Page 70 of Out of the Shadows
“Mommy!” Cody screamed.
Jack turned to him. “Hide. Pick the best place to hide and stay there until you hear my voice.”
Cody looked terrified, then he ran down the aisle of the barn and turned into one of the stalls.
Jack pulled his gun and ran toward the house, worried about Laura as well as Luisa. He focused on his training. He’d been a cop for thirteen years, and the muscle memory never faded. Tactically, he knew running across the yard wasn’t smart, but it was the shortest distance to the house. He made it quickly, and pressed his back against the house, and stopped. Listened.
The dogs were barking and he heard pounding on the front door, then it stopped.
Jack saw a glimpse of a figure near the corner of the house, only feet from him. Aberdeen had an accomplice during the hit-and-run and break-ins, though he had been alone at the hotel. Staying flush against the wall, away from the back lights, he glanced over, then heard a low whistle.
Luisa.
He whistled back, and Luisa immediately came to him.
She whispered, “I saw him approach the door alone. I don’t think anyone is with him, and no one else was in the truck. Police are on their way.”
Jack handed her the key to the back door. “Get inside, stick with them, I’ll go around front and cut him off.”
As Jack spoke, the sound of breaking glass cut through the night. He pictured Laura’s large front window shattering.
He ran to the front while Luisa went in through the back.
Laura retrieved her shotgun from under her bed when she heard the shattering of glass. Obi and R2 were barking up a storm, but they were secure in the den with Sydney and Bagel.
“Police are on their way,” Logan said. “They already had a call.”
Laura worried about Jack and Luisa—she didn’t know where they were, if they were injured, if Cody was okay.
Calm down, she told herself. Jack had Cody. Cody was safe. She would protect Sydney.
“Get my handgun from the safe,” she told Logan.
Logan went to the closet and retrieved the gun. She didn’t want to hurt anyone, but so help her God, if that man went anywhere near her daughter she would shoot him.
She wanted to go to the den and be with Sydney, but that would mean exposing herself and she didn’t want to put Logan or herself in the line of fire. Aberdeen had a gun, he’d shot at her front door, but the extra lock Jack had insisted they install had held.
She heard more glass as someone climbed through the window. Then swearing and a crash.
“You fucking bitch! Give me what’s mine!”
Then a shout from the kitchen and another gunshot.
Then another.
Jack.
Laura ran from the room, Logan behind her.
Jack looked through the broken window. Aberdeen had climbed through, but cut himself on the multitude of shards that covered the floor. He swore and kicked at a chair, toppling it. Blood poured from his hand.
“You fucking bitch!” Aberdeen screamed. “Give me what’s mine!”
He started down the hall, limping, blood dripping from his left hand, a 9mm semiauto in his right.
He was heading toward the den and the bedrooms. Where Laura and her family were hiding.
He saw Luisa in the kitchen, caught her eye, and pointed at her. She nodded, and shouted, “Aberdeen! Freeze!”
