Page 38 of The 9th Man

LUKE REALIZED THAT THE CAR COMING AT THEM WAS MOST LIKELYPersik’s backup team. No wonder he’d been so accommodating. Back to that out-of-the-fire-and-into-the-frying-pan thing. But since he was making things up as they went, mistakes were unavoidable. Like running out of ammunition in front of the guy you’re trying to bluff. He shoved the doubts aside. There’d be enough time to beat up on himself later. Right now he and Jillian needed to survive the next few minutes.

“Pedal to the metal,” he told her.

She jerked the wheel, skidding the Peugeot around the sedan, which did a 180 behind them and began pursuit. To their left, a chain-link fence ran parallel to their route. More of the warehouse acreage. The black sedan following them matched their speed, pulling alongside. The sedan’s rear passenger-side window descended, revealing a gun barrel.

“Tap the brake,” he said, “then swerve left, accelerate, and straighten out.”

She did exactly as instructed, slamming the Peugeot into the sedan’s side doors, forcing it to sheer away.

“Again, but gun the engine.”

She performed the maneuver a second time, this time maintaining contact and using the Peugeot’s power to drive the sedan sideways, its tires smoking over the cracked asphalt. The driver lost control and the car spun off the road in a cloud of dust. She slammed the accelerator to the floorboard and they sped away.

“I’m not a damn race car driver,” she said. “This is not comfortable to me.”

Their speed kept increasing.

“Let me take over,” he said to her.

He wiggled left and she squirmed over him, her foot momentarily leaving the accelerator, her hands replaced by his on the steering wheel. Luke settled into the seat and pressed the accelerator, speeding them back up.

“We’ve got new trouble,” she said, glancing back. “And coming fast.”

He saw it too in his rearview mirror.

The black sedan. Back from the dead.

To their right the chain-link fence was converging into a corner. He tapped the brake, slowing for the turn in the road, which allowed the sedan to close the gap until it was five feet off his bumper. The spinout had clearly gotten the driver’s blood boiling. Good. He was now driving angry, not smart.

“Seatbelt on?” Luke asked as he quickly buckled his own.

“Go for it.”

He stood on the brakes. The sedan slammed into their rear bumper. Luke accelerated again and cast a glance at the rearview mirror. The sedan’s windshield was bloated by white airbags. He tapped the brakes, bled off some speed, and readied for another turn.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a blur of white.

Jillian saw it too. “Do they have an army?”

He was wondering the same thing.

Luke looked left and registered a white Volvo speeding toward them. He then glanced in the side mirror and saw a pair of men climbing from the stalled black sedan, their guns already coming up.

He made a snap decision.

Time for some hill and dale.

“Hold tight,” he told her.

He whipped the wheel hard right. The Peugeot’s tail snapped around, tires stuttering sideways before he accelerated and straightened out. Ahead, a hundred feet away and closing fast, was the fence.

“You might want to duck,” he told her.

“You sure about this?”

“I’m sure we’re out of options. Get your knife out and be ready.”

She did so. “What’s this for?”

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