Unforgivable Read Free

with the door latch.
    The gunshot was a thunderclap inches from her head. The sound reverberated around her as she flung the door open and landed face-first on the pavement. Her gaze snapped up as a pair of headlights blinded her.
    She struggled to her feet and dashed off the road. She glanced back and saw her assailant heave himself out of the car. His glasses had fallen off, and his face was an angry scowl.
    Mia turned and fled. The ground disappeared beneath her, and suddenly she was on her knees, icy water surrounding her feet and calves. She was in a ditch. She scrambled for higher ground, out of the frigid water, hunching low and trying to stay out of sight. She cast a frantic look over her shoulder as the car following them squealed to a halt. Its headlights lit up the Jeep sitting diagonally in the road.
    A black silhouette moved into her view. He was coming after her! Terror spurred her. She ducked and ran deeper into the bushes.
    “You there!” a voice shouted. “Freeze!”
    It was the man who’d stopped to help. She didn’t turn. He was yelling at her attacker.
    “Drop your—”
    Pop!
    Then a deafening silence.
    Nausea gripped her, but she kept running. Something stabbed her thigh. She tried to swat it away, thenrealized it was barbed wire. Near panic, she dropped to the ground and dragged herself under the fence. Her sweater snagged. The bushes rustled behind her. God, could he see her? Heart pounding furiously now, she jerked her arms free of the sweater and stumbled to her feet.
    Pop!
    Something stung her arm just above the elbow. I’m hit! She plowed forward through the brush, and a single thought took over: I will not die tonight. Not, not, not! She swiped the branches away and willed her rubbery legs to move faster. The ground grew steeper, harder to climb. She tripped and pressed forward until her thighs burned and her throat felt raw from the cold air.
    And then in the distance, a siren. She stopped to listen. She held her breath. She crouched low and peered through the foliage at the two cars on the highway, both with headlights blazing and doors flung open. The siren grew louder.
    Where was the shooter?
    The Jeep’s headlights went black, and she had her answer. She heard the door slam, and the engine growled to life again. Mia rose to her feet and watched, mouth agape, as her Jeep lurched forward, made a U-turn, and then—still without headlights—shot down the highway and disappeared into the night.
    Mia had blood on her hands. She laced her fingers together and squeezed, trying to stop the tremors.
    “You should get this stitched up.”
    She glanced at the paramedic beside her who was cleaning her wound. The woman had short brown hairand a no-nonsense attitude that reminded Mia of her sister.
    “I have a feeling I’m going to be here a while,” Mia said as yet another plainclothes detective walked up to talk to her. Detective Macon. First name Jonah, like the whale story, which was easy to remember because he was a muscle-bound giant of a man. He’d already filled half a notebook with the information she’d given him, but it looked as if he needed more.
    “Ma’am.” He nodded at her. “Just a few more things.”
    Mia took a deep breath and braced herself.
    “About the Minute-Mart.” He flipped through the pages of his book. “You say you arrived about nine fifty-five?”
    “More or less.”
    “And you were there buying groceries?”
    “Ice cream,” she said. “I was on my way home to watch a movie.”
    “And Frank Hannigan entered the store as you were leaving?”
    Mia’s gaze darted to the knot of cops and crime-scene techs standing beside Frank’s body. Her throat constricted.
    Don’t let me keep you. See ya around, Doc.
    The guilt was like a noose around her neck. What if she’d stayed to chat for just a few minutes longer? Would it have changed anything? Would Frank Hannigan be home with his wife right now instead of sprawled across the asphalt with a hole in his