J. Konrath - Fuzzy Navel

“You know, I built you up in my head as this supercop. I considered you a worthy opponent. No one had ever beaten me before.”

She squeezes my cheeks together, like I’m a child.

“You got lucky, Jack. That’s how you beat me. Luck.”

Consciousness is slipping away. A slap brings me around again.

“Say it, Jack. Say you got lucky.”

I close my eyes. Alex slams me into the garage door.

“Tell me you got lucky!”

“I… got lucky.”

Half of Alex’s face breaks into a smile. I start to cry. Not for me. For Mom. For Latham. For Herb. And even – I hate to say it – for Harry. None of them deserve this. This night of horrors was supposed to end with the good guys winning.

Alex is right. Human beings are just animals, and all animals are selfish. And I selfishly want the people that I love to be okay, and I weep because I’m not going to get my way.

“Perfect,” Alex whispers. Her horrible face gets close to mine, and it looks like she’s going to kiss me. But she doesn’t.

Instead, she sticks out her tongue and licks away a tear.

“Hey! Frankenbitch!”

We both turn.

Harry McGlade is standing in the garage. The Kimber is in his left hand, pointing at us. His right hand is still attached to the refrigerator door, which is resting at his feet, the hinges shot off.

“Let my little sister go!”

Alex snakes her forearm around my neck, putting me between her and the gun.

It’s a mistake. I’m a physical wreck, and a mental disaster, but you don’t need muscles or brains to execute a judo flip. All you need is leverage.

I jerk my head back, snapping it into her nose, then immediately lean forward and to the right, throw her over my hip.

Alex tumbles ass over head, releasing me, flipping onto her back. I take three steps toward Harry and fall at his feet.

“Shoot her,” I mumble.

He drops the gun, grabs my arm.

“Out of bullets.”

Harry drags me and the refrigerator door back into the house.

“Hold on…”

I stop, spin around, and pull the door leading to the garage closed, turning the dead bolt, locking Alex in.

A shot pings through the living room window, whizzing past my face. We kneel side by side, propping up the stainless steel door like a shield. It’s not tall enough to cover us completely, leaving the humps of our backs exposed as we crouch behind it.

“Thanks, Harry,” I manage.

“Mom made me. I think she loves you more.”

Everything starts to spin. I rest my forehead on Harry’s shoulder. He looks at me.

“Jesus, Jackie. You got your ass kicked.”

I run a hand over my face, which is a mass of swelling and pain.

“You don’t need more blood, do you?” he asks.

“I think I’ll be okay.”

Then everything gets really blurry and the darkness takes me in its arms.

THE CAB SPITS PHINEAS TROUTT out in front of a house that isn’t Jack’s. According to the taxi driver and his electronic address finder, hers is the next one down the road. Phin prefers to walk the rest of the way. On the phone, Jack sounded scattered. If something is going down, Phin prefers to sneak up on it rather than announce his presence by getting out of a car at her doorstep.

It’s cool, dark, quiet. Jack lives in a woodsy area, practically a forest preserve. Phin walks alongside the winding road, not thinking about why Jack called him. There’s no point in speculation. Especially since he’ll know the reason soon enough.

A pop! pierces the calm of the night.

Gunfire. Far away.

Phin reaches behind him, retrieving the revolver he has shoved into the back of his belt. The gun is a.38, a scratch-and-dent that has probably been involved in crimes dating back to the 1960s. It was all Phin could get on such short notice. He picked it up an hour ago, off a gangbanger selling Thai stick to Wrigleyville yuppies in an alley off of Addison. Phin relieved the dealer of his gun, his stash, and eight to ten teeth.

He squints at the revolver in the moonlight, swings out the cylinder, counts six rounds. The gun is old but looks clean, cared for. Phin hopes it can fire. He breaks into a jog, holding the weapon at his side, finger off the trigger.

Another gunshot. Closer than before, but still a good distance away. Then another. Phin stops, scans the trees around him. Sees nothing. He moves to the tree line, alert, cautious.

Jack has privacy out here, that’s for sure. He walks another hundred yards before he sees her house in the distance. A few interior lights are on. Four cars are parked in the driveway. As he gets closer, he sees that two of the cars have been shot up; windows broken, wheels popped.

Now Phin does lapse into speculation. Jack’s a cop. Phin is not. If she has people shooting at her, why didn’t she call other cops?

Phin can think of two reasons.

One, because the people shooting at her are cops.

Two, because someone Jack is with wants Phin specifically.

Phin hasn’t been a criminal for very long, but he’s managed to pack a lot of crime into just a few years. He’s made enemies. It isn’t inconceivable that one of them is using Jack to get to him. Though they don’t see much of each other, Phin considers Jack a friend. It’s a strange friendship, centering around occasional games of pool, but there’s mutual respect. And strangely, considering their opposing vocations, there’s also a sense of trust. Someone may have picked up on that. Someone bad.

Another shot. Phin sees a muzzle flash, maybe two hundred yards away, in the woods across the street from Jack’s house. He heads for it.

A vehicle, coming up the road behind him. Phin hears it before the headlights come around the bend. He ducks into the trees, watches it pass. A truck, a Bronco or a Blazer. Single driver, tearing ass toward Jack’s house. It stops in the street. Phin can’t see what’s happening – he’s still too far away.

He cocks the.38 and creeps closer, moving slow and silent.

I’M RIGHT ABOUT JACK being lucky. She might very well be the luckiest bitch on the planet.

I yawn. It’s not from boredom. I can’t remember many days in my life that have been more exciting than this one. But fatigue is setting in. I’m tired. Sore. Part of me is tempted to get the hell out of here, find a nice bed-and-breakfast someplace quiet, murder the owners and spend a few days just relaxing.

But I’m not going to leave without killing Jack and Company. Plus there’s still the matter of the gun nuts surrounding the house who can’t aim for shit but still have managed to complicate things. I counted three. They’re using bolt action rifles with suppressors, and a variety of ammunition and scopes. Not pros. Anyone with military experience could have wiped out everyone in the house a long time ago. Hunters, maybe. Or wannabe soldiers.

Whoever they are, they seem angry at Jack, and I don’t expect they’ll give up any time soon. I’ll have to deal with them eventually, but first things first.

I pick up the gun Harry dropped and I’m not surprised to find it empty. I toss it onto the workbench.

Then I check the door to the house. Locked. It’s one of those security doors, a solid wood center sandwiched between metal plates, steel or aluminum. The jamb and frame are heavy-duty as well. I can’t kick it in, because the hinges are on this side.

I spy the automatic garage door opener next to the door. I could open it, run outside, and find another way into the house. But then I’d be opening myself up for target practice.

I glance at the door to the house again. Maybe there’s a key for the dead bolt in the garage somewhere. I check the workbench and see something even better than a key.