Sudden Prey

us,” Lucas said. “She went down shooting. We didn’t just shoot her out of hand: we gave her a choice to give up.”
    “Bullshit, everybody says it was over in one second, I saw the TV . . .”
    “Doesn’t take long to have a gunfight,” Lucas said. “Anyway, what’re we going to do here?”
    “Well, we’ve been talking about that, your old lady and me,” LaChaise said.
     
     
     
    THE SNIPER COULD feel just the lightest sweat start on his forehead, just a patina. Through the scope, he could see the crack in the door, and even, from time to time, LaChaise’s eye. He thought about taking the shot, but he didn’t know what Weather’s situation was. He’d seen training films where the crook’s gun was taped to the hostage’s head, the hammer held back on the gun with thumb tension. Shoot the crook, the hammer falls, and the hostage is gone.
    He wouldn’t take it, yet. Not yet. He moved his eye a bit farther from the scope: he didn’t want the glass to steam up.
     
     
     
    “ I DON’T WANT to talk on the phone anymore,” Lucas said. “I want to talk face-to-face. I want to see if Weather’s okay, what you’ve done to her . . .”
    “I haven’t done nothin’ yet,” LaChaise growled.
    “I’m gonna push open this other door. I won’t have any cover. I’m gonna keep my gun in my hand. You shoot her, you’re a dead man. But come on out here—talk to me.”
    Lucas pushed the second door open, and stood in the center of the hall, his gun by his side, the phone still by his face.
    “Trick of some kind,” LaChaise called down the hall.
    “No. We’re just trying to get everybody out of here alive,” Lucas said. “Your friend Martin would probably tell you to give it up. He went down shooting, but he seemed happy enough to be alive on the way to the hospital.”
    “You swear that’s true—man to man,” LaChaise said.
    “Yeah, I do,” Lucas said. “Now let me see your face.” After a moment of silence, LaChaise said, “We’ll come out to talk. Your old lady’ll be in front of me and the gun’ll be pointing right at her head. Anybody tries any shit . . .”
    “Nobody’s gonna try any shit,” Lucas said.
    LaChaise looked at Weather. “He is a tough guy,” LaChaise said. “Let’s go out there. You just stay right ahead of me.”
    “Don’t hurt me,” Weather said.
    “Let’s see what happens. Maybe this’ll work out.”
    She touched him with her fingertips. “You should give yourself a chance. You’re a smart man. Give it a chance.”
    Then she stepped in front of him, and felt the cold steel of LaChaise’s gun muzzle touch her scalp just behind her ear. They edged into the hall together, and LaChaise nervously looked behind him—nothing but a blank wall—and then down at Davenport, who loomed large and dark standing in the double doors. He held the gun at his side and LaChaise again thought, “Cowboys.”
    If he got out of this—he was thinking that way, now—if he got out of this, it’d be a long time before he played any cowboy games again.
    “I’m here by myself,” Davenport said from the doors. “And I’m pleading with you. Weather takes care of little kids . . . that’s what she’s doing. For Christ’s sake, if you gotta shoot somebody, go for me; let her go.”
    “You killed my Georgie . . .” But now Georgie was a bargaining chip.
    “We didn’t want to. Look, for Christ’s sake, don’t shoot her by accident, huh? Look, here is my gun.”
    Weather could feel the muzzle on the bone just behind her ear. But she wasn’t thinking about it. She was listening to Lucas’s tone of voice, and she thought, Oh, no, something’s going on. She opened her mouth to say something, but LaChaise, behind her, said, “This one time, I’m going to take your word for it . . .”
    Now there was a pleading tone in LaChaise’s voice, and Weather felt the pressure from the gun muzzle move away from her ear.
     
     
     
    THE SNIPER COULD see Weather from the shoulder up, and all of LaChaise’s head, and the muzzle of the pistol. He could hear what LaChaise was saying, but was mentally processing it in the background. Everything else was focused on the muzzle. He saw it start to move, mentally processed the words, going to take your word for it , realized that the muzzle was about to come away from Weather’s head, and then the muzzle lifted out of Weather’s hair and the sniper let out just a tiny puff of breath and squeezed . . .
     
     
     
    THE