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There was a noise outside, and Hayley swore, lifting the gun and pointing it squarely at the door again.
“I should take that,” Laura said. “I have firearms training.”
“No way,” Hayley said, with a short, humorous laugh. “No offense, but this is my only defense. I’m not handing it over to someone else. For all I know, you’re part of this.”
“I’m not,” Laura promised, but she could also see how hard it would be to believe that. “Do you know how to fire it?”
“Just point and shoot, right?” Hayley asked, setting the rifle to her eye again and keeping it trained on the door.
“Watch out for rebound, and take the extra millisecond to re-aim when he appears,” Laura advised. If she wasn’t going to be able to do it herself, all she could manage would be to give her as many tips as possible.
“I’ve got it,” Hayley said, and there was so much determination in her voice that Laura actually believed her.
There was a sound outside – a sound that had both of them tensing up.
Laura didn’t know what to do with herself. She was unarmed. If the killer had a gun, she had no way to defend herself – nothing to use as a shield in here, nowhere to hide. If he was unarmed and Hayley missed her shot, he was still strong and powerful – enough to win in a direct one-on-one fight. The fact there were two of them now was the thing they had going for themselves. But even in that advantage, Hayley was the one with the weapon. Laura just had to stand by and wait.
She hated it.
The noise from outside came again, and this time it was more obvious: a footstep.
What was he going to do? Try to creep up on them? Laura looked at Hayley and saw that she was shaking, the point of the gun trembling in the air.
“Are you in there?” the killer called out, in a singsong voice. Laura felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. “Did you get my present?”
“What is he talking about?” Laura muttered quietly enough she hoped only Hayley would hear her.
“The gun,” Hayley murmured back. “He left the gun here to make it more exciting or whatever.”
Something jumped at the pit of Laura’s stomach. That wasn’t right. Why would he leave the means for them to kill him? Why would he make it possible for Hayley to get away, when all the others had no chance at all?
Why change his MO this drastically?
Unless…
The door burst open in a shower of splinters and flying moss, and there he was – standing there – grinning at the two of them. Hayley aimed the gun and pulled the trigger, and –
And nothing happened.
Only an empty click that had Laura looking around at her in despair.
“Oh, come on,” he said, his eyes sparking with a kind of manic glee. “You didn’t think I would really leave it loaded, did you?”
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
Laura’s shock gave way to something else. Not fear, not determination, not courage. Just pure bare fight or flight instinct, no logic or reason, no thought process. All she knew was that there were two of them and one of him, and he was a threat, and he needed to go.
She lunged forward before Hayley could recover. The man’s hands were empty. No gun, at least not one that he was carrying in plain sight. She wasn’t going to give him the time to reach into his pockets. Laura collided with him in the air, so hard that he stumbled backwards and then fell, tripping over the step leading into the hut.
He landed on his back, the air knocked out of him. Laura struggled to get on top of him, sitting up so she could lean back and land a punch right into his face, but he recovered too quickly. He grabbed her hips and threw his own weight to the side, throwing her onto the ground. He was fast and strong. Laura kicked out and connected with his shin, not the softer target she was aiming for, and rolled away as fast as she could.
He was there when she came up again, right behind her. She aimed a punch at his stomach this time, trying to wind him again and get him to double over, but he simply twisted aside and then slammed his hand into the middle of her arm as it passed him. It was knocked down against the earth and then he was pinning her other arm, using sheer force to stop her from swinging that one at him as well, keeping her down. Laura tried to sit up, to push against him, but it was useless. He had her pinned against the earth, unable to move, unable to stop him.
Something hit his head so hard she heard a noise, and then it was Hayley standing over her instead of the killer, clutching the rifle butt-first in her hand.
She reached down, offering a hand to Laura to help her get to her feet. Laura took it, got up, and spun around – but too slow. The killer was already back on his feet as well, tapping his palm against his head and bringing it away with a light coat of blood, then snarling at the two of them.
He wasn’t playing anymore. He was angry. And he clearly knew exactly who he wanted to take it out on.
