Luke Murphy - Dead Man's Hand

“Baxter has disappeared, sir.”

Dale looked at Jimmy, who rolled his eyes.

“Baxter has breached the perimeter. They can’t see anything through the rain, Dale.”

“Bullshit! Baxter is not a ghost.”

“No, he’s just good at that part.” Jimmy hesitated before adding, “You need to make a decision.”

“I know.” He checked his gun. “Do we go in and blow our cover, or do we wait and put Watters’ life at risk? Check your weapon. Baxter is not going to give himself up.”

Calvin could at least exhale when Rachel was driven away and her safety was confirmed. He hadn’t heard from Dayton, who was supposed to call when Baxter had been spotted. He’d seen no sign of the killer through his monitors until a motion sensor picked up movement.

He knew Baxter was coming.

He shut off the computer monitor in case the light gave him away. Then he slipped on night-vision goggles and positioned himself behind the computer room door. The door was slotted so he could shoot outward, but low enough to make an incoming shot difficult.

He heard the click of the side door and Baxter stepped through the doorway, equipped with a Beretta 92FS Compact M and night goggles.

Calvin waited as Baxter neared, not risking a shot. He only wanted to disable with a shot to the leg.

When Baxter was within range, Calvin clicked back and aimed low. As he went to pull the trigger, his two-way radio said, “Baxter is in the house!”

Calvin looked down for half a second and consecutive, multiple shots ricocheted off the front of the door, one through the narrow metal slot. One inch to the left and Calvin’s head would have exploded.

When he peeked back through the slot, Baxter was gone.

This killer was good and Calvin only had a few minutes before the cops rushed the house.

Now Baxter knew this was a trap. He’d be waiting to pick off cops and escape. It would be a firing zone.

Calvin had to get Baxter first and his odds were low. He grabbed his .45 and checked the single action to make sure he had all eight rounds. Easing open the door, he poked his gun and head through the doorway, slipped in and sidestepped his way through the front room. He heard footsteps upstairs.

He took the steps one at a time, thankful the old, worn-down floorboards didn’t creak. When he reached the top and stuck his head up over the last step, two bullets flew past and smashed the wall.

He couldn’t risk a wild, blind shot that might kill Baxter. Calvin had to evade him until that one perfect shot.

With a deep breath, he launched himself off the top step and into the next room. Three more bullets hit the wall beside him as he dove head first, arms extended to break his fall.

Calvin had counted eight shots fired by Baxter. Chances were he had to reload his Beretta or at least pull a second weapon. That meant seconds to reach him.

Calvin stayed along the floor, crawling the hallway. When he reached the end, he rose and leaned against the wall outside the room where the bullets had come from. He couldn’t hear anything, only his own heavy breathing.

He pivoted and extended his arm into the room. As he inched inside, he was too late to spot Baxter, who kicked Calvin’s arm and jolted his weapon to the floor.

Before Calvin could react, Baxter caught him flush on the jaw with hard metal, dislodging the goggles. Calvin was stunned for a moment, but he was able to shake that off before receiving another blow from the butt of Baxter’s pistol to the bridge of his nose. He instinctively reached for his nose as his eyes watered.

The taste of warm, metallic blood brought him back to his football days. Adrenaline kicked in—no thinking. He heard a new clip snap into the gun pointed at his head.

From the dark, he heard, “Goodbye, Calvin Watters.”

But Calvin swung his body. The bullet hit his right shoulder, where the sleeveless bulletproof vest did not cover, and pain erupted. He rolled into Baxter, dropping the hit man to the floor. Calvin gritted his teeth, got into a three-point stance and exploded off his feet, barreling into Baxter’s midsection.

He heard the gun hit the floor, followed by Baxter’s night goggles. Now both men were blind. Feeling in the dark, Calvin landed a solid punch to Baxter’s throat and the two men wrestled.

Baxter went after Calvin’s bad knee with a swinging kick but missed.

Then the lights to the entire workshop came on.

For the first time they looked at each other and both saw their guns at the same time. Both men dove for their weapon.

Calvin, half a second faster, aimed and fired. The bullet hit with precision where he had wanted it to—mid-upper thigh—but hit a major artery and exploded, blowing Baxter’s leg off at the femur bone. Enormous clumps of thigh, blood and tissue hit the walls, ceiling and floor. Baxter fell to the floor, grabbing at the open wound and screaming. But he still attempted to crawl to his weapon.

Calvin rose to his feet and kicked the weapon away. Baxter stopped squirming and rolled onto his back, staring up into Calvin’s eyes.

Blood leaked from Baxter’s cut lip when he spoke. “Finish it!” He said, barely audible from the blood and spit in his mouth.

Baxter rose into a one-knee seated position, moving toward the weapon that hung at Calvin’s side. Baxter pressed his head into the muzzle of the gun.

“Hold the gun like a man!”

Calvin nudged the gun against Baxter’s temple. He struggled to stay conscious from the mind-numbing pain. His eyes burned, his nose stung and his shoulder throbbed.

Then he heard a voice.

Chapter 38

“The bullet was a clean in and out.”

Dale was jolted awake by a soft hand shaking his shoulder. He had fallen asleep in an awkward position, scrunched up, legs hanging over the arm of an open-armed, fully upholstered hospital chair bolted to the floor. A nurse stood over him, holding a clipboard to sign. The Las Vegas cops were picking up Watters’ medical expenses—somehow. There would have to be some accounting magic for that one.

“No problems?”

“Nope.”

Dale got up and wiped sleep from his eyes. He took the pen and signed on the dotted line.

“Is he awake?”

“Room 314.”

He headed down the hall. He paused outside room 314 and stretched, his back muscles were in a tight ball. He opened his cell phone.

“Jimmy, Watters is awake.”

“Did you talk to him?”

“Not yet, I’m just going in now.”

“I’ve been thinking about this all night. Do you think we did the right thing?”

“I don’t know. I understood Watters’ logic. He got us Baxter. We would have caught him sooner or later, but Watters took a lot of chances, even if he had his own interests in mind.”

“Okay. But he’s still a leg breaker too, somebody who has got to enjoy that work. Don’t forget that,” said Jimmy.

“Where are you now?”

“I’m just leaving the house. Tina cooked me Sunday breakfast.”

“I’ll meet you back at the office.”

“What about Rachel?”

“Tell her Watters is okay. But I think we should keep her where she is. There’s no telling what the pushback might be now that we have Baxter in custody. Whoever hired him could counterattack. She’s safe where she is.”

Dale hung up.

He stood outside and looked through the small glass-paned section of the door at Watters lying in the hospital bed. He saw the face of a hero and was all the more grateful that Watters had survived. He hoped that Watters could see some of Dale’s admiration, because saying directly what he thought and felt would only embarrass the man.

He knew, from what Watters had told him, that he was an expert marksman, but he also knew that Watters had never shot at anything but paper targets.