Nickel City Crossfire by Gary Ross (popular romance novels .txt) 📗

“No,” Keisha said. She pulled the trigger twice, hitting Loni squarely in the chest.

For a moment there was a perfect stillness in the church.

There had been no explosions, nothing to make anyone cower in fear of a third shot. Those who ducked had done so reflexively, but the absence of sonic booms was confusing. The snap of the PPQ was not unlike the phfft of a suppressor, but there was no extension on the barrel. As if surprised she was still standing, Loni looked down at her chest and saw the huge splotch of blue staining her robe. Then she looked at Keisha, who fired again and again, each snap of the CO2 cartridge adding yellow, green, more blue, and purple to the swirl of color on her vestments.

“A paintball gun!” Loni screamed. “A fucking paintball gun!” Hands curled into claws, she lunged for Keisha.

Just then there was a distant phfft and a chunk of the lectern blew off. A second shot whizzed past me and hit something as I screamed, “Everybody down!” and dropped. A third shot hit the piano as I tried to get a fix on the shooter. It just missed Dr. Markham, still on the bench. But I saw the flash that time. Though it had been minimized by the silencer, it came from a silhouette standing behind the front panel of the choir loft. “Jen, the loft!”

We both fired two shots at the loft, our gunfire loud enough to elicit screams as the silhouette ducked out of sight.

I charged up the center aisle, yelling “Stay down! Stay down!” and Jen raced along the wall, shouting “Police officer! Call nine-one-one!” We reached the narthex doors at the same time and stood on either side of the center, straining to see movement through the beveled amber glass. Nothing. I signaled I would go through on a three-count, and Jen nodded. Then I kicked open one of the doors and plunged through.

The narthex was empty, save for Harlow Graves, still tied and gagged but now dead, a scorched bullet hole in the center of his forehead. QC’s cuffs had been cut and left on the floor. With Jen on the other side, gun ready, I eased open the front door, expecting a shot. Instead, through a light snowfall, I saw a body sprawled on his belly halfway down the stairs.

Jen covered me as I went down. I didn’t need to turn him over to see who it was. The split left leg of his pants told me it was QC. The blood pooled around the hole at the base of his skull told me he was dead.

“That the guy?” Jen said when I returned to the top. “Did we hit him?”

I shook my head. “His partner.”

“What happened?”

“I guess he couldn’t keep up.”

We heard the sirens before we pulled the front door shut.

“This is gonna be a real shit show,” Jen said while we were still alone in the narthex. “Better give me your gun and we both better wipe our texts. I was just here to visit my wife’s childhood church and got caught up in a shootout. You good with that?”

“Absolutely,” I said. I handed her my Glock and QC’s gun, both of which she pocketed, and then my lock pick gun.

“Jesus, Rimes. Are you gonna hire me if I lose my job?”

“They’ll process my gun as part of this scene and get it back to me. But burglary tools—”

“Yeah, yeah.” She pocketed the lock pick gun too. “What about your friend? He carrying?”

“A pocket baton. He works security.”

Jen nodded. “I don’t know his name yet, so don’t tell me. And don’t tell me any more about your plan with Keisha. Did you know the whole time her gun wasn’t real?”

“Odell got her into paintball. A PPQ replica was one of the things I found in her closet when her parents let me go through her home.”

“All right then. I got up when the gun came out but I couldn’t announce myself or take a shot when I thought doing so would endanger lives.”

“Makes sense to me,” I said.

We pushed through to the sanctuary and walked down the aisle. There was turmoil on both sides as people asked whether it was safe to leave or if we had caught the shooter. There were also tears and prayers and people still in shock.

Reaching the center, Jen took charge. She called for quiet and again announced that she was a cop, off-duty. “Police are on their way. Get comfortable and stay exactly where you are. It’s going to be a long night with a lot of questions. When you’re asked what happened, just tell what you saw. Now, is anyone hurt or in need of medical attention?”

“Here,” came a trembling, tearful voice. It was Dr. Markham, seated on the steps with his wife’s head in his lap. A few choir members were gathered around him, crying and holding onto each other.

As Jen and I walked toward Dr. Markham and the choir members, we saw Keisha and Bianca some distance away from them, holding each other and crying.

“Hurt but long past medical attention,” Dr. Markham said. “She’s with the healer of all healers now.”

50

Just before the detectives arrived, I called Phoenix and said, “It’s finished. As soon as the police are done with me, I’ll drop off your car and leave the key on one of the hooks just inside your door. It’ll probably be late so don’t bother waiting up.” I said nothing then about all that had happened since Piñero had dropped us off yesterday afternoon. She knew nothing of my breaking into Tito’s home. Having read the paper, she might have guessed that the Sanctuary Nimbus fire had something to do with my case but wouldn’t know for sure. She couldn’t know Loni Markham had died from a bullet likely intended for Keisha Simpkins or that Dante Cuthbert had silenced two liabilities before fleeing into the night. She didn’t ask how the case ended or