Page 108 of First Star I See Tonight (Chicago Stars 8)

The overhead light blazed on.

The pressure on her throat stopped as the man jerked up and spun around. She rolled off the opposite side of the bed, fighting to free herself from the sheet as she fell. She hit the floor. Seconds later, she was on her knees, eyes blinking against the sudden light.

Jada stood in the doorway, her Nerf gun at her side, staring at the attacker, a man Piper had never seen. Jada’s voice wobbled. “Hank?”

He had a shaved head and a gun. A silver-barreled, nine-millimeter Beretta. Pointed straight at Jada.

And then right back at Piper.

He scowled. He was big, muscular. He might once have been a decent-looking guy, but the ugliness of hate had transformed his long face into a mask of malevolence. “What the fuck . . . Where’s Karah? Why isn’t Karah here?”

Jada whimpered from the doorway. He backed toward the far wall so he could keep them both within easy range of his gun. He had the wrong apartment. He was looking for Karah. Piper choked out the words. “She’s—she’s not here. I’m staying with Jada.”

He turned the gun toward Jada. “Where is she?”

Piper prayed Jada wouldn’t tell him her mother was asleep in the next apartment.

“I—I don’t know,” Jada sobbed.

“You lying little bitch.”

“She’s . . . at an overnight seminar,” Piper managed to say. “For a class she’s taking. Now get the hell out of here!”

“You’re lying.” He was sweating, flushed, maybe high on meth. “She’s with Graham. Whoring around with that bastard.”

He jabbed the gun at Piper. “Get over there with her.”

Piper moved carefully toward Jada, who stood frozen, the useless Nerf gun slipping to the floor. She wrapped an arm around the girl’s shoulders and prayed Karah wouldn’t wake up. “Karah’s not here. Now get out. Leave us alone.”

“She’s gonna pay for being a whore. She’s gotta pay.”

“Nobody has to pay,” she said carefully. “Just go.”

“Yeah, you’d all like to make me disappear. Make me forget what she did to me.”

“That’s in the past. Let it go.”

He moved closer to them. The gun steady. His attention on Jada. “And her little baby doll. Not so little anymore.”

Tentacles of dread slithered through her body. And then she heard it. The click of the apartment door opening. Karah. He would kill her. And maybe Jada, too.

She’d never felt more helpless. Her Glock was locked in the trunk of her car, and all the self-defense moves in the world were useless as long as he had that gun trained on Jada.

But it wasn’t Karah whose voice echoed from the living room. It was Coop, and her dread turned to ice. “I couldn’t sleep,” he said.

Hank grabbed Jada, jammed the gun against her temple, and jerked his head at Piper, gesturing her through the bedroom door ahead of him.

Coop froze as he saw them emerging. Piper first, then Jada and Hank. “Coop . . .” Jada sobbed, terrified.

“He’s looking for Karah.” Piper tried to take a step forward only to have Hank shift the gun from Jada’s head to her own.

“Stay right where you are or I’ll blow your head off!”

The gun barrel pressed into Piper’s skull. She tried to block out Jada’s sobs, fought a terror so stark it threatened to paralyze her. She glued her eyes to Coop’s.

Teamwork.

“Put that gun away.” Coop’s voice was low and ugly.

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