Expiration Date (24 page)

“Dunno.” Kenny hefted a saddlebag for Clay’s use. “Here. You can cover one side of the street, and I’ll cover the other. I’ll let you know which houses have special instructions. We get lucky, we might even find a tip.”

“See? I knew this would be fun.”

Clay’s face did not match his words as they pedaled into the street.

On the back porch of a house on Juniper, Asgoth was nearly finished with his trap. At his side he knew Monde was fine-tuning his plan, a mechanic of the mind calibrating psychological tools for maximum effect.

Behind them, a dog growled. Claws raked along wooden gate slats.

Asgoth shivered. “I know he can’t hurt us, but that thing scares me to death.”

“No need to worry, A.G. As you’ve marvelously demonstrated, you’re able to survive almost any danger.”

“Absolutely. But there are some I’d rather not experience firsthand.” Asgoth crouched near a welcome mat, adding last-minute details.

Monde rattled the fence, and the deep-throated beast went wild.

“Would you quit that?” Asgoth shook his head. “I already told you—”

A lock snapped like a branch in the morning calm, and the neighbor’s back door slammed into vinyl siding as a stubble-faced man thrust his barrel chest outside. Windows quivered in their panes, and the light fixture over his back door plummeted to the cement pad in a burst of frosted glass.

“Shut up, you stupid dog! See whatcha made me do?”

A low snarl escalated into one sharp bark.

“Just won’t listen, will you? Filthy, no-good mutt!”

Behind the wooden slats, the man appeared to move through time-lapse frames. He wore cowboy boots and no shirt. Curly chest hair sprouted with vigor around the straps of his coveralls. Cursing, he swung back a leg and shot the boot’s toe into the animal’s ribs. Did it twice more.

The dog slunk to the ground, growling, tail tucked—but eyes ablaze.

“That’ll teach ya to shut your pie hole! I’m tryin’ to get some sleep here.”

Asgoth peered over at Monde. His partner was a statue of intense thought, black hair lacquered to his head, sharp nose pointed forward. One hand covered his mouth, but there was no shock or sympathy behind the gesture. Instead, for the first time since they had worked together, Asgoth heard Monde start to giggle—the sound of a bird, high pitched and mocking.

The irate neighbor was headed back indoors, grumbling all the way.

Monde grabbed at the gate. Rattled it.

Again the dog went berserk.

Dmitri Derevenko entered Junction City from the north. He passed a church with a Scandinavian windmill on display, then spotted Safeway and Papa Murphy’s pizzeria.

These small towns amused him, wearing facades of respectability, while behind closed doors immorality played across plasma TV screens. No different than in Russia. Modern technology had paved new roads for age-old perversion.

He thought of the Cuban. And the old German.

His bullets had brought their lives to an end, but didn’t the Scriptures make it clear there was a time to kill? For the common good, evil men must be removed.

I’m one of the good Russian men. The Brotherhood will do what it must
.

Dmitri pressed his palm against his hip. The angel there, carved from flesh, accompanied him every step of his journey. She justified his actions, held his hand as his victims tried to inhabit his waking dreams. Although destiny wore him down at times, he felt comforted by the angel’s presence.

Following MapQuest directions, he arrived at the site of Engine 418.

The tender car and cab gleamed beneath a fine mist while plumes of fog around the huge iron wheels gave the illusion of steam. Encircling the beast of burden, the fence seemed a grave injustice.

Dmitri parked his rental car and approached. He bowed once before attempting to scale the metal bars, but the bars turned to molten lava in his hands. He pulled back. Scorched.

He tried again at a different spot. Same reaction. Again.

Five minutes later he roared like a creature robbed of its prey.

“We’re almost done, I hope.”

“Couple of blocks left.” With Clay looking to him for instruction, Kenny felt a glow of pride. “Here, let me show you how this house works. We gotta go to the back.”

They propped up their bikes and went around to the back porch, where flowerpots lined the railing and wind chimes jingled. On the ground, a fuzzy mat welcomed them.

“Paper goes here?” Clay asked. “On the mat?”

Kenny nodded. “And look, we got our first tip of the day.”

He lifted an edge of the mat to reveal a pack of watermelon Koolerz. At the same moment, he caught the shifting of a shape behind the wood slats next door, but he knew better than to let that Rottweiler scare him. The gate was always locked.

“Leave the gum alone,” Clay said.

“These people’re okay. They’ve left me stuff before.”

“Don’t touch it. Look at the powder around the edges.”

Kenny frowned at the pink-tinted dust sprinkling the pack. Strange. Maybe his protector had a point. As he stood and turned, he bumped into an earthen pot that seemed intentionally placed in his way. It wobbled and then toppled from the rail. Shards of red pottery scattered over the walkway. In his attempt to catch the object, his head brushed a wind chime, and the metal tubes rang with chaotic frenzy.

The dog came unglued. Behind the fence, a territorial growl built into
aggressive, fang-tipped barks. The Rottweiler’s anger was unlike anything Kenny had seen. Jaws snapped; slobbering lips peeled back, ripe with rage; large paws backed by muscular shoulders pounded against the gate.

Ka-clickk …

In the moment before the gate crashed open and the animal rocketed into full view, the tinny sound of the releasing clasp swept over Kenny’s arms, combed through his hair, shoved the breath back down his throat into his lungs.

Kenny stared in denial. “That gate’s always locked.”

Although he trusted Clay’s intentions and enjoyed the male attention, he had resisted, until this second, the reality of any deadly danger.

“Get behind me,” Clay ordered. “And run!”

Clay had already decided to protect Kenny Preston at any cost. To lose the kid would be to lose his own peace of mind. His past, his present, his foreboding future would collapse into one heap upon his head, crushing him.

But he’d never counted on a dog entering the fray.

On a logical level, Clay understood Rottweilers were not inherently evil. He could hear Dr. Gerringer explaining how the fear mechanism triggers a knee-jerk moral opposition to the source of one’s fear
—if it scares you, it must be bad
. Clay also knew dogs’ protective instincts were beneficial and often desired.

On a visceral level, however, this beast sent shudders through his limbs.

His senses went into overdrive: the taste of battery acid in his mouth; the touch of sweat droplets beneath his rain gear; the sound of cracking gate slats and grinding pottery beneath his feet; the smell of wet, musky fur, as the black and brown creature hurtled into the open …

And the sight of a rake poked down into the grass.

Clay scrambled across the wet lawn, slipped to one knee, got his fingers around the handle. The Rottweiler was charging, claws tearing up clods of mud.

Clay yanked on the garden implement, but the metal tines bit into the turf. Rebutted by his own strength, he was pulled forward and off balance. He
landed hard. The rake’s handle was underneath him. He rolled. Twisted the tool from the earth so that it lay atop his chest like a spine ripped from an enemy carcass.

The dog was upon him. Curved nails slammed into Clay’s thigh, thrust through his weather gear by rock-solid canine muscle. Above his throat, ropes of saliva dangled from snarling jaws.

He shoved the rake upward, and the Rottweiler’s fangs clamped down on the wood. The dog stumbled against this impediment, momentum carrying him up and over. In a black blur, the body hit the ground and skidded beyond Clay’s torso.

Clay clambered to his feet as the dog did the same.

The next attack was a blast of energized fury. Kill or be killed.

Clay drew back the rake, spun its unyielding metal prongs into position, and swung them with every ounce of his strength toward his relentless foe. He alone stood between this creature and a thirteen-year-old boy. He alone recognized that death was here on this early Sunday morning, stalking on paws and four legs.

No room for mercy.

7.1.1.0.4 …

“Not today!” he screamed, arching the heavy tool through the air.

The dog’s speed was explosive. He came in low, entering the circumference of the swinging rake. The force of Clay’s own motion spun him around; in a whirl, he corkscrewed on sturdy legs, a matador avoiding the blood-tipped horns of a bull.

The Rottweiler lunged past. One tooth snagged Clay’s skin, tore at his forearm.

He felt nothing. He was in the heat of battle.

To his horror, he watched the animal sprawl on the rain-slick lawn, catch itself with massive paws, then turn its broad head toward a figure in the driveway. The creature had found its original, more manageable target. The throaty bellow of a maniacal murderer could not have sounded more bloodcurdling than the growl he now heard.

“Kenny!” Clay was appalled by the kid’s lingering presence. “Get away!”

He couldn’t wait for Kenny to respond. He had to intervene. He pursued
the accelerating killer across the backyard, but the dog was built for short bursts of speed, and Clay was losing ground. He was running low on options.

In three deliberate, turf-grinding steps, he cocked the rake back over his head and windmilled it forward. The metal tines became predatory claws of a dinosaur. Clumped weeds and roots flew from the rake like eviscerated entrails from its previous feasting.

Down, down, toward the racing animal.

He couldn’t let the Rottweiler reach the kid. Kenny would be shredded.

Extending the man-made claw to its limit, he realized he would be short of his target, unable to detain or destroy the marauder. He let the rake fly. It scraped and thudded along the beast’s rippling back, producing an enraged yelp and a backward snap of fangs. Fell useless to the dirt.