“ Okay?”
“The smell made me realize that you handle guns. But then a little research revealed you’re an incredible marksman. Right from the start, given the way Tommy and Edita Kravic were gunned down, we were thinking trained shooter, someone with mad skills. Someone, well, like you, Mr. Gordon.”
Gordon glanced at Vivian incredulously and then back at Bree. “What possible reason would—”
“You and Viv are secret lovers,” Bree said. “That’s the real reason for the lack of passion in her marriage and her decision to ask Tommy to leave the house while she considered divorce.”
“That is not true,” McGrath’s widow said. “None of it!”
“You hide it fairly well,” Bree said. “No public displays of affection. A lot of late-night calls and fervent secret trysts.”
“We don’t have to listen to this nonsense,” Gordon said. “We’re leaving.”
Bree stepped up and stood in the way, said, “Tell me, Mr. Gordon, what bullets do you shoot in that fancy gun of yours?”
The attorney frowned. “I don’t know. Whatever my sponsors send me.”
“Bear Creek moly-coated two-hundred-grain RNHBs?”
“No,” Gordon said, but his lower lip twitched.
Muller turned to Vivian, said, “And you’re lying about your financial situation. We got a court order and looked into your investments. You’ve lost more than nineteen million dollars since the Chinese economy tanked, which was right before you asked Tommy to leave.”
Bree said, “We figure you found out about the life insurance policy and decided that since Tommy was leaving anyway, you’d profit by making sure he checked out permanently. You’d hide that, of course, behind a foundation you could loot to build back your fortune. Sound right?”
The widow McGrath tried to maintain her poise, but her eyes got glassy. She moved her lips but made no sound before fainting dead away.
Vivian hit the ground hard, cracking her head on the cement walkway. Bree went to her knees next to her.
Gordon put his competition pistol to the back of Bree’s head and said, “We’re leaving real quiet, now, you and me, Chief Stone.”
CHAPTER
95
GORDON GRABBED THE lapel of Bree’s jacket and jerked her to her feet, her body between him and Muller, who was going for his gun.
“Don’t,” Gordon said, keeping the gun on the back of Bree’s head. “Toss it.”
Muller looked pissed but did as he was told.
“Your backup gun.”
“I don’t carry one.”
“C’mon,” Gordon said, pushing Bree. “We’re moving out.”
He marched her into a maze of parked cars. She felt him relax a bit as they passed out of Muller’s sight.
“You’re making a big mistake,” Bree said.
“No, I’m not,” Gordon said.
Bree backed up fast and hard. She slammed into the attorney’s chest and grabbed for her service pistol. He pulled his gun away from her head, flipped it, caught it by its barrel, and used the grip like a hammerhead against her wrist.
The blow was excruciating. Her gun fell into the dust. Gordon flipped the gun again and had the pistol back to Bree’s head before she realized her wrist was probably broken.
“You’ll never get out of here alive,” she said, gasping.
“That’s where you’re mistaken,” he said, dragging her along.
“We have a SWAT team surrounding this place,” Bree said.
Gordon stopped short and jerked Bree tight to him.
“Bring on the amateurs, then,” he said. “I’ll watch them fall one by one, starting with you, Chief Stone.”
“You’re just going to shoot me in cold blood?”
“Just as you would shoot me.”
Bree felt the pressure from his gun barrel increase against her head, and she saw Alex and the kids and Nana Mama in her mind. It broke her.
“No,” she whimpered. “Don’t. Please.”
“To go out in a blaze of glory, you got to start somewhere,” Gordon said.
“Drop the gun, Gordon,” Muller shouted.
Bree caught the old detective in her peripheral vision, crouched in a horse stance between two cars fifteen yards away and aiming a .357 Magnum Colt Python revolver at Gordon.
“Now, I’m nowhere near the shot you are, Mr. Gordon, but I can’t miss from this distance,” Muller said calmly. “And I won’t hesitate to shoot a cop killer. So put the gun down, Mr. Gordon. Put it down real slow, and surrender.”
Muller would later say that he saw Gordon’s shoulders relax and his eyes turn peaceful then, as if he’d gone inside himself, preparing for whatever was to come.
Bree felt the pressure of the pistol muzzle increase, as if Gordon were squeezing the trigger. But then it eased, and Gordon dropped the gun slowly from her temple and then snapped it toward Muller.
The shots were so close, they were deafening and disorienting.
Bree staggered forward, her ears ringing. Several seconds passed before she realized that Muller was still on his feet and at her side and that Lance Gordon was dead on the ground, a bullet hole between his eyes.
CHAPTER
96