touched it with wet fingers.
Yeah. People were stupid around the holidays. Including himself.
And then came the defining moment of stupidity. He and James were called
“The call came from the deli,” one of the clerks in the front told them as they came through. “Someone’s down.”
“I’ll go get the stretcher,” James said.
Blake and Cristina entered, as well. “They said they might need a fire unit,” Blake told them. “What’s up?”
“Don’t know yet.” Blake radioed dispatch for more information while Dustin headed in, extremely aware of Cristina at his side. At the back of the store, a wide-eyed clerk peeking out from a swinging door behind the deli counter waved them over. “You’re just EMTs, right?” she whispered frantically. “No police?”
“What’s happening?” Cristina asked her.
“No questions!” The clerk grabbed Dustin’s arm. “He said no questions! Oh, God, you have to hurry, or it’ll be too late!”
Dustin went with her, with Cristina right on his tail. They both looked at each other, nonplussed, when the clerk locked the door behind them. “He said just two EMTs.”
Dustin opened his mouth to correct her that Cristina was a firefighter, but Cristina stepped on his foot. “It’s just us two,” she said quietly.
“Okay, good.” The clerk gulped in air. “Because if I let anyone else in, he’ll kill all of us. Hurry!”
The back area was empty, except for two people-the manager they’d met earlier, down on the ground, still sporting his black eye, but now holding on to his shoulder, as well, which was bleeding all over the floor.
And the customer from earlier, who stood over him.
With a gun.
“Well, it’s about time,” he said, tightening his grip on the gun. “This idiot made me shoot him.”
“You’re crazy!” the “idiot” yelled, writhing in pain, bleeding out on the floor as Dustin watched. “And so is the courthouse for letting you out on bail! They should have put you in a seventy-two-hour hold! And for the record, all I said was that you’re more stupid than you look if you think I’m going to apologize to you!”
“And you’re not only as stupid as you look, you’re also going to be dead.” He aimed the gun between the manager’s eyes. “Now say it. Say you’re sorry.”
The wounded man was bleeding fast and furious, and going very pale. “No.”
“You have another shoulder, you know. And I’ll shoot you in it-Hey!” The shooter turned his head toward Dustin, who’d shifted closer to the victim. “Stay right where you are until I tell you to move!”
Ignoring him, Dustin went down on his knees to look at the wound. The bullet couldn’t have hit any major arteries or the manager would probably already have bled out completely-one thing in the guy’s favor.
Dustin lifted the torn and bloody material away from the entry wound.
The manager hissed out a pained breath. “I’m going to die, aren’t I? How long before I die?”
Cristina went to move closer to help but crazy-gun-guy protested.
Her hands fisted but she stayed. “He needs helps.”
“Let me repeat. Move and I’ll shoot.”
“Okay, let’s all just try to relax,” Dustin said quickly, still crouched by the injured man. “You let us in here, right? So I know you don’t want anyone to die.” He went to open his bag, until the gun ended up in his face.
“No funny business!”
“No funny business.” Slowly, Dustin pulled out gauze and pressed it to the wound. “He needs a hospital.”
“Not until I get my apology.”
“For what?”
“He said I was a worthless loser.”
“You hit him,” Dustin pointed out. “And then you shot him. I think you’re even.”
“Mom said he has to apologize, that I shouldn’t give in until he apologizes.”
“Mom?” Dustin divided a look between the two guys as sirens sounded in the distance. “You’re brothers?”
“Only temporarily,” the brother holding the gun said. “Because I’m going to shoot him dead if he doesn’t apologize, and then I’ll be an only child.”
The manager groaned and lay back. “Jesus. You’re crazy.”
“Say you’re sorry!”
“Just say it,” Dustin grated out, trying to stop the bleeding and having little luck.
“No way in hell!”
The armed brother waved his weapon, looking quite pissed off at the world. When it ended up in the vicinity of the terrified clerk, she let out a low cry and started to back away.
“Don’t move!” The manager, gray from blood loss and pain, yelled from his position on the concrete floor. “God, Tess, don’t get shot for me!”
The gun was in her face now. “Yes, Tess,” the manager’s brother said. “Don’t get shot for him.”
“Okay, let’s just all stay very calm,” Dustin slowly rose, holding up his hands. “You don’t need the clerk anymore, right? You can let her go. Let both women go.”
“They can identify me.”
That didn’t sound promising. For any of them. The police were probably outside by now, maybe even making their way in somehow, or so he hoped, so he figured stalling was key. “Look, why don’t you tell me what it is you want, and I’ll try to negotiate it for you.”
“I want an apology, or he dies.” Emphasizing this, he pointed the gun at his brother.
Tess screamed and scrambled backward, turning to race recklessly toward the door.
“Stop!”
Knowing it was all going to go bad, Dustin grabbed Cristina and shoved her behind him, dropping them both down as the guy waved his gun around like a mad man over their heads.
Well, shit, he thought. He should have quit
8
FROM BEHIND Dustin, where he’d shoved her, Cristina couldn’t see, but what she heard stopped her heart.
“Stop!” crazy-gun-dude yelled. “Stop or I’ll shoot you!”
“Don’t shoot her!” his brother cried.
Cristina lifted her head.
Tess wasn’t stopping. Heart in her throat, Cristina tried to get free from Dustin’s grip but then he was surging forward, throwing himself at the gunman.
In Cristina’s life, she’d been afraid many times, but never like this, never such a gut-wrenching horror.
Dustin landed on the gunman and they rolled around on the floor, each grappling to be on top.
Cristina held the scissors like a weapon, planning on stabbing gun guy, but the two men kept moving, rolling, bizarrely in tune to the clerk screaming her head off. Then the man with the gun shoved free of Dustin, whose face was bleeding. He’d lost his glasses and squinted, as crazy-gun-guy leapt to his feet and aimed at the clerk’s back.
“No!” all of them yelled. Dustin lunged to his feet, the sudden motion causing the gunman to whirl on him just as the manager, still on the floor, yanked on his brother’s leg hard, causing him to lose his balance.
The gun went off.
