Blindsided by Katy Lee

committing the crimes.”
    “Then all the more reason for you to get out. They think I’ve kidnapped you. Letting you go will show them that’s not the case. You can tell them you got in the car willingly. In fact, you were being shot at by Ramsey’s men and I saved you.”
    “Pace won’t care. He will still take you down, and I will be there when he does.”
    “You enjoy watching ladies get cuffed and stuffed?”
    “Only when they’re guilty. And you are not.” He looked out at the back window, catching a glimpse of Maddie also rubbernecking. “They’re coming. What’s your choice?”
    She fixed her scarf, feeling her skin to find no scars breached the fabric.
    “I wish you wouldn’t do that.”
    “We do this my way, or not at all. Are you in or are you out?”
    “I’m in. I don’t like it, but I’m in. Now drive.”
    The car roared to life, screaming back out onto the highway in a blink of an eye.
    “We need to find cover from the helicopter,” Ethan said.
    She peered his way as she took the next exit. “It’s a good thing I know a lot about finding cover. To the trees.”
    * * *
    Roni chose roads with heavy overgrowth of pines in the hopes the pilot of the chopper would lose sight of them. The whomping sound of the blades told her she still had a tail, no matter what she did. As beautiful and fast as the Aston was, Roni didn’t know this car. Perhaps she couldn’t pull away from them because of a tracking device installed in the vehicle selling her out. But that would mean only the car’s owner could track her.
    Unless Ramsey sold out to the FBI.
    “How persuasive is this guy Pace you work for?” she asked.
    “Very. Why, you hiding something?”
    “No. Just wondering if he was able to capture Ramsey, would he convince him to offer up information, like how to track this car.”
    “That I doubt. I think Pace has met his match with Ramsey. I did my best to convince him back there to offer up the truth about you. Not even the threat of death worked. He just laughed. I had to leave him behind when I heard Pace give orders to go after you.”
    Roni nearly screeched the car to a halt. “Are you telling me you had that sick man in your clutches but chose to come after me, like I was the criminal?”
    “Not after you. To protect you.” He reached up to hold on to the door frame in the next sharp turn she took. “You have to understand how relentless Pace is, but I think sometimes he’s too close to see the truth.”
    She checked her mirrors, looking for the ambush at any second. “Go on.”
    Ethan sighed. “We grew up together in a tough neighborhood. Well, I grew up following him around is more like it. He’s five years older than me. It was a rough place, but he always looked out for me.
    “Pace’s sister raised him when their mother took off, but his sister wasn’t much older than he was. When he was sixteen her body was found in an alley and everything changed after that. Pace went crazy. Not insane crazy, but determined crazy. Driven to get out of the neighborhood and clean up the streets. And to get me out, too.”
    Ethan looked behind him at Maddie. “Believe me when I tell you he would die trying to get you out from your traffickers.” To Roni he said, “He would die trying to take down anyone he even thought was trafficking.”
    “And since he’s not dead yet, he has always gotten his man,” she stated to show she got his point. “Pace won’t stop until I am in his custody.”
    “Or dead.”
    She swallowed hard and missed her next turn.
    “That’s why I dropped Ramsey and went after you.”
    They drove in silence; the only sound was the helicopter somewhere beyond the covering of tree growth. At least it sounded a bit farther off in the distance. She could only think they were struggling to catch glimpses of the roof of the car and hoped that meant no tracker.
    She came to a fork and saw a sign for a town ten miles away if she took the right.
    She took it.
    “This road