Spencerville

Eighty yards. Ten more seconds, and he'd be on the steps to the porch. He focused on the dark sliding glass doors.

Sixty yards. He felt very exposed, very naked, charging across the open field, and he knew that if Baxter came through that door right now with the rifle and infrared scope, Baxter wouldn't even have to rush his shot and could even take the time to smile and say something nasty. Keith hoped that Billy Marlon was a good shot.

* * *

Cliff Baxter, responding to the alarm clock, had risen from bed and, still in his underwear, came into the living room and turned on the table lamp. He had his gun belt and holster draped over his shoulder and was wearing his bulletproof vest, but didn't have his AK-47 or shotgun with him.

Annie was kneeling on the floor in front of the rocking chair, her manacled ankles behind her. The poker was squeezed tight between her thighs, the end protruding between her feet and under the rocker, not visible to Baxter.

He asked, "Why you kneeling there in the dark?"

"I couldn't sleep in the rocking chair. I'm going to lie on the floor."

"Yeah?" He walked toward the sliding glass door. "I'm gonna wake the dogs."

He drew his pistol, unlocked the sliding glass door, and opened it just enough to point the pistol in the air and fire a shot. He began to close the door but froze and listened. The dogs weren't barking.

* * *

Billy Marlon, sighting through the telescopic sight of his M-14 rifle, covered Keith's run across the open clearing, the scope's crosshairs lined up on the glass door.

Suddenly, a light went on in the house, and a few seconds later he saw a backlighted figure at the door, but he couldn't be sure it was Baxter. The door seemed to move, and Billy heard a shot, then before he could squeeze off a round, the figure was gone. "Damn!" He saw Keith come into the view of his scope, still running. "Okay. Okay." Then a few yards from the base of the stairs, Keith veered off and disappeared from the scope. "What the hell?"

Billy Marlon stood there a second, confused, angry with himself, and feeling that he'd somehow let Keith down. There was nothing in the world more frustrating than a shot not taken, a target not engaged. He lowered the rifle, and without much thought, he began charging across the open field toward the house.

* * *

Thirty yards. Four or five more seconds. Keith looked up and saw a light come on inside the house. He didn't slow up or break stride, but kept going.

Twenty yards. A backlighted figure was suddenly at the glass door, and Keith thought he saw the door sliding open. Keith made a snap decision and veered off, running under the cantilevered deck and bringing himself to a short stop against one of the concrete-block columns that held up the house. A shot rang out. Keith put his back to the column and aimed his revolver straight up. The light from the house cast a faint illumination through the spaced deck boards. He kept the revolver pointed up, waiting for a shadow or movement on the deck above him, but he saw and heard nothing. A second later, he heard the door slide shut with a thud.

Keith was fairly certain that it was Baxter at the door and that Baxter hadn't seen or heard him approaching the house, or he wouldn't have turned on the light. Baxter had just picked that bad moment to rouse his dogs with a gunshot, and the dogs hadn't responded. Nor would they ever respond. Cliff Baxter knew he had company.

* * *

Cliff Baxter locked the glass door and took a long step away, his back to his gun rack. He stood absolutely still with Keith's Glock 9mm automatic pointing at the door. He glanced back at the table lamp about twenty feet away. He wanted to turn it off but didn't want to move. He listened.

He kept telling himself that no one could have gotten all three dogs, that they weren't dead, that the pistol shot just hadn't woken them. But that was not possible. Damn it.

He looked at his wife kneeling across the room, and their eyes met.

Annie maintained eye contact with him, and she recognized that look she had seen on his face when she'd pointed the shotgun at him. She wanted to smile, to smirk, to say something, but she sensed that death was near, and she didn't know whose.

Baxter lifted the key chain from around his neck and unlocked his gun rack. He took down the Sako rifle, turned on the electronic infrared scope, and flipped the safety switch to the fire position.

* * *

Keith stayed frozen against the concrete column, the revolver still pointing upward at the deck. Behind him was the open garage space where the Bronco was parked, and above the garage was the house. He listened for footsteps from the house but heard nothing.

He glanced out to where he'd left Billy Marlon near the edge of the clearing where the dead retriever lay. The moon had slipped behind the pines now, leaving the clearing in almost total darkness.