Secret Prey

had to maneuver it around the car’s roof post. Still, once it was out, it came up smoothly, and she saw the surprise register on Davenport’s face and heard him scream a word and saw a violent motion and then the muzzle was coming down . . .
    THE DOME AND DOOR LIGHTS CAME ON IN AUDREY’S car as she opened the door; and with that light, Lucas could see the shotgun barrel as it came up. Sherrill had come in behind him and he screamed, ‘‘Gun!’’ and battered her sideways as he went down behind a Lexus. At the same instant, the shotgun blew a foot-long finger of flame at him, and the wall behind exploded in a shower of drywall plaster.
    BAAA-OOOM.
    The sound came after the lightning flash—a long time after, it seemed, though he was suspended in air when he thought that. Then he was on the floor, groping for his pistol, dragging it out of the holster, rolling along beside the Lexus, and the shotgun lit up the garage again, blowing glass out over his head. He’d lost track of Sherrill, lost track of everything: the thunder of the shotgun was magnified in the enclosed space, and the lightning of the shots was now the only illumination, aside from the feeble dome light from McDonald’s car.
    • • •
    AUDREY HAD BEEN BLINDED BY THE MUZZLE FLASH; she hadn’t expected that, but she expected Davenport to be falling, so she dropped the muzzle of the weapon as she pumped it, and convulsively jerked the trigger again. Glass shattered and she registered a voice, screaming; and a surge of confidence ran through her. Got him. Now to finish him .
    ‘‘LIGHT.’’ LUCAS HEARD SOMEBODY SCREAMING; HIS mind processed it as Sherrill, but he couldn’t tell what she was saying. ‘‘Top.’’
    BAAA-OOOM.
    Three shots; and Audrey was getting closer, walking toward them. But some shotguns only held three shots. Was she reloading? Was this a four-shot chamber? And then suddenly, the overhead lights were on and he saw, from the corner of his eye, Sherrill scrambling away from a light switch, a gun in her hand. And at the same time, from his spot on the concrete floor, saw Audrey’s ankle behind the back bumper of the sport-ute. He pushed his hand forward, couldn’t see the front barrel of the pistol but squeezed off a shot. Twelve feet: and he missed to the right. Audrey did a little hop step, and he heard her pump, and a shotgun shell bounced off the floor and he adjusted a hair to the right and pulled the trigger again.
    And this time, he hit her.
    Audrey screamed and went down, and suddenly, her face was there, looking under the cars at him. And the barrel of the shotgun was pointing at him too and she was moving it toward his face. He rolled behind a tire as she fired, and the tire soaked up the blast; but he could feel the air torn apart beside him.
    She’d be dealing with recoil; she might be reloading. He didn’t think it, but knew it, and pushed himself just to the right and extended his arm again, still unable to find the front sight in the shadow under the car, but he was close, and her face was there, and he was tightening his grip on the trigger and she was moving the barrel back to him . . .
    • • •
    SHERRILL DROPPED ON HER LIKE A METEOR. SHE’D crawled over the sport-ute, and dropped from the roof. She landed with her feet behind Audrey’s neck, smacking Audrey’s head facedown into the receiver on the shotgun.
    Lucas jumped up and ran around the end of the car and caught Sherrill’s hand coming up with the pistol in it. ‘‘No, no . . .’’
    ‘‘What?’’ Sherrill looked confused.
    ‘‘We got her.’’
    Audrey wrenched her shoulders and neck around, looked up at them, dazed, blood running down her lips and across her teeth. ‘‘Who are you?’’ she asked.
    One of the cops outside was screaming, ‘‘Davenport, Davenport, talk to me . . .’’
    ‘‘We got her, we got her, we got her . . .’’ With his foot, Lucas pushed the shotgun under the sport-ute, out of reach. ‘‘She’s hit,’’ he said to Sherrill. ‘‘Let’s get her outside.’’
    ‘‘I’ll get the doors . . .’’
    Lucas got his arms under Audrey’s back and knees, and picked her up as best he could; then the three garage doors started rising simultaneously, and light flooded into the garage.
    The uniformed cops were there, pistols drawn. They reholstered as they saw Lucas carrying Audrey.
    ‘‘Jesus Christ,’’ one of them said. ‘‘What was that?’’
    ‘‘Shotgun,’’ Lucas grunted.