He releases me and sits back, reaching overhead to grip the handle above the Beemer’s passenger door. “Don’t kill us.”
“Yeah, I’ll try not to.” I check the rearview—the SUV is gaining. I swallow, every muscle in my body light and airy, running cold with adrenaline. There’s no one else in sight on the highway, and there’s a turnout up ahead.
Now or never.
I jerk into the opposite lane and slam on the brakes. The SUV swerves slightly, but careens past us. I accelerate, pinning the pedal to the floor, and we gun after them. We get up next to them, our cars side by side.
I don’t think—I rev ahead, the Beemer’s acceleration easy and liquid. In one swift motion, I angle in front of the SUV, shunting them out of the lane. They skid into the turnout, kicking up arcs of gravel. Their tires shriek as they spin out, the side of the car slamming into a semicircle of cement barriers.
I yank the wheel, turning us after them. The nose of the SUV is pointed the wrong direction, smoke pluming from under the hood.
Nik is already leaping out of the car. I slam us into park and follow, drawing and cocking my pistol in a motion that shouldn’t be as baked into me as it is after all of these years.
The driver’s door swings open out of sight. I hear someone coughing. A figure bursts out of the passenger side, swinging a Glock up toward Nik.
Pop pop!
And the man falls to his knees, screaming, clutching his thigh. Blood spouts between his fingers, flooding the gravel and grit of the turnout. Nik quickly kicks aside the man’s gun. It spins away under the car.
“Jesus, fuck! OK!” the man wails. He’s dressed in all black, and has a trace of a Russian accent. “OK, I fucking surrender!”
I round the back of the SUV. Through the smoke, a figure staggers, wheezing. “Cunts,” hisses the voice.
The familiar voice.
No way.
Nik rounds the front of the car. We have the driver pinned between us, guns raised. The smoke is slowly clearing.
She turns, sagging against one of the cement barriers. Blood pours from one temple.
Nik and I both lower our guns in the same instant.
“You fucking idiots,” says Maya, laughing coldly. “Look what you did! Now we’re all gonna die.”
* * *
Nik is the first to raise his gun. Maya is the second. She executes the motion with chilling confidence and soldier-like precision, gripping her forearm, pistol turned a neat ninety degrees at Nik’s head. He smiles coldly.
“So,” he says, “you’re fucking with Lebedev now?”
On the other side of the SUV, Maya’s passenger moans.
“You guys are always a little behind,” Maya says sourly. “But this is outrageous.”
I can’t bring myself to point my pistol. I’m still reeling, emotions kicking up like smoke around me. There’s confusion, and fear, and a sense of sinking, impending doom—but overwhelming them all is a sense of relief and bright, glittering happiness.
Maya. My best friend. My sister in every sense but blood. The girl I grew up with and haven’t talked to in five years. She’s alive. She’s OK. She’s here now.
Yeah, but what does thatmean?Could she really be working for Lebedev? If so, why?
And does that mean she’s here doing his dirty work?
Does that mean she was coming to kill me?
“You’ve been missing for months,” says Nik, an edge of real anger in his voice. He’s been playing it cool, but of course he was worried for his cousin. And given his family’s history, he was probably more certain she was dead than alive. “What the fuck are you doing?”
“What amIdoing?” She laughs, eyes darting toward me. She has Nik’s sharp features, but her tight curls are dark brown instead of black, and her piercing eyes are blue instead of green. They’re both chillingly beautiful and clearly related, which makes the sight of them aiming guns at one another all the more dismal. “Come on, Nik. What the fuck areyoudoing? Did you even look for me?”
