Page 169 of The Lincoln Lawyer

“Police!” a woman shouted. “Put your weapons down!”

I looked through the door and didn’t see anyone.

“Put your weapons down and come out with your hands in full view!”

This time it was a man who had yelled and I recognized the voice.

I pulled the gun out of my jacket pocket and put it on the floor. I slid it away from me.

“The weapon’s down,” I called out, as loud as the hole in my stomach allowed me to. “But I’m shot. I can’t get up. We’re both shot.”

I first saw the barrel of a pistol come into view in the doorway. Then a hand and then a wet black raincoat containing Detective Lankford. He moved into the house and was quickly followed by his partner, Detective Sobel. Lankford kicked the gun away from Windsor as he came in. He kept his own weapon pointed at me.

“Anybody else in the house?” he asked loudly.

“No,” I said. “Listen to me.”

I tried to sit up but pain shot through my body and Lankford yelled.

“Don’t move! Just stay there!”

“Listen to me. My fam—”

Sobel yelled a command into a handheld radio, ordering paramedics and ambulance transport for two people with gunshot wounds.

“One transport,” Lankford corrected. “She’s gone.”

He pointed his gun at Windsor.

Sobel shoved the radio into her raincoat pocket and came to me. She knelt down and pulled my hand away from my wound. She pulled my shirt out of my pants so she could lift it and see the damage. She then pressed my hand back down on the bullet hole.

“Press down as hard as you can. It’s a bleeder. You hear me, hold your hand down tight.”

“Listen to me,” I said again. “My family’s in danger. You have to—”

“Hold on.”

She reached inside her raincoat and pulled a cell phone off her belt. She flipped it open and hit a speed-dial button. Whoever she called answered right away.

“It’s Sobel. You better bring him back in. His mother just tried to hit the lawyer. He got her first.”

She listened for a moment and asked, “Then, where is he?”

She listened some more and then said good-bye. I stared at her as she closed her phone.

“They’ll pick him up. Your daughter is safe.”

“You’re watching him?”

She nodded.

“We piggy-backed on your plan, Haller. We have a lot on him but we were hoping for more. I told you, we want to clear Levin. We were hoping that if we kicked him loose he’d show us his trick, show us how he got to Levin. But the mother sort of just solved that mystery for us.”

I understood. Even with the blood and life running out of the hole in my gut I was able to put it together. Releasing Roulet had been a play. They were hoping that he’d go after me, revealing the method he had used to defeat the GPS ankle bracelet when he had killed Raul Levin. Only he hadn’t killed Raul. His mother had done it for him.

“Maggie?” I asked weakly.

Sobel shook her head.