Page 75 of Kill For Me Kill For You
And then her knee buckled, Amanda sprawled out on the sidewalk. She got her good leg beneath her and fired up into a standing position.
Hernandez was fifty feet away.
She wasn’t going to make it back to her car.
A black Escalade pulled up at the curb beside her. She took all her weight on one leg. She couldn’t even put the other foot on the ground.
The passenger door of the Escalade opened.
A big man wearing a blue jacket and a white shirt sat behind the wheel. The same man who’d been watching the house last night. The same man who’d followed her to the subway.
‘You just came from Frank Quinn’s house. We’re looking for the same woman. I can help you – get in quickly!’
Amanda’s jaw fell open. The man had his hand out, beckoning her into the car.
‘Hurry!’ he said.
Hernandez was closing. Thirty feet. Farrow was behind her with his own faltering, staggering jog.
Who the hell was this guy?
‘Get inside now!’ he said.
No choice. Get into the car with this stranger or go to jail for attempted murder.
Amanda hopped to the car, gritting her teeth against the pain, then threw herself into the passenger seat and closed the door.
The engine roared as the man hit the gas.
She turned to look at him, but he was ignoring her. Watching the traffic, making sure he didn’t crash into another vehicle as he made the turn at the intersection and then floored the accelerator.
‘Who are you?’ she said.
‘My name is Billy Cameron. You’re safe. It’s okay. Let me get us out of here and I’ll explain everything.’
40
Farrow
He saw an SUV stop beside the limping figure. He couldn’t see much more than the roof of the vehicle because of the line of parked cars along the street, with only a few spaces in between them.
Farrow had already slowed to a fast walk; his back was going into meltdown. Hernandez clocked the vehicle too, and somehow put on a spurt. She didn’t make it. At one moment, he thought she would, because at first the hooded limping woman didn’t get into the car. She seemed to stall. Undecided.
Then she leapt inside, and the vehicle took off. Hernandez slowed down, stopped, bent over and put her hands on her knees to catch her breath. She stayed that way for a few seconds, then straightened up and walked back down the street toward Farrow.
‘Did you get a license plate?’ he asked.
Hernandez was still out of breath; she just shook her head.
‘You think that was the person who broke in?’ he asked.
‘Maybe,’ was all she could manage.
‘Did you see the way she hesitated when the car pulled up? That wasn’t a getaway car. She thought about it before she got in.’
‘Farrow, let’s hand this back to Statler and Waldorf. They’re probably right. This was a domestic, and I’m guessing that was the perp.’
Farrow gazed down the street.
