The Last Time I Saw Paris - Lynn Sheene [91]
His breath whistled from his mouth. Grunting, he dropped his pants and grabbed her with both hands, shoving her back into the hay.
Claire looked into his eyes and pulled his hips toward her open legs. “You could say all the things I’ve done in my life were so I’d never have to taste dirt again.” Her left hand slipped down his side. Her fingers reached for the cold touch of steel.
The Luger roared. His heart exploded as a bullet tore through his chest. He collapsed on top of her. Claire jerked the pistol free, pointed at the soldier next to her and fired. He grabbed at his chest and fell backward. She pointed at the soldier ducking inside the doorway and fired again.
A flash from the doorway and the officer on top of her spasmed; the impact of a bullet knocked the wind from her chest. Gasping, she pushed him off and rolled beneath the raised wall between the stalls. She peered back at the officer. He stared at her, blinked once. His mouth hung open, sneer gone. Then his bored eyes stared at nothing.
She crawled across the stall, Luger clenched in her hand. She held her breath and listened. A soft groan from the soldier by the wall. A gurgle faded to silence.
Willy used to take her hunting on Sundays when their parents went to church. He was the cowboy and Claire always the Indian. She had better aim.
Claire heard the faint squeak of a rusted hinge. The soldier was in the empty tack room, looking for another way out. There wasn’t one. Gritting her teeth, she slid under the partition into the next stall. She inched forward on her knees to the doorframe and gripped the Luger with both hands. The barrel, motionless, was pointed at the tack room doorway. A slow breath in. Breath out. The air hissed over her tongue as she tightened her finger on the trigger slowly, deliberately.
A torso came into view. Feldgrau. A wide, black leather koppel belted around a thick waist. She aimed at the eagle on the metal buckle, swastika clenched in its talons. The gun barked in her hands and the uniform burst open in grey and then red.
The soldier outside shouted. Anna screamed. Claire raced to the door and peered out, her form hidden in the shadows.
He faced the barn, his rifle pointed at the wide doors, half his body shielded by the cab of the truck. The little girl was prone on the ground beneath his boot, her cries muffled into the dirt.
Claire rushed to the dead officer; his white buttocks peeked out between his long shirt and lowered trousers. She wrenched the shirt from his body. Blood ran down her arms as she wadded the shirt into a ball around the pistol gripped in her hand. She pressed the shirt against her stomach, felt the blood drip down her legs.
The soldier cursed. Anna wailed.
Claire sucked in a deep breath and dropped to her knees. She crawled into the farmyard, moaning, her hand clenched to her stomach, dragging her legs behind her. She kept her gaze on the dirt in front of her, body clenched as she waited for a bullet that didn’t come. Just outside the doorway, she collapsed, body limp, her eyes open to slits.
The soldier pointed the rifle at Claire. His face was twisted in hate, his boot poised over Anna’s head to stomp. Inside the bundle of bloody fabric, Claire pulled the trigger. The pistol jerked in her hand; he fell behind the truck. Dirt and rock chips exploded from the ground in front of her face from the impact of a rifle bullet.
“Hide, Anna, behind the wagon!” Claire rolled to her knees, aimed at the dodging boots she saw under the floorboards and pulled the trigger once, then twice. The third time and the chamber clicked. Empty. She fell back inside the door listening for his shots.
The dead soldier inside the barn door was slumped on top of a gun strapped to his back. Claire kicked him over and wrestled it free. Longer than a rifle, the wide barrel was slitted along the side, a line of bullets in the assembly over the handle and trigger.
Claire pressed the butt against her shoulder and cocked the trigger. Leaning out