Settling an Old Score - Delores Fossen Page 0,7

firearms. It meant Kellan and the deputy were in a gunfight with these men, but they weren’t stopping the one shooting through the door. The one who no doubt had the rifle.

Eli scrambled away from her again, heading back to the window. Putting himself in the line of fire, but a moment later she heard him deliver his own shot. It was even louder than the others had been, and it caused Cora to cry harder. Ashlyn tried to soothe the baby by rocking her, but the noise had obviously frightened her.

When Eli’s phone rang, he put the call on speaker, and she braced herself in case it was from the kidnapper. But it was Kellan.

“Hold your fire,” Kellan immediately said. “The shooter with the rifle is on the run, and Gunnar and I are moving in. But keep watch. We lost sight of the other one.”

“Where’d you last see him?” Eli asked.

Kellan didn’t even pause. “He was headed toward your house.”

Chapter Three

Eli had figured the danger wasn’t over, but he sure as hell hadn’t expected one of the thugs to come toward the house when he had two cops in pursuit and another lawman waiting for him inside. The smart thing to do would have been to try to escape, but this guy wasn’t doing that. That made him either an idiot, cocky or desperate.

None of those was a good option. All three would be the perfect bad storm, especially considering the guy was armed and ready to commit murder.

Eli fired glances all around the yard. No sign of the man, but Eli knew he was out there somewhere, and if his brother and Gunnar were in pursuit of the other gunman, then that meant Eli needed to make sure this clown didn’t get anywhere near Ashlyn and the baby.

He made a quick look over his shoulder at them, to make sure they were still behind the sofa. They were. But now that the security alarms weren’t blaring through the house and no one was shooting at them, he could hear Ashlyn’s ragged breaths and the baby’s whimpers.

Hell.

Ashlyn had to be terrified, perhaps even getting some flashbacks of the night she’d been shot. And that wasn’t even the worst of it, because this was a parent’s worst nightmare, to have a child in the middle of an attack.

No baby should be put through this, and once he had the situation under control, he needed to make sure it never happened again. That’s why he wanted to take the gunman alive. Maybe Kellan and Gunnar could do the same so they could pit the two against each other and get to the truth. Maybe, too, this wouldn’t be connected to Marta’s murder, but it wasn’t looking that way.

Your current houseguest, Ashlyn Darrow, is responsible for this, the kidnapper had said.

Eli didn’t intend to just accept the word of a guy trying to kill him, but it left him with an even more unsettled feeling. Had Ashlyn really triggered this by digging into the old case file or visiting Leon? And if so, why would it have caused someone to respond with violence like this?

Leon was in prison. Locked up in a maximum security facility where he was serving a life sentence. It was exactly where he belonged since he’d been the one who’d lured Marta, and therefore Ashlyn and Eli, into that alley with the drug dealer. No way could Leon dispute that, either, because there’d been multiple witnesses.

But Leon had always claimed that he’d been set up.

There’d never been an ounce of proof to that claim and plenty of evidence to indicate Leon had simply wanted Marta dead because he resented her and also because she was about to rat him out for his new criminal association with the drug dealer who’d been killed. Still, it chewed away at Eli that there could be something else about the violence that’d gone on that night. Something he’d missed.

Something that had led to the situation they were in now.

Eli was so focused on watching for the gunman that the sound of the bullet was an unexpected jolt. It caused Ashlyn to gasp.

“The shot wasn’t fired near the house,” he told her.

It had come from the east side of his land, probably where his brother and Gunnar were. Eli prayed that one of them hadn’t been shot. He figured Ashlyn was doing plenty of praying, too, because he heard her mumbling. Also heard her whispering reassurances to the baby.

There was another shot.