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If Amber had only been a puzzler,maybe that would have been true. Maybe it still would be, but she was an FBIagent.
“Not yet,” Amber snapped back, andupended the table, flinging the chess board into Colm’s face.
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO
Amber heard the gun go off, far tooloud at such close range. The bullet missed her, but Amber knew that she hadbought herself a moment at best with her surprise attack on the serial killer.
She threw herself forward, becausegoing back wasn’t an option when Colm had a gun. He would pick her off beforeshe made it halfway to the spot where her own weapon lay discarded on theground.
Amber slammed into Colm, strikingout at him with fists and feet. The impacts were hard enough to jar her hands,but Amber didn’t expect to simply be able to knock him out quickly. Colm waslarger than her, and he’d obviously been in his share of fights. Her blowsaimed simply to distract him, forcing him to deal with the barrage of attacksso that she might have a chance to get the gun away from him.
Colm raised his hands and now Ambersaw her chance. She wrenched at the gun, twisting it in Colm’s grip so that itfell from his fingers. Amber tried to grab for it, but Colm kicked it away. Hehammered a punch into Amber’s kidneys that made her cry out in pain, thenstruck her with an elbow that knocked the breath out of her.
His hands clasped around Amber’sthroat. “You want to cheat in my game? I’ll show you the price of that. I’llkill you, then I’ll go back and kill Agent Phelps, slowly.”
His grip tightened on Amber’s neck.Amber could feel the pressure building in her ears as the strangle tightened.She knew she only had seconds of consciousness left, so she struck out withstiffened fingers, striking Colm in his own throat. He coughed and fell back,both him and Amber gasping for breath as they tried to regain enough strengthto make their next attack.
Amber charged in again, but Colmkicked her as she came at him, striking her hard and knocking her back. Ratherthan follow up, though, he went for his fallen gun, and Amber realized that shewasn’t going to be able to get to him in time to stop him. She had an instantto make a decision, and in that instant, she dove for cover, throwing herselfbehind one of the steel pillars.
Amber made it just in time, thebark of the gun assaulting her ears again, followed by the sound of metalhitting metal as the bullet ricocheted away from the pillar.
“You think you can hide from me,Amber?” Colm demanded. “You think I won’t be able to get a clean shot at you?”
He started to come into view as helooked for an angle from which to kill Amber. She sprinted for the next post,throwing herself behind it as another shot came. She made it just in time, theshot missing, but coming close enough to her that Amber thought she could feelit whistling past her.
“Cat and mouse hardly seems like agame worth playing for the likes of us,” Colm said. “Why not step out into theopen and let me finish this cleanly? You know I’ll get a shot at youeventually.”
He jumped out, trying to shootAmber once more, but that only sent her scurrying to the next pillar, trying tokeep low and zigzagging to make herself a harder target. Amber’s heart washammering in her chest now, her breath coming in short gasps.
She could see her gun lying whereshe’d tossed it. She had to make it to the weapon. That was Amber’s only chanceof being able to come out of this situation alive. She sprinted from one pillarto the next, trying to keep her movements random, trying not to give Colm aneasy shot at her. He didn’t fire this time. Was he trying to conserve bullets?Was he only going to fire now when he was sure that he would be able to bringAmber down?
Amber couldn’t take that forgranted, but she had to continue making progress towards her weapon.
It seemed that Colm had realizedthe same thing, though. Amber saw him moving to cut her off, able to movethrough the open space where Amber had to keep in cover. Yet, if Colm got toher gun too, this was done. Without a weapon of her own, she was going to die.
She ran for her gun, and now, Colmfired. Amber felt something graze her arm, but ignored the sudden burst ofwhite hot pain. It didn’t matter if she was hurt, if she’d been hit. She stillhad to get to the weapon. Amber was just a couple of paces away now, and shedove for the gun.
Colm was faster. He got to it,kicking it away, standing between it and Amber. He had his own gun cradled intwo hands, pointed at Amber with the steadiness of a man who was lookingforward to what came next. Unlike Amber, he wasn’t breathing hard, wasn’tbleeding or wounded.
“You might have won one game,Amber, but you’ve lost this one,” he said.
“Best of three?” Amber said, tryingto stall for time, trying to think of anything that might buy her a few moreseconds.
There wasn’t anything, though. Nota single thing Amber could think of that might help her to survive what wasabout to happen.
“No,” Colm said. Amber could seethe coldness in his eyes, the determination to end this. He was going to killher. He would murder her, and then he would go over to Simon and kill him too.Amber wasn’t sure which part of that terrified her more. “Goodbye, Amber.”
Amber thought that she saw hisfinger start to tighten on the trigger.
Then, out of the corner of her eye,Amber saw a figure approaching, moving fast. She had a second to recognizeSimon, and to realize that he must have succeeded in cutting himself free whileAmber and Colm were fighting. Then he slammed into Colm, the shot going wide ofAmber as he bore the serial killer to the ground.
The two of them were fighting then,their hands locked onto each other’s wrists, Colm controlling the knife Simonheld, Simon struggling to keep the gun away from him. They hit out at oneanother and struggled to bring their weapons to bear. Simon might have beenstronger, but Colm was more aggressive, slamming his head up into Simon’s once,then again.
Amber knew that she had to help.She thought about jumping into the fight, but she saw her gun a few yards away.That was the better option, the one that would let her control the situationrather than struggling blindly with an armed man.
Amber ran over to her gun,snatching it up. Behind her, she heard the sound of Colm’s gun going off, thenoise filling the space and filling Amber with horror as she heard Simon cryout.
Amber turned back towards Colm andSimon. Colm was back on his feet now, while Simon was lying on the floor infront of him, his face twisted in pain. Colm still had the gun, and waspointing it at Simon, obviously intending to finish the job.
