Ghost Hand (#Wattys2016)

Chapter 29, Pizza with a Side of Tazer

Yale stood at the front door, looking as pizza-delivery-boyish as we could make him on such short notice. We'd found a navy blue cap in one of the guy's packs, and he was wearing it slightly askew. He was also holding the three pizzas in one hand, and his fully-charged tazer in the other, hidden beneath the pizza boxes.

Jason and I were plastered against the outer wall of the house to Yale's right, Jason's gun out and ready. On the other side of the porch, Marcus and Nose were in a similar pose, both their guns out. This was it. This was the first move in our plan to rescue Emma. It either worked or it didn't, but there was no going back once we rang that door bell.

Marcus looked at us, one by one, then gave the thumbs-up signal.

Jason darted forward, in front of Yale, and pressed the doorbell, then darted back to his position in front of me.

From inside the house, the bell chimed, sounding sweet and homey.

I could hear the pounding of heavy footsteps coming toward the front of the house.

Palmer's front door snicked open.

"You're late," said a deep voice. "Those pizzas better be hot."

"Oh, they are," Yale said, putting the three boxes in the CAMFer's waiting arms and sinking the tazer into his belly.

I heard a loud, sharp crackle. There was a burning smell in the air accompanied by a clicking, and then a heavy thump as the CAMFer went down. He fell across the threshold—a large, overweight man, flopping like a fish, the boxes bouncing on his chest, slices of pizza flying in all directions. His face was discolored, his mouth making some awful gurgling noise. As he convulsed, his shirt rode up revealing a glimpse of the gun that was holstered to his barrel-like chest. Yale pulled the tazer away, surveyed the room beyond the doorway, and said, "She's not in here."

There was yelling from the back of the house, followed by the sound of more footsteps. The other CAMFers had heard their friend go down, and they were coming to see what all the commotion was about.

That was the signal for phase two of the plan.

Jason, Yale and I turned and ran to the far end of the garage. Once we were around the corner of the house, Jason crouched down, gun trained on the porch. His job was to keep anyone from escaping out the front.

"Don't shoot Emma," I couldn't help whispering at him, but he ignored me, his full attention focused on the open front door.

I could hear the other CAMFers there now.

"Frank! What happened? Can you hear me?" said one voice, but it wasn't the Dark Man.

"I think he had a fucking heart attack," said a second voice. Not the Dark Man either. "Look at his face. It's blue."

"Oh man, I think you're right. We should call 911."

"Are you crazy? We can't call the cops. Besides, he's still breathing."

"I may have set this thing too high," Yale whispered, fumbling with his tazer and replacing the batteries in case he needed it again.

"Hey, it worked," I said, "and he's still alive."

"Come on," Yale said when he was done. We didn't have time to stick around and find out Frank's fate. We needed to get Emma out of the house while the CAMFers were still distracted.

The two of us ran along the side of the house, between the wall and the neighbor's fence all the way to the back yard. Nose and Marcus were already waiting for us on the patio just outside the kitchen.