Lauren’s state of mind had improved only a little since they’d left the chopper. She seemed capable of understanding basic instructions like Walk and Stay with me, and she was keeping her balance well enough, but her dazed condition remained. She almost certainly had a concussion. She needed medical help as soon as possible.

At fifty yards, Dani cupped her hands to her mouth and shouted: “Mr. Pierce!”

Pierce turned toward them.

“Dani?”

Before Dani could answer, Lauren flinched beside her and came to a stop. Dani, holding on to the girl’s arm, was jerked to a halt with her.

“Who?” Lauren said. The word was badly slurred, but audible.

“I’ll explain later,” Dani said. “Come on.”

Lauren didn’t move. She stood there, slowly shaking her head, as if confused.

“Lauren, come on.”

Across the rows of corn, Pierce called out, “Is it all three of you?”

“No,” Dani said. “Isn’t Sam here already?”

Pierce was silent a few seconds. Then: “He’s not with you?”

Dani heard concern in the man’s voice—to a degree that was almost strange. He was moving now, striding through the shoots toward them, thirty yards away. Dani was staring at him, opening her mouth to reply, when she caught a hint of movement in the darkness, forty or fifty feet away from the man. A low shape lunging upward, and then something—an arm, she guessed—swinging fast. A fraction of a second later, something collided with Pierce’s head. It slammed into it with a dull, heavy thud, knocking the man forward a step. He staggered and fell to his knees.

Then the low shape in the darkness started moving again—coming right toward her and Lauren, fast. She realized it was Sam in the instant before he screamed: “Run!”

Pierce was still on his knees, his hands groping at the side of his head. Watching him, and watching Sam run toward her, Dani felt a moment of logical paralysis; nothing she was seeing made sense.

Then Sam reached her, barely slowing, grabbing both her and Lauren and turning them, propelling them away through the corn, and at the same time she saw Pierce drop his hands from his head and grab something from his belt.

The first gunshot sounded like a wooden stick being snapped—a flat crack that ripped through the air. Dani saw the muzzle flash, and heard the bullet cut through the corn stalks somewhere off to her left. By then she was turning away, allowing Sam to drag her along, getting her feet moving under her, running to keep up.

A rapid series of gunshots followed, so close together it would have been impossible to count them. She heard the bullets passing behind her—behind all three of them as they ran.