She was halfway down the staircase. Steel had shot Heaton in the arm. The bullet ripped through his skin and burrowed straight into his bone. He howled in pain. Adam threw him off, backward toward the center of the room. She fired off another shot, this time hitting him in the other arm. She came off the steps now, her pistol pointing straight toward him as she slowly crossed the large, marble foyer.
Georgia was there. She had come up the back hall from the den. She took it all in, speechless. Steel. The American. David. The blood. She found herself able to form only one simple word.
“Davina.”
Steel didn’t respond; she kept her gaze locked on Heaton. She was shaking, horrified by his image, mortified by everything he had done: to her, to her parents, to Georgia, to Britain. She raised the pistol to his numb, conquered face. Both of his arms shot through, he was in pain and beaten. It was over, he knew it now, and his creaky quiver waved his version of a flag of surrender.
Steel held the gun even closer, her face drenched with her own tears, wet with confusion, overcome by a blinding repugnance that wouldn’t let up. It built up inside her brain like a steam whistle, ready now to bellow and blast. Georgia begged, once again.
“Davina. Please. Don’t … Don’t do it.”
She pulled the trigger. Heaton flew back toward the far wall, with a clean gunshot hole in the center of his forehead and another straight out through the back. He dropped instantly to the ground in the same sad trajectory that Gordon’s last seconds had taken, that Richard Lyle’s body had traveled. He was dead before he landed flat. She turned and faced Georgia and looked over to Tatum. No one was sure what to say.
Steel and Georgia locked eyes, a view that offered both of them nothing but pain. She dropped the gun on the ground, letting Georgia know it was over. She wasn’t a physical threat to her, letting Tatum know that if he was inclined to leave, now was the time to do it.