Page 63 of Kidnapped Bride

"Go get some sleep, Boss," he said, taking the truck keys in hand, moving to the driver's door.

Yakov stood next to me while two trucks took off, the decoy going toward the western exit while the shipment moved east. And I stood for a moment watching north over the river while my mind stewed about how this would go down when Markin rocked up hoping to find his drugs. But I didn't have to wait long.

"Uh, Boss?" Yakov nudged my shoulder, and I spun around to see a black SUV roll in through the western gate. The lights wereoff and it moved slowly. Whoever drove had a hand spotlight, shining it at crate after crate.

"It's gotta be Markin," I snarked, shaking my head. We had to get out of here. "Let's go," I growled, already moving toward the car. But the men in the SUV spotted us almost immediately. One of the rear doors flew open and a guy leaned out with a rifle, muzzle flashing before the first shots cracked across the dockyard. Bullets pinged off the metal crates behind me, sending sparks flying into the dark.

“Run!” I yelled, shoving Yakov hard toward the car we’d left near the warehouse. He didn’t need to be told twice. We sprinted across the pavement hard while more gunfire ripped the night apart. I heard the SUV’s engine roar as it accelerated straight at us, tires screeching.

Yakov reached the sedan first, yanking the driver’s door open and diving in. I slid across the hood, slamming my shoulder into the passenger door as another burst of shots shattered the rear window. Glass exploded inward, raining down on the seats as I yanked my own door shut just as Yakov cranked the key and the engine snarled to life.

“Floor it!” I barked, ducking as a round punched through the trunk.

The sedan lurched forward, rear end fishtailing on the loose gravel that dusted the pavement before the tires bit and we shot toward the eastern gate. The SUV swung around in a tight arc, its headlights finally snapping on and pinning us like rabbits. More shots hammered out—three, four, five in quick succession. One clipped the side mirror, ripping it clean off, and another lodged in the passenger side rear quarter panel.

"Fuck," I grumbled, pulling my weapon. "It's gotta be Markin's men. They were coming to get the shipment and we got it first."

"We should pull them away from the shipment route. We can't have them following the truck." Yakov wasn't wrong. He blasted through the open gate doing sixty, and the chain-link fence rattled as we tore it from the hinges.

Then he wrenched the wheel left onto the service road that ran alongside the river, heading deeper into the industrial stretch of Brooklyn. The SUV stayed glued to our tail, maybe thirty yards back, its driver pushing hard. I twisted in my seat, Glock already in my hand, and fired three shots out the shattered rear window, but the shots went wild. Still, they forced the SUV to swerve, buying us a couple of extra seconds.

“Faster, they’re right on us!”

“I’m going as fast as this piece of shit will go!” he snapped back, knuckles white on the wheel. The road blurred past as he weaved between parked cars as the road narrowed, potholes jarring the car hard enough to bounce me round the seat. And another gunshot from behind buried itself in the dashboard between us, making Yakov swerve.

"Hold it steady or I can't get a good shot!" I braced myself, firing back, and I knew I hit the radiator. But it didn't slow them down one bit. The bastards seemed to speed up.

Blue and red lights suddenly flooded the mirrors as two NYPD cruisers screamed out from a side street half a block ahead. They must have been patrolling the area or responding to the initial shots and one of them cut across our path, trying to box us in.

Yakov swore in Russian and jerked the wheel right, hopping the curb onto a wider avenue that fed toward the expressway. Thesedan bounced violently, bottoming out with a scrape of metal on concrete and throwing me into the ceiling. Yakov had wisely buckled in, but it knocked me hard enough that I saw stars for a moment, and after all of that, the SUV didn’t slow.

It rammed straight into the side of the first police car, metal screeching as both vehicles spun. The second cruiser tried to pursue us but got caught in the mess, its lights flashing wildly as it fishtailed and slid sideways into the wreckage.

"Shit, did you see that?" I blurted, almost laughing as I watched steam pouring from the SUV and the cop car doors opening while we sailed away into the night.

“Take the next exit,” I said over the roar of wind whipping through the broken windows. Then I turned and sat down properly, using my jacket sleeve to wipe the sweat off my forehead. The shipment had gotten away clean, so even if they got this license plate, they had nothing. My cars were secure, and no one could track us back to my house.

Yakov pulled onto the freeway where the road noise was so loud we'd never hear each other, and I sat back in the seat letting the chilly night air whipping around me cool me off. We zipped down the freeway a few miles until he pulled off at an exit, slowing for a red light at the end of the exit ramp.

"You good?" he asked with a stupid grin on his face, and I rolled my eyes at him while smirking.

"Thought they had us for a second," I said and sucked in a deep breath. "You think Markin's men saw those trucks leave?"

A cop rolled through the intersection going perpendicular to us, and both of us held our breath for a second, praying the copsdidn't see our busted up window and start the chase over again, but they kept going without stopping.

"Does it matter?" Yakov asked. "They're busted. They’re gonna get hauled in by those cops and they'll be locked up long enough that by the time they get to even talk to Markin, the drugs will be hidden, maybe parsed out."

He laughed and it was infectious. I had to laugh too. One of the greatest heists I'd ever pulled off and God, what a thrill. When the light turned green, he eased through the intersection and chose a back street rather than a main thoroughfare, which was wise given how obvious it was that we'd been shot at, and I sat back and closed my eyes, feeling the adrenaline fading.

"Take me home to my beautiful wife, Yakov… I need sleep."

"Yes, sir," he said, still with a hint of mirth in his tone.

I'd sleep better for the next few hours than I had in months.

Markin would come crawling and when he did, I'd have his daughter and his drugs.

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