Alpha One (Shadow Agents #1)(42)
Author: Cynthia Eden

A little blood? Susan’s shirt had been soaked with her blood.

“Their mistake,” Susan whispered.

“You’re not going to hurt Logan.” Juliana’s fingers had clenched around the knife so hard that her hand ached.

Susan’s head jerked. “You still care about him.” Now she sounded shocked. “You know what he did. I mean, I had to spell it out for you! The guy killed your mother, used you—then walked away.”

Another step, close enough to strike.

“And you still love him.”

Rat-a-tat. The sudden burst of automatic gunfire had Susan’s head whipping toward the window.

“Yes,” Juliana growled. “I still do.” Then she lifted her knife and lunged for Susan. Susan sensed the attack a few seconds too late. She screamed as her head swung back toward Juliana.

The knife shoved into Susan’s left shoulder, and Juliana twisted her body, bending low for another attack.

Susan’s fingers tightened around the gun and—

Gunfire erupted. Not down below, not outside. But from in the room. Gunner had crawled forward, and Juliana saw that he’d reached into his ankle holster and pulled out his backup weapon.

“Don’t think—” his voice was a rough rasp “—you’re…helpless…”

Susan staggered back. A balloon of red appeared on her chest. Her eyes were wide, her mouth hanging open in shock. She took another step back, another, her feet stumbling.

Then her eyes closed. Her head fell backward—her whole body fell—and she tumbled straight through that glass window.

* * *

LOGAN WHIRLED AT THE sound of shattering glass, and when he saw a woman’s delicate form plummeting from the window, his heart stopped.

He lurched forward, all of his instincts forgotten. It was too dark. All he could see was the tangle of hair on the ground. A broken body. Blood.

No!

A knife shoved into his back.

“Don’t worry,” a voice whispered in his ear, “I’ll make sure the pretty lady joins you in hell.”

Not Juliana.

Through the moonlight, he could just see the woman’s face. Not Juliana. Susan.

He spun around and grabbed the man behind him by the throat. “You’re not…touching her.”

This time, the man drove a knife into Logan’s chest.

Logan attacked. He shattered the man’s wrist, pounded with his fists, went for the man’s throat. His prey was near death when…

Another man appeared and drove a needle into Logan’s neck. Logan roared and tossed him back. The second attacker fell, his body crumpling into a heap.

But it was too late.

Logan’s body began to shake. His vision blurred. He tried to swing out at the man charging him, but Logan’s body slumped to the ground. He wanted to shout a warning, to Jasper, to Gunner, to Juliana, but he couldn’t speak.

Shadows closed in on him, faces he couldn’t see. Then a blade pressed over his throat.

* * *

“YOU’RE GOING TO BE all right,” Juliana said as she pressed towels against Gunner’s wounds. “I’m getting you help, okay?” She’d tried to call an ambulance, but the telephone upstairs had been dead. With the firefight going on out there…where was the backup?

More cops had to be coming. Cops and EMTs. They’d fix Gunner. They had to.

He caught her hand. His fingers were bloody, and they slipped over her skin. “Hide.”

She shook her head. “I’m not leaving you.”

“No more…gunfire.”

He was right. But there’d been a lull in the gunfire before. She wasn’t about to think it was safe just to have bullets start blasting again.

“Stay…down.”

Now he sounded just like Logan. She tried to smile for him. Hard, when she was sure the man was bleeding out right in front of her eyes.

“I’m going to my room and getting my cell phone.” She’d call for help. She wasn’t letting him die while she did nothing. So those attacking might have cut the lines that connected the house phones, but they wouldn’t be able to stop her from using her cell. “Everything’s going to be okay.” Juliana hoped she sounded more reassuring than she felt.

Gunner’s dark, tired gaze called the words a lie, but he didn’t speak. Maybe he couldn’t speak any longer.

Juliana lurched to her feet. She took a staggering step forward and—saw a faint glint from the corner of her eye.

She spun back around, her gaze flying to the painting. Susan had slashed it over and over, and there, hanging out from the bottom of the canvas, Juliana could just see the faint edge of…

A flash drive.

He said he gave you the evidence.

She grabbed the drive with her bloodstained fingers. People were dying outside because of this tiny thing. She shoved the drive into her pocket and rushed for the door.

Get. Help.

She was almost to her room when she heard the creak of the stairs. Juliana tensed. It could be Logan, but if it were him, then wouldn’t he have called out to her?

Her fingers reached for the doorknob. Then she heard another creak. Another. The soft pad of footsteps heading toward her father’s room.

Gunner.

Juliana spun around. She had taken Gunner’s gun, and the weapon felt slippery in her palms. “Stay away from him!” She rushed forward.

And nearly ran into the man who haunted her nightmares.

Juliana skidded to a halt. She’d expected to face his flunkies. The hired killers. Not…

John.

He smiled at her. The same tired, slightly crooked smile he’d given her when they were trapped in that hell. “Hello, Juliana.”

Ice chilled her. Logan would never have let the arms dealer get inside the house. The only way this man could have gotten past him…

No, Logan’s not dead.

John’s stare—no, Guerrero’s stare—dropped to the gun. “Give that to me.”

No way. “I’ll give you a bullet to the heart!”

His smile stretched. “I don’t think so.”

“You need to think again.” She wasn’t backing down. This man had destroyed her world. She wasn’t about to just stand there and be a lamb for his slaughter. She had the gun. She had the perfect chance to shoot.

Then Guerrero lifted his hand, and within his grip, a bloody knife blade glinted. “This is your lover’s blood.”

No. “Is he dead?” Her heart already felt as if it was freezing.

“My men will make sure that he is if you don’t come with me now.” Guerrero dropped the knife on the floor and opened his hand to her. “I’ll let him keep breathing, but you give me the gun and we leave.”