Roddy screamed, making a sound like a dog hit by a car.
“Get . . . off him!” Zig yelled, tackling Seabass from the side.
It was enough to knock Seabass off Roddy. That was all they needed.
Using momentum to his advantage, Roddy scrambled onto Seabass’s chest, pressing his forearm like a baton into Seabass’s neck and pinning him to the ground. From there, it didn’t take much. Seabass was coughing—puffs of white filling the air—craning his neck in every direction. They thought he was trying to escape, but really, he was just trying to check on the only thing he actually cared about. Reagan.
In two seconds it was over, his eyes rolling backward, his head hitting the floor. Roddy was still sitting on his chest, cradling his own stomach as he tried to catch his breath.
“Her! Don’t forget her!” Elijah shouted, still handcuffed, lying on his side by the door.
Zig turned, searching for Reagan.
She was gone—though along the white floor, a trail of blood ran up the far-right aisle . . .
“Take the gun, she dropped her gun,” Elijah said. “When you find her, you can—”
“Elijah, shut your face, or I’m gonna shoot you, too,” Zig said, grabbing the gun, its grip burning from the cold.
“Mr. Zig, I don’t think he’s breathing,” Roddy called out, still huffing as he pointed at Seabass.
Zig nodded; he already knew it from Seabass’s gray coloring. Picking up speed, he held the trigger on the gun and disappeared up the aisle.
She wasn’t far.
One down; one to go.
100
“I want you out of here,” Tessa warned.
Nola didn’t move.
In a blink, Tessa was on her feet, racking the slide of her gun and chambering a round. Nola made a note, especially about her shooting posture. Two-handed Weaver stance, like a boxer—toes forward, elbows unlocked, to allow for a better pivot toward her blind side. Well trained. Unafraid. And strong enough to handle the kick from that Glock 22. But she wasn’t driving her shoulder toward the gun. Definitely rusty.
“I said get out of my house,” Tessa growled, a few strands of chestnut hair sliding down from her otherwise faultless bun.
Nola just stood there, keeping her own gun at low ready. Minimize confrontation. On the far wall was a framed antique buccaneer revolver. On the bookshelf was a fat 105mm shell, from a gunship, that’d been sawed off and turned into a beer mug. Otherwise, from what Nola could tell, no other hints of the Mints’ military life. No unit plaques or framed berets. No shadow boxes with awards or medals. Instead, every frame in the room—on the glass coffee table, on an end table next to the sofa, on at least four of the bookshelves—contained family shots, smiling variations of Mint and Tessa with their kids, at Little League games, hiking at Arches National Park in Utah, swimming and laughing with a giant inflatable dragon, and at a junior high graduation. In one was a shot of Tessa holding a blue umbrella with clouds printed on it, her arms wrapped around Mint, him kissing her as she smiled like a chewing gum commercial.
“The affair,” Nola said. “That’s why you did this. You found out he and Rashida got back togeth—”
“Gun on the floor. Now,” Tessa growled. She sounded unshakable, but her eyes were dancing back and forth, dark circles like craters. No question, lack of sleep. Every few seconds, her lips parted, her mouth slightly open as her face got red. She was holding her breath, panicking, trying to get control.
“You were the one I saw in Black House. That was you with Zion,” Nola said, tucking her gun into the back of her waistband. This was never about money. Never about that night at Grandma’s Pantry. It was solely about Rashida.