She was thankful to see her—she had saved her life—but this was also not the way her plan was supposed to go.

But Tara didn’t have a second to hesitate. She jumped toward the knife, which had slipped from the man’s grip. But just before she could grab it, he flung his hand toward it.

He sat up, swinging the knife in every direction at Tara. She staggered backward, avoiding each one of his movements, as the girl snuck up behind him again. This time, Tara could see what she held in her hand—it was a rock. She swung it at his head, but he had anticipated her this time, and he spun around, sending the knife straight into her leg.

The girl, whose name Tara remembered was Anna, staggered back, crying out in agonizing pain as the man pulled the knife from her wound. He was about to stab her again, but Tara jumped on his back, and he stumbled backward. He swayed in every which way, trying to throw Tara off of him, but she held on with all her might until he began swinging the knife aimlessly over his head. Tara dodged each slice of the air near her face, barely missing.

She couldn’t hold on any longer; he was going to stab her. She jumped off of him and snatched the rock that had fallen beside Anna. She held its cold weight in her hand, ready to whack him in the head once more. But just as she lifted it higher, he spun around, his knife cutting the air around her wildly. Each time, he missed her barely, but then Tara felt a sudden burn, and her eyes instinctively shot to the pain. Blood gushed from her forearm as the rock fell from her grip.

She reached for the rock with her uninjured hand, but he grabbed hold of her neck, pushing her to the ground. She thrashed about wildly, but she couldn’t free herself; he was too heavy. She struggled to breathe as he raised the knife once more, ready to plunge it into her chest. In a split second she thought of John, of the call he would receive.

But then…

A gunshot rang through the air, the sound of a body fell to the ground, and a painful grunt sounded in the room.

The man looked up, and so did Tara, to see the old woman standing on the other side of the kitchen, holding Tara’s gun in her hand, pointing it past Tara and her son, to a body in the mudroom, collapsed onto the floor—it was Warren.

Tara’s heart sank. He must’ve been trying to sneak in, but the woman saw him too soon. He stared at Tara defenselessly while a hole in his shoulder bled out onto the floor.

Tara didn’t have a second to check on him. She needed to finish it all. Warren’s gun had skidded to the nook of the doorframe. And in the split second of distraction, the man had loosened his grip around her neck. She moved ever so slightly, grabbing hold of the rock beside her, and then hurled it through the air. It cracked his face, sending him into excruciating pain as he slid off of her onto the tiled floor.