“I can’t believe it,” Melanie said.

“I’ll say. Last time I checked, the Road Runner was charging ten grand for his simplest trap. To trap out a car like this, you gotta figure fifteen, twenty K easy.”

“Laundering money is one thing. But why would Benson have a Road Runner trap unless he was-”

“Unless he was moving drugs?”

They looked at each other. “Yeah,” she said, “moving drugs. Our victim got his hands dirty.”

“I’m really starting to believe you about this guy,” Dan said. He walked to the front and climbed up into the driver’s seat. Melanie followed, coming to stand beneath where he sat.

“Do you know how to open it?” she asked.

“Every trap is different. The Road Runner’s sequences are so complicated it’s almost impossible to figure them out without a snitch or an expert.” The keys were sitting in the ignition. Dan turned the car on, and the engine sprang to life with a rich, satisfying roar. “I can fiddle around with things and see if we get lucky, but I don’t think we have time.”

“You mean if we want to find your snitch?”

“I mean if we don’t want him to find us first. I’m betting he was sitting right here before we showed up, trying to open this trap just like we are.”

Dan wasn’t prescient. He just had good instincts, refined by many years on the streets. At that very moment, as their eyes met and the significance of his remark hit her, she heard a low growl. An enormous black dog, clad in a biker’s regalia of harnesses and chains, stood at alert in the open garage bay ten feet from them, salivating and poised for attack. She froze, rooted to the ground, fascinated by the intricate pattern of scars on the dog’s battle-worn hide. He’s not real, she thought as he leaped directly at her in slow motion.

“Slice’s dog! Get in!” Dan shouted, grabbing her around the waist and hauling her into the car as he stepped on the gas. She sprawled across his lap, then righted herself and clambered on all fours into the passenger seat as the car charged forward. Dan slammed his door. Off balance, she reached for the handle of her door, leaning out over open space for a harrowing second before managing to yank it closed, sitting up just in time to see the dog disappear with a thunk under the front wheels of the vehicle. They lurched out into the sunlight and hit the crunchy gravel of the circular drive. Instinctively they both turned to look back through the rear window. The dog jumped up, uninjured, and bounded after them.

“Shit! Get the back doors!” Dan shouted.

She threw herself over the gearshift and toppled into the backseat, her fall broken by soft, fragrant leather, pulling the driver’s-side rear door closed just in time. The dog bounced off it with a loud thumping sound, barking wildly, the second after it slammed shut. Melanie reached out for the passenger door and slammed that, too. The dog continued to pound insanely against the other door as they both gaped at him in astonishment, his powerful back legs propelling him all the way up to the high window, which threatened to shatter under the impact.

“Duck!” Dan yelled, drawing his gun, “I’m gonna shoot the fucking thing!”

“No, don’t!”

“Get down!”

Dan reached over the seat with one hand and pushed the top of her head. She hunkered down on the back floor as he leaned over, aimed, and shot through the closed window. The dog yelped; small chunks of shattered window glass rained down on her.

“Shit, only grazed him!” Dan fired three more shots in rapid succession. Melanie raised her head and climbed shakily up to the backseat, brushing away pebbles of sea green glass. Dan opened his door and stepped down, leaning over to examine the dog.

“Is he dead?” she asked, looking out through the empty space where the window had been.

“Yeah.”

Melanie descended gingerly from the Hummer, picking her way over to where Dan stood. She looked down at the viscous puddle seeping into the white gravel under the dog’s carcass, and then back at Dan.

“Look,” he said gently, reading her face, “I hate to hurt an animal, sweetheart. But this one, Slice ruined him. It’s like he was rabid.”

She nodded. Nervously, she looked over her shoulder toward the house. “Wait a minute, now. How do you know this was Slice’s dog? Why would your snitch be here with Slice’s dog?”

“I ever tell you you ask very good questions?”

Standing over the dog’s carcass, scanning the seemingly deserted house, he snapped the cartridge from the base of his gun, examined it quickly, and snapped it right back in. Before she could ask him another one, the glass of the Hummer’s side window exploded, followed a split second later by a loud pop that reverberated from somewhere above them. Suddenly she was on the ground, breath knocked out of her, hands and knees scraped, with Dan’s bulk on top of her.

“Shit! We’re under fire!” He held her head down with one hand as he shot off several rounds toward the house. A window shattered on the second floor, followed by silence, the only sound the rustling of leaves in a sudden breeze.

“Is he still there?” she whispered after a moment. “Did you get him?”

“No way.” He spoke into her hair, his warm breath tickling her ear. “He’s inside. The only way to get him is gonna be to go in after him.”

“So let’s go,” she whispered harshly.

“I can’t take you into a gunfight. This ain’t no exercise-these are live rounds we’re talking.”

“Okay, so you go. I’ll make a run for the garage.”

“He’ll pick you right off. He’s got a bird’s-eye view from up there.”

As if to emphasize Dan’s point, several more rounds exploded in the gravel around them, ricocheting wildly, kicking up clouds of dust.

“Oh, my God!” Melanie cried, hunkering down in the scratchy gravel, finally comprehending the danger they were in.

“See? Jesus, what an idiot I was to bring you here!”

“What should we do?”

“The car is between us and the house,” he murmured. “In a minute I’ll start shooting. That’ll provide some cover for us to get to it. Stay low to the ground. I’ll make a run for the driver’s seat. You jump in the back and stay down on the floor, okay?”

“But then we won’t get him.”

“I’ll drive you to a safe spot, you jump out, and I’ll come right on back and find the guy.”

“Okay.” She wasn’t about to argue. She wanted to live to put her daughter to bed that night.

“Here we go. Ready? One, two, three-”

She could feel the kick of the gun in the way his body jerked into hers as he fired. Ears ringing from the deafening reports, she ran, crouching as low as her legs would allow, and dove headlong onto the floor of the backseat. None of the rough chunks of glass she landed on had edges sharp enough to cut her. She knew that Dan had made it into the driver’s seat only because the car lurched forward. That was when she realized that the shots whizzing past the remaining windows were not from his gun. A bullet buried itself with a clang in the side of the car. The acceleration kicked in, and they shot down the driveway. She lifted her head enough to see out the side window. They careened off the gravel and bounced over grass and flower beds, sideswiping a picket fence before righting themselves. They made it to the main road, and Melanie grabbed the front seat, vaulting over the gearshift to settle in beside Dan. One side of his yellow polo shirt was streaked with blood.

“My God, are you hit?” she cried.

He looked down in surprise, nearly swerving off the road before righting the steering wheel.

“I didn’t feel anything.”

“Keep driving!”

She turned sideways in her seat and tugged on his shirt with both hands, pulling it up to expose his abdomen, slightly sticky with blood, but smooth and unmarred. She ran her hand around his belly, and he drew his breath in sharply.

“I think the blood must be from the dog. You’re fine.”