12:15 p.m.

“What the hell did you do, Jared?” Melanie asked for the second time, trying to keep her voice controlled. She had driven with hands shaking, pretending that what she’d heard wasn’t a gunshot. Now, as she waited at a stop sign, she glanced at Jared in the rearview mirror. He was stuffing his mouth with a slice of pizza and popping the cap off a beer. Another glance at Andrew made her insides churn. The writer had doubled over, his forehead pressed against his hands, almost as if he was expecting to be sick.

“What did you do, Jared?” she asked again.

“What did I do?” he asked through a mouthful of food. “You should ask your buddy what he did.” This time he flung a piece of paper over the seat. “Take a right.”

“We just came from that direction.” But she didn’t argue and pulled onto the highway. She grabbed the paper before it slipped off the seat to the floor. It looked like an ordinary credit card receipt with a signature.

“What? He signed the correct name.”

“On the back, stupid.”

“Don’t call me stupid,” she said before she could stop herself. Her hands were shaking so bad she couldn’t read what was printed on the back. “What’s coviale?” she asked, pronouncing it as best she could.

“No, no. It’s CO via 6. Don’t you get it? He was trying to tip them off. Tell them which way we were headed.”

“Oh, I get it,” Charlie piped up and Melanie could see him grinning in the rearview mirror like a schoolboy who’d answered a question correctly. “Colorado via Highway 6. That’s what it is, right?” He looked to Jared for approval.

“You didn’t need to kill her,” Andrew said without lifting his head, his voice a quiet muffle.

“The way I see it, buddy, pal, Mr. Ordinary Citizen Kane, you killed her.” Jared spat out the words with such exaggerated enunciation that Melanie could feel his angry spittle on her neck and could smell the pepperoni on his breath.

Silence. It was suddenly so quiet Melanie could hear Jared chewing and swallowing. There was some rustling of paper and she saw that Charlie had joined in, unwrapping a sandwich and ripping open a bag of chips. Nothing seemed to spoil either of their appetites.

She knew as far as Jared was concerned the subject was closed. This was crazy. Another person dead? When would it stop? Had Jared lost his mind? This was not the brother she knew. She tried to keep her mind on the road. Every intersection had her checking for police cars. What if someone heard the gunshot? What if someone saw them drive away?

As if he could read her mind, Jared said suddenly, “We need a new car.”

“But I just filled this one up,” Melanie said, recognizing immediately what a stupid thing it was to say. Stupid, yes. Maybe Jared was right. She was stupid. Stupid to ever trust him, now knowing full well why she wasn’t in on “the plan” from the start. The guns, the getaway—she would never have agreed to any of this. Now Jared had them all in such a mess there was no turning back.

“Whadya think, Charlie?”

“I noticed some kind of manufacturing plant a few miles out. Parking lot with a bunch of cars. Should be up here.” Charlie sat forward, surveying the area.

Melanie hadn’t noticed it, but, of course, Charlie would have. Sure enough she could now see the building back off the highway, partially hidden by trees. Some farm-implement maker or so she guessed something called Val-Farm Manufacturing would be.

She took the turn for the access road without needing Jared’s instructions. She noticed Andrew had sat up. He had taken off the sunglasses and was rubbing his eyes and forehead with such force she expected the wound to start bleeding again. What was wrong with him? Did he want to hurt himself? Sure enough, drops of blood fell onto the car seat. She grabbed a napkin she hadn’t used earlier and tossed it into his lap. He stared at it, then finally, after glancing at her, picked it up and put it against the wound.

Jared and Charlie looked like two kids in a candy store scoping out the cars as Melanie drove up and down the rows.

“Not another Saturn,” Jared said. “And nothing flashy.”

“I can do Tauruses pretty good,” Charlie said. “How ’bout that one over there? It’s kinda dirty. I can’t even tell what color it is. I can exchange license plates with that Ford Escort behind it.”

“It’s perfect. Melanie—”

But she was already pulling in to an empty slot two cars away.

Charlie jumped out and walked up to the car as if it was his and they were dropping him off. It didn’t matter. There was no one around. And the building didn’t have any windows that looked out over the parking lot.

Charlie grinned as he opened the Taurus’s door without jimmying the lock. The owner hadn’t even bothered to lock it. Melanie watched him slide into the driver’s seat, his head disappearing while he hot-wired it. But suddenly his head popped up with a wide grin as he dangled the car’s keys for them to see.

“Christ,” Jared said. “People are so fucking trusting out here. They deserve to have their cars stolen.”