Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
Then, he looked at Trent.
The cop was twenty yards away, his face a mask of sweat and blood. Ferrera watched the man’s eyes. They were wild, darting between Dante and the girl. But as Ferrera stepped into his line of sight, he saw the exact moment Trent spotted him. He saw Trent’s gaze flicker from him and back to Dante.
Ferrera saw the decision settle into Trent’s eyes.
“Wait—” Ferrera started to say, his own finger tightening on his trigger.
He saw the muzzle of Trent’s snub-nose swing away from Dante and towards him instead. He saw the flash, bright and sudden in the grey morning.
There was no sound, only a massive, hollow thump in the center of his chest that sent him staggering backward. He felt his boots lose their grip on the gravel. He looked down and saw his own blood jumping out of his shirt in a rhythmic, frantic spray.
He tried to raise his arm, to find the target one last time, but the world was already fading to the color of grey. He saw the warehouse roof again, wondering why the Sicaria hadn't fired first.
He hit the dirt hard. The grit of the salvage yard was the last thing he tasted, a bitter, salty end for a man who had been undone by the one variable he’d dismissed as a stray dog.
The silence that followed the gunshot didn't last. It was punctured almost instantly by a high, thin shriek from the sidewalk near the fudge shops, and then the world on the foreshore erupted into a chaotic, directionless stampede.
Up on the roof, the Sicaria didn't move.
She watched through the scope as a man dropped his camera; a woman scooped up her child and ran blindly toward the Seawall.
The sound of the crowd was a rising tide of panic—screams, the rhythmic, desperate honking of a horn from a delivery truck blocked by the sudden swarm of bodies.
It was a mess. It was loud, public, and amateur.
The Sicaria adjusted the rifle. The crosshairs were still directed notably at the pile of clothes and cooling meat that used to be José Ferrera.
He lay twisted on the ground, one arm flung out as if reaching for the truck he’d just stepped out of.
The driver of the white Ford didn't wait to check on his boss; he threw the truck into a violent, screeching reverse, clipping a stack of pallets and sending them splintering across the yard before he tore out toward the industrial canal, disappearing into the salt-haze.
In the center of the yard, the three of them stood frozen in the dust—Dante, Jessica, and the bloody, panting beat cop.
The Sicaria’s phone vibrated in her pocket. She didn't take her eye off the scope. She reached down, pulled the phone out, and pressed it to her ear without checking the screen.
“Is it done?”
The voice on the other end was soft, filtered through the static of a long-distance connection. It was a voice that didn't care about the screaming tourists or the sirens that were already beginning to wail from the direction of the Seawall.
The Sicaria’s gaze remained fixed through the glass. The crosshairs lingered on Ferrera’s unmoving chest, watching the dark stain beneath him grow on the dirt. She didn't look at the couple, or the cop.
“Yes,” she said. She hadn’t been the one to do it, but it had nonetheless been done.
The line went dead with a soft click.
The sound of the shot was still vibrating in Dante's feet when he saw Ferrera hit the dirt.
For a second Dante didn't understand it.
His mind had been bracing for the round to come his way—he'd already felt it land somewhere behind his sternum—and instead Ferrera was folding sideways into the dirt with a dark bloom spreading across his shirt, and nothing about the moment made sense.
Trent had been pointing the gun at him. At Dante.
Two seconds ago, that was the whole story.
Dante's gaze snapped to Trent. The beat cop was standing there with his mouth hanging open, like he couldn't possibly have predicted that firing his gun might actually kill someone. The muzzle was smoking, grey wisps curling into the humid air.
He didn't know why he'd done it either. Dante could see that much. Whatever had moved Trent's arm those few degrees to the left, it hadn't come from anywhere Trent could account for.
Move, you idiot, Dante thought, his heart hammering against his ribs.
Somewhere near the Strand, a woman was screaming—a high, thin sound that cut through the other sounds. Dante looked at the perimeter. The white Ford was a blur of dust and retreating exhaust.
“Dante!”
Jessica’s voice pulled Dante’s head around. She was huddled by the pallets, her face a mask of pure terror. Dante lunged for her, his boots crunching on the oyster shells, and hauled her up.
He swung around and grabbed Trent by the shoulder. The cop flinched, his head snapping toward Dante. For a split second, the muzzle of the .38 drifted toward Dante’s chest.
“Don't even fucking think about it,” Dante said.
For one suspended second Dante weighed it. Leaving Trent here. Taking Jessica and the truck and disappearing and letting the cop explain a dead cartel enforcer to whoever reached the pier first.
But Trent had just put a man down in front of a dozen witnesses, and the panicking cop was a loose end that would lead straight back to them.
He was unstable, he was armed, and right now he was the only one of them who could legally be standing over Ferrera's body when the uniforms arrived.
Dante didn't trust him an inch. That was exactly why he couldn't leave him behind.
He gripped the lapel of Trent’s rumpled shirt. “You better get us all the fuck out of here before you make this mess of yours even bigger.”
Trent’s eyes were bloodshot, the reality of the situation finally breaking through his shock. He looked at Jessica, then back at Dante.
Dante didn't wait to see if the order landed.
He scooped Jessica into his side, shielding her with his body as they sprinted across the open ground.
They reached Trent's truck just as he caught up to them and fumbled the door open.
Dante shoved Jessica into the middle of the bench seat and piled in after her, slamming the door.
“Drive,” Dante commanded, his eyes fixed on the side mirror. He saw the first flash of blue light at the end of the pier. “The cops will want explanations, Trent. The cartel will want your head. Guess which one finds us first if we sit here?”
Trent’s training finally kicked in. He slammed his foot onto the gas, and the engine roared, the Ram tearing backward and clipping a rusted trash bin with a deafening clang before Trent spun the wheel and headed for the service exit.
Dante kept his eyes on the side mirror. He reached down and pried the gun out of Trent’s unresisting hand, tucking it into his own waistband.
Jessica was pressed against Dante's side, rigid, her breath coming in short pulls. She was staring at the side of Trent's head like she'd never seen him before.
“He shot him,” she said. Not to anyone. Like she was testing whether saying it out loud made it true. “Trent, you—you shot him.”
Trent's hands were locked on the wheel, knuckles white. “He was gonna kill you,” he said. His voice was wrong, too high, with a tremor running under it. “He had a gun on you. I wasn't gonna let him—” He stopped, swallowed. “I wasn't gonna let that happen.”
Jessica looked at Dante, and Dante saw his own confusion mirrored back at him. Since when? her face said. Since when does he protect anyone but himself? Dante didn't have an answer for her.
“What the fuck happened?” she said. “Miller told us to meet there. How could Ferrera have known—”
“Miller must have been compromised,” Dante said grimly.
Jessica let that sink in. It was a terrifying thought that they had been walking straight into a trap. A trap that Trent—of all people—had freed them from.
“So where the hell are we gonna go now?” Jessica said.
“I know a place,” Trent said, his voice straining. “My uncle...he had a bait-and-tackle shop out by the West End canals. Storm took the storefront back in '08, but the storage shed is still there.”
Dante watched a patrol car scream past them in the opposite lane, its sirens a deafening howl. He didn't breathe until the taillights vanished. The police weren't the ones he was looking for. He was looking for the dark SUVs that wouldn't have their lights on.
“Go,” Dante said, his hand resting on the snub-nose.