter of lead.
Someone was screaming in my ears. “… are coming!”
I kept going, got a glimpse of a foot and shot at it. Hit it, too. A shout, and a groan. He emptied his pistol into the wall, trying to hit me with a ricochet.
While all this was going on, I shoved the last of my shells into the Remington. I had lost count of how many were in there, and my pocket was empty.
This guy must have fired seven or eight shots into the walls. I figured he had one of those thirteen-shot magazines. When the shooting stopped, I heard him sob, so I ran upward. He was lying on the landing against the concrete wall, the stump of his foot covered with blood, blood on his face, trying to get another magazine into his pistol.
I took careful aim and shot him square in the face. That close, his head exploded.
Working the slide, I eased up the stairs to the fifth-floor landing.
Keeping against the wall as much as possible, I kept going, carefully. You won’t believe how careful I went up.
Heard an explosion, not muffled. He had blown the lock on the eighth-floor door. Now I heard him grunting, trying to get it open.
I kept going, the shotgun up, looking for …
A shot, and simultaneously a bullet hit the wall right above my shoulder. Reflexively I jerked off a shot and jacked the slide.
Pounding feet. He had given up on the door and was climbing!
I went up, too.
