The roar of engines and howl of sirens got him scrambling to his feet.
“What in the holy hell…?”
Cuthbert was standing only a few steps away from the building he’d just climbed out of, gun dangling limply from his hand as he turned toward the interstate to see what the racket was all about.
Brady was under Eric’s arm, urging him toward the facility road, but that didn’t mean they both didn’t get an eyeful.
“Holy shit,” Brady muttered. “Is that Ace?”
They’dheardabout his driving, and they’dseenthe car he’d driven—hell, they even had been told that the shoestring garage on the shiny edge of nowhere had been supported by his skills behind the wheel. Ericthoughthe knew what the fuss was about after the trip to save Brady from the bank robbers.
But until this moment, neither one of them had really seen him drive.
The Forester that Brady had brought to be fixed up wasscreamingdown the road, a flurry of dust in its wake, going about a million miles per hour faster than factory spec, with at least a dozen cherry-topped units on its ass.
The distance was so great between them, it was like watching the electric rabbit taunting the greyhounds at the dog races, except this electric rabbit was turbocharged with a shot of nitro in its electronic blood.
“Jesus God,” Eric muttered, the car chase to the south keeping his attention from the blood trail he was leaving as he ran for all he was worth. Cuthbert wasn’t firing at them anymore. It didn’t matter how badly he wanted Brady, there was something alluring about a high-speed chase—whoever that motherfucker was down there, he wasbad, and he needed to be gottennow. Cuthbert went squealing out of the parking lot, hitting the road as the now-familiar silver SUV that Eric had bought the day before turned in.
They made it to the road in time for Jai to fishtail in the dust, and Brady put Eric in the back while he jumped in the front.
“He’s hurt!” Brady cried. “We’ve got to—”
“I’ll live,” Eric grunted. “Brady, we’ve got to get you to the phone.”
“It is coming to us,” Jai said. “But first….”
He’d pulled a 180 and was heading to the interstate at a moderate pace. At first, Eric thought he was simply waiting for the wave of cop cars in the high-speed chase to recede into the distance, Ace in the Forester still that elusive electric rabbit.
Then Brady swore softly under his breath. “That can’t be good.”
“Your sheriff,” Jai said deliberately, “is a very stupid man.”
“What in the actual fuck…?”
Jai’s phone buzzed on the dashboard, and Jai hit it.
“You got ’em?” Ace asked, sounding for all the world like he was sitting at a desk.
“Da. You see the—”
“I see ’em,” Ace said, indicating thewaveof cop cars, sirens blazing, coming from the west. From their vantage point on the slight rise of the police station, they could see the impending wave crash of sirens, with Ace in between. “I got me an idea, though, so I need you to do me a favor. You know that road construction about three miles east, past the other north-south road before Victoriana?”
“Da?” Jai’s voice rose a little.
“Could you, uh, maybe get that flatbed truck in the middle of the road for me and drop the end to the ground? I’ve got an idea here. There’s a road to the south in about two miles—”
“There’s more cars there!” Eric called, mindful of what he’d heard from the dispatcher. Brady held up a radio in his hand that he hurriedly turned on and held to his ear.
“Perfect,” Ace said. “Jai, make sure that ramp’s pointing east, ’cause that’s where I’ll be coming from, you hear me?”
“Da,” Jai said, sounding almost distraught. “Da—Ace, be—oh fuck.”
At that moment, as they watched, Ace met the new wave of cruisers and SUVs head on, and… oh holy fuck.
“How long can he do that?” Eric breathed as the green Forester wove—almostdanced—in and out of the oncoming vehicles. Over the phone, a voice—Sonny—cried out, “Yeefuckinhaw,Ace!” and they all stared, stricken, terrified, inaweas Ace threaded the needle, in and out, in and out, and in and—
“Clear!” Ace cried. “Get to that motherfuckin’ ramp, brother, now!”
