Don Pendleton - Terror Trail

CHAPTER SIX

Los Angeles

Doug Castle saw his partner emerge from Starbucks with a coffee cup in each hand. He watched as Larry Shapiro crossed the street, heading for the parked cruiser, weaving between the pedestrians milling around the town square. Shapiro was no lightweight but he maneuvered the crowd like a trained gymnast. Castle was grinning as he stepped out of the cruiser to meet his partner.

The two cops had been partnered for almost five years. They were good cops, though not promotional material. They liked the way things were. Steady and uncomplicated. Let the ambitious guys go for the higher ranks, even plainclothes in the detective division. That might bring in more pay, but it also brought more responsibility, longer hours and fractured lives. Castle and Shapiro preferred their street-cop existence. The younger guys could have all the pressure.

Through the open door of the cruiser Castle could hear the click and hiss of the car’s radio. The dispatcher’s voice came and went, issuing instructions, keeping track of the city’s patrol vehicles. He hoped nothing would come through to break into their midmorning coffee halt.

“Hell of a crowd in there,” Shapiro said. He handed Castle his paper cup. “Watch out, it’s hot.”

“You don’t say.” Castle felt the scalding brew leeching through the waxed cardboard. “Hey, you forgot the protector.”

“They ran out,” Shapiro said.

A couple of young children ran by, yelling and screaming excitedly.

Castle took off his uniform cap, sleeved his forehead. “Hot day.”

The sky was open and cloudless above the rooftops. No breeze to cool the temperature.

“Good thing they fixed the climate control,” Shapiro said. He kicked one of the cruiser’s tires. “It was an oven in there last week.”

“Hey, you and Helen fixed your vacation yet?” Shapiro asked.

Castle shook his head. “She still can’t decide between going to stay with her mother in Florida or booking that Caribbean cruise… .”

Shapiro didn’t hear the rest of his partner’s words.

Things began to happen quickly.

Someone screamed. A high, shrill sound that carried above the general hum of the crowd.

A split second later the scream was drowned out by a sound Shapiro had never expected to hear on the streets of his city.

The hard, brutal crackle of auto-fire. Not individual shots from a handgun, but the continuous, chilling rattle of an automatic weapon.

“Jesus,” Shapiro said, dropping his coffee cup and not even noticing that most of it splashed his shoes and the legs of his uniform pants. He reached for his holstered issue Beretta 92F pistol. “Doug, call it in. Now. And bring the shotgun.”

The gunfire was coming from the square Castle had walked across only a short time ago.

He cleared his pistol as he moved forward, left hand reaching to ward off people who were already scattering away from the source of the shooting.

As a gap opened Shapiro saw bodies down on the ground. His mind tried to gather it all in. The victims were spread around, some writhing in agony, others still. And there was blood. On the bodies. On the paving slabs. And then there was the lone figure at the epicenter of the panic. A tall, lean guy in dark pants and a bright shirt. A ball cap on his head. He had a sports bag slung across his body and an AK-47 in his hands; Shapiro recognized the weapon’s configuration from the training sessions they received in the academy classrooms and on the firing range. He did notice this one had the buttstock removed. The AK-47 was the favored weapon of—terrorists. The word stopped him. One of the classic assault rifles in existence. Known and used the world over. Millions had been, and still were being produced. A deadly, reliable and accurate weapon.

His mind snapped back to the moment. His Beretta lifted and he aimed at the shooter.

Shapiro had never raised his pistol in anger before. The only time he had fired was on the range at stationary targets. He held back for an instant because people were still milling around, crossing his firing zone. He couldn’t risk hitting a civilian.

He realized the shooting had stopped. Wondered why.

The shooter had let the AK-47 hang by a shoulder strap. His right hand reached into the sports bag, came out holding a spherical object.

What the hell?

Realization struck Shapiro as the shooter pulled the pin on the fragmentation grenade and threw it in the direction of scattering people. He shouldered aside a screaming woman and stepped forward, his Beretta settling on the shooter.

The grenade detonated with a harsh sound. A flash of brightness, a swirl of smoke. Bodies were thrown aside by the blast.

Shapiro fired his weapon, felt the pistol kick against his palm. He knew he had missed. His finger had jerked back on the trigger instead of squeezing in a steady motion.

Then he heard the second grenade go off, felt the shock wave. Something tore at his left hip. A searing rush of pain and he was down on the ground, trying to suck air into his lungs. When he glanced at his hip he was shocked at the sight. There was a ragged mess of a wound where his solid flesh had been lacerated by whatever had hit him. His black uniform was shredded and he could see chunks of torn flesh and shattered bone. Blood was welling up out of the wound.

The third grenade exploded.

More screams. People shouting for help.

The AK-47 started firing again, spraying slugs back and forth.

The whole area was a jumble of frantic people, smoke, blood, and in the distance the sound of approaching police sirens.

A dark figure loomed up beside Shapiro. He looked up and saw Castle, the cruiser’s Mossberg shotgun in his hands.

“Larry. You stay down,” Castle said.

“Go get that bastard,” Shapiro managed to say before he slipped into shock.

He never saw Castle crouch and run forward, the Mossberg rising in his steady hands as he cut across the square.

The shooter swung in Castle’s direction as he ejected the empty magazine from the AK-47 and snapped in a fresh one.

The rifle was turned on Castle a fraction of a second too late.

The Mossberg began to jack out 00 buckshot. Castle had never fired on a human target, either, but he triggered as he moved and kept on triggering. The shooter shuddered under the impact of the Mossberg’s full magazine. His right arm was severed above the elbow, bloody chunks of flesh and bone misting the air. His torso, from the waist up, took the brunt of the fusillade. Flesh disintegrated, ribs splintered and internal organs were reduced to mush. The shot-ravaged corpse slumped to the ground in an ungainly heap, nerves shivering to a stop as the body settled.

Doug Castle lowered the smoking shotgun and keyed his shoulder mike.

“Castle here. Situation under control. Perp is down and contained. Just get as many ambulances to the scene as you can. Multiple casualties. One of our own among them. Larry Shapiro took a hit from a fragmentation grenade to the hip. He’s bleeding badly.”

The screams and moans from around the square filled Castle’s ears as he made his way back to where Shapiro lay. He concentrated on his partner for the moment. Shapiro was pale, semiconscious.

“Hang in there, Larry. Help’s on its way.”

Castle took a quick look at Shapiro’s wound. He’d seen enough body wounds, from road accidents, to know it was serious. He dropped the shotgun and leaned over Shapiro. He could see where blood was pumping continuously from a severed artery. He reached into the wound and clamped his fingers over the tear, trying to clamp it off. The heavy flow lessened after a short while.

Uniformed cops appeared, weapons out, faces paling as they surveyed the scene around the square.