The Knight

by Steven James

  A quick nod and then she was on her way to the porch.

  I rolled under a length of barbed wire fence and ran toward the barn.

  Giovanni dipped his hand into the bucket, caressed the rose petals. Smooth. Velvety.

  Fragrant.

  He cupped a handful and tossed them onto the silk sheet, and they fell in gentle curling patterns that made him think of great, crimson snowflakes. Red on white. Petals the color of blood landing on a silken field of snow.

  Jacked on adrenaline, I arrived at the barn built of wooden boards, baked dry in the Colorado sun.

  Assess the situation.

  Assess and respond.

  I checked the Infiniti.

  Empty.

  Then turned to the barn.

  The best way to get killed is to rush into a situation like Rambo. I’ve known too many agents and police officers who’ve died in the line of duty because they reacted instead of anticipated.

  Be careful. Be smart.

  I ran around the southeast corner and tried to picture what lay inside. I’d grown up on a farm in Wisconsin, so I knew barns, and this one probably had a tack room, the seed room, horse stalls, hay bales, dead farm equipment. This barn was nearly twenty-five meters long and twenty wide—larger than I’d thought at first.

  Looking for a way in, I circled around the south side, saw that the four-meter high metal sliding doors were closed off. Tried sliding them open.

  Locked.

  Inside the barn a dog was barking. Wild. Ferocious. I’m not an expert on dogs, so I didn’t know what a greyhound sounded like, but this one sounded more like an attack dog than a racer.

  No sign of anyone outside the barn.

  The dog growled, then barked again.

  As I ran around the corner, I noticed a standard-sized door at the far end of the barn. Probably to the seed room or the tack room. Or maybe an office. Or hay storage area. Whatever it led to, I was going in.

  The dog’s agitated barking told me it wasn’t alone in the barn.

  I sprinted toward the door.

  47

  Giovanni was still scattering rose petals when he heard Thomas Bennett stir.

  He pulled his ski mask from his pocket. Put it on.

  “Where am . . .” Bennett’s voice was garbled. He was still waking up. “What’s going on?”

  “I was hoping you might sleep through this, Thomas.” Giovanni was lying but tried to sound as convincing as possible. He emptied his hand of petals and then faced his captive. “It’ll be a bit more distressing for you this way, I’m afraid.”

  The door was locked.

  I peered around the corner of the barn and saw no other doors, just a line of small windows.

  Back to the door then. I could shoot out the lock, but if the killer was in the barn with Thomas, the sound of the shot would alert the killer and put Bennett in more imminent danger.

  Of course, he might have heard the helicopter.

  But with all the barking, he might not have.

  At least for the moment I decided not to announce my presence. Instead, I yanked out my keys, flipped open my lock pick set, and slipped a pick blade into the keyhole.

  Thomas was still disoriented. Giovanni saw him look vaguely in his direction, but a moment later when Nadine growled and sprang toward the bars, the meaty slap of impact seemed to jar him awake.

  He stared at the dog, then jerked his head down and gazed at the wheelchair, the bindings. Tried to wrestle free.

  Failed.

  Tried again, but he was secure.

  His eyes widened with confusion and fear. “What are you doing? Where am I?”

  Giovanni set the bucket of rose petals on the ground. “How did I do there a moment ago? When I said I hadn’t expected you to be awake? Did I have you convinced? It’s important for me to know; I’ve really been working on my acting.”

  “What?” A tremor in his voice.

  “The truth is, I was waiting for you to wake up.”

  Thomas let his gaze travel around the barn and then land on the dog. “What’s going on? Who are you?”

  “My name is Giovanni and I murder people, and you’re about to become my next victim.”

  Thomas became frantic. Struggled uselessly to get free. “Let me out of here!”

  Giovanni walked to the wheelchair and disengaged the wheel locks.

  His captive tried desperately to pull his arms and legs free, but the duct tape snugged tighter the more he strained against it.

  He positioned the wheelchair so that the man’s knees were under the cage and his chest was less than a foot from the feeding door’s opening.

  Nadine seemed pleased.

  “No,” Thomas cried again. “Please stop. Please.”

  “On Thursday night I gave a man who was about to die the option of wearing a gag,” Giovanni said. “I’d like to extend the same courtesy to you, although I should probably tell you that I’m not expecting your situation to last as long as his did, so it might not even be worth the trouble.”

  Nadine shoved her muzzle through the bars and snapped. Growled.

  “Why are you doing this?” Thomas’s voice was becoming shrill, girlish.

  “I did bring one along however,” Giovanni said, ignoring Thomas’s question, “just in case, and I’ll be glad to accommodate you, if you like.”

  “What do you want?” Thomas’s voice had fallen from a shriek to a whispered plea. “Please, don’t do this. You don’t have to do this. What do you want? Money? I can get you money. A million. I swear.”

  Giovanni took that as a no regarding the gag. So, two for two. Maybe his victims weren’t taking him seriously enough. Next time he would make sure he’d been unequivocally clear about their situation. He set the wheel locks so that the chair wouldn’t roll back from the cage once things got started.

  Then he stepped back. “Now, in Pamfilo’s story, after your death your wife is supposed to join a convent and live a godly and abstinent life, but in today’s culture that seems unlikely. I decided instead that I would just help her along with the abstinence part. The surgery is relatively simple. I’ll be visiting Marianne as soon as we’re done here. I promise not to make her suffer long. That should be of some comfort to you.”

  “No, please—”

  He placed one hand gently on Bennett’s shoulder. “I want you to look carefully at that dog. It’s very important to me that you visualize what’s about to happen.” Then he unbuttoned Thomas’s shirt to reveal his bare chest.

  To make it easier for Nadine to get to her meal.

  The lock gave me more trouble than I thought it would, and when I heard yelling from inside the barn, I was getting ready to shoot it out after all—Click.

  Finally.

  Gun ready, I pressed the door open, swept the room.

  The clean, musky scent of leather.

  Saddles, halters, bridles hanging on the walls. Two grooming kits on the floor with fly spray, liniment, and brushes.

  The tack room.

  Nothing.

  No one.

  A door on the far wall.

  I ran toward it, eased it open, and stepped into the dusty, muted light of the barn.

  A network of shadows skirted along the wall. Just to my right, a thick wooden ladder led to the hayloft that darkened this corner of the barn even more. I was still out of sight. Good.

  My heart raced.

  I edged around the corner of an empty horse stall and scanned the barn.

  To the left, rows of hay bales and two horse stalls. Rusted farm equipment. A tractor. A few gasoline cans. To the right, four more horse stalls. Tarps. Boards. Rolls of twine. Several buckets, two containing water, one sweet feed, the fourth empty. A few bridles hanging from hooks on the wall nearby.

  A typical barn.

  Except for the hanging cage.

  And the dog.

  There were two men beside the cage. One in a wheelchair, the other with his back to me.

  John.

>   Six foot, maybe six-one. Medium build. Jeans. Black sweatshirt. Black ski mask.

  Not much to go on, it could be almost anyone.

  I could see the side of the victim’s face and I recognized him from his DMV photo as Thomas Bennett. I couldn’t see the suspect’s hands. I had to assume he was armed.

  If I shouted for the killer to step aside, he might kill the man. I needed to move on him, but I needed to play this right.

  Nadine snarled, a green fire in her eyes.

  “Well, then,” Giovanni said, reaching for the feeding door’s latch.

  “Let’s get started.”

  When I heard the words I knew I couldn’t wait.

  I stepped out of the shadows. “Stop!” I aimed my gun at the suspect’s center mass. “Hands to your side and step away from the cage.”

  Giovanni froze. He recognized that voice.

  Bowers.

  Impressive.

  Impeccable timing.

  The suspect didn’t move. His back was still toward me.

  I edged closer. “Hands to the side and turn around. Do it now or I will shoot. Hands out, now!”

  He didn’t move.

  “He’s gonna kill me!” Thomas Bennett hollered.

  “Show me your hands!” Then I heard a metallic snap, the suspect lifted his arms, and that’s when Thomas Bennett began to scream.

  48

  The next two seconds were a blur.

  The suspect dove toward the jumbled network of hay bales, and I saw the dog thrust its head through a small door in the cage, lunging toward Thomas Bennett’s chest.

  No!

  I eyed down my SIG at the dog.

  Giovanni was rolling beneath the gate of an empty horse stall when he heard the shot.

  Before I could pull the trigger, a gunshot ricocheted through the barn and the dog slammed against the side of the cage, dark blood spouting from a gaping wound in the back of its head. One of the small windows at the far side of the barn was shattered.

  Cheyenne.

  She’d fired through the glass, threaded the bullet between the bars of the cage, and hit the dog in the eye in mid-attack at fifteen meters.

  Brilliant shot.

  Admire her later.

  I ran to Bennett but kept my gun trained on the hay bales. “Are you hurt?” He was staring blankly at the dead dog. “Mr. Bennett, are you OK?”

  At last he nodded. Swallowed. Nodded again.

  We were too exposed. No time to untie him.

  No time.

  I tried to push the chair to safety, but the wheels were locked.

  Quick. Quick.

  With one eye on the hay bales, I unsnapped the locks and yanked the wheelchair across the barn floor, bouncing it over the boards and into an empty horse stall in a shadowed corner of the barn. If the suspect were armed, the gate to the stall would offer at least a little protection.

  Cheyenne was outside. She could cover the door in case John tried to escape.

  Unless there’s another way out.

  “I’ll be right back,” I told Bennett.

  “Don’t leave me.”

  “I’ll be back.”

  “Untie me!”

  I started for the hay bales as Cheyenne threw open the tack room door.

  “He’s behind the bales,” I shouted to her, and she slid into position to cover the east side of the bales. Bennett kept yelling for help, but for the time being I ignored him. I had to find John.

  “Step out now!” I yelled.

  I saw shuffling movement somewhere in the darkness, but I had no visual on the suspect. “Hands in the air!” I signaled to Cheyenne that I was heading in, and she ducked behind the tractor to cover me.

  Giovanni lay still and silent beside the gasoline cans and looked down the barrel of his Wilson Combat Elite Professional .45 ACP at Detective Warren’s back.

  He had a clear shot at her. Yes. He could shoot her right now and then take out Bowers as he rushed to help her, but he didn’t want to do that. Not after all the planning, all the preparations.

  Giovanni considered his options.

  He doubted the FBI or DPD could offer him any better adversaries than these two.

  Well, one way to find out just how good they were.

  The sound of a gunshot sent me pivoting backward behind a horse stall.

  I looked at Bennett and saw that he was still struggling to get free.

  “You OK?”

  “He’s shooting at me!” He sounded unhurt.

  Cheyenne still sat crouched behind the tractor. I called to her, “Cheyenne, are you—”

  “I’m fine.”

  Then I saw that the bullet had shattered a bucket near the cage and sent rose petals spewing across a silk sheet laying on the hay.

  “Drop your weapon!” I yelled.

  End this now.

  I nodded toward Cheyenne, and she leveled her gun. I rounded the corner of the stall and entered the maze of hay bales.

  Nothing.

  Heart beating.

  Around another bale.

  No one.

  Where is he?

  I edged around the second row of bales near the wall of the barn.

  Still nothing. Still quiet.

  Maybe there’s another way out.

  Then, the scent of gasoline.

  And then a line of flames, leaping, springing to life from the dry hay near the Appaloosa’s stall. The fire raced across the floor to one of the barn’s support beams. In the tangled light I saw a figure bolt toward the tack room out of Cheyenne’s line of fire.

  I aimed. “Stop, FBI!”

  Identify the subject. Confirm that it’s—

  This man wore a gray polo shirt, not a black sweatshirt.

  No shot! No shot!

  “There’s two of them!” I yelled to Cheyenne. I ran forward.

  He slipped through the tack room door. A moment later I arrived and grabbed the handle.

  Locked.

  I shot out the lock, then threw my shoulder against the door, but it wouldn’t move. I slammed into it again, but it held fast. He must have propped something against the other side or bolted it shut.

  The fire was spreading quickly around me, devouring the hay in great gulps, snaking around the perimeter of the barn.

  Smoke billowed toward the ceiling.

  A shift in priorities.

  Get Thomas and Cheyenne out of the barn. Now.

  49

  I holstered my weapon and ran toward Bennett as Cheyenne wrestled with the metal sliding doors at the far end of the barn. “Will it flare up if I open the door?” she yelled.

  I wasn’t sure. The rush of oxygen might cause the barn to fill with flames, but we didn’t have any other options. “It’ll be fine. Open it!”

  Beside one of the stalls I noticed the black sweatshirt.

  He changed shirts so you wouldn’t shoot him!

  Man, this guy was smart. Really smart.

  Either that, or there are two men . . .

  “Help!” Thomas yelled. I made it to him and grabbed the wheelchair’s handles but quickly realized that the fire was spreading too fast to roll him all the way across the barn. I needed to cut him loose. I flicked out the blade of my Wraith and slit the tape binding his right arm.

  Cheyenne opened the sliding door.

  The barn didn’t explode into flames—thankfully, yes, thank-fully—“Get out!” I yelled to her, but she ran toward the stalls to free the horses.

  I cut Thomas’s left wrist free. Bent to cut his legs loose.

  Smoke began pooling at the ceiling. The two horses circled in their stalls, snorting, stomping. Tossing their heads.

  “Hurry!” Bennett yelled at me.

  How is this fire spreading so fast?

  As I cut the tape from his left leg, I took a quick glance around the barn. Almost immediately, I could see that the hay and the boards hadn’t been strewn randomly across the floor, but were laid in careful, crisscrossed rows. All designed to block t
he exit with flames.

  John was ready for us. He was prepared.

  I cut the tape from Bennett’s other leg. Put the knife away. “Can you stand?”

  “I don’t know.” He tried but collapsed backward. He shook his head. “Drugged me. Knocked me out.”

  A quick survey of the barn.

  It was bad.

  The fire already barred the exit and was moving steadily toward us, sealing us into the corner of the barn that lay farthest from the sliding doors. I couldn’t carry Thomas through the field of flames. We’d never make it.

  Cheyenne unlatched one of the horses’ gates. A black horse reared back, then took off at a dead run, jumping over the two-foot-high ridge of fire now encircling the barn’s perimeter, and disappeared out the door.

  Cheyenne reached for the Appaloosa’s gate, and I had an idea.

  “Wait!” I yelled.

  I hoisted Bennett over my shoulder and snatched a bridle from a hook on the wall.

  Even if I couldn’t get Bennett out, Cheyenne could.

  50

  She must have read my mind because she grabbed the horse’s halter to steady her.

  “Take Thomas!” I yelled.

  “What about you?”

  “Don’t worry about me.” I lowered Thomas to his feet and wrapped an arm around him to support him.

  The horse tensed and whinnied, but Cheyenne worked at soothing her, calming her down. Then she shouted to me. “I won’t leave you!”

  Two of the walls were completely consumed. I grabbed Cheyenne’s arm. “You have to go.”

  “Get me out of here!” Thomas hollered.

  I handed Cheyenne the bridle, but she tossed it aside, grabbed a handful of mane, and swung onto the horse’s back. “I’ll come back for you,” she said.

  “I’ll look forward to it.”

  With a surge of adrenaline and Cheyenne’s help, I hoisted Thomas onto the horse, where he wrapped his unsteady arms around her waist and then slumped forward. I hoped he’d be clear-headed enough to stay on the horse.

  The fire climbed the wall to my left, toward the hayloft.