Four Blind Mice

Chapter Ninety-Four

Sampson and I were up in a flash and sprinting full-out toward the cabin. We reached the front door together. He went in first with his gun drawn.

“Police!” he yelled over the blaring rock music and TV. “Police! Hands in the air. Now!”

I was right behind Sampson when Starkey opened up with an MP5. At the same time, Griffin fired a handgun from across the room. The two Asian women were screaming as they scampered out the cabin's rear door. They had enough street smarts to get out of there fast. I saw that the smaller woman had a deep gash across her cheek. Her face was dripping blood.

Marc Sherman lay on the floor, motionless. There were dark splatters of blood on the wall behind the lawyer's body. He was dead.

The big gun erupted again, noise and smoke filling the room. My ears were ringing. I wasn't even sure if I'd been hit or not.

“Move out!” Sharkey yelled to the others.

“Di di maul” Brownley Harris shouted, and actually seemed to be laughing. Was he completely mad? Were they all insane?

The three killers bolted out the back door. Warren Griffin covered the retreat with heavy fire. They didn't want a final shootout inside the cabin. Starkey had other plans for his team.

Sampson and I fired at the retreating men, but they made it out. We approached the back door slowly. Nobody was waiting there, and no more shots were fired at us for the moment.

Suddenly there was the sound of shooting away from the cabin. Half a dozen hollow pops. I heard the shrill screams of the two women cut through the trees.

I peeked my head around the corner of the cabin. I didn't like what I saw. The two women hadn't made it to their car. Both lay on the dirt road. They'd been shot in the back. Neither of them moved.

I turned to Sampson. “They'll come back for us. They're going to take us out here in the woods.”

He shook his head. “No they're not. We're going to take them out. When we see them, we open up. No warnings, Alex. No prisoners. Do you understand what I'm saying?”

I did. This was an all-or-nothing fight. It was war, not police work, and we were playing by the same rules as them.