Chapter Eight
“I have but two rules, and you’ve chosen to break one of them. You know the consequences.”
His handler snorted. “I don’t think you remember the mercy we’ve shown your brother. It’d be a shame if he had a tragic accident.”
Davis felt nothing but calm, his stony indifference back in place. “I understand you are rather proud of your son rising in the ranks of the organization. He’s expecting his first child; your first grandchild, if I’m not mistaken.”
“Don’t you dare go near him!”
Davis pitched the mobile phone into the creek next to his campsite. He’d already placed the call of an abandoned car to lure Deputy Stephens and her partner out to the wooded area. He had loose ends to tie up before he took care of his handlers. Make the scene bloody enough and any others wouldn’t dare touch his brother.
He shouldered his rifle, strapped on his hunting knife, and shoved his Glock in his shoulder holster. Hannah had changed everything. She’d robbed him of one-dimensionality. She’d forced emotion back into him last weekend. Two days lost in one another. Two days to rediscover what living actually meant.
But he had a job to finish. His handlers wanted to widen their influence by finding not only law enforcement and judges to put on the payroll, but also using his skills to intimidate anyone standing in the way. How long before they were ordering him to slaughter entire families? Hannah was only the first in line.
But he couldn’t let her go. It was too late for her as much as it was too late for him to walk away. She had a hit out on her, and if he didn’t handle things now, she’d die anyway.
He set up position in the bough of a tree. Dressed in camo, he blended seamlessly with the leaves. He waited, staring at the bait car, his nondescript Ford sedan. When he saw the patrol SUV pull up his heart rate jumped. The breeze stirred as Deputy Stephens and Deputy James stepped out. He sighted Hannah in the scope of his rifle. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail, her freckles standing out in the harsh sunlight. Hers was a face he’d always remember.
He eased his finger over the trigger, re-aligned the rifle scope, then squeezed. The shot made a loud pop just as a hard gust of wind rattled the trees. He watched Deputy James fall while Hannah dove to the ground then scrambled to the other side of the SUV. He had no idea if his shot had hit home. When he saw Hannah peep over the hood of the SUV, her hand going for the transceiver of her radio, he aimed. His next shot struck the radio transceiver exactly as he had planned. He saw Hannah fall backward as the bullet passed through her shoulder. She was left handed, and wore her radio on her right side, out of the way. A clean but painful shot away from vital organs.
She retreated to the wood line and returned fire, the bullets whizzing through the trees. He climbed down from his perch, shouldered his rifle, then returned fire with his Glock, counting her shots until she’d emptied her clips. She had one bullet left as he drove her deeper into the trees and when he finally made it to the SUV, he saw that Deputy James had disappeared.
He followed Hannah’s trail, trying to keep as quiet as possible while searching for both her and the other deputy. He found Hannah first.
“I know you’re out there,” she called to him. “I bet you didn’t think I was clever enough to figure out who you were.”
He pulled a new clip from his pocket and slipped it into his Glock. It clicked into place. He loaded the chamber.
“I mean, come on, a handsome, cultured guy from England, who are you trying to be, James Bond? A little cliché, don’t ya think?” She gave a short laugh. “I know who hired you. I know you’re here to take me out. And by the way, you weren’t even that good in bed.”
He grinned and stepped out. Hannah leaned against a tree trunk, holding her jacket to her shoulder. She was pale from blood loss, and on the losing end of their situation, but her eyes burned in defiance.
He needed to keep her talking. “Not good in bed?” he countered. “I have a hard time believing the last part, love. That weekend with you is one of the best weekends I’ve ever had with a lover.”
“I never said I wasn’t any good,” she shot back.
He laughed. “That’s what I like about you American women, you’re blunt. None of that stuffy, beating around the bush BS when it comes to fucking.”
Hannah wobbled, her eyes closed and she began sliding down the tree. She bared her teeth and managed to straighten back up. He stayed where he was; he couldn’t afford to go to her. Not now. Though everything inside of him wanted to rush to her, and gather her into his arms. He counted the minutes she had left before the blood loss became too much.
He had to keep her talking.
“Give it up and give me the gun. You’re bleeding to death, love. Your fight is done.”
Her eyes opened, their soft brown color blurred behind a sheen of tears. He saw it in her gaze, she knew she was dying. She knew he’d been the one to kill her. And she refused to plead for her life. The pain he felt was immediate and deep in his chest. The choking squeeze of guilt and regret that nearly stopped his heart.
Then he spotted movement in the forest beyond. The gamble had paid off. He’d bet with the life of the most important person in the world to him, because he’d had no other choice. “And though I’ve greatly enjoyed our time together,” he began. “I think it’s time to end this.”
He whipped his gun up, angling sideways in the same moment he saw her drop low, swinging her own sidearm around. Her round grazed his ribcage, he barely felt the sting as he watched Deputy James, thirty meters away, fall backward, Davis’s round lodged between his eyes. His rifle round had unfortunately been displaced by the wind earlier, giving James a chance at escape.
The Irish Mob had James on the payroll; he’d been the one to suggest the hit on Hannah. Davis turned to her. “Hannah, stay with me. Stay with me, Hannah! Open your eyes, love. Stay with me.”
She fell to the ground, curling into the fetal position.
He dropped down next to her, rolling her onto her back. Her eyelids fluttered, her mouth worked, but she was too weak to continue. She went limp. Davis gathered her into his arms and ran through the woods to the bags he’d stashed. He’d come prepared for the worst and dug out his medical kit. He packed her wounds with sterile gauze; a clean through-and-through shot as he expected, then grabbed needles and an IV tube, inserting one needle into the vein in his arm and the other needle into hers.
“I’m type O negative, love,” he said, though he doubted she could hear him. “Don’t you die on me. If there had been another way than this, I would have taken it.” He paused and stroked her loose hair from her face. A knot tightened in his throat, and he blinked, surprised to find tears in his eyes. He hadn’t cried since he was a small child. “But maybe there was another way and I simply couldn’t see it. I have been killing for so long I know no other way than this.”
He sat on the ground next to her prone body, passing his blood to her, though he feared it was too late. He was ruthless, a sociopath, but in that moment he was but a terrified man staring at a woman he couldn’t live without.