The Twelfth Card

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    The slugs zipped under the garage door and at least one punctured the right rear tire. As the car lurched to the right and collided hard with the brick wall of the alley, Sachs rose and sprinted toward the wreck, wincing from the pain. At the garage door she paused and looked around it. It turned out that both right tires were flattened; she’d hit the front oneas well. Boyd tried to drive away from the wall, but the front wheel was bent and frozen against the chassis. He climbed out, swinging the gun back and forth, searching for the shooter.
    “Boyd! Drop the weapon!”
    His response was to fire five or six shots toward the door. Sachs responded with one shot, which struck the car body inches from him, then she rolled to her right and rose fast, noting that Boyd was fleeing from her into the street beyond.
    She could see the backdrop this time—a brick wall across the far street—and squeezed off another round.
    But just as the gun fired, Boyd turned aside as if he’d been expecting this. The slug sailed past him, also inches away. He returned fire, a barrage of shots, and she dropped hard to the slimy cobblestones again, her radio shattering. He disappeared around the corner, to the left.
    One shot left. Should’ve used only one on the tire, she thought angrily, as she rose and hurried after him as best she could on the painful leg. A pause at the corner where the alley met the sidewalk, a fast glance to the left. She saw his solid form sprinting away from her.
    She grabbed the Motorola and pressed transmit. Nope, it was gone. Shit. Call 911 on the cell? Too much to explain, too little time to relay a message. Somebody in one of the buildings had to’ve called in about the shots. She continued after Boyd, breath rasping, feet slapping on the ground.
    At the far intersection, the end of the block, a blue-and-white rolled to a stop. The officers didn’t climb out; they hadn’t heard the shots and didn’t know the killer and Sachs were here. Boyd looked up and saw them. He stopped fast and leapt over asmall fence then ducked underneath the stairway of an apartment building leading to the first floor. She heard kicking as he tried to break into the basement apartment.
    Sachs waved toward the officers but they were looking up and down the cross street and didn’t see her.
    It was then that a young couple stepped out the front door of the apartment directly across from Boyd. Closing the door behind them, the young man zipped up his vest against the chill day and the woman took his arm. They started down the stairs.
    The kicking stopped.
    Oh, no . . . Sachs realized what was about to happen. She couldn’t see Boyd but she knew what he was going to do. He was sighting on the couple now. He was going to shoot one or both, steal their keys and escape into the apartment—hoping again that the police would divide their forces to look after the wounded.
    “Get down!” Sachs shouted.
    Nearly a hundred feet away, the couple didn’t hear.
    Boyd would be drawing a target on them now, waiting for them to get closer.
    “Get down!”
    Sachs rose and limped toward them.
    The couple noticed her but couldn’t make out what she was saying. They paused, frowning.
    “Get down!” she repeated.
    The man cupped his hand behind his ear, shaking his head.
    Sachs stopped, took a deep breath and fired her last bullet into a metal garbage can about twenty feet from the couple.
    The woman screamed and they turned, scrabblingup the stairs into their apartment. The door slammed.
    At least she’d managed to—
    Beside Sachs a block of limestone exploded, pelting her with hot lead and bits of stone. A half second later she heard the loud pop of Boyd’s gun.
    Another shot and another, driving Sachs back, bullets striking feet from her. She stumbled through the yard, tripping over a foot-high wire edging fence and some plaster lawn ornaments, Bambis and elves. One slug grazed her vest, knocking the breath from her lungs. She went down hard in a planting bed. More slugs slammed home nearby. Boyd then turned toward the officers leaping out of their cruiser. He peppered the squad car with several rounds, flattening the tires and driving the officers to cover behind the car. The uniforms were staying put but at least they’d have called the assault in and other troops would be on the way.
    Which meant of course that there was only one way for Boyd to go—toward her. She hunkered down for cover behind some bushes. Boyd had