Page 201 of Buried Too Deep

Tandy. Oh God. Tandy.

Phin pushed Cora off him, rolling to his feet as he lurched toward Alan, grunting in pain when Alan fired again. “Get out, Cora!” Phin thundered. “Take Tandy and get out.”

Phin dropped to his knees, crawling a few feet forward, his gaze fixed on Alan, one arm hanging limply at his side. Cora watched blood hit the floor around him in a steady flow. She looked up, following the path of the flowing blood.

It was pouring from Phin’s arm. Pouring.

Cora stared in shock for a few hard beats.

Do something. Help him.

She’d pushed to her knees when the back door flew open and Patrick appeared, his hair flying every which direction.

“Tandy!” He ran inside, reached under the table, and grabbed Tandy under her arms, dragging her backward toward the kitchen door.

Another shot rang out and Patrick dropped Tandy to the floor, clutching his own chest, his face blank with shock.

No.

But it was true. The front of Patrick’s white shirt was becoming dark, the blood looking black in the light from the streetlamps.

Patrick staggered backward, grabbing onto the kitchen counter. He slid to the floor, one hand still pressed to his chest while he shoved the other hand into his jacket pocket.

Cora saw the gun in Patrick’s hand an instant before he fired.

Alan cried out, but he didn’t slump to the floor. His shirt was also stained red, but not like Patrick’s.

Not like Phin’s.

Alan was looking around, wild-eyed, the gun in his hand sweeping back and forth as he grimaced in pain. He pointed his gun at Phin again.

Phin, who was crawling toward the older man. While blood still poured from his arm.

No more.

Cora flung herself forward, landing on Alan, grabbing onto his arm, trying to take the gun from his hand, but he was strong and he fought her. Hard.

Knowing that she fought not only for her own life, but for Phin’s and Tandy’s—and maybe even Patrick’s—she put all her strength into bending Alan’s wrist so that his gun pointed at his own chest. Not Phin’s. Not Tandy’s. Not mine.

A pair of strong hands—bloody hands—landed on hers, shoving at the gun in Alan’s hand. Phin. Together they got the weapon pointed at Alan and Cora slid her finger over the older man’s. Right over the trigger.

“Let it go,” Cora ordered, her words choppy, her breath coming in pants. “Drop the gun, Beauchamp. Or I’ll kill you myself.”

He met her eyes, his burning with rage. “You won’t,” he gritted out. “You can’t.”

One pull of her finger would do it. One little pull.

But he was right. She couldn’t do it.

Tears blurred her vision once again. I have to. I have to. Or he’ll kill Phin. He’ll kill Tandy. He might have already killed Patrick. And Val. Where was she? Had he killed her, too?

Do something.

Her mental self-talk shattered into a million pieces when another shot fired. Cora stared at the hole in Alan’s forehead.

She fell backward when Alan suddenly stopped fighting for his gun. He hadn’t fired, and neither had she. Slowly she looked across the kitchen at Patrick, who lay in a pool of his own blood, his gun lowering to the floor.

Alan was dead.

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