Texas Outlaw (Rory Yates #2)(82)

And one more guy I haven’t seen before.

Harris hasn’t drawn his gun, but the two soldiers carry automatic weapons. The one I don’t know is holding binoculars to his eyes, relaying to McCormack what he sees.

“You just killed the only thing I ever cared about,” Carson says from below. “How about I hurt something you care about?”

I kneel and use the railing as a shooting rest. I put the sight on McCormack, but I can’t keep the gun steady. The crosshairs float all over the place. A foot to his left. A foot to his right.

He knows I can’t make this shot—that’s why he isn’t ducking for cover.

I might have been able to draw a pistol faster than his son, but when it comes to this rifle and shooting a bullet the length of ten football fields, I’m not in the same league as Gareth.

“I’m going to count to three, Yates,” Carson says through the walkie-talkie on Gareth’s belt. “When I get to three, I’m going to shoot Ariana. If you want to save her, drop my son’s rifle off the derrick before I get to three.”





Chapter 101



I TRY TO remember where my bullet hit the last time I fired this gun.

A foot high and to the left.

If I were sighting in the gun, I’d shoot at least three times, try to find a pattern, then adjust the sight. The problem is I’ve had only one test shot.

I aim at what I think would account for the difference—a foot low and to the right—and I find that the crosshairs are lined up directly over Ariana’s face.

“One,” Carson says.

I can’t do this.

There’s no way to know if the range is the same. It looks like a thousand yards, but I could be off a hundred either way. I’m shooting at a downward angle now—that changes things, too. And there’s no real way for me to know that the one and only shot I’ve taken with this rifle was a good one. If I took one or two or ten more shots, it’s doubtful they would hold a tight pattern around the first. I don’t know if the adjustment I’m making is the right one.

I stare at Ariana’s scared expression through the scope.

If I squeeze the trigger, I might kill her.

But if I toss down the gun like Carson wants, he’ll kill us both.

Taking this shot is the only chance we have.

“Two.”

My trigger finger itches—that damn rash!—and I try to push the distraction out of my head.

My father taught me there’s a lot that goes into being an accurate shooter. There’s your angle and trajectory, velocity and range, all that stuff—physics and math. But to be a truly good shooter, it’s really about the feeling.

Muscle memory.

Knowing in your gut—not on a piece of paper—that you can make the shot. Especially when you’re shooting at something more than paper targets.

I learned to trust my feeling when I was growing up hunting deer, when I’d shoot uphill, downhill, sometimes at targets bounding through the trees. And I learned to trust my feeling in the Rangers when the thing I was hunting could shoot back.

I tell myself to trust my feeling.

I line the crosshairs over Ariana’s nose.

From the walkie-talkie below, I hear Carson say, “Thr—”

I squeeze the trigger.





Chapter 102



“—EE,” CARSON SAYS.

Ariana sees the muzzle flash from Rory’s rifle, just a tiny spark from atop the oil derrick. She knows she has a second or two to wait for the bullet and considers trying to dive to the ground. But that might disrupt where Carson is positioned and make Rory miss.

She has to trust Rory.

Carson must have seen the muzzle flash as well and doesn’t believe Rory can hit him. As soon as the bullet zings by, she’s sure the gun jammed against her temple will go off and she’ll be gone.

She closes her eyes and waits.

I believe in you, Rory, she thinks.

There is a noise—thwack!—like the sound of a nail gun popping against a piece of plywood. The sound is so close and so loud that she’s sure the bullet must have hit her.

But then the gun barrel jammed against her skull pulls away.

She opens her eyes and turns her head in time to see Carson McCormack falling backward, as stiff as a board. He lands unmoving in the grass, his python-skin boots pointing at the sky.

Her whole body feels numb. She lets out a breath she didn’t know she was holding.

I can’t believe I’m alive, she thinks.

And then she realizes this isn’t over. Harris and two of McCormack’s men are still crowded around her. Harris—her former boss, that son of a bitch—reaches for his pistol.

Ariana scrambles onto her knees and pries the gun out of Carson McCormack’s dead fingers.

“Freeze!” Ariana shouts, pointing the gun at Harris.

He stops, his gun half in, half out of its holster. He looks scared for an instant, and then he realizes the odds remain in his favor. He grins.

“Ariana, sweetheart, you’re still outnumbered.”

Keeping her gun on Harris, she glances around quickly. The guy with the broken nose and the other man both have their AR-15s aimed at her.

She turns her attention back to Harris and sees that he’s pulled his gun the rest of the way out. He hasn’t raised it yet, but his body language tells her that he feels confident she won’t shoot.