Edge

where his cousin had stitched him up from my gunshot at Carter’s lake house.
    As he struggled to get to the gun, I grabbed his leg and jacket.
    I realized he’d used a fire door on the other side of the hill and had sprinted here through the grass and foliage of the camouflaged roof.
    Amanda crawled forward toward him, brandishing her pepper spray. I started to tell her not to but it was too late. She cried out in rage and pushed it close to his face.
    As he’d been expecting.
    His hand shot out, grabbed the canister and twisted the nozzle toward us both. Amanda’s battle cry turned to a scream of pain as a stream of the orange liquid shot out between us, catching both the girl and me in the peripheral mist.
    The pain was excruciating. I jammed my eyes shut as the tears started and then opened them, squinting. Amanda had rolled to the ground andwas wiping at her face frantically. Through the damp slit of vision I could see the lump of my weapon ahead of us, no more than five feet away from Loving’s hand. He dropped the spray and began to pound on my arm with one hand and claw his way toward the gun with the other.
    He dragged me a foot closer to the weapon. How could the unimposing man be so strong? I thought at first desperation was driving him but then I realized it was calm determination. He began kicking. One shoe caught my cheek and I tasted blood. Loving’s whole purpose in life had become reaching that gun.
    Which he did just a moment later.
    As he spun toward me, I dug my feet into the ground and leapt forward. Gripping his wrist with one hand, I pulled car keys from my pocket with the other. “Can you drive?” I called to Amanda.
    The girl said nothing but was staggering to her feet. She looked defiantly at Loving.
    I repeated my question, shouting.
    “Yes,” she gasped, wiping her eyes.
    I flung the keys to her. “My car’s up the road. The Honda. There’s an address on the front seat. Go there and wait!”
    “I—”
    “Now! Do it!”
    She paused only a moment longer and then fled.
    Loving’s efforts grew more ferocious as he tried to shake me off. We were locked in a sweaty, agonizing wrestling match, fighting fiercely for control of the weapon. A moment later I heard my car start and the tires squeal as the girl sped into the night.
    The lifter glanced toward the vanishing taillightswithout reaction and renewed his battle to escape my grip.
    Then I began to feel my grip loosen . . . and finally Loving wrenched his gun hand free and swung the boxy Glock toward me hard. I felt the metal barrel slam into my temple and I was suddenly on my back, blood in my eyes, making them sting all the more. In seconds, Loving had my hands in restraints, then pulled me into a sitting position.
    The lifter staggered to his feet, he too nearly spent. Breathing deeply, he hawked and spat. He looked in the direction that the girl had gone and gave a blink. His expression was as if he’d missed a parking space close to his destination. He pulled out a phone and placed a call, stepping away but watching closely. I couldn’t hear what he said but I knew the message was to explain to the primary what had happened and tell him not to come here. He disconnected.
    We regarded each other for a few seconds. He looked around again and then said, “I know you’ve called people in. But I estimate I’ve got twenty minutes.”
    I recalled that it had taken him only seven to get all the names he needed from Abe Fallow, lying beside that creek in North Carolina.
    He continued softly, “Now, the address in your car, where the girl’s going? It’s not the safe house. You wouldn’t write that down. Where?”
    I thought of Amanda, getting away, speeding through the night, up and down the hills on Route 15.
    A distant memory of Peggy and the boys surfaced.Sam and Jeremy. This time I couldn’t dispose of it. Nor did I want to.
    I said nothing to Loving.
    He slipped my gun into his waistband and stepped closer. He pushed me onto my back and put restraints on my feet too, keeping his face back in case I tried to kick him, which wasn’t going to happen. I just didn’t have the strength.
    He looked around once more and took a small, well-worn manila envelope from his pocket and shook the contents onto the ground.
    So there it was. His tools of the trade to get subjects to talk. The alcohol was in a small bottle, not much bigger than one allowed on airplanes by TSA. The sandpaper was fine grained. The sort you’d use