To Catch a Copperhead (3 page)

I didn’t answer because I
didn’t know. For two years, I’d been on the rooftops or in the
shadows. I’d been alone and had avoided letting anyone know about
me. As frustrating as Emma was, I realized that I’d been more open
with her than I’d ever been with anyone. My past wasn’t something I
talked about. In fact, I’d never spoken to anyone I rescued or
helped until that night.

What would I have done to
that man? It bothered me that I didn’t know. It bothered me that my
first instinct had been to kill without proof of guilt. Her words
bothered me on a deep level that I didn’t want to admit to having.
Had I become as dark and sinister as the thug who’d beaten me? He’d
shown no compassion or concern for my life and I saw that I’d had
no concerns for the lives of the men who’d been in my
crosshairs.

“
I don’t have time for this.
We’ve got to move.”

We rounded a corner and came
upon a scene of chaos. Whiffs of smoke belched from a few lower
windows and the front doors of a hotel. In addition, dozens of
people, many in nightclothes, were streaming out of the building.
Calls of ‘Fire!’ echoed through the streets.

Through the mess of running
and panicking people, Emma grabbed my arm and pointed at one man. I
immediately knew he must be a Copperhead since his expression
wasn’t of fear or concern but one of satisfaction.

“
He’s one of them,” she
belted out as I reached for my rifle. She grabbed my arm and added,
“You can’t shoot him. Not out here in the open where everyone will
see you.”

I glanced at her in
annoyance and sprinted away. He charged down the street in our
direction, so I wove through the light crowd that’d gather and
appeared in front of him before he realized I was there. His speed
as well as my own only added to the power of the punch. His head
snapped back and his feet and legs flew out from under
him.

He hit the ground and I
dropped on him, slamming my fist into his face again. His nose
crunched and blood gushed out and covered his mouth and chin. He
wouldn’t get up anytime soon. A measure of rope was pulled from a
pouch on my belt. The thick twine was twisted and tied around his
wrist, then strung down to his ankles and bound around them as
well. By the time I was done, he was thoroughly hogtied.

A small crowd had begun to
form around us and it made my skin crawl. I worked at night for a
reason, so that I wasn’t seen, yet here I was, the center of
attention. Emma came to my rescue, grabbed my arm and helped me to
my feet once the Copperhead was securely tied up.

“
I need someone to fetch a
copper,” she shouted. “This man is a saboteur. He and his
companions are Copperheads and they’re setting fires to the hotels
of our city. Anne and I have to stop them but I need you all to
hold him here until the police arrive.”

“
Anne? Assassin Anne?”
someone asked.

I grabbed Emma’s hand and
pulled her away from the crowd. After a few steps, we dashed off in
a full sprint and escaped the calls for us to stop. We wove through
the crowd and heard the clanging of fire bells. Once a block away
from the scene, we slowed.

“
Thank you,” she huffed in
between breaths. “For not killing him.”

The block-long run had been
nothing for me since I routinely ran for miles each evening. But
for Emma, it’d been an ordeal. She’d already covered more ground in
the past hour than she probably walked during the course of a
regular day. I couldn’t fault her with being winded.

“
The Royale is two blocks
away. If we hurry, we may be able to catch the bastards in the act,
before they can unleash their firestorm.”

She picked up her pace and
nodded. In between deep breaths, she asked, “What about the other
places?”

“
If they are already there,”
I replied, “which I suspect they are, then it’s too late to stop
them. At least the Royale is close enough that we may have a chance
to stop them or catch them as they leave.”

“
But the people…”

“
Causalities of war,” I said
and looked over at her. “I don’t mean that to sound callous but
it’s true. These men are committing an act of war. All we can do is
be happy that we were able to stop the ones we have.”

“
Only one,” she
whispered.

“
No, not one. The three men
who attacked you had a case, so that’s one target safe. The one who
went up in flames is two. We didn’t stop the last one, but we did
capture him so he’ll never be able to do anything against our city
again,” I said and waited. It took a moment before she responded
with a nod. “Alright, can you run? We’ve got ground to cover if
we’re gonna make it.”

Again, she nodded and we
dashed towards the Royale.

It was after ten o’clock
when we reached the doors of the Royale. The bleak hotel stood
several stories, just another building amongst the many on the
block. A handful of people walked the streets at this hour but none
gave notice to our final sprint up the stairs and into the
doorway.

Darkness hid much of the
lobby. Only a lantern that hung behind the counter burned and shed
enough light to illuminate the sparse furnishings and the three men
inside. The body of a man lay sprawled out beside the counter. His
head rested in a pool of blackness that could only have been his
own blood.

A wooden tote sat on the
counter, open with a man’s hand hovering over it. The Copperhead
stared at me, frozen in place and unsure if I was a threat. His
gaze locked first on the butt of my rifle as it protruded over my
shoulder and then dropped to my hands. He moved fast and I drew my
pistols. Before he could get a word out, a round from both weapons
tore into his chest. In a blur, he fell back against the counter
and slid to the floor.

The other two reacted
quickly, one dove behind the counter and the other charged at me. I
swung my pistols in his direction but he’d closed the distance
faster than I’d thought possible. A large hand swatted the pistol
in my right hand so hard that I lost my grip and the weapon flew
out of reach. Still, my other hand held fast to a pistol and I
fired it point blank into his torso. He jerked to the side and
grunted in pain, but grabbed my wrist and twisted hard enough to
loosen my grip on the weapon.

Pain shot through my arm and
I suddenly feared that I might hear the sounds of bones snapping. I
tried to pull away but his hand was just too strong. He wore a
devilish smile, punctuated by blackened teeth. His gaze moved to
the pistol and his fingers squeezed harder. The pressure increased
to the breaking point and I couldn’t stand it any longer. My
fingers opened and the gun tumbled to the floor.

When he looked into my eyes,
his smile faded. He’d been distracted enough by my struggle not to
notice that my empty hand now held my Bowie knife. Its blade
shimmered as it flashed in front of him and ripped into his
stomach. He flinched from the pain and I twisted the hilt for added
measure. He released my hand and I pushed myself away from him,
drawing the knife out of him in the process. I didn’t see the quick
jab his fist made but I felt its impact on my face. The room seemed
to light up for a split second before the pain set in. A second
punch hit as well but I ducked and avoided the third.

I slashed upwards and dug a
deep gash across his chest. He pulled back and I took advantage of
the space between us. With a quick twist, I kicked out to the side
and put my boot in his stomach. He grunted from the pain of the
kick but also from the impact of my foot on the pistol and knife
wounds. He staggered back and I lunged forward. The knife slammed
into his chest as we collided. He stumbled over and fell on his
back with me riding him down. The force of our fall caused me to
push the blade even deeper into him.

“
Anne!” Emma
screamed.

I glanced to her and
followed her gaze to the third man who charged at me. I leapt to my
feet but the brute was on already on me. Hands the size of
Christmas hams grabbed my arms and with surprising strength threw
me across the room, headfirst into a wall.

Dazed, I tried to stand but
his fist slammed into my stomach. My body seemed to wrap itself
around his hand as he pushed me back against the wall. He punched
me again and again, until my body felt numb. Thick fingers wrapped
around my neck and squeezed until no air could enter my
lungs.

“
Now li’l kitten, Youse gone
and killed two of me friends. I think I’ll be taking it out on….”
His slurred voice hesitated as he rolled my head back and forth and
studied me. “Wait a tick… I knows you.”

Shadows covered much of his
face but the voice struck a nerve. I knew him as well. I knew the
feel of his hands slapping me, punching me, and holding me down. I
couldn’t see his face through the shadows but I knew he was
smiling. He’d found me, found his favorite play toy, the girl who’d
been his punching bag on those drunken nights when he’d had the
money to pay his way into the brothel that my father had sold me
to.

My heart froze and fear set
in. The memories of his brutality flooded my head and I couldn’t
stop the wave of emotions. Tears streaked down my cheeks as I
tugged at his hand, nails digging into his flesh but still I
couldn’t get air to my lungs. Death didn’t scare me, but I couldn’t
die like this, not by his hands.

“
Let her go!” Emma screamed
and punched him in the head.

He released me long enough
to backhand her. I heard the smack and then the thud as she hit the
floor. Fury boiled up and replaced the fear. He’d hurt my friend.
As irritating as she may be, Emma was under my protection. I lifted
one foot and planted it against the wall and then pushed away as
hard as I could. The force caused him to stumble back a couple of
steps.

In a flash, my hand grabbed
the butt of my rifle, spun it over my shoulder so that the barrel
was mere inches from him and pulled the trigger. The bullet blasted
though his chest and sprayed the floor behind him with his blood.
Before he could register what had happened, I’d cocked, chambered
another round and fired it into him, an inch above the first hole.
As he staggered back, I brought the weapon to head level and fired
the last shot into his forehead.

“
Bitch….”

The word was barely audible
as he fell to the side and lay still. Once certain that he and the
others were down for good, I moved to Emma’s side. She sat up, her
hands rubbing her right cheek where the brute had hit
her.

“
Are you alright?” I asked
and watched her nod. “Thank you.”

“
For what? All I managed to
do was get smacked like a schoolgirl,” she quipped.

“
You got his attention long
enough to give me a chance.”

A low moan from the second
man caught our attention. His hand moved to the knife that still
stuck out of his chest. We stepped over and knelt beside
him.

“
How many more Copperheads
are there?” I asked. When he didn’t answer, I leaned closer and
repeated the question.

“
Don’t know. Our
group—meeting at Ryan’s Pub—after fires set,” he
stammered.

I toyed with killing him and
ending his suffering, but we could hear footsteps coming down the
stairs. The ruckus we’d made from fighting and the gunplay had no
doubt roused most of the sleeping patrons, if not all of
them.

“
Grab the tote,” I said to
Emma as I located my pistols. I returned to him and wrapped my
fingers around the hilt of the knife. “This is going to
hurt.”

He nodded and I jerked the
blade free. He moaned softly and whispered, “Finish the
job.”

I looked at Emma who had
walked up beside me, tote in hand. She looked down at the dying man
with profound sadness, then her gaze moved to me. With a slight
nod, she gave her approval to his request. I stood and pointed the
pistol at his head as she turned away.

The shot felt wrong to me
but I knew it had a good purpose. I didn’t murder him in anger.
Instead it was a mercy killing. I looked at her while we walked out
the door and wondered, for the first time, if there was a
difference.

***

“
Where do we go now?” she
asked after we’d gotten a block away from the Royale.

The sounds of fire bells
echoed down the myriad streets. We’d stopped a few, but many of the
Copperheads had achieved their goals. The frustration was the
hardest thing to deal with. We’d done as much as possible and it
wasn’t enough to stop them all.

“
Ryan’s Pub,” I whispered
and then said it out loud when I saw she hadn’t heard me. “He said
his group was meeting there after the fires were started. I want to
catch as many as possible.”

“
Catch or kill?” Emma asked
and for a change, there was an absence of sarcasm in her
tone.

“
Catch,” I said and looked
over at her. “We’ll catch them, turn them over to the police and
let the city hang them.”

“
Fair enough,” she
replied.