Sudden prey

TWENTY-FIVE

STADIC WAS UP, DRESSED BUT STILL GROGGY-HEWAS A hundred hours behind on his sleep, he thought-and thinking about breakfast cereal when he heard the screaming on the radio.

He threw on a parka and gloves, grabbed his gun, and ran for his car. He was five minutes from downtown: he made it in four. The parking lot outside the medical center looked like a used car lot, cops coming in from everywhere in their own cars. Light racks lit up the snowstorm.

He paused, looking at the chaos, then went on by, and took a turn down Eleventh.

Yes: Lights shone down from Harp's apartment. Damnit: He went around the block, got a shotgun out of the trunk and loaded it. If he could flush them, unsuspecting, he could finish it. Dispatch said both men were hurt.

He decided to wait a few minutes: if they'd been shot, maybe the woman would be going out for medical supplies. He could take her at the door, and then go right on in. Otherwise, the place was a fort.

• • •

A DOCTOR CAME DOWN THE HALL TO THE PHONES AND said, ''Are you Davenport?''

''Yeah.'' Lucas was on the phone with Roux. He said, ''Hang on,'' and looked at the doctor.

''We got a picture, you might want to look at it.''

''OKAY.'' OUT THE WINDOW, HE COULD SEE THE MEDIA vehicles piling up down the street. Cameramen orbited the building, their lights like little suns illuminating the night. ''Gotta go, they got an X ray on Del,'' he said to Roux.

''I'll be there in fifteen minutes,'' she said.

Lucas followed the doctor back into the emergency room, where two other doctors were looking at an X ray clipped to a lighted glass. Lucas could see the outline of the Formica where it pierced Del's face.

''He got lucky,'' the doctor said, tapping the film. ''It just penetrated into the base of the tongue. Didn't quite make it through: we were afraid that it had penetrated the pal… the roof of the mouth, but it didn't. It's just sort of jammed in there. We'll get it cleaned out.''

''No damage?''

''He's gonna hurt like hell, but in a couple weeks, he'll be fine. He's gonna need a plastic guy on his neck, though. The thing looks nasty.''

''How about his wife?''

Cheryl had ripped some IV tubes loose when she'd crawled across to her husband, and had been bleeding. ''That's nothing,'' the doctor said. ''She's fine.''

''God bless,'' Lucas said. ''And Franklin?''

''He's okay.''

TWENTY-FIVE MINUTES AFTER THE FIREFIGHT, LUCAS was talking to a patrol captain, trying to figure out why theyhadn't found the car: ''Christ, they were no more than thirty seconds ahead of you guys.''

The captain was getting a little hot: ''Look, a fuckin' mouse couldn't have gotten out of here on its hands and knees. We're looking at every car parked in the loop, they must be in a parking garage, somewhere. We'll get them…''

Lucas was staring over his shoulder, his eyes defocused. He said, ''Stay put,'' and put his handset to his mouth and said, ''I need a run on Daymon Harp. That's first name D-A-Y-M-O-N, last name H-A-R-P. I need to know what he drives.''

The captain looked at him curiously; five seconds later, Dispatch came back, a different voice. ''Lucas, Sandy Darling just called. She's left the phone off the hook, she says they're there…''

''On Eleventh Avenue?'' Lucas asked.

''Yeah… how'd you know?''

Then the other dispatcher: ''Lucas, he's got a 1994 Lincoln.. .''

''A brown one,'' Lucas said.

''Yes.''

''All right,'' Lucas said, and he felt the rush, the lift that came at the end of a hunt. ''I want to do this right. They're at Harp's apartment on Eleventh, it's a two-story, they're up above a laundromat. There's a front stairs and a garage on the side. I want somebody down there now, and we'll need an ERU team. ..''

Behind him, the patrol captain broke for his car. He shouted back, ''I'll get some guys moving.''

AGAIN, STADIC HEARD THE SUDDEN RUSH ON THE RADIO. And the phrase, ''Down on

Eleventh.''

He knew immediately what it was. He grabbed his phone, punched in Harp's number.

Busy. Christ. He couldn't allow a siege: there'd be survivors.

The apartment would be surrounded, there'd be helicopters overhead

… when it came to outright suicide, LaChaise and the other crazy fucker might change their minds. And once they were out, and behind bars, they'd deal him.

The fear clawed at him, propelled him out of the car door. He ran up the side street past the garage, around the corner, kicked in the glass on the bottom floor door and ran up the stairs. At the top, facing the pile of cardboard boxes, he screamed: ''LaChaise, they know you're here. They're coming now. Right now. You've got less than a minute. They've got Harp's car, they've got Harp's car. You hear me? Harp's car, they got it.''

And he ran back down, seeing in his mind's eye a cop car pulling up from across the street, leveling a shotgun at him, the questions…

The street was empty. Hell, the radio traffic hadn't started more than a minute ago. He ran back around the corner, jumped in his car, started it and rolled away.

And as he went, he noticed the utter silence of the night, the quiet in the snow. Every siren in town had been killed. But every cop car in town was rolling toward him.

He punched the car down the street, one block, two, and stopped: when the first cars came in, he wanted to be with them.

The first car came in as he thought, gliding in silence toward the laundromat on the corner.