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“Do you think he followed us when we left the apartments?” Rachel asked. “I looked around, but I didn’t see anyone who looked suspicious.”
“Yeah, I did too, but there was plenty of cover to be found in the park across the street.”
The gunfire stopped as suddenly as it had started and the silence left in its wake pulsed along with the pounding beats of their hearts.
“Let’s go,” Shane said. He grabbed the black bag and shoved Rachel in front of him, shielding her body with his own as he pushed her down the stairs and led her through a long corridor of offices to an oversized steel door. The door opened soundlessly on well-oiled hinges, and cold rain beat against their skin as they ran into a dark alleyway.
“What are we going to do?” Rachel asked.
“We’ve got to find an alternate mode of transportation. There’s no way we can make it to the Tahoe without him seeing us.” Shane looked around the alley and noticed an older model Toyota. The paint had peeled in several places, the fender was rusted, and the tires were bald. He didn’t think the car would get them down the street, much less to Chicago.
“What about that?” Rachel asked, pointing to a black-and-chrome Harley parked a ways down the alley behind the corner bakery.
“My kind of woman,” Shane said with a quick smile as he grabbed her hand and ran the rest of the way down the alley. He could only pray that the guy shooting out front wasn’t smart enough to think about checking the back entrances, but chances were if this guy worked for the Valentine family then he was plenty smart.
Rachel straddled the bike behind him and her arms wrapped loosely around his waist. Seconds ticked away in his head as he touched wires together and heard the sweet purr of the engine as it started and echoed through the quiet. They wouldn’t be able to keep the bike for long before it was reported stolen. It belonged to the tattooed bakery owner, and he’d notice it was missing as soon as he brought the first load of morning trash to the dumpsters.
“Do you know how to fire a gun?” Shane asked, giving Rachel a quick look over his shoulder as he held out the Glock.
“Point and shoot, right?” she answered with a smile that Shane couldn’t interpret the meaning of.
“Just do the best you can.” He revved the engine and shot out of the alley at a high rate of speed, studying every spot on the street he would have used to hide if he was the one doing the shooting. He caught the reflection of steel as the streetlight glanced off a weapon pointed in their direction.
“Nine o’clock,” he yelled to Rachel as shots rang out and pinged into a car barely a foot from his front tire. The streets were slick with rain, but his mind and hands stayed in control as he guided the bike across the pavement. He didn’t even flinch as Rachel fired three rounds in close succession. All three hit the corner of the building their attacker was shooting from. It was a hell of a shot, no matter how you looked at it, and it reminded him he knew absolutely nothing about Rachel Valentine other than the fact she sent his body into overdrive and came from a dangerous family who’d obviously taught her how to shoot to kill.
* * *
Rachel held on for dear life as Shane tore out of New Orleans like a bat out of hell. The feel of freedom washed over her with every mile that separated her from her hunter and giddiness and adrenaline was its own euphoria.
It was just past sunrise when they stopped in a small town outside of the city. Houses were few and far between and trees were thick and covered with vines. The fishermen and trappers who worked the bayous were long since gone and others were still fast asleep.
“What are we doing here?” Rachel asked. “Do you think we should stop so soon?”
“We’ve got to change vehicles. I guarantee the bike has already been reported stolen. It’s only a matter of time before we’re spotted.”
Shane gave her a funny look and she wondered if she had bugs in her teeth from the motorcycle ride.
“Where the hell’d you learn to shoot like that?”
“At my daddy’s knee, of course,” she answered with an attempt at the thick Cajun accent she’d heard so many people speak with since she’d been in Louisiana. “I shot for sport in college. Team captain.”
“If you ever want a job, lady, give me a call. You’re almost as good as I am.”
“I’d be glad to accept a challenge. Anytime. Anywhere.” Rachel couldn’t believe how brazen she was being with someone she barely knew. She’d never been much of a flirt, and she’d never been promiscuous, but there was something about Shane Quincy that made her want to throw up her hands and say, “To hell with it.” Despite her father’s notoriety, she’d lived a pretty sheltered life. Boyfriends had been few and screened carefully. Her roommate from college had been handpicked, and every tenant in her apartment building had had a thorough background check.
“Be careful. I never back away from a challenge,” he said softly.
The intensity and heat in his stare was enough to bring a blush to her cheeks, and she looked everywhere but at him with a newfound purpose. “It doesn’t look like we have a lot to choose from.”
“We don’t need anything fancy,” he said. “Just something that will get us part of the way to Chicago.”
Rachel watched as Shane looked in the windows of a beat-up pickup truck. It was parked at the mouth of the bayou next to an old wooden dock. “We don’t need to go to Chicago. We need to go to Dallas.”
“Wait. Rewind,” Shane said as he looked up from his task of hot-wiring the truck. “Why do we need to go to Dallas? I thought the list was in a safety-deposit box in Chicago.”
The truck started with a sputtering cough and Shane threw in his duffle bag and practically tossed her into the cab.
“Why are we taking this? It won’t do us any good if we break down on the side of the highway.”
