“You were so close to getting out,” Xander called out, his footsteps moving rapidly in her direction. “But now I know where you are. The light from that exit sign should frame you nicely when I shoot you as you try to leave.”

Jessie glanced around, looking for another way out. But none was visible. He was right. If she tried to make a run for it, he’d have a clear shot at her. Based on what he’d just done to Emerson, she didn’t want to give him the chance.

She guessed she had about twenty seconds until he was to her. The one thing working for her was that when he got there, she’d be surrounded by thirty to forty mannequins who could easily be mistaken for her. She decided to make it more challenging.

Placing the pistol delicately on a cardboard box, she pulled off her jacket to reveal the cream-colored top she was wearing. It wasn’t as white as the mannequins. But it would help her blend in a bit.

She picked up the pistol and took up a position between two mannequins—one male and one female. The sliver of space between them was just wide enough for her to aim through.

The footsteps stopped and she knew he was close, though she couldn’t see him. As she waited, trying to breathe silently, she heard his breaths, loud and wheezy. A thought belatedly registered in her mind.

Xander’s footsteps when he was running moments earlier were uneven, almost as if he was half-shuffling one of his legs. That and his labored breathing reminded her of something she’d forgotten in the terror of the situation. He was injured.

It had been only weeks since he’d been shot in the abdomen and shoulder, smashed in the skull with a nightstick, and jumped out of an apartment window. Detective Ryan Hernandez, thirty years old and in great shape, was expected to take two months to recover from two stab wounds. How weak and tired must a fifty-something man feel with vastly worse injuries? The realization filled her with hope and another, far less expected feeling: confidence.

If I can get that gun out of his hand, I’ll have the physical advantage. But how?

She looked around and her eyes fell on two unattached mannequin pieces. One was a head and the other was an arm from shoulder to fingertips. She had the kernel of an idea. Under normal circumstances, she’d take a moment to try to anticipate how it might play out. But these weren’t normal circumstances and she didn’t have time formulate all the details. This would either work or it wouldn’t. She was about to find out.

Shoving the gun in her front pocket, she grabbed both mannequin body parts. She tiptoed forward a bit until she could catch of glimpse of Xander. He was spinning back and forth between her direction and the other side of the warehouse, unsure which side she was hiding on.

She was about to toss the mannequin parts when a sudden explosion rocked the warehouse, making the walls shudder and sending some of the mannequins toppling over. After the racket subsided, he shouted to her.