Page 86 of Running to You

“I’ll tell you in a minute. Good shot, by the way.”

“Thanks.”

She looked up at him. “You…shot him?”

“The tire. Caused the crash. I was running to get you when Jon came from”—he nodded to a cross street—“up there. Hopped out of his truck and…” Sam grinned, then laughed. “How did you do that?”

Jon shrugged.

“What?” she asked.

“I think Goatee was gonna keep going,” Sam said, “tire or not. But Jon ran to the door, even though the car was moving, pulled the door open, and punched him. Then grabbed him out and tossed him on the ground.”

“Yeah,” Jon said, “but you slowed him down. And got the car stopped. And got the girl.”

Sam looked down at her, and his amusement faded. He swallowed, hard. “Yeah. I got her.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Two men had been beaten, and one was unconscious when the cops arrived.

The other started screaming that he’d been tortured.

Sam didn’t know exactly what Jon had said to the guy, but Gil was still breathing, and he still had both his eyes. Sam figured the dipstick should shut up while he was ahead.

He shouldn’t have been surprised when the police insisted that he, Eliza, Jon, and Grant go to the station with them and fill out a report.

Even Grant flashing his credentials hadn’t helped.

So the four of them recounted to a detective at the police station everything that happened on the street in North Conway.

And then Sam and Eliza told him about Camilla’s near kidnapping at Sam’s house.

And the attack at Linda Pelletier’s.

And then, the detective suggested they stay until a state investigator arrived.

When he did, they recounted the story again. Sam sat on one side of Eliza at a table in a small room—a break room, if the half-empty box of cookies on the counter was any indication. Jon sat on her other side. Grant excused himself after recounting all he knew—those police credentials were finally good for something.

When they finished, Detective Jones—silver hair, suit and tie—leaned back. “What I want to know is, why?” He directed the question to Eliza. “Why are”—he glanced at the paperwork in front of him—“Gilbert Lyle and Elliot Ramsey after you?”

Elliot Ramsey, a.k.a. Spike.

She looked to Sam for help.

“She has amnesia,” he said. “She doesn’t remember.”

The man didn’t even flick a gaze his way. “You can speak for yourself, Miss Pelletier.”

“Right. Sorry. I was involved with these people in Utah. At least we think that’s where it started. I think maybe they were doing something illegal. I think my plan was to expose them, but like Sam said”—she shrugged—“it’s all really fuzzy.”

“You have a lot of guesses for someone who claims to have amnesia.”

“She does have—”

The cop lifted a shut-up hand toward Sam, still watching Eliza.

Sam would press his point, but he saw it too. It seemed at least some of Eliza’s memories had returned.