The Overlook - Michael Connelly [76]
Bosch turned to Walling. She had let her guard down and was just standing there looking at the dead agent.
“Rachel,” he said. “He’s gotta still be here.”
He stood and moved toward the door so he could search the squad room. As he glanced through the window he saw movement behind the electronics racks. He stopped, raised his weapon and tracked someone moving behind one of the racks toward a door with an exit sign on it.
In a moment he saw Maxwell break free of the cover and dash toward the door.
“Maxwell!” Bosch yelled. “Stop!”
Maxwell spun and raised a weapon. At the same moment that his back hit the exit door he started firing. The window shattered and glass sprayed across Bosch. He returned fire and put six shots into the opening of the exit door but Maxwell was gone.
“Rachel?” he called without taking his eyes off the door. “Okay?”
“I’m fine.”
Her voice came from below him. He knew she had hit the floor when the shooting had started.
“Which exit is that door?”
Rachel stood up. Bosch moved toward the door, glancing at her, and saw glass all over her clothes and that she had been cut on the cheek.
“Those stairs go down to his car.”
Bosch ran from the room toward the exit door. He opened his phone as he went and pushed the speed dial for his partner. The call was answered on half a ring. Bosch was already in the stairwell.
“He’s coming down!”
Bosch dropped the phone and started down the stairs. He could hear Maxwell running on the steel steps below and instinctively knew that he was too far ahead.
TWENTY-TWO
BOSCH COVERED THREE MORE LANDINGS, taking three steps at a time. He could now hear Walling coming down behind him. He then heard the booming sound from below as Maxwell hit the exit door at the bottom. There were immediate shouts and then there were shots. They came so close together it was impossible to determine which had come first or how many shots had been fired.
Ten seconds later Bosch hit the exit door. He came out onto the sidewalk and saw Ferras leaning against the back bumper of Maxwell’s fed car. He was holding his weapon with one hand and his elbow with the other. A red rose of blood was blooming on his shoulder. Traffic had stopped in both directions on Third and pedestrians were running down the sidewalks to safety.
“I hit him twice,” Ferras yelled. “He went that way.”
He nodded in the direction of the Third Street tunnel under Bunker Hill. Bosch stepped closer to his partner and saw the wound in the ball of his shoulder. It didn’t look too bad.
“Did you call for backup?” Bosch asked.
“On the way.”
Ferras grimaced as he adjusted his hold on his injured arm.
“You did real good, Iggy. Hang in there while I go get this guy.”
Ferras nodded. Bosch turned and saw Rachel come through the door, a smear of blood on her face.
“This way,” he said. “He’s hit.”
They started down Third in a spread formation. After a few steps Bosch picked up the trail. Maxwell was obviously hurt badly and was losing a lot of blood. It would make him easy to track.
But when they got to the corner of Third and Hill they lost the trail. There was no blood on the pavement. Bosch looked into the long Third Street tunnel and saw no one moving in the traffic on foot. He looked up and down Hill Street and saw nothing until his attention was drawn to a commotion of people running out of the Grand Central Market.
“This way,” he said.
They moved quickly toward the huge market. Bosch picked up the blood trail again just outside and started in. The market was a two-story-high conglomeration of food booths and retail and produce concessions. There was a strong smell of grease and coffee in the air that had to infect every floor of the building above the market. The place was crowded and noisy and that made it difficult for Bosch to follow the blood and track Maxwell.
Then suddenly there were shouts