Cora stretched and got up out of her seat. “We’re gonna sleep good tonight, aren’t we, Sam?”
“Yeah, I guess,” he said.
“I hope the rain lasts all night,” she said, going to the front window and leaning against the sill. Sam joined her, and she smiled at his reflection in the glass. “I want to open our windows at home . . . and . . .”
As she watched, a truck passed the house, hit its brakes, and backed up. A blue truck. Dread rolled through her, sudden and sharp. “You guys!” Cora yelled. “Davis is here!”
Which was the last thing she knew as the bullets shattered the world around her.
Chapter 24
Slider saw it all unfold in slow motion. As in a dream, or a nightmare.
Him turning as Cora called out.
A voice shouting in the night. “This is for the Iron Cross, you Raven pieces of shit!”
A hail of automatic gunfire hitting the front of the house, shattering glass, ricocheting around the room.
Slider yelling Cora’s name. Oh, Jesus, she was right in front of the window.
She turned, grabbed Sam, pushed him to the floor.
And then all of a sudden, time was a runaway train, speeding so fast Slider could hardly keep up. Screaming, crying, shouting, diving. Were they still shooting? Slider couldn’t tell for the buzzing in his head. He pulled his weapon from the small of his back and went to the edge of the window, but the brake lights were already moving away, and Caine was running across Dare’s front yard, firing as their attackers retreated.
Seconds had passed at most, but Slider couldn’t breathe for needing to get to Cora and Sam. He went to the floor next to where she was curled around his son. “Cora, are you okay?” Ignoring the glass under his knees, he put his hand on her back. “Sweetheart, are you okay? Sam?”
“Christ, who’s hurt?” Dare yelled, all kinds of commotion happening around Slider that he couldn’t even track.
Because Cora and Sam weren’t responding. Why weren’t they responding? Slider turned Cora over . . . and found the whole left side of her sweater soaked with blood. He couldn’t tell where she’d been hit through the thick fabric, but his hands went to her anyway. “Jesus, Cora! Oh, God. Oh, no. Somebody call nine-one-one!” Slider didn’t even know what he was saying, he was horror and devastation personified, especially when she still didn’t respond.
Sam moaned. “Dad?”
“Sam, thank God!” Slider cried, torn between these two people he loved. He reached for him before he noticed the blood covering his own hand. Cora’s blood.
“I got Sam,” Alexa said, crawling up to them and examining the boy. “It’s his arm.”
“Dad? Is it over?” Sam said, his voice a raw scrape, his shirt streaked red.
Lifting Cora’s sweater, Slider tried to assess her wounds, but the material was so fucking thick and he feared jostling her too much trying to take it off. “Yeah, buddy,” he managed. “Hang in there. You’re gonna be okay. I promise.” When his brave little boy gave a shaky nod through his shock and tears, Slider called, “Scissors. I need scissors. And towels.”
“Is Cora okay?” Sam asked, panic lacing into his voice for the first time.
“Yeah,” Slider managed. “She’s strong. She’s a fighter. You hear me, sweetheart? You’re a fighter. Damnit.” His own voice cracked, because he wasn’t sure which of them he was trying to convince.
“That’s right,” Alexa said, the words wobbly as she pressed her hands to Sam’s arm. “She is. She’s gonna be okay.”
After what was probably seconds but seemed like hours, someone finally brought him everything he needed, and Slider didn’t even know who. And then he was cutting off Cora’s sweater to find two gunshots to her left arm, a shot to her side, and a fourth through her upper chest, high enough to almost be her shoulder. Shaking and pleading, he pressed towels to the most serious wounds. Because, Jesus fuck, she had more of them than he could even address. Nonono this is not happening. Please, God. I just found her.
“Sam’s arm is bandaged,” Alexa said, grasping a clean towel. “Is it okay if I put pressure on Cora’s?”
God, Alexa was his angel tonight. “Please,” he rasped. The word wasn’t even all the way out of his mouth before Al was right there, her hands helping to staunch the flow.
Maverick crouched beside him, his face a mask of rage and shock. “Ambulances are ten minutes out. Can I help here?”
“I . . . I don’t know,” Slider said, his mind reeling. Ten minutes felt like a lifetime. “I don’t know what else to do.” The admission was like a knife to the heart.
Mav’s blue eyes burned. “Just hang in there and keep doing what you’re doing. Haven and Caine are also hit. But we’re going to get everyone the help they need.”