Gregg Hurwitz - Last shot

Walker said, "Dead ends don't scare me."

"You've got one move left. You let Dolan live, you walk out of there, we sit down with the AUSA and have a long talk about extenuating circumstances."

"Like they did for you."

"Like they did for me."

Walker laughed. "Somehow I don't think I'll get the same treatment." He set down the phone and turned to Dolan. "All you fucking people. When the chips are down, you hide behind them."

Dolan said, "You're right. But I had nothing to do with killing your sister. And I never would have. Stop and think what your sister put her life on the line for. I didn't see it until I came in here tonight. Sam was going downhill fast. She risked everything that mattered to her to give him something to die for. This drug my father and brother were trying to bury, she was gonna ransom with her own blood. For three hundred thousand people. This could be what Sam did with his life. Which is a lot more than my brother did with his. Or my father's doing with his fucking companies. With my company. Tess died trying to get the right AAT vector to the market. Now I'm the one who knows what it is and how to do it." His jacket had fallen open, and a few wet splotches appeared on his T-shirt at the stomach. He bucked his head to wipe his nose against his shoulder. "Just give me a chance to set things right. Give me a second chance."

Walker killed the cordless phone. "No one ever gave me one." He leaned forward. Dolan recoiled, but Walker just reached into Chase's leather jacket and removed the cell phone from the inner pocket and set it on the counter. "People like me end up answering for your mistakes. We work your jobs, we take your falls, we fight your wars." He released the wheel of the Redhawk and spun it, watching the primers blur into a ring. "Assholes like you make big fucking messes. But it's guys like me gotta clean 'em up for you."

He jerked his wrist. The cylinder slammed home, and the gun stilled, its sights centered on Dolan's forehead. A dark voice spoke to Walker, a distant song.

A temptation, not a curse.

A return to what had always been natural.

A cold wind riffled the vinyl SWAT jackets and blew a swirl of trash into a minicyclone at the bus stop. Behind the three-vehicle-deep barricade, the crisis negotiator paced back and forth, tapping a black cordless against his thigh, the members of his team giving him space. At the makeshift command post behind two giant armored personnel vehicles, Tim and Bear huddled with Miller, Tannino, and the LAPD SWAT lieutenant. The other ARTists were arrayed around the building and in the stairwells, their olive drab flight suits standing out among the SWAT members with their black balaclavas, goggles, and Colt CAR-15s. Snipers from SWAT's D Platoon had rolled, regarding the various entrances through the three-by-nine scopes of their bolt-action Remington 700. 308 cals. The firepower assembled on site reminded Tim of a military operation; they were equipped to take down a small army.

Still pacing, the negotiator raised the phone to his face. Tim watched him walking and waiting as the phone rang and rang.

"What the hell's he doing in there?" Tannino said.

A movement on the blocked-off stretch of Wilshire caught Tim's eye. A blue-and-white ambulance motored up the center of the empty street. He watched it as the SWAT lieutenant and Miller crunched endgame scenarios. The ambulance approached the LAPD officer working the sawhorses a half block up. Tim pivoted, regarding the two fire department rescue vehicles parked on the far side of the fire engine.

"Who called for a civilian ambulance?" His question went unanswered amid the banter, so he repeated it, louder.

The lieutenant said, "No one. Ours are right there."

The cop waved the ambulance through. Tim said, "Then you'd better have someone stop that vehicle and ID the driver."

The lieutenant spoke into his radio, and two black-and-whites lurched forward, halting the ambulance's progress. It screeched, banking off the skid, the familiar shield drawing into view on its side: UCLA MED CENTER, EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES.

Tim's breath caught. "Damn it, Walker."

He shouldered past Tannino and the lieutenant, sprinting toward the Beacon-Kagan Building. An instant later, on cue, Walker kicked through the exit beside the revolving doors. Three spotlights zoomed over, casting the building front in daylight. Walker wore a ballistic vest over his T-shirt, and he held his Redhawk at his side. He was without Dolan. A piece of paper, pinned to his vest, fluttered in the breeze.

Tim hurdled two cop cars, parked hood to hood so the headlights kissed. He banged past an open car door, yelling, "Hold fire, hold fire!"

Walker halted. Tim stood alone in front of the blockade, mist rolling through the spotlights' glare. Walker faced him from about twenty yards, revolver dangling. Tim's gun was still at his hip, though the holster strap was thrown. His right hand was fastened around the stock, his elbow pointing back. His feet slid, found a shooting stance, but still he didn't draw. Around him Tim could hear puzzled murmurs and shouts.

Tim said, "Don't. We can figure something else out."

The SWAT sergeant yelled that he was blocking their angle, but Tim didn't move. He stayed frozen, his eyes on Walker's, the heat of the spotlights baking his back, the snipers ready with their armor-piercing rounds. Walker's lips moved, resignation taking shape as the faintest of grins. He gave Tim a little nod and raised his arm.

Tim drew and shot him through the forehead.

A chilled moment of silence, and then ART and SWAT lumbered out from their various posts, making tactical advances on the body, though there was no way there was still life in it. Thomas cleared the weapon, and the two fire department paramedics crowded the body.

Tim could make out the first few lines of scrawled writing on the paper safety-pinned to Walker's vest.

Last Will and Testament

I leave to Sam Jameson my

The sergeant said, "Why the hell would he show us he had a vest?"

Tim didn't slow his pace past the body. "So I'd know where not to shoot."

A paramedic unsnapped the vest, and a pack of ice fell out the right side. "This for his bullet wound?"

"No," Tim said. "Put it back in. Get the UCLA ambulance up here. They're set up for him already."

The paramedic looked puzzled. "How?"

"Because he called ahead." Tim shoved through the door, Bear following him offset to the right so he'd have more room for his Remington. A hidden button beneath the reception booth popped the door into Vector. Propping it open, Bear signaled the second team of paramedics to hold back, and he and Tim pressed forward down the corridor. Freed, Thomas, and Miller shuffled behind them, covering the rear.

Up ahead their dark corridor intersected another, that one lit. Rounding the corner, Tim felt his teeth grind. An office chair lay overturned, dumped forward, Dolan still bound to it. All they could see were his legs and the uprooted base, the wheels still rocking on their mountings. Tim sprinted down the corridor. Dolan's face and chest were mashed to the floor. His eyes flickered, and he tried to turn his head.

Beside his bruised cheek, six titanium bullets lay on the floor where Walker had let them fall.

Edwin answered the door, regarded the FBI team soberly, nodded, and withdrew. Behind the cluster of agents, Tim and Bear waited by the koi pond. It had become the Bureau's case, but Tim had some pull with Jeff Malane, the special agent in charge, who requested Tim and Bear's presence for the arrest. A few years back with Tim and the Escape Team, Malane had busted up an incipient terrorist group trying to gain a foothold in Los Angeles, and he'd ridden the acclaim up the promotional ladder. Now he wore nicer shoes and a more pronounced scowl.