horizon, creating deep pools of shadows under the heavy-limbed oaks that lined the road.
She gave Lisa’s hand an extra-hard squeeze, preparing her. “I have to go to the bathroom,” Kat declared loudly.
Cranston dismissed her. “You’ll wait.”
“I won’t. I’m going now-either outside or back here.”
Cranston twisted in his seat, eyeing her, judging her determination. She didn’t break eye contact. His gaze flicked to the lonely road around them, then he sighed.
“Fine. Stop the car.” His next words were for one of the guards. “She runs… you shoot her.”
The Ford pulled to the shoulder of the road.
Kat gave Lisa’s hand a small tug, trying to get her to understand.
Lisa tightened her fingers. “I should go, too… if we’re stopping anyway.”
“You’ll take turns,” Cranston said. “I’m not taking any chances.”
They piled out of the backseat on the driver’s side, leaving the two men up front. One gunman kept a grip on Lisa’s upper arm, resting a palm on his holstered pistol.
Kat hiked off to the shadows beneath an oak.
“That’s far enough!” Cranston yelled out the open window.
Her guard had his pistol out, emphasizing the order.
She squatted in the weeds and slipped her shorts down. After all of the drugs in her system, her bladder had been begging for relief. The guard watched. She stared right back at him, challenging him. Once finished, she stood back up and headed toward the roadside.
The guard kept his pistol pointed, maintaining his distance.
The other gunman pushed Lisa toward the field. “Your turn. Be quick about it.”
That was all Kat needed.
She swung her arm, sharply flicking out her wrist. The hidden baton extended to its full length. She might be out of range of the guard-but the baton wasn’t.
Back on the streets of Charleston, Kat had taken the weapon from Amy after hiding her body behind the recycling bin. She had concealed the collapsed length of the baton in the small of her back, tucked into the waistband of her shorts-then tossed her pistol out, appearing unarmed.
She had wanted Lisa a safe distance away from her captors before acting, to wait for their guard to lower.
Like now.
Kat cracked the baton’s hard length across the guard’s wrist, breaking bone. The pistol tumbled from his fingertips.
Already diving forward, Kat caught the weapon before it hit the pavement. She landed on her shoulder and rolled, already firing. She blasted the guard in the knee, twisted to shoot the other gunman in the head, then back to her guard, finishing him off with a round through his throat.
Kat lunged to the car. Her attack had been so sudden, so savage, the driver barely had time to react. She shoved her gun through the open window and fired point-blank into the side of his head. Skull fragments and blood splattered across the front seat, striking Cranston across chest and face.
The doctor sat stunned, one hand held up, palm open. The other clutched an open cell phone.
Kat wasn’t taking any chances with him. The good doctor had answers Sigma needed. She intended to deliver him to Painter, all trussed up and tied with a bow.
“It’s
8:12 P.M.
Lisa guided the Ford explorer down the country road, trying her best to ignore the gore still staining the seat. As a medical doctor, she seldom found herself squeamish, but the raw brutality of Kat’s attack still shook her. Prior to today, she had known Kat mainly as a mother or a strategist working alongside Painter. She’d never witnessed Kat’s skill in the field, her pure animal cunning and savagery.
Though that trait had won them their freedom, it still unnerved her.
That, and the cold blood seeping through the seat of her dress.
After the roadside attack, Kat had forced Cranston to haul the bodies into a ditch, to hide them from direct sight of the road, though it looked rarely traveled.
Which was turning out to be a problem.
“Any signal yet?” Lisa asked.
“No,” Kat answered from the backseat.
Her friend crouched behind Cranston, a pistol in one hand, the doctor’s cell phone in the other. Cranston still sat in the front passenger seat, his wrists zip-tied to the headrest behind him. An awkward stress position, but Kat ignored his protests.
Beyond that cold professionalism, Lisa recognized a glimmer of hatred in Kat’s eyes. While not getting the full story concerning what had happened at the North Charleston Fertility Clinic, Lisa understood enough to know whom to blame.
Cranston was a monster hiding behind a handsome face.
And one with great ambitions.
“There should be a signal by now,” Kat said. “But I’m still not getting any reception.”
After commandeering the vehicle, Kat had ordered Lisa to turn the SUV around and backtrack along their path. She wanted to reach a phone or get close enough to a cell tower to regain reception.
“Some farmhouses off to the right,” Lisa offered. “We can turn in and ask for help.”
“They might alert the local authorities. I don’t know who to trust out here.”
Lisa remembered Painter expressing the same concern. The Gants owned much of South Carolina. Who knew how far that reach extended into local law enforcement?
“Look.” Lisa pointed ahead. “There’s a sign for a turnoff to Orangeburg. Surely that town must get cell signal.”
“Head that way,” Kat agreed, but she kept searching around the vehicle, with a suspicious look.
Lisa made that turn and traveled a half-mile. Off in the distance, the steeple of a church poked above the tree line. That had to be the town of Orangeburg.
Too focused on the horizon, Lisa glided through an intersection with a flashing red light. A small drawbridge crossed a hidden river. A warning gate began to drop across its entrance.
She pulled to a stop in front of it.
As she waited for the drawbridge to open, Lisa asked, “Anything now?”
“Nothing.”
In the rearview mirror, Kat’s eyes fixed at the back of Cranston’s head. He’d been unusually quiet for the past five minutes, no further complaints about his wrists.
A low rumble announced the raising of the bridge-but then got louder and louder-becoming more like a thumping.
Lisa frowned, concerned about the worn mechanics of the old bridge.
Kat’s reaction was rougher. She jerked upright and threw her cell phone out the window. She clutched Lisa’s shoulder at the same time.
“Get us out of here! now!”
The warning came too late.
A sleek military-gray helicopter burst out of hiding from the riverbed to the left. It lofted high over the bridge.
Lisa yanked the car into reverse and jammed the gas. She raced backward to the intersection, fishtailed the car a full 180, and was ready to speed off-but the helicopter was faster. The chopper cut them off, plunging out of the sky to block the road.
Lisa braked, avoiding a collision with the whirling blades.
Rotor wash beat at the Ford’s windshield.
