Gabe (In the Company of Snipers, #8)(114)

Shelby kicked and struggled, scratching at Fallon’s hands in her hair. “Ow! Stop hurting me! You’ve already killed Mr. Stewart. Isn’t that enough?”

Fallon’s eyes bugged out in rage. “It ain’t enough! I want it all.”

He tossed her against the front door, rolling his shoulders as if a mighty weight sat there. He couldn’t have looked more fierce—or more in pain. “You’re gonna die, bitch. Your dumb-assed boyfriend, too. Then I’m gonna burn this shithole of Stewart’s to the ground. Maybe then I’ll start feeling better. Maybe not. Might need to kill every last one of his guys, too. Especially that piece of Mexican trash he’s got working for him. Shit. What’d he do? Collect every worthless stray that came along?”

Izza? What could this bastard possibly have against Connor’s wife?

Gabe knelt at the kitchen table, nearly on his feet. He needed to draw Fallon away from Shelby, so he egged him on, risking death. “What you got against Izza Maher?”


“He hires a lousy slut instead of a real man? He deserved to die!”

Shelby had landed on her butt in the corner by the door, the bookcase behind her. She extended a hand toward Fallon, and for a moment, Gabe thought she might be in the middle of working a miracle. A damned scary miracle.

He took advantage of the distraction and scanned the floor for either of his weapons.

She kept trying to help this sick bastard. Did she really think Fallon was worth saving? “You’re sick, aren’t you? You need help. You might have radiation poisoning. I can help.”

The hard light in his eye softened. She lifted onto her knees, and—

No way in hell. Not this guy. Gabe spotted one of his pistols. He jerked it of the floor and on target. Muscle training took over.

BLAM!

The 9mm in his shaking hand roared with authority. Shadows danced at his peripheral. He wiped the burning sweat out of his eyes. Damn. I’m not going to last.

Fallon staggered backward.

Shelby ducked low and scurried into the hall.

Gabe crouched, cupped his bloody right hand with the other to steady it, and fired again.

Fallon backed into the sheet of plywood over Kelsey’s front picture window.

Gabe climbed to his feet and advanced, firing a third time. Die, you bastard. Die.

Fallon refused to drop his weapon.

The kickback of each discharge pulverized Gabe’s bleeding shoulder, but who cared? He was all out of human kindness. His pistol roared again.

Two final rounds pinned Fallon flat to the now bullet perforated plywood. He stood rigid, his knees locked in death and his damned weapon still in his clenched hand. The arrogant bastard sneered, as if he had anything to say about who would live or die. He lifted his lip, scornful to the bitter end.

Holy hell, Gabe ached to shoot him again. And again! But it took every ounce of strength he had left to hold that smoldering piece steady in his hand.

Fallon’s jaw sagged. No ugly threats formed on his blood-slick lips now. The revolver slipped out of his limp fingers. The bastard fell, stiff as a plank to the floor.

About damned time.

Gabe looked down at the weapon in his palm, dazed, yet grateful. Funny that a friend this powerful should feel so warm and so deadly at the same time.

“Did he hurt you?” he asked, needing to know. “Touch you? Anything but—“

“No,” Shelby answered quickly. “I tried to call for you when he grabbed me.”

Must be what woke me. Gabe staggered, going down for the count. Adrenaline pounded in his ears, but he still had work to do. That was why he’d been born—to clean up the ugly messes that life revealed so that good women like Shelby didn’t have to. No matter what.

He lurched on unsteady legs to where Fallon lay staring at the ceiling. Gabe dropped to one knee before he keeled over and peeled the man’s revolver out of his fist, securing it in his own belt. With two bloody fingers, he closed Fallon’s gaping eyes. Good women don’t need to see that, either.

Shelby launched herself at him. “No, no, no! Gabe.”

He stiff-armed her before he fell on his face. The war might be over, but one last duty remained. Man’s work. He stiffened his spine and snapped his fingers, his palm extended. “I need... a sheet. Or something. Now, please.”

Shelby scrambled into the hall. In a second, she was back. She shoved a clean folded bed sheet into his bloodied hands, but damn. Focusing on this one last thing took a lot of effort. The walls moved. He stumbled on his own feet. Time was running out.

“Bastard,” he hissed at the dead man. “You don’t come into good people’s homes to kill ’em.”

Clutching the sheet to his chest, he flipped it with one hand, but it only half-opened.

Shelby pulled the sheet from his fingers.

“No.” He tried to pull it back. “I got... this.”

“And I’ve got you,” she said, unfurling the sheet over Fallon’s body.

Gabe bowed his head, the wretchedness of death now concealed beneath a mantle of white. Like snow. With big, wide red splotches. Good enough.

“You’re shot, Gabe.” The anguish in her voice stabbed him.

His knees buckled, and down he went. His mission done. Kelsey. Shelby. D.C. Safe.

“Call... 911.”

“They’re on their way.” She dropped to the floor, cradling him the same way Taylor Armstrong, his best bud, had done on another far off battlefield on another Godawful day.