screamed and ran toward him.
One of the goons stopped her.
She fought to get free but he was too strong.
The children cried in the background. She should go to them. She knew she should but she couldn’t take her eyes off poor Mr. Allen.
The leader walked over to her. He grabbed her face in one ruthless hand. “Bring me the Reimes boy,” he snarled to the man restraining her who immediately let her go.
This was it. The moment of no return.
She had to do something…if she could just break free.
Fear and hurt churned desperately inside her. But there was nothing she could do for Mr. Allen now. She had to try and help the children.
“Not the children,” she blurted, the leader’s hard fingers still digging into her skin. “Kill me instead.”
He laughed. “So, you want to be a martyr?”
“Kill me,” she urged, scared to death he wouldn’t agree and at the same time worried that even this wouldn’t stop him from harming the children. Surely the SWAT team was prepared to take action considering a weapon had been fired. As much as she feared the results of that…it was better than nothing. At least some might survive. “Kill me instead of the boy. Please.”
The leader laughed long and loud. “We’ll let our martyr be the one to pull the trigger.”
A new surge of terror made her sick to her stomach, had her knees threatening to buckle beneath her.
The leader leaned his face close to hers. “Have you ever killed anyone, sweet teacher?”
“Stop!” She tried to get free but her attempt proved futile. “I won’t do it.”
“You’ll do whatever I say,” he growled, his voice savage.
As the others watched, the man snatched Peter Reimes from the window and moved back toward the front of the room. The children cried frantically. Claire’s heart shattered at the idea that she couldn’t protect them. There was nothing she could do.
“It’s okay, boys and girls,” she cried, despite the ringleader’s brutal hold on her chin. “I want you to keep watching out the window.”
Her heart squeezed painfully when every last one obeyed. Still, their soft whimpers made her want to kill these four men with her bare hands.
By the time the man dragging Peter shoved him toward the leader, her entire body trembled violently. She couldn’t make it stop.
Oh, God. Oh, God. Please don’t let this happen.
As the leader released her, the man who had brought Peter forward manacled her around the waist with his left arm and slammed her hard against his body. He forced her hands onto his rifle.
“Please,” she cried. “No!”
The leader gripped Peter’s shoulder with his left hand and used his right to manipulate and then press the barrel of his comrade’s rifle against the boy’s forehead.
“Wrap her finger around the trigger,” the leader ordered. “Make her do it! Now!”
“No!” The word tore out of her throat on a wave of anguish.
Tears slipped down Peter’s reddened cheeks. “I want my mommy,” he pleaded, then cried out as his captor wrenched his shoulder harder.
There was nothing she could do to stop this.
The man restraining her with his left arm used both hands now to force hers to do as his leader had ordered.
“That’s better,” the one in charge said softly, lethally as her finger was stuffed into place.
Her teeth ground together and she wished more than anything in the world that she could kill this subhuman creature.
“I’m going to count to three, teacher, and then we’re going to do this. I want you to have time to look into the boy’s eyes before you kill him. One…two…”
“Screw you!”
In a move the man restraining her had not anticipated, she pulled back hard on the rifle’s stock, jerking the barrel out of the leader’s hand. Without missing a beat, she twisted left with all her might as her right forefinger coiled against the trigger. The weapon fired, sending a bullet straight through the chest of the man holding Peter. His gaze held hers for one eternal instant before he crumpled to the floor.
“You stupid bitch!”
The man restraining her yanked the rifle free of her reach. Her right hand dived into her pocket and grabbed the metal claw. As he tried to shove her away, she jammed the claw into his thigh with every ounce of force in her body.
He howled with pain.
She threw herself onto Peter, taking him down to the floor.
Glass shattered and some kind of foul-smelling smoke suddenly filled the room.
More shots echoed in the air.
She could hear the children screaming.
Chapter 3
“Step away from the weapon!”
Claire huddled behind her desk, Peter in her arms, as three men dressed in SWAT gear faced off with the only terrorist left standing. As soon as SWAT had stormed the classroom, she and Peter took the closest form of cover.
The children were crying on the other side of the room. God, she needed to get to them. But she had been ordered to stay put. She understood that the one remaining terrorist was still armed.
She peeked around the corner of her desk. The smoke was slowly clearing. Two other guys in SWAT garb were trying to see to the children. But as far as Claire was concerned, the kids needed their teacher.
Moving wasn’t an option. She couldn’t risk getting in the way of the ongoing standoff. Staying put was the hardest thing to do, but reason told her that any distraction could have devastating consequences. So she resisted the desperate urge to go to the children.
The three men suddenly converged on the lone terrorist. When he was cuffed, Claire scrambled to her feet. “I need to go to the children now,” she said to no one in particular. Her heart pounded so hard she could scarcely hear herself think.
“Go ahead, ma’am.”
She waited until they had ushered their prisoner to the door and then she reached for Peter. “Come on, Peter, let’s go see about the others.”
“You are dead!”
A chill rushed over Claire’s skin at the savage sound of the prisoner’s voice. She turned toward the man who had issued the threat. He resisted being ushered out the door. His mask had been removed and he glowered at her with sheer hatred.
“You
