"I'm not wearing a mask," he points out.
"Oh yeah. You've really pulled a Clark-Kent-to-Superman move with that one," I snort.
He growls.
The road gets steeper, tighter. Each turn is a gamble. Too fast and we'll fly off the mountain, too slow and we lose him. Myforearms burn from gripping the wheel like our lives depend on it. Guess they do.
"There!" Plague points ahead where Valek's sedan suddenly swerves off the main road onto what looks like a fucking logging trail. "He's trying to lose us in the forest."
"Like hell he is." I yank the wheel hard right, following him onto the narrow dirt road. Trees press in on both sides, branches scraping against the SUV like skeletal fingers. The path is barely wide enough for one vehicle, let alone two.
"Whiskey, this is insane?—"
"I know!"
The SUV bounces over roots and rocks, the suspension protesting every impact. I can barely see through the dust cloud Valek's kicking up, just flashes of black metal between the trees. My teeth rattle in my skull as we hit a particularly nasty pothole.
The trail curves sharply left, then right, then left again in a series of switchbacks that would make a snake dizzy. I'm pushing the compact SUV way past what it was designed for, the engine roaring in protest. Every instinct from my military training is fuckingroaringat me that this is a trap, that we're being led somewhere we don't want to go.
And then, suddenly, Valek's brake lights flare red through the dust.
The sedan slides sideways across the narrow road in a perfectly controlled drift, blocking the entire path. There's nowhere to go. Trees on both sides, his car in front, and no room to turn around.
"FUCK FUCK FUCK!" I slam on the brakes, the SUV sliding on the loose dirt. We're gonna hit him, we're gonna?—
I manage to stop maybe three feet from his bumper, close enough that I can see Valek's eyes, silver and cold as winter.
"Reverse!" Plague shouts, but Valek's already out of his car.
I throw the SUV in reverse, but the wheels just spin in the dirt. "Come on, you piece of shit!"
Valek's alongside us in three strides. Something flashes in his hand. Metal catching the filtered sunlight through the trees.
Holy fuck, does he have aswitchblade?
"Drive!" Plague yells.
"I'm fucking trying!" I snarl.
The wheels finally catch and we lurch backward, but not fast enough. There's a loudBANGas Valek drives his knife into the sidewall of our front tire. The whole vehicle lurches violently to the right as the tire explodes.
"Hold on!" I try to control the slide, but with one tire gone and the road this narrow, physics becomes a real bitch real fast.
The SUV spins, the blown tire grinding into the dirt. We're sliding sideways now, the world tilting at an impossible angle. Through the passenger window I see nothing but sky, and through mine, nothing but dirt and rocks rushing up to meet us.
"Brace!" I yell, though there's fuck-all to brace against.
The world goes sideways.
Then upside down.
Then sideways again.
The SUV flips, metal screaming and glass exploding. My head cracks against the window and my shoulder slams into the door hard enough that I see stars. Everything's spinning, tumbling, chaos and noise and the taste of copper in my mouth.
We hit the ditch with a final, bone-jarring crunch, landing on the roof. I'm hanging upside down in my seatbelt like a thoroughly beaten piñata, blood dripping from my throbbing lip and a bunch of other cuts instead of candy.
"Plague?" I croak, blinking through the haze.
