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Sampson was gone!
I didn’t see his body anyway. At first, I figured I was just disoriented. But then I was sure I wasn’t. His body had been over there — near a tall beech tree. Now it wasn’t.
No warnings, Alex.
No prisoners.
Do you understand what I’m saying?
I heard his words echo inside my head. I could hear the exact sound of it.
“Put down your guns,” I said to Starkey and Griffin. “Drop them right now. Now!”
They looked puzzled, but Starkey and Griffin kept their guns aimed at me.
“I’m going to cut you everywhere,” Starkey said. “This is gonna take hours. We’ll be here till morning. I promise.”
“Put down the guns!” I heard Sampson’s voice before I saw him walk out from behind a beech tree. “And the knife, Starkey! You’re not cutting anybody.”
Warren Griffin spun around. Two shots instantly caught him in the throat and upper chest. His gun went off as he fell over backward to the ground. Arterial blood pumped from his wounds as he died.
“Starkey, no!” I yelled. “No!”
Thomas Starkey had raised his gun at me. Then he took one high in the chest. It didn’t stop him. A second shot stung Starkey in the side and spun him full around. A third blasted through Starkey’s forehead, and he went down for good in a bloody heap. His gun and K-Bar fell into the gully near my feet. His blank eyes stared into the night sky.
No prisoners.
Sampson was weaving toward me. As he came forward he rasped, “I’m okay, I’m okay.”
Just before he collapsed into my arms.
Part Five
FOUR BLIND MICE
Chapter 100
AS IT TURNED out, Jamilla was a godsend after the shootings in Georgia.
She called every day, often two or three times, and we talked until she could tell I was healing some. Sampson was the one who’d been physically wounded, and he was healing now too, but I was the one who seemed hurt the most. There had been too much killing, for too long, in my life.
Early one morning Dr. Kayla Coles arrived at the house on Fifth Street. She marched right into the kitchen where Nana and I were eating breakfast.
“What’s that?” she asked with an arched eyebrow, pointing an accusatory finger.
“It’s decaf. Just terrible. A memory of real coffee, and a bad one at that,” Nana told her with a straight face.
“No, I’m talking about Alex’s plate. What are you eating?”
I pointed out the ingredients for her. “These are two eggs, over easy. What’s left of two hot sausage patties. Home fries, slightly burned. The remains of a homemade sticky bun. Mmm-mmm good.”
“You made this for him?” She looked at Nana in horror.
“No, Alex made it for himself. He’s been cooking most of the breakfasts since my fainting spell. He’s treating himself this morning because his big murder case is finally over. And he’s feeling better.”
“Then I take it you don’t always eat like this?”
I smiled at her. “No, Doctor. I don’t usually eat eggs, sausage, sticky buns, and greasy potatoes. I was almost killed down in Georgia, and I’m celebrating that I wasn’t. I guess that I prefer death by breakfast. Care to join us?”
