Sydney siege inquest: Lindt Cafe hostage angry at police negotiator's response to gunman's demands.

A Sydney siege hostage has told an inquest she was angry and worried when told that then prime minister Tony Abbott was too busy to speak with gunman Man Haron Monis.

“You don’t tell someone who has a gun pointed at their head that,” Marcia Mikhael said, recounting the remark by a police negotiator that Mr Abbott was a “very busy man”.

Ms Mikhael, a former Westpac project manager, was one of seven hostages to stay in the Lindt Cafe until the siege ended in December 2014.

Three people died in the 17-hour siege, including the gunman.

Ms Mikhael said after she held her hands up near a glass cafe door for two hours, the gunman directed her to phone police negotiators with his demands.

She said a negotiator’s response made her feel anger, frustration and fear.

“I guess when you are under pressure and you are about to die everything counts,” she said.

“I thought he would harm or kill us if provoked.”

She said when Monis first took his gun out of a backpack she thought it was some sort of joke.

“I thought Channel 7 was going to come out of the kitchen and say it’s a prank,” she told the inquest.

The witness said it soon became obvious that Monis could be dangerous.

“He was forcing people to stand near doors and windows. He told us if we escaped someone would die,” she said.

She said the gunman, who told the hostages he had a bomb in his backpack, was wearing it all day but she did not see any wires coming out of it.

Ms Mikhail said the hostages were terrified and crying, and at times she was frozen with fear by the gunman’s threats.

“I could hear someone crying on the floor not far from me … that turned out to be Elly Chen,” she said.

Ms Mikhael said the gunman allowed her to help Ms Chen, who was on the floor vomiting, because she had a first aid certificate.

Officer’s signals calming, but he ‘disappeared’

Ms Mikhael also praised the first police officer at the scene, Senior Constable Paul Withers, who helped her calm down by gesturing to her through the glass doors.

Using hand signals, she was in turn able to tell him there was only one gunman and where Monis was.

“Then he disappeared,” she said describing how Senior Constable Withers suddenly moved away.

“I was hoping he was going to come back with lots of police but it didn’t quite happen that way,” she said.

She said she wanted to personally thank him for helping her that day but has been discouraged from doing so.

Ms Mikhael said when the final group of hostages ran from the cafe it was dark and she saw shadows of people running.

She said she lay on the ground because she feared Monis would shoot at anyone escaping.

“As people were still running I think he shot,” she told the inquest.

“I was hiding.”

Moments after the last group of hostages fled, Ms Mikhael said she heard Monis say to cafe manager Tori Johnson: “Come over here right now”.

Monis then shot a kneeling Mr Johnson in the back of the head.

Ms Mikhael said she felt pain in her legs after police stormed the building, shooting and killing the gunman.

She said she remained in the foetal position until police carried her out over Monis’ dead body.

Last year the inquest heard Ms Mikhael suffered leg wounds from fragments of police bullets during the crossfire in the final moments of the siege.

Hostage Katrina Dawson also died after being hit by shrapnel from police bullets that bounced off the cafe walls.

The inquest continues.

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This post originally appeared on ABC News.