Suddenly he turned, shoving her behind him.
She stumbled in her sneakers, falling against the side of his truck. “What the—”
Her breath caught in her throat when she saw a fit-looking man in his thirties wearing jeans and a dark hoodie pulled up over his head, holding a gun low at his side, pointed right at them.
“Start walking to the house,” he said quietly.
Grace’s throat tightened with pure panic. Across the street her neighbor was unloading groceries, and two doors down she could hear another neighbor’s kids playing in the front yard. Dear God, what was going on? Who was this guy?
Logan shoved her behind him.
“Hands where I can see them,” the man snapped out.
“You don’t want to do this.” Logan kept his hands slightly out, palms up so the guy could see them.
Grace was frozen in place, half behind Logan, unable to move as she stared at the gun. Her phone was still in her car and so was her pepper spray. Not that pepper spray was going to do a hell of a lot of good at this distance against a man with a gun.
“Don’t tell me what I need to do. You ruined my parents’ marriage. You destroyed my dad.” His voice was quiet, but rage filled every word, his expression dark.
Oh God, no. This had to be Austin Brister’s son.
“Why don’t you put the gun down and walk away? You won’t get away with this.” Logan’s voice was calm while Grace’s heart raced out of control, a fast, erratic beat.
“You have no idea what I’ll get away with,” the man snarled. He took a menacing step forward. “I’m not going to tell you twice. Get in the house.”
Grace peered around Logan and somehow found her voice. “My keys are still in the car,” she whispered. She didn’t want to go into her house but she also didn’t want to be shot in her front yard. Maybe if the guy was distracted, they could…
No, he kept his weapon trained on them as he retrieved her keys, and her neighbors didn’t notice anything strange going on. They were so involved in their day-to-day lives, which was normal. Because people didn’t expect random gunmen to show up and hold their neighbors hostage.
The man tossed the keys to Logan, who caught them in one hand, his reflexes lightning quick.
“You open the door,” he said to Logan. “And then you come back here with me.”
Logan kept his hands out so Grace could move around him. “Look, she’s not part of this, just let her go—” He stopped as the man took another menacing step forward, his face tightening.
“Inside now or I’ll shoot you both right here. Then who knows, maybe those kids across the street might get hit too.”
Grace took the decision out of Logan’s hands and stepped around him.
“Open the door.” She understood that this shooter wanted Logan in front and she was supposed to remain behind him as a sort of buffer, ensuring Logan wouldn’t attack the guy.
It was smart and terrible.
But if they could just get him away from her neighbors, away from innocent kids and into an enclosed space, maybe Logan could take the guy out. She knew he had the training, and at this point, this was the only chance they had. They just had to take the upper hand.
Somehow.
Feeling numb, mind racing, she stepped toward the man as Logan walked up the little steps of her cottage-style house. As Logan opened the front door, her security alarm started beeping.
“Disarm it.” The man shoved her slightly and she stumbled forward through the door.
Heart racing, she moved around Logan and started to plug in the emergency code—the one that would actually silence it but still send out a distress call. But Logan must have seen an opening.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw him lunge at the other man. She fell against the wall as the two men rammed into her. The gun fell, clattering to the floor.
Her head slammed against the security pad of the alarm under the impact of their bodies. As the alarm kept beeping, she rolled out of the way, watching Logan slam his fist into the guy’s gut.
But the other man was clearly fit and got a shot in, punching Logan in the face.
Grace scrambled to her hands and knees, heart racing. The gun! She had to get to the gun.
Chapter 23
Logan was in a fight for his life. For Grace’s life.
He had to stop this guy. He’d seen the file on Brister’s family and this was his oldest son, Steven—who was supposed to be working in London right now.
Not that it mattered. The only thing that mattered was getting him down and keeping him down.
Logan dodged another blow to the face, coming up with a left uppercut to Steven’s jaw as the alarm started full-on blaring.
Brister’s head snapped back but he barely stumbled. Instead he went into a bull stance and ran at Logan, clipping him right in the middle.
Logan took the impact and rolled back onto the floor. As he did, he jabbed the guy hard with three quick punches right to the kidney. He needed to find the dropped pistol, but couldn’t pause long enough to look where it had fallen.
As they tumbled to the ground, Brister groaned in raw agony at the blows. He rolled onto his side, trying to get away from Logan.
Logan, still on the floor too, kicked out, slamming his boot into Brister’s stomach before jumping to his feet. This guy was staying down.
“Freeze! Don’t you dare move!” Grace shouted above the now blaring alarm.
Logan looked over at her, her hands trembling as she held a pistol on Brister, who was struggling to his feet.
Logan didn’t waste any time, simply strode over to her and plucked the weapon from her hands, never taking his eyes off Brister. He trained the weapon on him. “Stay on the ground and get on your stomach,” he snapped. Then he said to Grace, “I’ve got some zip ties in my truck. Back seat in a duffel bag. Go grab them. Call the police.” They’d probably already been alerted because of the alarm but he wanted her to call them anyway.
Moments later she was back with the zip ties, eyes a little dilated with shock.
“Go back outside while I tie him up,” he said as he took the ties from her. He wanted her as far away from this madness as possible. Brister was on the ground, staring at him with murder in his eyes, but he was remaining still.
“Should I turn off the alarm?”
“Yes, now go.” He kept the weapon pinned on Brister as she disarmed it. In the following silence Logan strode toward his prisoner. “Move and you’ll make my decision to end you really easy,” he growled.
Brister snarled in anger, but didn’t try to fight him as Logan quickly secured his hands behind his back. For good measure, he secured his ankles together as well. This guy wasn’t going anywhere. And Logan wasn’t moving from his side until the cops showed up.
Thankfully sirens wailed in the distance, growing closer and closer.
And Grace was safe. The woman he loved was okay.
Until that moment, he thought he knew fear. Because he’d been afraid before overseas. Would have been stupid not to have a healthy dose of fear. And then in the desert with Grace he’d been worried.
This… Hell. Grace had come so close to being shot. Killed.
He was going to be having nightmares about today for a while.