Blue Molly (Danny Logan Mystery #5) (22 page)

Greg nodded. “I agree. Lead on.”

We set off at a jog, looking for any clue, any kind of sign that Libby might have been able to escape.

The rain had started while we were underground and now it misted down, causing little halos around the streetlights in the mall. It was nearly dark, and there were only a few people walking in the mall—none of them tall and big like Laskin or short like Libby, but all of them frozen with curiosity at the sight of ten heavily armed SWAT team members, jogging through the mall two by two, on the trail of a couple of ordinary-looking guys.

“We’re gonna need a bread crumb,” Miguel said. “A sign, something.”

“That’s right,” Greg said. “If he made it around the corner down there, it’s going to get a helluva lot harder.”

He was right. Every corner Laskin rounded that took him away from the scene multiplied the number of places he could hide exponentially. Soon, it would get out of hand. I nodded. “That’s . . . wait!” I raised my hand. “Look.” I pointed. We had passed Freeman’s photography store plus one empty space and were standing in front of the entrance to the Lyon Building’s lobby. A bright brass key was sticking in the door lock, a crowded key ring dangling below, rocking gently back and forth. The door had a little gap, not all the way closed. “This door is always closed. Those must be Mike’s keys.” I turned to Miguel. “How’s that for a bread crumb? They’re inside.”

Greg called his men up and left orders for two of them to remain outside the building entrance, control traffic, and call in the developments. The rest of us went inside.

As soon as we entered, I raised my hand in a fist. For just a moment, I’d heard a very distinct clomping
sound—the sound
of footsteps somewhere
above us on the building’s open stairwell. It would have been hard for anyone to mask his sound, but Laskin weighed 240. The footsteps stopped right after we entered.

I pointed upstairs. “Footsteps,” I whispered.

Greg nodded. “Got it. How many floors?”

I held up four fingers.

He nodded again, then he pointed to one of his men and signaled for him to stay in the lobby. “No one comes in; no one goes out,” he whispered. He turned to me. “Lead on.”

We moved quickly up the stairs. We didn’t make it past the second floor landing when I heard a door open above us. I raised a fist again. For a moment, I heard outside noises, then the door closed, and it was silent.

Miguel tilted his head. “What was that, traffic noises?”

I nodded. “That’s right. He’s on the roof. Let’s go.”

We moved out. I was reasonably sure Laskin wasn’t tricky enough to swing a door open and closed for a decoy, then backtrack and wait to ambush the guy who went to investigate, especially if he had to control a hostage all the while. Then again, he definitely had a gun and, because of that, a person might not get any second chances. I picked up the pace, but I was not stupid about it. I was careful to clear each landing before we exposed ourselves. As we ascended, Greg left a man on the landing of each floor, to guard against the unlikely event Laskin was trickier than I thought. I moved us out again. Somewhere around the third floor, the thought occurred to me that any notion of “protecting the civilian” had apparently vanished somewhere back around Sylvia’s shop. For the moment, anyway, I was an equal, if not the de facto leader.

I reached the top floor and held up a fist. After carefully peaking over the landing, I stepped up and waved everyone up to follow. “This door here leads to the last stairway—the one that goes up to the roof. Let’s open it, clear it, and then we’ll head on up.”

Greg nodded, then he moved his people into position. “On three,” he whispered. We took positions on each side of the door and watched as Greg used his fingers and counted.

At three, one of the men reached over, turned the handle, and pushed the heavy door open. The stairway was empty.

I pointed up the stairs to the landing. “The landing up there is small, maybe six by six, tops. And the roof door swings in, so there’s only room for two or three guys. I’m one of ’em.”

Greg nodded. “You earned it.” He turned to Miguel. “Me, you, and Danny go through first?”

Miguel nodded.

Greg turned to the remaining five guys. He pointed to one. “You guard this landing. The rest of you, wait for our signal, then follow us out onto the roof. Keep your eyes open.”

Miguel led the way up the stairway. When he reached the top, I grabbed his shoulder. “Hold it. When you go outside, you’re going to see a mechanical room just to your right. I think there’s an HVAC unit in there. That’s your nearest cover.”

He nodded and reached for the door again.

I grabbed his shoulder again. “Wait!”

“What?”

“You know, when you open that door, Laskin’s likely to start shooting. It’s likely to get dangerous real quick.”

“Yeah? No shit.” But he thought about it for a second, and then he nodded. “Okay. You’re right.” He stepped back. “You’d better go first.”

I smiled. “What? I was just reminding you, dude. You’re supposed to be the public servant here.”

Greg pushed past me. “Get out of the way, you bozos. I’m going through first. I’m the only one here wearing body armor.”

In the army, I was a reasonably macho guy, not one to shirk going through a door first. But what the hell? Greg had a point. Besides, I didn’t live through two combat tours by being stupid.

“It’s all yours,” I said.

He nodded. We stood to the side of the doorway, and then Greg turned the knob. He gave me a quick nod, and I pulled it open from behind. He burst through the door and disappeared onto the roof.

There were no gunshots. Miguel peeked around the corner, twice. “Greg’s good,” he whispered. “He’s up against the building. I can’t see anything else, though.”

“So we don’t know where Laskin is?”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

I nodded. I heard footsteps behind me—the remaining SWAT team members from the roof team were making their way up the stairs. As soon as they arrived, I passed off door duty to one of them and peeked outside. From twenty feet away at the mechanical room, Greg noticed and gestured to us. I looked at Miguel. “Let’s go.”

He nodded and then drew his service weapon—a Glock 23. He held it at high-ready position, then he took a deep breath before bolting around the corner and dashing through the doorway. I was right on his heels, my 1911 at low ready, my head on the proverbial swivel. I didn’t see Laskin anywhere. We reached the mechanical building and huddled up to the wall next to Greg.

Greg gestured for the remaining team members to hold in place. Then he pointed to me and indicated that he wanted me to circle right around the mechanical room. He was going to circle left. He had Miguel hold in position.

I moved out. What had been a drizzle had now turned into a light rain, but I noticed this more because of what it did to visibility than the fact that I was slowly getting drenched. In fact, if there was any kind of moon out, it was completely blocked by the clouds. Below us, I heard rush-hour traffic sounds from all sides, sounds that tended to blend together with the million raindrops falling on the roof, making a low hum. I moved forward and reached the edge of the mechanical room. I peeked around the corner. To the right was an air vent, perhaps three feet tall, the kind that made a little upside-down U to keep the rain out. It was made of sheet metal, so it would offer no cover. But it was decent concealment and that made it my objective.

I glanced back at Miguel and then at Greg beyond. Greg waved at me. He pointed to himself, then held his hand over his eyes as if he were shielding them from the rain; he tapped his wrist, grabbed his throat, and pointed around the corner he was standing behind. Translation: I see the enemy and a hostage to my left.

I gave him an okay sign. I understood. Thank goodness the police seemed to use the same hand signals I’d learned in the army.

I answered back. I pointed to myself, then made a sweeping motion with my hand like a reverse karate chop—low, moving forward. Then I made a T with my hands. Translation: I’m moving up to the corner. New target. He gave me an okay sign, and I took off. I reached the edge of the building a couple seconds later, and I peeked around. Sure enough, Laskin was standing near the edge of the building. He had a tight grip on Libby with his left hand. Even with the poor viz, I could see that his right hand held a big, nasty handgun, maybe a Desert Eagle .44 or even a .50. No wonder the bullets had buzzed past us in the tunnel. They were like flying Toyotas. The air pressure alone could mess you up.

“Give it up, Laskin!” Greg yelled from his side. “It’s all over. No need for anyone to get hurt up here!”

“Get back!” Laskin yelled in his heavily accented voice. “I’ll kill her!”

I peeked around and saw another air vent, this one closer. New target.

“Don’t do that!” Greg yelled back at Laskin. “That’s not going to help you. Let’s just talk for a minute.”

Thinking Laskin might be distracted, I slipped from behind the building and moved toward the air vent. Unfortunately, Laskin wasn’t distracted. He saw me moving. Worse, his response was to turn that mighty cannon my way. A bolt of flame jumped toward me, and the bullet whizzed by like an angry hornet. Actually, it sounded like an Apache attack helicopter, only about a thousand times faster.
God, don’t let it hit anybody.
“Boom!” I hit the ground, or should I say, the roof gravel, and rolled. Just in time to see another bolt of flame. The bullet slammed into the air vent, six inches above my head just as the second “Boom!” split the night. Then, the most beautiful sound in the whole world. A very loud “Click!”

“He’s out!” I screamed. I jumped up immediately, my sidearm leveled, and sprinted toward him before he had a chance to reload.

As soon as I cleared the building, I saw Greg moving up as well. I ran up to within fifteen feet of Laskin, my weapon leveled, the safety off. “Drop it, Laskin!” I yelled.

“Ee-dee nah, hooy!”
he yelled. Then he surprised me—he threw his gun at me. Wonders never cease. I dodged it easy enough.

“Stay back!” he yelled. “I throw the bitch off the building.” To emphasize his point, he looked over his shoulder and moved himself and Libby back, close to the edge of the roof.

“C’mon, Laskin!” I yelled. “Even if she goes over, where’s that leave you? How’s this going to help you?”

“Shut up, you!”

I glanced at Libby. She was essentially frozen. Laskin still had a tight grip on her right arm with his left hand. Her eyes looked straight at me, wide with terror. Through them, she seemed to be pleading for me to do something.

The trouble was, I didn’t have many options. Hitting Laskin and missing Libby from this distance was no problem. I was 100 percent confident I could make the shot. The problem was, Laskin had the two of them perched just a few inches from the edge of the roof. Even if I shot him, he’d likely take Libby over the edge with him. This was quickly turning into a nasty stalemate.

“Move away from the edge, Laskin!” Greg yelled. “Let her go!”

“I not go to jail for this bitch!” he yelled back, anger dripping from his voice. “She . . .”

He must have shifted or some other way loosened his grip on Libby, because she suddenly jerked her arm free from his grasp and immediately crouched down. Then, as he reached for her, she moved. Faster than I might have thought possible, she stood back up and elbowed him right in the chest with her right arm, hard.

Even with him unprepared, I didn’t think tiny little Libby would actually be able to move huge Laskin more than a step or so. All he had to do was shift his foot back a couple of inches to compensate, and he’d left himself that much between where he stood and the edge of the roof. Unfortunately for Laskin, he didn’t have that step. When she’d crouched down, Libby stuck her right leg out a little, just enough to wedge her shoe behind Laskin’s shoes, between him and the tiny ridge at the top of the flashing on the edge of the roof. When she’d elbowed him, she shoved his weight backward, just a bit. But with her shoe between his and the edge of the roof, his left foot was not able to take the necessary compensating backward step. She’d tripped him, which of course caused him to lose his balance. His mouth and his eyes flew open wide and his arms began to windmill. A look of terror appeared on his face as he reached for Libby. Unfortunately for him, but very fortunately for Libby, she’d already ducked and leaned forward again, out of his reach. Laskin extended his right leg out to the side, looking for balance, but the lateral move gave him no help. His foot landed on the slippery flashing at the roof’s edge and slipped out from under him. He tumbled backward off the roof into the darkness, screaming all the way down to the sidewalk, five floors below.

Time froze for a second, then we moved. Libby was still bent over, perilously close to the roof’s edge. I ran to her, reaching her at the same time Greg did. I grabbed her.

“Whoa!” I said, pulling her to me. “Move away from the edge, Libby!”

Her body literally shook as I led her ten feet away from the edge, away from danger.

“Oh my God!” she said. “Oh my God!” To my complete surprise, she broke away from me and ran back, straight over to the edge. Then she stopped and carefully looked over. “Asshole!” she screamed. I ran toward her again and wrapped my arms around her from behind. I turned her around.

“It’s over, Libby. You’re safe.”

“The fucker! He was going to kill me!”

“Not now,” I said. “Not now he isn’t.”

It’s always nice when a case reaches a satisfactory resolution. The client’s happy, the police are happy, and we’re happy—most of the time, anyway. Bad guys? They’re usually
not
happy but, then again, they bring it on themselves.

At the conclusion, my role switches as things return to a more normal mode. For example, the next morning I changed from “Danny Logan—Solver of Mysteries, Rescuer of Damsels in Distress” to “Danny Logan—Beleaguered Business Owner and Part-Time Counter of Beans.” I’d been working straight since 7:30 a.m. putting together a final bill for the Lyons, and I found myself growing increasingly frustrated. It wasn’t the numbers that were getting to me; they were pretty straightforward. But still, I had some nagging feelings that I couldn’t shake. Usually, this was because I like to wrap up every loose end in a case. Unfortunately, this isn’t a perfect world, and some cases end with open issues. For example, I figured there was a 99 percent chance that Laskin was the one behind the offers on the building. His death almost certainly meant that the offers—and the harassment—would stop. But there was still that nagging 1 percent. These things eat at me for a while, then they gradually fade. Meanwhile, our 9:00 a.m. wrap-up meeting was a welcome distraction. I wanted to be in a better mood in front of the troops, so I sucked it up.