Gabe (In the Company of Snipers Book 8)

by Winters, Irish

Oh, yeah. Oh, wow. So, this is what I’ve been missing. I’m so glad I waited.

  Shelby lay snug in the crook of the arm of the only man she’d felt so in tune with, awed by the nature of the beast and his handsome body. The guy was built. He had broad shoulders, and was solid from stem to stern. She would know. She’d checked out that tight backside of his, hands on. He didn’t seem to mind her fingers or palms on any part of him. She now had favorite Gabe parts, and she liked to touch them all.

  His stomach, for one. It was relaxed now, but still muscled, firm beneath her questing fingers. She was on a Gabe quest, filled with an insatiable need to explore every facet of this magnificent male specimen.

  He smiled when her fingertips brushed his nipples, so she did it again. With his eyes still closed, he captured her hand and pressed it to his lips.

  And that was another thing. Her entire body had revved up for more, only he seemed to want to sleep. Of course, he was probably tired. She got that. After all, he had saved the world. He’d also gotten up to lock the house and retrieved his holster and guns, but then, they’d done it again, only they hadn’t exactly made love. Oh, no. They’d made the most exquisitely slow love. It still had her purring. She’d found the perfect answer to her stress. Gabe.

  Shelby stayed her quest, content to explore in other ways. Lying tucked into him as she was, his arm around her, his fingers under her arm, she noticed things. His profile. The sexy mess of hair she’d run her fingers through. His ridge of tiny hairs on his right ear. The shadow of a long day’s scruff on his face. The way his fingers curled around her hand.

  The minty taste of his tongue. His nose, a very straight and normal nose that flared every once in a while, as if it too was taking in her scent the same way she took in the smell of the great outdoors on his skin. His breath. Nuances that belonged to her and her alone.

  “I love you, Shell,” he murmured, his eyes still closed. “Stop staring at me. Go to sleep.”

  “I can’t,” she confessed, lifting up on one elbow to watch his handsome face. “I’ve just had the most mind-blowing experience of my life. How can you just go to sleep?”

  “You want more?” He peered out of the corner of one eye at her, the hint of disbelief in his tone sparking her libido all over again. The darned thing seemed to have a mind of its own. And no off button.

  “Yes, please,” she whispered, a giggle lifting up from her heart. “I want your body. All of it. Every last inch. Again.”

  The man was cunning. In no time at all, she found herself facing the other direction, her back to his very impressive front, and his arm around her chest cupping her right breast.

  “Then you shall have it,” he growled into the nape of her neck.

  Who knew sex could make that part of her anatomy so ticklish?

  A rash of goose bumps shivered over her bare shoulders at the speed with which he’d manhandled her body. And this new position. Sweet.

  That was all it took. She succumbed to the sweetest death, the death of her old self, her past life and all her childhood fantasies. This new dream was better and worth changing everything for. Living for. Maybe even dying for.

  He buried himself inside her with one quick thrust.

  Ahh. My very favorite Gabe part.

  He woke to an empty bed. Not what he’d expected. And a noise.

  The palest light of pre-dawn shimmered through the heavy curtains. Alarmed, he hurried into his cargo pants, sliding his holster over bare shoulders. The sight of him half-dressed and armed in the kitchen might scare Shelby, but then again, it might not.

  No quiet breakfast-making kitchen sounds. No hint of bacon frying. A prickle of fear dumped acid into his gut. Where is she?

  He opened the bedroom door to a dark hallway. A too-quiet house. The hair on the back of his neck lifted. He pulled both pistols, securing their power in his hands.

  Might be over-reacting. Let’s find out.

  Three long strides took him to the front room at his left, the kitchen at his right. A shadow moved near the boarded up front room window. The same sound. A whimper. Gabe flipped the front room light on. Anger flooded his soul.

  Fallon. The sonofabitch had Shelby pressed against his chest, one hand over her mouth, a snub-nosed revolver stuck in her neck.

  Gabe raised pistols both on target, every fiber of his being begging to be let loose to destroy the man who dared touch Shelby. His inner sniper analyzed the odds of getting a clean shot off without hitting her. Not good with adrenaline hitting his body with a freight train load of flight or—fight, damn it!

  “Let her go.”

  The poor thing’s eyes were wide, her chest heaving. Both hands clutched Fallon’s arms, her elbows jutting in front of her. At least she’d requisitioned Gabe’s black TEAM polo for morning-wear. Smart decision. It hung to her knees, but the thought that it might be all she had on stalled his heart.

  What else did Fallon do to her while I slept, damn it?

  The bastard sneered, his lip cut and his nose bleeding. The fact he was dressed from head to toe in Army green added to the demented look. So did the Green Beret expertly angled over his bristly crew-cut. The black ink of Army-shit tattoos covered what his short-sleeved shirt didn’t.

  The man had to be stark raving, certifiably nuts to be dressed in spec ops gear, right down to his spit-polished black boots. He nailed Gabe with a cold, hard look over Shelby’s shoulder. “Where is she?” he snarled.

  “There’s no one else here,” Gabe countered quickly, hoping to God that Shelby kept her cool.

  “I won’t ask again,” Fallon bellowed. “Where is she?”

  “Who are you looking for? Do you mean—”

  BLAM!

  The round blasted Gabe backwards over the kitchen table and to the floor. He found himself blinking up at the ceiling, gasping for air that wouldn’t come. Heat engulfed his right shoulder, radiating down his arm and outward to his fingertips. The coppery scent of blood—his blood—filled his nose.

  Shit. I’m—shot?

  Shelby screamed.

  Damn. I’ve failed her. Too.

  “Gabe. No! Please let me go to him and—”

  “Shut up, bitch! On your knees. Watch and learn something smart for a change.”

  Gabe struggled to draw in one solid breath, but the sheer weight of the pain drilling him to the floor stole it back again. He clutched the hole in his shoulder. Bloody. Hot. Gut-wrenchingly painful. The kitchen filled with shadows and bouncing white stars. Panic choked him, but he shoved it back inside where it belonged.

  Not now. Get up. Gotta get up.

  Rolling to his knees, all he knew was that he needed to live long enough to finish the job. He lifted his head and forced his vision to clear. By then, Fallon had Shelby kneeling, her hair wound tight in one fist, and the revolver hard at the back of her head. He kept jerking her off balance, toying with her.

  It pissed Gabe off, even as wrecked as he was.

  She clutched at Fallon’s wrists and forearms, struggling to keep her knees on the carpet. Her sweet face was paralyzed with fear, like a fawn in a wolf’s jaws, already given up and prepared to die.

  Gabe braced himself to rise. It’s not going down like that, Shell. I promise.

  “I’m only asking one more time, hero.” Fallon jerked Shelby’s head back, the barrel of his gun pointed downward at her skull. “I’ll blow her away the second another line of shit comes out of your yap. Where’s Stewart’s wife? Where’d she go, gawddamn it?”

  “Richmond,” Gabe rasped, his eyes searching the floor for the pistol he’d dropped when he fell. He lifted to one knee, gripping the edge of the kitchen table with a bloody hand. “Let her go. She’s got nothing to do with this. She can’t hurt you.”

  Fallon growled and released Shelby with a mean shove. “Get on the couch!”

  She scrambled on all fours to Gabe instead.

  “Get the hell away from him!” Fallon roared, stabbing a finger at the couch. “I said sit!”

&nbs
p; “You’ve hurt him,” she cried defiantly. “I won’t let you hurt him again.”

  Gabe groaned at her foolish insolence. She thinks she has to save me?

  Fallon cocked his head in annoyed disbelief at the crazy woman in front of him. He aimed at her, his eyes wide and crazy. “I got news for you. You ain’t no sniper and you ain’t no soldier. All you are is bait. Now git your ass on the couch where you belong!”

  No. Don’t do it. Don’t shoot her.

  Once again, Shelby angled herself into the line of fire. “You’re right. I’m no soldier, but he needs my help.”

  “Shell. Move,” Gabe gasped, his strength fading, but needing to keep her alive. “Do what he says.”

  The damned woman never did know how to listen. She yanked a kitchen towel from the table and used it as a compress to slow the bleeding instead of doing what she was told.

  “I don’t give a shit if you’re God.” Fallon stomped into the kitchen to snare his victim again. He yanked her to her butt, dragging her backward by her hair, his eyes fixed on Gabe the whole time.

  Shelby kicked and struggled, scratching at Fallon’s hands in her hair. “Ow! Stop hurting me! You’ve already killed Mr. Stewart. Isn’t that enough?”

  Fallon’s eyes bugged out in rage. “It ain’t enough! I want it all.”

  He tossed her against the front door, rolling his shoulders as if a mighty weight sat there. He couldn’t have looked more fierce—or more in pain. “You’re gonna die, bitch. Your dumb-assed boyfriend, too. Then I’m gonna burn this shithole of Stewart’s to the ground. Maybe then I’ll start feeling better. Maybe not. Might need to kill every last one of his guys, too. Especially that piece of Mexican trash he’s got working for him. Shit. What’d he do? Collect every worthless stray that came along?”

  Izza? What could this bastard possibly have against Connor’s wife?

  Gabe knelt at the kitchen table, nearly on his feet. He needed to draw Fallon away from Shelby, so he egged him on, risking death. “What you got against Izza Maher?”

  “He hires a lousy slut instead of a real man? He deserved to die!”

  Shelby had landed on her butt in the corner by the door, the bookcase behind her. She extended a hand toward Fallon, and for a moment, Gabe thought she might be in the middle of working a miracle. A damned scary miracle.

  He took advantage of the distraction and scanned the floor for either of his weapons.

  She kept trying to help this sick bastard. Did she really think Fallon was worth saving? “You’re sick, aren’t you? You need help. You might have radiation poisoning. I can help.”

  The hard light in his eye softened. She lifted onto her knees, and—

  No way in hell. Not this guy. Gabe spotted one of his pistols. He jerked it of the floor and on target. Muscle training took over.

  BLAM!

  The 9mm in his shaking hand roared with authority. Shadows danced at his peripheral. He wiped the burning sweat out of his eyes. Damn. I’m not going to last.

  Fallon staggered backward.

  Shelby ducked low and scurried into the hall.

  Gabe crouched, cupped his bloody right hand with the other to steady it, and fired again.

  Fallon backed into the sheet of plywood over Kelsey’s front picture window.

  Gabe climbed to his feet and advanced, firing a third time. Die, you bastard. Die.

  Fallon refused to drop his weapon.

  The kickback of each discharge pulverized Gabe’s bleeding shoulder, but who cared? He was all out of human kindness. His pistol roared again.

  Two final rounds pinned Fallon flat to the now bullet perforated plywood. He stood rigid, his knees locked in death and his damned weapon still in his clenched hand. The arrogant bastard sneered, as if he had anything to say about who would live or die. He lifted his lip, scornful to the bitter end.

  Holy hell, Gabe ached to shoot him again. And again! But it took every ounce of strength he had left to hold that smoldering piece steady in his hand.

  Fallon’s jaw sagged. No ugly threats formed on his blood-slick lips now. The revolver slipped out of his limp fingers. The bastard fell, stiff as a plank to the floor.

  About damned time.

  Gabe looked down at the weapon in his palm, dazed, yet grateful. Funny that a friend this powerful should feel so warm and so deadly at the same time.

  “Did he hurt you?” he asked, needing to know. “Touch you? Anything but—“

  “No,” Shelby answered quickly. “I tried to call for you when he grabbed me.”

  Must be what woke me. Gabe staggered, going down for the count. Adrenaline pounded in his ears, but he still had work to do. That was why he’d been born—to clean up the ugly messes that life revealed so that good women like Shelby didn’t have to. No matter what.

  He lurched on unsteady legs to where Fallon lay staring at the ceiling. Gabe dropped to one knee before he keeled over and peeled the man’s revolver out of his fist, securing it in his own belt. With two bloody fingers, he closed Fallon’s gaping eyes. Good women don’t need to see that, either.

  Shelby launched herself at him. “No, no, no! Gabe.”

  He stiff-armed her before he fell on his face. The war might be over, but one last duty remained. Man’s work. He stiffened his spine and snapped his fingers, his palm extended. “I need... a sheet. Or something. Now, please.”

  Shelby scrambled into the hall. In a second, she was back. She shoved a clean folded bed sheet into his bloodied hands, but damn. Focusing on this one last thing took a lot of effort. The walls moved. He stumbled on his own feet. Time was running out.

  “Bastard,” he hissed at the dead man. “You don’t come into good people’s homes to kill ’em.”

  Clutching the sheet to his chest, he flipped it with one hand, but it only half-opened.

  Shelby pulled the sheet from his fingers.

  “No.” He tried to pull it back. “I got... this.”

  “And I’ve got you,” she said, unfurling the sheet over Fallon’s body.

  Gabe bowed his head, the wretchedness of death now concealed beneath a mantle of white. Like snow. With big, wide red splotches. Good enough.

  “You’re shot, Gabe.” The anguish in her voice stabbed him.

  His knees buckled, and down he went. His mission done. Kelsey. Shelby. D.C. Safe.

  “Call... 911.”

  “They’re on their way.” She dropped to the floor, cradling him the same way Taylor Armstrong, his best bud, had done on another far off battlefield on another Godawful day.

  “Call Mark, too.” The dim kitchen light faded into shadows. His mind drifted. “Where’s Zack?”

  She eased him flat to his back, her tears falling like rain. “Zack took Kelsey to Richmond and Mark’s home sleeping, remember? Hold still. I’ve got you now.”

  The shock of his predicament set in. Of all the damned luck. Find the woman of my dreams. Die to save her. Lose her anyway. Doesn’t seem fair.

  He had so much to tell this woman, so much of his heart he hadn’t given her yet. He clutched her fingers, needing her to know one thing for sure. He gurgled, his throat and mouth filled with spit he couldn’t seem to swallow. “I love you, Shell. Know that. Be sure.”

  “And I love you, Gabe. You know that.”

  “I... do.” He sucked in a wretched pull of pain that in no way resembled breathing. Shadows filled the room. Ghosts.

  “You’re going to be okay,” she cried.

  No, I’m not. Not this time, Shell.

  She knelt over him, and the damned ceiling spun round and round until he had to close his eyes before he fell off the—floor.

  Her hands on his chest hurt so damned bad. He pushed her away, but Shelby wouldn’t back off, and he didn’t have the strength to make her. Then he knew. The bullet was still inside. Still hotter than hell, and his heart wouldn’t stop pumping until every last drop of blood eked out of him through the hole in his chest.

  Still, he had to ask. “Am I... dying?”
/>   “No, no, no.” The tears dripping off her chin denied her words. “I won’t let you.”

  Silly girl. You can’t control this. None of us can. I am too dying.

  He pulled her down for one last kiss. “’S okay, Shell. Don’t... cry. Love you, my... silly... beautiful girl.”

  She dipped her head into his face, her eyes swimming with heartache. “I love you, Gabe. Don’t go. Don’t leave me.”

  “Shh.” He pressed his lips to hers, needing the touch of her mouth and the taste of her lips to fasten him to this reality. This earth.

  Her fingers clutched the side of his head. The kiss she blessed his mouth with burned in a really good way. He inhaled the scent of her into his soul. One last time. Roses and vanilla. His favorite flavor and now his last memory.

  With a ragged breath, his mind flew home to the One Star State. Mom. Dad. I’m not coming home like I promised. I’m so damned sorry. Don’t cry, Mom. Please, don’t cry.

  Shelby lifted up out of his arms and morphed into—a guy?

  Gabe squeezed his eyes tight, then opened them again, seeing things for sure. The guy was still there. But who? Zack? No. Not Zack. Not Mark. Who then?

  He pressed harder on Gabe’s wound than Shelby had. The heels of his palms dug in. He growled like a sonofabitch, “You’re not dying, damn it. You hear me, junior agent? Not tonight.”

  Gabe blinked at the fierce scolding. He’d heard one just like it once or twice before. Kind of.

  His world contracted. The hole in his chest became everything. Blackness welled up through the floor. It overwhelmed him, with tentacles that wrapped his body limb by limb until only blurry vision remained. Blurry vision he couldn’t trust. Who is this guy?

  Icy-cold shadows sat upon his chest, tapping impatiently to be off. He tried one more time to push the hard hand away, but he couldn’t make it move. It seemed at war with the shadows. Sad blue eyes lasered through the blurry darkness.

  No. It can’t be. You’re... dead.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Talk about the nick of time.

  Shelby tried, but there was no resisting the fierce man who’d banged Kelsey’s back door wide open in a rush, dropped his gear bag beside the kitchen table and commenced emergency first-aid on Gabe as if he knew exactly what to do. The guy simply knelt opposite Shelby and covered her blood-drenched hands with his. Together they compressed Gabe’s bleeding chest wound.