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CHAPTER 3
The Givenchys were the first thing to go.
Lauren stumbled, would have gone down but Finn’s death grip on her arm prevented her from slamming face-first into the hard surface. He pulled up, shooting pain down her shoulder. “Come on!”
“Wait!” She pulled back.
He gave her just enough time to slip out of her three-inch heels, pick them up
by the straps and start running again.
They reached the curved white metal Finn had spotted earlier, which was—thank God—a ladder that disappeared over the edge and hugged the side of the building.
Finn pushed her forward. “Go.”
She hooked her shoes over her fingers, turned and put her first foot on the top rung. Across the roof, the door to the stairwell flew open and two men—two really big-ass, threatening men Lauren had seen downstairs in the club—spilled out of the space.
“Go!” Finn ducked behind a venting unit with his gun gripped in both hands.
Lauren’s heart rate shot into the triple digits. Shouts exploded from the opposite side of the roof. Gunfire lit up the night sky. She ducked out of the way, her hands shaking as she grasped the metal rails and lowered her foot to the next rung. Holy shit, what the hell was going on? What did these men want? It was as if she’d stumbled into a scene straight out of a James Bond movie, only this wasn’t fiction, it was real life.
Sweat broke out over her palms, making the bars hard to grip. She lowered herself down another rung, said a prayer she wouldn’t slip and kill herself. Just before she cleared the roof, she caught movement as a man charged Finn’s hiding spot.
Her adrenaline surged. “Finn!”
Finn ducked back behind the metal vent and shifted to the other side. From his vantage she knew he couldn’t see the gnman. Reacting without thought, she pushed back up on the ladder and chucked one beaded strappy Givenchy heel his way. It hit him in the face with a thwack. Dazed, the man stumbled, righted himself, shouted something in Spanish Lauren didn’t understand. She hurled the second shoe and yelled, “Finn!”
Finn was on his feet in a split second. His fist plowed into the gangster’s chin, knocking the man back and down. The gun sailed from the man’s hand. A blur caught Lauren’s attention. Fear closed her throat. Before she could even scream, Finn lifted his gun, whirled and fired toward the second man, charging from the other direction. The bullet struck the man in the shoulder, the impact jerking him off his feet.
The guy on the ground scrambled to his feet, hollered in Spanish, then surged forward, slamming into Finn, taking them both to the ground hard. Finn’s gun flew from his fingers. The two reached for the weapon at the same time, wrestling for control.
Lauren cringed as fist met bone. Cracks and grunts resounded. Finn and the terrorist rolled across the roof. Finn landed on his back. From above, the guy slammed his fist into Finn’s jaw. Finn’s head smacked back against the roof. The man shouted in Spanish again, his arm sweeping out, searching for his gun. Just as his fingers closed around the grip, Finn threw a right hook that landed square in the other man’s nose. A loud crack resounded. Blood spurted in every direction.
“Mi nariz!” the man shrieked.
Finn wriggled out from under the man’s weight, kicked him in the ribs. “Yer damn nose is the least of your problems, asshole.”
Across the roof, the second man, dazed and bleeding, found his balance. The gun in his hand glinted in the moonlight.
Panic nearly stole Lauren’s breath. Indecision froze her mind. Words clogged in her throat. “Gun! Turn! Tierney . . . oh, shit!”
Finn looked up and saw the threat. In a blur, he jerked the other terrorist against his body, wrapping his arm around the man’s throat. His right hand closed over the man’s gun hand. He lifted and fired. Gunshots echoed and sparks lit up the darkness.
A scream caught in Lauren’s throat. Before she could make a sound, the man on the other side of the roof dropped to his knees. The gun fell from his hand. Finn let go of the limp terrorist in his arms, blood seeping from the wound in his chest, and stepped over the body at his feet.
Too stunned to believe what she’d just witnessed, Lauren stared at the carnage. Footsteps echoed somewhere close. She looked up and into Finn’s tight face, mired in blood and dirt and fresh bruises. “What the hell are you waiting for? Get off this fucking roof! There’ll be more coming.”
His voice shocked her back to reality. She didn’t argue, didn’t question. She picked her way down the ladder on her bare feet, her sweaty hands slipping on the rungs while her heart raced. When she reached out with her foot and felt nothing but air, her gaze shot down. The ladder had ended and she was still eight feet above the ground.
Oh, shit. “Tierney!”
From three feet above, Finn stopped climbing, glanced down. “Shit. Can’t one damn thing go right tonight?”
She knew he saw exactly what she did. No bushes, no trees, nothing but hard, packed dirt that ran all along the back of the building. “You’ll have to jump.”
“I’ll break my leg!”
“It’s either that or get shot. Hurryup, Slim. It’s not gonna take them long to figure out the two yahoos they sent up to the roof are dead.”
