After filling up with gas—and spotting no more trailing Chryslers—Jason considered grabbing a snack from the convenience store. But he couldn't take Ana in, and he really shouldn't leave Rachel here with her, the car, and the cash, so he just dug something out of the backpack his mom had prepared. From outside the open window, Rachel eyed him with a frown, probably thinking along similar lines, so he tossed her a pack of crackers and an energy drink. His shoulder twinged. He bit into a granola bar and swallowed the pain along with it.

"I think we should take smaller roads there," he said as she slid in from the gas stall.

She turned over the keys, and the AC kicked on, humming along with her sharp laugh. "I've been following road signs. What do you think I am, your personal GPS?"

"Don't you have a phone?"

"Don't you?"

"I'm out of service," he lied.

Her head cocked in a yeah, right look.

"Okay, so I took the SIM card out."

"Paranoid much?"

"We did just narrowly dodge someone following us." Someone who had been waiting for them at that restaurant. Or who had recognized them somehow. What were the odds of that? His mom's words floated back to him. There are spies more places than there are not.

Rachel's lips curled. "Don't remind me." Then she flipped around in her seat and smacked him on his good shoulder. It still sent a shock through him, but he hid a wince. "And don't ever send us to the cops like that again! Sheesh, you're crazy."

"You're the one who pulled in," he protested.

"Uh-huh." Rolling her eyes, she slid back into her seat. "Unless you're gonna go get a map"—she pointed at the store—"we're following the road signs."

"Check the glove compartment."

"What?"

He half-stood, leaning over the console to pop the compartment open.

"What are you doing?" she demanded.

"Whoever owned this car was old-school enough for antiques. Maybe they were also old-school enough to keep a map."

"I never," she sputtered. "I mean, this is my—"

"It's your car now." He looked sideways at her. "And I'm sure you got a steal of a deal on it."

She sucked on her lip and slid down in her seat. He finished rifling through SportsClips receipts and insurance information to pull out a roadmap and a pen. He held it up to show her, then dropped back into his seat, arm hissing at him.

"If you've got a problem with it—"

"I just want to get to New York," Jason said. He cleared his throat. "Give me a minute and I'll mark us out a path."

He did have a problem with it, but obviously not enough of one to call the cops on her. He was sure the man she'd stolen it from had it insured. He was sure he'd gotten a rental, and that he hadn't missed too much work, and that at the end of the day, it was just a dumb car anyway. This was Jason's life, and his sister's life, and there was no sense getting bent out of shape about something he wasn't going to do anything to fix.

She craned her neck around the headrest. "You know how to read that thing?"

"My mom," he said, drawing out a route that avoided tunnels and toll roads, "was also very old-school. We never traveled anywhere with GPS."

She wrapped her arms around the back of the seat, watching him work. Someone honked at them. Ana startled awake with a whine.

"Yeah, yeah," Rachel grumbled and pulled the car out of the gas stall.

"Hey, you're okay," Jason murmured to his sister. Then to Rachel, "Hand me one of those receipts, will you?"

As she passed some back, Jason handed them to Ana. She watched him with watery, wide eyes. "Let me finish what I'm working on," he told her, "and you can draw me a picture, okay? Just give me a minute." He made his final marks, considered the map, then passed the pen to Ana. "There you go."

She took it with a shaky hand, but her fingers just curled around it. A thread of worry ran through Jason's heart. She did just wake up, he reminded himself. Shaking it off, he told Rachel which road to take out of the city.

The late afternoon sunlight slanted through their windows as they wound through backroads. Ana eventually started drawing on the backs of the receipts—a cat, maybe, in her quick, wispy strokes. A little bit of the worry unwound from Jason's chest.

Bracing his good arm on the chair in front of him, he tucked his chin into his elbow. "What are you going to do with your money?"

Rachel snorted. "What are you going to do with yours?"

"Take care of Ana," he said without hesitation. "And maybe see if I can find out what happened to my parents."

"Just don't get yourself shot again, okay?" Rachel sucked on her lip. "I'd hate to see you on the news while I'm living it up at the Plaza."

"Aye-aye, Captain," he said softly. With his head down, weariness plucked at his eyelids, begging him to sleep. Luckily, the soft bursts of pain from his arm kept him alert, and so he just rested a moment, watching the countryside pass them by. Trees dotted the rural road, with little screened houses set back away from it.

"How'd you know I stole the car?" A self-conscious note twinged Rachel's voice. Her fingers shifted on the steering wheel, like they couldn't quite get comfortable there.

"You said you don't have a driver's license." He smirked. "Why would you own a car?"

She blushed. "You really could do to be less nosy, you know? Nobody likes a know-it-all."

"And don't I know it," he muttered.

"See? Know-it-all."

He laughed, even though it wasn't really that funny, but it felt funny right now when he really didn't feel like he knew anything. Then the pain in his arm sharpened, and he hissed out a breath to still himself.

"When was the last time you took something for that?" she asked, sparing him a glance. "You can have more of that Motrin every four hours. But not on an empty stomach."

"I'll get some in a minute." His body, for the moment, was content where it was. "How'd you learn so much about all of this anyway?"

"Ah, there your nose goes again, digging into things it shouldn't."

"I'm just making conversation," he mumbled. He blinked hard, trying to wake himself up.

"Uh-huh. And I'm just driving you to New York out of the kindness of my heart. Now take your medicine."

The winding road straightened out as Jason reluctantly sat back up and dug through the first aid kit. He was popping the cap on the bottle when Rachel cursed. His head snapped up. "What is it?"

"Cop just pulled out behind me."

Jason threw a glance back to where the cop cruised just seven or eight car lengths behind them. The straight, sleepy road with lots of driveway turn offs screamed speed trap. "Tell me you were going the limit."

"I was over by"—she waved her hand—"just a tiny bit."

His eyes flicked to the speedometer dipping barely below 90. "Rachel," he growled.

"Oh, don't come at me like you're some law-abiding citizen, Mr. Money Bags," she snapped. "Look, I'm slowing down. I'm sure he just wanted to scare—"

Blue lights flashed in the mirror.

"Or maybe not." She tapped a nervous rhythm on the wheel. Then, in a scarily innocent voice, she asked, "Are you buckled up?"

"No," Jason ordered. "No, Rachel, pull over. We can still talk our way out—"

"I'll take that as a yes."

She floored it. The cop's siren began wailing. Ana squalled, her high, thin voice echoing in the cabin. Her pen clattered to the floor.

"Rachel!" Jason yelled. "Pull. Over."

"I am not going to jail."

"You're not going to outrun him!"

Ana flailed, banging against the window, against Jason. She kicked the back of Rachel's seat.

"Knock it off," Rachel snarled.

"She might," Jason shouted, "if you would quit being an idiot."

"Shut up and let me drive!" The car whined up to a higher pitch, twisting along with Ana's sob's and the siren's screams.

"Hey, hey." He took Ana into his good arm. Thankfully she stilled a little instead of punching him again. As she cried into him, he craned his neck. The police cruiser was losing ground, the driveways flashing faster and faster past them. "You..." He blinked, astonished. "You're actually losing him."

Rachel cackled, glancing back at him. "See? I know what I'm do—"

The car slammed to a halt. Jason's body vaulted forward, cheek punching into the passenger seat. A jolt of lightning ran up his good arm—the one wrapped around Ana, buckled in. The windshield cracked as a dark mass blurred over it. Something scraped against the top of the car and thudded behind them. An alarm blared. Ana sobbed. Blood streamed down the windshield, and an acrid smell filled the cabin.

Jason's mind spun. What did we just hit?

"A deer," Rachel gasped. He blinked at her, not sure if he'd spoken aloud or not. "I think that was a deer."

His good arm burned, but looking back at where it was wrapped around Ana, he realized that might have been the only thing that'd kept him from being launched out the window. Ana's breaths came fast and hard, shaking him out of his stunned analysis. "Hey, hey." He slid into the seat again and rubbed her back. "Everything's fine." He forced his breathing to calm—in, out—so as she pressed against his chest, maybe she would copy his rhythms.

Rachel shifted hurriedly in her seat to slide the gun underneath her leg. "That freaking cop is still coming."

"What are you going to do, Rachel?" Pure disbelief splattered his voice. "Shoot him?"

"I am not going to jail."

"You can't just murder him!"

The cop was passing Ana's window now, peering anxiously in. Relief splashed his face. He gestured for Rachel to roll down her window. One of her hands edged toward the controls while her other arm tensed, hand tucked beneath her leg. Ana's sobs gave way to a choked song against his chest.

Possibilities flashed through Jason's mind. Do nothing, and the cop's blood would be on the pavement. Signal the cop, and maybe Rachel's would.

His free arm shot forward. Fire ran through the wound, but he grabbed Rachel anyway—not her gun, but her upper arm. His fingers, desperate, pleading, tensed against her wound-up muscles. As the window rolled down, she glanced at him in the mirror, and he begged with his eyes. Don't do this.

"Are you kids okay?" the cop called over the horn. Real worry coated his voice, and he glanced again through the cabin. "It's a miracle those airbags didn't deploy. I think you took the legs off that doe."

"We're trying to get my sister to the hospital," Jason called back, and he didn't have to fake the tremor. "Please." She shook against him, singing self-soothing notes he couldn't quite hear.

"Turn the car off!" he yelled helpfully and twisted his wrist in mime. "That'll get rid of that horn!"

Before Rachel could do it, the guy's eyes narrowed. Jason didn't know what suddenly set the man off—Rachel's hidden hand, or the strange way Jason was gripping her, or maybe just professional instinct. But his gun came up, and he stepped back. "Turn the car off and step out!"

Rachel trembled under his hand, wound like a spring. She didn't move—to obey, or to shoot—but she would soon.

Jason yanked away from Ana, and she wailed a long, high note. "I'm turning off the car," he called to the officer, Rachel's arm still in his grip.

Her cursing was lost to the horn. She twisted—to get out of his grip? to fight him?—and the police officer yelled, "Hands where I can see them!"

Jason's arm snaked past Rachel's reaching hand and twisted the key off. The cop yelled again. The engine died; the horn stopped blaring. Ana's frantic singing suddenly rang between his ears instead. It blocked every other thought out, every other sound. All it left room for was one primal call: LEAVE, LEAVE, LEAVE.

🧬🧬🧬

Jason blinked. A house stretched out before him, two stories tall with an American flag waving out front. Ivy grew up the sides in patches. On the porch, an empty swing swayed gently in the wind. The gravel driveway crunched under his feet.

For a disorienting moment, he wondered if this was his family's newest rental. It was that feeling of waking up in a new bed—only he was already awake.

"I'm not telling you again!" a shaky, reed-thin voice called. From a garage off to the side, an old woman clutched the leash of a German shepherd. The dog barked, a deep, throaty warning. "Get off my property!"

Hands up, still not quite sure how he'd gotten here, Jason quickly backpedaled. Rounding a tree that took him out of the dog's sight, he spun and raced down the driveway.

It was a good sprint back to the main road through the winding path. He skidded to a stop when he hit the blacktop. There was the car, the hood dented and spattered from the deer. The animal itself lay in a heap behind. The cop was nowhere to be seen.

And Rachel's car was empty.