Lou glanced up at the rearview mirror and looked away. His eyes snapped back as his mind processed what he’d seen. The trunk lid was open, bouncing with each rough spot in the road. He brought his foot off the accelerator and hit the brake pedal hard enough to make the chest strap of the seat belt cut into him. He jammed the gear lever into park and was out the door while the car still rocked on its springs.
Behind Lou, Edgar’s door slammed. “What happened?”
“He got out,” Lou rasped. “But he can’t go far.”
The headlights lit an empty street ahead. Lou pivoted to look behind him. The industrial district was deserted. Buildings were dark. The only illumination came from a distant streetlamp and an occasional security light shining dimly through dirty windows. Alleys, black as the inside of a coal mine, divided each building from its neighbor. Lou completed a full turn but saw nothing except Edgar, motionless beside him, his eyes darting left and right. He cocked his head to listen.
There were no cars around; no sign of life anywhere. Their captive couldn’t have gone far. They’d find him—they had to.
Lou heard a faint metallic scrape to his left. He swung around and cupped his hand over his ear, the way he’d seen his almost-deaf aunt do. There it was again, coming from that alley. Lou pointed first to Edgar, then to the source of the sound, and jerked his head. The little man nodded once and together they edged slowly forward.
Lou’s snakeskin Gucci loafers, although elegant and guaranteed to impress the ladies, were not designed for this kind of activity. The leather heels clicked with every step; the leather soles slipped and slid over oily patches in the road. At that moment, he would have traded his five-hundred-dollar shoes for a pair of Converse high-tops. He forced himself to slow his pace and tread carefully, like a hunter moving through the jungle.
At the entrance to the alley, Lou stopped and looked back at Edgar, who stood five yards behind him, his head on a swivel. Lou pointed first to himself, then into the alley. He indicated Edgar and gestured for him to stay put. His cohort pulled a revolver from his waistband and nodded his understanding.
Lou opened his coat and drew his own gun from its shoulder holster. He cursed himself for not taking the time to search the car for a flashlight. Maybe the lighter in his coat pocket would do. If he lit it after he was in the alley, it might spook the fugitive into running. Lou would fire as soon as he saw the man. If he missed, Edgar was ready at the mouth of the alley. Either way, they had him dead to rights. Lou chuckled silently at the pun.
He thumbed the safety of his Beretta to the firing position and cocked the hammer. He had ten rounds in the semiautomatic. The fugitive had nothing. Nothing fair about this fight, but then again, Lou gave up any pretensions of fighting fair long ago. He held the pistol firmly in his left hand, finger inside the trigger guard. He stretched his right arm in front of him, stuck out his foot, and, like someone walking through a minefield, took a careful step forward. Ready or not, here I come.
Matt paused before moving deeper into the alley. He took a few deep breaths, and each one brought a new wave of pain that threatened to immobilize him. He clutched his white coat around him against the early morning chill and, for a few moments, felt marginally warmer. Then he looked down and realized the coat was like a white beacon in the dim light. Be warm or be a target for men trying to kill me? Not much of a choice.
With a sigh, he rolled the coat into a tight ball and shoved it behind one of the dozens of trash cans lining the alley. Now the wind that swirled around him seemed to go right through the thin material of his surgical scrub suit. His teeth chattered, from both cold and fright. He shivered, and each muscle twitch caused more pain.
He was in a narrow passageway between two industrial buildings. Ahead in the dark was a veritable obstacle course. He didn’t know if there was escape at the end of the alley. All Matt knew was that he had to keep moving.
Matt stretched his hands in front of him like a blind man entering a strange room. He moved close to the right-hand wall and worked his way into the darkness. As his eyes adjusted he could make out dim shapes. He circumnavigated garbage cans, empty crates, and piles of debris, following an irregular course along the wall, moving steadily deeper into the alley. He encountered metal doors at irregular intervals. He checked every one. Locked.
He mentally kicked himself—he could call for help. Matt felt at his waist for the cell phone usually clipped there. Gone, knocked loose at some point. Perversely, his pager was still at his waist on the other side. He thumbed it to the off position and dropped it behind a pile of debris.
Matt’s heart sank as his dark-adjusted eyes showed him a wall a few feet ahead. This was a blind alley. He was trapped.
He heard a series of faint shuffling noises behind him. They’re here. Matt stopped dead still and quickly compressed his six-foot frame into a doorway. He held his breath. He tensed his aching muscles, ready to run, then realized he had no place to go.
The sounds stopped. Matt peeped out of his hiding place and caught the faint outlines of two men, the smaller silhouetted against the entrance to the alley, the larger moving slowly toward him, one careful step at a time. He heard the rasp of a lighter, saw a brief flicker, then the flame died. Despite repeated sounds of flint on metal, with an overlay of profanity, the darkness remained unbroken. Good. Darkness was Matt’s friend right now.
Matt’s mind’s eye replayed the images from that momentary flash of light. Something had glinted in the big man’s hand—a gun. Probably the same one Matt had felt pressed against the base of his skull. Did the smaller man have one as well? No matter. A single bullet from one weapon would be enough to kill him.
Matt groped around him for a weapon of some kind, any kind. Nothing. He had nowhere to go, nothing with which he could fight. His only hope was to hide. But where? How?
When he was about to give up, his fingers touched rough wood. He squinted against the darkness and used both hands to explore further. Near the brick wall that blocked the end of the alley, a stack of wooden pallets had been shoved against the wall. Matt stretched as high as possible and was barely able to touch the top. Would the stack hold him? If it came tumbling down, the noise would certainly bring his captors. He held his breath and wedged his toe into an opening in the stack. With infinite care, he scaled the rickety pile, wincing over every sound, praying the big man was still too far away to hear it. At the top he pulled himself up and stretched prone. He wiggled around to peer back over the edge, his legs hanging off either side of the improvised platform.
There was the sound of a step, a long pause, another step, another pause. Then, from the mouth of the alley, a metallic cacophony was followed by a spate of curse words erupting into the night. Apparently one of his pursuers had found the garbage cans Matt had so carefully avoided.
“Lou, I need help.” The loud whisper’s high pitch told Matt this was pursuer number two. “I cut my leg on this—”
“Shut up! A cut won’t kill you.” There was a guttural laugh. “But if I can find the doc, I’m going to kill him.”
Matt willed himself to be perfectly still. As the shuffling moved toward him, Matt peeped over the edge and could faintly see the dark bulk of the larger kidnapper creeping closer. The man’s hand traversed left, right, left, right in concert with the motion of his head. If he looked up, Matt was dead.
The kidnapper continued along the alley, trying doors along the way, moving on when he found them locked. He stopped at the wall that blocked the end of the passageway, turned, and retraced his steps along the opposite side of the alley. Matt hardly dared hope he would escape, but there was a chance . . .
Finally the man reached the entrance to the alley. Matt could see him, silhouetted by the faint light of the street, as he shook his head and dropped the pistol into his coat pocket. He ducked his head and whispered to his partner, who was bent at the waist, holding his right shin. In a moment, they disappeared from Matt’s view, the injured man limping and hopping, struggling to keep up.
After what seemed like an hour, Matt heard two car doors slam. There was quiet for a few seconds, then an engine revved and accelerated away. Matt couldn’t believe his good fortune. They’d missed him. They were gone. Or were they? Had one of them crept back to keep watch? He couldn’t take the chance.
Matt’s back muscles were in spasm. He forced his nails into the palms of his hands to keep from crying out as he kept his body pressed against the rough wood.
He decided to count to five hundred before he moved. By the time he reached a hundred and fifty, he thought he’d never be able to lie on his perch for another second. He swallowed hard, gritted his teeth, and continued his count.
At last Matt drew a deep breath and willed his muscles to relax. Like an old man getting out of a chair in which he’d sat too long, Matt hunched himself slowly into a crouch. He turned his back to the alley, intending to descend backward from his hiding place. Matt groped with his foot for purchase in the stack of pallets, but found only air. He teetered as he struggled to keep his balance, then threw his arms wide in a futile attempt to hold on to something, anything. Instead, gravity grabbed him and pulled him head-down into black oblivion.