Chapter Fifty-Four

 

RYAN

 

I can't stop thinking that I might have really fucked up this time. I don't recognize the guy whose body is clogging my door, but I'm not going to get it shut again, even if my only hope is to get myself out of sight.

I have to move back. The dividing wall between the kitchen and the living room provides a nice place, but it opens me up too much. Two ways through means that no matter which way I'm watching, someone can come up either side. I take a deep breath.

I could go up the stairs a little way, as well. Shorter sight lines, though, mean that I have to work on reaction a hell of a lot more. I'll know their coming, but I won't have more than a fraction of a second to aim and fire.

Never mind missing, if I just wing a guy and he gets the chance to shoot back, I'm done. Two down, though. At least nine more to go. I take a deep breath.

I raise the phone to my mouth. "Davis?"

"Talk to me," she says. She sounds alert. Ready. So different from how I'm feeling.

"I'm sorry."

"Where the fuck did that come from?"

"Should've have gotten you involved in this."

"Ryan, if you have time for that kind of shit—"

"I don't want you to get hurt. So when you take the shot, I want you to get the fuck out of that window, you hear me?"

"I'm not an idiot, Beauchamp."

I hear the door opening. I hope they haven't gone around back, and I hope that Logan got away as best as can be hoped for in the time they took getting here. They'll be here in a second, and I have to do this shit right.

"I don't want you to take this the wrong way, Davis, but if I die—"

"Save it."

"I like you a lot, babe. Take the shot when you're ready."

Somewhere in one of my upstairs bedrooms, a small explosion goes off. I can about see the bullet hurtling through the air, see it smacking into Scheck's body.

Two guys I don't recognize come around. I squeeze off a shot on the first one I can. I get lucky that he was the one who looked ready to shoot the second he got around the corner. The other takes a second to raise his gun, and in that second I adjust my aim and take a second shot.

I hear shots firing outside. Probably firing into my bedroom window. The house is going to be destroyed before this shit is over.

"Davis? You there?"

She takes a second to answer. In that moment, my chest gets tight, and when I hear her voice on the other end of the line, I feel like I can breathe again, all of a sudden.

"You worry too much," she says. All surly, all toughness. That's her, alright.

I don't have time to tell her so. Boots on the tile. I squeeze off another shot as another goon comes through, and another body litters the back hall of my house.

Another comes around the other side. They're committed to this thing. I adjust my aim and start to squeeze. In that split-second, Dupree comes around the closer corner.

The muzzle of my pistol drops. I squeeze and the gun erupts in my hand again. A shot goes wide, and now I'm in trouble, because the little guy is faster than anything I've ever seen, and he's coming for me. There's nothing I'm going to be able to do about it, not from here.

I move back instead. He's closing the distance faster than I can open it, but as my heel steps up onto a stair-step behind me, time seems to slow down for half an instant, and my finger snaps again.

My arm absorbs the recoil, and the bullet flies out of the barrel at twelve hundred feet per second. It might have slowed down a little by the time it smacks into Dupree's chest. Not enough to save him being knocked back, all his momentum canceled by the bullet in an instant.

He falls back onto the guy behind him, and the other guy gets knocked back as well, not expecting a body to be falling onto him. I take the shot. I'm not above taking luck to the bank, and then there's another guy on the ground. Six down. I hope seven.

"Davis? What's the situation outside?"

"They've moved around. Scheck's down. I don't know if she's dead or just wounded."

"Don't worry about that. Who's left?"

"Rosen's hiding behind the car. You got one unaccounted for, one behind the car with Rosen. Two more coming in, looks like."

"You get a shot, take it and move."

"You got it," she says.

I take a breath. She's got a handle on things. She still sounds rock-steady. Better than anything I could have hoped for. I try to remember how many bullets I've got left in this magazine.

In the seconds I've got before the next pair hits the stairs, I hit the magazine eject. Not enough rounds. I drop it on the floor and grab a reload. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast.

I repeat it over and over in my head. Smooth is fast. The magazine clicks home and I rack the slide to chamber a round. We've already done it. I just have to stay calm long enough to keep this going for another few short minutes. No problem. I can do this.

There's five more left, and one of them comes around. I take the shot, but not before the second can come into view. Like a shooting gallery. Bang. Bang. The second shot goes wide. A third bang, this one not from my pistol.

I don't feel the shot hit me, so he must have missed. I adjust and fire again. Bang, and the target goes down.

I take a deep breath. Another explosion from upstairs as the rifle goes off.

"Another one down. Rosen remains, another unaccounted for."

"I hear you," I said.

It hurts to breathe. At first I think it's just the adrenaline catching up with me. Then I look down. My shirt, previously a nice olive green, is stained with red.

God damn it. I pick the phone up. My hands are starting to shake a little. "Davis, I've been hit."

She curses softly. I don't know if I was supposed to hear it, but I do, clear as day.

"Bad?"

"I don't know."

I hear a noise downstairs. That'll be the one unaccounted-for. He's taking his time. Going slow. A shot fires from downstairs. I don't know what he's shooting at, but something hits the ground.

I bring my gun up as footsteps approach the stairs. My hands are shaking, but I can still shoot straight as they come into this funnel. That's why I stayed here, after all.

"Jesus, what the fuck did you do, Ryan?" The gun lowers. Logan steps through the bodies. He's got a weapon in his hands. He looks up and sees me. "Fuck me, you're hurt!"

I let out a long breath. "Yep. I think I'm shot."

He rushes to my side, scoops me up and pulls me out of the stairwell. I didn't need him to do that, but he apparently decided that was what he wanted to do, and he was going to do it either way. I'm too tired to fight him.

"Jesus Christ, Ryan, you fucked up. Why didn't you take the fucking money?"

My eyes are getting a little fuzzy. Between my body feeling wrong after my head getting hit, and it being so hard to breathe, I don't think I'm in very good shape.

"What are you talking about?"

"The God damned money that they offered you, Ryan. Why did you do it?"

"You don't get it at all, man." I smile and lay my head back. I'm not sure if I'll open them again, but I don't have much choice in the matter. "It wasn't about the money."