“I gotta take a leak,” he tells the guys. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

Then Munchel stands up, stretches, and heads off to get another rifle.

9:10 P.M.

JACK

AFTER A SEMI-FRANTIC SEARCH I find the handcuff key on the kitchen counter. I unlock the remaining bracelet, drag Alex across the floor by her hair, and secure her wrists around the U pipe under the sink.

“See if she’s got my battery pack in her pocket,” Harry says.

I don’t like touching Alex – even restrained and unconscious she frightens me. But when I reach for her pocket she doesn’t leap up, break free, and then plunge a knife into my chest. She just lies there, unmoving. I locate the bulge in the front of her pants and tug out Harry’s battery. Well, a few pieces of it.

“Shit hell damn,” Harry says. “Kick her in the head, from me.”

“Can’t you pry open your hand?

“Yeah, why didn’t I think of that? Then I could have actually tried to hide, rather than just squat here like an idiot.”

I frown. “Maybe we could pull off the handle.”

“I already tried. Who the hell made this fridge? Brinks?”

Harry reaches inside, helps himself to one of my Goose Island India Pale Ales.

“Latham!” I call to the living room. “We got Alex subdued. You holding up okay?”

My honey answers affirmatively, but his voice is weak.

“How about you, Mom?”

“I’m good. Did you punch her lights out?”

“Harry did.”

“Nice job, Harry!”

“Thanks! But your daughter hit me in the dumplings with a hot pie.”

“Jacqueline!” Mom scolds. “Why did you do that?”

“It was an accident, Mom.”

“Did you apologize?”

I mutter, “Sorry, Harry.”

“She didn’t sound sincere!” Harry tells my mom.

I roll my eyes, then fish out a bag of peas from the freezer. I hold it to my sore chin and consider the situation.

Alex, for the moment, is secure. We have no cell phone ser vice, which means the snipers are jamming the signal. My landline is also out. Since my home phone goes through my cable connection, I assume my cable Internet is gone too.

I ponder the likelihood of someone hearing the gunshots and calling 911, and realize the chances aren’t good. The shooters are using suppressors, and the trees do a decent job of stopping the echoes.

Latham is still bound, still bleeding. I need to get to him, but between us is a vast open space, all of it viewable by the snipers. I counted at least two shooters, but I’m guessing that all three are here. I have no clue why. Are they pissed off I didn’t die in Ravenswood?

Harry picks an apple slice off of his shirt and pops it into his mouth. “I never got to thank you for inviting me over. We should do this more often.”

“Alex forced me, Harry. I tried to warn you.”

“No biggie. Who needs balls anyway? They make your pants fit funny.”

“It’s bad?” I ask.

Harry pulls out his waistband and peeks inside.

“I don’t think they’re supposed to swell up this big.”

“You need to see a doctor.”

“I need to see Mr. Ripley.”

“Mr. Ripley?”

“The Believe It or Not guy. I should make a plaster mold for his museum.”

I toss him the frozen peas. He stuffs them down his pants.

“COLD!” Harry yells. “SO COLD!”

I stare at him, hopping from foot to foot, and then I look at the freezer door of the stainless steel refrigerator. It’s pockmarked with bullet holes, each in the center of a huge dent. Strange. Full-metal jacketed slugs should have punched right through without denting it. I crawl up to Harry to get a closer look.

“So what shitstorm did I wander into?” McGlade asks. He drains the beer, tosses the bottle at Alex’s head, misses, then reaches for another.

“Three snipers. They kill sex offenders. Call themselves TUHC.”

Harry belches and says, “The Urban Hunting Club.”

I appraise him. “You’ve heard of them?”

“No. But there’s a producer of DVD adult entertainment called TUBC. The Urban Booty Club. Lots of college girls taking off their tops and eating Popsicles, stuff like that. The first DVD is only nine ninety-nine, but that’s how they sucker you in, because they send you two new DVDs every month for twenty-nine ninety-nine each. And they’re only forty-five minutes long, which is a real rip-off.” Harry scratches his nose. “So I’ve heard.”

The Urban Hunting Club sounds right. That’s something a group of disgruntled blue-collar Grabowskis would call themselves.

“They killed three rapists to night, then gunned down ten cops,” I say. “Looks like they followed me home.”

“You think?”

I open the fridge, can’t find where the bullets have gone through on the inside. The door seems to have stopped them. I shake it, and hear some slugs rattling inside. I use a spoon to pry back the plastic molding, and a gray bullet drops out. It resembles a mushroom. The snipers have switched from jacketed rounds to soft points. A soft point has more stopping power, expanding on impact, but not the penetrating power of a full-metal jacket slug, which didn’t deform as much.

“You know, Jackie…” Harry stares down at me, “the top of your head is really sexy.”

“This is the only time you’ll ever see it, McGlade.”

He takes out his cell phone and snaps a picture.

“Hot,” Harry says. “I especially dig the gray roots coming in. I like a woman with de cades of experience.”

I ignore him, something I’m particularly good at. “We need to turn off the lights. We’ve got two in the kitchen, three in the living room, the hallway, the bedroom, and the garage. Then, when it’s dark, I can grab the gun bag in the bedroom, pop outside, and sneak up on these bastards.”

“You can kill all the lights at once,” Harry says. “Got a circuit breaker?”

“End of the hallway, in the laundry room.”

“I’ll wait here.” Harry shakes his prosthetic for effect.

“Actually, Harry, I’m thinking we use this refrigerator for cover.”

“You want to push this heavy thing all the way across a carpeted hallway? Good luck.”

“We’re going to push it.”

“And give the psycho kitty another chance to use Acorn Andy as a scratch post? No thanks.”

I reach into the refrigerator, take out the squirt gun we keep in there for when Mr. Friskers disagrees with guests.

“Just spray him if he gets close.”

“Like this?”

Harry squirts me in the face. Big surprise there. Then he sprays me in the chest a few times, squinting to see through the material. I take the gun away from him.

“Grow up, Harry.” I yell over my shoulder, “Mom! Latham! We’re going to shut off the electricity!” I face Harry again. “Let’s do this.”

Harry grins, then adjusts his peas. “All right, but I’m warning you – if it’s really heavy, I’m going to make you check me later on for a hernia.”

“I can’t wait,” I deadpan. Then I unplug the fridge and we begin to push.