fierce, dry heat.
They might have only seconds before the ceiling exploded into flames or
caved in on them.
He didn’t understand how he could be getting colder by the moment when
fire was all around them. The sweat streaming down his face was like
ice water.
Even if the roof didn’t cave in for a couple of minutes, he might be
dead or too weak to pull the trigger when at last the killer rushed
them. He couldn’t wait any longer.
He had to give up the two-hand grip on the gun. He needed his left
hand to brace himself against the For mica top of the counter as he
circled the end of it, keeping all weight off his left leg.
But when he reached the end of the counter, he was too dizzy to hop the
ten or twelve feet to the blue door. He had to use the toe of his left
foot as a balance point, applying the minimum pressure required to stay
erect as he hitched across the office.
Surprisingly, the pain was bearable. Then he realized it was tolerable
only because his leg was going numb. A cool tingle coursed through the
limb from hip to ankle. Even the wound itself was no longer hot, not
even warm.
The door. His left hand on the knob looked so far away, as if he were
peering at it through the wrong end of a pair of binoculars.
Revolver in the right hand. Hanging down at his side. Like a massive
dumbbell.
The effort required to raise the weapon caused his stomach to keel over
on itself repeatedly.
The killer might be waiting on the other side, watching the knob, so
Jack pushed the door open and went through it fast, the revolver thrust
out in front of him. He stumbled, almost fell, and stepped past the
door, swinging the gun right and left, heart pounding so hard it jolted
his weakening arms, but there was no target. He could see all the way
across the garage because the BMW was up on the service rack. The only
person in sight was the Asian mechanic, as dead as the concrete on
which he was sprawled.
Jack turned to the blue door. It was black on this side, which seemed
ominous, glossy black, and it had gone shut behind him.
He took a step toward it, meaning to pull it open. He fell against it
instead.
Harried by the changeable wind, a tide of bitter tarry smoke washed
into the double-bay garage.
Coughing, Jack wrenched open the door. The office was filled with
smoke, an antechamber to hell.
He shouted for the woman to come to him, and he was dismayed to hear
that his shout was barely more than a thin wheeze.
She was already on the move, however, and before he could try to shout
again, she appeared out of the roiling smoke, with one hand clamped
over her nose and mouth.
At first, when she leaned against him, Jack thought she was seeking
support, strength he didn’t have to give, but he realized she was
urging him to rely on her. He was the one who had taken the oath, who
had sworn to serve and defend.
He felt dismally inadequate because he couldn’t scoop her up in his
arms and carry her out of there as a hero might have done in a movie.
He leaned on the woman as little as he dared and turned left with her
in the direction of the open bay door, which was obscured by the
smoke.
He dragged his left leg. No longer any feeling in it whatsoever, no
pain, not even a tingle. Dead weight. Eyes squeezed shut against the
stinging smoke, bursts of color coruscating across the backs of his
eyelids. Holding his breath, resisting a powerful urge to vomit.
Somebody screaming, a shrill and terrible scream, on and on. No, not a
scream. Sirens. Rapidly drawing closer. Then he and the woman were
in the open, which he detected by a change in the wind, and he gasped
for breath, which came cold and clean into his lungs.
When he opened his eyes, the world was blurred by tears that the