He dragged the wheelchair in front of her so she’d have some cover, and then he turned to check on Tessa.
Landon’s heart slammed against his chest.
Tessa was barely visible at the back corner of the building where he’d left her. But she wasn’t alone. Landon couldn’t see who was with her, but whoever it was had a gun.
“I’m sorry,” Tessa said. “I didn’t see him in time.”
Landon hated that she even felt the need to apologize. With all the bullets flying and the chaos, it would have been hard to hear someone coming up behind her. Besides, they hadn’t even known the locations or even the number of the other gunmen. With this guy and the sniper on the roof, there were at least two, but Landon figured there could be others waiting to strike.
For now, though, he had to figure out how to get Tessa away from this goon before one of his comrades showed up to help. To do that, he had to stay alive, so he, too, ducked behind the wheelchair. It was lousy cover, but it was metal and might do the trick. Besides, he didn’t plan to be behind cover for long. Not with Tessa in immediate danger.
Even though the timing sucked, Landon thought of what she’d said to him in the car.
I’m in love with you.
Landon hadn’t had a chance to react to that, hadn’t even had much time to think about it, but now those words troubled him. Because if Tessa was indeed truly in love with him, she might do anything to try to keep him safe. That might include sacrificing herself.
“I don’t know what you want,” Landon said to the guy, “but tell me what it’ll take for you to release Tessa.”
Nothing. For some long heart-pounding moments. Then Landon saw the person lean forward and whisper something in Tessa’s ear. He couldn’t hear what the guy said, but he got a better look at him. He was wearing a ski mask like the other thugs who’d been trying to kill them.
Not good.
Because it was hard to negotiate with someone who would murder for money.
“He wants Courtney,” Tessa relayed. Her voice sounded a lot steadier than Landon figured she actually was. Trying to put on a good front.
Or maybe it was more than that.
She sounded angry. Perhaps because the guy had managed to sneak up on her, or maybe he’d added something else to that whisper.
“Courtney?” Landon questioned. “Why her?”
Landon figured he wasn’t going to get a straight answer to that question, and he didn’t. In fact, he didn’t get an answer at all.
But it did make him think.
All along they’d believed the attacks were about Tessa, about what she possibly saw the night Emmett was murdered. The other theory they’d had was the attacks were connected to him, that Quincy was behind them. But maybe Quincy was after only Courtney and the baby, and Tessa and he just got in the way.
“Quincy’s dead,” he told the thug in case he hadn’t noticed the body. “I hope he paid you in advance or you’re out of luck.”
The guy whispered something else to Tessa. “He still wants Courtney. He wants you to step aside.”
Well, hell. Quincy must have left orders to kill Courtney even if something happened to him.
“If you kill Courtney, you’ll make the baby an orphan,” Landon tried again. “Whatever Quincy paid you or planned to pay you, I’ll give you double. All you have to do is let Tessa go.”
Of course, that might just prompt the guy to take her hostage, but every second he had a gun to her head was a second that could take this situation from bad to worse.
And it got worse, all right.
Landon heard the sound of an engine. Not a car. But rather a motorcycle. And it was coming at them fast. It didn’t take long for it to come barreling up the alley, and Landon saw yet one more thing he didn’t want to see.
Another ski-mask-wearing thug.
He brought the motorcycle to a stop right beside Tessa and his partner in crime. Landon wanted to send a shot right into the guy’s head, but the thug holding Tessa might retaliate and do the same to her.
“I can pay you off, too,” Landon told the second thug. He practically had to shout to be heard over the motorcycle engine. “With Quincy dead, wouldn’t you rather have all that money than end up dead?”
“I got no plans to die,” the one on the motorcycle shouted back. He was bulky, the size of a linebacker and armed to the hilt.
He killed the engine and climbed off, and Landon could have sworn his heart skipped some beats when he saw what was happening. The thugs switched places, and the whispering one who was holding Tessa dragged her onto the motorcycle with him.
Hell. Time was up. Landon couldn’t let the guy just drive off with Tessa, because he was certain he’d never see her alive again.
“When you’re ready to give us Courtney,” the bulky guy said, “then you’ll get Tessa back.”
Landon doubted that. No way would they leave Tessa alive. “Take me instead,” Landon bargained.
Tessa frantically shook her head and moved as if ready to cooperate with this stupid plan that would get her killed. Yeah, she’d been right about that I’m in love with you. She was putting her life ahead of his, and that wasn’t going to happen.
“Lawmen don’t make good hostages.” The bulky guy again, though the other thug, the whisperer, said something else to Tessa. Something that Landon couldn’t catch.
But whatever it was caused Tessa’s shoulders to snap back.
“Landon, watch out!” she shouted.
The bulky guy took aim at Landon, and Landon had no choice but to fire.
Chapter Seventeen
The man who still had hold of Tessa yanked her to the side of the motorcycle. Just as the sound of two shots cracked through the air. One of those shots had come from Landon. The other, the thug who’d ridden up on the motorcycle.
Tessa hit the ground, hard, so hard that it knocked the breath out of her, but she fought to get up because she had to stop the big guy from shooting at Landon again. She managed to catch on to his leg, and it off-balanced him just enough to cause his next shot to go up in the air.
Landon’s didn’t.
His bullet went into the guy’s shoulder. It didn’t kill him, but it sent him scrambling for cover.
The uninjured gunman didn’t do anything to help his partner. He latched on to Tessa’s hair, dragging her back in front of him. Once again, she was his human shield, and Landon wouldn’t have a clean shot to put an end to this.
“Get down!” she shouted to Landon.
He didn’t, but at least he hurried back behind the wheelchair next to Courtney. Courtney was still moaning in pain. Still bleeding, too, from the looks of it, but at least she was alive. For now. And so was Landon. Tessa needed to do something to make sure it stayed that way.
“I’ll go with them,” she called out.
“No, you won’t!” Landon answered. “They’ll kill you.”
Almost certainly. Tessa didn’t want to die, but at least this way, Landon would be safe, and he would be able to get Courtney to the hospital. Samantha wouldn’t be an orphan. Of course, if these men killed her, it wouldn’t end the danger to Courtney, Landon or the baby, but maybe Landon could get them all to a safe house before the gunmen could regroup and attack again.
Tessa tried to hold on to that hope, and since she was hoping, she added that she could find a way to escape. Maybe she could do that once they had her wherever they were going to take her. All she would need was some kind of distraction.
The injured thug crawled to his partner and whispered something to him that Tessa didn’t catch, but whatever it was, it got her captor moving. He had his left hand fisted in her hair, and with the gun jammed against her temple, he hauled her to her feet, keeping behind her. He then began to back his way to the motorcycle.
> “We’ll trade Tessa for Courtney,” the wounded man shouted out to Landon. “You’ve got thirty seconds to decide.”
Tessa knew that wasn’t going to happen. No way would she make a trade like that, even though Courtney immediately tried to sit up. Tessa got so caught up in trying to figure out how to stop this that she nearly missed something.
Something critical.
Why was the wounded man doing all the talking? He was having trouble breathing and couldn’t stand, and yet the whispering guy had let him bark out the order for the trade.
Why?
Was it because she might recognize his voice?
Even though her mind was whirling, she tried to recall those whispers, but he’d purposely muffled his voice, and that meant this was likely either Joel or Ward. Too bad the men were about the same height and build, or she would have been able to tell from that.
So Tessa went with a bluff. Except in this case, she figured her bluff had a fifty-fifty chance of succeeding.
“The man holding me is Ward,” she shouted.
Bingo.
Even though it’d been a bluff, she knew she was right when she heard him mumble some profanity under his breath. Then he cursed some more, much louder.
Yes, definitely Ward.
This time it was Landon who cursed. “How the hell could you do this? You’re supposed to uphold the law, not break it.”
“Breaking it pays a lot more than upholding it,” Ward answered. “Now, bring Courtney to me, or I start shooting.”
“You’re going to start shooting no matter what I say or do,” Landon countered, but Tessa saw him readjusting his position. Probably so he could take the shot if he got it, but Ward was staying right behind her.
But Ward wasn’t staying put, either. He was inching her backward, but Tessa couldn’t tell if he was trying to get her on the motorcycle or simply closer to his hired gun. Yes, the guy was injured, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t kill her.
“Who killed Quincy? You?”
“Possibly. He got in the way. He was here to get Courtney, but I never had any intentions of letting him have her.”
“Because you want to kill her yourself,” Landon concluded.
“She knows too much.”
“About what?” Courtney asked, her breath gusting through the groans of pain.
“You don’t really want me to go into that here, do you? Because then I’d have to kill Landon.”
“I already know,” Landon assured him.
It was a lie, but Tessa could feel the muscles in Ward’s arm turn to steel.
“This is about your dirty dealings with Joel,” Landon went on. “Both Tessa and Courtney were investigating him, and you believed they were on to you. They weren’t, but I was.”
Tessa hadn’t thought it possible, but Ward’s arm stiffened even more. “Joel will turn on you,” she said.
“Joel’s dead,” Ward whispered. “Or soon will be. Before he dies, he’ll confess to all of this. Including Courtney’s murder. And yours.”
She was pretty sure that wasn’t a bluff. In fact, Ward had no doubt already arranged for Joel’s death, and with Ward’s connections in law enforcement, he could indeed set up Joel. Then Ward could walk away a free man with all the money he’d made from his business deals with Joel.
Well, he could walk if Landon, Courtney and she were dead.
That meant no matter what Landon and she did, the bottom line was that Ward would kill them. And he would do that before Landon got a chance to tell anyone else. That meant Tessa had to do something fast.
But what?
She went with the first thing that popped into her head. “Landon, did you record Ward’s confession with your phone?” she called out.
“Sure did,” Landon answered. She doubted he had, but judging from the way Ward started cursing, he didn’t know it was a lie. She could see Landon put his left hand in his pocket. “And I just sent it to Grayson. Now every lawman in Silver Creek knows you’re a dirty agent.”
A feral sound came from Ward’s throat, and Tessa knew he was about to shoot her in the head. She didn’t waste a second. She dropped to the ground. Or rather that was what she tried to do, but Ward held on to her hair, yanking it so hard that she couldn’t choke back a scream of pain.
Not good.
Because her scream brought Landon to his feet. He bolted toward them, firing a shot at the wounded gunman. Tessa wasn’t at the right angle to see where his bullet had gone, but since the gunman didn’t return fire, she figured Landon had hit his intended target.
Ward moved his gun, too. Aiming it at Landon. But Tessa rammed her elbow into his stomach. It didn’t off-balance him, definitely didn’t get him to drop his gun, but he had to re-aim, and that was just enough time for Landon to make it to them.
Landon plowed into them, sending all three of them to the ground.
Tessa felt the jolt go through her entire body, and while she didn’t lose her breath this time, Ward’s gun whacked against the side of her head. At first she thought it was just from the impact, but he did it again.
The pain exploded in her head.
But even with the pain, she heard Landon curse the man, and he dropped his own gun so he could latch on to Ward’s wrist with both hands. It stopped Ward from hitting her again. Stopped him from aiming his gun at either of them, but Ward let go of her hair so he could punch Landon with his left hand. And he just kept on punching and kicking him.
Tessa tried to get out of the fray just so she could find some way to stop Ward, but it was hard to move with the struggle going on. She fought, too, clawing at Ward’s face, but the man was in such a rage that she wasn’t even sure he felt anything.
However, she did.
Ward backhanded her so hard Tessa could have sworn she saw stars. She fell and landed against the hulking hired gun—and yes, he was dead—but before she could spring back to her feet, Landon and Ward were already in a fierce battle. Landon was punching him, but Ward was bashing his gun against Landon’s face.
Mercy, there was already so much blood.
Tessa frantically looked around and spotted the dead guy’s gun. She wasn’t familiar with the weapon and prayed it didn’t go off and hit Landon. Still, it was the only thing she had right now. She scooped it up and tried to aim it at Ward.
But she couldn’t.
Ward and Landon were tangled together so that she couldn’t risk firing. Someone else had no trouble doing that, though. In the distance she heard a fresh round of gunfire. Grayson, the deputies and that sniper. Maybe she could try to put an end to this so she could help them. Until the area was safe, the ambulance wasn’t going to be able to get to Courtney to save her life.
Maybe Landon’s, too.
In that moment she hated Ward so much that she wanted to jump into that fight and punch him. But that wouldn’t do Landon any good. He was battling for his life. For Courtney’s and her lives, too, and Tessa was powerless to help him.
She waited, praying and watching for any opening where she would have a shot. But then she saw something that caused her breath to vanish.
Ward quit hitting Landon with the gun.
And Ward managed to point it at him.
He fired.
Tessa thought maybe she screamed. She screamed inside her head, anyway, and the scream got louder when Landon dropped back.
Oh, God. Had he been shot?
She’d heard that when some people died, their lives flashed before their eyes, and even though she wasn’t dying, it happened to her. Tessa saw everything. Her time with Landon. All the mistakes she’d made. All the chances she’d lost to have a life with him.
Ward could have just taken all of that away. He was trying to make sure he killed Landon. He took aim at him again.
> Everything inside her went still. And then the rage came. Even though Landon was still too close to fire, she shot the gun into the ground next to the dead man.
Ward whipped his head in her direction, turning his gun toward her. But Landon reacted faster than Ward did. Landon lunged at the man, twisting his wrist so that the gun was pointed at Ward’s chest.
Ward fired.
Like his hired thugs, Ward was wearing a bulletproof vest, so Tessa expected him to make the same groan of pain that she’d heard from Courtney. But what she heard was a gurgling sound. Because Ward’s bullet hadn’t gone into his vest but rather his neck.
He was bleeding to death right in front of them.
Tessa didn’t care. If fact, she wished him dead after all the hurt and misery he’d caused. Instead, she looked at Landon and was terrified of what she might see.
His face was bloody. So was his left arm.
“The bullet just grazed me,” he said.
It looked like more than a graze to her, but at least he wasn’t dead or dying.
The relief came so hard and fast that she probably would have dropped to her knees if she hadn’t heard Courtney groan again.
“Check on her,” Landon instructed. “I’ll watch this snake.”
Tessa nodded, and she somehow managed to get her feet moving. Though she’d made it only a few steps when she heard Ward speak.
Or rather he laughed.
“You think you got Emmett’s killer,” he said, his voice not much louder than a whisper. Still, Tessa had no trouble hearing it. “You didn’t. He’s still on the roof, and he’s probably killing more Rylands right now.”
And with that, Ward drew the last breath he’d ever take.
Chapter Eighteen
Landon didn’t want to be stitched up. Hell, he didn’t want to be in the hospital ER. He wanted to be out there with Grayson and the rest of his cousins so they could catch Emmett’s killer. At least, he was dead certain he wanted that until he took one look at Tessa.
She was staring at him as if she expected him to keel over at any moment.
He was probably looking at her the same way, though.
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