Page 58 of The Perfect Prey

Jessie knew her friend well enough to guess what she was thinking.Part of her just wanted vengeance.But now there was more.She’d dared pierce to kill Haddonfield, and the woman had done it.Even though she might not mind him being dead, she didn’t want to be responsible for his murder.She was in no condition to take any shot.

“Now let’s stop playing around,” Pierce called out, guiding the hostage officer in front of her toward the open squad car door.“Here’s what’s going to happen.Officer Poulter and I are going to leave now.If you make any attempt to stop us, you can explain that decision to his widow and his orphaned son, who is less than a month old.Isn’t that right, officer?”

Officer Poulter nodded.Jessie sensed Kat’s arms tighten beside her.

“Don’t,” she muttered quietly.

“If she gets away, everyone is in danger again,” Kat muttered, her voice tight.

“Do you want that cop’s blood on your hands if you miss?”Jessie asked.

“It’s a risk I’m willing to take,” Kat said.

“I’m not,” Jessie told her.“This isn’t the way.”

And then it was too late.Pierce had slid into the squad car, behind the bulletproof glass.They no longer had a shot.She wriggled over to the passenger side as Poulter took the car keys off the dead officer’s body and started the vehicle.Then he put the car in drive and pulled away.

In the passenger seat, Pierce rolled down the window just slightly and, in a loud, cheerful voice, called out to them as they drove out of the garage.

“I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again soon!”

CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT

Jessie hung up the phone and returned to the couch.

Ryan had drifted off while she spoke to Susannah, but as she sat down, he startled awake.

“I’m sorry,” he said.“That medication makes me so drowsy.Are there any updates on the situation?”

“Yeah,” she said.“I just got off the phone with Susannah.She’s still at the station, but she wanted to fill me in.”

“Tell me,” Ryan said, sitting up, the cloudiness in his eyes clearing up almost immediately.

“The police car was abandoned less than a mile from the courthouse,” she told him.“A woman had been carjacked nearby.Her body was found in the bushes beside the squad car.The police think that Pierce feigned being an officer to get the woman to stop her car, then shot her and took the car and her ID so the police wouldn’t know who she was or what car she drove.”

“What about Officer Poulter?”Ryan asked.

“She took him with her,” Jessie said.“By the time they identified and located the woman’s vehicle, a 2014 Honda Accord, it had been three hours.It was in an alley behind an apartment complex in Tustin.They think it was one of Pierce’s safe houses.Officer Mike Poulter was found in the apartment bathroom shower, bound and gagged, but alive.”

Thank god for that, at least,” Ryan said, exhaling heavily.

“Yes,” Jessie agreed.“But he was in the minority.Counting him, the bus driver, and the inmate shot in the back, there were three survivors.But Pierce’s rampage left six people dead: two officers, the carjacked motorist, and three inmates, including Mark Haddonfield.And that’s just the people we know about so far.”

Ryan’s expression suggested that he knew not to ask her how she felt about that right now.

“Do they know where Pierce went after that?”he asked instead.

“They do, thanks to Jamil,” Jessie said.“A street camera caught a woman with Pierce’s bone structure and features leaving the complex.She wore a wig and had on sunglasses, but they’re pretty confident it’s her.”

“How can they be so sure?”

“Because a woman matching that same description was seen on CPB cameras at the San Ysidro border crossing between San Diego and Tijuana.She appears to have crossed on foot an hour and a half ago.They identified her on the surveillance footage thirty minutes ago, so she’s probably well south of Tijuana by now, likely headed to another safe house.”

“So she’s in the wind?”Ryan concluded.

“It looks that way,” Jessie confirmed.

“How are Hannah and Kat taking it?”he asked, well aware that those were Pierce’s last targets and that she might have chosen to go after them rather than pursue an escape.

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