He keyed his radio. “Hey Box, are you close?”

“Right behind, you,” he said, inches away from Jonathan’s ear.

He damn near shit his pants. “Goddammit, don’t do that.”

Boxers laughed. “This doesn’t look good for the good guys,” he said.

“Yeah, well, just wait.” He explained what he wanted to do.

To Dom’s ears, the crash of the oil tank was louder than an explosion. It reverberated off the concrete walls, echoing like a gunshot in the Grand Canyon.

Running was out of the question. If Venice was in trouble, he had to help her out. And staying put was out of the question, too. The words of a long-forgotten football coach bloomed in his memory: If you’re not moving forward, then you’re going backward. Reborn in the acid bath of panic, he heard the advice as, If you don’t get out of this basement, you’re going to die.

Again using the light of his cell phone as a guide, he navigated through the assembled junk and glided up the stairs into the old hose tower, and from there, through the utility room. He held his breath as he cracked the door to the living room open an inch and looked around. Everything looked as it always did: neat, organized. In the glow of the street light that painted parallelograms of light through the old bay doors, he could make out the outlines of the furniture. There continuhovrom the end of the porch you can run around-”

A fusillade of bullets ripped at the floor of the porch just above Thomas’s head. They’d locked in on his position. He needed to move. Now. His only viable plan was to emerge from the trench as fast as he could, then dash around back and hope that there weren’t a thousand bad guys waiting for him.

“Thomas, did you-”

“I heard you!” he shouted. And so did everybody else, he thought. Where the hell was Scorpion?

He rose to his knees, with his elbows still pressed to the ground, butt up, then raised his head to take a look. The flashes in the trees had become people now, and they were moving toward him in a wide line that ran parallel to the front of the cabin. With the distorted vision, he had no idea how far they were, but it couldn’t have been more than forty or fifty yards.

On impulse, Thomas brought his new rifle to his shoulder, rested the forestock against the ground, and picked a target. He squeezed the trigger just as he’d been taught, and jumped as the muzzle spit out a long burst in full-automatic mode. The target he’d picked flopped like a rag doll onto the ground, and the four or five attackers closest to him dove for cover.

His hidey hole became the battleground’s most popular target. Bullets shredded the wood and churned the turf at the edge of the porch. Thomas heaved himself out of the trench onto the open ground, falling forward into the grass and eating a mouthful of turf. Behind him, the section of ground he’d just left was consumed by a sustained burst of incoming fire. Scrambling to get his balance, his feet found traction and he ran for the nearest corner of the house.

Three steps later, a sharp jolt slammed him hard and he yelled in horror and pain as his leg hinged up at mid-thigh and his own foot kicked him in the face.

Venice could see the fear in Charlie Warren’s eyes and hear it in his voice as he tried unsuccessfully to raise his people on the radio. He glared at her. “What’s going on?”

Completely immobile, and at the whim of this man who seemed intent on killing, Venice opted to say nothing.

“Do you know a priest?” Charlie asked.

“We live next to a church,” she said. “This is a small town.”

“What would he be doing here?”

She shook her head. “I have no idea.”

“Call out to him. Tell him that you’re busy and can’t be disturbed.”

That didn’t even make sense, she thought. Why would she say such a thing?

“Say it,” Charlie repeated. This time he pressed his pistol to her head. “If I see anyone, I’m going to shoot.”

“Dom!” she shouted. “Is that you?” If nothing else, maybe she could save his life.

No one responded.

“Is that the priest’s name?” Charlie asked. “Dom?”

Venice nodded.

“Tell him to stay away.”

She took a breath. “Dom, if that’s you, I don’t have time for you. I’m busy.”

Again, no reply.

“Maybe the noise was nothing,” Venice offered. “A picture fell off the wall.”

Charlie flashed her an angry look. “Pictures don’t scream,” he said. He moved away from her, closer to the door. He adjusted his grip on the pistol. “Whoever it is, is about to be shot.” He placed his hand on the kn›

Even in the cacophony of the gunfire and above the piercing sounds of Stephenson’s shouting, Gail heard the bullet hit Thomas, a wet snapping sound. They all heard it. Julie screamed, “Oh, my God! Thomas!”

Stephenson scrambled for the window.

Gail yelled, “Steve! No! I’ll get him!”

“He’s my son,” Stephenson said. And that said everything. He heaved himself over the window and onto the porch with a clattering thump.

Julie reached for his ankle, but he was already gone.

The volume of fire outside crescendoed. But for the heavy timber walls, they’d have all been torn to pieces.

Gail started to crawl across the cabin to Stephenson’s window, then realized that a chance to hit a second target at the same spot would spell disaster for her. Acting on pure impulse, she turned and vaulted out of her own window into the tall grass that still rimmed the foundation in the backyard.

She braced herself for a brutal fusillade.

Alone now inside the cabin, Julie felt blinded by a terror she’d never known. Thomas and Stephenson both were out there being raked by bullets. She couldn’t lose both of them.

Where was Scorpion? And his obnoxious sidekick? How could they leave her like this? Even her own family had left her. She didn’t want to die.

Her gaze fell on the detonators. The clackers. Giant shotguns. Their last resort. Their Alamo position.

The only way to save her boys’ lives.

But Scorpion might be out there among the attackers.

“Don’t do anything unless you hear me say…” Whatever. Something. How was she to know if Scorpion was even alive anymore?

She didn’t care.

Dom knew from her voice alone that Venice was in distress. Her message was out of character. She needed him.

Yet here he stood, paralyzed by indecision. He knew it was a trap. If he walked through that door, God only knew what might come next. He’d get shot, probably. But to stay out here while Venice was in danger in there was…cowardly. How could he-

The turning doorknob settled it. Dom darted to the hinge side of the door and waited. When the tongue of the latch cleared the strike plate, he launched his full weight against the heavy panel.

As he’d hoped, his explosive entrance caught the intruder off-balance. He backpedaled to keep from being propelled to the floor, but unlike the man downstairs, this one was agile and light on his feet. As Dom clutched fistfuls of the man’s suit jacket and tried to drive him to the floor, the intruder effortlessly pirouetted free. His hands were empty, though.

The intruder struck a martial arts pose, and Dom knew right away that he was in trouble. Army training notwithstanding, Dom could not prevail in a hand-to-hand confrontation. He prayed for a weapon, and in that instant saw the intruder’s pistol on the floor. That was his only hope.

The intruder moved first. He seemed to have read Dom’s mind as he struck like a snake to throw a punch at the left side of the priest’s head-the side closest to the weapon on the floor. Dom dod his knees and sent him tumbling to the floor. He knew without doubt that his jaw had been broken. And he knew that the pistol was still on the floor. He could see it. If his arms were four inches longer, he could have touched it.