Sweet Seduction Serenade (42 page)

A little hope drenched the dark shadows of panic in my mind with a weak ray of light. I lifted my head up from the floor of the car and attempted another sneak peek outside. There was movement down the far end of the carpark, near the entrance. I hoped it was someone on our side, cornering the shooter or shooters, rather than the shooter or shooters making their escape. But I couldn't tell, they were all just black shapes in a blacked out world through black glass.

I narrowed my gaze, trying to decipher shapes and wishing for the umpteenth time I had a gun. Then a thought occurred to me, maybe Nick kept spare weapons in the car? Where? Under his seat? In the glove compartment? The centre console? I shifted so I could look under the driver's seat, but lacking a torch left me staring at darker shapes in a dark environment, not even outlines could be deciphered. I reached in and felt around, glad that Nick kept his car litter free. But nothing met my finger search. I'd have to get into the front of the car again.

More shots sounded out as soon as I sat up and started to wedge myself between the two front seats. I paused, hunched my head down between my shoulders waiting for more glass to shatter or a twang of a bullet on the side of the car. Or worse still, the puff of fabric and stuffing material exploding all around me as their ammunition hit the seats on either side. I didn't allow myself to consider the splash of blood should they connect with
me
.

But the gunshots were out in the carpark, I'd been forgotten for now. There were lots of them out there though, and with a quick glance as I slid into the front passenger seat again and then made myself fit into the footwell out of sight, I noticed flashing lights on several police cars out on the main road, and the twirling red lights spinning on the guard towers up above the carpark, inside the prison walls. The cavalry were here and aware, so some of those shots were on our side.

I reached up and opened the glove compartment, relieved to find it unlocked. But that relief was short lived, when I only found pens and a couple of pads of paper - nothing else. No spare gun. I ground my teeth, made a muffled squealing sound as a stray bullet found the side of the car and made the whole vehicle rock slightly and then returned my attention to the task at hand. I had my taser back on my belt again - after having it returned to me when we left the prison - but a taser against a gunfight seemed pathetic. I wanted a gun. I could fire, if I could find a target to shoot at, that is.

The centre console was full of receipts, a strange hammer shaped device which I think is used to shatter glass safely, and an electric door opener. I fingered the door opener in frustration, then out of nothing else to do pressed the button down just to feel the familiar resistance against my thumb. A whirring sounded and something by my shoulder, under the glove compartment, started to move down. I squashed my body back against the seat, twisting to watch intrigued as a black metal shelf lowered.

Revealing a Baby Glock. I stared at it for a split second, then reached in and grabbed the device, checking the magazine was loaded. Ten rounds, ready to go. I smiled. I don't think it was particularly pretty. If I spotted Levi Russell out there, I suddenly knew I could do it. Pull the trigger and watch him fall. He wouldn't be expecting me to shoot. Apart from the fact he sees me as his cute little cousin in pigtails no doubt, or probably more to the point, a defenceless woman and nothing else, meant he'd not expect gunfire to come from Nick's car.

The car I had been hiding in pathetically for over ten minutes now.

Sucker.

I rearranged myself so I was looking out the broken side window and waited until something moved that I could identify. It wouldn't do any good to shoot at ASI or the cops and guards. I needed to confirm my target. Jeez, I was sounding like a sniper now. Adrenaline had that effect on you, making everything surreal and you thought nothing was out of place at all.

It took a good minute for me to realise the fighting had moved to the other side of the car. The side where the windows were up and I couldn't gain a clear, unhindered shot without lowering the glass. I couldn't do that, Nick had the keys and they were - of course - electric. The thought of Nick made me freeze for another minute, stealing valuable Levi shooting time. But I couldn't gain control of my runaway heart, as it thundered in my chest chasing the panic that Nick was hurt.

I counted to fifty, forcing myself to calm, then had a brainwave. That little strange device in the centre console. I'd never used one before, had never really seen one being used, but surely it couldn't be that hard.

I reached in and grabbed it, deciding the steering wheel would get in my way, so the rear window behind the driver was the best spot to set up my sniper's nest. I slithered through the two front seats again, feeling bruises forming over top of bruises as my sides hit the belt buckle anchors and my thigh brushed heavily against the gear shift. Porsche Cayenne's look big on the outside, but let me tell you, they are compact on the inside. Comfortable, but small. I think I'll suggest Nick invests in a Hummer after this.

I settled down beneath the rear window and assessed the hammer-like device in my hand. Plastic handle, with a slit on the side to slash through seatbelts and two metal tips to the hammer head. One pointed, one flat like a traditional hammer. The pointed looked mean, so I shifted my hold to have that pointing out and waited for some gunshots to fire and cover the sound of me shattering glass.

It took several seconds, but things had heated up out there, what with half of Auckland's Police Armed Offenders Squad - the AOS all in black body armour and black visored helmets - in attendance, and no doubt all of ASI and the prison guards backing them up. Gunshots were cracking out from several different directions, so without further ado, I timed my strike against the window as carefully as I could. It took a couple of harsh hammer blows, but the glass eventually shattered, timed to perfection by several rapid fire gunshots from across the carpark.

I sat down in the footwell behind the driver's seat and gently brushed the safety glass off my clothes, realising I was now going to have to kneel in the blasted stuff. No pain, no gain. Levi Russell had caused enough mayhem.

The consequences of what I was about to do kept pounding through my skull. I might talk the talk, but actually doing it?

Then I spotted Adam and Koki, over by the far razor wired fence. Moving in on a shadow behind a visitor's car. My heart leapt into my throat at the sight of people I knew. Especially my stalker. Koki I wasn't so familiar with, but he was part of ASI, part of those who belonged to Nick. Both men were dressed in black, and I was enormously relieved to see, both were wearing bullet proof vests over their black T-Shirts, but no helmets, like the AOS. A shot to the head would prove fatal.

My mouth went dry as I watched the events unfold. Adam went one way, Koki the other, in a choreographed movement they'd obviously perfected before. But their focus was solely on the shadowy figure, they'd missed a second threat at their backs and off to the side. I could see the person shift to follow their approach on shadow number one, for a moment I couldn't see if it was AOS, another ASI guy or someone else on our side. My hand with the Baby Glock in it, had already raised the weapon through the shattered window of the Porsche. Without conscious thought I rested my second hand beneath the wrist of the one holding my gun and sighted down the barrel.

I licked my lips, knowing this was at the upper end of distance I could hit a target at, but also knowing that Adam and Koki were now sitting ducks, and if this person wasn't on our side, covering their butts, then they were in for a shit-load of trouble. It was one thing to have heard all the gunfire out there, but it would be a totally different thing if I had to watch one of the Russell boys shoot a friend.

I waited, with my heart in my throat and my breathing laboured, for shadow number two to identify himself. Good or bad? My breathing meant the gun wavered slightly, if I was going to fire the darn thing I'd need total focus and a steady hand. But it was hard to get on top of my respirations. I blinked back sweat from my eyes and concentrated on what my firing range supervisor had taught me back in Nashville. Deep breath in, hold it, count to three, long breath out, count to three then repeat.

Several inhalations and exhalations later and I got what I needed. Leo Russell's face bathed in a shaft of light. Not Levi, so I momentarily felt a pang of disappointment, then Leo raised a gun - like he'd raised a gun on Katie's passing car outside of Nick's house - and aimed it at Adam's head.

I don't think so, cowboy!

I narrowed my eyes, re-gripped the gun, tilted my head, blocked out all the other gunshots
ringing around the carpark and aimed - then let a long, slow breath out and held it. The moment his finger shifted on the trigger, I fired.

The sound of the gun firing in the small confines of the car was deafening, the roar in my ears as blood shot through my veins even more so. But the soft
thwack!
and muted grunt from Leo's surprised lips hit me harder than any sounds, droning out my heartbeat right then. I'd hit him in the thigh. Fitting really, Aunty Jessie had hit Nick in the thigh too.

Then I had to stifle an hysterical giggle, because I hadn't been aiming at his thigh at all. I'd been aiming for his chest. Specifically where I suspected his evil little heart would be. My aim was off and wasn't that a kicker? What if I'd hit Adam or Koki? Who were right now aware of the threat at their backs, from the grunt Leo had made when my bullet hit.

Koki muttered something - a direction maybe to Adam - and turned on Leo, while Adam resumed his approach on the first shadow, but found he'd taken the opportunity to move. In a flash Adam took up the chase, disappearing behind the car shadow number one had been hiding behind, while I watched Koki pounce on Leo and muscle him to the ground, a knee in his thigh - I was thinking right above the gunshot wound I had created. I felt a little sick surge up into my mouth and had to swallow it down.

Then forgot all about vomiting as a flurry of bullets pinged against the Porsche and ricocheted around the interior cabin of the car. I screamed, ducked down with my hands above my head, one still holding the Baby Glock and then promptly screamed again as the door on the opposite side opened and someone threw themselves inside, slamming the thing shut at their backs.

"Take it easy, cowgirl. It's just me," Ben murmured, his eyes flicking over my body, no doubt looking for obvious signs of injury, and then flicking around the vehicle just as quickly. "Are you hurt?"

"N...no," I stammered.

"You wanna put the safety on that thing and aim it somewhere else maybe?" he asked, casually, tilting his head towards the Glock in my hand, which was currently trained on his chest.

I shakily did what he requested, placing the gun down in the footwell I was kneeling in and running both hands through my dishevelled hair, pulling loose strands off my face in an effort to calm myself down.

"You scared the darn crap out of me," I admitted, my voice still a little wobbly.

"Yeah, well, you scared the
darn
crap out of us firin' at the targets," he returned, then casually added, "Duck." I did, without hesitation, and he leaned over my body and fired two rounds out of the shattered window above my head. "Good girl," he muttered, releasing his magazine and nabbing another from his vest and reloading.

"Is Nick OK?" I asked, as soon as he pulled back to his side.

"Mad, furious, shoutin' commands and damn near havin' a heart attack when we all realised you were armed and shootin' your cousins."

I hadn't realised how much I needed to hear that, my whole body abruptly shutting down and making me slump into the footwell, racking shakes throughout my entire frame, a hiccoughed sob escaping my lips.

"Hey there, cowgirl, it's all right," Ben said soothingly. Then in a more level and professional voice, he added, "Nah, she'll be right. Just relieved you're alive, I think."

I blinked up at him puzzled, then slowly realised he wasn't talking to me. He had one of those ear pieces in his ear like Nick. He'd been talking, in fact, to Nick. The shakes doubled and I let an even more pitiful sob out of relief.

"Eva," Ben said softly. "Hang in there, chick. Nick'll be here as soon as he's rounded up the other idiot out in the carpark."

"There's three of my cousins here?" I asked, forcing myself back into the reality of the situation and darn well insisting my body quit the shakes. It obliged, but only reluctantly.

"Four, 'sfar as we can tell," he replied, eyes alert and scanning the scene out of the window above my head. "You tagged Leo for Koki to finish off, Adam managed to get Tyler before he escaped, and Nick and the AOS are closin' in on Bailey and Ryder as we speak."

"No Levi," I said a little flatly.

"Not surprisin'," Ben commented. "He's more a control the scene from the peripheries kind of perp. My bet, he vanished as soon as the shit hit the fan."

Yeah, I'd second that assumption. Levi, the coward, would have ordered his brothers into the fray and stood back waiting for them to drag my bullet ridden ass to him for his gloating. I crushed down the disappointment Nick hadn't yet managed to hog tie my cousin's legs.

A sigh escaped my lips and then it occurred to me that the gunfire had ceased.

"Is it over?" I asked, hopefully, anticipation chasing that emotion as I thought of seeing Nick again.