Shay popped up and squeezed off a few quick shots. A Harriken with a rifle dropped to the ground, his neck spewing blood. The thugs began to rush toward the other cars for cover, firing wildly.
Brownstone continuing along the circular drive, following the parked vehicles. Bullet after bullet whizzed by him, throwing up dirt and shattering a windshield here or there.
A thug’s submachine gun suddenly flew out of his hand, and Shay blinked. The man hadn’t let go. It was as if some invisible force had yanked it from his grip. To the man’s credit, he dropped his hand to pull out his pistol without any hesitation.
Shay took the opportunity to fire a burst into his chest, and he fell with a scream. She continued sweeping back and forth until she ran out of bullets. No bastards died, but they also didn’t risk anymore shots at Brownstone.
Her failure to continue shooting finally sank in, and the thugs opened up on her. The car window next to her shattered, showering her with safety glass fragments.
“Damn it,” Shay muttered. “Should have worn a mask.” She shook her head to try to get some of the fragments out of her hair.
Now close to several of the men, Brownstone opened fire, his .45 hurling forth its angry contents. Shay took the opportunity to crouch and swap out her empty magazine.
The remaining thugs had bought a clue by this point, and tried to tighten up their formation while continuing to lay down covering fire.
A bullet ripped into the back of Shay’s Lexus shield, and her head jerked up. Three men stood on the balcony, firing down at her and Brownstone.
If those guys were better shots we’d probably be dead. Too damn rusty at this.
The old killer instincts now subsumed the field archaeologist. She raised her gun and held down the Steyr’s trigger, pelting the three men with bullets.
Two collapsed where they stood and the third bullet-riddled body fell to the ground, landing with a sickening thud. She ejected and replaced the mag.
Brownstone charged from his latest cover position, a bright-red Lamborghini. Four men dropped in the blink of an eye, throwing knives stuck in their throats or hearts. The bounty hunter’s .45 delivered quick deaths to several others directly after that.
Their screams overlapped.
Shay fired several bursts off to Brownstone’s sides, doing her best to pin the thugs down. The concealed enemies stayed down after one man in desert-pattern camouflage took three bullets in the head for his bravery. He didn’t even have time to scream before he died.
The sounds of yelling and footsteps from Shay’s opposite side forced her to redirect her attention. Reinforcements from the other side of the chalet had arrived, so she needed to distract them before they flanked both her and the bounty hunter.
Okay, as good as time as any to use one of the toys.
Shay grabbed a frag grenade and pulled the pin. “It’s been a while.” She grinned as she achieved a beautiful forty-five-degree arc. Three…
“Grenade!” one of the men screamed. Two… They all scattered. One!
Most of the shrapnel pierced two Harriken. They’d have to join the Living Battering Ram from the other night in a mass closed-casket funeral. Two other men groaned, having taken more than a few hits themselves. They might not have been killed outright, but they were on their way to dying.
Huh. I forgot how much fun those things could be.
The other reinforcements hesitated, stunned by the carnage—a rookie mistake.
Shay tossed her other frag grenade toward another group, and her incendiary at the back of a gaudy purple SUV being used for cover by some of the reinforcements. The first explosion wounded only a few men, but the second exceeded her wildest expectations.
The explosion ripped into the SUV’s gas tank and a massive fireball erupted from the vehicle, blowing it several feet into the air and setting several men aflame. The shockwave knocked the nearby attackers to the ground.
The burning men screamed.
Shay took advantage of their confusion and pain to dart toward them and give them a fatal overdose of lead. Hell, some of them she was putting out of their misery. She spun on her heel, blasting the groaning and confused men on the opposite side.
The difference between a thug and a true killer was discipline. Being able to inflict violence was easy—it was human nature—but being able to inflict violence when you were terrified and people were dying around you was a much rarer skill.
Shay waited for more victims, scanning the sides of the chalet and looking up for more balcony snipers. Shots rang out, a mix of Brownstone’s .45 and the guards’ weapons.
Thirty seconds passed, and no more reinforcements showed up. The enemy must have decided that wasting more lives outside was pointless. Shay spun to check on Brownstone’s status. Every other man lay dead or dying, except for one Harriken holding a shotgun.
The wide-eyed man backed up slowly as the bounty hunter stalked toward him. He didn’t have his pistol out. Shay waited to see if he intended to stare him to death.
The criminal threw his gun up and squeezed the trigger. “Die, oni!” The shotgun jerked as it released its deadly load.
“No!” Shay screamed as Brownstone took a load of buckshot to the chest.
Why did you get so close, you idiot? You should have been smarter.
She blinked. Something wasn’t right—or maybe it was more that something wasn’t wrong enough.
Brownstone didn’t yell or scream. He didn’t jerk or fall. He just stood there with a bored looking expression on his face, like he got shot point-blank in the chest every day and it’d lost all meaning or excitement.
The bounty hunter glanced down at his now-shredded shirt and raised a single finger, wagging it back and forth. “You fuckers keep tearing up my clothes. It’s really starting to piss me off.”
“Kami-sama tasukete kudasai!” the Harriken screamed.
Shay had no idea what that meant; maybe a plea for mercy or a
