Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 106090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
“Why stay?”
She pauses, considering. “Because it’s honest. The wilderness doesn’t pretend to be anything it’s not. It’ll kill you, sure, but it won’t lie to you first.”
She opens a gun cabinet and pulls out a second rifle, checks it, hands it to me. “You know how to shoot?”
“Yeah.” I take the rifle, feel its weight, check the safety out of habit.
“Good. It’s a bolt-action, so take your time between shots. Make them count.” She hands me a box of rounds. “We don’t have unlimited ammo.”
The weight of it feels good in my hands. Solid. Useful. I’m done being the person who hides and waits.
Michelle spots them first. She’s at the window, coffee mug still in hand, when her whole body goes still.
“Incoming. Six machines.” A pause. “No, seven. There’s another one hanging back.”
Marlena. Of course she’d stay out of the initial line of fire.
She dismounts and walks forward until I can see her face. We’ve cost her time, resources, reputation. She’s done playing.
“Ms. Parker. Mr. Bishop. Mr. Calloway.” Her voice carries clearly. “Come out. Return what’s mine. I’ll make your deaths quick.”
Michelle sets her coffee down and picks up her rifle. “That her?”
“That’s her.”
“She always this dramatic?”
“You have no idea.”
Michelle moves to the window. “Not happening,” she calls out. “These people are under my protection. Turn around and leave, or things are going to get ugly.”
Marlena laughs. “How charming. The park ranger thinks she’s in a Western.” She gestures at her people. “Twelve professionals against four? I admire the spirit, but let’s be realistic.”
“Five minutes,” Michelle says calmly. “Then I start shooting. Your choice how this goes.”
She steps back and checks her ammunition. “She’s going to attack. People like that don’t back down.”
“You sure about this?” Knox asks.
Michelle’s eyes are steady. “I told you. I don’t hand people over. Not ever.” She moves to her position. “Besides, I don’t like her. The dramatics are annoying.”
Despite everything, I almost laugh.
Knox takes the main window. Liam takes the side. Michelle guards the back. I position myself at the smaller window near the door, rifle braced against my shoulder.
Five minutes pass.
Marlena signals.
Her people open fire.
Bullets punch through the boarded windows and thud into walls. I duck below the sill, then rise just enough to sight down the barrel. A figure is moving between trees, trying to get closer. I track him, steady my breathing, and squeeze the trigger.
He drops.
“Nice,” Michelle calls from across the room.
Knox returns fire with measured precision—no panic, just methodical targeting. Liam covers his angle.
“Two o’clock, behind the big spruce,” Michelle calls out. “He keeps poking his head up.”
Knox adjusts, fires. The man crumples.
Glass shatters. Boards splinter. I work the bolt, chamber another round, and wait for my next opening.
“They’re flanking left!” Liam shouts.
“I see them.” Knox shifts, fires twice. One of them drops.
“Nice shot,” Michelle says. “The one behind him is mine.”
Her rifle cracks. He goes down.
Movement at my window. Two of them now, using the chaos as cover. I sight on the one in front, fire, work the bolt, swing to the second. He sees me aiming and tries to dive behind a snowbank. Too slow. I squeeze the trigger and he collapses into the snow.
My ears are ringing. My hands are steady. Funny how that works—I’m calmer now than I’ve been in days. Something to do, finally. Something I can control.
The siege stretches on. Marlena’s people try to advance, get driven back. They flank again, find every approach covered. But Knox is rationing shots now, his jaw tighter every time he pulls the trigger.
An hour in, two hours, ammunition running low.
“We need those townspeople,” Liam says during a brief lull. “Where the hell are they?”
“Takes time to mobilize.” Michelle’s changing position, covering a gap. “Bill has to call around, people have to gear up, drive out here. Could be another hour.”
“We might not have another hour.”
“Then we make it stretch.”
I check my rounds. Six left.
Engines. New ones. Coming from the north.
Everyone freezes.
Knox risks a look and his whole body relaxes. “It’s them. Dozen machines, maybe more.”
I scramble to see. A convoy of snowmobiles is roaring in from the tree line, rough-looking men and women with hunting rifles and the kind of expressions that say they’re not here to negotiate.
“Bill came through,” Michelle says. There’s satisfaction in her voice. “Told you. People help each other up here.”
The locals don’t ask questions. They see attackers shooting at the ranger station and they open fire. Marlena’s crew gets caught in a crossfire, outgunned and outflanked.
Three of her people go down. The others break and run, engines roaring as they disappear into the forest.
Marlena stands her ground.
Even with everything falling apart around her, she doesn’t move. She’s staring at the window where I’m visible through a gap.
Our eyes meet.
I see rage. Calculation. She’s already planning her next move.
Then she turns and runs.