“Stop!”
The man behind the car slapped its trunk. Nina braked. In her mirror she saw the top of a hand truck and a stack of boxes rising above the roof. He'd come around the truck while Luis held the bag.
“Move back,” she said, too quietly for him to hear. She lowered her window. “Please move. We need to get out.”
Owen was already beside Beth's open door.
“There you are.”
Luis straightened, the bag still between him and Beth. “I'm handing this over.”
“That's fine. I'm here for her.”
“No,” Beth said.
Nina pressed the horn. It sounded enormous in the lane. The man behind them shouted something about the boxes and pulled his truck sideways, but the ramp blocked him from clearing the space at once.
Owen put one hand on the passenger door. “Don't make a scene.”
Beth reached to pull it shut. He caught her wrist against its edge.
“Get off me.”
Luis took a step back, looking from one to the other. In the gap left by the bag, Owen leaned toward the car.
Nina hit the horn again and kept her hand there.
“You're going to hurt somebody,” Owen said. He sounded irritated rather than frightened, a man trying to finish a task while people kept getting in the way.
“Yes,” Nina shouted. “You are. Let her go.”
She released the horn and reached across, but Beth had twisted away from his hand. The canvas bag slid to the footwell. Luis caught its handle before it fell out entirely.
“Dani!” Beth shouted.
Her voice went past Owen, past the small argument he'd made of them. Dani appeared at the doorway, keys still hanging from her finger.
“I'm Beth Rowan,” Beth called. “This man assaulted me this morning. He's followed us. Call the police.”
Owen turned his head. “It's family business. She's upset.”
“She's my housemate,” Dani said. “Who are you?”
“I'm helping her move.”
“No, you're not.”
Nina heard the change in Luis's breathing, the sharp intake of someone finally understanding the kind of problem in front of him. He set the bag down inside the car and stepped between Owen and the opening.
“Let go of the door.”
Owen pushed him with one flat hand. Not enough to knock him down. Enough to make the choice visible.
Luis didn't move back. He called to his crew in a voice that made two men stop what they were doing. One came around the ramp. The other put down a chair and took out his phone.
“Get clear behind the car,” Luis said. “Clear the lane.”
Nina could have reversed now, except Beth's door was open and Luis was standing in its swing with Owen pressed against him. She couldn't move without making their bodies the part of the maneuver she hadn't accounted for.
She turned off the engine, took the keys and opened her own door.
“Beth. This way.”
Beth shoved the canvas bag across first. Nina caught it against the gearshift and hauled it onto the driver's seat. Then Beth dragged herself after it, one knee catching on the console. Nina reached in and pulled at the sleeve of her coat, not her arm. Beth got her foot clear and came out stumbling onto the pavement.
Owen had let go of the door. He was coming around the rear of the car.
“Come here,” Dani called.
Beth took the bag. Nina turned toward the back seat, where her own bag lay with the work phone and the notes she'd made when she still had access. Owen was closer to that door than she was.
He looked through the glass, saw what she was looking at and reached for the handle.
She could go back. The key was in her hand. She could lock it, get around him, keep the little packet of things that still made her look prepared.
“Nina,” Beth said.
She went to her instead.
Dani pulled them into the open space beside the building. One crew member stood at the curb filming, not following Owen, keeping both the car and the people in view. Luis remained near the truck. He was calling the driver to raise the ramp.
Nina got her phone out. Her fingers slipped on its side. Beth gave the address before the call had connected, then gave it again when a voice answered.
“He's here now,” Nina said. “Owen Pike. He grabbed her. There are people here. A moving truck.”
She described him while watching him. He had opened the rear door. Her bag was in his hand.
“That's mine,” she shouted.
He looked toward her. For a moment he seemed to consider coming after them anyway. Dani stepped out of the doorway with a fire extinguisher she wasn't attempting to use. She held it low in both hands.
“Don't come near us,” she said.
Owen's attention moved to the phone at the curb, the man holding it, the driver in the truck cab who was now looking directly at him. He lifted Nina's bag as if she had asked him to bring it to her, then changed his mind and dropped it onto the pavement beside the car.
Papers spilled. The work phone landed with a hard plastic crack.
Nina started forward. Beth caught her coat.
“Leave it.”
Owen kicked the phone beneath the truck. He did it without looking, a small mean act on his way back to his car. The man at the curb turned his camera enough to keep him in view.
Nina gave the dispatcher the car's description. Luis read its plate aloud. Owen got in and pulled away too fast, then had to stop at the mouth of the street for traffic. For several seconds everyone stood watching a man who had frightened them wait for a perfectly ordinary red light.
“He's leaving,” Nina said into the phone. “We're here. We're staying.”
She kept talking until she was told what to do next. When she ended the call, her thumb had left a damp print on the screen.
Dani set down the extinguisher. She looked at Beth.
“What the hell was that?”
Beth had the sealed bag against her chest. The top tape had pulled loose, exposing the edge of the folder inside. She pressed it down.
“I told you about him.”
“You told me somebody was difficult.”
Beth looked at her. “I know.”
Luis came toward them with the other crew members. The man who had been behind Nina's car was holding a box with one crushed corner. He looked angry, not exhilarated.
“Is anybody hurt?” Luis asked.
Beth shook her head. Nina wasn't sure. Her hip hurt from the morning, her wrist hurt, her heart made it difficult to distinguish one kind of pain from another.
“No new injury,” she said.
“Good. Nobody goes back for anything yet.”
He looked at the scattered pages and the phone beneath the truck. Nina followed his gaze, then looked away. She had left them once. She could leave them for another minute.
Down the street, a siren became audible. It didn't solve anything. It did mean they no longer had to persuade the whole street by themselves.