Page 119 of Blake

The air smelled of gunpowder and broken plaster. Shards of glass crunched beneath their feet. A picture frame lay shattered on the floor, and several bullet holes marked the wall near the doorway.

Devon refused to look at them.

Blake’s phone crackled.

“Savage, what’s your position?” Emmett asked.

“Hallway, headed back toward the kitchen. I’m trying to get Devon and Gwen to the garage.”

“Hold there. I’ve got movement near the mudroom.”

Blake stopped immediately.

Devon nearly collided with his back. He raised a finger to his lips.

Quiet.

She nodded.

A floorboard creaked somewhere ahead. Blake shifted his weapon toward the ground.

“Emmett, I’ve got someone inside,” he whispered.

“Copy. I’m coming around.”

The next few seconds stretched into an eternity.

Devon could hear her own breathing. The faint hum of the refrigerator. Somewhere outside, a man shouted.

Then a figure appeared in the kitchen doorway at the end of the hall.

Black clothing. Ski mask. A gun.

Blake fired.

The man ducked behind the doorway.

“Back!” Blake shouted. To Devon, he ordered, “Get her back to the laundry room!”

Devon stumbled as Gwen pulled her back. Another gunshot cracked. The bullet struck the wall inches from Blake’s head.

He fired again, and the masked man disappeared.

Gwen had barely pulled Devon back toward the opposite end of the hall when another man burst through the mudroom entrance.

Like the man in the kitchen, he was dressed in black, his face concealed behind a mask. And he was holding a gun.

For one terrifying instant, everyone froze.

The masked man raised his weapon.

“Blake!”

Her warning came too late. A deafening shot exploded through the hallway.

Blake jerked. Devon watched in horror as a dark stain spread across the lower left side of his shirt.

Oh, God!