Page 105 of Dead Mountain

“No more talk!” DeGregorio shouted angrily. “I want the camera. What did you do with it?”

“I’ll tell you—just don’t shoot her.”

“Count of three. One—”

Corrie felt the barrel press into her kneecap.

“Two—”

“Don’t,” said Nora. “I’ll tell you where it is. It’s hidden in the bunker. I’ll take you there.”

“Tell me where.”

“You have to promise not to shoot her.”

“I promise.”

Nora hesitated just a moment. “In the grand piano.”

DeGregorio raised the gun from Corrie’s knee to her head. “No need to kneecap you now. Happy trails.”

Corrie managed to quickly close her eyes on the world just as she heard the boom of the gun.

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NORA WATCHED IN horror as Corrie lurched backward in her chair.

At almost precisely the same moment, DeGregorio spun around, gun flying from his hand.

A split second later, the lodge door burst open and a fusillade of shots rang out. Two figures rushed in, moving so fast in the stormy darkness that Nora could not immediately locate them. They fired fast and furiously, catching DeGregorio’s mercenaries completely by surprise. Two were struck with bullets before they could even draw their weapons, and the other two were gunned down as they were trying to get off a shot.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it was all over. DeGregorio and his men lay sprawled across the floor and draped over the leather furniture, some motionless, others groaning or coughing up blood. The two who had burst in, Nora saw with something like disbelief, were Sheriff Watts and Agent Sharp. The sheriff holstered his six-guns as they were still smoking and rushed over to Corrie, who was lying on her side, still taped to the chair. He pulled out a knife to cut her free and then, grasping her body gently in his arms, laid her out on the nearby rug. There was blood on her head, and the wooden back of the chair had been pierced and splintered by the bullet.

Meanwhile, Sharp cut Nora free. With a cry, she dashed over to where Corrie lay. Watts was cradling her head and inspecting the wound. He pulled a bandanna out of his pocket and gently wiped at her temple.

“It’s just a graze,” he said. “Thank God!”

Heart pounding, Nora knelt beside him. “I thought she was dead.”

DeGregorio must have been hit an instant before he’d squeezed his trigger, Nora thought. The round had only grazed Corrie’s temple before going through the back of the wooden chair.

Now Corrie’s eyes fluttered and opened. She stared up at Watts. “Homer? What . . . are you doing here?”

“Everything’s good, and the bad guys are dead. Thank God you’re okay.” Watts looked so hugely relieved, so enormously thankful that Corrie was alive, that tears started running down his face.

Nora suddenly realized: He’s in love with Corrie.

“Bad guys? . . . What bad guys?”

“We’ll talk about it later,” Watts said. “You’re okay—the wound is superficial.”

“I’m wounded?” Corrie raised a palm and touched her head, then looked at the blood on her fingers. “Oh shit.”

“You seem to have a slight concussion,” Watts told her. “We’re going to get you to the hospital. Okay? Ambulances are on the way.”

Sharp, in his turn, knelt beside Corrie on the other side. “Agent Swanson?”

Corrie looked at him, surprised once again. “You here, too? God, I feel like Dorothy waking up from the dream. What’s going on?”

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