Page 52 of Lone Star Witness

And the bullet tore into the tree right where he’d just been standing.

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Chapter Eighteen

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Marise wanted to add a shouted warning to Nash’s. A warning for Slade to get out of the path of one of the gunmen. According to the thermal scanner on the monitor, the one on Sonny’s right had stepped out from the cover and was taking aim at Slade.

The sound of the shot ripped through the woods and the van and it sent Marise’s heartbeat galloping until her pulse was thick and throbbing in her ears. That made it hard to hear, but she could feel and she could see.

Mercy, could she ever.

Marise had to fight off the old images, the nightmares caused by the sound of the gunfire, and she instead tried to focus on what she could see. She knew which heat source was Slade’s, and she saw him on the ground.

For a handful of horrible moments, she thought he’d been shot, but then she saw him roll to the side, taking cover behind the tree.

Another shot came.

Not from Slade but rather aimed at him. It was hard for her to tell, but she thought it hit the tree. And that’s where the shooter continued the barrage of gunfire that followed.

She saw more movement, this time from the drone side of the monitor. Another man darted out from a tree, running to the other side of the small trail. Mercy. Was he trying to maneuver himself so he could come up behind Slade?

No.

She soon learned that wasn’t his plan at all.

He took aim at the van and started firing. Not with a handgun either. This appeared to be some kind of assault rifle.

“Get down on the floor,” Nash told them.

He’d barely gotten out that command when the gunman began sending one round right after another into the windshield. She didn’t know the strength of bullet-resistant glass, but she doubted it would hold for long.

Again, the old images came. Of a different battle. Still just as deadly.

When she heard her breath gusting and her heart in her throat, Marise forced herself to focus. She had to ground herself, and she could do that by pinning her attention on the monitor. She levered her head up just enough so she could keep watch and see what was going on.

On the drone side of the feed, she spotted more movement. From the thug who was guarding Stephanie and the colonel. The man suddenly pitched forward, and he plunged forward. He went over the side of the bluff.

But not before dragging his knife over the rope.

Oh, God.

If he’d managed to cut one of the ropes, either Stephanie or Rosa was going to fall.

But that didn’t happen.

In a blink, Jericho was there, catching hold of the cut rope, and he began to haul someone up. Not an easy task since it appeared the ground around the top of the bluff was slick, and Jericho was having trouble keeping his footing.

Marise’s gaze was firing between the two feeds while one of the gunmen was trying to kill Slade. The other was attempting to rip the van apart with his shots. The only time that he stopped was to reload.

She saw Slade move. Saw the hot red image of him lean out again, and he fired at the guy who’d been shooting at him. He didn’t miss. The shots must immediately killed him because the guy dropped into a sprawl on the ground.

That helped tamp down some of the PTSD reactions. This was a victory. Not a full-out win but a start in the right direction.

One down, two to go.

But then she saw Sonny’s thermal image, and he wasn’t running to help his fallen comrade. He was heading in Jericho’s direction just as Jericho managed to drag up one of the hostages.

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