Star Witness - By Mallory Kane Page 0,58

the table with a bang. He crouched behind it. Dani threw herself down beside him.

“What’s going on?” Paul cried from behind the corner wall that opened onto the dining room. “Do something!”

Out of the corner of his eye, Harte saw Stamps open the refrigerator door and hide behind it. Beside Harte, Dani pulled out her gun.

“Give it to me,” he said.

Dani gave Harte a sidelong glance. He was pale and his lips were pinched and white at the corners. He looked as if he would pass out any second. “Not a chance,” she snapped. “You’re wounded. Switch sides with me.”

“Dani—”

“Do it!” she hissed, and crawled behind him. “Move, Harte! I mean it. And stay down.”

She saw the irritation and resignation in his eyes as he acquiesced. It hurt him that she wouldn’t let him protect her, she knew, but she didn’t have time to argue or persuade. He was wounded and too weak to handle the gun, and she had to be able to aim and shoot with her right hand.

She clicked off the safety and sat up and held her gun in her right hand, steadied by her left. Carefully, she eased her head up enough to get a glimpse of the men. She needed to see their positions and, if possible, get a look at their armament.

There were two of them casting about blindly, working to get their bearings in the dark living room after being outside in the brightness of the rising sun. The one on the left was the brute who’d grabbed her. She could tell by his size and the tan raincoat. She aimed low and fired. He yelped and went down.

She ducked back behind the table.

“Paul!” Harte yelled. “Get out the back and go for help!”

“What?” Paul’s mouth fell open. “Me?”

“Hurry!” Dani snapped. “One of them is going around the back.”

“I can’t!” Paul gasped.

“Watch out,” Dani cried. “Duck!”

Sure enough, a firestorm of bullets peppered the walls, the tabletop and the stainless-steel refrigerator.

Paul cowered farther into the corner. With a moue of disgust for the man, she popped up again and fired off four quick bursts.

“Damn,” she whispered. She could tell from the weight of the weapon that the magazine was almost empty. Why hadn’t she counted how many times Harte had fired it? She slung her purse off over her head. “Get my other clip!” she told Harte.

She fired again, and again the men responded with a burst of pistol fire. As the noise from the explosions faded, she thought she heard police sirens. She exchanged a quick glance with Harte.

He handed her the fresh clip. When she took it, she felt the sticky slickness of blood on it.

Harte’s blood. Her pulse pounded in her throat as she ejected the nearly empty magazine and inserted the new one, then braced herself to rise and fire again. If she didn’t keep up a barrage of bullets, the men would rush them and kill them. She’d hit the brute who’d grabbed her the night before, but she wasn’t sure she’d hurt him.

She glanced behind her. Paul was still tucked into the corner and Stamps was still behind the refrigerator door. She didn’t see a back door. She’d just have to deal with the third guy when he showed up.

As she turned back to shoot another round at the men in front of them, a gun fired behind her. She jerked in surprise. Before she could distinguish where exactly the shot had come from, Paul let out a tortured cry and fell to the floor.

She turned her head, preparing to whirl and take out the shooter, but Harte yelled, “Got him!”

“No! Harte!” she cried, but it was too late. He had vaulted up. She heard a thud and two grunts and knew he’d connected with the shooter.

Don’t you dare get killed after all we’ve been through, she thought desperately as one of the men in front of them angled around the French doors and fired directly at her. She ducked behind the table, heard the bullet zing past her ear, then rose and shot several rounds at the open doors.

A startled cry told her that one of her bullets had found its mark. Suddenly, the staccato yelp of police sirens sounded, deafeningly loud, and a bullhorn roared.

They heard a voice, accompanied by more short bursts of the siren. “Police! Drop your weapons! Drop them! Now!”

Dani rose slowly, her gun at the ready, and pointed toward the two men. The man in the tan raincoat, the goon who