LITMIR.BIZ

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those she loved in danger. Anger coursed through her—along with the fear. And she thought fleetingly of running back—of trying to negotiate with a killer. Her life for the lives of her son and Milek. But her little boy paused in the middle of the lobby, staring back at her, his eyes wide with fear. He needed her; he needed his mommy.

      She squeezed through the metal frames of those shattered doors and caught up with him, swinging him back up into her arms. But she didn’t know where to go. Outside the gunfire continued. And inside all she could hear was screaming. And crying.

      But she and Michael had gone silent—probably with shock. The screaming and crying emanated from behind the check-in and concierge desks. She could have carried Michael back there. But the night clerk’s fear would terrify Michael even more.

      She needed to take him somewhere safer. She had the key to the room Special Agent Rus had booked for them. But how had the shooter found them? Had Rus told him where they were? Or was it Rus out in the parking lot—shooting at Milek?

      She shouldn’t have trusted the FBI agent. She hadn’t been certain she could trust Milek when he’d told her that they needed to leave right away, that he would take them home with him where he would be able to protect her and Michael.

      He was protecting her now, putting his own life in danger to save her and their son. Maybe he was the one man she could trust. And she might be losing him...

      Panic pressed on her heart, painfully squeezing it. The gunfire grew louder—the shots even closer now. Windows splintered next to the already shattered doors. And vases and pictures broke, exploding into sharp fragments.

      Clasping Michael more tightly in her arms, she ran again—through the lobby to the bank of elevators and the stairwell. She couldn’t go back to the room Agent Rus had booked for them. He could be the one shooting at Milek and the hotel, and he had a key to that room. She had to go somewhere, though, somewhere safe from the person so determined to kill her that he didn’t care who got hurt or worse along with her.

      Was Milek okay? Would he survive?

      Or would he die her hero?

      * * *

      Glass raining down around him, Milek ducked down between two rows of cars and cursed. He’d thought the hired assassin was called the Ghost because he had eluded the authorities for so long. But maybe he was called the Ghost because he was impossible to stop. No one could kill the already dead.

      No one could see them, either. Milek hadn’t sent Amber back to the hotel with their son because he’d seen the assassin or the gun. The darkness complete, there had been no glimpse of the man or glint of his weapon.

      Milek had felt his presence. When he and Amber and Michael had stepped into the parking lot, Milek had instinctively known they weren’t alone. Maybe it was the year of being a bodyguard that had honed those instincts—instincts instilled in him since childhood when his father had groomed him and his brother to be thieves. Those instincts had also told him it wasn’t another hotel patron hanging out in the lot. It was someone waiting for them.

      Waiting to kill them.

      He’d barely passed Michael to Amber and sent them into the hotel before the gunfire had opened up. He’d heard the glass break—in the cars around them and in the hotel lobby windows. Had they been hit?

      He had heard only one scream. But then Amber wasn’t a screamer. She was too controlled for that—too strong. And she must have passed that strength onto their child, because no screams could be heard from Michael now, either.

      Unless...

      His heart pounded frantically with fear, but he couldn’t consider such a horrific possibility. They hadn’t been hit. But the shooter was getting closer to the hotel—firing more shots through those windows.

      A shriek rang out.

      It wasn’t Amber’s. Her voice wasn’t as high-pitched. It wasn’t a child’s cry, either.

      Had someone else been hurt? Caught in the cross fire?

      Milek cursed again. But he hadn’t fired toward the hotel. He was firing in the direction from which the shots seemed to be coming. There had to be a silencer on the assassin’s gun, because Milek heard only a faint whoosh of air when a bullet left the barrel. But he still couldn’t see the shooter.

      So Milek was just wasting ammo now. He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his last magazine. He needed to make these shots count. He needed to hit the Ghost this time or he risked becoming one himself.

      Because a hired assassin wasn’t about to run out of ammo. The man would have enough bullets left to kill Milek and Amber and Michael if he found them.

      He prayed she had listened to him—that she would hide herself and their son where the killer wouldn’t be able to find them. Because he wasn’t sure how much longer he would be able to protect them.

      As evidenced by the shriek, there were other people in the hotel, though. The night clerk and the concierge. Maybe a bellhop. And several other hotel guests. Someone would have called 911 by now.

      Help had to be on its way. The Ghost wouldn’t stick around; he wouldn’t risk getting caught. Unless Milek could distract him until the police arrived...

      “Frank!” he called out. “Frank Campanelli!”

      Movement ceased. There were no more whooshes of air, no more breaking glass. He’d stopped shooting; he was listening.

      “Yeah, Frank,” Milek continued. “The police know it’s you who killed the district attorney. They know it’s you who fired the shots into Ms. Talsma’s home. And the FBI agent saw you today.” Apparently Nick Rus could see ghosts. Milek had been so totally focused on Amber and his son that he hadn’t gotten a good look at him. “You’re a wanted man, Frank. You’re not going to get away with this.”

      A chuckle came from out in the darkness.

      Of course the assassin had no fear of getting caught. No one had come close to apprehending him during his long and infamous career.

      “The special agent who’s after you—it’s Nicholas Rus,” he said. As Milek talked, he moved closer to where that chuckle had come from. “He’s the agent who brought down Viktor Chekov. Rus is River City’s version of Eliot Ness.”

      Hunched low, Milek slipped between the rows of cars. One of his father’s lessons on how to be a thief had been about moving silently. Like everything they’d been taught, Garek had picked it up more easily—was better at it, even now. But Milek was good.

      If he’d been driving to the hotel, he knew Frank wouldn’t have been able to follow them the way he must have followed Nicholas Rus. Rus was a good agent, but he wasn’t a bodyguard. He didn’t know all the ways and means of protecting an endangered client.

      But Milek had wanted to sit in the backseat—close to his son. He hadn’t been able to stop staring at the little boy and it hadn’t been just to make certain Michael was okay. While he’d had his reasons, Milek regretted never seeing his son, and for the past year he’d thought he had missed the opportunity of ever getting to know his child.

      But maybe that car ride to the hotel was all the time he would have—because another rule of being a bodyguard was giving up your own life to protect your subject. And Milek had never been as willing to do that as he was now.

      That was why he spoke again. Frank would know where he was, that he was getting closer. But it was a risk Milek had to take, so he could pinpoint the hit man’s exact location and make his remaining bullets count.

      “Rus didn’t bring down Chekov alone,” Milek continued. “He had help.”

      Frank snorted; Milek was close enough now that he clearly heard it. “Feds never act alone,” Frank said. “A whole bunch of Feds have tried to take me down, and they haven’t succeeded yet.”

      “It wasn’t other Feds who helped Rus take down Chekov,” Milek

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