Page 58 of The Evening Wolves

A gunshot clapped behind him.

Cover, his brain said again. Concealment. Situational awareness. Situational awareness. What’s around you, and how can you use it. What are the threats. What are the tactical advantages.

Those thoughts took place in a sub-layer of his brain, not even quite words, but a combination of instinct and training and the flash fires of adrenaline. His steps hammered on the wooden floorboards. His blood sang in his ear. He was distantly aware of the rest of his body: the breath whooshing in his lungs, the stinging citrus of that cologne lingering in his nostrils, the slow white scream of his shoulder.

Another gunshot rang out. Ahead of John-Henry, a piece of the railing at the top of the stairs blew apart. Splinters flew to strike the glass with a soft, rattling noise like rain. Steps came after him, and John-Henry risked a glance back. The smaller man sprinted down the hall, and if his injuries slowed him, John-Henry didn’t see any sign of it.

He turned his attention forward and realized, with a flash of horror, how stupid he’d been. He was running full speed when he went off the top of the stairs. The old animal horror of falling made his stomach weightless. Then he came down, and it was luck as much as his natural athleticism that kept him upright even as the shock zinged from his heels up to his knees. One more stride carried him to the landing, and he swung around the switchback staircase to launch himself down the next flight. For a moment, he and the smaller man were facing each other. The man didn’t break stride as he raised the gun to fire again, and John-Henry launched himself down the stairs. The shot cracked the air. The bullet must have come close; John-Henry felt it like an angry whisper, the air so sharp it felt like it stung his cheek.

He hit the bottom of the stairs and tried to crank on the speed. He was in excellent condition. Better than most guys his age. Better, for that matter, than most guys ten years younger. But the smaller man looked like he could have been half John-Henry’s age, at that time in his life when energy seemed endless, when the body rebounded from everything, when eye and hand were most tightly fused. If I can get to the car, John-Henry thought. If I can get to the car. He sucked in air as he sprinted toward the front of the house. Just get outside. Just get across the entry hall, open the door, get outside—

Situational awareness.

The rug.

At the last moment, John-Henry jumped. He’d never been a track kid, and running had always been a means to something else—kicking ass in football, at first, and then, as an adult, as a way of being a better police officer. Having Emery in his life had taken that to the next level. The decision happened between one footfall and the next, and John-Henry jumped. He cleared the rug, landed hard at the front door, and checked the wall with his bad shoulder. Pain moved the world back a few inches, but he kept moving. He managed to remember to keep his sleeve over his hand as he got the door open. A wordless shout came from behind him, and then the door jerked in his hand as though someone had kicked it. Gunfire thundered again.

But John-Henry threw the door open and darted outside. The wind was a knife against his cheeks. Frozen concrete and asphalt threatened to make him slip with every step. The branches were moving again, or maybe that was just the blood rushing in his ears. Half a block. He had to make it half a block out in the open, with the streetlights making him an easy target.

Even over the hammering of his blood, he heard the thud and cry from within Brey’s house. The rug. He wanted to laugh, but something else was surging up inside him—the anger that he hadn’t felt until now because he’d been too busy staying alive. Anger at this man who had tried to kill him. Anger at yet another dead end in the investigation. Anger—a thick, seeping black rage—at the universe, the world, this town for allowing this to happen to him. It ballooned inside him until it felt like it took up all the available space inside his body, until it felt so big that he didn’t think he could breathe.

His hip bumped the Mustang as he fumbled the keys out of his pocket. He risked a glance. The man stood framed in Brey’s doorway, looking up and down the street. The way he held himself suggested that when he’d fallen on the loose rug, it had been a bad one. Or maybe the blows that John-Henry had gotten in were finally catching up. Maybe both.

John-Henry wasn’t going to wait around to find out. He got in the car, cut a sharp U-turn, and sped into the night.

13

The restaurant was called The Nifty Fifties, and from the road, it looked like the perfect spot: an hour away from Auburn on a state highway that, on an ordinary night, couldn’t have seen more than a hundred cars. A lone security light in the parking lot sent a gleam warping along the plexiglass window and picked out the fuzzy algae growing on the side of the frame building. A handful of cars suggested other people, real people—which meant the Nifty Fifties felt like an oasis of light and warmth and normalcy in this nightmare.

John-Henry parked behind the restaurant, between an overflowing dumpster and a Port-a-Potty. At least it’s winter, he thought. He tried not to imagine summer.

His hands were shaking so badly his finger missed the first time he tried to call Emery.

“Where are you?”

“Hi. I’m fine.”

“Good. Where are you?”

In spite of himself, John-Henry smiled. “The Nifty Fifties.”

Silence. Then, “Have you been drinking?”

“Not yet. It’s the name of a restaurant out on—Jesus, I don’t even remember. It’s on the way to Auburn. I had to stop, so I just wanted you to know I was here. I’ll be home, I don’t know, in an hour or two.”

“Why are you out there?”

John-Henry heard the real question, though. The one that Emery had already asked once: Have you been drinking?

Then Emery said, “Wait, Auburn?”

“It’s a long story.”

“What happened?”

“Well, I was going to tell you about that. It’s more of an in-person conversation. As soon as I’m good to drive, I’ll be home.” John-Henry heard how that must have sounded, so he rushed to add, “I swear to God, I haven’t had a drop. I’m just a little shaken up.”

More of that silence. John-Henry could almost hear the calculations.

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