Shiver

to give Tyler a chance to escape that was the best she could hope for, and what she was going to do. Jerking up her gun, whirling to face the intruder, she opened fire— bang, bang, bang, bang, bang in huge, earsplitting explosions that clearly caught the intruder by surprise, that tore up her cabinets and shattered her counters and filled the air with a sulfurous smell, that didn’t cause Mrs. Menifee’s poor bloody fingers to so much as twitch. To her astonishment the man didn’t fire back, didn’t shoot her dead where she stood, but jumped back out of sight into the kitchen, yelling, “What the fuck?” or maybe that was somebody else, because a different voice roared, “Get the bitch!”
    That’s when it hit her: they didn’t want her dead, not yet, not until she told them where Marco was. So she turned to follow Tyler, turned to take a chance, to run—and saw that instead of bolting toward the front door, Tyler had fled into his bedroom.Out of the corner of her eye she caught the flash of his bare legs, the light green of his Incredible Hulk short pajamas, disappearing into the dark.
    “Tyler!”
    Behind her, the man popped into view again, filling the space just inside the kitchen, his gun up and aimed at her.
    “No!”
    Dizzy with fear, Sam leaped headlong after her son just as a bullet smacked into the wall inches away from where her left leg had been. No bang—a silencer. They might not want her dead—yet—but this guy had no qualms about shooting her. And there was nothing they wanted from Tyler. The knowledge galvanized her.
    These had to be professional hit men. Hadn’t Marco warned her?
    “Mom! Mom! Are you shot?”
    Tyler slammed the door behind her as she hit the floor hard on her hands and knees, hanging onto the gun for dear life. Until then, she hadn’t even realized that she’d been screaming like a woman faced with imminent death—which it was terrifying to realize was exactly what she was. The hardwood was unforgiving. The jolt of her landing cut off her scream and shot through her wrists and knees. But she was so frightened that she barely even registered the impact. With the door closed, only moonlight filtering through the thin curtains kept the room from being pitch black. On the shelf above Tyler’s bed, a favorite stuffed snake glowed faintly yellow through the dark.
    “No. Lock the door. ” Still clutching the gun, she scrambledto her feet. Tyler did as she told him, his hands looking tiny and pale through the shadows as he snapped the tarnished brass dead bolt into place. But even though the door was big and heavy and old, she didn’t trust the lock to hold for longer than a minute or two. A grown man would be able to kick his way in easily, or they could shoot out the lock.
    Even as the thought occurred, Sam’s heart leaped into her throat and she shrieked, “Tyler! Get away from the door!”
    He did, darting toward the far wall.
    She was already spinning away toward the rocking chair beside the bed, the one in which she’d left Mrs. Menifee, in which she had spent many an hour soothing Tyler when he was a baby, an old friend. Purchased at a yard sale and lovingly repainted, it had a wood slat back and a cane seat, and it was sturdy and just the right size and absolutely better than nothing. Picking it up—it was heavy—and practically lunging with it the eight or so feet needed to reach the door, she strong-armed the chair beneath the knob, wedging it tight, bracing the door as best she could. It wouldn’t hold up to a full-scale assault, but at least now, she hoped, the door wouldn’t spring open under a single hard kick.
    A bullet drilled the door. Clearly aimed at the lock, which it just missed, it plowed into the floor near Sam’s feet. She screamed, an instinctive reaction that tore its way out of her throat and that she quickly swallowed for Tyler’s sake. Tyler gave a high-pitched cry that ripped at her heart and threw himself toward her. Catching him, throwing an arm around him, she took him with her as she bolted toward the room’s solitarywindow. Escape, was what she was thinking. They had to get out of that room if they were to have any chance of surviving.
    “Are they gonna get in?” Eyes huge with fear, Tyler clung to her even as Sam, struck by an epiphany, whirled back to face the door.
    “No,” she promised grimly. Clapping Tyler’s head to her side and covering his exposed ear with her free hand, she pointed the gun at the wall in