Page 57 of The Evening Wolves

He drew himself back to the present moment as he reached the top of the stairs. The argument didn’t matter, not right now. What mattered was that he was here, alone, without backup and without even the option of calling the local police. And he didn’t have a gun. And someone was here. Maybe it was only Brey, but someone was in this house.

A door stood immediately to the right of the stairs, but no light showed inside the room. He kept going. The hallway continued, the shadows thickening as it stretched away from the windows facing the street. John-Henry thought he could make out a pair of double doors. He filed the other details—the console table with a vase and flowers; the dull gleam of the wainscotting; the smell of wax and polish and pine; oil paintings that showed pale-faced men and women in antiquated clothing—all the way at the back of his brain.

The double doors opened onto what he would have called a trophy room or a game room—he could make out the animal heads mounted on the wall, the shape of the furniture filling the space. It was the kind of thing that didn’t really exist anymore, but here it was, existing. He could smell it, an animal smell, dry and dusty and unpleasant. He shut the doors and kept going.

When the hall turned, he stopped. Ahead, light spilled from a partially open doorway, cutting an arc out of the darkness. For what seemed like an eternity, he heard nothing. And then the rustle of clothing came, strained breathing. He inched forward.

The door stood open far enough for John-Henry to see into the room, and he registered some of the details instantaneously: the unmade bed, the dresser cluttered with the usual wallet and keys and loose change, the familiar smell of a space heater. Like the great room and the kitchen, this was a lived-in space—one of the few in the old Brey house. The sound of movement came again, then it stopped, and someone exhaled in frustration. John-Henry moved closer, tested the door for squeaky hinges, and then pushed. It swung open another handsbreadth.

Two men were on the bed, one straddling the other, and for a single moment, embarrassment washed over John-Henry. Then he took in the rest of the picture. Both men were fully dressed. Eric Brey sat propped against the headboard, a belt looped around his neck and between the headboard’s spindles. His head hung loose on his neck, and he didn’t appear to be breathing.

The other man wore dark jeans and a dark coat, and the coat rustled when he moved. John-Henry did the automatic catalogue: possibly Hispanic; dark hair buzzed; muscular but not big—a whipcord kind of strength. John-Henry guessed that if the man were standing, he’d probably be Auggie’s height, maybe even a little shorter. The raised tissue of an old scar ran along the side of his neck.

With a satisfied noise, the man yanked the belt tight. Then he shimmied back until he was clear of Brey’s body. He undid Brey’s jeans and yanked them down to his ankles. Brey’s peppermint-striped boxers went next. The man sat back on his heels, inspecting the picture. And then his whole body stiffened, and his head snapped toward the door.

Dark eyes locked with John-Henry’s. Then he cut them to the left. The man didn’t cry out. He didn’t demand to know what John-Henry was doing there. He rolled off the bed, the movement liquid, and landed easily on his feet. Then he lunged toward something out of sight.

Instinct took over. John-Henry hit the door with his shoulder as he barreled into the room, and he was moving at full speed when he jumped. He caught the shorter man in a flying tackle, and they both went down. They hit the floor hard, the impact sending a shock through John-Henry’s shoulder. It was like heat. Like a flower of heat opening inside his shoulder. A bad tackle, a small part of his brain thought. Coach would have his ass.

But those thoughts were happening in a far-off place as he rolled across the floor. The smaller man was trying to get free, twisting and bucking, and John-Henry grappled with him, trying to hold on. It was harder than he expected—the coat was some sort of synthetic, the material slipping out of his grip, and the man was strong. Much stronger than he looked. They crashed into the dresser, and something toppled. Glass broke. A sweet, citrus smell filled the air, and that far-off part of John-Henry’s brain said, Cologne. When the man planted his feet and tried to rise, he dragged John-Henry into a sitting position.

That was when John-Henry saw the knife and gun resting on a chair near the door.

He only had a moment to process the threat before the man tried to headbutt him. John-Henry avoided a blow that would have broken his nose and, quite probably, left him unconscious, but only by letting go of the man’s coat and dropping back. The man twisted like a snake, taking advantage of the sudden freedom to break toward the gun and knife.

John-Henry scissored his legs, trapping the man’s ankles. The man’s own momentum worked against him, and he crashed to the floor again. The whole house seemed to shake under the impact.

Seconds, John-Henry thought in that far-off place. It would be over in seconds, not minutes. He wasn’t a brawler like Theo. He didn’t know how to fight dirty like Jem. He lacked Emery’s mass and strength.

But even as those thoughts spilled out, years of training, years of being a cop, were already activating: lines of defense going up inside his brain, conditioning taking over. You fight to win. That was the first and final rule of any engagement. You will win. They called it the winning mind. You fight until you win. The one who keeps fighting, the one who doesn’t give up, that’s the one who wins.

He crawled toward the smaller man, grabbing his leg, the waistband of his jeans, one flailing arm, and dragging him back. The smaller man must have given up on reaching the weapons, at least temporarily, because he flopped onto his back, obviously having decided he had to deal with John-Henry right then. But John-Henry had already closed the gap, and he was ready.

John-Henry’s first punch caught the smaller man in the face, and his head rocked back and clipped the floor. John moved into the blow, following it up by clubbing the man on the side of the head, and then again. He stuck with his right hand; his left shoulder, where he’d fallen, was still a white-hot bloom of pain, and the most he could manage was to keep those fingers hooked in the smaller man’s belt loop, securing him as John-Henry rained down blows. The smaller man’s face was a mess of gore, and the third time his head rebounded from the old boards, John-Henry felt a flicker of hope.

Then, faster than John-Henry could believe, the man sat up, grabbed John-Henry in a bear hug, and rolled. They came down on the floor together again, and John-Henry let out a cry of pain when his shoulder took the fall. They rolled again. And again. Suddenly teeth were at John-Henry’s throat, and animal instinct took over: panic. All he wanted to do was get away from those teeth, the sharp threat seeking his jugular. He threw an elbow with his good arm, twisted, whipped his head from side to side. The teeth withdrew, but too late, John-Henry realized he’d given his opponent exactly what he wanted: an opening. And then fingers were at his injured shoulder, as though the man had a sixth sense for weakness, biting down.

John-Henry’s world exploded. He screamed. He couldn’t fight; he couldn’t think. But he thrashed, a frenzy of uncoordinated blows, and something must have connected because the pain stopped, and a choking, gurgling sound reached him from what seemed like a long way off.

Somehow, he scrambled to his feet. The smaller man was on his hands and knees, choking and gagging. John-Henry stumbled back. They’d gotten turned around. He was closest to the door now. The chair, where the gun and knife had been, had gotten knocked over in the fight, and the weapons had disappeared. Under the bed, maybe. Or under the dresser. Or—

The man spat blood and wiped his mouth on his coat sleeve. His head came up. His nose was broken, that much was obvious. Blood was caked around nostrils already beginning to swell. More blood ran around his mouth. It looked like a clown’s heavy makeup, John-Henry thought. Like some grotesque lipstick.

“I’m going to cut your cock off and stuff it in your mouth,” the man said. The words were hard, but he sounded younger than he looked. “That big fuck of a husband too. I’m going to leave you in your kids’ beds. I’m going to let them find you. And tonight, before I kill you, I’m going to tell you everything I’m going to do to them before I finally, eventually, let them die.”

John-Henry had heard a lot of hard men make threats. He’d heard a lot of bravado. A lot of bluster. And he’d heard the real thing, too. People who said what they meant. People who did things other people couldn’t fathom. A matter-of-factness to the words. The conviction—

Cover and concealment.

The old cop part of his brain was still alive, still running tactics.

Decision, advantage, adapt.

Why talk? Why take the time to say anything unless—

The smaller man dropped to his belly, his hand shooting out toward something under the bed.

John-Henry ran.

---