The Battle: Alone: Book 4 (21 page)

     There were heavy shrubs against this side of the house. Another of Randy’s oversights. Shrubs against the side of a house provide excellent hiding places for burglars to hide during times of peace. And for marauders to hide in times of conflict.

     The good news, as Dave saw it, was that it would provide him the same cover.

     He started to go, and a huge bolt of lightning struck a tree in the woods, not a quarter mile away.

     “Damn it!”

     If he hadn’t hesitated, he’d have been caught in the open, lit up like a Christmas tree, for anyone within half a mile to plainly see.

     He wished there was a way to foresee lightning bolts. But there wasn’t. He’d just have to get lucky.

     Once again, he held his breath and ran, ducking behind a shrub on the south side of the house.

     And once again he remained perfectly still for several minutes, watching and waiting to see if anyone had detected his presence.

     He heard someone cough.

     Someone close by.

     Someone on the front porch, a mere thirty feet away from Dave and around the corner of the house.

     Dave tried to wipe the fog from the lenses of his night vision goggles. Every stitch of clothing he wore, though, was soaking wet in the driving rain. So he merely replaced the fog on the lenses with streaks of rainwater.

     But at least he could see through them again.

     Once confident no one knew he was there, he crept along the side of the house, then peeked around the corner.

     A lone sentry, lit cigarette in hand, was standing at the porch railing looking to the east. His rifle leaned against the railing, his handgun remained holstered.

     Apparently he wasn’t expecting any trouble.

     Ordinarily, Dave would have been able to sneak up on the man in the near total darkness. But the lightning would be problematic.

     Dave hoped his luck would hold.

     He reached down and, one at a time, unlaced his boots and took them off.

     He knew the boots would make way too much noise as he tried to sneak up on his prey.

     He took off his soaking wet socks as well.

     Floppy socks, especially when soaking wet, could make even more noise than the boots.

     The man never wavered from his stance, never walked away from the railing, never turned his head. It was incredibly easy for Dave to creep up silently behind him and wrap his left arm around the man’s neck while driving his knife upward, beneath the back of his ribcage and into his heart.

     Sergeant Holliman would have been proud. He’d have said, “Score one for the good guys. Semper Fi.”

     At the precise moment the two men made contact, a flash of lightning lit up the porch, catching them in a macabre death ritual of sorts. It would have made a great scene in a horror movie if accompanied by spooky organ music.

     But this was no movie scene. This was reality. The grunt the man let out as his body went limp was drowned out by the crack of thunder which immediately followed the brilliant flash of light. His blood gushed all over the front of Dave’s clothing, but it didn’t matter. He was soaked to the bone with rainwater anyway.

     This was the first time he’d ever killed a man in such a manner. He was amazed at how quickly it was over with. How fast life had gone from the man’s body.

     How quickly he was the victor in this deadly game of cat and mouse.

     He continued to prop the man up with his left arm, the lifeless body leaning against his own. With his right hand he returned the knife to its sheathe, then walked backward. He hoped to drag the body back off the porch and hide it in the bushes before the next bolt of lightning lit the porch back up again.

     He was well aware that she might well have been spotted, had anyone inside the house been looking out the window at the time he made his kill.

     But no one came rushing out to aid his adversary. No shots came through the window at him. No one opened the front door and fired into him.

     Indications were that he’d gotten away with it.

     So far.

Chapter 37

     Inside the farm house, no one knew the battle had entered a new phase. Dave had quite literally brought the fight to Swain’s front door.

     And Swain, once again in his room at the top of the stairs, was blissfully unaware.

     Perhaps because he was sitting on the bed, watching a naked Sarah prepare his latest “bump” of crystal meth and water.

     “You know, Sarah, you really do have a beautiful body. It’s a shame such a thing should go to waste. Perhaps I should have been more aggressive with you from the beginning. Perhaps I should have just taken what I wanted from you. Like any other man in my position would have done.”

     Sarah said nothing. She was afraid to. Instead she continued to pulverize the crystals into powder, and stirred the powder in the water to make it dissolve faster.

     “Oh, my dear Sarah… how do you think this is going to end?”

     “I don’t know, sir.”

     “Well, I do. I do indeed. You see, whoever is out there thinks they’re going to win. They think they’re more powerful than I am, simply because they’ve been able to pick off a few of my men. But we have the advantage of high ground. Do you understand that concept, Sarah?”

     “No, sir.”

     “It’s simple, really. He who holds the high ground holds the advantage. The same is true whether you’re at the top of a hill, shooting down at would be attackers, or whether you’re in a castle, defending said castle from aggressors.

     “In other words, we have all the advantages. We can see them through the windows, but they cannot see us. We can fortify our position, by barricading our firing points. They have to cross open ground to get to us. And we, by firing from the upstairs windows, have the proverbial high ground.”

     Sarah could hold her tongue no longer.

     “And what about the moral high ground?”

     “What do you mean, my love?”

     She cringed at the sarcastic tone of his voice, and the way he said “love” as though he understood what it meant.

     “If they are coming to rescue us, then isn’t it true they have right on their side? And doesn’t that give them a different kind of advantage?”

     He paused for a moment, as though caught off guard by her question. Then he laughed. It was the hideous laugh of a madman.

     “It’s always easier to defend a position than to attack it. And I believe we still have the numbers. If they thought they had a greater force than we did, they’d have attacked us in a full assault by now. The fact they haven’t means they’re a very small force. Probably only half a dozen men or less. And with a force that small, all we have to do is take out a couple of them to cut them down by a third. That’s when we’ll see them start to fall apart.”

     Sarah bit her tongue, not mentioning the obvious fact that Swain’s force had been reduced to half a dozen men as well.

     Instead, she asked, “How are you going to take them out?”

     “Simple. We keep two men on guard duty at all times. One in the northwest corner of the living room, where he can see the north and west sides of the house through the living room windows. The other will be in the dining room on the southeast corner of the house. He can see the south and east sides of the house through the dining room windows. At night we’ll leave all the lights off downstairs, so our men can see out but no one can see in. In the daytime we’ll move our guys upstairs so they can see even greater distances. In the daytime, again, it’ll be lighter outside than in the house. And again, we can see out and they can’t see in.

     “In a nutshell,” he said as she brought his needle over to him, “We’ll stop going outside. From now on, they’ll have to come to us. And when they do, we’ll pick them off one at a time until they give up.”

     He examined the needle and then handed it back to her.

     She waited while he tied a small rubber hose around his arm and pumped his fist several times.

     “Are you sure you don’t want to try this stuff? Not even once?”

     “No, thank you. One of us has to have a clear head.”

     He found a good vein and thumped it a couple of times to make it swell, then held out his arm for her.

     As she pierced the vein and pumped the clear concoction into his arm, he asked, “Meaning what, exactly?”

     “Meaning people are getting killed all around you, and you don’t seem to care at all. Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t care if your men die. They signed up for it when they attacked my sister’s farm and killed her husband and the others. They deserve to die, and they deserve to spend eternity burning in hell. So do you, for that matter. But the problem is, with all these people dying around here, I’m afraid it’s just a matter of time before somebody I love gets taken out by mistake. And that thought terrifies me.”

     As the rush hit his brain, he lost his voice and his train of thought for several seconds. Then he managed, “Do you really think I deserve to die?”

     “Yes. I certainly do.”

     “You realize, don’t you, that I could have you killed just for saying that.”

     “Yes. I know. But you tend not to be violent when you’re high. You tend to be violent when you’re paranoid, after your high has worn off and your body stars to ache for another fix. And I’ve noticed that you’ve been forgetting things a lot lately. So I know I’m on thin ice, yes. But it’s important you know how I feel about you.”

     “Important why, exactly?”

     “Because I think there’s a good chance you might die soon. And I don’t want you going to meet your maker with the mistaken impression that I love you, or even care for you.”

     “If you were anyone else, you’d be dead now.”

     “Maybe. But I don’t think you’ll kill me.”

     “Why not?”

     “Because you need the junk. I’m the only one you’ll let prepare it for you and inject it in your veins. And I look prettier naked than Sanchez or Davis or Garcia.”

     She was making a joke, but it went right past him. The junk in his veins had taken full control of his mind now and his eyeballs rolled back in his head. For the next few minutes he’d be a zombie, oblivious to most of what was going on around him.

     For the thousandth time, Sarah thought about how easy it would be to kill him while he was in this state. And for the thousandth time, she’d opt not to. For the reality of the situation was, she could handle Swain. Some of his men, though, were loose cannons. When they learned of his death, there was no way of telling what they might do.

Chapter 38

     Outside it was still pouring rain. On the opposite side of the house, which overlooked the front porch, Dave was making his way up a wooden trellis covered with English Ivy.

     With Thomas’ lifeless body hidden in the shrubs and draining blood into the flowerbed, there was no one to prevent Dave from executing the next part of his plan.

     Getting up the trellis was slow going. The wet ivy was slippery as hell, and his still-bare feet kept slipping out from under him. But the structure was well built and secure against the house, and was able to bear his weight even when hanging temporarily by just his hands.

     And hanging on by his hands each time his feet slipped free wasn’t a problem.

     Dave had continued to maintain his upper body strength even after the left the corps and stopped lifting weights at the base gym. Sarah had bought him a set of free weights shortly before he was discharged, saying his biceps and broad shoulders turned her on and made him look like Superman. As proof, she pointed out that she was six months pregnant and still wanted him each and every night.

     “I don’t want you to turn into some skinny little runt with a beer gut. I want you to stay the handsome man I married and then fell in love with.”

     He’d corrected her, saying, “You mean the man you fell in love with and then married.”

     She teased him.

     “Nope. I married you first because you were hot and were a great lover. Your personality, on the other hand, was only so-so. It took me a little longer for the love thing to come along.”

     Remembering how she looked when she’d been pregnant with little Beth brought sweet pangs of remembrance to him. He couldn’t wait to kiss Sarah again and to hug both his daughters. But little Beth, especially, always had a habit of wrapping her arms around his neck and squeezing as hard as she possibly could. It made him feel like the most special daddy on the face of the earth. He decided that he’d enjoy her little hugs most of all.

     After the blackout sent the world into a tailspin, Dave stopped lifting weights, but maintained his upper body strength by doing endless pushups and chin-ups. Part of it was done to fight the tedium. Part of it was because he somehow sensed it would come in handy. And now, climbing up a slippery trellis with a driving rain pounding him in the face, it really did.

     He made it to the top of the porch roof and stepped over onto it.

     His hunch was right. The upstairs lights were on because the upstairs bedrooms were occupied. The curtains were drawn in the first window he came to, but through the crack between the curtains, Dave could make out the form of a man, in bed and under a single white sheet. He was propped up on one elbow, his back to the window, and appeared to be reading a magazine.

     Dave couldn’t see his face. He didn’t have a clue who the man was. But the rifle propped up in the corner of the room, by the closed bedroom door, told Dave the man wasn’t a hostage.

     He was one of
them
.

     And that made him something else too.

     It made him a target. 

     But first, he’d check out the other window on that side of the house.

     In the second bedroom, the curtains weren’t drawn, but the mini blinds were closed.

     Luckily, they weren’t closed all the way, and Dave could see the entire room through a tiny slit between each blind.

     In this room, a man was walking in stocking feet, first folding a basket of laundry on the bed, then placing it within drawers in a large oak dresser.

     On his hip was a Glock handgun.

     Another bad guy.

     And, since this one was up and walking around and therefore could bolt at the first sign of trouble, he had to be taken out first.

     Dave had figured out how to use the thunderstorm and driving rain to his advantage.

     He took his handgun from its holster and took steady aim, in a classic shooter’s stance.

     His first inclination was to take a head shot. From this distance, it would be a safe bet, and would alleviate any possibility the man would cry out when he was hit.

     But Dave worried about the double-paned window. He knew that the two sheets of glass, although not capable of stopping his bullet, could alter its course to a very slight degree. Certainly not enough to make him miss his target by itself.

     But there was another factor as well. Dave was soaked to the bone and was shivering almost uncontrollably. He was having a difficult time holding his hands still.

     Those two factors combined would almost certainly make his shot slightly off its mark.

     He decided that a center mass shot would be a better option under the circumstances.

     He lined his weapon up to fire a bullet through the man’s heart.

     And he waited, moving the gun slightly to follow his target as the man moved about the room, still doing his laundry.

     Dave had to wait for the right moment.

     It came some fifteen seconds later, as a brilliant flash of lighting lit up the night sky to the west.

     And a viciously loud crack of thunder followed it a second later.

     It was during that crack of thunder that Dave pulled the trigger, and his target went down instantly with not so much as a whimper.

     Dave was counting on the sound to muffle his shot. Between the rain beating down on the roof and windows, and the thick outer walls of the farm house, he hoped that no one heard a thing, other than maybe the soft tinkling of breaking glass or the soft thud of a man falling forward onto his bed and piles of folded shirts.

     And, to be sure, Dave hadn’t even heard the shot himself.

     He’d find out soon whether anyone else had heard it. If they had, they’d either come bursting into the bedroom and would instantly start spraying bullets through the window and in Dave’s general direction. He’d have to leap to the ground, hope he didn’t break his ankle while doing so, and scamper for cover.

     Or… they would come rushing outside and shoot at him on the roof. In that case, he’d damn well shoot back well and quickly, or he could be a sitting duck.

     The seconds ticked by, and seemed like years.

     And the greatest thing happened… absolutely nothing.

     No one went tearing into the bedroom. No one came rushing outside. Dave had gotten away with it.

     His luck was holding.

     He crept back to the first bedroom.

     Sure enough, the man was still in bed, still covered by a single white sheet, still reading his magazine.

     This time, Dave felt a little bit uneasy. He still wasn’t comfortable with shooting a man in the back, despite the admonition given him by his Marine Corps lieutenant.

     Dave had known men who were killed by friendly fire. He knew that accidents happened in the fog of war. Miscalculations were made. Clues were overlooked. And sometimes the good guys died instead of the bad ones.

     Shooting a man in the back was bad enough. Not being able to see the man’s face was even worse. He cringed at the thought that he might shoot this man, and that he might fall backwards off his propped elbow, face up on the bed.

     And that he might see his brother-in-law Tommy’s face.

     Still, Dave could plainly see the rifle propped up in the corner. And as he ran possible scenarios through his mind, he couldn’t think of a single one that would call for a hostage being entrusted with such a weapon.

     He once again lined up his target and said a short prayer under his breath.