"Funny how you just slipped off like that. I followed you back here."

"Yeah, I gathered that. I need to get back before the speech."

I move past him and he grabs my arm.

"Let go of me, Lance."

"Now, hold on."

"Get off of me," I hiss.

I slap him, backhanded. He doesn't let go. He pulls my arm, and with his other hand, grabs my neck, digging his fingers into my throat.

I can't breathe!

He's heavier than I am. He just throws his weight at me and pushes me down. It feels like I'm falling forever and then my head bounces on the carpet and I see stars.

The doork.n.o.b clicks and twists, and Lance freezes, looks back. I claw at his face with my free hand, dragging my nails into his cheek until I feel his skin peeling, and he screams, and drives his fist into my stomach. All the air blasts out of my lungs and when I try to pull in more, it won't come. I try to roll out from under him, but he's too heavy. Get off me. Get off me.

The door shudders.

"Open the f.u.c.king door," Hawk bellows.

Lance doesn't make a sound. His cheek his bleeding, streaks of red running down his chin. A drop of blood quivers and falls, and lands on my chest.

The door bursts open and slams against the bookcases, a great chunk of the stained hardwood, doork.n.o.b and all, flying across the room. It hits the desk and thumps to the floor. Hawk steps in, crosses the room in three strides and grabs Lance's ankle, and drags him off of me. Hawk fists Lance's hair in his hand and pulls him up, Lance screaming as he grabs at Hawk's wrist. Hawk doesn't say a word, he just spins around and drags Lance with him and Lance's face hits the edge of one of the bookshelves with a soft, meaty crack.

He staggers back and his nose is bent and twisted, blood gushing over his face. He looks at Hawk and raises his hands and starts flailing, and Hawk rears back and kicks him, drives his heel into Lance's stomach. Lance topples back over the c.o.c.ktail table, knocking it over as his head thumps on the floor. Hawk picks up the table by the edge and flips it and it topples the side chair over with it, and he puts the toe of his shoe on Lance's crotch, and levers his foot forward.

Lance screams.

"Stob!" he pleads, his voice thick with blood and twisted by his broken nose. "Sob plead!"

Hawk digs his foot in, and Lance screams.

Hawk reaches down, grabs his tie, and pulls.

Lance's eyes go wide and he struggles against Hawk's hand as the tie tightens around his neck.

"Stop!" I scream.

Hawk looks at me.

"Don't kill him."

"Why the f.u.c.k not?"

"Hawk, he's your brother... please."

He looks at me, and his expression softens.

Hawk's fingers open. He draws his foot back, and Lance rolls on his side, tugging the tie loose from his neck. He takes a deep, ragged breath. Hawk fishes through his pockets, and pulls out a cell phone, tosses it to me.

"We have to go, now. Text May, tell her to get to the end of the block. We're picking her up."

"But-"

"We're leaving," Hawk says, finally. "You did what you had to do. Is the computer done?"

I stumble over to it. "Yeah, it's done."

I yank the drive out.

Lance moans, and mumbles something. Hawk prods his stomach with his shoe.

"Let's go. Now."

He takes my arm, and when we're out of the office he says, "Are you hurt?"

"I b.u.mped my head and he punched me in the stomach. But I think I'm okay."

Hawk slips his arm under my legs and lifts me up from the floor, kicks the back door open and carries me out. He pushes the front seat of the Honda forward and lowers me into the back seat.

"Stay back here. May has to jump in the front when we get her. We need to put as much distance between us and Paradise Falls as we can."

"We should go to Jennifer and Jacob's place."

"Let's get May first. Text her."

I nod, and send a quick message, just tell her to get away from the rally and get to the corner so we can pick her up. Hawk yanks his tie off and drives, rolling his sleeves up as we go. I curl up in the back seat, trying not to retch. Hawk takes a wide route, crossing over Commerce Street well below the firhall and drives up behind it. May spots us and runs to the car as he pulls to a stop, and yanks the door open.

"What the h.e.l.l is... oh my G.o.d," she looks at me. "Is that blood?"

I look at my hand and my dress. "It's not mine."

May blinks. Hawk grabs her arm and pulls her into the car. May pulls the door shut with a loud slam and takes off.

"What happened?"

"We're leaving," Hawk says. "Right now."

"Can I get my bag?"

"No, we have to go right this minute."

"Alex?"

"I'm okay," I sigh, and sit up.

May sits sideways in the seat and stares at me.

"Hawk, let's go to the safehouse."

"We could be hundreds of miles from here by dark," he says. "You have almost a full tank of gas. We'll take turns driving. The further we get, the better."

I pull out my phone and call Jennifer.

She picks up on the third ring.

"Alexis?" she says. "People have noticed your absence. You-"

"Listen," I say, and tell her what happened.

"Go to the safehouse."

"Hawk's driving. He thinks we should just run."

"Let me talk to him."

"Hawk?"

He sighs and takes the phone, presses it to his ear.

"Yeah. Yeah I know, but the further we... I know he won't stop looking for us. Yes, he'll file a police report on May.... I know, we can't... that doesn't matter, I have some cash..." He trails off. "He can? Freeze my accounts? Christ. d.a.m.n it. Fine, we'll go to your place."

He hands back the phone.

"Where are you now?" Jennifer asks when I press the phone to my ear.

I tell her roughly where we are, and she starts giving me directions. I feed them to Hawk.

Hawk Now I drum my fingers on the wheel as I drive.

I was expecting another gas station, but the safehouse turns out to be... a house. A quaint farmhouse, actually.

"It's green?" I say.

Alexis nods. "Yeah, she says it's the green one. We're in the right place."

We've been driving for maybe forty-five minutes. It's still daylight.

The house is low and broad, two floors, a farmhouse maybe fifty or sixty years old, big and airy with a wraparound porch and a peaked roof. Behind it there's a barn, and I drive around the back through tall gra.s.s, get out, and grunt as I haul the big doors open. Alexis and May emerge from the car and stand outside as I roll it in, close the doors, and join them in the backyard.

This was a working farm at some point, but now it's just tall gra.s.s as far as they eye can see, rolling and rolling up to a wall of corn so far away it's just a straight line of green from an artist's brush, dragged across the horizon.

"We're here," Alexis says into her phone. "Yeah, I'll call back. Yes. Thank you." She sighs. "She says there's clothes and supplies inside."

"Good."

There'd better be. We have nothing but the clothes on our backs and the contents of our pockets, so that'd be my wallet, a couple of phones, whatever Alexis is carrying, and I don't think May bothered to take her purse.

"Key's under a fake rock," Alexis sighs.

I walk beside her to look for it. I spot it immediately, draw out the key and walk up to the back door.

The kitchen is a little dated, and it's dark and smells faintly of mothb.a.l.l.s and dust. I flick on the lights, though, and they work, and a ceiling fan starts turning. The place has air conditioning and it's blessedly cool inside. May walks through the kitchen while Alexis bolts the back door and leans on it, shaking.

I gather her up in my arms and she presses against me, shaking like a leaf.

Very, very softly, she begins to cry.

"It's okay," I murmur.

"Are we going to make it?" she whispers. "Is this it? Are we free?"

"I don't know."

Alexis wriggles in my arms and I loosen my grip. She turns around in my embrace, slides her arms around me and rests her head on my chest. She still has dried blood under her nails and there's a stain on her dress. Lance bled all over my arm. Just the thought of him and I want to choke the life out of him again. Alexis was right. I was going to kill him. I'd kill anyone who laid a hand on her like that. I'd kill them all.

"Why did you stop me?"

She knows instantly what I mean.

"He's your brother, Hawk. No matter what else he is, he's your brother first."

"Yeah, he is."

She starts unb.u.t.toning my shirt.

"What are you doing?"

"I can't stand seeing you walking around with his blood all over you."

She peels it back and tugs it loose from my waistband and I shrug it off. Alexis moves her hands to my chest, and traces the outline of the hawk tattoo spreading its wings across my body, smiling softly to herself.

"Have I told you I like this?"

"No," I murmur, "You didn't mention it."

"The tattoos are hot." She traces her nail over my shoulder, playing along the outline of feathers. "You're going to have to tell me what they all mean."

"Bow chick a wow wow," May says, in a sing-song voice.

Alexis shoves away from me and rounds on her sister.

"What are you doing?"

"Watching you guys get hot and heavy." She fans her face. "I think I've got the vapors."