the throttle wide open and the engine loud. The storefronts sent back a watery reflection of their headlights. Jas peeked over Ford’s shoulder and couldn’t hold back a shriek of surprise. Someone had run into the middle of the road and stopped, right in their way.
The girl. She held the knife waist high, waiting for them. Waiting for Jasmine.
“Hold on!” Ford shouted. He didn’t stop; he aimed straight for the girl. He leaned forward and Jasmine gripped his waist. His coat was slick with rain. Jasmine’s chest was tight with terror. He was going to run the girl down.
He was going to kill her.
Ford. She tried to shout his name, but she couldn’t get the word out of her throat. It was too late anyway. They were almost on top of the girl, so close Jas could see her mouth open in surprise, the small dimple between her eyebrows as she frowned. Jas squeezed her eyes closed and braced for impact.
But the bike kept purring along. They didn’t even swerve.
When Jas looked back, she saw the girl picking herself up off the pavement. She must have jumped out of the way just in time. Jasmine exhaled. The girl was quickly swallowed up by the distance and the dark. Jas wondered what had happened to the boy with the long hair.
She knew that both of them would be back. They wanted her dead. That much was obvious.
She still had no idea why.…
On their left, lit windows streamed past and buildings danced in and out of sight.
On their right, the wide mouth of the bay was open to the dark gray sky. The salty smell of the bay mixed with newly cut grass and dew.
Several more minutes went by before Ford slowed the bike and they veered right, onto a boardwalk along the beach. The bike trail. The normally packed trail was empty as Ford guided the motorcycle with ease along the boardwalk.
Jas was cold. Salt spray from the bay mingled with the rain. She leaned in closer to Ford, feeling the heat radiating through his back. He smelled good. As she pressed close to him, she remembered what he had looked like without a shirt on, the muscles, the jacked-up strength.
Not human. She quickly pushed the thought aside. She was too tired for questions and doubts.
Maybe they would just keep riding forever. That would be okay with her.
Ford weaved expertly around the pitted spots on the trail and places where the earthquake had punched a fist skyward, leaving broken piles of wood in its wake. They jumped back onto the road. Ford slowed the bike and pulled into a parking spot at Fort Point. When he cut the engine, Jas pulled off the helmet and swung her leg over the seat, surprised at how solid the ground felt under her feet. The crash of the waves against the rocks was thunderous, and the sky was still bleeding rain. Jasmine realized she had no idea what time it was—the clouds had turned everything a uniform gray.
Ford climbed off after her and put a hand on her back.
“We’ll be safe here for a while!” he shouted, leaning close so she could hear him.
Jas was so surprised by how nice it felt to hear him say we that she couldn’t even ask where here was. He started toward the chain-link fence put up to keep people out of the section of the fort under the Golden Gate Bridge, which rose above them, a vast steel giant with fingers pointing to the sky. A big No Trespassing sign was visible in the half dark. Ford ignored it. He shoved at the gate, exposing a narrow gap just large enough to slip through.
He motioned for Jasmine to enter. She hesitated. Jas had sworn to Luc to stay out of trouble. Even thinking about her brother, and where he could possibly be, made her chest feel heavy. What if something had happened to him? What if those crazy assassins, or whatever they were, had gotten him?
Thinking about the boy and the girl and the possibility of their return made her decide. She slipped through the gate, and Ford followed. She could still hear the slurring of the waves against the shore and the drumming of the rain on the damp sand, loud as a march. She realized with a start that although Ford was walking next to her, she couldn’t read anything off him—no feelings. No wants. Nothing.
“What are we doing here?” They had arrived at the