too narrow, but he knew that the shopkeeper would have left the door to the apartment open. He attached a carabiner to the nylon line and slid silently down the line to the window ledge. He unclipped, then squeezed through the bars and dropped to the floor in the hallway.
He kept close to the hall walls, taking careful, exaggerated steps to keep his toenails from catching on the carpet. He could smell onions cooking in a nearby apartment and hear the child's voice coming from the door down the hall, which he could see was open, if only a crack.
"Dad, I'm ready to get out! Dad, I'm ready to get out!"
He paused at the doorway, peeked into the apartment. He knew the child would scream when she saw him - his jagged teeth, the claws, his cold black eyes. He would see to it that her screams were short-lived, but nobody could remain calm in the face of his fearsomeness. Of course, the fearsome effect was somewhat reduced by the fact that he was only fourteen inches tall.
He pushed the door open, but as he stepped into the apartment something grabbed him from behind, yanking him off his feet, and in spite of his training and stealth skills, he screamed like a flaming wood duck.
Someone had Super Glued the key slot in the back door and Charlie had snapped his key off trying to get it open. There was some kind of arrow stuck on a string through the back of his leg and it hurt like hell - blood was filling up his shoe. He didn't know what had happened, but he knew it wasn't good that the hellhounds were bouncing around him whimpering.
He pounded the door with both fists. "Open the goddamn door, Ray!"
Ray opened the door. "What?"
The hellhounds knocked them both down going through the door. Charlie jumped to his feet and limped after them, up the steps. Ray followed.
"Charlie, you're bleeding."
"I know."
"Wait, you're dragging some kind of line. Let me cut it."
"Ray, I've got to go - "
Before Charlie could finish his sentence, Ray had pulled a knife from his back pocket, flicked it open, and cut the nylon line. "Used to carry this on the job to cut seat belts and stuff."
Charlie nodded and headed up the steps. Sophie was standing in the kitchen, wrapped in a mint-green bath towel, shampoo horns still protruding from her head - she looked like a small, soapy version of the Statue of Liberty. "Dad, where were you? I wanted to get out."
"Are you okay, honey?" He knelt in front of her and smoothed down her towel.
"I needed help on the rinse. That's your responsibility, Dad."
"I know, honey. I'm a horrible father."
"Okay - " Sophie said. "Hi, Ray."
Ray was topping the steps, holding a bloody arrow on the end of a string. "Charlie, this went through your leg."
Charlie turned and looked at his calf for the first time, then sat on the floor, sure that he was going to pass out.
"Can I have it?" Sophie said, picking up the arrow.
Ray grabbed a dish towel from the counter and pressed it on Charlie's wound. "Hold this on it. I'll call 911."
"No, I'm okay," Charlie said, pretty sure now he was going to throw up.
"What happened out there?" Ray said.
"I don't know, I was - "
Someone in the building started screaming like they were being deep-fried. Ray's eyes went wide.
"Help me up," Charlie said.
They ran through the apartment and out into the hall - the screaming was coming from the stairwell.
"Can you make it?" Ray said.
"Go. Go. I'm with you." Charlie steadied himself against Ray's shoulder and hopped up the stairs behind him.
The harsh screaming coming from Mrs. Ling's apartment had dwindled to pleas for help in English, peppered with swearing in Mandarin. "No! Shiksas! Help! Back! Help!"
Charlie and Ray found the diminutive Chinese matron backed against her stove by Alvin and Mohammed, swinging a cleaver at them to keep them at bay while they barked salvos of strawberry-kiwi-flavored bubbles at her.
"Help! Shiksas try to take supper," said Mrs. Ling.
Charlie saw the stockpot steaming on the stove, a pair of duck feet sticking out of it. "Mrs. Ling, is that duck wearing trousers?"
She looked quickly, then turned and took a swipe at the hellhounds with the cleaver. "Could be," she said.
"Down, Alvin. Down, Mohammed," Charlie commanded, which the hellhounds ignored completely. He turned to Ray. "Ray, would you go get Sophie?"
The ex-cop, who felt himself the master of all situations chaotic,