Page 100 of Shadowing You

“How will we know who we’re looking for?”

“You’ll know,” Gavin said.

Ethan nodded as if that made perfect sense. “And then what? You have any details?”

“Get to the meeting place. We’ll figure out the rest.”

A muscle in Ethan’s jaw moved, but all he said was, “Okay.”

“Talk soon. Be safe.”

The line went dead.

He tucked the phone into his pocket. “At least we have a plan.”

“Part of a plan.”

“More than we had ten minutes ago.”

“True.” She didn’t understand how an American man could find people to help who were within two hours of them in a town she’d named two minutes ago, or how those strangers would get them across a country without getting caught. But Ethan had said he’d come for her, and he had. Gavin had said he’d put people in the area, and he had. Michael had directed them over and over.

The men on the other end of that phone knew what they were doing, but God must be leading them.

Thank You.

She stood and brushed dirt from the back of her trousers.

Ethan took her hand, and they crossed back the way they’d come.

“Two hours,” he said.

“Enough time to get gas for the moped. And helmets.”

“Good idea. They’ll hide us better.”

“Plus, it is illegal to ride in China without a helmet, and that’s a stupid reason to get caught.”

“I didn’t know that.” He squeezed her hand. “I’m lucky you’re with me.”

They turned a corner, and she froze, urging her husband to stop while she made sense of what she was seeing.

Two blocks ahead, lying on its side on the edge of the road, was a moped that looked very much like the one they’d stolen that morning.

She pulled Ethan into the recessed doorway of a shuttered shop and edged forward to see what was happening.

Two boys—twelve or thirteen—stood a few yards from the bike, one of them gesturing with both hands. A uniformed police officer stood in front of them.

The wind carried their voices to her in pieces.

“…the man and the woman…” the officer said in Mandarin. “A foreigner?”

“Foreign.” The smaller boy’s voice was clear. “He was tall.” He lifted his hand high above his head. “They went that way.”

He pointed almost right at the spot where Mei Lin and Ethan hid.

She backed up.

“What’s going⁠—?”