Page 16 of You Can Run

Dante exhaled hard through his nose. God, he'd believed that.

The 'Cuda fishtailed when he pushed it too hard along the shoulder, gravel spitting out from under the tires before he corrected, hands steady even as the car snapped back into line and shot forward again.

If he was too late...

The thought didn't finish because it didn't need to.

IfLa Mano Negragot to her because he'd been too proud to listen, there wouldn't be any coming back from that.

Dante pressed the accelerator down until it hit the floor.

EIGHT

Jessica heardthe wardrobe door slide open. Then there was a long pause.

Her heart hammered against her ribs so hard she was certain the sound must carry through the walls. She raised the gun anyway, forcing her hands to steady as she brought it level with the door at chest height, just as she had practiced. Slow breath in, slow breath out, don't rush, don't think beyond the next second.

From the other side of the wall came the faint sound of breathing, close enough that she could almost picture him standing there, one hand on the handle, his head tilted slightly as if listening for her.

Silence stretched between them, thin and taut.

Then a voice broke through. Male, calm, with a faint Spanish accent.

“Jessica,” he said, as though they were alone together in a quiet room. “I know you're in there.”

Cold spread through her chest. For a fraction of a second, instinct urged her to answer but she shut it down, pressing herlips together and closing her eyes as if that might make her disappear.

Ryan's voice found her before the fear could spiral, low and controlled through the phone.

“Jessica. Stay with me.”

She focused on that, anchoring herself to the sound of him, to something beyond the thin barrier of wood and drywall separating her from the man outside.

She sensed a pressure settle slowly against the door. Like he was testing it, learning the structure.

A shoulder, she thought.Or a hand braced flat against the wood.

The door held.

Jessica adjusted her grip on the gun, her body remembering what her mind was trying not to panic about.

“Ryan,” she whispered, her voice barely audible even to herself, “he's testing it.”

“Just stay steady.”

The impact came without warning: a heavy strike that shuddered through the door and into her spine, the frame creaking as a thin crack split along the edge of the casing.

Jessica flinched but did not lower the gun.

The door gave with a second, splintering crack, the wood bowing inward under the force of the impact.

Jessica fired as it moved, the shot tearing through the confined space with a concussive force that rang through her ears and snapped up her arm. The recoil was sharp but controlled, her grip holding as the bullet punched through the weakened panel and struck something solid beyond it.

A man cried out. Footsteps stumbled back, sudden and disordered, and someone cursed in Spanish.

Her heart pounded so hard it blurred the edges of her vision.

“Ryan,” she managed. “I fired. I hit him.”