"I think I'm old enough for a little respect."
In the winter of 1922, teens Vivian and Gilbert watch their family disintegrate. Their chemist father always travels. Their mom seems awfully interested in that slick traveling salesman - and in drinkin...
Ace dropped a crowbar over the side. It clanged on the pavement below, and she wasted no time following it down. She scissored her legs over and out and slid down the curve of the fuselage. The last six feet, she dropped through the air, landing in a crouch. The athletic woman arrived at the rear of the truck before the teens disentangled themselves from their seat belts.
By the time they joined Ace, she had found a padlock dangling from the back of the truck. She jammed an end of her crowbar into it and enthusiastically twisted and pulled. In noisy pulses, she ripped the padlock to pieces.
The muted roar of a fire grew, and the area at the front of the truck grew brighter and more orange.
Ace said, "What do you know? Archimedes was right again about leverage." She rotated the latch lever and yanked one of the doors. With a brief suction sound, it opened, all the way until it banged against the side of truck.
"Mom!" Vivian half-sobbed.
She and Gilbert climbed into the rear, treading on hunks of B-anthracite to the limp shape sprawled on top.
Ace sheathed her crowbar through her wide belt like a sword. "Lift her out. Moving her is less risky than staying. Quickly."
Between them, they lugged the soft unresponsive body from the truck. A few yards back, Ace nodded. "Down."
They laid Mrs. Fernwood on the cold highway between burning truck and hot-engined biplane. A swelling on her temple glistened with dark blood. Ace grasped the plump woman's shoulders and pumped them up and down, causing a whistle of breath to emerge. The twins flanked Ace, bending down in a huddle over their mother.
"Please, oh please, oh please," Gilbert said. Vivian pressed knuckles against her teeth.
Jillian sighed, barely audible above the growing roar of the gasoline fire. Ace clapped two fingers to Jillian's neck. Jillian's eyelids fluttered.
"Oh, Mom!" Gilbert choked out.
"Heartbeat's strong," Ace reported. "Temperature's good. Color's good. No oxygen starvation. Nasty lump on her head, though."
A metallic snick pricked the air. Chills more primal than winter weather gripped their spines. Death hovered near, sending sibilant whispers along their vertebrae. When the huddled three swiveled their heads to look, they only confirmed what the pits of their stomachs already knew. A man and a woman, all in black, each held pistols leveled at the rescue party.
"Hold very still," said the man.
Ace murmured, "Somehow, I never thought to ask about guns."
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