Page 256 - Hunter - The Vigil

Gabreski waved Jack to cover the door to the right as he moved up to the ragged opening ahead.
Candlelight glimmered fi tfully in the darkness beyond.
Vince stepped to the edge of the crude threshold and saw a small room that had been emptied
of furniture, save for a salvaged dining table set against the far wall. Four women in severe
black dresses knelt on the fi lthy, water-stained fl oor before the table, clutching handkerchiefs
and watching Vince with frightened, tear-streaked faces. A tall, very old portrait hung on the
wall above the table, depicting a fi erce-looking man in some kind of medieval attire. The eyes of
the man in the painting were dark and unsettling, like the fevered stare of a madman.
A body lay upon the table, bathed in candlelight. It was wrapped in a hand-stitched shroud
of white linen, covering everything but the corpse’s pale, wrinkled face. The body was that of
an elderly man. His face was contorted, as though in terror or pain. Burnished coins covered his
eyes. Blotches of fresh blood soaked the linen around the corpse’s throat.
“Talk to me, Vince!” Jack yelled over his shoulder. The detective’s freckled face was pale,
and his hands were trembling. “What are we doing?”
Vince backed away from the hole. A sense of unreality swept over him, blurring the edges of
his perceptions. He shook his head savagely and yelled, “Keep going!”
Jack muttered a curse and stepped through the doorway. Beyond lay a short, narrow hallway, heaped
with stacks of broken furniture. The kids’ incessant howling was coming from somewhere at the far end
of the hall.
Gabreski saw two doors immediately to either side of the doorway. Vince swept left, while Andrea
dashed in and went right. At virtually the same time, they kicked in the door in front of them.
“Police!” Gabreski shouted, adding to the cacophony, and found himself standing on the
threshold of a small, lantern-lit room arrayed with a trio of narrow beds. Unlike the rest of the
apartment, the bedroom was so neatly kept that the sight of it was actually jarring. An old woman
and two girls, both obviously pregnant, cowered in the far corners of the room. They screamed
and cursed at him in Russian; the elderly woman had a small book in her hand, which she hurled
at Vince with a sulfurous curse.
More shouts and screams sounded behind Vince as Andrea stumbled onto yet more of the Russians. This
isn’t an apartment, it’s a damn nest, Vince thought, feeling a twinge of panic. The farther in they went,
the worse the situation became.
Three loud, fl at bangs echoed from the far end of the hall. A bullet hit the wall six inches
behind Vince, then Jack let out a pained shout. A man’s voice, hoarse and angry, bellowed
something in Russian.
Gabreski whirled just in time to see an older man rushing at them out of a cloud of blue powder
smoke. An antique revolver wavered in the man’s liver-spotted hand.

“Put the fucking gun down!” Vince yelled, centering his weapon on the old man’s chest. Jack was staggering
backwards, his left hand pressed to his side.
The barrel of the revolver swung towards Gabreski. A fl ash, and another bullet droned past
Gabreski’s head. Splinters from the doorframe stung his left ear.
Then Raimundo charged through the doorway behind Vince, blasting away at the old man. The
Russian’s body jerked as 9mm rounds tore through his chest and abdomen, even as his lifeless
body toppled to the fl oor. The gang leader kept fi ring until his clip was empty and the trigger was
clicking on an empty chamber.
For half a heartbeat, the apartment was silent, stunned by the racket of the guns. Then
everyone began to shout at once. Screams and angry wails split the air; Vince could see fi gures
moving at the end of the hall, past the drifting curtain of powder smoke.

“What the fuck is the matter with you?” Vince yelled, nearly shoving Raimundo off his feet.
“Motherfucker was shooting at me!” Raimundo shouted back. The young Hispanic bounced back
until he was nearly nose to nose with the much bigger man. “The hell did you think I was going
to do?”
Gabreski saw Jack leaning against a rickety bookshelf, gasping for breath. From the look on
Jack’s face, he guessed his vest had stopped the Russian’s bullet, but left him with a bruised rib
instead. Andrea was covering the far end of the hall; from her savage expression, she looked like
she was ready to shoot everyone and let God and the Devil fi ght over who got what.
“Goddamnit,” Vince snarled. Things were getting rapidly out of hand. “Let’s go. Everybody
out. Now!”
A knife came whirring out of the shadows at the far end of the hall and struck Andrea handle fi rst; she spat
a stream of curses and fi red three rounds well above head-height down the hall. Gabreski grabbed Raimundo’s arm
and all but threw him back the way they’d come, then tapped Jack on the shoulder. Dean nodded, and the three
cops beat a hasty retreat before they found themselves surrounded.
Screams and panicked wails rose from the corpse room as Vince covered their retreat. He
glanced toward the hole and saw Karl inside the room, taking pictures of the portrait with his