Game (Jasper Dent #2)(120)

Her gun. That hand-cannon in her shoulder rig. If I can get to it…

It was no more than a few feet to her, but right now it looked like a marathon.

Just then, the overhead light in the hallway flickered to life for the space of two or three seconds and Jazz could see the face of the man with the gun. His gut turned in on itself, writhing and twisting. He knew this man.

Duncan Hershey. The very first man the task force had interviewed based on the FBI profile. Jazz had a potent flash of watching the interrogation, of watching him drink a cup of water and surrender that same cup.

Of course. He didn’t care if we had his DNA because he knew it wouldn’t match Dog’s. Dog’s Get out of Jail Free might as well have been Hat’s, too.

“You’re the other one,” Jazz said, unable to help himself. “You’re Hat. We had you.”

Hershey snarled and didn’t even bother to look in Jazz’s direction as he spoke. “You had nothing. A ghost, a vapor. Nothing more. Quite possibly much less. And by the by, I’m not Hat. Not anymore. That was just my name in the game.” His lips quirked into something Jazz imagined was supposed to approximate a grin, but was more of a leer. “The game is over now. I won.”

“The game isn’t over,” Belsamo said again in that peculiarly emotionless voice. Still, Jazz could tell Dog was worried. “It’s still my move. I still—”

“This has nothing to do with you!” Hat snapped. “Don’t you get it? You were never in contention. Not really. You were just there to temper me. Anvil to my blade. Nothing more. A tool. Used. Used up. Discarded. Do you really not understand this?”

Jazz swallowed, his throat barely working. The pain from his leg—it was definitely his leg that had been hit, he knew now; all the pain radiated from his thigh—had cranked up, as if it wanted to remind him of something. The thought of moving at all terrified him.

But the gun terrified him more.

You got lucky once. Don’t push it.

You have to push it. You have to. They’re not gonna talk forever.

Hissing in a breath, he dragged himself along the floor, careful to go on his right side. Every time he moved, he jostled his left leg and it screamed at him in protest, but he bit down on his lip and refused to cry out.

Pain turns Hat on. He’s the one who liked hurting women. He likes it when people are hurt. Dog doesn’t think other people are real. They’re just toys to him. But if Hat sees I’m in pain, that’ll just get him off even more.

The pain doused his eyes with tears and his left side with napalm.

It also brought him a little closer—just a little—to Morales.

He blinked several times to clear his vision, which had gone watery again. Morales was breathing. He could tell. Hat had knocked her out in the struggle, was all. She was so close. Without a bullet in him, it would be nothing to dive for that gun and—

“What do you think you’re doing?” Hershey had finally turned his attention back to Jazz.

“I’m just going to check on her,” Jazz said, strong-arming his voice into a non-shaking, confident tone. Fighting the urge to whimper, to beg. “She’s FBI. You don’t want a fed’s death on your rap sheet, man. Trust me. Even Billy was never stupid enough to—”

“Oh.” Hershey blinked. “She’s still alive?” He moved the gun a bit, pulled the trigger before Jazz could even shout.

Small-caliber bullet. Back of the head. It made a perfectly tiny entry wound and Jazz could swear he heard it ricocheting inside her skull, making a hash of her brain. One eye—her right—popped open as though in surprise. It filled with blood startlingly fast.

Morales thrashed only once, then lay perfectly still.

You’re gonna be the death of that FBI agent, Jasper. I promise you that. You’ll watch her die.

Oh. God.

Look at all these bodies, Jasper. Look at all these bodies pilin’ up around you. You still think your hands are clean?

“You didn’t have to do that,” Jazz whispered. “You didn’t have to. Even Billy—”

“Stop talking about Billy Dent,” Hershey said in a tone of boredom. “I don’t care about Billy Dent. I’m going to out-murder and out-terrorize Billy Dent. I’m going to kill my way up and down this country and from coast to coast, until my name is written in blood on the Statue of Liberty as a warning to anyone who dares come here. I’m going to fill the Grand Canyon with carcasses and blood. I’ll be the greatest Crow ever.”

Crows again. If Hat didn’t worship Billy, Jazz knew his life was very much in danger. He thought back to the techniques he’d taught Connie for surviving a serial killer. All he could do now was try to keep Hat and Dog talking and maybe get his hands on Morales’s gun.

“A Crow,” Jazz said. “Is that what you guys call yourselves?” He gestured to Belsamo. “We called you Hat and Dog, but—”

Dog took a step back, but—and this impressed Jazz—kept talking. “You’re ruining the game,” he said. “They’ll catch us now. Both of us.”

“No. I’m not ruining anything. And they don’t even suspect me.”

And he pulled the trigger before even finishing the sentence. Belsamo gasped and grabbed at his chest as though he could snatch the bullet out before it could do any damage, but Hershey pulled the trigger again and this time a bright disc of red blossomed on Belsamo’s left cheek.