MIchael Prescott - The Shadow hunter

"God damn it," he snapped, anger overcoming compassion, "why the hell did you leave cover? What made you do that?"

She didn't answer, and of course she didn't have to.

He knew what had made her scramble away from him when the bullets started flying. She had lost her nerve.

She had heeded the blind impulse to put distance between herself and gunfire. In consequence she had blundered into Hickle and had nearly gotten killed.

Travis steadied himself. Gently he clasped her shoulder.

"You okay, Kris?" he asked in a softer voice.

She looked at him.

"I thought I was strong," she whispered.

He understood. She was a veteran of the news business.

She had covered earthquakes, gang wars, sadistic slayings. She had believed she could handle anything.

But tonight when the gunshots were aimed at her, when she was at the center of the story, she had cut and run like a panicky child. She wasn't as tough as she'd imagined. It was a painful lesson, but she would survive, and to Travis her survival was all that mattered.

Not far away he heard sirens. The local residents and the guard at the gatehouse must have called 911 when the shooting started. Malibu contracted its law enforcement services to the LA County Sheriff's Department.

The nearest sheriff's station was miles away in Agoura, but evidently a couple of squad cars had been in the area.

He looked up and down the road. The two TPS staff officers stationed at the guest cottage, Pfeiffer and Mahoney, were approaching fast.

Every light was burning in the homes that lined both intersecting streets. Nothing like a little midnight gun battle to wake up the neighborhood.

Circling the car, Travis found Drury sprawled on the macadam, his knees twisting slowly, blood soaking through the left sleeve of his jacket.

Hickle had unloaded the shotgun at the driver, but most of the spray had gone wide. A few steel pellets had caught Drury in the arm and shoulder. There was blood loss but no arterial spurting. The angle of the arm inside the jacket suggested broken bones, possibly a shattered elbow.

"It's okay, Steve," Travis said, knowing the man couldn't hear.

"You'll be fine."

The sirens grew louder, then whirred to a stop.

Travis saw the gate rising to admit a pair of sheriff's cruisers.

"Status?" That was Pfeiffer, arriving with his Beretta unholstered, his eyes glassy with an infantryman's thousand-yard stare. Mahoney came right behind.

"Hickle ambushed us and fled," Travis said crisply.

"I don't think he'll be back. He scored a lucky hit, incinerated the car. Nailed Drury in the shoulder. Mrs.

Barwood is okay, just shaken up. Where's the husband?"

"We told him to stay put," Mahoney answered. He lowered his voice to add, "He didn't need much persuading."

Travis nodded, unsurprised that Howard Barwood was reluctant to throw himself in the line of fire.

A few yards from the smoking wreckage the squad cars rolled to a stop.

Two deputies, each riding solo, got out with guns drawn and eyes wary.

Travis met the men and summarized the situation.

"RA coming?" he asked. Rescue ambulance.

"En route," a lanky red-haired deputy answered.

His nameplate read Carruthers. He couldn't have been older than twenty-five. His gaze kept darting to the shrubbery at the roadside.

Travis knew he was worried that Hickle would return for a second try, but there was little chance of that.

Hickle had taken his best shot and failed. Now he was heading for some dark corner where he could console himself and lick his wounds. But he hadn't had time to go far.

"Either of you men care to join me in pursuit of an armed suspect?"

Travis asked.

"I think we can pick up his trail."

Carruthers wanted in on the action. The other deputy, less enthusiastic, elected to remain at the scene and wait for the paramedics.

Travis drafted Pfeiffer to complete the posse.

"Mahoney, you stand post over Drury and Mrs. Barwood.

See if you can find some blankets for them. Drury looks like he's shivering."

"Nice kid, Drury," Pfeiffer said.

"He'll be all right. Let's move."

The three of them set off together, Travis in the lead, Pfeiffer and Carruthers close behind.

"What kind of firepower this son of a bitch packing?" Carruthers asked.

"He used a shotgun in the assault. My information is that he also owns a rifle with a telescopic sight and laser sighting system. You wearing a vest. Deputy?"

Carruthers snorted.

"I wish. Thing is, this duty's usually pretty quiet, and that vest gets hot."

"Pfeiffer?"

"Yeah, I got on my Kevlar. How about you. Boss?"

"Left mine at home." Travis snapped a new magazine into his Walther.

"Let's hope Raymond doesn't put up a fight."

Hickle ran blindly, lugging the duffel like a heavy load of guilt.

Behind him there were sirens. He never looked back. He was afraid he would see a whole squadron of cops rushing after him.

This was bad. This was a complete mess. In his imagination he had always carried out the attack perfectly.

Yes, he had been arrested afterward, but only once Kris was dead and his immortality was assured.

It was Jackbnimble's fault. In all his e-mail messages Jack had said not one word about armored plating on Kris's car or bulletproof glass.

"Not one goddamned word," he gasped, furiously indignant, and then he blundered into a steel fence topped with razor wire.

It was part of the fence that encircled the Reserve.

He had reached the perimeter of the compound.

Panic screamed in him. He was trapped.

He could turn around, try hiding in the woods, but they would find him before long. There had to be another way. Think.

The fence ran down to the water's edge but no farther.

He could slip around it onto the adjacent public beach, then use the access path to get back to his parked car.

Limping on his bad ankle, he ran along the fence toward the sea. The last house on Malibu Reserve Drive loomed on his right. The space between the home's side wall and the fence was narrow, but he crab walked through, pulling the duffel after him. The shotgun, he noticed, was in the duffel now. Sometime during his run he must have stuffed it inside the bag to free his right hand. He couldn't remember doing this.

He was operating on instinct like any hunted animal.

On the verge of the beach Hickle paused, afraid of the open space where he would be exposed and unprotected.

If the police had anticipated his escape route, somebody might be watching the beach even now. But he saw only white sand, the fringe of the surf, and above the water a few scattered rocks glistening with kelp. He risked going forward, kicking up sand as he ran. Where the fence ended, he sloshed into the tide and staggered ashore on the public beach.

As he climbed a hill of damp sand above the low tide mark, it occurred to him that he was leaving tracks.

He looked back. A line of shoe prints receded into the water. There must be a similar line on the other side of the fence and in the loose dirt of the woods. His enemies could follow him easily.

As if on cue, a glow of flashlights appeared in the shadows between the last home and the fence. They were coming. At least two of them, maybe more.

He ran for the path that led to the parking lot, but at the end of the path, beyond the trees and the dark roof of a ramada, danced a flickering glow of red and blue-the dome light of a police car.

Cops had pulled into the parking lot already. They'd found his car.

Hickle reversed course, retreating up the path toward the beach again.

The flashlight beams were nearer. The pursuers who'd followed him from the Reserve were closing in, following his shoe prints in the sand.