Page 62

Shit. Who’s kidding who?

He knows what the hell I want…

Payne reached the door and kicked it open. The door swung open onto the sidewalk on Tioga. The Shriners Children’s Hospital was across the street. He looked left and saw people running away, clearly in fear. He started to look around the leading edge of the open door when he heard two shots being fired-and the unmistakable sound of bullets impacting metal.

Payne dropped to his knees.

A glance up the door revealed two exit holes, the thin sheet metal with two ragged holes roughly resembling a king’s crown.

“You sonofabitch!” Payne said.

He quickly stuck his head around the edge of the door and back again.

His split-second view had shown him the man running down the middle of the street, holding his right hand up as he fed the pistol a fresh magazine of ammunition.

Payne popped to his feet and gave chase, running along the sidewalk to use the cars parked at the curb for cover and concealment.

The man cut the corner at Germantown Avenue and started running up it. Payne started to cross Tioga to follow, but the loud horn of a taxicab he hadn’t seen coming forced him back on the sidewalk. He checked again for any traffic, then bolted up Germantown Avenue.

Payne kept looking for an opportunity to shoot. But there were people on the sidewalks and vehicles beyond the running Hispanic male, all of them in what would be the fi

eld of fire.

As the man approached the intersection of Germantown and Venango, the traffic light changed. The vehicles started moving east and west, effectively blocking the male’s path. At the corner, he made a right onto Venango, and Payne, looking over his shoulder, crossed over Germantown Avenue to follow.

Two blocks later, at Camac Street, the man again got caught by the changing of the traffic light. This time he cut down an alleyway behind the row houses there.

Payne, breathing heavily, turned down the alley. But when he got there, he saw that the only row houses there were the ones facing acing Venango Street. Behind them, the alleyway opened up for more than half a block. The other row houses had been torn down, leaving a huge vacant area.

And the man was running right down the middle of it, wide open.

Payne could hear the sirens of squad cars in the direction of the burn center. But he had no way of directing them to his location.

Payne once more shouted, “Stop! Police!”

Surprising him, the man did stop-only to turn and fire off two shots.

The shots struck the pavement near Payne. He dropped to one knee and, trying not to let his heaving chest botch his aim, squeezed off one round, then a second one.

The second shot found the Hispanic male. He went down, rolling as he hit the ground, holding his left thigh with his left hand.

Payne stood and started toward him cautiously, shouting, “Drop the goddamn weapon! Now, goddammit!”

From where he lay, the Hispanic male rolled and fired another round at Payne, causing Payne to seek cover behind a tree. Then the man popped up and took off, running with a bit of a limp.

“Sonofabitch!” Payne muttered to himself. “The fucker just won’t quit.”

Up ahead, Payne saw that vehicles were again stopped at a traffic light, this time at Old York Street. And the light was about to cycle from red to green.

Good! I can close the gap again.

But then Payne watched in surprise as, just before the lights changed, the man ran up to the first car in line. It was an older silver Chevrolet Caprice sedan-The Whale Car, Payne thought, for whatever reason remembering its nickname. The man grabbed the handle to the driver’s door, flung it open before the driver-a fat middle-aged black male-even knew that anyone was there, put the muzzle of the pistol to the driver’s left cheek, and started shouting at him.

Payne could not hear what he was saying, but it was obvious what was happening. And the fat driver clearly understood he was being carjacked. He was frantically rushing to undo his seat belt.

Payne ran with what energy he had left.

The Hispanic male grabbed the fat driver by the shirt collar and yanked him to the street. The Chevy Caprice, having been in gear, started to roll on its own, and the man then ran alongside and jumped in, hitting the accelerator. There was a squeal of tires and then the driver’s door slammed shut.