Fatal Convictions

100

Alex had been so focused on the witness that he didn’t know anything had happened behind him until he heard the shots. There was instant chaos, people screaming and scrambling for cover. In his peripheral vision, he saw Taj Deegan take a hit. He whirled toward the back wall just as Shannon lunged from her seat and knocked Khalid Mobassar to the floor. Alex froze. Where are the shots coming from?

He dove for the floor, but that split second of hesitation cost him. He saw the flash of a gun and had time to register that it was held by a Middle Eastern man on the side wall with an eerily calm look in his eyes. Before Alex even heard the noise, he felt the slug explode in his left side and drive him backward, sucking the wind out of his lungs with the most intense pain he had ever experienced. There were more screams, but they seemed distant now as Alex gasped for air and the edge of his vision started going black.***

Hassan had trained his whole life for this. He felt an almost supernatural ability to process all the stimuli at once, slowing the world like a frame-by-frame video. He had hit Taj Deegan and Alex Madison, but the little gymnast had reacted too quickly, tackling her client to the floor and pulling him behind the safety of the solid wood rail that separated the spectators from the counsel area.

Everyone else in the courtroom reacted the way Hassan had predicted for the weak-kneed Americans. Hysteria. People screaming and diving for the floor. There were no heroes in this bunch.

He swung the pistol in a wide arc and started quickly moving toward the front of the courtroom so he could stand over Khalid Mobassar and see the look of fear in his eyes before Khalid met his maker. Just before he got there, the back door burst open, and two deputies rushed in, guns drawn. Fortunately for Hassan, it took them a fraction of a second to locate their target. By the time they realized that Hassan was their man, he had unleashed a flurry of shots, dropping both of them as more screams filled the courtroom.

He was at the rail now and put his left hand on the top to sidestep over when he noticed a blur from just over his shoulder. He whirled quickly enough to see a man in a leather jacket diving into him with a jarring tackle that sent both of them crashing over the wooden rail and sprawling across the floor. Hassan held on to his Glock and whipped it across his assailant’s face, cracking the man’s cheekbone and spraying the area with blood. The man’s eyes rolled up in his head. Hassan scrambled to his feet and into his shooter’s stance.

He now had a point-blank shot at both Shannon Reese and Khalid Mobassar. “Allahu akbar!”

But before he squeezed the trigger, he felt something slam into his chest, driving him back to the floor in an explosion of pain. He struggled to stand, but his movements were sluggish. His thoughts were cloudy; the world seemed to spin as blood poured from his chest wound. As he staggered to his feet, he saw Taj Deegan pointing a gun at him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw more deputies rushing through the back door. He saw a flash of gunpowder and felt more bullets tear into his chest and side.

Blood spattered the wall and carpet. One bullet exploded part of his face.

But Hassan was no longer there. In that last moment of life, he was riding through the infidels again, swinging his sword in a large arc, the arrows of the enemy piercing him from every direction.

His last thought was the grim certainty that he had allowed Khalid Mobassar to live. His last emotion was the fear of an angry Allah, condemning him, telling him that he should have done more.

At first there was calm. Then fire. And faces melting like wax.

The sound of wailing was deafening.