Merker blinked. “Yeah, well, I forgot a bit of it,” he said. He steered the truck over to the right lane without signaling, cut some motorists off. Someone laid on the horn and Merker held up a finger to the window, then reached into his jacket, where I knew he was touching the grip of his handgun, wondering whether to pull it out and use it as a traffic calmer.

Never again would I honk at anyone.

The exit was a couple of hundred yards up, so Merker rode the shoulder until we reached the ramp. “When you get to the light at the end,” I said, “hang a right.”

Merker’s face was full of fury. He wanted his money, and he didn’t appreciate anything, like other drivers and traffic lights, that delayed our arrival at the prison and moving forward with his plan. At the light, we waited behind a white Civic, its right blinker going. I couldn’t make out the driver, sitting up high as I was in the pickup. But it was a timid one. Several times, there was enough of a gap in the traffic for the Civic to go, but the car held back.

“Fuck! Come on!” Merker shouted, gunning the accelerator while he held his other foot on the brake. The moment he let his foot off it, we’d shoot ahead like a rocket.

“Just take it ea—”

I didn’t have a chance to finish. Merker let his foot off the brake, trounced harder on the gas, and rammed the rear right corner of the Civic, shoving it out of our way.

“Christ!” I shouted, throwing my hands forward and bracing myself against the dashboard.

“Stupid bitch!” Merker shouted, even though he couldn’t see into the Civic any better than I could.

The car lurched forward into the street, forcing an oncoming SUV to slam on its brakes. Merker steered the truck around the Civic and headed north, the pickup’s shattered exhaust system sounding like a round of gunfire.

“Honest to God,” Merker said. “Some fucking drivers. How many chances did she have to pull out but she just sat there?”

I craned my neck around, saw a man get out of the Civic, a woman stepping out of the SUV, both of them pointing as we vanished into the distance. What if Merker got us both killed before we even got to the prison? Who’d tell Leo to let Katie go then?

I dropped my hands from the dash and gripped the door handle with my right one. The fingers of my left hand dug into the vinyl upholstery, unable to get a secure grip.

“So how far up here?” Merker asked, his nose twitching.

“Uh, three lights up, turn left. The prison’s up on the right.”

Merker scratched his nose, glanced over, grinned. “You sure are a nervous passenger.”

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s me.”