Page 4 of The 9th Man

Twenty yards, in the dark.

And missed.

The man, though, stumbled backward for cover and disappeared behind the van. From inside the house came a trio of muffled shots, followed by the loud crack of an unsuppressed weapon, a second shot, then a woman’s voice.

“Don’t move. Drop it.”

Jillian.

Footsteps pounded on stairs.

More gunfire, the suppressed and non-suppressed reports overlapping one another.

This was turning into a full-on firefight.

He didn’t give himself a chance to consider what awaited him past the front door, and burst through, the two guns up and tracking. A short hallway stretched before him, one doorway on the left, two on the right, a staircase at the end. A shadow figure appeared on the stairs. A muzzle flashed orange. The doorjamb beside Luke’s head shattered with splinters. He ducked, rushed forward, and slipped through the first doorway as a second bullet punched the wall behind him.

Upstairs, the gunfire ceased.

“No, stay there. Behind my cover.”

Jillian’s voice again.

A lone, muffled shot pierced the darkness.

“Oh, God,” Jillian screamed. “No. No.”

He heard anguish in her voice.

What had happened?

He peeked around the corner.

The hallway and stairs were empty.

He sprinted forward, paused at the second doorway to clear it, then bounded up the stairs to the landing where the steps swung right and up to the next floor. Above, a sound-suppressed pistol opened fire with steady and paced shots. Suppression fire? Designed to keep the enemy’s head down. In this case? The enemy was Jillian.

Above, he saw a balustrade and what looked like an open, loft-style space. Sprawled motionless beside the upper railing was Ball Cap.

That left only one of the ninjas.

Luke stuck the guns around the corner and fired twice with some suppression fire of his own. Then he charged up the stairs. Silhouetted by pale light leaking in from what looked like French doors the ninja hunched, half kneeling, obviously wounded.

The guy saw him and fired twice.

Luke dropped flat on the stairs, rolled right against the wall, then rose to his knees. As soon as his muzzle cleared the stair treads, he opened fire. The ninja dragged one leg behind him and shuffled toward the glass doors, which he opened. One of Luke’s rounds caught the man in the back and he stumbled out onto a balcony where he pitched face-first over the railing. Luke was there a few seconds later and looked down. The ninja was crawling across the grass, dragging his grotesquely twisted legs behind him.

“Stop,” Luke called out.

The ninja kept going.

He fired a shot just ahead of the man, who halted at the warning, tilting his head back and gazing up.

Two suppressed shots popped.

The ninja’s body jerked, then collapsed to the grass motionless. A lone figure—the driver, he guessed—stood near the van, pistol aimed, after taking out his own. The man slipped into the van, powered the engine, and drove off. It took two precious seconds for Luke to register what he’d seen and get his mind back in the game. Problem solved. Still—

He stepped back through the open glass door and called, “Jillian.”