Gone South by Robert R. McCammon Read Free Book Online

him from behind.
    “Get him out!” Blanchard hollered. “He’s gone crazy!”
    A pair of husky arms had clamped around Dan’s chest, pinning his own arms at his sides. Dan thrashed to break free, but the security guard was strong. The grip tightened, forcing the air from Dan’s lungs. “Get him outta here!” Blanchard had wedged himself into a corner, his face mottled with red. “Faye, call the police!”
    “Yes, sir!” She’d been standing in the open door, and she hurried to the phone on her desk.
    Dan kept fighting. He couldn’t stand to be confined, the pressure on his chest driving him to further heights of frenzy. “Hold still, damn it!” the guard said, and he began dragging Dan to the door. “Come on, you’re goin’ with —”
    Panic made Dan snap his head backward, and the guard’s nose popped as bone met cartilage! The man gave a wounded grunt, and suddenly Dan was free. As Dan turned toward him, he saw the guard — a man as big as a football linebacker, wearing a gray uniform — sitting on his knees on the carpet. His cap had spun away, his black hair cropped in a severe crew cut, his hands cupped over his nose with blood leaking between the sausage-thick fingers. “You busted my nose!” he gasped, his eyes slitted and wet with pain. “You sumbitch, you busted my nose!”
    The sight of blood skidded Dan back to reality. He hadn’t meant to hurt anyone; he hadn’t meant to tear up this man’s office. He was in a bad dream, and surely he must soon wake up.
    But the bad dream took another, more wicked turn.
    “You sumbitch,” the guard said again, and he reached with bloody fingers to the pistol in a holster at his waist. He pulled the gun loose, snapping off the safety as it cleared the leather.
    Going to shoot me, Dan thought. He saw the man’s finger on the trigger. For an instant the smell of ozone came to him — a memory of danger in the silver-dripping jungle — and the flesh prickled at the back of his neck.
    He lunged for the guard, seized the man’s wrist, and twisted the gun aside. The guard reached up with his free hand to claw at Dan’s eyes, but Dan hung on. He heard Mrs. Duvall shout, “The police are comin’!” The guard was trying to get to his feet; a punch caught Dan in the rib cage and almost toppled him, but still he held on to the guard’s wrist. Another punch was coming, and Dan snapped his left hand forward with the palm out and smashed the man’s bleeding nose. As the guard bellowed and fell back, Dan wrenched the pistol loose. He got his hand on the grip and fumbled to snap the safety on again.
    He heard a click behind him.
    He knew that sound.
    Death had found him. It had slid from its hole here in this sweltering office, and it was about to sink its fangs.
    Dan whirled around. Blanchard had opened a desk drawer and was lifting a pistol to take aim, the hammer cocked back and a finger on the trigger. Blanchard’s face was terrified, and Dan knew the man meant to kill him.
    It took a second.
    One second.
    Something as old as survival took hold of Dan. Something ancient and unthinking, and it swept Dan’s sense aside in a feverish rush.
    He fired without aiming. The pistol’s crack vibrated through his hand, up his snake-tattooed forearm and into his shoulder.
    “Uh,” Blanchard said.
    Blood spurted from a hole in his throat.
    Blanchard staggered back, his yellow necktie turning scarlet. His gun went off, and Dan flinched as he heard the bullet hiss past his head and thunk into the doorjamb. Then Blanchard crashed to the floor amid the family photographs, fox-hunt prints, and leather-bound books.
    Mrs. Duvall screamed.
    Dan heard someone moan. It was not Blanchard, nor the guard. He looked at the pistol in his hand, then at the splatter of red that lay across Blanchard’s desk. “Oh, God,” Dan said as the horror of what he’d just done hit him full force. “Oh, my God … no …”
    The gears of the universe seemed to shift. Everything shut down