Chương 2
The register drawer stood half open behind her. Nineteen dollars lay in the till—one ten, one five, and four singles arranged with embarrassing neatness. Above it, a county property-tax notice had been pinned to the corkboard with a red thumbtack. FINAL DEMAND appeared across the top in block letters.
Curtis followed her glance.
Delaney closed the drawer with her hip.
Outside, through the snow-striped windows, three black SUVs sat crooked in the parking lot. One had climbed the curb near the gas pump that had not worked since Delaney was twelve. Another leaned toward the ditch with both rear windows shattered. The third faced the diner at an angle, its headlights dimming as the battery failed. Blood marked the snow in a broken line from the nearest vehicle to the porch.
Beyond them, two distant lights appeared on Route 28.
Delaney saw them first.
“Someone’s coming.”
Every man in the diner changed posture at once.
Two drew pistols. One moved behind the counter. Another killed the porch light. The young guard with red eyes crouched beside the window, breathing through his mouth.
“Put those away,” Delaney said.
Nobody listened.
Curtis stood beside the booth, one hand resting near Sartori’s shoulder. “How many vehicles?”
“One. Maybe a plow.”
“Maybe?”
“It’s snowing sideways.”
He turned to the men. “Mason, rear exit. Paul, kitchen windows. Evan, stay off the glass.”
The young guard—Evan—backed away from the window.
Delaney reached for the landline beneath the register.
Curtis caught her wrist.
His grip was firm, not crushing. His fingers were cold enough that she felt them through her skin.
“Don’t,” he said.
She looked down at his hand.
He released her immediately.
“My mother is twenty feet from a room full of armed strangers,” Delaney said. “There’s a bleeding man on my furniture and whoever shot him may be driving up to my door. I am calling nine-one-one.”
“If the wrong deputy comes, he’ll finish what they started.”
“And if no one comes, Sartori dies in my booth.”
Curtis studied her face, perhaps measuring whether fear could be used against her. Delaney was afraid. Her stomach had tightened so hard it hurt. But fear had spent the last two years living with her in quieter forms: unopened bills, her mother’s medical appointments, the freezer motor making a new sound, the tax notice above the register. Fear no longer impressed her merely because it carried a gun.
“Use your cell,” Curtis said. “Speaker off. Don’t give his name.”
Delaney picked up the landline instead.
“No signal after six rings means the line’s down,” she said. “The storm does that.”
She lifted the receiver. There was a dial tone.
Curtis’s eyes narrowed.
Delaney dialed.
The distant headlights moved slowly through the snow.
The emergency dispatcher answered on the second ring.
“Nine-one-one. What is the location of your emergency?”
“Lamplight Diner on Route Twenty-Eight, north of Bellwether Road. Adult male with a gunshot wound to the upper torso. Unconscious, severe blood loss, breathing but unstable.”
The dispatcher’s voice sharpened. “Is the shooter present?”
“I don’t know.”
Curtis shook his head once, warning her not to say more.
“There are armed men here,” Delaney continued. “They brought the victim in. They are not threatening me at this time.”
A guard near the coffee station stared at her as if she had insulted him.
“Ma’am, move away from them if you can.”
“I can’t. I’m holding pressure on the wound.”
The headlights grew brighter.
“County units are limited due to the storm,” the dispatcher said. “Do you know whether the victim has an exit wound?”
“No. Entry high under the left arm. Pulse around one-forty, weak. Respirations shallow and irregular. Skin pale, cool.”
“You said you’re holding pressure?”
“Yes.”
“Continue that. An ambulance is being dispatched from—”
The line clicked.
Delaney heard static, then nothing.
She tapped the cradle. “Hello?”
No answer.
The lights outside slowed at the edge of the parking lot.
One of the guards moved to the front door and turned the dead bolt open.
Delaney left Sartori’s side long enough to slam her palm over it.
“What are you doing?”
“Creating an exit.”
“You unlock that door, you can all use it.”
The guard stared down at her. He was at least six inches taller, with a bruised cheek and a cut along his scalp.
“You don’t understand what’s coming.”
“Neither do you, or you wouldn’t be standing in my diner.”
Curtis spoke from behind them. “Leave it locked, Frank.”
Frank’s mouth pulled tight. He stepped away.
The vehicle emerged from the snow as a county plow truck, orange beacon rotating. Its blade pushed a low wave of powder across the parking entrance. It passed the diner without slowing.
Several men released breaths they had been holding.
The relief lasted three seconds.
Then the diner’s lights went out.
The refrigerator motors died. The neon OPEN sign vanished from the front window. The coffee warmers clicked as their elements cooled.
In the darkness, someone knocked over a chair.
“Everybody still,” Curtis said.
Delaney could hear weapons shifting, cloth sliding against cloth, men deciding where to aim.
The emergency lights above the kitchen door flickered on, filling the room with weak red illumination.
Her mother coughed again.
Delaney pushed through the guards. “Mom?”
“I’m fine,” Ruth Ward called from the back room, though the words came thinly.
“Stay where you are.”
“I was planning to.”
Even frightened, Ruth could make a sentence sound inconvenienced.
Delaney found the flashlight beneath the register. The beam shook once before she steadied it. She checked Sartori. His breathing had become shallower.
“The generator should start automatically,” she said.
“It didn’t,” Curtis replied.
“Thank you. I noticed.”
She looked at the young guard. “Evan, you know how to hold pressure?”
His red eyes widened. “I—yes. I think.”
“You think?”
“I took a course.”
“Then take over.”
He approached the booth with both hands visible, copying Curtis without being told. Delaney positioned his palm over the gauze and pressed it down.
May you like
“Harder.”
“He’s bleeding through.”
