Dog Eat Dog (32 page)

Authors: Edward Bunker

BOOK: Dog Eat Dog

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“Stay where you are,” he told the hostages; then reached between his legs for the .38 and opened the door handle with his elbow. They had waited too long. He was ready in his head. He slid out, holding the pistol next to his thigh.

“What’s wrong, officer?” he asked as he stood up. He could only see the headlights and grille. He raised his left hand to block the glare. His breathing was fast and shallow; he felt drained and enervated. Thank God he wasn’t shaking visibly.

“Don’t move, mister,” said the amplified voice. Now Troy saw the shape outside the open driver’s door.

Troy took a step forward. “We’re kinda lost,” he said.

“Freeze!” yelled a new voice. It was to his left. He looked and saw a second officer on an embankment across the road, a shotgun braced against his shoulder, aimed at Troy.

“What’s wrong with you? Don’t point that—”

“
It’s him!
” echoed the amplified voice.

Troy reflexively turned to look at the police car. That officer was pulling his pistol.

Troy raised his .38 and fired in one motion. It was a dozen years since he’d practiced, but it was twenty yards and he’d once been really good with small arms—plus the officer had neglected to put on his bulletproof vest. The lead slug hit him just below the collarbone and angled down through a lung and out his back. It made him drop his weapon and go down on his knees.

Troy turned and squeezed. He didn’t hear the shotgun, but he did hear what sounded like a handful of pebbles striking the car trunk. It tore into his cheek and shoulder and knocked him sideways but failed to knock him down. Not buckshot. That would have torn him apart. It was—bird shot.

He righted himself and fired three times to a pattern. His shots were drowned by a second blast from the shotgun. This time it hit him head-on, chest and stomach and neck. It knocked him down on his back. He was torn up by the bird shot, but none of the wounds was really serious. He was unaware of the fact, but his third bullet had nicked the officer’s chin, went through his throat and out the side. He fell backward over the embankment.

Troy’s brain spun. Through his daze, he heard a pistol firing. The shots were rapid and many. Troy opened his eyes. The officer beside the police car was sitting down; he had his thirteen-shot, nine-millimeter semi-automatic pistol in a two-hand rest. He was emptying it through the backseat of the Cadillac. The bullets tore through trunk and upholstery and buried themselves in the bodies of the Reverend Charles Wilson and his wife, Charlene.

Troy felt around and was unable to find his pistol. He crawled from the glare to shadows and fog. Near the edge of the road, he lost consciousness.

Now he felt it, he was moving; he was on a stretcher. He kept his eyes closed. If they discovered him awake, they might work him over or tighten the chains, as if they weren’t too tight already.

They stopped. He heard doors being opened; then he was sliding inside. From the babble, Troy heard an occasional word and fragments of sentences: “… no pulse … in the irrigation ditch and drowned …” “… two in the car look like Swiss cheese …” “Madigan’s gonna feel terrible when he finds out he killed two innocent citizens …” “He thought they were perps.” “Let’s roll.”

The doors slammed; the ambulance started to move. Then it stopped. Troy opened his eyes and looked. He could see the intersection full of police cars, their flashing lights eerie in the fog.

Footsteps approached. He could see a figure at the driver’s window. A new voice: “How’s this scumbag? Is he gonna die on us?”

“Naw. He’ll live to go to the gas chamber.”

Derisive laughter. “Fat chance of that. Okay … move it …”

The ambulance began to move. It gathered speed. Its siren began to wail. Troy closed his eyes and went out again. His dreams this time were terrible.

Copyright

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa

This edition published in 2011 by
MysteriousPress.com
/Open Road Integrated Media

180 Varick Street

New York, NY 10014

www.openroadmedia.com