Sudden Prey

coming back from his bedroom. He was wearing his camo parka.
    “Better for us, since they plastered pictures of me and Butters all over hell,” LaChaise said. “Less people on the street.”
    “Nothing must’ve happened with Ansel. They’d be going on all channels if he’d done something.”
    “Maybe backed off,” LaChaise said. “Maybe nothin’ there.”
    Martin looked at Sandy: “You ready?”
    “I’m not sure about this,” she said. “If somebody sees us . . .”
    “We’re just gonna ride around,” LaChaise said. “Maybe go to a drive-through and get some Egg Mc-Muffins or something.”
    “Gonna be light soon,” Martin said.
     
     
     
    BUTTERS GOT BACK to the house and saw the snow-free spot where Martin’s truck had been parked, and the tracks leading away. Hadn’t been gone for more than a couple of minutes, he thought: wonder what’s going on? He parked Sandy’s truck over the same spot and went inside. A note in the middle of the entry floor said, “Cabin fever. Gone an hour. We’ll check back.”
    Butters shook his head: Cabin fever wasn’t a good enough reason to go out. Of course, he’d been out. Still. LaChaise had once saved his life, LaChaise was as solid a friend as Butters had ever known . . . but nobody had ever claimed that he was a genius.
     
     
     
    WHEN LUCAS ARRIVED at the parking lot off university and Lexington, the St. Paul cops were putting together the entry team under a lieutenant named Allport. Four plainclothes Minneapolis cops, all from homicide or vice, were standing around the lot, watching the St. Paul guys getting set.
    Allport spotted Lucas and walked over to shake hands: “How’re you doing?”
    “Anything we can do to help?”
    Allport shook his head. “We got it under control.” He paused. “A couple of your guys were pretty itchy to go in with us.”
    “I’ll keep them clear,” Lucas said. “Maybe we could sit out on the perimeter.”
    Allport nodded: “Sure. We’re a little thin on the ground ’cause we’re moving fast. We want to get going before we have too many people on the street.” He looked up into the sky, which seemed as dark as ever with snow clouds. But dawn was coming: you couldn’t see it on the horizon, but there was more light around. “Why don’t you take your guys up on the east side, up on Grotto. You’ll be a block off the house, you can get down quick if something happens.”
    “You got it,” Lucas said. “Thanks for letting us in.”
    “So let’s go,” Allport said.
    Lucas rounded up the Minneapolis cops: “There’ll be two squads on Grotto, which is a little thin. We’ll want to spread out along the street. St. Paul will bring us in as soon as the entry team pops the place.”
    A sex cop named Lewiston said, “St. Paul don’t have a lot of guys out here.”
    “There’s a time problem,” Lucas said. “They want to get going before they have too many civilians on the street.”
    Lewiston nodded, accepting the logic, but Stadic said, “I wish we were doing the entry. These fuckin’ shitkickers . . .”
    Lucas grinned and said, “Hey.” Then: “We don’t even know if it’s anything. Could be bullshit.”
    The entry team left, followed by the other cops in squads and their personal cars, a morose procession down through the narrow streets of Frogtown, staying two blocks from the target, walking in the last block.
     
     
     
    STADIC HUNG BACK as they walked, his shotgun under his arm. He’d been caught up in the rush around the office, when word got back that Davenport’s source might have something. Now he was worried: if they got tight on the house, they just might pull some people out of it alive . . .
    Davenport pushed on ahead, walking fast with two other Minneapolis cops. This was his first chance, and probably his last: Stadic stepped behind a dying elm, took his cellular from his pocket and pushed the speed-dial button.
    “Yeah?” LaChaise answered in two seconds, as though he’d been holding the phone.
    “Get out of there,” Stadic rasped. “There’s a St. Paul entry team coming in right now. Go out the back, go east, they’re thin up there. Get out.”
    After a second of silence, LaChaise said, “We ain’t there.”
    “What?”
    “We’re in the truck. Where’re you at?”
    “Old house in St. Paul, north of the freeway a few blocks . . . If that’s your place, you stay away. I can’t talk, I gotta go.”
    He heard LaChaise say “Shit” and then Stadic turned