The Monuments Men Murders (The Art of Murder 4)

Instinct—and training—kicked in.

“Get down!” Jason knocked de Haan to the floor of the porch, aware of J.J. leaping left.

Bullets laced across the log cabin exterior, shattering glass and sending white wood chips and the stuffing from the cushions on chairs flying. From inside the building came screams and shouts of terror.

The automatic gunfire sent Jason’s heart thundering in his chest, and blood roared in his ears. For a vital second or two, black edged across the corners of his vision. He desperately, desperately, did not want to be shot again.

“Move,” he urged de Haan, blindly pushing him to crawl to the end of the porch. De Haan didn’t budge, his terrified gaze frozen on the swift-approaching truck. Jason spared a sideways look and saw the ranch house door slam behind Thompson. J.J., like him, was flattened to the planks of the porch, taking aim at the ever-larger target.

They were trained to handle this, but the surge of adrenaline was sickening. In a flash, Jason’s fine muscle control was gone, his vision narrowed down to pinpoints: the sunlight glinting off the shooter’s belt buckle, the tactical glasses the driver wore, the music blasting from inside the cab. Music?

Beneath the tuttut-tuttut-tuttut of automatic gunfire, “Old Town Road” floated on the dry, dusty breeze.

“Hans, move.” Jason steadied his Glock and fired at the truck’s right tire.

The tire went with a bang, the truck lurched, veered right, and the driver lost control. As the vehicle began to spin out, the shooter lost his balance and swung his assault rifle skyward, still firing. Bullets ripped through roof of the porch and the overhanging tree branches. The air smelled acrid, a sulfuric mix of engine oil and propellant and burnt wood.

Everything was happening at light speed, and yet somehow at the same time, in slow mo. Jason could hear J.J. swearing, hear de Haan praying, hear the people inside the building screaming and crying, hear his own quick, shallow breaths—which he immediately tried to slow and deepen. He took aim again.

J.J. fired and the shooter flew back, flung forward, and fell out of the careening truck. He hit the ground like a rag doll. The truck crashed into a tree and sent a wooden swing flying across the yard. Jason scrambled up, jumped over the railing, and ran toward the truck as the driver’s door opened.

“Out of the vehicle with your hands on your head. Do it now!”

The driver, blood streaming down his face, locked his hands behind his head, staggered out from behind the door, knelt—and then pitched forward in a face-plant.

“Can’t nobody tell me nothin’…” repeated the voice on the radio.

Jason reached the driver, weapon trained on the man’s inert form, ready to shoot if the asshole so much as twitched. He planted his knee in the guy’s back, holstered his weapon, yanked one limp arm back and cuffed him, cuffed his other wrist, and rolled the driver over.

He was out cold.

He was also young. Early twenties. Wispy blond hair and an even wispier attempt at a beard.

Jesus Christ. Was this the Montana version of a drive-by?

“Russell?” he yelled.

“This fucker’s dead,” Russell shouted back. Like Jason, he sounded out of breath and pumped up on adrenaline.

“Hans?”

No answer.

Jason looked back in alarm.

Hans waved to him from the porch, clambered unsteadily to his feet. He dropped into one of the bullet-riddled chairs and put his face in his hands.

The door to the main ranch house flew open, and a mob of people poured out, everyone shouting and talking at once.

The Park County Sheriff’s Office arrived before the FBI, but not by much. First on-scene was Bozwin Police Chief Amos Sandford.

Jason was unclear why the Bozwin chief of police had been summoned by Bert Thompson—Big Sky Guest Ranch was not even in the same county—but he was doing his best to cooperate.

Sandford reminded him a bit of a disgruntled polar bear. He was a big man. Tall, broad, and heavy. Not fat—not yet—but getting there. He had eyes the color of dirty ice and a head of longish silvery-white hair that furthered the impression of a dangerous arctic animal woken too early from hibernation.

He had been in the process of chewing out Jason and J.J. when the procession of government cars started down the long dirt road, and the sight of that cavalcade of shiny G-rides just made him louder and angrier.

“I want to know what the hell the FBI is doing traipsing around in my backyard without so much as a by-your-leave.”