What was that saying that Blaze kept mouthing off?
Oh, yeah, that he was never out of the fight.
And neither was Sarah.
Sarah tried not to attract attention as she pretzeled her spine, reaching for the vase. Her blunt fingernail scraped the rough rim, so if she could just bend a little more and grab—
Crack.
Blaze held both guns in his fists, pointing them at Logan and the other guy. He snarled, “We’ve known each other for over a decade, but you assholes forgot that I am a goddamned US Navy SEAL.”
Logan was holding his wrist and scowling, and the other guy was shaking his hand like he’d grabbed ahold of an electric fence.
Ho-lee carp.Sarah slowly straightened behind Blaze, watching her brother and the other guy for any sign of a countermove.
Blaze said, “Down on the floor, assholes. You, too, Tristan.Allthe way. Put your faces in the goddamndirt.”
Logan mumbled, “There’s no dirt in my house,” as he bent his knees.
“Shut up, traitor. On the floor, or I will shoot you. I don’t give one feeble shit about what your neighbors hear.”
The three men lowered themselves to their knees, then flattened themselves on the white carpeting like blown-down scarecrows.
Blaze called out, “Tristan,youdrained our bank accounts, didn’t you? You and your hacking and your computers.”
The third man, the one without a gun, nodded and didn’t look at them.
Yeah, heshouldlook down like he was ashamed. What a jerk, stealing from a frickin’farmerlike herself. She didn’t have jack-anything to begin with, and he’d taken what little she’d scrimped and put away.
Blaze’s jaw jutted forward. “I can’t believeyou threesold us out to Mary Varvara Bell.Damn you all.”He turned his head slightly. “Sarah, unlock the front door. You assholes don’t move a damned muscle.”
When Blaze leaned forward, Sarah scurried around the edge of the room, keeping two snowy-upholstered chairs between her ankles and where Logan was lying on the floor, a dark swastika stain on the white carpeting.
The whole apartment was so monochromatic white that even the art hanging on the walls was nothing but blank white canvasses. The blizzardy chill scraped her arms even though she’d just come inside from a warm June night.
She backed down the hallway, keeping those jerks in sight so she could yell if one of them tried to attack Blaze, and then flipped the locks on the front door. “It’s open.”
Blaze followed the same path around the edge of the room, holding both handguns outstretched as he watched the three men lying on the floor.
As he neared, Sarah cracked the door open, then held it wide and glanced at the empty hallway outside. “It’s clear.”
“Lock the knob. Walk ahead of me. Go push the elevator button.”
She ran over to the elevator, tapped the red-glowing button about twenty times, and stood before the closed doors, shaking her hands because her arms were cramping.
Blaze’s broad back filled the open doorway, immobile as a brick wall.
The danged elevator finally pinged, and the doors separated.
She yelled, “It’s here!”
Blaze stepped backward and closed the apartment door, then sprinted at her.“Run.”
As she started to jump into the elevator, Blaze grabbed her around her waist and jerked her out. She scrambled to find footing with her boots on the beige carpet and then sprinted with him toward the far stairwell at the other end of the hallway rather than the one closest to the elevator.
He snatched the stairwell door open, flung her inside,“Go,”and then silently eased the steel door closed as Sarah ran down the stairs.
Blaze passed her on the steps in just seconds, leaping the last half of each flight and landing silently as a tiger.
