A Friend in the Dark - Gregory Ashe Page 0,87
bank of light switches. Things came back together more slowly, and the mixture of pain and consciousness was accompanied, a moment later, by shock.
Sam wasn’t dead.
He just wasn’t sure what the fuck was going on.
The shock of red was the first thing Sam was able to focus on—a beacon of light surrounded by drab nothingness. Then the red took on a face, shoulders, arms—and then it was Rufus on top of Bruno, wrapping his arm around the brute’s thick neck and yanking backward as hard as he could.
“Shoulda dropped that fucking monitor on your head when I had the chance!” Rufus screamed, his voice hoarse, broken, incensed, insane.
Bruno let go of Sam’s head and tugged hard on Rufus’s arm, trying to grapple or fling him off, but Rufus clutched to him like a subway rat fighting for a crust of pizza. Bruno reared back on his knees, struggled to his feet, and gave Rufus another hard shake. But the addition of Rufus’s weight threw Bruno off balance and he tipped dangerously toward the edge of the stairs. Rufus let go and fell on his ass as Bruno waved his arms wildly for balance before tumbling forward. The fucker let out a shout as he crashed down the stairs, and then a loud snap silenced him.
Gasping for air, Sam flopped onto his belly. He’d lost the Beretta when he’d hit the ground. Now, he spotted it at the edge of the landing. Eighteen inches, tops. But he was exposed, and the world still hadn’t quite settled down after the blow to his head. He was aware of Ophelia screaming, a wordless noise of rage punctuated by another shot.
Dragging himself to the edge of the landing, Sam wrapped his hand around the Beretta. The composite grip was pleasantly cool in his hand; everywhere else, he felt like he had a fever. Heckler must have retreated, because he couldn’t see her below him, but Lampo was pinned down on the landing. The balding man swore and fired once at Ophelia, and when she pulled back into her hiding spot, Lampo darted down the stairs.
Sam was ready for him. He shot once, taking Lampo in the thigh, and the dirty cop stumbled, squealed, and hit the wall hard enough that his fancy comb-over flopped to the side and exposed the bald spot. Lampo came to rest two stairs down, still making that squealing noise, his gun forgotten as he clamped both hands around his thigh.
“Oh my God!” His voice was shrill. Hysterical. “I’ve been shot, I’ve been shot, I’ve been—”
The sound of sirens interrupted him.
And then, from Heckler: “Aww, fuck.”
The back of Lampo’s head exploded as a round from Heckler tore through his skull. Then, from her hiding spot below, Heckler tossed her handgun onto the stairs.
“I’m unarmed,” Heckler said. “I surrender unconditionally.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Rufus had never seen so many cops at one location in all his life. The street in Queens was congested with black-and-whites, and uniformed officers swarmed the auto shop like ants at a picnic. Ophelia had Bridget Heckler in cuffs, and Rufus thought, if ever there was a criminal who didn’t deserve her Miranda rights, it was her. Because as far as he was concerned, a human being who killed good men, who kidnapped and abused children, didn’t have rights. He thought of what Bruno had asked him, about how long Rufus would last on Rikers as a snitch.
A snitch behind bars was one thing.
But a cop behind bars? So long, Heckler.
The kids had been escorted out of the garage, taken in awaiting buses to the closest hospital where Rufus hoped good cops like Ophelia would be able to reunite them with the families they’d been ripped from. He and Sam were sent to the hospital too—scrapes and bruises for Sam, and Rufus had a mild concussion and needed a few stitches in his head, which required buzzing some of his wild hair to reach the gash, but they were both doing a hell of a lot better than Bruno and Lampo, that much was certain.
Rufus didn’t have any idea how big the sex trade was or how many cops were involved in the prostitution of exploited teens, but at least they’d gotten a few of them. And with the cell phone Jake had left behind, hopefully they’d track down all the guilty parties. Jake wouldn’t have settled for anything less.
The hospital hadn’t officially discharged Rufus, but with the blood cleaned up and bottles of pain killers and antibiotics in-hand, he