Lead and Sorrow

The front door exploded inward.

Splinters of wood rained down like confetti. Men in tactical gear swarmed the porch, MP5s raised.

"Lead!" Caleb yelled, flipping the heavy kitchen table for cover.

Bullets chewed through the rotting drywall. The sound was deafening, a continuous rip of automatic fire. The house, already dying, began to disintegrate.

Caleb returned fire. His hand was steady. *Pop. Pop. Pop.* Two men went down in the mud outside.

"Caleb!" Isabella screamed, huddled on the floor. "Do something!"

"I am!" he shouted back.

He checked his ammo. Six rounds left.

He looked at Isabella. She was checking her watch.

The rage flared in him, hot and white. He could end it right here. He could put a bullet in her and let the Russians sweep the pieces. It would be justice. It would be Karma.

But looking at her, he saw the terrified girl in the diner again. He saw the lie he had fallen in love with.

He couldn't kill the dream, even if the dreamer was a monster.

"The storm cellar!" Caleb yelled, grabbing her collar. "Go!"

"What about you?" she asked, her eyes wide.

"I'll hold them off. Go!"

He dragged her to the pantry door, kicked away the rug, and yanked open the trapdoor. "Get in!"

Isabella scrambled down the ladder. Caleb slammed the door shut and dragged a heavy cabinet over it.

Then he turned back to the war.

He moved through the house like a ghost, firing from the shadows. He took a bullet in the shoulder. Then one in the thigh. He grunted, stumbling, sliding down the wall in the hallway.

The Russians were cautious now. They tossed a flashbang.

* Bang.*

Caleb’s ears rang. He couldn't see. He fired blindly into the white haze. He felt impacts—punches to his chest. One. Two. Three.

The lead weighed him down. He slumped against the baseboard, the wood rough against his neck. His gun slipped from his fingers.

The shooting stopped.

"Clear!" a voice shouted in Russian.

Heavy boots stomped on the floorboards. They ignored him. They were looking for the prize.

Caleb coughed, blood bubbling on his lips. He watched through dimming eyes as the cabinet was pushed aside. The trapdoor opened.

Isabella climbed out.

She didn't look scared. She dusted off her knees. She looked at the Russian commander—a tall man with a scar—and nodded.

"Took you long enough," she said.

"Roads were bad," the Russian grunted.

Isabella walked over to where Caleb lay. She stood over him, looking down. She looked like an angel of death in a hoodie.

Caleb tried to speak. He wanted to ask why. He wanted to curse her. But all that came out was a wheeze.

Isabella crouched down. She wasn't sad. She was clinical. She reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the car keys. Then she picked up the velvet bag of diamonds from the floor where it had fallen.

"You were good, Caleb," she said softly. "Really good."

She leaned in. Caleb flinched, expecting a knife.

Instead, she pressed her lips to his forehead. A kiss. Cold, dry, and utterly empty.

"You were a good dog," she whispered.

She stood up. "Burn it," she ordered the Russians. "Leave no evidence."

Isabella Moretti walked out the shattered front door, stepping over the bodies of the men Caleb had killed to protect her. She walked into the night, toward the waiting convoy of black SUVs.

One of the Russians uncapped a jerry can. The smell of gasoline overpowered the smell of rot.

Caleb couldn't move. The lead in his chest pinned him to the floor of his childhood home. He watched the flame of the lighter flicker.

He closed his eyes. He thought of Montana. He thought of silence.

The fire caught. The heat rose. And finally, Caleb Vance went home.