Headlights in the Lane

Ruby Bell was faster than a dead woman should have been.

She cut behind the delivery van, through a side yard, and over a low hedge into the service lane behind Claire's subdivision. Elise followed on anger and bad shoes. Theo followed on longer legs. Roslyn shouted for them both to stop, which helped no one.

Ruby reached a chain-link gate and fumbled with the latch. Elise caught her sleeve.

"Who are you?" Elise demanded.

Ruby swung back with a small metal flashlight. It struck Elise's cheek hard enough to flash white through her vision.

Theo grabbed Ruby's wrist. Ruby twisted, wild and terrified.

"Let me go," she said. "He will kill me."

"Martin?" Elise asked.

Ruby's eyes filled. "All of them."

Roslyn arrived with her weapon low. "Hands where I can see them."

Ruby laughed, one broken sound. "Police? Great. Then I die in a room with forms."

"You were declared dead under my name," Elise said. "You owe me better than running."

Ruby looked at her closely. Under the hoodie, she did resemble Elise in the cheap way paperwork allowed: height, hair, age, face shape if no one wanted detail. The bandage at her shoulder showed red at the edge.

"I was supposed to be you for one hour," Ruby said. "Sign in, lie still, leave through the back."

"Who was the body?" Roslyn asked.

Ruby's lips trembled. "There wasn't supposed to be one."

The service lane went quiet except for distant sirens.

Elise stepped closer. "What changed?"

Ruby looked past her toward the smoke rising from Claire's house.

"Vivian changed the file," she said. "She said if I helped her, I could get my husband's policy back. Then Martin found out."

"Where is Lenora Pike?" Roslyn asked.

Ruby shut her eyes.

"In the van," she whispered. "The one that burned."

Behind them, a car engine revved at the mouth of the lane.

The headlights came straight for Ruby.