Page 85 of Over the Top

Spencer’s wolflike smile was all the answer he needed. Excellent. These fuckers were trying to hurt his baby girl. He had no compunction about killing every last one of them.

The three of them fanned out, moving more slowly now. They eased through the trees, steering clear of the rolling expanse of manicured lawn. Drago muttered that they’d taught the security team not to bother trying to shoot at anyone beyond the grass.

That made sense to Gunner. The security staff’s odds of hitting targets in the woods would be too low without sniper training and weapons, and the goal was to keep intruders out of the house, which meant said intruders would have to cross the lawn to get to the main structure.

It didn’t take them long to see muzzle flashes ahead of them. Four of the Oshiro gang members were lying at the west edge of the lawn behind a low brick wall. Unless they were sitting there shooting at the house for the hell of it, Gunner figured they were supposed to give someone cover as that someone tried to reach the house. Which meant the incursion would probably come from the north or south, at right angles to these yahoos.

He and Spencer and Drago had discussed their rules of engagement at the kitchen table yesterday, and they’d agreed that if the Oshiro boys were using lethal force, they would match it. Which meant the men in front of them were dead and just didn’t know it yet.

Spencer indicated that he would take the shooter on the far end, Drago would take the nearest guy, and Gunner should take the two in the middle. They crouched no more than twenty feet behind the targets, weapons at the ready. After a few quick clicks on their primary radio frequency to verify they were ready to roll, Spencer gave the go signal.

Gunner exhaled and double-tapped two shots into the back of his first target’s head, then shifted quickly to his second target. The guy had rolled onto his side to look behind himself, and Gunner sent two rounds into his neck above where body armor would end.

It was quick and brutal. But then, that was a nature of the job. He raced forward to check his kills while Spencer and Dray did the same. And then they were off, sliding toward the south end of the estate in search of the next team trying to capture or kill Poppy.

They’d been moving forward quickly for perhaps three minutes when Gunner’s earpiece came to life, startling him. Once they’d engaged the enemy, SEALs rarely spoke at all. They relied on hand signals and their superb training to know what to do next and what their teammates would be doing.

Except it wasn’t Spencer talking in his ear. It was Chas, talking on the secondary frequency in the headset Gunner had given him.

Chas asked low, “Gunner, did you guys just come back to the house?”

He clicked the radio twice. He’d taught Chas yesterday: one click for affirmative, two clicks for negative.

Chas whispered urgently, “Oh God. Then there’s someone in the house.”

Gunner’s entire being exploded with tension. He reached up and touched his throat, transmitting back a single word. “Hide.”

Spencer whipped his head around to glare at him as he broke operational silence.

There was no help for it. Gunner murmured, “Chas says there’s someone in the house with him.”

Spencer hesitated for no more than a millisecond. “Go.”

Gunner nodded and spun, taking off running at full speed, silence be damned. Chas was in mortal danger.

Chapter Twenty

CHAS LOOKEDfrantically around the bedroom. Where to go? They’d talked about it last night. Think. What had Spencer told him about where to hide? His panic was so bad, he couldn’t remember anything past the overwhelming urge to run and keep on running.

Laundry chute. There was an old laundry chute in the house that Spencer thought was big enough for him to climb inside, but Drago had been against him using it. He’d said it trapped Chas and gave him nowhere to run. Something about shooting fish in a barrel.

Think.

It sounded like the person or people had come in the kitchen door. He’d heard the distinctive squeak of the old hinges perhaps thirty seconds ago. Since then he’d heard nothing. They could already be upstairs. He raced over to the door on bare feet and locked it. Not that the old-fashioned lock would slow the bad guys down for more than a second or two.

He turned to face the room. Closet? Too obvious. Under the bed? Same. Behind the curtains? He’d be visible. Could he squeeze under the dresser? Probably not.

Out of options, he ran over to the window and heaved the old wooden sash open as he looked outside. It was a solid twenty-foot drop to the ground. Knowing him, he’d break his leg if he tried to jump down there, and then the bad guys would find him and kill him anyway. He glanced left and right and spied a rain gutter overhead. He probably shouldn’t try to hang from that. They weren’t usually attached that firmly and were made of flimsy aluminum. But it gave him an idea.

He punched out the screen and winced as it hit the ground with a faint metallic clang. Quickly, he climbed up onto the windowsill, sitting first and then reaching up to grip the top of the window frame. It was precarious as hell, but he managed to gain his feet standing on the open sill and reaching up to grip the rain gutter for balance. Carefully, he slipped his fingers behind the rain gutter, which was in fact quite loose, to grip the edge of the roof itself.

Using his right foot, he reached up and caught the edge of the open window with his toes and stepped down on it. Fortunately, the window was in good repair and slid shut until it rested on top of his left foot. That was as closed as he was going to get the thing. Hopefully, it would disguise his mode of exit from the house from a fast search by a bad guy.

From inside the house, he heard movement. A stair tread squeaked.

Oh God.No time to go slow.

He eased to his right until his left foot stood on the very last bit of the exterior sill, his fingers gripped the edge of the roof, and his right foot braced against a downspout at the corner of the house.

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