NINETEEN

Then I suggest you close your eyes. Caitlyn.”
Barely maintaining her outstretched iron cross between the walls near the ceiling, Caitlyn tensed. Had she understood Razor correctly? Or was she wrong, and he was going to give her up?

“Hold him good,” Melvin told Jimmy. “I don’t trust him.”

Only then did Melvin look up from his wheelchair. Directly into Caitlyn’s eyes.

Time paused. His mouth slackened with shock.

Caitlyn had no choice now. She closed her eyes and dropped.

She landed on Jimmy’s broad shoulders and desperately tried to wrap her arms around his neck. She bounced against him and ended up halfway down his back, hugging at his windpipe.

Caitlyn kept her eyes closed and squeezed Jimmy’s neck as hard as she could manage. He turned and tried slamming her into the wall. But there wasn’t room to get momentum to shake her loose.

Eyes still closed, Caitlyn fought to keep her burning arms wrapped in place. She pulled herself up and put her face into his head. Her lips felt his ear, and she bit hard, feeling her teeth go through.

Jimmy yelped.

“Jimmy, Jimmy!” Melvin shouted. “Don’t let go of Razor!”

Too late. Jimmy’s instincts had taken over, and he reached up to pull her arms free. He found Caitlyn’s head with one hand and closed his fingers over her face. His other hand tore her arm away from his neck with as little effort as pulling off a scarf.

“Jimmy, close your eyes!” Melvin screamed. He was finally coming to the conclusion that had guided Caitlyn. He must have remembered the vid of their escape from the police.

A tremendous, searing white flash came through Caitlyn’s closed eyelids a split second later. Just like the night before.

Jimmy squealed with the pain of his blinded eyes. He let go of his grip on Caitlyn, and as his massive arms went to his face, she fell away, landing at an angle but managing to keep her balance.

“Outside!” Razor shouted at Caitlyn.

With his knife, Melvin slashed at her upper arm as she swung by. There was a flash of pain. She pushed past the wheelchair, taking the two steps to the open door and the hallway.

Escape. Down the short corridor.

From the night before, she knew the next door led outside to an alley at the rear of an office tower. On the other side of the door was a security pad, where Razor had touched his fingertips to a scanner to let them in.

She flung it open, expecting Razor to be right behind her. Fleeing.

The first shock was three men, standing guard, backs to her, staring at the alley. They whirled, but she reacted first and slammed the door shut again, hoping it locked.

The second shock was the emptiness of the hallway. Razor wasn’t behind her.

She darted back to the open door that led into his hideout. A quick glance showed what had happened.

Jimmy, face still contorted in agony, had blindly managed to get hold of Razor’s left bicep. Razor was throwing futile punches, with Jimmy holding Razor at arm’s length. Melvin had moved in as close as his wheelchair would allow. He slashed out with his knife at Razor’s abdomen.

Caitlyn grabbed Melvin’s wheelchair handles. She lifted them high, flipping Melvin into a pile on the floor. His knife skidded across the floor when he opened his hands to protect himself against the fall.

“I’m a crip!” Melvin shouted. “You can’t do that.”

She threw the empty wheelchair into the hallway, where pounding came from the outside door down the hall.

“Jimmy! Jimmy!” Melvin screeched. Not fear. Rage.

Caitlyn grabbed Melvin’s ankles and yanked him a few feet away from Jimmy, almost into the hallway. Then she knelt and wrapped her fingers around his neck. In close, she could see little white specks clinging to his hair. The nits of lice.

She gritted her teeth and sucked in air, fighting her revulsion. At the lice, but also at what she had to do next—attack a cripple. But the man was smart. Smart enough to have closed his eyes before Razor’s flash burst.

She began to squeeze her fingers around his larynx.

“Tell Jimmy to drop him,” Caitlyn said. “I’ve got nothing to lose here.”

“You won’t kill Melvin,” Melvin croaked.

“Ask the man whose belly I put a knife in last night?”

“That was you?”

Caitlyn responded by tightening so hard that Melvin gagged. She eased off, just enough to let him speak.

“Jimmy!” Now Melvin’s strained voice sounded the same as Razor’s after Jimmy’s blows. “Let him go!”

As if lashed by a whip, Jimmy dropped Razor.

“Melvin?” Jimmy was totally blind, cocking his head to Melvin’s voice.

“Find me,” Melvin said. “Down here. Grab the girl!”

Razor was already leaping forward, pushing Caitlyn to the hallway.

Melvin was partly in the doorway. Caitlyn was clear now. Razor shoved Melvin deeper into the room, where Jimmy tripped over the man and tumbled toward them with the ponderous weight of a falling tree, hands outstretched.

Razor managed to slam the door shut. But not completely.

A tremendous muffled scream reached them from inside.

Caitlyn pointed at three fingertips extruding from the door frame, just above the floor.

“Can’t do it,” Razor said. “Can’t leave him like that.”

He popped open the door and, as the fingers disappeared, slammed it again, as if expecting that Jimmy would try to charge through.

Razor slid the bolt in place. Jimmy thumped the door from the inside, howling in rage and pain. To Caitlyn, the hinges appeared to flinch.

“Your arm,” Razor said, pointing.

She looked at it. In the adrenaline rush of the previous minute, she had not felt the pain. Blood dripped from her left elbow, from a slash wound halfway to her shoulder.

Banging from the outside door drew their attention.

“Melvin’s men?” Razor asked.

“No,” Caitlyn said. “Suits. Like last night. Three of them.”

“Crap,” Razor said. “They’ve probably got the building surrounded.”

Blood droplets hit the floor from her elbow.

“No place to run outside,” Razor said. He pointed at the splatters on the floor. “And that will give them a trail to follow.”

He reached for her arm. Instinctively, she pulled away. Nobody touched her. Ever. She was a freak.

“Come on,” he snapped. “Don’t be stupid. If you had any idea how much I hated blood…”

He reached again, and she let him examine it, aware that her skin was not like other women’s.

“Pretty deep,” he said, pulling off his outer shirt, leaving him in a black undershirt. He looked at the blood on his fingers, swallowing a look of distaste.

He folded the shirt once, then twice. He applied it like a pad to her arm. “Hold that in place.”

“What about you?” she said, looking at his belly, where the black T-shirt was seeping blood.

“Crap,” he repeated. He pulled up the T-shirt. With his fingers bloody from Caitlyn’s wound, he probed the shallow slash, wincing. Not perhaps in pain, but revulsion, marked by the tone of his voice. “Blood.”

He tucked the T-shirt back into place. “It won’t leave a trail. Now let’s go.”

He jogged down the hallway away from the banging of the outer door. He stopped and turned. Caitlyn had not moved.

“Are you insane? You still not convinced that chances are better with me?”

He stretched out his arm, and Caitlyn ran to him.