Page 81 of Single Mom's Firefighter SEALs
CHAPTER 44
CALDER
Elena makes a sound that no human should ever need to make, and everything in me goes cold.
Kozlov is strong, but strength isn’t the same as control. He’s trying to do too much now, holding a hostage, aiming a weapon, tracking Buck, Weston, and Elena. His gun side is tighter than it should be, and the arm locked around T.J. is doing too much work. His feet are set to move, not to hold. If Buck pressures him from one side and Weston from the other, he’ll have to adjust before he pivots.
I know those habits. I studied them for Arseny. I learned the angles, the body mechanics, the vile preferences of men trained to make terror tactical.
And I know T.J. He’s Elena’s son, and Tyler’s. He’s brave enough to listen when it matters.
“Easy,” Buck says, his voice low and deadly as he edges another fraction left. “It’s over.”
Kozlov jerks the gun toward him and bares his teeth. “For him, maybe.” Then he aims toward Weston, unable to decide which threat matters more. Good. Let him split. Let him choose wrong.
Weston takes one slow step right, his whole body coiled. “T.J.,” he says, calm enough to cut through the panic. “Stay still, buddy.”
Elena says his name, too, and that does it. T.J. goes still and holds, trusting us.
Kozlov pulls him tighter against his chest, and that tiny adjustment is enough. A shift in weight, a flex through the shoulder, the briefest opening at the neck, as he tries to keep all of them in front of him, and all of his control from slipping.
The shot is there, narrow and brutal. Impossible for anyone who doesn’t know exactly what they’re doing.
Easy for me. The realization brings a strange, bone-deep calm. Certainty.
My pulse steadies, and my breath evens out. The rifle settles into my shoulder like it belongs there.
My heart finds the line before my finger does. I exhale halfway and squeeze.
The round threads the narrow gap between T.J.’s shoulder and Kozlov’s throat.
Kozlov jerks, and for one awful instant, nobody moves.
Then his grip tears free. His gun discharges into the bleachers instead of Buck or Weston, the shot exploding uselessly into metal and dust.
T.J. stumbles with a ragged cry, and Buck is on him before Kozlov’s body finishes falling, hauling him backward and covering his body with his own. Weston crashes in a second later to help drag them clear as Kozlov’s weapon skids across the wet gym floor.
Elena screams T.J.’s name again and drops to her knees where she is, one hand braced like the world just came out from under her.
All I can hear is my own pulse and the fading ring of the shot until Buck looks up, and I read his face.
Got him.
Weston’s hand comes up in a sharp signal, all business and relief and disbelief tangled together, and the world rushes back in all at once.
The fire, the smoke, Elena sobbing, my own heart pounding hard enough to bruise.
T.J. is alive.
Anton Kozlov is dead.
The threat that’s been stalking us through Elena’s grief, through the fires, through sleepless watches and tightened perimeters and contingency plans, ends on the gym floor among children’s soaked science projects.
It’s not pretty, but it’s done.
I hold position long enough to confirm there are no more moving hostiles and no late surprises. When I’m sure it’s clear, I lower the rifleand climb down.
My hands start shaking when I’m halfway to the bleachers. It’s an adrenaline crash. And maybe three years’ worth of rage finally burning itself out.
