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“Becca! Dammit, come back here!”

She heard Adam yelling but didn’t pay any attention. She heard her father’s voice, then Special Agent Cobb’s voice. She didn’t slow. She was out on the narrow front porch before Adam reached the entryway.

She heard all of them shouting at her, running after her, but she knew she had to get away. No one else was going to die. Not Sam. Not her father. She had to stop it. She didn’t know how she was going to do it yet, but she would think of something. She should have thought of something before—maybe even been a bit on the subtle side. Yes, you fool, you should have just calmly left the living room, pretending to go upstairs or go to the bathroom, whatever. But no, she’d lost it—here she was running away with people chasing her, FBI agents everywhere. But that didn’t matter, either. She had no choice. If she could prevent it, no one else was going to die. She ran.

There were no sidewalks in this very nice neighborhood, just big lawns, thick curbs, and the road. She hit the road. She was fast, always had been since she was on the track team in high school. She put her head down, turned off all the voices, and ran. She felt the breath pumping in and out of her lungs, felt herself filling with energy, with power, expanding, moving faster, faster. Her feet in Nikes were unbeatable.

She ran right into Sherlock. Both women went down.

Becca was on her feet in an instant. “Sorry, but I’ve got to go.”

“Stop her!”

Sherlock grabbed her ankle and pulled. Becca went down on the edge of a lawn, hitting her hip on the curb. A shaft of sharp pain went through her, but she ignored it. She was ready to fight, ready to do whatever she had to, but Sherlock had somehow managed to straddle her, how she didn’t know, but she’d been fast, too fast, and now she was holding her arms down. How could she be so strong when she was so small, hardly anything to her at all? How did she get her in this position so quickly? Sherlock was leaning over her, her curly red hair bouncing against Becca’s face. “What’s going on here, Becca?”

“Get off me, Sherlock. Please, you’ve got to let me go. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You can’t hurt me, so don’t even try. Tell me what’s happened.”

Becca started struggling, but then it just didn’t matter, and she stilled because Adam was there, not even panting hard, standing over them, staring down at her, his hands on his hips. “Thanks for bringing her down, Sherlock. That wasn’t very smart, Becca.”

Sherlock didn’t like this one bit. She looked at all the men running to the scene, even the two dark-suited FBI guys who’d been parked discreetly down the street. “What’s going on, Adam? Oh yeah, given that I could have hurt Becca dragging her down, I’d really better like the answer.” She pulled herself off Becca and slowly got to her feet. She held out her hand.

Becca looked at that slender white hand that was surely too strong, but she didn’t move. She just rolled over away from them, grabbed her purse, and was off again. A sharp pain went through her hip but she ignored it.

She got at least ten feet before two arms went around her waist and she was picked up, twirled around, and thrown over a man’s shoulder. She hit her chin against his back. “Hold still,” he said, and his voice was calm and quiet. Too calm, too quiet.

Sherlock was one thing. Having a big guy haul her over his shoulder was another. It was humiliating. “Bullshit,” she yelled, and jerked and pulled and kicked. “All right,” he said, and pulled her down. He brought her back up against him, wrapped his arms around her, and held on tight. No matter what she did, she couldn’t get free. He’d pinned her arms to her sides but good.

Three hours, she thought. Time was running out. “Oh God, what time is it?”

“I’ll tell you after you promise not to run away again.”

She leaned down and bit his hand, hard. He didn’t make a single sound, just jerked her around to face him and said, “I’m sorry, Becca,” and lightly tapped his fist against