It was as if the lower floor of the library was plunged into hellish darkness when the power went out. There were no windows, naturally, since it was below ground level, but the opening where the escalators came down from the ground floor let in light from above. And since there were a lot of windows up there, it meant that a considerable amount of light slanted down to the lower level.
But the difference was so sudden, so unexpected, that for two seconds everyone down there (Jake included) couldn't see much of anything. The shock made several people cry out in fright. A gun blasted somewhere, deafeningly loud, and that caused more terror-filled screaming.
Calhoun didn't have to see to do what he died. He twisted sharply and lashed out with his left arm. His forearm struck Brooke's arm and knocked it to the side. He hoped she wouldn't jerk the trigger and fire the .32, endangering innocent hostages.
But he couldn't stay a prisoner himself and hope to do any good.
Brooke cried out, but the gun in her hand didn't go off. Calhoun planted his hand against her shoulder and gave her a hard shove that sent her flying backwards. In the next split second, he drove forward, hoping to grab Lark Barlow again and maybe get the hand once more.
Barlow was already gone, though, darting away into the shadows. Calhoun's hurried gaze couldn't find him. More shots roared. Muzzle flame split the gloom. Shrieks of pain and fear ripped the air.
Somewhere, Barlow shouted, "Kill Weaver! Kill him!"
Instinct sent Calhoun diving to the floor. A bullet whistled somewhere above him but didn't come close. He came up on hands and knees, scrambled behind one of the love seats, and heard a slug thud into it. Another lunge carried him into the stacks, those rows and rows of shelves full of old volumes and bound periodicals. The shadows really were thick in those narrow aisles. With each step he took, it grew darker around him.
Not that he minded that. Darkness was his best friend right now.
As he ran, he trailed the fingers of his left hand along the shelves beside him. When he came to an opening, he ducked into it. It was a good thing he did, because one second later, Barlow or one of his goons reached the spot where Calhoun had disappeared into the stacks and emptied a magazine of 9mm rounds along that aisle.
By then, Calhoun was 2 aisles over, moving as quietly as he could. He glided along that path for a moment, found another of the cross aisles, and slipped into it.
"Dammit!" Barlow yelled. "Use your phone lights! Get your asses in there and find him!"
Calhoun stayed on the move, weaving his way through the stacks toward the back of the lower level. The wheels of his brain turned over rapidly. He had already figured out that was the direction he needed to go. The stairwell was back there. If he could reach it, he could head up and lose himself somewhere on the other floors of the library. Barlow didn't have enough people to hunt him down.
Once he'd accomplished that, he could start planning his counterattack.
Counting Brooke, Barlow had only 4 allies on this level. He couldn't sent all of them after Calhoun, because the hostages might well panic and try to escape if they weren't being closely guarded. Calhoun looked back toward the front of the room and spotted 2 moving, flickering glows among the stacks. Those were the two men Barlow had sent after him, using the lights on their phones to look for him.
Calhoun wanted to avoid them if possible, but he would take his chances against them if he had to. He liked the odds if he had to take them on one at a time, even though they had guns.
He didn't let himself think about Brooke and her stunning betrayal. Those thoughts tried to crowd into his mind, but he wouldn't permit them to do so. Later, what she'd done would be painful to consider---assuming he was still alive to do so.
Assuming any of them made it through this alive.
His eyes had adjusted to the shadows. He knew he wasn't far from the stairwell.
Unfortunately, the same thought must have occurred to Barlow. The man shouted, "Get to the stairs! Don't let him get out that way! Keep him trapped in those shelves!"
So much for stealth, Calhoun thought. He broke into a run, his shoes pounding against the floor as he headed for the stairwell.
Normally an exit light burned over the heavy steel door with its push bar. Since the power was out, that light was dark now, but Calhoun was able to spot the door anyway as he emerged from the stacks. The stairwell was about 20 feet to his left, beyond a pair of water fountains. The doors to the men's and women's restrooms were back to his right.
As he turned toward the stairs, one of Barlow's men emerged from an aisle beyond the metal door. The light from the phone in his left hand splashed over Calhoun, who slowed down, but only for 1 second, just long enough to grab a heavy book from the end of a shelf he was passing.
He flung the thick volume at the gunman as hard as he could.
The book struck the man's gun hand and knocked it aside just as he pulled the trigger. The bullet whined off one of the metal shelves in the stacks.
Calhoun had charged right behind the thrown book. His outstretched left hand clamped around the gunman's right wrist. Calhoun's right fist rocketed up and crashed into the man's jaw with enough force to slew his head far around to the side. He went limp.
Footsteps slapped the floor behind Calhoun, who spun around and pulled the stunned gunman with him. Flame spurted twice from the muzzle of the gun fired by the man who'd just emerged from the stacks in front of the restrooms. Calhoun heard the bullet smack into the back of the first gunman and felt his body jerk. The pain jolted the man back to consciousness for a second as his eyes widened. Then they began to glaze over in death.
Calhoun plucked the dead man's gun from nerveless fingers, thrust his arm under the man's arm, and triggered twice as the pistol Calhoun had just freed belched fire three times. The trio of swift shots spun the second gunman off his feet. His gun flew out of his hand.
Calhoun might've liked to have that second pistol, but it had landed somewhere in the stacks and he wasn't going to take the time to hunt for it. He did slap the pockets of the first man as he lowered the corpse to the floor and came up with three magazines. He hoped they were fully loaded but didn't take the time to check as he stuffed them in his pocket, then slapped open the stairwell door.
It was pitch black in there as once the door swung closed behind Calhoun. He wished he had some way to wedge it closed so Barlow's men couldn't peruse him, but there was nothing he could use for that. Instead he switched the gun to his left hand, since the stair railing was on his right, and started up as fast as he could, sliding his hand along the rail so he would know when he reached a landing.
Running upstairs in the dark was more of a challenge than he thought it'd be. He stumbled several times and dropped to a knee once, banging it painfully on the stair riser. But he didn't waste any time getting to the next level, which was the ground floor.
He was able to make out line of light coming through the little gap around the door on this level. It was a lot brighter here because of the large windows in the library's front wall.
Calhoun hesitated for a moment, unsure whether to try leaving the stairwell here. There was at least a chance he'd be able to fight his way past Barlow's men and reach the doors before they could stop him. Then he'd be out.
But he wasn't sure he wanted to be out. Once he left the library, he wouldn't be able to do anything to stop Barlow's plan. All the innocent people in here would be left to that madman's mercy!
A short time earlier, he would have included Brooke with those innocent people, he thought bitterly. Now that he knew the truth about her, he felt like he should hate her and believe that whatever happened to her, she had it coming.
Somehow, he just couldn't do that.
If he escaped from the library, eventually things would come down to a bloodbath. The authorities would breach the building sooner or later. There was no way of knowing how many would be slaughtered in that battle. Taking Barlow down from the inside was still the best chance to minimize loss of life, Calhoun decided.
He started up the stairs to the second floor.
As he climbed, he thought that probably all the members of Barlow's bunch were carrying satellite phones. Barlow seemed to be pretty smart. He would have anticipated that the authorities would take the cell towers offline and jam the walkie-talkie bands. It'd be hard to stop the sat phones from being able to communicate with each other, though. By now Barlow would've warned his men on the other floors of the library about Calhoun being loose. All they had to do was guard the doors to the stairs and be ready to shoot him down if he poked his head out.
He might've escaped one trap by charging right into another, he mused. But under the circumstances, there was nothing else he could have done.
When he reached the second floor, he didn't stop. He didn't even slow down. The idea of going all the way to the roof had begun to nibble around the edges of his brain. If he could get up there, he might be able to communicate somehow with whatever law enforcement agencies were on hand. He might even be able to help them work out a plan to storm the building without too much loss of life.
There was still the matter of those bombs, Calhoun reminded himself. He still believed there was a good chance Barlow was running a bluff. Barlow's men could have planted one, perhaps two, actual bombs, just enough to make it seem like a possibility that he could blow up the whole campus.
Or maybe by the end of the day, what had been Stonewall College would be just a huge, smoking crater in the ground. Calhoun didn't know. One thing was sure, though. Lark Barlow couldn't set off any bombs if he was dead.
Even though only a few minutes had passed, it was starting to seem to Calhoun like he'd been climbing forever in the darkness. There was one landing between each floor, so he knew when he reached the 3rd floor. He paused at the door this time and wondered why none of Barlow's men had started down from above. They would have had him cornered in the stairwell with nowhere to go. He supposed they didn't want to risk a firefight in such cramped quarters. They might feel like they had a better chance by waiting him out.
He pressed his ear to the door and heard nothing from the other side. Well, that made sense, he told himself. If there were two of Barlow's men on this level, one of them would be watching any hostages they had taken---probably not many, considering that this floor was devoted to Special Collections and not as many students utilized those----while the other would be hidden somewhere with a good view of the door to the stairwell, ready to fire if Calhoun emerged from it.
He thought about kicking the door open to draw the gunmen's fire, then trying to pick him off. Every bit he could whittle down the odds against him made it more likely he would survive the last showdown.
He had just about thrown out the idea, though, when he heard a sudden crash on the other side of the door. A man yelled, "What the hell?" at the same time as someone else let out a startled, incoherent cry.
Then guns began to roar, but Calhoun realized quickly that none of the bullets were striking the door. Nobody was shooting at him.
That meant that someone else was in serious trouble in there, and Calhoun didn't hesitate once that thought went through his head.
He bulled the door open with his shoulder and plunged out into the third floor with the pistol gripped in both hands, ready to deal out death.
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