Forgive Me(108)

The first bullet to hit Angie struck her in the arm. The second went into her side. The third missed because she fell onto her back to minimize the chance of another hit from the fusillade. Shot placement was everything, and her would-be killer’s bullet hadn’t hit anything vital. She could still breathe. Her senses functioned. Her heart continued to beat. The bleeding was brisk, but not overly so. The pain, however, was intense—white hot, burning her from the inside out.

She wasn’t frozen in fear, nor was she in too much pain to continue to fight. Lying on her back, she fired again. Bullets from her gun punched several holes through the cardboard and may or may not have hit her attacker. Light streamed into the crawlspace through the bullet holes in the box. Dust motes danced inside columns of brightness. The holes weren’t big enough to see through, so she fired blindly again, expecting a return volley.





With his gun in his hand—a Glock pistol in .40 S&W caliber—Bryce knew something was wrong the moment he’d seen coins wrapped in electrial tape wedged between the door and the jamb molding. The coins were easy enough to remove from the outside, but it would have been impossible to do so from inside. The door was unlocked and he went right inside. Before he could even call out Angie’s name, he heard a series of gunshots.

He oriented himself to the sound and soon a found a set of stairs behind a door in the kitchen leading to a basement.

His heart hammered away. All the anxiety, fear, everything he’d felt while taking down Buggy was magnified tenfold. The situation, the threat level, and the number of assailants were all unknowns.

“Angie? Are you okay?”

Bryce’s call went unanswered.

“Angie, it’s Bryce. Talk to me if you can?”

To his surprise, a male voice responded. “Taggart! Taggart! Raynor Sinclair, U.S. Marshals. Get down here right away. Angie’s been hurt!”





The killer has a name. His name is Raynor, and he works with Bryce. These were passing thoughts. Angie’s real focus was protecting Bryce.

She heard footsteps above her and screamed, “No! Don’t!”

But the sound of Bryce’s footsteps quickened anyway.





Raynor had moved away from the box and Angie’s line of fire. He fired his weapon at the exact moment Bryce emerged from around the corner. The bullet struck Bryce in the chest, left of the heart. Shock and pain sent him to his knees. Blood painted the cement floor beneath him in drips of red. He fired off two shots, but his aim was worthless.

Raynor came forward with his gun aimed for the kill shot. “Drop your weapon,” he said, his voice even and steady despite the pain of his injury. “Do it or you’re dead.”

Bryce looked disoriented and off balance while placing his gun on the ground beside him.

“Now, slide your weapon over to me.”

Bryce did as he was told. Raynor picked up the gun and slipped it into the waistband of his pants, wincing at a stab of pain. He approached Bryce with caution, though confident he was no longer a threat. Raynor hoisted Bryce up by his shirt collar, spun him around, and used an arm lock to the neck to keep him upright.

He pushed Bryce forward and called to Angie, “Throw out your gun and come out where I can see you, or I put a bullet through his head right now.” He could hear Angie’s labored breathing coming from behind the box.

“Counting to three,” Raynor said. “One . . .”

More breathing.

“Two . . .”

The cardboard box came open like a hinged door. A bloody hand appeared from within and tossed out a gun. A Ruger it looked to be. The gun landed with a clatter.

“Now, you come out where I can see you,” Raynor said, trying to ignore the pulsing pain in his side.

From the crawlspace, Angie slithered out on her belly, knocking over paint cans in her wake, sending them rolling across the floor like bowling pins. Her left arm appeared mangled and blood seeped out from a hole in her side where she’d been shot.

Raynor wasn’t in much better shape. The pain radiating in his belly was intense, the blood loss steady. He knew he should work quickly to finish them off, but rage owned him. Angie needed to suffer for shooting him, hurting him, humiliating him.

He pointed his gun at her. “On your knees.”

Angie did as she was told. “Why are you doing this?” Her voice came out shaky.

Raynor found the fear swimming in her eyes to be almost hypnotic. He rarely wounded his quarry, and so rare was the opportunity to see a living creature process death. It was a thing of profound beauty. He respected Angie greatly for her courage. But she had to die. He turned Bryce around and forced him onto his knees next to Angie. Blood continued to pour out of his body, as well. Bryce could barely lift his head, and he might have been in shock.

Raynor gritted his teeth to stave off the stabbing pain as he searched them both for any hidden weapons. He found none. They had no recourse, nothing left to do but die. He backed up three steps and aimed his Glock at Angie’s head.

“You shot me,” he said, breathing hard, staring Angie in the eyes. With his left hand, he unsheathed the bowie knife from a holster strapped to his boot. “Nobody hurts me. If they do, they pay for it. So I’m going to shoot you both, but I’m going to kill him quickly. You, I’m going to work on slowly, make it hurt as much possible. Any last words?”