“All right, out there!” the general manager of Sacramento Live! shouted from inside the cash room on the second floor. “We’re coming out! We’ll open the door, then the guards will toss their guns out, and then we’ll be unarmed. Do you hear me? We surrender! We’re coming…”
The claymore mine blast slammed into the steel door, ripping it from its hinges and hurling it inside the cash room like a two-hundred-pound leaf being tossed around by a tornado. One security guard inside died instantly, crushed by the flying door; the body of a second one shattered as the force of the blast hit him square-on. The third guard was just picking himself up off the floor, leveling his weapon at his attackers, when he was killed by a burst of automatic gunfire from their assault rifles.
The Major now had his helmet on. A grenade launcher was slung over his shoulder and he was carrying an AK-74 combat assault rifle with a laser aiming sight; a small backpack held additional ammunition. He went into the devastated cash room with his heavily armed personal guard and Mullins, the renegade watchman.
The general manager and his three club managers were cowering on the floor, blood seeping from wounds on their faces and hands and from their ruptured eardrums. The Major scanned the room. None of the money bins were visible-apparently they had all been locked away in the safe at the back. He raised his rifle and aimed it at the man in the middle. “Who is the general manager?” he shouted.
Mullins pointed to the man on the left, who was crouched over the mangled body of one of the guards. “He is,” he said, praying it would help save these poor bastards’ lives.
“Sie!” the Major said in a loud voice so they could hear him through his gas mask and through their shattered, blood-filled ears. “Open the safe now or you will die.”
“I can’t,” the general manager said. “It’s on a time lock. It won’t open until nine tomorrow morning. Any attempt to open it will trigger an alarm, and it can’t be-”
“Liar! Idiot!” The terrorist pulled the trigger of his assault rifle, and the head of one of the club managers burst open like an overripe melon. The general manager, showered with blood and brains, screamed, then stared in horror at the destroyed head.
“Open that safe or you will watch the rest of your employees die.”
The general manager was on his feet in an instant, fumbling for keys. He inserted a key into the combination dial with shaking fingers, turned it, entered a combination, turned the key again, completed the combination, and pulled the safe door open.
“Schweinehund! You needlessly caused the death of one of your workers to save your profits!” the Major shouted, and shot the general manager point-blank in the groin with a three-round burst from his assault rifle. The burn from the muzzle blast was a full foot in diameter, and the noise in the small cash room was deafening-but not as loud as the agonized screams of the emasculated manager until he finally bled out and died.
“Schnell!” the Major shouted, and three more of his men rushed in, as heavily armed as their leader. “Get the bins to the truck!” They pulled the steel cash bins out of the vault and wheeled them outside. The Major ignored the two surviving club managers, issued more instructions through his radio, then turned to Mullins. “How will the police deploy outside? Will they use heavy weapons?”
“I don’t think… no, they won’t,” Mullins replied, more afraid than ever of saying he didn’t know to a guy who had just killed five men in cold blood right in front of him. “I haven’t heard any reports of a SWAT call-out, and anyway this city’s SWAT teams are only on fifteen-minute alert during graveyard shifts-it’ll take them at least a half hour to get here. The shift sergeant might have a semiautomatic M-16, but they don’t train with it much…”
“Bin einziges Gewehr? One rifle? What kind of police force does this city have?” The Major laughed. “A child with a Kalashnikov can do battle with the police in this city and have a good chance of winning! Kinderpolizei!”
“Hell, only SWAT had M-16’s until just a couple months ago-and half the politicians in this city want the cops completely disarmed,” Mullins said. He was so glad to actually know something that he was babbling. “All the other cops only got sidearms or shotguns with double-ought buck. Your only real problem is that the county jail is only three blocks away, and police headquarters is only six. Once the call goes out, lots of help will arrive real fuckin’ fast.”
“We will be out of here long before that,” the Major said confidently. “Kill all the police!” he shouted to his men as they made their way down the stairs to the rear exit, heading toward the alley and the waiting truck: “I will tolerate no gunfights with them. We hit hard, and we hit first.”
The explosion from the claymore mine rattled the windows and rippled the glass front doors of Sacramento Live! Paul McLanahan jumped. He dropped the radio, fumbled for it in the darkness, picked it up from the wet pavement, and mashed the mike button: “I heard explosions! Explosions coming from inside the building!”
“Clear this channel!” came another voice, probably Lamont. “KMA, Edward Ten, show a 211 and 994 on this location, all downtown units respond Code Three, set up a perimeter on Capitol, Eighth, Fifth, and I streets, bomb explosion inside the Sacramento Live! complex, repeat, bomb explosion inside Sacramento Live!… stand by… KMA, add a 246 on this location, shots fired… Jesus, more shots fired… requesting SWAT and Star unit call-outs for a 994 and 246 inside Sacramento Live! and request a 940-Sam on my location on Seventh Street.”
“Edward Ten, One Lincoln Ten responding,” came another radio message. That was from the downtown-sector lieutenant, obviously monitoring the radio. He was the one who would take charge of the scene when he arrived.
To a supercharged Paul McLanahan, the automatic-rifle fire from inside the complex sounded even louder than the explosion. His SIG Sauer P226 was out and leveled at the front entrance to the Sacramento Live! building before he realized it. The gunshots seemed so close, so goddamn loud, that he ducked as if the bullets were pinging off the walls around him. His gun hand was shaking, and every little sound, every gust of wind, made the gun muzzle jump. He felt vulnerable as hell, exposed to the entire world.
He started running through scenarios again. What do I do if I see a guy come out of the building? Should I challenge him? But won’t that give away my location and make me a target? If he’s got a gun, should I shoot first? What if he’s got more bombs, or even grenades?
The bulletproof vest he was wearing underneath his uniform shirt didn’t seem nearly as thick and protective as it did half an hour ago.
Craig LaFortier had the squad car’s spotlight aimed right at the delivery door that swung open behind the Step Van truck parked in the alley. It lit up the three black-clothed armed men who came rushing out of the building pushing the big wheeled bins that LaFortier knew the clubs used to hold their cash. He saw the hydraulic lift mounted on the rear of the truck rise to the level of the loading dock. Two more armed men in black were standing in the back of the truck, ready to pull the bins inside it.
“Five 211 suspects in the alley on the loading dock!” LaFortier shouted into his portable radio. “All suspects 417. Request immediate backup!” He reholstered the radio, then took a firm Weaver grip on his service pistol, crouched as low as he could behind the right front fender of his squad car, and shouted, “Police! Freeze! Drop your weapons! Now!”