Home Invasion - J. A. Johnstone [109]
Alex caught herself on the back of the chair in which she’d been sitting earlier. A man in jeans and work shirt, holding a rifle, came into the room and leveled the weapon at Garaldo. Another man, this one with a pistol, remained in the doorway, keeping an eye on the lobby.
Garaldo sneered at the men, but didn’t try to shoot again. If he had, the rifleman would have blasted him before he could pull the trigger. Garaldo set the pistol on the desk, and Alex lunged forward and snatched it up.
“Lady, what’re you—” the man with the rifle bit out as Alex pointed the pistol at the middle of Garaldo’s face.
She thought about how her friends and co-workers had been slaughtered wantonly by killers under the command of this man. She thought about everything Garaldo planned to do if he got his hands on that nerve gas, quite possibly including wiping out the lives of every man, woman, and child in Home. They would all be better off, safer, if she just pulled the trigger and turned that ugly, arrogant face into a crimson ruin.
But even after everything that had happened, she was still sworn to uphold the law, and killing Garaldo in cold blood would be murder.
She lowered the pistol a little and said, “He’s in command of the invasion. Who are you men?” They were dressed like cowboys, but something about them didn’t really fit the part.
“We heard about what happened and came here to help,” the man with the rifle replied, an answer which, Alex realized, wasn’t really an answer at all.
From the doorway, the second man said, “Hey, you’re that hot police chief … I mean, the police chief of Home. I’ve, uh, seen you on TV.” He stiffened suddenly and barked, “Hold it!”
“Don’t shoot, please don’t shoot!”
Alex knew that voice. “That’s Eloise,” she exclaimed. “That’s my dispatcher.”
The man with the pistol relaxed a little. “All right, lady, come on around the corner. Anybody else up there?”
“Just the … the men you killed,” Eloise said.
“Keep him covered,” Alex told the rifleman with a jerk of her chin toward Garaldo. She stepped past the other man into the hall and put her arms around Eloise, being careful with the general’s pistol as she did so. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, I … I guess. Just scared.”
Alex gave her a smile. “Welcome to the club.” She turned back to the two men. “What are your names?”
“I’m Lawrence Ford,” the one with the pistol said. “My friends call me Fargo.” He nodded toward the other one. “That’s Brad Parker.”
“Well, Mr. Ford, Mr. Parker, as you know, I’m Chief Bonner, and I’m mighty glad to meet you. But now we need to get out of here before some of Garaldo’s men come back.”
“What’ll we do with him?” Parker asked.
“Bring him with us,” Alex decided abruptly. “He’ll make a good hostage.”
“Never!” Garaldo said. “You’ll have to kill me!”
Parker grunted as his finger started to tighten on the trigger. “That works, too.”
“Wait!” Garaldo held his hands out to them. “All right. I’ll come with you. But you might as well surrender and throw yourself on my mercy. You can’t win, only a handful of you. I have too many men. You’ll all die.”
“Maybe there’s more than a handful of us,” Alex said, thinking of how she had told J. P. Delgado to round up some people willing to fight and get them to the high school. “And maybe we’d rather die than let you win.”
They jerked Garaldo’s arms behind his back, fastened his wrists with plastic restraints, then hustled him out of the office and left the police station through the back door. Ford had gathered up all the rifles from the dead men in the lobby and carried them in his arms, except for the ones he gave to Alex and Eloise.
“Follow me,” Alex said as they trotted along the alley. “We need to get to the high school.”
“Why there?” Ford asked.
“Because that’s where the resistance is gathering,” she replied, hoping that was true.
“What resistance?” Parker asked. “I thought everybody in this town gave up their guns.”
“Well, I’m hoping not everybody did. And even if they did, we’ve