Page 153 of Better the Devil

The gunman adjusted his stance and his grip, his eyes darting over to where the voice had come from.

‘It’s fine! Don’t listen to him!’ Fleck said. ‘He’s trying to get into your head. Don’t let him. I’ll protect you all, like I said I would. I’ll fix everything.’ He nudged the man beside him. ‘Do it. Shoot him.’

Beneath his mask, Curtis Neil hesitated.

‘I… I don’t know.’

‘Fucking shoot him!’

Curtis looked around at the others, eyes darting around in the dark shadows of his balaclava.

‘Gavin, I don’t think?—’

Fleck shouldered him aside, grabbing for the gun, his face twisting up into a knot of tight fury.

‘Jesus Christ! Give it to me. Give it to me and I’ll?—’

The end of the sentence exploded in a spray of blood and snot, as Logan’s fist connected with the end of Fleck’s nose.

The sergeant went down hard, and the shotgun clattered to the floor at Curtis’s feet.

‘Don’t even think about it,’ Logan warned, but Curtis was already moving, already grabbing for the weapon, already snatching it, and turning with it, and taking aim.

Logan positioned himself in front of Bosco again, raising his hands in surrender. Down on the floor, the Russian choked out a sound. Gratitude, maybe, although Logan doubted he had that in him.

‘Don’t do this, son. You’re smarter than this,’ Jack said.

‘Shoot him!’ Fleck cried, his voice muffled by the hand he was holding over his face, trying to stem the blood flow.

‘You’d be killing a police officer. There’s no way you’d get away with it.’

‘Maybe… maybe I would,’ Curtis whispered. ‘You’re out here alone. We’ve got all of us. We’ve got an army.’

Logan sighed. He let his arms fall back down again.

‘You’re wrong on two fronts there, Curtis. This isn’t an army. This is a bunch of scared people who’ve been manipulated into ruining their lives for one man’s personal vendetta. That’s the first thing you’re wrong about.’

Curtis couldn’t help himself. He had to ask.

‘What… what’s the second?’

Logan smiled. It was a dangerous thing, all teeth and menace. He raised his voice, so it would be heard all around the room, and beyond.

‘Whatpossiblymakes you think I’d come all the way out here on my own?’

A fist pounded on the door. Multiple sirens screamed into life beyond the bothy’s walls.

All around the room, men and women fretted and sobbed, as the horror of it all—of what they’d been a part of, of what they’d allowed themselves to become—hit home.

‘See, me? I do have an army, Curtis. They’re good people. Loyal. And they’re only a quick text away.’

He held a hand out, palm up.

‘Give me the gun, son,’ he said, not unkindly. ‘He used you. He used all of you. Don’t let him get you into any more trouble than he already has.’

Something changed in the eyes of the man in the mask, like a shadow passing over them. The gun shook in his hands. Logan braced himself for the pain, but then cried out, ‘No!’ as Curtis spun and turned the shotgun on the fallen Sergeant Fleck.

And thunder and fire filled the air.