“Get the hell off me.” Wolfe shoved his legs to the side and pushed away from the stretcher, landing on his feet. His head spun. He couldn’t see anything and furiously wiped at his eyes until they cleared. His stomach heaved, and he bent over, losing what dinner he still had left.

Sounds roared in. Sirens, boots running, people over radios talking. What had happened?

He lifted his head and focused on Angus Force sitting in the back of a nearby ambulance, an oxygen mask covering his nose and a blanket around his shoulders.

Force tugged the mask off, his face layered in soot. “You covered me with your body, asshole.” He tossed off the blanket and struggled to step down.

“Wait,” the same voice said as before. “We’ll bring him to you.” A tightly muscled paramedic who looked about eighteen shot an arm beneath Wolfe’s shoulders and helped him up. “Let’s at least check out your head.” He assisted Wolfe over to sit by Force, grunting on the way.

Pain burrowed through Wolfe’s solar plexus, and his ears rang, but he sat by Force as firefighters and police personnel ran around. “How bad are you hurt?”

“Not as bad as you. Don’t ever do that again.” Force leaned to the side and coughed hard enough to dislodge a lung.

The paramedic ducked and pointed a penlight into Wolfe’s eyes.

Agony pierced his brain. Wolfe slapped the penlight away. “I’m fine. Go make sure there aren’t other wounded.” The blast had been fairly localized, it seemed, so hopefully nobody else had been injured. “Guess Gary wanted to sanitize the crime scene.” He coughed, trying not to cry when his ribs protested vehemently.

Force groaned. “Yeah. He’s probably tying off loose ends and appeasing his need to kill on the way to you. Frank Spanek didn’t have a chance.”

Wolfe’s head would fall off if he tried to turn it, so he didn’t move. The image of the dead woman flashed across his mind. “Have you ever seen something like that?”

“Yeah, unfortunately,” Force grunted. “I’ve chased my share of serial murderers, and more than a couple of them were really sick jerks.” He glanced toward the building and then stiffened. “Ah, fuck.”

Wolfe’s eyeballs wanted to roll from his head, but he looked up anyway to see their HDD handlers maneuvering around firefighting equipment and emergency personnel to reach them. “Can I just shoot them?”

“Too many witnesses,” Force said, the sound strained.

Agent Kurt Fields reached them first, his normal limp more pronounced than usual. Soot dotted the time-worn brown suit that went perfectly with his shaggy brown hair and beard, streaked with gray. He was in his late fifties and gave Wolfe the impression that he just wanted to retire. “You guys okay?”

“Great,” Force growled.