Here, L texted.
Tina let out a breath. “Okay, put the phone away. We need to focus.”
An Uber—identified by the placard in its front windshield—drove slowly into the lot and did a meandering circuit through the aisles of vehicles.
“Could that be him?” He waved at the Uber, which was a blue late-model Honda CRV.
“Maybe.” They were both talking in low tones, as if the driver of the CRV could hear them. The Uber paused just in front of their bait car, the silver Camry. He felt Tina tense next to him.
“Is there a passenger?” he asked. “All I see is one person, looks like a man.”
“Agreed. It’s got to be him.”
The driver’s door opened and someone exited, but from where they were they couldn’t see a face or anything else about him.
“I’m going in,” Tina said tensely. She slipped out of the car and strode along the edge of the lot, scrubby weeds to her left, pavement to her right. Over by the Camry, there was movement, then the slam of a door.
Jack squinted past Tina’s striding form, trying to see what was going on over there.
What happened next was so confusing that he couldn’t make sense of it at first.
Tina dropped to the ground and flattened herself against the pavement. Then, using elbows and knees, she pulled herself into the weeds. Shit. Gunfire? Again? He hadn’t heard any shots, but that was almost more chilling, since whoever was shooting must be using a silencer.
The Uber was back underway, rolling past the beige Sentra, the driver not looking Jack’s way. Whoever was at the wheel wore sunglasses and a baseball cap and could have been anyone trying to stay unrecognizable.
Should he follow the Uber? Rescue Tina? Shit, what to do? He climbed over the gear shift into the driver’s seat and turned the key in the ignition.
The Uber was picking up speed now, but it wasn’t headed for the exit of the parking lot. It was headed right for the spot where he’d last seen Tina.
Shit.
Jack jammed his foot on the accelerator and swung the wheel directly toward the Uber. “Hey,” he yelled. “Stop right there!”
A bullet cracked the windshield, sending a spiderweb of splintering grass across the passenger side. Tempered glass, meant to withstand stray rocks and pebbles, but not bullets.
He ducked low and gunned the engine as he raced toward the Uber. He’d never played chicken with another car—that was stunt double territory—but there was always a first time. He intended to hit that car one way or another, either head on, or in its side if it kept on course toward Tina.
Tina was on her feet now, racing through the low grass, hunched over. Who was firing and where from? He didn’t have time to figure that out, since that Uber was only a few yards away from her now.
He roared and honked his horn and hit the gas pedal and then?—
The driver of the Uber changed course, wrenching the wheel the other direction. He sped past Jack, too fast for him to get a good look at his face.
But he did see something else, something that sent a bolt of electric energy through him. Someone was lying in the back seat. He couldn’t make out anything about that person, but he did catch a flash of forest green—Jessie’s favorite color.
31
Tina was fairly sure she hadn’t been shot, but with the amount of adrenaline coursing through her system, who even knew. She kept moving, staying low, until she heard Jack’s shout.
“Get in!”
She peered over the grass to see their rented beige Sentra pulled up right next to her, with Jack leaning over to open the passenger door. “Duck down!” she yelled at him. The shooter was still out there, or up there, or wherever he or she was.
He obeyed, and she launched herself toward the car. Before she’d even finished climbing onboard, he hit the accelerator and headed for the exit. She quickly figured out why; he wanted to catch up with the Uber that was now racing toward the exit of the parking lot.
“What’d you see?” she demanded as she made sure every bit of her was inside the car, then closed the door.
“I don’t know who was driving, but I think Jessie might have been in the back seat. Can you call it in or something? Make them stop?”
