The Full Story. Dawn Stewardson

I’ll knock him unconscious and then fill you in. You can even take pictures.”

      “But—”

      “Mickey, the odds are very high that we’re talking about a professional hit man. Just letting you stay goes against my better judgement, and I definitely don’t have time to baby-sit.”

      “I don’t need baby-sitting. I even know how to handle a gun. I used to take target shooting with my brothers.”

      “You don’t have a gun, though, do you? So just sit tight.”

      “But—”

      “That’s how it has to be,” he snapped. “Take it or leave it.”

      “All right,” she said sullenly.

      He walked out of the room—closing the door behind himself, despite knowing damn well that she’d have it cracked open within thirty seconds—and headed back to the kitchen once more.

      The monitors were still showing nothing out of the ordinary, so unless his killer had snuck up tight to the house during the past five minutes…

      That thought didn’t sit well with him. Considering the way the day had been going so far, it just might have happened.

      After concealing the recycle box in the back of a closet, keeping only his own cell phone accessible, he scanned the screens again.

      The unsettled feeling worming its way around in his stomach was telling him that he’d better make sure things were still cool, so he took his Glock from his waistband and headed for the front door.

      If he discovered someone plastered against the outside of the house, the way he’d found Mickey earlier, at least he’d have the element of surprise.

      He silently unbolted the door and threw it open—his gun ready for action.

      But there was no new company. Not out front, anyway.

      Still, he’d better take a quick walk around the house. Be certain that he hadn’t missed seeing anything.

      He strode down from the porch and started off, pausing to listen for a moment when he reached the corner.

      All he heard was the raucous call of a jay and the clicking sound that some insect made when it flew.

      So far so good. Then he headed around the corner and found himself face-to-face with big trouble.

      Actually, face to mask, he thought uneasily.

      A man wearing a rubber mask that made him look like an alien was standing five feet in front of him—with a Magnum centered on his chest.

      “Put down your gun,” the masked man said. “Slowly.”

      Wordlessly Dan set his Glock on the ground.

      “Good. Now we’re going into the house. You first.”

      He turned and began walking back toward the front door, both his heart and his thoughts racing.

      Most likely, he was only still breathing because this guy figured Billy was inside and hadn’t wanted to alert him with a shot.

      But he couldn’t count on staying alive for long. Not when professional killers tended to have a take-no-prisoners, leave-no-witnesses style of thinking.

      However, the man didn’t know the house and Dan did. Which meant that all he needed was one little break.

      Adrenaline pumping, he stepped inside.

      “Where’s Billy?” the killer asked.

      “This way.”

      He started across the polished pine floor of the entrance area, wishing he had eyes in the back of his head.

      Ages ago, he’d perfected a move that would work if the man was close enough. At least, it had worked a few times in the past, in dark New Orleans alleys.

      But if he guessed wrong and the killer was too far back, he’d get himself shot for sure. Then this guy would search the place and Mickey would take the next round of bullets.

      So he couldn’t guess. He’d just have to hope to hell that—

      “Stop dead and put your hands up,” Mickey ordered.

      There was his break!

      He whirled around and dove toward the floor in one motion, catching the killer around the knees as the Magnum exploded.

      They both went sprawling and the gun skittered across the floor, vanishing beneath a massive desk.

      The killer swore, grabbing Dan by the throat.

      He slammed his fist into the guy’s face hard enough to make him let go. Then there was another deafening shot. Just as he realized that Mickey must have fired again, she screamed, “Stop! Both of you!”

      Instinctively he glanced in her direction, which proved to be a really stupid move. The killer caught him with such a wicked fist to the temple that it almost knocked him senseless.

      While bells were bonging inside his head, the other man tore out of the place.

      Mickey slammed the door shut after him, threw the bolt, then hurried over to where Dan was sitting on the floor.

      She had a semiautomatic in one hand. The other, she tentatively rested on his shoulder, saying, “Are you okay?”

      “I’ve got to catch him,” he told her, managing to lurch to his feet.

      “Dan, I don’t think—”

      “There’s only one way he can go. And I can drive that road faster than someone who doesn’t know it.”

      He reached for her gun; she whipped it behind her back and said, “Let’s give that idea some thought.”

      DAN FELT AS IF he’d been hit with a tire iron rather than a fist, and when he tried to ask Mickey where she’d gotten a gun no words came out, which he took to be a bad sign.

      If not for that, and if he had more confidence about getting farther than the porch without collapsing, he’d wrestle Mickey for the gun and head after the killer.

      Given the reality of the situation, however, he simply stood waiting to hear what she’d say next.

      “Dan, you hardly look up to chasing after a hit man,” she began. “And for all we know, he has another gun in his car or wherever.”

      Right. And he’d need another one. That Magnum was still lying under the desk.

      Everything had happened so quickly that Dan had almost forgotten about it. But he’d dig it out before he left. It never hurt to have an extra weapon.

      “So if he does have a second gun,” Mickey was saying, “and you go looking for him, you might end up awfully sorry.”

      He’d have nodded that she had a point, only he suspected the movement would make his head explode.

      “I should have shot him,” she said more quietly. “Instead of simply firing into the air, I should have shot him in the leg or something. I was afraid of hitting you, though. Then he sprinted by me like a track star and that was that.”

      “It’s okay,” he managed to say. “You probably kept us both from getting killed. So…thanks.”

      When she smiled and said he was welcome, the thought that she had a great smile somehow found its way into his mind.

      He wasn’t sure which was more bizarre—the fact that he was having the thought at all or that he was having it while his head was pounding.

      At any rate, he told it to find its way back out, then put together the words to ask where the gun had come from.

      “It was in a drawer,” she told him. “In the theater. I don’t usually go poking around in other people’s drawers,” she continued quickly. “But you seemed certain