Page 116 of Deliver us from Evil

Bang.

I can hear every future gunshot slamming home into one of my men’s chests.

Just as Nick gets in arm’s reach, I dodge to the side.

We’re in a child’s room, a boy judging from all the action figures and faded blue paint. Where is he now, the boy that used to live here?

I slam into the door, pluck at the handle. Yes, even though it’s locked, because all I can hope for right now is a fucking miracle.

Locked.

Nick laughs again. I spin around, flattening myself against the wood. He’s only got ten minutes with me. And I’m determined to keep playing this game as long as—

Nick lifts Jess’s gun. Or maybe it’s his own, who the fuck knows?

And then he shoots me.

Chapter Forty-One

Rube

“Is this seriously the fastest you can go?” Apollo yells as he thumps the back of Cass’s headrest. “I thought you said this was a muscle car?”

“Do you even have a dick?” Cass yells back. “This is a fucking SUV. The muscle car is that yellow Mustang we left back in California, you idiotic, dickless—” he cuts off with a growl that comes close to competing with the SUV’s engine.

We’re headed south down the highway at a ridiculous speed.

I’ve never been an adrenaline junkie. Going this fast makes me feel sick, not excited. But I grit my teeth and I bear it, because the faster Cass goes, the faster we get to Trinity.

She has to be there.

It’s our only hope.

I mentally urge Cass to push the SUV as hard as he can without blowing the engine, and I hold onto the seat with claws for hands, and I will the contents of my stomach to remain where they are.

“How far, Apollo?” Zach asks.

Apollo briefly relents giving Cass shit, and checks his phone. “Another ten miles.”

“Go faster,” Zach says.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Cass mutters. “Do any of you even know what a speed limiter is? And that this car has one? And that, even if Iwanted—”

“Shut up and drive,” I bark.

Then there’s silence.

And fuck, it comes just in time. Else I’d have told them to find me something to puke into.

“This is our turn off,” Cass says just as we pass a sign for a shooting range a few miles up ahead. He slows the SUV and puts on the indicator. “Christ, they weren’t fucking around when they decided to go remote, were they?” he mutters.

There isn’t much to see—just another long road.

“We still don’t know which house it is.” Apollo holds up the printout from the Redford library and starts looking through the windows. “But it’s got to be at least two or three stories.”

“Sounds like we’re looking for a mansion,” Cass says dryly. He catches Zach’s eye in the rearview mirror. “Sound familiar, Mason?”

Zachary narrows his eyes, but then his face relaxes again. He nods reluctantly. “Long drive, so the main house is far from the road. Lots of tree cover.”

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