Pierce moved. He pivoted, swinging his arm through another 180-degree arc, the gun whipping around—

—and pointing at Dani’s face.

By then Sam was moving, too, throwing himself forward across the five-foot distance to the gun.

He wasn’t fast enough.

He saw Pierce’s fingertip compress against the trigger. Saw the man’s whole grip on the gun tighten with it, the hand going white with the force of the pull.

Nothing happened.

In the instant before Sam crashed into him, he saw Pierce’s face register confusion, his eyes darting down to the gun.

A tenth of a second later Sam got his right hand on the gun’s barrel, then collided with the man at something close to sprint speed.

Pierce was a head taller and fifty pounds heavier than Sam, but he was not balanced to take a hit, and he wasn’t expecting one. The impact sent him—and Sam with him—toward the shelves on the side wall of the room. They took three lurching steps and crashed into them, Pierce hitting first. At no point did the man’s grip on the gun weaken.

That sense of absolute clarity was still there, even in Sam’s thoughts. They came through as sharp, concise little sentences, like bullet points:

He was not going to win a fight over the gun itself.

Not against an adult.

Even now, Pierce was reaching to put his second hand on the weapon, because—

Because he thinks you are fighting for it.

Which you can take advantage of.

The man’s other hand closed over the pistol, right beside Sam’s.

The doubled force was too much to handle; Sam could feel the metal twisting, slipping away in his grip.

He held on as best he could with just his right hand, and pivoted his body while shoving himself inward toward the man. The resulting position put Sam almost in front of Pierce, with his back to him; Sam’s left side was now tight against both of the guy’s arms.

It also put Sam’s left elbow twelve inches in front of Pierce’s face.

Pierce’s undefended face.

Sam stopped thinking any of it through, and simply exploded. He slammed his elbow backward, as hard and as fast as he could, over and over.

Every blow connected somewhere. There was nothing Pierce could do to move his head out of the way. Sam felt the hard point of his elbow hitting teeth, an eyeball, skipping under the jaw and hitting the throat. He heard Pierce grunting, seething—but still the man’s two-handed grip on the pistol held.

Then Sam’s elbow struck Pierce’s nose. He saw the impact at the edge of his vision, felt the cartilage crunch and deform, and the sudden hot rush of blood onto his arm.

He saw Pierce react instinctively, turning his head sideways to spare his nose another hit.