Page 12 of Crossfire Creek Siege

The gunman turned toward the sound.

Then he looked up.

For one suspended second, Rena saw their eyes meet—Gage and the man below, predator and target, thirty feet of cold air between them.

The rifle barrel rose.

Rena didn’t think. Training and instinct blurred together as the rifle below swung toward Gage.

Her pulse slammed once, and then she fired.

The Glock kicked in her hands, the recoil biting into her wrists. The shot cracked through the hangar, sharp and echoing, the sound swallowed by the chaos below. The gunman jerked, body twisting mid-turn, then dropped like a sack of gear, rifle clattering across the floor.

For half a breath, everything froze. Smoke drifted around the body, the metallic scent of gunfire heavy in the air. Rena’s hands shook. Her vision tunneled, the migraine’s pulse fighting the adrenaline, but she kept the Glock up, scanning.

Gage turned toward her, eyes wide in the dim light. He didn’t say a word, just gave her a quick nod. Gratitude maybe. But then his gaze snapped past her shoulder.

“Down!” he hissed.

Rena barely hit the beam before the next volley started. Gunfire erupted from below, rounds tearing through the rafters, sparks raining down. The metal beam quivered under them, every vibration like a warning.

They were pinned, exposed, thirty feet above the floor with nothing but shadows and adrenaline between them and the bullets screaming upward.

Chapter Four

Hell. They were sitting ducks. Exposed, pinned, and with three—no, make that four—rifles aimed straight at them. Gage could see the faint glint of night-vision lenses, the slow, precise tilt of muzzles tracking upward.

He squeezed as much of himself as he could onto the thirteen or so inches of space on the beam, the metal biting cold through his clothes, his lungs dragging in smoke-thick air. He’d never spent much time wondering where he’d die. A battlefield, maybe. Some nameless stretch of sand or dirt halfway across the world. But a rafter, thirty feet above a birthday party, surrounded by fairy lights and frosting, that one hadn’t crossed his mind.

Below, one of the gunmen adjusted his aim. Another stepped back, signaling something. Gage’s muscles coiled, ready for whatever came next, even though there was nowhere to go.

Then the world split open with a blast of sound.

A deafening, metallic wail tore through the hangar. Louder than gunfire, a screeching feedback that made his teeth ache. For a second, Gage thought something had exploded. The attackers flinched, several dropping to a crouch, their weapons wavering.

It took Gage a heartbeat to spot the source. Owen, across the hangar, half-hidden behind a steel pillar. The man had a bullhorn in hand, pressed to his mouth, and he was letting it scream a wall of static that drowned out everything else.

A distraction.

Gage’s chest tightened with a whole lot of relief. Trust Owen to turn chaos into an opening.

He glanced over his shoulder, caught Rena’s eye and jerked his chin toward the next beam over. If they were going to move, this was the only window they’d get.

Two of the gunmen snapped their attention toward the sound of the bullhorn, rifles swinging in unison. The air was still vibrating with the feedback, the pitch high enough to rattle Gage’s teeth. He could barely hear his own breath over it.

Then, just as the first of the gunmen fired toward Owen’s position, another noise ripped through the hangar. A metallic whine, sharp and fast. Gage squinted through the haze, trying to make sense of the movement above the smoke.

Something was flying toward the gunmen.

No, not something. Two somethings.

Flaming silhouettes shot across the hangar on a cable line, leaving trails of sparks and smoke in their wake. For a disorienting second, Gage thought they were people, until the shapes tilted and he realized what they were.

Dummies.

Owen had rigged the training mannequins, set them on fire, and sent them hurtling down a zipline that cut straight through the center of the chaos.

The attackers shouted, ducking instinctively as the burning forms streaked toward them. The smell of scorched fabric and melted plastic filled the air. One of the gunmen panicked and opened fire, bullets tearing through a dummy in a spray of embers. The flames flared brighter, blinding them all for a split second.