Maureen unsnapped her holster. She figured she didn’t have long to find them. Gage loved a good lecture, loved to hear himself talk, but he had to know his time was running out.
She pulled her gun, held it low by her hip, and considered her options. Gage surrendering, she figured, was not one of them. She knew from the Walmart sporting-goods section that the Watchmen were not the surrendering type. Gage, if he couldn’t kill her and escape, would want his blaze of glory for the effort. And he’d want to take her and Heath with him when he went. For all Maureen knew, his pockets bulged with grenades. He couldn’t know she was there.
She could call for backup, wait for others to help her search the house. That was the sensible course of action. But the radio would make noise. She was in a quiet house. If the men inside hadn’t been arguing, they might’ve heard her calling out or stepping on the broken glass. Maureen glanced again at the ice on the floor. Waiting for backup would cost her a fair amount of time. Heath’s house opened onto Audubon Park. Gage could easily disappear into the park with his hostage. He could have a getaway car on Magazine Street, on St. Charles, on any number of side streets that ended at the park. They could vanish in any direction. That was most likely the plan. They were not far from the river, not far from where Quinn had disappeared under its currents. The river road, dark and winding, would lead Gage right out of town whether he was taking a hostage with him or leaving another corpse in his wake. She reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone. Atkinson: she worked all night like Maureen. Straining to follow the path of the conversation through the dark rooms of the mansion, her gun in one hand, Maureen thumbed a silent message to Atkinson. Her location, the men in the house with her. She sent the text and slipped the phone back into her pocket. Help would come, then, Maureen thought, she just didn’t know how long it would take to get there.
The voices in the dark grew heated. Someone struck a blow. The other man hit the hardwood floor. In stages, it sounded like. Knees then hands. Gage urged Heath to get on his feet. Maureen heard doors thrown open. A cold wind blew through the house. They were headed for the porch, Maureen thought, and for the park. She couldn’t let them get away, couldn’t let them disappear. As quietly as she could, she moved from the lighted kitchen into the deep, dark belly of the big house, moving forward into the cold November wind.
35
It is too damn dark in here, Maureen thought. Gage must have made Heath turn off the outside security lights, leaving virtually no ambient light in the house.
The men had stopped talking, and she was losing her sense of how far away they were. She did not want to bump into them. She did not want to get too close. Her biggest advantage was Gage not knowing she was there. She moved slowly through what she thought was a small study into a wide living room. She held her gun in front of her in both hands, pointed at the floor. One set of French doors leading onto the wraparound front porch stood wide open. A trap? Had Gage heard her in the kitchen, and decided to lead her outside? To what advantage? They’d gone outside through the middle of three sets of French doors. There really wasn’t any place for Gage to hide and ambush her. He couldn’t know she was tracking him.
On the porch in front of her, Maureen could see the motionless silhouettes of Heath’s rocking chairs. She listened for footfalls. Nothing. She moved into the doorway, crouched behind one of the rocking chairs. It wasn’t much cover, but the darkness that Gage wanted for himself could help her, too.
She scanned the front yard. Nothing in the yard but the black shape of the barbecue. She looked beyond the grill, peering into the darkness under the huge live oaks that bordered the park. The branches grew so large and hung so low to the ground that ten men could hide under them. She strained to see a different shade of darkness, a lighter or darker shadow. She considered retreating into the house. If Gage and Heath had gone deep into the park, there was no way Maureen could track them by herself. She’d be letting them get away. How would she ever explain herself? How would she live with herself if she let Gage get away to kill again?