have thought of something before–maybe even been a bit on the
subtle side. Yes, you fool, you should have just calmly left the living
room, pretending to go upstairs or go to the bathroom, whatever.
But no, she’d lost it–here she was running away with people chasing
her, FBI agents everywhere. But that didn’t matter, either. She
had no choice. If she could prevent it, no one else was going to die.
She ran.
There were no sidewalks in this very nice neighborhood, just
big lawns, thick curbs, and the road. She hit the road. She was fast,
always had been since she was on the track team in high school.
She put her head down, turned off all the voices, and ran. She felt
the breath pumping in and out of her lungs, felt herself filling with
energy, with power, expanding, moving faster, faster. Her feet in
Nikes -were unbeatable.
She ran right into Sherlock. Both women went down.
Becca was on her feet in an instant. “Sorry, but I’ve got to go.”
“Stop her!”
Sherlock grabbed her ankle and pulled. Becca went down on
the edge of a lawn, hitting her hip on the curb. A shaft of sharp pain
went through her, but she ignored it. She was ready to fight, ready
to do whatever she had to, but Sherlock had somehow managed to
straddle her, how she didn’t know, but she’d been fast, too fast, and
now she was holding her arms down. How could she be so strong
when she was so small, hardly anything to her at all? How did she
get her in this position so quickly? Sherlock was leaning over her,
her curly red hair bouncing against Becca’s face. “What’s going on
here, Becca?”
“Get off me, Sherlock. Please, you’ve got to let me go. I don’t
want to hurt you.”
“You can’t hurt me, so don’t even try. Tell me what’s happened.”
Becca started struggling, but then it just didn’t matter, and she
stilled because Adam was there, not even panting hard, standing
over them, staring down at her, his hands on his hips. “Thanks for
bringing her down, Sherlock. That wasn’t very smart, Becca.”
Sherlock didn’t like this one bit. She looked at all the men running
to the scene, even the two dark-suited FBI guys who’d been
parked discreetly down the street. “What’s going on, Adam? Oh
yeah, given that I could have hurt Becca dragging her down, I’d
really better like the answer.” She pulled herself off Becca and
slowly got to her feet. She held out her hand.
Becca looked at that slender white hand that was surely too
strong, but she didn’t move. She just rolled over away from them,
grabbed her purse, and was off again. A sharp pain went through
her hip but she ignored it.
She got at least ten feet before two arms went around her waist
and she was picked up, twirled around, and thrown over a man’s
shoulder. She hit her chin against his back, damn him. “Hold still,”
he said, and his voice was calm and quiet. Too calm, too quiet.
Sherlock was one thing. Having a big guy haul her over his
shoulder was another. It was humiliating. “Bullshit,” she yelled, and
jerked and pulled and kicked. “All right,” he said, and pulled her
down. He brought her back up against him, wrapped his arms
around her, and held on tight. No matter what she did, she couldn’t
get free. He’d pinned her arms to her sides but good.
Three hours, she thought. Time was running out. “Oh God,
what time is it?”
“I’ll tell you after you promise not to run away again.”
She leaned down and bit his hand, hard. He didn’t make a single
sound, just jerked her around to face him and said, “I’m sorry,
Becca,” and lightly tapped his fist against her jaw. It was the
strangest feeling. It didn’t really hurt, but she saw a whole skyful of
white lights, popping all over her brain, then it was as if someone
switched off the lights. Just nothing. She slumped against him.
“She’s a fighter,” he said to Sherlock, who was standing beside
him as he picked Becca up in his arms. He looked at the back of his