Grant almost fell flat on his face before regaining his balance. He caught up as Eddie stopped, flinging open the passenger door. ‘What the hell are you doing?’
‘Someone’s trying to kill my wife!’ Eddie shouted. ‘I need to get to her, fast - either get in or get out of the way!’
Grant chose the former, his bewildered expression returning. ‘Dude? Seriously?’
‘Seriously!’
‘Shit, dude, no way! Well, come on, let’s go save her!’ The half-smile on Grant’s face suggested that he was already picturing himself as a real-life action hero. ‘What are you waiting for? Let’s roll!’
Eddie held back a sarcastic comment. Instead, he blasted the Murciélago away from the nightclub with an ear-splitting V12 howl.
Nina looked back. The Ram was still behind them, closing as both vehicles weaved through the traffic along Third Avenue. The pickup truck was much larger than the cab, not a vehicle at home on the streets of New York, but it was also more powerful - and better maintained. The Crown Victoria now sounded as though several important parts were rattling around loose in the gearbox.
The driver was making just as much noise. ‘For the love of God,’ he cried, ‘stop! You can keep the cab, just let me out!’
‘Look - what’s your name?’
‘Ricardo!’
‘Ricardo,’ said Nina, ‘we’re almost at the police precinct. Okay? Just one more block!’ She pounded on the horn and swung the cab into the wrong lane to avoid cars stopped at the 20th Street intersection, cringing as she saw headlights rushing at her from the left - then the taxi was through. She hauled it back into the right-hand lanes.
The Ram also swerved, smashing into a car and sending it spinning on to the sidewalk. But the truck was barely slowed, the heavy bullbar across its radiator grille taking the brunt of the impact.
Macy stared back at the crash. ‘Jesus!’
‘Just hang on!’ The next intersection was just ahead . . .
Which way was the precinct? Left or right?
21st Street was one-way, traffic running westbound across Manhattan - and the road to the right was blocked by waiting cars.
No choice—
Nina turned hard left, the cab tipping on its suspension. A Porsche was parked just beyond the crosswalk, the Crown Vic skidding right at it.
‘Shit, shit, shit!’ She wrestled with the controls, feeling the back end sliding. If she braked, the cab would spin out and hit the other car—
Instead, she spun the wheel back and stepped on the gas.
The rear wheels writhed and squealed, kicking the taxi out of its skid - but not quickly enough to stop its tail from bashing against the Porsche. There was a horrible crunch as the cab’s rear bumper was ripped off.
Nina straightened out. ‘Sorry,’ she told Ricardo. He made a disgusted sound.
Rising sirens. Flashing lights, the red and white strobes of police cars—
In the mirror.
‘Damn it!’ The precinct had been in the other direction, and now they were heading away from it, away from help.
Macy, looking back, was happier. ‘Yes!’ she crowed as the cars at the lights pulled out of the way to let the cops through. An NYPD patrol car accelerated across the intersection—
And was hit by the Ram as it ploughed round the corner, the police cruiser smashing into the Porsche and folding it like wet cardboard. The pickup tore away the police car’s front wheel as it wrenched free of the wreckage and continued the pursuit, twisted debris dangling from its bullbar like streamers.
Macy’s relief vanished in an instant. ‘No!’
‘Have you still got the phone?’ Nina shouted.
‘Yeah, but—’
‘Call Eddie again!’
Macy thumbed through Nina’s contact list. ‘What can he do?’
‘You’d be surprised. Just call him!’
Macy frowned, but found the number and selected it. ‘It’s busy!’
‘What? Who the hell’s he talking to?’
The Lamborghini powered out of 108th Street and turned sharply south, its broad tyres and four-wheel drive keeping it clamped firmly to the road. The lateral G-force of the turn, on the other hand, threw Eddie against the door. Ahead, the long straight of Central Park West stretched to infinity, the park itself a swathe of darkness to their left.
Streetlights and windows streaked into hyperspace as the Murciélago accelerated. Eddie leaned back upright, Grant holding the phone to his ear. ‘So can you help us?’
‘I’ll do what I can,’ said Amy - now in her official role as Officer Martin of the New York Police Department. ‘But it’ll take a while to get the word out to every unit - if you get stopped before then, you’ll get a ticket.’
That was the least of Eddie’s worries. ‘I’ll just not have to get stopped, then.’
‘Or you could not break the speed limit . . .’ Amy’s tone became dubious. ‘You’re speeding right now, aren’t you?’
‘A bit,’ he admitted as the speedometer needle flashed past eighty.
‘Where are you?’
‘105th Street . . . 104th . . . 103rd . . .’
‘God damn it, Eddie! Don’t you know how dangerous that is?’
‘Just make sure all your guys know that Nina’s the good guy and the fuckwits chasing her are the bad guys, okay? Bye!’
‘So . . .’ Grant said cautiously as he withdrew the phone, free hand tightening round the leather armrest, ‘you’ve driven fast cars before, yeah?’
‘Yeah,’ said Eddie, focusing on the road. The Lamborghini’s grip and handling made weaving through the traffic a precise, almost game-like experience, but the slightest mistake would not only total the Murciélago, but probably injure or even kill innocent people as well.
‘Like what?’
‘Last thing I drove this fast was a Ferrari 430.’
Grant nodded approvingly. ‘Cool car. Yours?’
‘You think I’d be working as a bodyguard if I could afford a Ferrari?’
‘Good point, man. Whoa, bus, bus!’
‘I see it.’ The oncoming lanes were almost empty for at least two blocks. Eddie whipped round the bus and accelerated, the Lamborghini surging effortlessly past a hundred miles per hour.
Grant let a relieved breath escape. ‘So this Ferrari - you took good care of it, right?’
‘Nope,’ said Eddie with a small smile. ‘Smashed it to fuck.’ The gulp from the other seat sounded as though Grant was trying to suck the breath back in. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll look after your Lambo.’
‘Not a scratch, okay?’
‘If it gets anything bigger than a scratch, you probably won’t be in any state to worry about it.’ He let the actor figure that out for himself as the phone rang again. ‘Get that, will you?’
‘Eddie!’ Nina shouted as Macy poked the phone through the slot. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m on my way,’ came the Yorkshireman’s voice. ‘I’ve told a mate in the NYPD what’s going on, and I’m coming south - head uptown, I’ll meet you. Where are you?’
‘Going north up Park.’ She had turned off the narrow 21st Street on to the much broader Park Avenue.
‘The bad guys?’
‘Right behind us!’ yelled Macy.
She wasn’t kidding. The lights in the mirror flared brighter, the Ram’s engine roar like a charging beast. Figures leaned from its windows, the bald man in the front passenger seat, Snakeskin behind the driver.
Both had guns raised—
Macy dropped flat, the phone snagging in the slot and falling to the dirty floor. Gunfire crackled, the flat boom of the revolver and the rapid chatter of a TEC-9 machine pistol. More shots struck the cab. The bulletproof screen took another two rounds, a fist-sized section crazing just behind Nina’s head. Another hit and it would shatter . . .