Page 4 of Secret Stalker

“Negative,” he whispered in response to Dillon’s next question. “No clue what they want. As soon as the cashier screamed, they started shooting. Erratic though, as if they don’t know how to handle those M16s they’re waving around. Thankfully no one’s been hit yet except the one gunman I took out.”

With his fellow SWAT team members apprised of the situation, he put his cell phone away so he could focus on finding the one customer he knew was unaccounted for.

Bex.

* * *

ASPLANSWENT, hiding behind a waist-high clothing rack of “I Dig the Pig” Piggly Wiggly T-shirts probably wasn’t the best one Bex could have made. But when she’d seen the end of a rifle emerging from one of the side aisles, she’d dived behind the closest cover she could find. Unfortunately, the T-shirts were apparently good sellers. There were barely enough left to conceal her.

She held her breath as the gunman crept past her hiding space. He was dressed in black jeans and a black T-shirt and was wearing sunglasses. She supposed that was his idea of a disguise, but he clearly was young—probably barely out of high school. The other gunman she’d seen a few minutes ago had a black ski mask over his face and the build of someone older, maybe late twenties. Both of them were carrying wicked-looking rifles.

The guy in sunglasses turned down the aisle she’d left just a minute earlier. She let out a shaky breath, then crept to the side of the display, ready to zip down another aisle to get to the front of the store. That’s where she’d last heard the sound of a pistol. And she was betting that pistol belonged to Max.

She leaned forward, looked left, right, then—oomph! A hand clamped over her mouth and she was yanked backward behind the shirts.

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