And Gage chimes in with, “It reads like a motherfucking setup,” as I switch off our lights in the hopes that this matte-black bike willfade into the night. But they’ve got me surrounded, emerging from every fucking which way.
“Jesus, fuck,” I hiss, zipping between two heavy-traffic lanes on a main road, right up the middle through the slapping wind, before veering off to another side street. “I’m clocking nearly two hundred in the dark. They’re coming out of the goddamn pavement.”
“I got us a route,” Liam wheezes. “The bed cover is off. You’ll have a minute to do a high-speed transfer. Maybe more if we do it right.”
“Motherfucker,” I spit out as I bolt past another police car, whose tires screech in their attempt to switch direction and chase after me. I lose them without an issue—the gravelly asphalt spewing remnants in our rear—but need to cut off a sedan in order to do so, causing them to fishtail and ram into the curb.
This is definitely tempting fate.
“What’s a high-speed transfer?” Rena asks.
I whip around in a loop through a vacant strip-mall lot, my thighs gripping the tank as I take a turn so low to the pavement that it has Rena chirping a strained giggle before I guide us back to the road and explain, “They want us to meet them and jump into the truck bed while moving.”
“It’s either that or we’re gonna end up in a goddamn shoot-out with cops,” Gage growls.
“I can do it,” she declares, and when I don’t object because I’m out of fucking options, Liam belts out the instructions.
“Take the next right. You’re gonna encounter two more paddy wagons. Lose them. Then, you’re cutting through the Shell station, dipping onto the four-lane road for about a quarter mile—expect mild traffic—and taking the on ramp. Two exits down, you’ll veer to the right, take the second left, third right, first left. We’ll be there.”
“Christ,” I mutter. “Fucking leapfrog across the whole damn state.”
“It’s all I got,” Liam groans. “They’re fucking everywhere, and they won’t be expecting that crossover.”
“It’s fine. Got it.” With that, I play chicken with the oncoming squad car until they end up smashing into the other that was dashing for us.
“That was one way to fucking do it,” Rena sings, and while she’s enlivened, there’s still a hint of fear in her tone that I hate.
After cutting the corner through the gas station parking lot and narrowly avoiding a van unloading a horde of drunks, I glide back out onto the road, noticing a racing patrol car on the other side. They can’t hop the median to reach me, so I’m in the clear, zooming full throttle up the on ramp and scaring the shit out of the civilian drivers as I weave in and out like a fucking ghost.
Lights out. No warning. Just a sonorousvroompreceding a blur of black.
And a melody of honking horns in our wake.
For the two minutes it takes us to reach the second exit, I breathe.
Inhale. Exhale. Tighten my hold on my entire fucking world.
The wind whistles. The freckled night twinkles in deception. And traffic parts as though we were kings, owning this nation.
We sway back and forth in a comforting cadence, hanging on for dear life and drifting along the open road at once.
Anothing left to losedrenching of freedom with everything at stake.
“Listen, baby girl,” I rasp out, my throat like sandpaper as I maneuver the turns—right off the exit—with the romping red-and-blue lights hot on our tail again. “When I sidle up alongside Gage, you’re gonna hold on to my shoulders, stand on the seat, and jump into the bed. Got it?”
Second left. Low to the asphalt.
There’s a brief pause before her response, but I think it’s less her reluctance and more her absorbing the moment. Something tells me, even in her fright, she’s soaking it all in. Committing every brush and smell and harrowing turn to memory—one of her most admirable attributes.
Her quick wit is another.
“Remember that time you said no more circus climbing?” she jeers as I lose our shadows again.
Third right. Almost there.
A half-amused, half-stressed-to-the-point-of-insanity chuckle huffs out of my mouth on the first left. “Yeah, well, all sense is on hold until we’re back on the ground. This is your time to shine, Little Moon.”
As I spot the truck, I slow my speed and cruise up beside him, so we’re both trekking along this secluded side street at about one hundred miles per hour, my gut knotting so tightly that I swear it’s coiling around my spine.
