Above the Law by J. F. Freedman Page B

and stupid, he thought to himself, you don’t put yourself in a cross fire, the way Jerome had them spread out. Jerome was too sure of this operation, he wasn’t taking all the proper precautions.
    He watched through the glasses as the men inside moved closer to the target. Maybe I’m wrong, he grudgingly had to admit to himself, intently surveying the action. A part of him did not want this to go perfectly. Being shut out didn’t suit him—he was a man who wanted to be in the middle of the action. Even if he was too damn old.
    He kept watching. In a few seconds Jerome would be leading the charge through the front door. With any luck, it would all be over before—
    The sound was first: an all-points alarm, an earsplitting, pulsing siren, like a maximum-security penitentiary signaling an escape. And then, within seconds, the rest of all hell broke loose. The entire compound was lit up: one moment everything was in darkness; the next brought on dozens of high-density lights that lit the place up like a night game at Yankee Stadium.
    The agents in the compound were caught totally off-guard, frozen in their tracks like a herd of deer caught in headlights. Then before they could react further there commenced a firestorm of gunfire from within the house, so deafening it almost obliterated the sound of the alarm.
    Miller watched the debacle unfolding, for the first few seconds as dumbfounded and paralyzed as the men inside. Then he came unstuck. Jesus Christ! he thought. They’ve walked into an ambush!
    A lifetime of reflex took over. He began running toward the action. He was almost eighty years old, but he could still run pretty well when he had to. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Bearpaw, running with him stride for stride.
    Inside the compound, the agents were scrambling for cover. Half a dozen were down, wounded or dead, their screams of pain louder even than the cacophony from the siren and the gunfire. The rest were running, crawling, whatever they could do to get out of the line of fire.
    Jerome had reached the cover of the edge of the main building, and was shrieking into his headset: “Fuck taking them alive, take this fucking building out! Fire! Fire! Fire!”
    Immediately, from outside the compound, the rear-guard agents started laying down a carpet-bomb barrage of mortars at the building. Shells and tear gas. Within seconds they’d hit their target, shattering windows and blowing huge holes in the root. The inside of the building burst into flame, fire and black, tarry smoke pouring out from all sides. There was a brief pause, no more than a few seconds; then came the sounds of bullets and other munitions going off inside.
    They’ve got ammunition in there, Miller realized. By now he and Bearpaw had breached the perimeter and were about forty yards from the house. “It’s going to blow sky-high!” he screamed to his deputy above the clamor. “We’ve got to get out of here!”
    They turned and started hightailing it back toward the safety of the woods.
    Jerome had the same realization. “This place is going to explode!” he cried out. “Everybody get the hell out!”
    His men scrambled to their feet and started running for cover. Disregarding their own safety, pockets of agents picked up their wounded comrades and dragged them along the ground, away from the house.
    Miller and Bearpaw reached the safety of their former viewing place. They watched the debacle unfolding. Miller was bent over double, gasping for breath. “Bastard Lopez double-crossed us,” he cursed. The first goddamn rule of informants—never trust them.
    Bearpaw nodded grimly. Turning their focus to the house, they saw the fugitives staggering out, running in every direction, assault rifles and other state-of-the-art weapons in their hands, firing wildly. Most of them had been blinded by the tear gas—they ran like rabid dogs, weaving incoherent patterns.
    Jerome and the remaining agents had safely retreated to the edge of the