Chapter 25
RELEASING the latch, Hurley dove for the receptionist’s desk.
He didn’t make it.
One moment, he was stretched out like Pete Rose sliding headfirst into second base. The next, he was flat on his back staring at the ceiling. He didn’t understand what he was seeing at first. The air was thick with smoke and dust, but the room was strangely brighter.
Then his shell-shocked brain processed why.
The front half of the building was missing.
Pushing himself to his knees, Hurley concentrated on forcing air into his still-quivering lungs.
Saying that he’d had the wind knocked out of him didn’t do what had happened justice.
His torso felt like he’d been on the receiving end of a flurry of body blows delivered by Mike Tyson.
After what seemed like an eternity, he managed to draw a breath that didn’t end with dry heaves.
With shaking fingers, he pulled the pistol from his waistband and oriented the muzzle toward the adjacent room.
He was no stranger to gunfights, but Hurley really hoped nobody on the other side needed shooting.
The front sight post was dancing so much, he didn’t think he could hit the broad side of a barn.
The acrid air was polluted with a smell reminiscent of melting plastic.
Doing his best to hold the pistol steady as he weathered a coughing fit, Hurley peered through the smoke.
A gaping hole loomed where the monstrous door had once been.
Judging by the state of the front half of the building, the detonation must have launched the door across the room like a cork exploding from a champagne bottle.
He didn’t imagine there was anything left worth seeing, but Hurley wasn’t going to leave that to chance.
Steadying his nerves, he pushed through the smoke, leading with his pistol.
He was greeted by the twin smells of charred meat and perforated bowels.
His gag reflex was instantaneous, but he kept himself from puking.
A quick sweep of the wreckage confirmed his suspicions.
The room’s reinforced exterior had concentrated the blast wave produced by the detonating Semtex.
Bits of gore dripped from the ceiling and slid down the walls.
A more thorough survey could have probably turned up something recognizable as human, but Hurley didn’t bother.
The explosion had incinerated anything of value.
Arabic voices echoed from the front of the store, reminding Hurley that he was on the clock.
Holstering his pistol, he turned and staggered out of the travel agency.
In a testament to the foulness inside, the external air smelled good.
A crowd of bystanders had begun to gather, and Hurley pushed his way through, pointing to his ears and feigning deafness as a way to avoid questions in a language he didn’t speak.
It wasn’t exactly Method acting.
He’d only caught the periphery of the blast wave, but the noise accompanying the explosion was a different matter.
His ears were ringing, and what sound that did come through was muffled.
If the tinnitus didn’t wear off soon, he was going to have a hell of a time relaying what had happened to Irene via telephone.
Maybe that was just as well.
His final lead had just gone up in smoke.