Page 97 of Hot Intent

They moved through the trees for maybe five minutes in silence. Well, he was silent. She panted like an overheated dog and crackled leaves far too often for safety. Had they eliminated all the bad guys or not?

The longer they went without being shot at, the more her heart rate dropped to something commensurate merely with strenuous exercise. But then her hands started to shake. And then her whole body started to shake.

As she walked, she popped out the clip of this weapon—aRussianmake of pistol. What didthatmean?Were these attackers freaking Russians?She yanked her attention back to the gun in her hand. Mike had brought a similar model of weapon home from a mission a few years ago. All her brothers had tried shooting it, and not to be left out, she’d insisted on trying it out, as well.

She was relieved to count eleven bullets in the clip of her stolen weapon. Alex had to be getting low on ammunition by now, too. On cue, he ejected a clip and rammed a new one into place.

Even better, he stopped for a moment, appearing to listen for movement around them. Grateful for the respite, she leaned against a tree and took several blessedly deep breaths while Alex extracted the two remaining bullets from the first clip and pocketed them.

She knew from experience that he usually had at least two spare clips on his person whenever he was packing a weapon. They were back in business for a little while, at least. Thank God for his paranoia and his associated obsession with preparedness.

Hopefully, they would not need their remaining firepower.

And…she was wrong.

Alex froze abruptly in front of her. She peered over his shoulder and saw a man in a black leather jacket poised beside an SUV, wielding a sawed-off AK-47 alertly.

The guy spoke into the lapel of his jacket where there must be a microphone of some kind. Her jaw dropped as she identified the language he spoke to be something Slavic sounding. Russian, perhaps?

Alex frowned faintly beside her, but she dared not break the silence to ask what the man had said.

Slowly and with maximum stealth, Alex backed up a dozen feet with her staying behind him. Only when they’d placed the crest of the ridge between them and the man below did Alex eased down quietly behind a thicket of weeds and brambles. She was relieved to join him in hiding.

He lifted away a few leaves to reveal wet, black earth. In the soil, he drew a crude map with a car, a hill, and two X’s, she gathered were her and Alex.

Alex pointed at his own chest and then drew an arc to the left. He pointed at Katie and then drew another arc to the right. He then drew two lines from the stick figures from him and her toward the man.

He mouthed the words, “Field of fire,” and she nodded immediately. By flanking the shooter below, the two of them had to be careful not to end up shooting each other. Alex was darned lucky she’d grown up in a military family and happened to know about such things!

“Shoot when I do,” he breathed. Without any further ado, Alex moved away from her. Lord, she felt naked out here without him beside her. She eased off to the right, arcing around to the far side of the man with the AK-47. Every tiny sound made her jump, and she felt as twitchy as a marionette on a string.

When she deemed that she’d reached the position Alex had drawn for her, she inched forward in a crouch, pistol at the ready. Using the largest tree she could find, she straightened and peered out from behind the trunk.

The shooter was looking off toward Alex’s position intently. Focused. Had he seen or heard Alex out there?

The guy’s AK-47 swung up from his hip to a shooting position as she planted her forearm against the tree trunk to steady it, blew out her breath, and lined up the sight on the front tip of her gun barrel with the sights mounted above the trigger. Oh, the Russian dude was sonotgetting off a shot atherman.

Screw Alex’s signal. Without hesitating, she went ahead and fired. She was sure she’d hit the bastard. Although he staggered, he didn’t go down. The man swung his weapon toward her and raked the hillside with a barrage of automatic fire as she ducked behind the tree.

She was sure she’d hit him. But then an awful thought occurred to her. Was the guy wearing a Kevlar vest under thatbulky jacket? Alex had been taking head shots a lot, today. He must’ve assumed their attackers would be wearing body armor.

Duh. Of course they would. How dumb of her not to anticipate that.

Alex opened fire from across the ridge, and the automatic gunfire swung away sharply from her and toward Alex’s position. She wasted no time stepping out from behind the tree far enough to take aim and fire again, this time at the man’s head.

She missed twice and was forced to duck back behind the tree as he sprinted toward the back of the SUV. She only waited a fraction of a second before swinging out from behind the tree again. The shooter was going to take cover behind the vehicle and possibly take to the woods beyond it. Their lives would be immeasurably more difficult with this jerk and his vastly superior fire power roaming around in the forest hunting them.

Alex shouted something in Russian and the man shouted back as she took careful aim one more time on the guy’s head. She held her breath and squeezed off the shot.

The man’s legs crumpled and he dropped to the ground. She held her position and scanned the woods in the direction she and Alex had come from. She heard Alex crashing out of the trees behind her. She turned in time to see him running fast and low, zigzagging as swift and nimble as a cheetah, toward the downed man.

“Come to me!” Alex called out in Zaghastani.

She stepped out of the woods in time to see Alex fire two shots into the prone man’s head. It was brutal. Cold-blooded, even. She could shoot at an armed attacker who was shooting back at her, but she severely doubted she could’ve taken those shots. Alex had justexecutedthat man. Shock and horror roared through her.

He crouched, patting down the dead man’s pockets. He straightened, a car ignition fob in hand as she reached his side. “Did you have to kill him like that?” she demanded, appalled to her core.

“Get in. I’ll drive.”

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