“Give me the package,” Dekker called. His voice was rougher than Colin expected. Not loud enough to carry to the floors below unless someone was already listening for trouble. A professional voice.
A dead man’s voice if I can get a clear shot.
Maren went very still behind him. Colin couldn’t afford to look at her.
“Package,” Dekker repeated. “And I let you walk away.”
Colin gave a short, humorless laugh. “You really think I’m that stupid?”
“No,” Dekker said. “I think you’re that attached.”
There it was.
The read.
Dekker had seen it. Maybe in the way Colin moved for Maren, or in the way his body stayed angled toward her even while he tracked the threat. Maybe because men like Dekker recognized love when they could use it as leverage.
Colin’s jaw tightened.
“She looks exactly like the one I already killed,” Dekker said. “Don’t make me do it twice.”
Maren made the smallest, pain-filled sound.
Colin’s vision narrowed.
Every promise. Every nightmare. Every time Juni had looked up at him and decided he would do. Every time Maren hadtrusted him with her life and her heart and that little girl’s future.
Colin breathed in. Held. Breathed out.
“Hailstorm,” Elissa said sharply. “Don’t let him pull you out of cover.”
Colin was already moving.
He crossed low behind the line of parked cars, counting the shots.
One. Two. Three.
Dekker was good, but he’d expected Colin to stay pinned behind the SUV with Maren. He might have clocked that Colin and Maren were together, but he didn’t know what she was to him.
Dekker shifted out from the column, trying for a new angle on Maren. Colin saw the silhouette and fired twice.
Dekker staggered back. Not down, damn it.
He’s wearing a vest.
Dekker raised his weapon. Colin fired again, higher this time.
Dekker’s head snapped back. He dropped.
The silence afterward hit almost harder than the gunfire. For one second, no one moved.
Then Maren said, “Colin?”
He turned. She was on her knees behind the SUV, pale, glass in her hair, the package still clutched against her body beneath her jacket.
Alive.
“Stay there,” he said. But she was already looking past him at Lynn.
