still while the action happened around her. She shook her head, pointed to her chest and then to the right. Dez rolled his eyes and nodded. He pointed to himself then to her, meaning he’d follow her.
Sherri crawled to the right then stopped as she saw two shoes on the other side of the table she crouched behind. She wasn’t sure if they belonged to someone on their team or to one of the drug runners, but she wasn’t going to wait to find out. She pointed them out to Dez then held up her gun. She stood and held her gun out in front of her. “Federal agent. Put your hands up!”
The guy turned to face her, shooting his gun in her direction as he did so. It felt like everything was in slow motion after that. She fired her weapon twice as she fell to the floor, knocked over by the weight of Dez. She felt the back of her head smack on the concrete floor, and she moaned.
Dez looked down at her, his body lying on top of hers. “Are you okay? Did he get you?”
She squirmed under the weight of him. The sensation of his body against hers felt odd, yet familiar and intimate in the middle of a gunfight. She tucked that thought away to analyze later. “Why did you knock me down? I had him.”
“More like he had you.” Dez poked his head up then frowned down at her. “Stay down or you’ll get us both killed.”
She rolled to her belly and used her arms to push herself off the floor. “Intelligence said four or five guys and no weapons. What happened?”
“So much for the intel.” He pulled her closer to his side. Bullets still flew in the air around them. He aimed his weapon at one of the drug dealers who provided suppressive fire to cover their retreat. Dez fired his gun and hit the man in the shoulder, then turned to aim at another one who shot at the DEA agents by the front door. One shot, and the man went down, too. Sherri knew Dez was a good shot. He’d been known for it in the Marine Corps, but she’d never seen it firsthand. Impressive.
“Do you plan on taking them all down one by one?”
He glanced back at her. “Right now my goal is to get us all out alive. Forget trying to subdue twenty men with a team of half that.”
Sherri nodded and took in their surroundings. Two DEA agents held down one of the drug runners, but there were at least a dozen more of the bad guys by one of the exits with guns blazing. She did a perimeter check and noticed a door on the far right side of the warehouse. Probably led to an office, but it could be a means of getting out. Or there could be more of these drug runners hiding out and waiting for their time to take them all down. She pointed it out to Dez, who gave a short nod. “Go. I’ll back you up.”
She took a deep breath then got to her feet and ran for the office door. A man to her left turned his gun on her, and she shot him before he got the chance to put his finger on the trigger. He gave a cry and fell to the floor. She kept running, the office door ten feet away. Five. Two. One.
She tried the door handle. Locked. She hit her fist on the door then turned and shook her head at Dez. They needed to get in that room. Just like they needed to call for more backup. No one was going to get out alive if they didn’t get more firepower on their side. They were outmanned and definitely outgunned.
Dez came up alongside her then pushed her away from the door. He gave the handle a kick. Nothing. Another kick, and another. On the fourth, it gave way and the door opened. Empty. Sherri entered and secured the area then nodded to Dez. He stayed in the doorway and watched for any intruders on their temporary hideout.
Sherri pressed her earpiece, trying to make sense out of the shouting and garbled nonsense. “Something’s blocking our communications. You know what that means.”
“No one’s coming.” Dez grimaced and muttered a curse word under his breath. He glanced around the office and pointed to an old rotary phone. “See if that works.”
She picked up the phone and checked for a dial tone. She gave a short nod and dialed 911. After giving the address and a brief summary of events to the operator, she could feel her heart starting to slow down to a normal beat. She thanked the dispatcher and hung up the phone. “They already sent backup. Someone must have gotten word out before we lost communication.”
“Good.” Dez kept his gaze out on the warehouse floor, where movement seemed to have ceased. So had the gunfire. “Sounds like they’ve given up. Or left.”
“Or they’re pausing to reload.”
Dez turned back, a grin splitting his face. “Always the optimist.”
The sound of sirens in the background sent a wave of relief through Sherri. The cavalry was here to save them. She joined Dez at the doorway, gun ready just in case. “We should see who’s hurt.”
“Feels like Fallujah all over again. I left the Corps to get away from this. That’s what I don’t miss about the military.” He led the way back to the warehouse floor and bent down to check on a fallen woman, one of the DEA agents. He shook his head at Sherri.
She bit her lip as she leaned down and closed the woman’s eyes. It was the one she’d just been joking with about being a female in a predominantly male office. They had laughed about it only an hour ago, and now she was dead and Sherri couldn’t even remember the woman’s name. And that seemed to hurt more.
She straightened and felt a little woozy. She shook her head, trying to clear it, and followed Dez to where more bodies lay on the floor. He took the right side of the room while she took the left. Two dead agents and five drug runners. Plus another agent and seven more bad guys wounded.
The warehouse doors opened, and four uniformed police officers swarmed inside. Dez and Sherri holstered their weapons and held up their IDs. “Border Patrol.”
One of the officers approached them and nodded. He surveyed the room. “What happened in here?”
Dez put his ID back into the pocket of his jeans. “Drug raid gone bad. I assume we have some ambulances on their way here, too.”
The officer nodded. “Call came in about gunshots fired. Protocol says we get an ambo just in case.” He looked Dez and Sherri up and down. “You two hurt?”
Sherri shook her head, which seemed to be buzzing. Probably the adrenaline. “We were the lucky ones.”
The officer frowned and glanced at Sherri’s side. “Are you sure about that?”
Sherri looked at her right side and gasped. A bullet had shredded the body armor, and a dark red stain seeped through her white blouse underneath. She put her hand over the area and found it wet. She looked over at Dez. “Did I get shot?”
Dez removed her bulletproof vest and whistled. “I’d say so, Ace.” He put his arm around her. “I think we need to find a paramedic.”
Sherri nodded, but it felt as if it wasn’t her head that moved. Just as it wasn’t her body that had been pierced by a bullet. She felt nothing. Shouldn’t she feel something? She opened her mouth to say something to Dez, but blackness enveloped her.
* * *
BEFORE SHERRI COULD hit the floor, Dez scooped her up in his arms as easily as if she was a rag doll. He pushed past the officer and walked out the door of the warehouse. Too much like Fallujah. An ambulance with lights flashing waited outside in the parking lot of the warehouse. “I’ve got an agent down here.”
A
