Ryan watched Jak drop onto the opposite rooftop, landing lithely and rolling to keep from injuring himself. The albino was up in seconds, pulling the slack out of the rope as Dean fed it through to keep it clear.
“The wag in the alley?” J.B. asked.
Ryan nodded. “We make a run for the horses Dean and Jak stashed, they’re going to hand us our heads.”
Blasterfire sounded from inside the hotel, letting Ryan know the two groups had found another battleground.
“Go!” Jak called, twanging the rope to show that he had it taut.
Even with him tying it to the other side of the building below, the descent grade was steep.
“Cawdor!” Wyatt shouted again. “We got an account to settle up.”
“Over here!” someone yelled from below. “They’re trying to get off the building!”
“Mildred,” Ryan growled.
The woman nodded and ran over to the side of the building facing the alley. She took careful aim with the ZKR 551 target pistol and began to bang off shots.
Ryan went to the front of the building, scouting for the wag with the rocket launcher. He spotted it with difficulty, but watched Wyatt waving it forward.
Settling in behind the sights of the Steyr, Ryan shot through the wag’s front tires. The vehicle went out of control and slammed into the front of the general store, coasting through the main window. The men aboard scattered at once, bailing out with their equipment. Ryan sighted on the man carrying the rocket launcher and put him down with a bullet between his shoulder blades that ripped through the front of his chest.
His next rounds were directed at the RPG-7. At least one of the rifle bullets ricocheted off the rocket launcher before another jacker grabbed it and hauled it to safety.
“Fireblast!” Ryan cursed. He turned the Steyr on the circus wag and banged off two rounds that kicked the open door against Wyatt. The man was completely hidden by the armored door—except for the hand on the door.
Ryan grinned coldly, then sighted through the scope. A moment after he squeezed the trigger, he saw blood spray from the jacker leader’s hand.
Wyatt withdrew into the cab of the circus wag, screaming in pain and rage.
“Handsome!” Ryan yelled over the rooftop. “You might want to think about coming up against me again. You’re running out of fingers, you stupe bastard!” He pushed up from the roof and ran to the alley side. “Get across the rope, Dean. You can help some of the others on the other side.”
His son nodded, then wrapped a leather thong around the rope and jumped over the side. The rope bowed with his weight, but the thong slid freely.
“Doc goes next,” Ryan said as Dean hit the rooftop, cradled partially by Jak. “Then Mildred, Albert, Krysty, J.B. I’ll bring up the rear.”
“My dear Ryan,” Doc started, gazing across the expanse between the two buildings, “truly I wish you thought of another—”
“Get on with it, Doc. You’re going to get someone chilled by hesitating.”
The old man wrapped his leather thong around the rope, then leaped over the side with a harsh yell of “Geronimo!”
“A little more quiet would have helped,” J.B. said.
The other companions and the dwarf quickly slid along the rope, as well.
Just as Krysty swung out over the alley, the first of the jackers reached the rooftop. The man opened up with his blaster, slamming bullets into the rain barrels atop the roof. Ryan threw himself to one side, then swept up the SIG-Sauer from his hip. He drilled the man three times, dropping him to his back.
“Blow the building,” Ryan told J.B.
The Armorer nodded and jerked the radio-controlled device from his jacket pocket. He flicked off the plastic protective cover, then depressed the plunger.
The roar of the erupting plas-ex charges was deafening in spite of the calliope music still sounding in the street below, and the wild bursts of blasterfire.
The hotel trembled, swaying far more than Ryan had figured probable with the amount they had used for the demolition work.
For a moment he was certain they had managed to blow themselves up when a huge section of the rooftop collapsed in the center of the hotel. Then the rumbling died away.