“We’ll take you,” the driver said.
“No, you won’t.”
“That’s a strange attitude, missy,” he said. “We’re police officers trying to help. Is there something in your car you don’t want us to see?”
“You’re not cops of any kind,” she said. “Your shoes have eyelets in them. They reflect light.”
The two men looked at each other. “You need to get out of the rain,” the driver said. “We also need to take a look inside your car.”
“Get away from me,” she said.
The driver twisted her wrist and pulled the keys from her hand. Then he threw them on the floor of the car and shoved her inside. When she tried to get out, he slammed her down again and handcuffed her to the steering wheel. He looked over his shoulder. A car was coming, its tires whirring on the asphalt. Its lights flashed across his face. His hair was uncut and his mouth had an overbite; he was older than she had thought. He blocked her from view while his friend waved the car on.
“My father will be looking for me,” she said. “He knows the streets I take to get home.”
The driver rubbed the back of his hand along her cheek. “I hate to do this to you, missy. But a job is a job. You should have stuck to your studies and such.”
The other man opened the passenger door and leaned inside.
“What are you all doing?” she said.
She heard the second man unscrew the cap from the can, and smelled the gasoline splashing on the floor and the plastic seat covers. She jerked against the handcuffs.
“Listen to me, missy,” the driver said. “I want to make this as easy as possible. I’m going to give you a shot. I guarantee in ten seconds you won’t feel a thing. Close your eyes.”
She thought the size of her heart would shut down her lungs. Her eyes welled with tears. “Why are you doing this?”
“People always try to buy time. It won’t change the outcome, sweetheart.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“You’re in a bad position to be giving orders.”
She spat in his face.
“I don’t blame you,” he said. He wiped her spittle off his cheek and mouth. “But you’re on your own now. Back away, Seth.”
The other man capped the can and stepped back into the rain, then kicked the passenger door shut, not touching any of the surfaces with his hands. The driver took a book of matches from his shirt pocket and pulled one loose. He shielded the matchbook with his body and dragged the match across the striker.
She held her eyes on his and pressed down on the horn with both her forearms. She never blinked, even when all the match heads flamed into a miniature torch.
“You should have let me inject you,” he said. “You’re pretty. I hate to do this. But you dealt it, little girl.”
Chapter
19
THE FLAME BURNED down to his fingertips and died in his hand. He dropped the remnants of the matchbook and stepped back from Valerie’s car. A big Buick with a grille that resembled chromed teeth roared down the street and came to a lurching stop two feet from Valerie’s fender. The driver’s door flew open, and Vick Atlas was in the street, his suit coat unbuttoned, a pearl-handled pistol pushed down in his belt. He was wearing his eyepatch. “What do you guys think you’re doing?”
“Mr. Atlas?” the driver of the Ford said.
“Get away from her car,” Atlas said.
“Yes, sir,” the driver said. He brushed the soot from the dead matches off his fingers and held up his hands to show they were empty.
“You with the can,” Atlas said. “Set it on the ground.”
“You got it,” the man said.