She stood straight.
Boots down, shoulders back straight.
“Mr. Rainey,” she said, “take your hand out of your jacket. Slowly.”
Rainey’s smile was gone.
“You have no idea who you’re dealing with, nurse.”
“I know exactly who I’m dealing with,” Lauren said. “I’ve met you before. Not you. Men like you.”
Sutter’s hand came out of his jacket.
It held a pistol.
The room exploded into motion.
Lauren did not think.
Thinking was for the quiet hours.
This was the part her body remembered.
Sutter swung the pistol up.
His arm was stiff and extended.
A man who trusted the gun more than himself.
She stepped inside the muzzle.
Her left hand clamped his wrist.
Her right palm drove up under his elbow.
The joint locked.
The pistol turned away from the children, away from the baby, toward the ceiling.
A twist.
A sharp crack of strain.
