She watches as Jenna tugs out a lockbox from the hole, which she carries back to the vehicle like a giant lunch box.
Willow’s mouth is agape.
Jenna looks at her stepdaughter, exhales. “You’re just going to have to trust me.”
Fifteen minutes later, they sit in the Jeep at a Sunoco gas station. It’s dark now, and Willow has the lockbox on her lap. Dirt still cakes the box and it’s all over Willow’s legs and part of her skirt, but she doesn’t seem to notice. Willow keeps flipping through the items that came from a document pouch stored in the box. The two passports, one blue, one maroon, both with Jenna’s photo on them, both with different names. Then similar counterfeits for Simon, Lulu, and Willow herself. Jenna managed to slip the small handgun out of the box without Willow seeing.
Willow doesn’t touch the bundles of cash or the small stack of credit cards secured with a rubber band. She recoils, her hands jerking away as if touching a hot stove, when Jenna reaches over and slides a few twenties from one of the stacks.
Jenna looks around the lot. There’s a lone worker in the gas station’s convenience store, a pickup truck filling up in the other lane. Jenna opens the Jeep’s door but before climbing out says, “You want a water or something?”
Willow shakes her head.
Jenna heads inside, pays for the gas. After, she fills the tank, eyeing Willow in the front seat.
Willow has stopped gaping into the lockbox and is staring out the windshield at nothing. What is going through her teenage mind?
Back inside the Jeep, Willow finally speaks: “What are you, like in witness protection or something?”
Not a bad guess. She’s a more sophisticated teen than Jenna ever was. The kids now have information on virtually any topic a few thumb clicks away. Television and movies have educated them on modern law enforcement. She wishes it were as simple as being in WITSEC.
“I promise, your dad and I will sit down and tell you—”
“That’s not fucking good enough, okay!” Willow says. “That lady, she—” Willow’s voice quavers. “If I’m in danger, I deserve to know.”
Jenna doesn’t respond. Her eyes are fixed on the 1980s-era Chevy Camaro with tinted windows.
Did she see that car earlier behind them on Route 42?
She pulls out of the station and sees the Camaro, which had stopped for gas, pull behind the Jeep without filling up.
She looks at Willow. “Yes.”
“Yes what?”
“Yes, you’re in danger,” Jenna says, and slams the gas pedal to the floor.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Willow grips the roll bar as Jenna maneuvers the Jeep down a desolate road, the Camaro following close behind.
How did they find us?
She got rid of the wig, the jacket, the burner phone. They’d have no way of knowing she’d take Billy’s car. Her phone remains at SoulCycle and Willow left hers in her school locker.
Or did she?
Jenna cuts left onto a dirt road. The Jeep has no onboard navigation, so she prays it isn’t a dead end.
Willow looks petrified, the seat belt tight against her chest. The narrow lane is dark save for the headlights, allowing visibility only a few feet ahead of them. A fork in the road appears. Jenna checks the rearview: the headlights of the Camaro are gone. Either the driver has cut the lights or it hasn’t rounded the corner yet. Jenna takes a right at the fork, then slams the brakes, purposefully creating a dust trail. She then slots the Jeep in reverse and twists around, maneuvering back to the fork, then takes the left, driving slowly, so as not to kick up more dust.
She veers off the dirt road into a stretch of overgrown scrub and weeds. Here they have an advantage. The Jeep has large tires, high clearance, and off-road capabilities. A 1980s Camaro is not so well equipped. It’s an odd choice for a vehicle to tail someone, since it’s hardly inconspicuous.
Another one of those things that doesn’t feel quite right …
The Jeep bumps over the embankment and Jenna pulls to a stop, kills the engine and headlights.
Her heart is beating in her ears. Thud-thud, thud-thud.
She turns and makes hard eye contact with Willow. “Did you bring your phone?”
Willow’s eyes are wide.
“I’m not mad, but if you did…”
Willow thrusts the device into Jenna’s hands. Jenna’s mind races. She can smash the phone, but it may be too late. At the same time, tracking is not as precise on country roads.
She opens the door, startled by the glow of the interior light popping on. She slaps the light off with her hand.
“Wait here,” she whispers.
Willow’s mouth is open, but words don’t come out, like her voice box is paralyzed.
“I’ll be right back.”
Jenna climbs out, listens. The sound of an engine fills the air; headlights approach.
Jenna stalks through the bramble and up the embankment.
The car’s headlamps brighten.
Jenna darts closer to the fork in the road. The car is getting closer. Dust floats in its headlights as it speeds toward her.
With everything she has, she hurls the iPhone across the dirt road and into the weeds, then dives
into the brush, the headlights directly ahead now, barreling toward her.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The Camaro comes to a fast halt at the fork in the dirt road, red brake lights illuminating the night.
Jenna crouches low as the rumble of the V8 engine fills the air. In her head, the beat of her heart is rattling louder than the engine and she worries she’s visible through the brush. She’s even more concerned about Willow. Alone in the Jeep, terrified in the dark. Jenna will never forgive herself for this.
The tinted window comes down, and the woman—deceptively pretty with those cheekbones and almond-shaped eyes—appears. She looks at the left side of the fork, then the right. Then her gaze moves to the scrub where Jenna lies flat on her stomach, peering sniper-style at the Camaro through the spaces between the tall weeds.
Jenna doesn’t release a breath, stays motionless.
If the woman gets out of the car, Jenna knows what she needs to do. She’d spent much of her twenties riddled with guilt and self-loathing knowing that she’s an assassin, which is just a nicer way of saying cold-blooded killer, murderer, executioner. By her early thirties, she’d justified it all—the targets were bad people, the world was a safer and better place without them. But on her last assignment, her nineteenth, hiding in the closet of a Russian arms dealer, she had an epiphany: She liked her job. The revelation didn’t save the Russian, but it was the moment she decided she needed to get out. The first step toward a vow to make amends, to never take another life. But tonight, for her family, she knows it’s a vow she might have to break.
Jenna feels a tremor vibrate through her at the sound of the engine revving. The car juts into gear and tears down the right side of the fork.
When the taillights are at a safe distance, Jenna climbs out of the brush and runs to the Jeep.
Willow is in the passenger seat, hugging her knees, her head down.
She startles when Jenna opens the door.
Willow says, “I’m sorry, I didn’t think—I didn’t know my phone could…”
Jenna looks at her stepdaughter, who averts her eyes. “Look at me,” Jenna says.