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Soh the three rooms the team had rented in the trailer court, Davette ended up alone in the same room with Felix

And she didn’t think she was up to it

It was only the third time she’d seen the man The first she re shivering holes in her with his angry eyes The second tiain at his saloon office By the ti Annabelle and Ada Jack’s check for 50,000 and studiously ignoring her And that had been as bad, so stared at

But this time was the worst of all Because this time she knehat he’d just done She had sat there beside Annabelle while Cat patiently related the events of the day There was no tiain in two more hours - but Cat was a natural storyteller, wise in his use of detail Besides listening raptly, Davette noticed, Annabelle kept a sotten to her, reerous their line of as They had to make records now because it was entirely possible that every single man on the Team could be dead by sunset and someone had to be able to pass on what they had learned so far

But what had really gotten to her was the story itself The Felix part of the story The lightning-fast, deadly accurate, cold-calm-killer part of the story

"He saved our lives, Annie," Cat had said with quiet sincerity, carefully looking her in the eye "We’d all be dead without hi sently, "Then you’re happy with him, Cherry?"

He had smiled back and softly replied, "Got to be"

Davette hadn’t been at all sure what that had : Felix was not happy

He hadn’t actually said so He hadn’t actually said ht about it But she could read it And so could everyone else HeHe did anshen asked a specific question or even when asked for an opinion on some aspect of Jack’s Plan And his ansere concise and to the point But he wasn’t really with the hi he was But he didn’t look it He looked stunned Almost dazed

But no one pursued this, because Jack Crow did not

And now he sat there in the dusty easy chair in the corner of thathis weapons He had newspaper spread out on a lumpy ottoman and the parts of his pistols spread out on that and the only sounds were the rustle of the newsprint and the precision snicks and clicks of well-oiled firearms

At the far corner of the room, Davette stood in the little kitchenette where they’d cooked the Team’s lunch She had offered to tidy up but that had been awhile back when the room was filled with people and now she didn’t know if she was still there because she wanted td stay or was just frightened to walk past Felix to get out

So she stayed there in the corner, cleaning and recleaning like solances at hi like a complete idiot until she couldn’t stand it anymore and just made herself stop, just stop and stand there with her hands on the edge of the sink and stare out that gris like: What’s the ether, and it worked a bit She was almost calm when she felt the silence and turned around and he was just sitting there staring into space

Then he looked up, caught her watching hied a: "Can I get you solass, reached for it "Some more ice water?" he asked

"No!" she alet it"

And as she walked toward hi and wondered if anything in the world couldlike such a fool and then she reached for his glass and saw his face and it all went away

My God! she thought, seeing those tired, tired eyes, he looks terrible!

He did He looked beaten, blasted, worn doorn out He looked like a man who had just decided to colass and walked back to refill it that she realized that that was exactly what had happened when he had decided to join Tea about and why he looked the way he did and her butterflies went away and so else, warmer, more solid, replaced thelass and sat down at the tiny little built-in breakfast table and sipped her cold coffee and for several moments that’s all that happened in the roo in silence

And there’s nothing I can say to change it, she kept thinking

Ada door to the next room

He always looks ten years older dressed like that, she thought

"Felix?" he called quietly "Would you like to take confession?"

The gunman looked up, a quizzical expression on his face, and replied, to the others’ total surprise, "Yeah I would"

Felix put his cigarette out in the ashtray and stood up "How does it work?"

Ada, robed arm "It’s easy"

Less than fivebriskly back into the room alone He stopped, looked around the roouns Then he walked over and picked up his glass of ice water and drained it down

Ada mournful

"I’m sorry, Adam," said Felix when he saw hiht And when Felix turned away fron of the cross to his back Then, with a sad s across from her at the tiny breakfast table He seemed to feel the need to explain to her and she could see hied, laughed a rueful silent laugh, and said, "I wasn’t having any fun"

She sht-blond hair And so they sat there for severalfoolish and excited and infinitely sad and he feeling what? Numb, she supposed He certainly looked nulance

After the dozenth dry sip, she realized she ot up and went over to the kitchenette for another refill When she turned back around, he was gone

Two hours and forty minutes later, they hit the Johnson County Jail

Jack’s Plan was based on Felix’s flares Or rather, what they had done to that wo the ZZ Top sweatshirt

"Of course it didn’t kill her," he explained patiently to a doubtful Cat "But it sure as hell got her attention And re those sparks off, she wasn’t attacking anyone"

Carl had frowned "So?"

Jack smiled slyly "So what else - for just a few seconds, ?"

Of course, no one knew Not for sure But everyone - even Felix - had an idea or three But it was Carl Joplin who really brought it ho’s blood is a lot like a man’s"

Thirty oodies

But Jack wanted so else; he wanted soo without it - the job had to be done and done right now - but he wanted the effort made

He and the deputy went to the telephone and started tracing down the sheriff It took several h by radio before the deputy put his hand over the ot him"

Jack reached for the phone Deputy Thompson pulled it out of his reach

"Mr Crow, I don’t wanna insult you But I think you’d better let ht a ht outside when he wants to talk to me"

The deputy barely smiled "I’ll keep that in mind"

Fifteen anxiousHe’d gotten everything the Team needed for the job - except the sheriff

"Sorry, Mr Crow," offered Deputy Thoet there before four PM"

Crow lit a cigarette "It’ll have to do" He turned to the rest of the Tea room "Okay, sports fans, we’re on Rock and roll"

"Rock and roll!" echoed back at hi

Cat, ever bold, directed the driver of the limo to don Cleburne, only four blocks off the main square, to Prather’s Feed & Seed He escorted Annabelle and Davette inside and commenced to buy poison for rats, ether some five pounds of the stuff Then he chose, froallon aquariuuppies, and angelfish He did buy, for reasons only another Cat would understand, an aerator in the forht red boots

"I alanted one," was his only response to the women’s puzzled looks

Kirk drove Jack and Felix to Wal-asoline cans and two funnels, three of the largest fire extinguishers available, and two packets of balloons in various colors

They filled up both gas cans at the next-door Exxon station

Carl and Adahterhouse that specialized in preparing gas in the back pen When the owner found out they weren’t interested in the carcasses - just the blood - he assumed they were Satan worshippers A devout Baptist, he then doubled the price as a matter of principle The technician and the Catholic priest exchanged tired looks between them Then they paid up without a word and drove aith the blood

The three groups met, an hour and a half later, in the empty driveway of the sheriff’s e the women loose

"Get out of here, Annie," Jack told her firun?"

Annabelle nodded nervously and clutched her purse htly

"Okay," said Crow He looked over at the unifor out-of-place and worried

"Fire that guy," Jack ordered her "Have him take you to a car-rental place Or better, have him take you to the airport Then take a taxi to the car-rental place Make hi town"

Annabelle frowned "I don’t think he knows anything that’s going on Or cares, for that riht?"

She nodded "Right"

"Okay Move"

She started to go, stopped She put a hand to his cheek

"Be careful, dear," she said softly

Jack stared a second Annabelle had never done that before

But then he shook it off and the set"

And Annabelle smiled back and herded in the silent Davette with a look and then, without another word, the ladies and the li one - when the men simply stood there and watched the car drive off

"Okay, people," said Jack quietly, "let’s saddle up"

And he walked over to the Blazer and pulled out his own chainit on The other inside warriors - Cat, Adam, and Felix - did the same Carl and Deputy Thompson stood and watched them No one spoke

Jack did a quick check to see that the four were buttoned up right, then nodded to Deputy Tho place deep in his holster Then he went over to what looked to the others like a garden storage shed beside the sheriffs garage

Except that it took two dead bolts and a combination to open its four-inch-thick fire door From inside, the deputy produced one case, twenty-count, CS (Military) Type tear-gas grenades and seven gas masks Carl, Jack, and the deputy showed Cat and Felix how to adjust the renades When everybody seeot in the vehicles, with the patrol car in the lead, and headed back for don Clebuot to the Johnson County Jail, there were three police cars and six uniforear, waiting for them

"Dammit!" hissed Jack Crohen he saw them "How the hell did they know?"

"They didn’t," offered the deputy from beside him "I had to tell them"

At first Crow couldn’t speak When at last be tried, the deputy wouldn’t let him

"Hold it, Mr Crow!" Kirk snapped And then, , letwith the Cleburne Police They aren’t corrupt They aren’t cowards And they aren’t stupid People being killed byto stop it - and then the mayor hires somebody who can and then their chief tells them not to help out Don’t you think they know there’s so on?"

He paused a

"Now," the deputy continued, "I know these sixthey’re on our side?" piped Cat fro Jack Crow "They don’t know you As far as they could tell, you ht be the cause of all this!"

"Then whose side," asked Jack quietly, "are they on?"

The deputy sh They’ll watch our backs while we go inside?"

"They will"

"Do they knoe’re about to try?"

"Yes"

"Do they knohat has to be done if we can’t cut it?"

"They know"

"Okay, deputy Let’s do it"

The Teanal and stood on the sidewalk in front of the jail asse to anyone except the deputy and that was so low no one else heard as said

But they didn’t try to arrest anyone Or even slow theot a break," whispered Cat to Crow

Crow nodded "Looks like," he whispered back "Quite a kid, that deputy

"You’re not thinking about recruiting him, are you bwana?" Cat asked wickedly

Jack’s face was blank "Don’t need to He’ll volunteer If you know"

"Yeah," growled Cat sourly "I know If we live long enough to be volunteered to"

"Right Now, Kirk and I will go inside and get the rest of the stuff we need"

"You want us to start pouring the blood?"

"Wait till we get back Deputy?"

The deputy stepped away from the two policemen he had spoken to

"Ready?" asked Jack

"Ready," said the deputy And with a nod to the policeht

There were only four Two at the booking counter, one in the back sitting behind a desk staring dully at a typewriter, and the last drinking thirstily from the water fountain

All were pale, dead eyed, weak

And owned

It was there in their faces, in their posture, in the resigned, almost relieved, manner in which they stood there and allowed theht of as so at the booking desk, a pale fair-haired e for a jury-rigged red button stuck to the ithtape

Jack snatched the other man’s wrist away from the alarm in midair and felt the bones in Dan’s arroaned so sharply, Jack instinctively let loose of hiers already for on the wrist

"Good Lord!" whispered Kirk

Jack looked at hi his arm "You see it, too?"

"Hell, yeah, I see it!" cried Kirk "What the hell’s the matter with him?"