Page 77 of Secondhand Secrets

But her parents would. And her sister. And Whitney. Yes, Whitney. So many good reasons to run head-first into the inevitable. To force her eyes open now and stare into Mark’s cold glare.

“Chip won’t do it.” She gave Mark a small nod, even though she didn’t have the strength for any satisfying, smug smirks. To press the point that she’d come to terms with the truth of this situation and figured he could rot in hell for all she cared. “You won’t do it, will you, Chip?”

Mark’s frown dropped, providing the satisfaction she’d sought. He saw just how much she wasn’t bluffing. And even as she stared him down, she directed all her words to Chip. “I know you want to save us both but say you won’t. Say you’ll let me go.”

Though their hands no longer touched, Chip leaned his head back into hers, the action and his next words a plea for her to give him some other choice. “Ally.”

But as far as she was concerned, there was no other choice. As much as she wanted to demand his compliance, the best she could muster was an imploring whisper. “Promise me.”

“Chip, she’s right.” Sarah’s hushed tone cut through the tension, as ever, a voice of reason. “Either option is bad, but what this asshole is offering is worse.”

Sarah scowled at Mark, a glare that seemed to say, Fuck you before her gaze softened and fell to Ally. Ally closed her eyes and nodded. Her silent way of saying, “Thank you.”

Seconds passed under the weight of Chip’s implied thought, like he battled against what he wanted. To save her. And what she asked of him. To let her go.

Meanwhile, Mark’s gaze bore into her, as though he sought to gouge holes through her resolve with his voiceless promise of hell to pay should Chip choose against his wishes.

“I promise.”

Chip’s hands found hers again, his tight but reassuring squeeze a seeming goodbye. A goodbye she hadn’t given him in Boston, but one she wanted all the same.

Sarah’s eyes slammed shut, and her face crumpled to a grief-filled grimace. Next came the smoothing out of wrinkles over Mark’s cheekbones, his soulless stare assessing Ally one last time, like he too had something to come to terms with.

But then, his gaze flicked to the man with the gun pointed at her head. That man removed the safety while looking at Mark. “Boss?”

Mark nodded, and she squeezed her eyes shut, ready to die.

A series of echoey bangs shook the air. A hard thud hit the ground beside her. Where was the pain? The oblivion? Was she dead already?

She opened her eyes. Not dead.

The man nearest to Sarah fell to his knees, a small round wound at his collarbone seeping a wide bloom of blood over his shirt before he toppled over completely.

Mark fell too, but not out of injury, more like him taking cover behind her. Another explosion of bullets had Chip’s tormentor dropping, too, his chest quick to coat in liquid red.

Ally’s entire body coiled in defense. She couldn’t cover her ears, and her head rung from the deafening sounds, exacerbating her incessant need to vomit.

The man nearest her groaned, the same man who’d leered, and groped, and threatened her in the woods. As much as she should have smiled at his agony, all she felt was weak and numbness while trying to decide whether to be elated or horrified at this twist of fate.

Once again helpless, she watched as Mark lashed out a hand and stole that man’s gun, quick to roll in the opposite direction until he held the weapon to Sarah’s head. “I’ll shoot her, Holloway.”

Ally startled at Dean’s surname but forced her body to twist so she could see over her shoulder to the open barn doors. Sure enough, Dean was there with the sheriff, both men’s weapons trained on Mark.

“Not if I shoot you first.” Dean glared through his gruff warning. “Drop the gun.”

Mark shook his head, the skin over his face glistening with sweat, his once-pristine shirt torn and soiled from his interaction with the ground.

He fished a hand into his pants pocket and produced his phone, using voice-command to place a call, although his only words to the person on the other end were, “Start the jet.”

He tucked the phone back into his pocket and stood, pressing the gun closer to Sarah’s temple. “Just one bullet and she’s gone, Holloway. How much do you trust you can kill me first?”

He narrowed his harsh stare at Dean while Sarah’s forceful breaths pushed the loose flaxen strands from her ruffled ponytail, her wide stare also glued to Dean in a plea for him to do something. To save her.

“And there are two guns, to your one, Mr. Farro.” The sheriff’s calmer tone filled the space, perhaps a man with less skin in this race or just a man with more years and patience on his clock. Sarah was near to a daughter to him, after all. “You don’t have enough time to kill us all. Step down.”

Mark held impossibly still and silent, his attention bouncing between Dean and the sheriff. A man who’d made Chip weigh the value of his life, now forced to do the same for his own.

High-pitched jet engines howled from outside, the ear-splitting whir adding pressure to the moment, a pressure the sheriff seemed to capitalize on. “Last chance, Farro.”

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