Free Allegiance (Joe Logan Book 4) by Michael Kerr Page B

where she had retreated to at the side of the boiler, she could make out the barely visible shape of a man as he stood up and became an inky silhouette against the charcoal gray from the open door behind him.  He wouldn’t shoot blindly, or so she hoped.  It struck her that if he did, then the muzzle flash from his gun would illuminate the basement for the fraction of a second he would need to see her.
    When he had spoken, Della stealthily used the sound of his voice to mask her movement.  She was now crouched behind the wicker chair.  If he approached her she would do her best to spear him like a fish in a barrel.
    Frankie stepped over Lennox and paused to feel for a pulse, but his partner was as dead and gone as yesterday. He picked up the gun from where it had fallen from Lennox’s hand onto a step and tucked it in his belt.  He had no intention of taking the bitch alive now, as per his orders.  He was going to make her suffer, kill her, and then call Dusty and tell him that Lennox had whacked her.
    Della’s knees were aching, and a cramp tightened her left calf muscle, causing her to gasp
    Frankie heard the sudden inhalation of breath.  It was from his left at the back of the basement.  He slipped his leather loafers off and kept his back to the wall as he silently moved in for the kill.
     
    Logan put the Taurus in park after driving the length of the street looking for anyone suspicious sitting in a vehicle.  Knew that it was a pointless exercise, but stuck to old tried and tested procedures.  If they had come for Della they would now be gone, with or without her. “Stay in the car,” he said to Benny.  “If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, leave.”
    “And do what?” Benny said.
    “Go back for Margie and get the hell out of New York.”
    Benny said nothing.  He knew that the woman Logan had come for would be alive, or dead, or gone, and he didn’t particularly care which.
    Making his way around to the rear of the house, Logan approached the back door.  It was closed, but he saw the large, circular hole in the glass.  He was immediately disheartened.  A part of his mind told him that he was too late.  He drew the Glock from the right-hand pocket of his fleece and entered the house slow and easy.  For a man so big he was light on his feet, and took one careful step at a time as if he was walking on rice paper, to reach the open door to the basement and stop at the side of the jamb to listen for any sound.
    Frankie caught his shoulder on the metal box that encased the circuit breaker.  He opened the small hinged door with his left hand and felt for the main switch.  Found it and thumbed it on.
    The house lit up like Coney Island on a Saturday night.
    Della narrowed her eyes against the sudden glare, pushed up into a crouch, rounded the chair and lunged forward with the pointed broom handle gripped in both white-knuckled fists.  The thick beech rod was coated in blood, as were her hands.
    Maybe if she had been nearer to the man it would have been possible to skewer him in the same way she had dealt with the other, but there was ten feet between them, and he was pointing a gun at her.
    Frankie smiled, but there was no humor in the mirthless expression, just a cold and maniacal grimace; fixed like that of reptiles that cannot show any emotions, should they have any.
    “Go for it babe,” Frankie said.  “See if you’re faster than a bullet.”
    Della froze and stood in place like one of the waxwork figures in Madame Tussaudes on West 42 nd Street.
    This was it , she thought.  Another second or two and I’ll be in oblivion or reunited with Ray .  The crushing fear that she had endured for hours suddenly evaporated.  She just stared at the man and waited to enter heaven or nonexistence.
    “Turn round and kneel on the floor,” Frankie said.  “And if you’re religious, say a prayer, but make it quick because in five seconds I’m going to blow your fucking brains out.”
    “Bad