Dead Bang by Robert Bailey Page A

for the back of the house. At the window I stuck the .380 in my belt.
    The front door had been ventilated like a cheese grater, and the leather sofa bed had been slaughtered for the second time. Someone had his shoulder to the door. A clatter of automatic rifle fire roared in the kitchen. I spied over the half wall and saw the muzzle of the blazing weapon stuck in through the window. The suitcase had been upset, spilling bundles of money over the table. On the floor lay Karen with her back to the wall in a fetal ball with her face buried in her hands.
    I drew the .380, but the firing stopped and an arm in a white sleeve snaked in the window to grapple with the suitcase, causing bundles ofmoney to cascade from the table. Karen bounded off the floor, grabbed an iron skillet from the stove, and bludgeoned the arm.
    â€œYou fucking asshole!” Karen yelled. “You shot up my house!”
    The arm snapped back out of the window like an anteater’s tongue with a termite in tow. “We want the money!” yelled Manny, with a growl in his voice.
    Karen said, “Come up to the window, and I’ll give you the money.” She lobbed out several bundles.
    The person battering the door quit. I shoved the sofa and took back the four or five inches they’d gained.
    â€œI am out here,” said Manny.
    Karen grabbed the teakettle and poured it out the window.
    Manny screamed, and Karen launched out of the kitchen at a dead run for the back of the house. I didn’t interfere. In the bedroom I said, “Go! Run for the boat in the yard behind yours. Wendy’s there.”
    Karen slid out. The front door gave it up. I locked the bedroom door and climbed out the window. I could hear panicked voices arguing. Over the din, Manny yelled crisp, individual words that I did not understand.
    Karen ran, eating ground with long strides and pumping sharp elbows. I scrambled backwards, watching the bedroom window over the sights of the .380. Police sirens filled the air from all directions.
    Wendy yelled, “They’re coming down the side of the house!”
    I turned and ran until I found Karen and Wendy crouched and peeping around the boat. Wendy held the rifle out to me.
    â€œToo heavy,” she said. We traded weapons.
    The porch light at the side of the house with the boat blinked on. A man with bulldog jowls and more belly than T-shirt stepped out of the side door.
    â€œWhat the hell is going on out here?” he asked, uncorking the charred stump of a fat cigar from the corner of his mouth. A burst of AKR fire hosed an arc into the side of the house. The porch light exploded and tinkled down the asbestos siding. Ducking back into the door, he said, “I’m calling the police!” From inside the house, he added, “Jesus Christ, my fish tank!”
    We ran out along the dirt-rut drive and crossed the street.
    Six or seven houses closer to Division Avenue, we took cover behind a large blue spruce tree on the lawn of a Dutch Colonial. Icicle Christmas lights dangled, belatedly, from the eaves. A dog in the house raised a racket, but no lights came on.
    â€œKaren?” I said, and realized that I didn’t have the air to finish thequestion—time to cut down on the cigars and lay off the donuts. I took off my suit jacket.
    â€œWhat on earth?” gasped Wendy, leaning her shoulder against me with her pistol dangling in her hand.
    â€œWere you doing?” I finished, loosening the sling on the rifle.
    â€œI had to go back to the kitchen,” Karen said, not winded.
    â€œFor what?” I asked.
    â€œI had to get my shoes,” said Karen.
    â€œThey could have killed you,” I said. I slung the rifle over my right shoulder, muzzle down, magazine to the rear, and with the butt just under my armpit.
    â€œThey could have killed Art,” said Wendy, shaking a finger.
    â€œArt didn’t have to come back,” said Karen. “Manny wouldn’t have hurt