Page 72 of Crossfire Creek Vengeance

“Stop. Stop. Stop shooting,” Wynn yelled, the words slicing through the gunfire.

He rocked back in a panic, eyes wild, the explosives strapped to his chest catching the thin wash of cemetery lights. Whoever was firing wasn’t doing it on Wynn’s orders. Wynn looked terrified.

The shots kept coming anyway.

Jessa pressed lower to the ground, breath frosting in the cold air. Her heart slammed so hard it hurt. Somewhere behind the veil of gunfire sat another tombstone, another patch of shadows, and if the shooter had even half-decent aim, they were sitting ducks out here.

She heard Roman curse, and Martelli shouted for his deputies to stay covered. Gravel pinged against the cruiser they were hiding behind.

Jessa gripped her gun tighter and forced herself to breathe. They had trained for chaos like this, but training didn’t account for seeing Wynn curled up like a terrified child or the explosive-laced vest that could take out half the cemetery if anyone made the wrong move.

And still the shots kept coming.

Jessa flattened herself against the cold ground, mud soaking through her jeans as she tried to angle her body behind the cruiser’s tire. The air stank of gunpowder and damp earth. Bullets kept ripping through the cemetery, each crack vibrating through her bones.

“Shots are coming from the mausoleum,” Deacon called out.

She jerked her head up long enough to follow his line of sight. About thirty yards away stood the old granite structure, squat and rectangular, with a peaked roof and a pair of heavy iron doors that hadn’t been opened in years. Its stone walls were streaked with age and moss, and tonight it looked more like a bunker than a tomb.

A rifle barrel jutted out from behind the left corner.

She still couldn’t see the shooter, just the flash of muzzle fire lighting up the stone like angry sparks, but now that she had a direction, she pivoted and raised her gun.

Homes sat along the road that ran past the cemetery. She reminded herself of that as she lined up the shot. A stray bullet could go through a window or a wall and hit someone who had nothing to do with this nightmare.

So she aimed tight. Stone would stop the round. She fired, her shot hitting the mausoleum with a sharp, satisfying smack that sent a splinter of rock flying. The shooter jerked back out of sight.

Good. At least she could put the pause button on this.

But the reprieve didn’t last long.

Jessa’s breath stuck in her throat as Wynn toppled back, arms flailing before he hit the ground beside a shattered tombstone. Another burst of gunfire chewed into the dirt where he’d been standing, spraying chunks of stone and soil.

The shooter didn’t let up. The steady, punishing rhythm of the AK kept pounding through the cemetery, echoing off the trees. Wynn lay there, unmoving, the explosives strapped across his chest glinting faintly in the weak security lights.

“Damn it,” Deacon whispered, eyes narrowed on Wynn. “He’s still breathing. That hit didn’t take him out.”

Another round cracked into the headstone inches from Wynn’s shoulder, sending marble dust into the air.

Wynn groaned and lifted his head just enough to shout, his voice raw and breaking. “He said he’ll blow me up. He said he’ll blow all of you up.”

Jessa’s stomach twisted. Whoever held that detonator, whoever had been whispering poison into Wynn’s ear through that earpiece, wasn’t done. And they were willing to kill every person in this cemetery to tie up loose ends.

Deacon shifted beside her, eyes on the mausoleum. “The shooter keeps focusing on Wynn. He wants him silenced. If Wynn talks, everything unravels.”

Wynn made a weak attempt to lift his head again. But a fresh spray of bullets slammed into the ground around him, forcing him flat.

Jessa took a breath and steadied her aim. She didn’t know how long they had to shut this down, but it wasn’t long. Wynn might be a mess of grief and delusion, but he was their only living link to the truth.

The shooter clearly planned to make sure he didn’t stay that way.

Deacon angled his head toward her. “I’m going to try to circle behind the shooter.”

“No, you’re not,” she hissed. “Not alone. You’re hurt.”

“I can handle it,” he shot back, but the tightness around his mouth said otherwise.

“I’m going with you,” she insisted.