This whole thing is a clusterfuck, thought Riley. He was still stunned from the helicopter’s crash. He’d heard the bird’s straining engine, realized something was funky a moment before he saw the Bell rise up over the buildings, already tilted sideways and slipping fast.
The next two minutes had been the craziest show he’d ever seen. The helicopter came down and tore the shit out of the building and probably half the dudes dumb enough to be inside it. Then the Gunfight at the Glass Corral had started, muzzle flashes hot in the sudden dim after most of the lights had been smashed.
Now smoke. A lot of smoke. Riley figured the Bell chopper was burning and taking what was left of the pavilion with it.
“We got cops. Police boats. Coming up on the dock,” Taskine said in his ear. Riley could tell from the stuttering beat of Task’s words that his partner was moving fast.
“Fuck. I can’t see shit inside. Is Hargreaves still alive?”
“He was twenty seconds ago. I’m getting into position.”
“For what?”
“What do you think? These mothers get to the dock, they’re meat. I’ll take ’em like tin cans off a fence.”
Damn it. Riley didn’t mind Taskine shooting cops. But it would require time to get to their own boat and exfil the hell off this island. Maybe these two police boats were just the first to arrive. Could be planes watching from the sky or helicopters dropping SWAT teams next. Even the fucking National Guard.
“How many cops on the boats?” he said.
“At least a dozen jagoffs. Tac gear and rifles.”
“Keep them offshore. Make ’em scared to even look at the dock. Buy me ten minutes and I’ll put our boat in the water. You come on the run, we get the fuck out of here before they know you’ve left.”
Taskine was silent. Riley knew that his fearsome nature was at war with his logic.
“Yeah,” he said. “Go.”
Riley started to do just that. He was on his feet before he saw two figures hurrying from the smoke-shrouded pavilion. Visible in the weak light still shining through the pavilion’s former walls.
The geek. And Shaw.
No time for the scope. Riley knelt and aimed over the barrel. Shaw and the geek were almost under the shade screen of an outdoor patio between the pavilion and the north wing.
Got you. He grinned as he pulled the trigger.