Page 79 of Sniper's Pride

But he didn’t move.

He waited.

Time flattened out. Stretched.

Mariah had a significant head start, but the man behind her was bigger, fitter, and a whole lot taller. It meant his strides were longer. He gained ground quicker.

And there was no discounting the effects of testosterone and rage, both of which were written all over this animal’s snarling face.

Still Griffin waited, because he wanted this gorilla to do exactly what he did next. Reach out his hands, think he had her, shout something Griffin didn’t have to hear to know he wouldn’t appreciate—

The man lunged.

And Griffin took him out.

One perfect shot, crisp and clean.

A split-second later, Mariah stumbled, and he knew she’d heard it.

But she still didn’t look behind her.

She kept right on going, righting herself from her nearstumble and running faster—as if she didn’t know or care that there was no longer anyone chasing after her.

Or, possibly, as if she planned to follow the last order he’d given her until he gave her a new one.

Griffin waited until Isaac and Jonas moved into the barn, ready and more than capable of handling any remaining threats. Only then did he abandon his post. It took him seconds to disassemble his rifle, pack it away, and sling it back into place over his shoulder.

He swung himself down from the tree, hitting the ground in an easy crouch.

And when he stepped into the field, Mariah was still running. Straight toward him.

She didn’t stop when she saw him. She was panting, loud and ragged, and he wasn’t sure if she was breathing or crying. Or maybe both.

Then he didn’t care, because in the next second she was hurtling herself forward and into his arms.

Griffin didn’t know why he felt so ragged, so undone, as if he’d been the untrained person running for his life across a wide field.

All he knew was that when he ducked his head to bury it in her hair, the sweet scent of her made that ache in his chest better and worse at the same time. Better and worse, and then more of each, until it was very nearly unbearable—but he didn’t let go of her.

She wrapped her arms tight around him and kept making that same sobbing noise against his chest, and Griffin felt his head spin, as if she were the one holding him up instead of the other way around. He couldn’t seem to tell the difference.

“It’s over,” he told her, and he didn’t recognize his own voice.

Or his own hands when he looked down to see them shaking.

When Griffin was a man who never, ever shook.

Across the field, Isaac was escorting a man with blood all over his face out of the barn. Jonas was briefly visible through a hole in the second-floor wall, moving around the loft, sweeping the building for any surprises. Blue came around the side, Mariah’s mother hobbling beside him and leaning heavily on his arm. Isaac met him and helped Rose Ellen find a seat where she could elevate her leg. Then the two of them escorted the men they’d rounded up—at gunpoint and with their hands zip-tied behind them—out to where the remains of the Mercedes smoldered.

No one bothered with the man left in the field. That was a law enforcement problem.

And no one appeared to look over to where Griffin stood with Mariah still in his arms, but he knew they’d all seen him. The fact that he’d have to answer for that nipped at him—but he didn’t have it in him to care the way he knew he would eventually.

And he still didn’t let her go.

“It’s over,” he told her again.

Mariah tipped her head up then, and he tensed at the sight of her. One whole side of her face was puffed up and bruised. Her eye was almost entirely swollen shut. And he didn’t need her to tell him that someone had hit her. More than once. It made him want to start shooting all over again.

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