Free Slow Burn: Bleed, Book 6 by Bobby Adair Page B

deck.
    I squirmed around the corner, holding the handrail with one hand, leaning far forward and keeping well out of Dalhover’s line of fire. I reached out to Jerry and laid a hand on his gun.
    “Let him have the gun.” Dalhover ordered. “Tell your people if I hear them move again, I’m shooting. Do it.”
    In a wavering, weak voice, Jerry called, “Don’t move.”
    I pushed the pistol into Murphy’s hand. “You know I can’t hit anything.”
    Murphy grinned and took the weapon.
    I reached back up and took my machete. Rearranging ourselves, Murphy aimed the pistol up the stairway.
    Dalhover moved so that Freitag could come all the way into the cabin. “You come down here, Jerry.”
    I couldn’t see the stairway, but I heard no movement.
    “You can walk down here or fall down.”
    “You don’t need to do this,” Jerry pleaded.
    “Now.”
    A stair creaked. Another creaked.
    Dalhover backed into the cabin.
    Murphy scooted back a bit, and Jerry stepped onto the floor. Murphy grabbed the back of his neck and drove his face to the floor, placing the pistol against the back of his head.
    Dalhover called up. “You two. Lay your weapons on the stairs where I can see them.”
    “No,” a man’s voice called back down. “I’ll shoot your ass.”
    Murphy used the barrel of the gun to persuade Jerry to make a guess on what to do next.
    Jerry guessed right. He called, “Do what he says, Gerald. Just do it.”
    “Do it, Gerald.” Dalhover called.
    Muffled voices conversed above, but I couldn’t make out what was being said.
    Murphy harshly nudged Jerry with the pistol barrel again.
    “Do it now!” Jerry ordered.
    “Good man,” Murphy said to him.
    I heard the sound of metal being laid on the deck. It was one of the guns. Another followed.
    “You two,” Dalhover called, “go to the stern. Face away from me. Put your hands on the gunwale.”
    Murphy kneed Jerry in the ribs.
    Jerry called, “Go to the stern.”
    Feet moved on the deck.
    “Don’t move.” Dalhover started up the stairs.
    Murphy looked at me, passing responsibility for Jerry.
    As he got up to follow Dalhover, I dropped a knee between Jerry’s shoulder blades and laid the machete blade across the back of his neck.
    “Don’t hurt me,” Jerry pleaded.
    Five minutes later, we were all on the deck. I looked around at the lake to get my bearings. We were nearly a mile from either shore, far up the lake from Monk’s Island, and around several bends. No one still on the island had any chance of seeing or hearing what had been planned for us.
    Hefting my machete, I looked at Jerry, Gerald, and the girl kneeling in the stern as they leaned over the gunwale.
    Freitag must have seen the way I was looking at the three, because she guessed my thoughts. “You promised not to kill them.”
    Implicitly, maybe. I looked at the three. Crap. “Sure. But they were going to kill us.”
    “No, they weren’t,” Paul assured me.
    I pointed my machete at the water around the boat. “Don’t you wonder why we were stopping in the middle of the lake?”
    Paul looked around. His face went slack.
    Gretchen asked, “Was that the plan, Jerry? Were you going to kill us?”
    “Of course not.”
    “Why were we stopping in the middle of the lake?”
    Jerry turned to look up at Gretchen.
    “Stay on your knees,” said Dalhover.
    From an uncomfortably twisted position, Jerry asked, “How could you even think that?”
    Gretchen repeated her question.
    Gerald snapped, “We were looking for a marina.”
    “A marina,” Jerry confirmed.
    Gretchen looked around.
    “Man,” Murphy said, “they’re lyin’.”
    Freitag said, “We can’t kill them. Let’s put them ashore somewhere.”
    “Or let ‘em swim.” Murphy was shaking his head and pointing at the water. “That’s what they were gonna do to us. If they didn’t shoot us first.”
    “As much as I want to kill them, we can’t.” Dalhover made it clear that debate on the matter was closed.
    “I