(2013) Shooter (17 page)

BOOK: (2013) Shooter

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"What's so damn funny?" he removed his foot so I could answer.

I coughed, and a globule of crimson spattered the floor. I grinned up at him, all of my bloody teeth showing. "You've got to be the sorriest bastard I've ever met. If you think I'm about to beg for my life, then you might as well just shoot yourself."

"You'd rather be beaten?"

"Like I said, I've always been a little bit of a masochist." I lifted my head a few inches and spat a mouthful of coppery liquid at his feet. "Go fuck yourself. If it'll reach."

More wheezing chuckles came from me as I looked for my former ally. Daisuke was standing exactly where he had been he entire time, an odd look on his face. It looked like emotional agony, but I couldn't be sure. My vision wasn't so great. "Happy?" I mumbled to him. He flinched.

I dragged my gaze over to my torturer, to find that he was missing, having moved off into the periphery.

"We done playing so soon?" I gasped.

That was when a baseball bat came crashing down on my right leg. A scream tore from my throat, the most pathetic sound I'd ever heard in my life. The edges of my vision faded to black.

The onslaught subsided for a few moments, in which time I'd decided something important.

I was going to sit upright and stare my death in the muddy-brown eyes. He would not own me.

Ignoring all of the many pains of my broken body, I fought my way upright and back onto my knees. I straightened my shoulders. I raised my head. And I stared Connor Allan in the eye as he raised the barrel of a pistol even with my head.

"Are you going to fucking kill me or not?" I shouted in my hoarse, ruined voice.

I could see the flared nostrils in his nose, the beads of sweat on his forehead, the crease between his eyebrows from his anger.

But the gunshot I heard didn't come from his gun. It came from somewhere far away, accompanied by the sound of tinkling glass and a cry of surprise that died instantly as a bullet ravaged Connor Allan's throat, ripping it to pieces.

He fell right there on the carpet in front of me, with a look of shock so profound that I knew in that instant that I was saved.

Connor Allan died right there in front of me, gasping for air that he couldn't breathe.

A grunt of pain and a misfired shot that made me jump, and I spun around, a movement that nearly overbalanced me.

Daisuke had the mercenary pinned to the ground, his big hands around the man's throat. The merc's face was an odd purplish color, I remarked with some detachment. It was becoming difficult to focus.

I couldn't hold myself up any longer, and I toppled over just as the door to the basement slammed open and a small crowd of people rushed through.

My best friend was among them.

Julia ran straight to me, looking as though she were on the verge of tears. She skidded to a halt next to me, trying to figure out what to do.

I managed words. "Looks like that's three close shaves now, huh, Julie?" I smiled as best I could, and she smiled back. There was some relief in her eyes.

Because surely, if I could make wisecracks, I was going to be fine.