As if it were a signal, someone fired from the house, a shot he first felt as a burning past his cheek. Immediately afterward he heard the instantaneous report, so close it sounded like cannon fire.
Lobison fell into an instinctive pe and rolled, coming to his feet again behind the trunk of a tree, shaking snow from his eyes. Romanov shouted something, and almost simultaneously there was a crash of glass and breaking wood from the back of the house. There were yells and screams and more shots.
"Ben! Are you all right!"
"I'm okay, you?"
"I'm good!"
And that was all the time they had for conversation as another shot hit the tree he was standing behind. It tore away a chunk of bark and he flinched away, and in that same instant the house exploded with a thunderous roar, blowing out the walls and bursting into an immense ball of flame. The wind whipped up and fanned the flames higher and the heat was so intense that even from behind the tree the force of it pushed him into retreat, hands half raised in a futile effort to ward it off. His heel caught on a thick root and he fell hard and clumsily.
As he fell, the wind tossed the branches between him and the burning house. Shadows cast by the moon formed and broke and formed again. For just an instant he thought he saw a four-legged form, dark and somehow elegant, leaping through a top-floor window to the roof of the porch. From the porch it leapt in a dark, fluid continuation of movement to the ground, and melted into the trees as if it had never been.
"A stray bullet hit the propane tank at the back of the house," the chief of detectives said. "Kaboom. "
"Jesus," Lobison said. "Our bullet, or theirs?"
"Don't know," the chief said firmly, "and don't want to know, so don't ask again. "
Lobison felt dizzy, disoriented, and generally pissed off. It was, he felt, a reasonable response to nearly being blown up. Romanov, by contrast, looked barely ruffled, the moonlight giving her an ethereal, other-worldly glow. God, she was so gorgeous it made him want to bite.
Her eyes widened as if she could hear his thoughts, and he looked away and cleared his throat. "How many bodies?"
"Eight," the chief said, "but they're still counting crispy critters in there, and they will be for a while. It was a pretty efficient explosion. If anyone was in the house, they're dead. "
Next to him Romanov said quietly, "The local cops say there were twenty-three family members spread over three generations, all residing at this address. "
"Three generations?" Lobison said.
"No children," Romanov said, answering what he'd meant rather than what he'd said. "The youngest of them was twenty-three. They evidently . . . " She hesitated, seeming to search for the correct word. "It appears that each generation evidently married early and had children very young. "
In some distant part of his brain Lobison was relieved at the news, but it felt as if he had received it at a distance, one step removed from himself. He shook his head again, not in disbelief but in an attempt to shake off his disorientation. His stomach growled, loud enough for Romanov and the chief both to hear. That was nuts, he'd had a Pop All-Dark at the Lucky Wishbone just before they'd headed out, he couldn't possibly be hungry.
Romanov looked at him and he felt the weight of her considering gaze. He shook his head a third time, almost angrily. The scent of her perfume seemed to increase in intensity, so that he could smell nothing but her.
The chief took Lobison's demeanor as remorse over the slaughter. "I wouldn't weep any real tears one way or another," he said. "We found this. " He held out a dented metal box. "Explosion blew it out one of the windows. Looks like trophies from all thirteen victims. Your partner's already ID'd some of them. "
Lobison took the box
automatically, looking inside it, recognizing a ponytail holder, an earring, a pitiful jumble of personal objects that held no meaning except to the loved ones left behind.
"One for the books," the chief said. "A whole family of serial killers. I put it in NCIC and the Feebs are practically pissing in their pants. They're sending up a profiler from Quantico on the red-eye. A whole family," he said again, marveling, and then brightened. "I guess the family that preys together stays together. " He laughed at his own joke and elbowed Lobison. "'Preys together?' Get it?"
"Jesus," Lobison said again, only this time it was a whisper. "The guy who called. He was telling the truth. It was them. "
"Damn straight it was," the chief said. "The way I see it, we're damn lucky that stray bullet caught the propane tank and fried the whole bunch of them. This way we've got the perpetrators of thirteen bloodthirsty murders dead to rights - " He laughed again. "And we don't even have to bring them to trial. Not to mention, you both get gold shields. " He grinned. "It's the gift that keeps on giving, Sergeants. Merry Christmas. " He looked over Lobison's shoulder. "Oh, crap. "
"What?" Romanov followed his gaze. A Channel 2 truck was pulling into the yard.
"Who called us?" Lobison said. "Who tipped us off?"
"Who cares?" the chief said, straightening his tie. "I'll take these assholes for you. " He winked at them. "You two head on home. Sleep in, come in late. Reports on my desk tomorrow by end of shift. "
"Yes, sir," Romanov said.
The chief headed for the television crew, and Lobison registered the logo on the side of the van for the first time. "Shit," he said, and pulled out his cell. "I've got to call my family before this hits the news. They're always expecting to see me dead or dying on film at ten. "
Romanov was amused. "Your family worries about you on the job?"