“He prefers to be called Sly,” Wren says softly from my side.
One glance at her innocent face, and I’m nodding in agreement. “Okay, Sly it is.” The small smile on her lips is enough to have me wanting to do anything to make her happy.
There’s a loud bang, and the car lurches forward when someone hits us from behind.
“Shit shit shit!” I make a sharp left, hoping to gain us a few extra seconds as I try to think of the best way to lose them.
“If we could get to one of the bags in the back, we could shoot at them,” Peter suggests.
“No,” I shake my head adamantly. “We might not be on their side, but we can’t kill any of them. They aren’t bad people.”
“If they try to take Wren from me, I won’t hesitate to pull the trigger,” Sly says with a voice that sounds way too damn calm for the threat he shares. I don’t answer, knowing I can't change his mind and unsure if I wouldn’t do the same thing.
I take another right turn, trying to remember which way to the highway. If I can get them off my tail and make a break for the highway, I know it splits up ahead in three directions, and if they don’t see which way we go, we have a thirty-three percent chance of getting away. Of course, they are likely to split up, but at least that reduces the number of vehicles chasing us.
Just ahead on my right, I see a large garbage truckreversing straight into the road. “Hold on!” I yell as I press my foot down as far as it will go and aim for the shrinking gap behind it.
“Oh fuck!” Peter yells. Dex twists his body slightly, moving Wren away from the side the truck might hit us on, as I focus my gaze on our only hope of escape.
I think I hear Wren scream, but it's hard to hear over the ringing in my ears as I speed through the gap. The garbage truck scrapes along our back bumper as we fly out the other side. I slam on the brakes, then make a right turn, followed by three more quick turns, then head for the highway entrance straight ahead.
“Woo!” Peter cheers, his fear a moment ago suddenly turning to excitement when he sees we lost them.For now.
“We’re not free of them yet,” I mumble. “Shit.” I curse, seeing a police cruiser ahead. I don’t think it’s spotted us as I’m not going as fast now, so I slow even more and turn into a parking garage on my right.
I move up to the second floor and find an empty space, right beside a brand new Yukon. It’s a large SUV, even bigger than my old one. I switch the car off and wait, looking back and forth to make sure we weren’t followed.
“Alright, everyone out. Dex, you watch Wren. Peter and Jagger, grab the bags. Sly, you watch for incoming threats.”
“And what are you gonna do?” Sly asks with a raised eyebrow.
“I’m gonna disable this SUV’s alarm system and reprogram it to my own keyfob.”
I quickly move over to the driver's door and pull out my small pouch of tools from my pocket.
“I didn’t know key fobs could be reprogrammed?” Peter says as he starts lifting bags out of the back of the car.
“They can’t,” I tell him with a grin. “By anyone but me, that is.” I press the magnetic patch against the door and pull up my decoder. It’s a gadget I made out of a smartphone. It allows me to do all sorts of tricks, like breaking into anything with a digital lock, switching off car or house alarms, and even reprogramming car key fobs.
My decoder beeps, and I pull open the door, then hit the unlock button. Standing up, I yell, “Dex! Get Wren secured in the back. Jagger and Peter, you can load the bags now.”
“I prefer Pete,” he says, and I file that away. Do none of them go by their full legal names?
“Alright,Pete,make sure the sedan is closed up and doesn’t draw any unwanted attention, then get in the back with Jagger.”
I start to climb into the driver’s seat, but a hard hand on my shoulder pulls me back. I turn to see Sly watching me with what I can only describe as distrust. “I’m driving.” He pulls me away from the door and climbs in. I let him, because it doesn’t really matter if he drives, as long as he goes where I instruct. And this might give me a chance to breathe for a second and come up with a plan.
I run around the side, and seeing Wren sitting in the back beside Dex, I smile, eager to hop up on her other side. But once again, I’m pulled back by Jagger this time. He points me to the front passenger seat, and I roll my eyes, but climb in as I know we have no time to waste.
Once the doors are shut, Sly slowly pulls out of the parking spot and garage as if we have all the time in the world—a wise move as it doesn’t draw any unwanted attention to us.
I direct him to the highway, and only after we’ve beensafely moving for ten minutes without any sign of pursuit do I finally take the first real breath since this all started.
I glance over at Sly and the way his knuckles are white from his tight grip on the steering wheel. I think he’s worried about a tail until I realize he keeps glancing at me, not the rearview mirror.
“Really?” I ask with a huff, trying not to sound wounded. “After everything I’ve done for you all, and everything we just went through, you still don’t trust me?”
“What exactly have you done for us? Besides bringing the feds down on our doorstep?”
