Under Fire Read Online Free PDF Page A

concussion, most likely, but she might also have some internal injuries. He tried to sound encouraging. “All right, that’s good. Listen, I promise we’re gonna get you out of there. Sit tight while we secure the back end, and then we’ll bring you out through the rear. Okay?”
    After a pause, she nodded.
    “That’s my girl. I’m going around to the back and—”
    “No! Don’t leave me!” she wailed, shaking her head.
    “I’m not leaving you, Cori. You have my word.” He put a thread of steel into his voice, using her first name on purpose. The calm assurance, the familiarity—firefighters employed these to keep a victim from wigging out. “I’m not going anywhere except through the back to meet you.”
    “Promise?” Cori pushed a wet strand of brown hair from her eyes. Even through the sleet, he could see the tension and fear etched on her white face.
    Cori was terrified. Depending on him. In that moment, Zack’s problems, the sickness threatening to topple him, vanished. His whole world shrank to a laser point of purpose. Nothing mattered except keeping his promise, getting her to safety.
    “Absolutely. Just give me a few seconds.”
    “O-okay.”
    As Zack hurried to the back end of the vehicle, he wondered if she’d recognized him. Probably not, with the storm obscuring her vision and the hat shielding his face. If she was in shock, she might not even consider how he knew her name.
    Skyler and Salvatore had secured the chain to the rear axle by the large hook on one end. The other end, they’d wrapped several times around the guardrail on the opposite side of the bridge to take out as much slack as possible.
    Salvatore waved a hand at the makeshift support. “I don’t like this,” he said in his clipped Spanish accent, which always grew more pronounced under stress. “The guardrail can’t take the deadweight if she shifts.”
    “It’s what we’ve got to work with.” The captain jabbed a finger at Howard. “Six-Pack, you’re the heaviest. Your weight will help hold it steady while you take her—”
    “No.” That single, sharp command from Zack got the attention of the entire team. Including Tanner, who gaped at him. “I promised Ms. Shannon I’d go in and get her, and I’m not about to break my word. She’s hanging by a thread, and we need her calm.”
    Tanner’s face darkened with anger violent enough to rival the storm. “Knight, did you hear what I—”
    “I heard, Cap, and I’m still going in. Ms. Shannon doesn’t have time for us to stand around arguing about it.” Dismissing Tanner, he turned to Skyler, the youngest team member. “Tommy, get the hatch.”
    Skyler stared at him, pale eyes wide, jaw slack. To his credit, he turned and twisted the knob, opening the rear entry without argument. The door gave easily, despite being bent from the earlier wreck. Had to be done anyway, so Zack hoped Skyler wouldn’t catch hell later. His own job, however, was probably toast.
    “What’s this? Look!” Crouched by the right rear tire, which was suspended a couple of feet off the ground, Eve pointed to the tread.
    “Tire blew,” Six-Pack observed. “That’s what sent her into the skid.”
    “Not just a blown tire. A bullet hole.” Crouching by Eve, Salvatore poked a finger at the rubber about an inch from the rim. “Where I come from, I ought to know. Madre de Dios. Skyler, get a police officer to come take a look.”
    Skyler jogged down the bridge, toward the barricade. Another wave of heat and cold swamped Zack, and he had to concentrate hard not to let his weakness show. A bullet. Jesus Christ, someone shot out her tire! Who would do such a malicious thing?
    “Let’s push the vehicle down, get the back tires on the ground,” Tanner said. He positioned himself on the right corner of the vehicle, leaning just inside the hatch, Six-Pack on the left. The two men braced their hands on the lip, above the bumper. “Slow and easy.”
    When the rear tires met pavement,