Page 22 of You Can Run

His eyes flicked to Dante, then back to Santiago.

“And the way you saidLa Manojust now…” Julian continued. “It felt like the same kind of thing.”

Dante felt something tighten in his chest. “What man?”

Julian shook his head slightly. “I don’t know. They said he was important. Dangerous. There’s a manhunt.”

Santiago stared at him for a beat longer than necessary. “El Merc,” he said quietly.

The name seemed to drain the air out of the space.

Dante’s stomach dropped. “Ferrera?”

Julian nodded once, slower now. “Yeah,” he said. “That was it. That’s the name they said.”

Silence settled over the porch. Santiago’s hand tightened on the railing as the past snapped into focus, no longer abstract, no longer buried.

Alive. Andback.

His gaze moved to Jessica again, but the anger was gone now, replaced by something colder. “Then you definitely shouldn’t be here.”

The words had barely settled when Jessica heard it—the low sound of an engine rolling up from the street, close and slowing.

Dante turned first. His posture shifted, shoulders tensing.

An old white pickup with Mexican plates pulled up hard to the curb, dust kicking up around the tires. The engine didn't cut. It idled, restless, like it didn't plan on staying.

Ryan stepped out.

He looked worse than he'd sounded on the phone. She hadn't expected that. His voice had been so steady through the worst of it—through the men at the door, through the gunshot, through the long minutes afterward when she'd been shaking too hard to hold the phone level, that she'd built an image of someone untouched by any of it. But the man crossing the street toward her looked like he'd aged ten years since she'd seen him last night.

His eyes swept the block once, quick and practiced, before landing on the porch. Whatever he saw there—the four of them lined up like a family portrait nobody had asked for—he absorbed without expression.

Santiago straightened beside her. “And who is this?”

The question had an edge to it, territorial, the voice of a man standing on his own porch deciding whether the person approaching had earned the right to step onto it.

“Ryan Inglis,” Jessica said, before Ryan could answer for himself. “Former U.S. Marshals. Emphasis on the “former”.”

She felt rather than saw Dante glance at her, a quick flick of attention that she didn't return.

Ryan stopped at the bottom of the porch steps, keeping the distance. His gaze moved briefly to Julian, registering what his presence meant about the stakes, then back to Dante and Jessica.

“I take it you've seen the news?” Ryan asked.

The question was directed at all of them, but Santiago was the only one who nodded.

He shifted his weight, and Jessica noticed for the first time that he was armed, the slight drag of a holster beneath his jacket, visible only because the wind pressed the fabric flat for a second.

“José Ferrera's transport was hit about eighteen hours ago. Whoever pulled it off knew the route, the timing, theresponse window.” His gaze moved between them. “That's not improvised. That takes access.”

Jessica felt the chill start at the back of her neck and work downward.

“He's not running blind,” Ryan continued. “He's going to start with what he knows. Old names, old connections. People who helped put him away.”

She could feel Dante go rigid beside her, could feel Santiago processing behind his stillness.

Ryan looked at her then. “You're not just a loose end, Jessica. You're someone he remembers.”