“You’ve got one bullet,” he says. “What will you do with it? Once Ms. Masters is on fire, will you put her out of her misery? Or will you try to kill me?”

Like a suspicious primate taunted by a cruel zoo worker, I hesitate to reach for the derringer. But in the end, I snatch it up. Maybe I can inflict some degree of harm on Brody before I die. Breaking open the weapon, I check the remaining round—a .22 long rifle bullet. It seems to be live, but it’s practically useless from this range. To reliably kill from this gun, this bullet should be fired from a foot or less.

“There’s a third choice, Brody,” Randall says. “He might save the bullet for himself. To spare himself the pain.”

Royal laughs. “Are you that blind, Randall? Not Mayor Cage. He’s a white-knight type. He’s Ivanhoe, son. Chivalry and honor. He’s his daddy all over again. Nope … he’ll shoot the girl. I’d stake my fortune on it.”

“Look at his eyes,” Regan says, watching me warily. “I’d take a step back, if I were you.”

“Oh, he’d love to kill me,” Brody concedes, like a sportsman arguing about a casual bet. “But he’ll save the bullet for her. That’s true love, Randall. Pay close attention. It’s something you never felt in your whole life.”

While Caitlin silently reaches out to me with her eyes, I force myself to ignore her, quickly calculating the relevant distances, not only from where I stand, but from where my gun hand could reach if I leaped toward Brody. With the full length of the chain, my body, and my gun arm, a dive forward might buy me an additional six or seven feet. But I’d have to time the shot perfectly to kill him, and still Regan would remain free to burn Caitlin and me to death. No … the only way to prevent that outcome is somehow to kill Brody and take his pistol—then shoot Regan before the man incinerates us.

Impossible—

“You want me to light her up now?” Regan asks, his eyes on Caitlin.

Brody peers into Caitlin’s bloodshot eyes as though he could subsist on her tears alone. “No,” he says softly. “Give me that unit, Randall.”

“What?”

“I said, give me the damn thing. Take my pistol.”

Regan looks like a wolf cheated of a tasty meal by his alpha male.

“Help me put it on,” Brody orders.

Regan unhooks the khaki straps, then helps settle the pack onto Royal’s shoulders. The old man scarcely bends under the weapon’s weight. “Heavier than I remember,” he says, adjusting the straps on each shoulder and closing his hands around the hissing jet pipe.

“Can you handle it?”