The Coffin Dancer (Lincoln Rhyme 2)

"Yeah. What's going on?"

"Jodie's the Dancer."

"What?"

"Stephen Kall was the diversion. Jodie killed him. It was his body in the park we found. Where's Percey?"

"In her room. Up the hall. But how--"

"No time. He's going for the kill right now. If the marshals're still alive, tell them to get into a defensive position in one of the rooms. If they're dead, find Percey and Bell and get out. Dellray's scrambled SWAT, but it'll be twenty or thirty minutes before they're there."

"But there're eight guards. He can't've taken them all out . . . "

"Sachs," he said sternly, "remember who he is. Move! Call me when you're safe."

Bell! she thought suddenly, recalling the detective's still posture, his head slumped forward.

She raced to her door, threw it open, drew her gun. The black living room and corridor gaped. Dark. Only faint dawn light filtering into the rooms. She listened. A shuffle. A clink of metal. But where were the sounds coming from?

Sachs turned toward Bell's room and trotted as quietly as she could.

He got her just before she got to his room.

As the figure stepped from the doorway she dropped into a crouch and swung the Glock toward him. He grunted and slapped the pistol from her hand. Without thinking, she shoved him forward, slamming his back into the wall.

Groping for her switchblade.

Roland Bell gasped, "Hold up there. Hey, now . . . "

Sachs let go of his shirt.

"It's you!"

"You scared the everlivin' you-know-what outta me. What's--"

"You're all right!" she said.

"Just dozed off for a minute. What's going on?"

"Jodie's the Dancer. Rhyme just called."

"What? How?"

"I don't know." She looked around, shivering in panic. "Where're the guards?"

The hall was empty.

Then she recognized the smell she'd wondered about. It was blood! Like hot copper. And she knew then that all the guards were dead. Sachs went to retrieve her weapon, which was lying on the floor. She frowned, looking at the end of the grip. Where the clip should have been was an empty hole. She picked up the gun.

"No!"

"What?" Bell asked.

"My clip. It's gone." She slapped her utility belt. The two clips in the keepers were gone too.

Bell drew his weapons--the Glock and the Browning. They too were clipless. The chambers of the guns were empty too.

"In the car!" she stammered. "I'll bet he did it in the car. He was sitting between us. Fidgeting all the time. Bumping into us."