why don’t you explain?”

“Me, sir?”

Porter nodded.

“Okay.”

I looked in Tony’s direction. He kept his eyes and his gun on Terri. I flicked my glance her way. We didn’t need words to know this was it.

Tony said, “Mr. Porter just didn’t see a role for you guys. I mean, a way that you could be useful if we brought you in. So he came up with a different idea, which is that the two of you were lovers—”

I said, “Oh, but we aren’t. We’ve just been friends since—”

Tony glared at me and said, “Shut up, Leland!” Then he resumed his shooting stance, looking at Terri. “So the story is, you two were lovers, but then things went wrong. You got jealous.”

I locked eyes with her and saw terror there, but fury too. She hadn’t given up.

Porter picked up where Tony left off. “And that’s why you lured her here this morning—”

I gave Terri a nod, then lunged and punched Porter in the jaw. It was a crappy punch from a bad angle, but it made Tony swing around. I got a glimpse of Terri launching herself at him, and then Porter hit my gut with the hardest punch I’d ever taken.

As I doubled over, he burst out of his chair and shoved me toward the nearest wall. I hit it, turned around, and saw Terri and Tony struggling on the floor. His gun went off as Porter stalked toward me, pulling his own gun from his belt. It was pointing at my face when one of his feet slipped on Buster’s blood. He flailed to get his balance, and I ducked, pushed off the wall, and rammed him with my shoulder. A gun fired again, and Terri started screaming like a Valkyrie. I grappled with Porter, trying to push him out of the way so I could see if she’d been hit.

She was still screaming, one hand clamped on Tony’s wrist, her elbow locked to keep him from pointing the gun at her. The blast horn of her voice in his face was pure rage, pure power, a thing she needed to find the strength to hold him off.

Then another sound came from outside: the whoop of a police siren. I felt Porter’s muscles freeze. The siren shrilled again. He shoved me away and ran out the back door.

I yelled Tony’s name. He looked up, then looked around. His arm slackened as he realized his boss was gone. Terri stopped yelling and tried to catch her breath.

I walked over, took Tony’s gun, and kicked him hard in the ribs.

Outside, some cop’s voice on a bullhorn said, “Police. Police. We have you surrounded. Drop your weapons and come out with your hands up.”

Terri got to her feet and held her hand out for the gun. She popped the clip out, gave it to me, and racked the slide to get rid of the last bullet. Then she tossed the gun toward the door, walked over to Buster, and squatted down.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, stroking his fur. “Buster, baby, I’m so sorry they hurt you.” He whined weakly as she struggled to try to pick him up, and I eased her aside and gathered him up in my arms.

Then, together, we walked to the door.

36

Tuesday, December 24, Morning

Jackson was released just before lunch on Christmas Eve. After the FBI made several arrests and Garrett spoke with Ruiz’s boss, after charges were formally dropped and all the paperwork was done, the only thing left to do was go get him. I drove, because Mazie said, “I can’t look at the road. I’ll cause an accident. I just want to look at him.”

We went in, and I waited a little while in the jail’s waiting room, letting them have a moment together. When they came out, Jackson was wearing the freshly laundered clothes Mazie had brought: jeans, death metal T-shirt, black fleece. He was so skinny that they hung on him. Apart from that, he was himself again. Or not exactly. He was himself, but stronger.

I got up, shook his hand, and clapped him on the shoulder.

He clapped my shoulder back and said, “Thank you, Mr. Munroe. I can’t wait to get home.”

That night, we all gathered at my house for dinner. The two of them, me and Noah, Terri, and even Ruiz, who brought a gift-wrapped box of his wife’s cookies to add to our grocery-store Christmas dinner. We passed them around, and everyone toasted Jackson for coming home a free man.

I hadn’t been up to explaining to Noah or anybody else what all had gone down—whenever I tried, I felt that gut punch that Porter had landed on me—so Ruiz filled them in. The sniper, he said, had been Dunk, who was now in jail in Charleston. Detective Blount had had the pleasure of arresting him and handing him over to the FBI.

Garrett had told me Blount and Henry were turning state’s evidence, although since the case against the cartel was still ongoing, he wasn’t at liberty to say what information they’d provided. I still didn’t know what Blount had done to get blackmailed in the first place, and I wondered if I ever would.

Garrett had also shared what he’d told the solicitor’s office that got them to drop all charges against Jackson. Karl’s killer, he told me, was Dunk.

I’d asked him if Pete had ordered Karl’s death—I wanted Jackson to know the whole truth, and if his hunch that Pete had killed his dad was right, I wanted him to know that too. But that wasn’t something Garrett was free to say.

From the other end of the table, Jackson asked, “Mr. Munroe, would you mind passing the salt?”

As I handed it down, I noticed Terri sneaking a bit of her chicken to Buster. He was still healing, but his appetite was back to normal, and the vet had said things looked good for a full recovery. Terri lived six blocks from the house where we’d been terrorized, and

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