James PATTERSON - Cross Fire

“Not as good as it is to see you,” he said, without hiding his pleasure anymore.

But then as they went to shake, Bree’s free hand whipped a small canister out of the pocket in her robe – the hair spray from the complimentary kit in the bathroom. She sprayed it in Kyle’s eyes. He yelled in pain, and with a second fluid motion, Bree kneed him in the groin.

At the same time, I took a glass decanter off the bar, where I’d positioned myself. I crossed the floor in three fast steps and swung as hard as I could. The heavy container smashed into Kyle’s jaw and nose. He crumpled to the floor. Shards of glass flew everywhere.

Ali screamed, but there was no time for explanation or soothing. Bree scooped him up as if he were weightless, grabbed Jannie’s arm, and got them out the door.

And I fell onto Kyle with everything I had.

KYLE SWUNG HIS fist and caught me square in the jaw. A shock ran through my head, but I couldn’t swing back. I now had one hand on his wrist and the other on the gun he’d carried in.

I head-butted him instead, hard, where he’d already been cut. It was enough to wrench the weapon free. A Beretta nine millimeter. Max Siegel’s gun.

I scrambled backward on the floor, aiming it between his eyes, which he was rubbing at furiously, trying to see.

“Roll over!” I told him, getting to my feet. “Face down on the floor, hands away from your body!”

Kyle smiled. His eyes were practically bloodred, running with tears, but I knew that he could see me again.

“This is ironic,” he said. “I could have sworn you were lying that night in the car, but you really can’t pull that trigger, can you?”

“Not without a reason,” I said. “So either give me one, or roll over and kiss the floor – right now! Do it!”

“You know I don’t say this lightly, Cross, but fuck you.”

Suddenly, he did roll, too fast, and a shard of glass clenched in his hand crossed the space between us. I felt the muscle in my calf tear. My knee buckled. I was halfway to the ground before I knew what happened.

And Kyle was up on his feet.

He stumbled on his way out, and it probably saved his life. The one shot I managed to get off splintered the sliding door instead of his head, just before he jumped off the terrace and disappeared outside.

I FIRED ONCE into the air as I came onto the beach. Anyone who wasn’t already moving out of Kyle’s way started scattering now. His gait was erratic. It was possible he had a concussion, but my leg wasn’t doing me any favors either. I had never seen a chase like this one.

Some people were screaming; others were pulling their kids out of the water. Then, without a clear shot, I could only watch as Kyle reached down and plucked a small boy, maybe two or three years old, off the ground before his mother could get to him.

The woman ran right at them, but Kyle clutched her boy over his torso like a shield.

“Get back!” he screamed. “Get back, or I’ll–”

“Take me!” The mother was on her knees, unable to come closer or turn away. “Take me instead!”

“Kyle, put him down!”

He turned to look at me then, and I was close enough to see the calm coming back into his eyes. He had the bargaining chip he needed, and he knew it.

“You came here for me, not this boy,” I said. “Let him go! Take me.”

The poor boy was sobbing and reaching out for his mother, but Kyle just hitched him up a little higher and held on even tighter.

“I’ll need that gun back first,” he said. “No more talk. Just set the gun down and back away. Three. Two–”

“Okay.” I started kneeling slowly. My leg was seizing up, and I could barely move it now. “I’m putting it down,” I said.

But I didn’t trust that boy’s life to Kyle’s word. So I took the chance I had to take. I turned the gun at the last second and fired low. The boy wasn’t big enough to shield Kyle top to bottom. My shot caught him just below the kneecap.

He howled like a wild animal. The boy dropped to the sand and then scrambled for his mother. Kyle tried to stand, but he could get up only on one leg – and only until I shot that one, too.

He flew back into the sand, his chest heaving with pain. His legs were a bloody mess now, and it felt good. I especially liked taking him down with his own weapon.

I saw Bree then, running toward us with two uniformed officers. She pointed Kyle out to them as they came, and then ran straight over to me.

“Oh my God.” She put an arm around me to take some of the weight off my leg. “Are you all right?”

I nodded. “He’ll need an ambulance.”

“It’s on the way,” one of the police officers said.

Kyle’s eyes were closed, but he opened them when my shadow crossed between the sun and his face.

“It’s over, Kyle,” I said. “For good this time.”

“Define ‘over,’” he wheezed. His breath was ragged, and he was shaking with pain. “You think you’ve won something here?”

“I’m not talking about winning,” I said. “I’m talking about putting you away where you can’t hurt anyone ever again.”

He tried to smile. “Didn’t stop me the last time,” he said.

“Well, you know what they say. The only thing worse than going into solitary is going back,” I said. “But maybe it’s just an expression.”

For possibly the first time ever, I saw something like fear in Kyle Craig’s eyes. It lasted only a second before he snapped back to the same rigid demeanor.

“This isn’t over!” he croaked, but he was already talking to my back.

The ambulance was just pulling up to where we were, and I wanted to warn the EMTs.

“Take care of him first,” I said, “but you need to be careful. This man is extremely dangerous.”

“We’ve got this, sir,” one of the policemen told me. “And I need you to surrender that weapon.”

I handed it over a little reluctantly, and Bree helped me down onto a lounge chair, where I could still keep an eye on things. In the meantime she grabbed a towel and wrapped it tightly around my leg.

Kyle didn’t bother to resist as the med techs gave him a drip and an oxygen mask, then cut away his pant legs. He’d lost a lot of blood. His face was paper white. I think the reality of going back to ADX Florence was really starting to sink in.

They got him onto a gurney and put the IV bag and oxygen tank between his legs so that they could lift everything up into the ambulance.

“You need to cuff him,” I called over to the cops. “And don’t let those EMTs ride alone!”

“Just calm down, sir,” one of them told me in an angry voice.

“I’m a police officer, and I know what I’m talking about,” I said. “This man’s wanted by the FBI, and you need to restrain him. Right now!”

“Okay, okay.” He motioned to his partner, and they walked over toward Kyle.

Almost as if the scene were in slow motion, I watched as the first cop stepped into the back of the ambulance. The cuffs came up – and then I saw Kyle reach for them, with the kind of channeled strength only a psychopath like him could muster in that condition. He used the cuffs to pull the officer down to him and, in a second, had the man’s gun in his hand.

Bree stood up instinctively to help, but I rolled off the lounge chair and pulled her down with me.

There was a gunshot, and then another.

Then the first of two loud explosions. We would find out later that a bullet had pierced Kyle’s oxygen tank.

It burst into a ball of flame inside the confines of the ambulance, followed quickly by the fuel tank.

The entire vehicle imploded with a blast that stunned my eardrums. Glass and metal flew more up than out, and a shower of sand rained down over us. People were screaming again.