I was cold and getting more chilled by the second. We were in another room—only this one was actually a retrofitted barn and had been brazenly lit from the moment we walked in. Part of the reason it was so bright was because of the sun pouring in through skylights overhead.

The other reason was the heat lamps.

One full wall was filled with marijuana plants using said heat lamps. Two others held shelves with blocks of paper-wrapped packages. I didn’t know if they held drugs or money, but I suspected there were both.

Near the door was a rack of guns. Illegal ones, by the looks of them. Or at the very least they vastly overpowered Rob’s small police-issued handgun.

I was on the floor in the corner, trying to appear insignificant and attempting to stay out of sight.

I’d had enough time to slip my phone into my underwear—on the opposite side of the screwdriver . . . hopefully they wouldn’t both fall out and give me away—and cram part of my foot into the cable tie around my ankle before the trunk had flown open. I hadn’t been able to get my hands behind me, but no one had seemed to notice that particular detail.

So, I sat in the corner and watched the sun go down beyond the skylights.

“Here.”

I glanced up and saw Cal had extended a bag of pretzels in my direction. I took them in my lap. “Thanks,” I murmured, but I didn’t eat anything from the open bag, only reached my hands in until he turned away, and then stashed the bag behind me.

I wasn’t eating or drinking anything from this place.

Leaning my head against the wall, I stared back up at the skylights. I was in a strange sort of euphoria. Nothing hurt any longer, and while I was cold, I couldn’t seem to muster up the energy to care about it.

I wondered if I was going into shock and if Rob somehow managed to find me—maybe track my phone—if I was going to die anyway.

The tourniquet on my thigh meant that I wasn’t gushing blood, but I did have a steady drip that kept the cotton of my pajama pants wet and sticky. Add in my feet and my wrist—now purple and swollen—and I hardly felt human.

Which was probably why I didn’t scream when I saw the shadow peer through the window.

Some angel of death had come to take me away.

Or not, I thought and blinked up at a man I’d only seen once.

Danny. From the security company.

I squinted and leaned forward, but Danny shook his head, raised a finger to his lips, and disappeared from sight.

That cold lethargy disappeared, and despite half my brain deciding that I had imagined the whole thing, the rest of me got ready.

I was down a leg, one arm, and the bottoms of both feet. But my ankles weren’t bound, and I had the screwdriver down my pants.

By the way, that was a terrible euphemism that nearly made me snort aloud.

Not that the room at large would have heard it because the moment I thought it, the front doors blew open. My mother screamed, Celeste grabbed a gun off the rack and began firing through the wall. Cal picked up a pistol and crouched in front of me, eyes moving between the disturbance at the front and the back doors.

What neither of them saw or heard were the windows shattering and the men rappelling in through the ceiling.

I’d not have believed something could be so efficient or rapid if I hadn’t witnessed it with my own eyes, but I did see it, and it was amazing.

One tackled Celeste from behind, ripping the gun out of her hands and using his size advantage to pin and then handcuff her wrists and ankles.

Not so nice, was it bi-otch? I thought before my attention was pulled to Cal and the two men who were working to subdue him.

Blows were exchanged nearly faster than I could track, and he seemed to just be getting the advantage of one of the men when Danny grabbed him from behind in a choke hold and took him to his knees.

Thirty seconds later, he matched Celeste and was cuffed hand and foot.

Danny turned to me. “Are you—?”

“Where is she?” Rob thundered, sprinting through the debris at the front of the house. Hayden trailed him, the police chief two steps behind.

I opened my mouth. “I’m—”

The arm around my throat and the gun pressed to my temple cut off my greeting.

“Stop right there,” my mother said, and I felt the click against my skull as she turned off the gun’s safety.

“Sonya,” Rob began.

“Where’s the fucking money?” my mother screamed, and when I jumped she pushed the barrel even harder against my skin. “Shut up,” she hissed and asked again, “Where is the money?”

“Sonya,” Rob said, taking a step toward us.

“Don’t move a muscle, Robert,” she spat. “You were always an interfering little shit, and this is no different. You couldn’t take Celeste’s warning with that dumb dog of yours. No, you had to keep pushing and because of you Cal missed his chance at a drop.” The gun came off my head, pointed at Rob. “You cost us fifty million, you son of a bitch.” The barrel returned to my temple, dug in violently. “And just when we’d had you set up to take the fall, you had to go to the FBI.”

“Where your husband works,” Rob said softly.

I hadn’t even known my mother was married again. I’d lost track of the number of husbands, in all reality. But it would have been really helpful to know she’d had an FBI spouse named Cal before Rob and the chief had gone to seek the government’s help.

“You should have gone to ATF,” I muttered. Or any other organization besides the FBI.

Rob’s mouth quirked at the corner. “I agree.”

“Shut up!” my mother screamed and yanked me to my feet.

I cried out in pain and collapsed to the floor.

“Stop being such a baby. The drugs on those pretzels should have you flying by now.”

Except I hadn’t eaten the pretzels.

Except the screwdriver and my phone had fallen from my underwear.

“Get up!” She yanked at my hair, and I barely had time to grip the screwdriver in both hands and get my good leg under me before the gun was back at my temple.

“The money’s not coming,” I said, shifting my weight slightly as I rearranged the screwdriver.

“Miss,” Rob warned

I shook my head, twisting my shoulders to look up at my mother.

“You’re always looking for that easy payday,” I told her. “But I can tell you this time that it’s not coming.”

“Hate to contradict you, Melissa,” Danny said. He tossed a duffle bag on the ground. “But the payday is here.”

“Open it,” my mother ordered as I slowly shifted my head from the gun. She still had a handful of my hair, but there was nothing to be done about it.

Especially when I saw Danny hesitate and knew the bag was only a distraction.

One deep breath and I moved.

Using a technique Rob had taught me long ago, I rotated under my mother’s arm and brought the screwdriver up hard.

My hair ripped and my scalp was on fire. The tip of the tool met resistance . . . then that resistance was gone.

The screwdriver slid home.

I screamed and let go, falling to the floor as the men ran forward and grabbed my mother.

But I knew before I saw the empty, unseeing eyes.

I knew she was gone. Forever.