He tried the leader of the security guards. “Reinhard, come in. Reinhard — the assassin is riding in car three!” There was no response. Just as there hadn’t been since he’d first called the man. “Damn it, Reinhard — I know you can hear me!” The head security guard wasn’t responding. Maybe he’d been serious about clearing Chapel off his radio frequency. Maybe he’d turned off his walkie-talkie.
The timing suggested that was more than a coincidence.
He grabbed the handset of the radio unit built into the car’s dashboard. He tried to raise anyone and heard only static in response.
“That can’t be right,” Young said. “I ran a radio check not ten minutes before we left the courthouse. It was working just fine.”
“Somebody’s jamming it,” Chapel said. It was the only thing that made sense. Except it made no sense at all. “We have to let them know. There has to be some way to communicate with them.” Two of the sedans were way up ahead, one in front and one in back of the limo. Car three, with Quinn in its backseat, was just ahead of Young’s car, which was trailing at the back of the convoy. “Short of yelling at them—”
“There’s a thought,” Young said. Chapel looked at her, having no idea what she meant. She laughed and gripped the steering wheel with both hands. “I guess I’ve been doing this longer than you. I remember back before we had cell phones, before we had wireless Internet, before—”
“Young? What are you talking about?”
“Just hold on,” she said, and floored the accelerator.
The patrol cruiser shot forward, swerving to narrowly miss the rear bumper of car three. The sedan made way for them, though the driver flashed his lights and honked his horn. Young ignored him. “There’s a pen and paper in the door pocket by your right hand,” she told him. “Write a message, quick.”
Chapel scrabbled for the items — a ballpoint and a citation book. He scrawled out the words ASSASSIN IN CAR THREE CALL REINHARD while Young pulled up alongside car two, directly behind the limo.
“Here, give me it,” Young said, and grabbed the citation book. She flicked her siren on and off until the guard in the passenger seat of car two looked over in their direction. She held the citation book up to her window. “Is he looking?”
“Yeah,” Chapel said, watching the passenger’s face. “Yeah, I think he’s got it. He’s shouting something but I can’t hear him.”
Young rolled down her window. Air burst into the car, ruffling the pages of the citation book.
“I said,” the passenger shouted, “are you nuts?”
Chapel grimaced in frustration.
“Our radio is out,” Young shouted back.
The passenger in car two rolled up his tinted window.
“I don’t think they’re taking us serious,” Young said. Her face was impassive, but Chapel knew she must be thinking the same thing he was.
They were a guard detail for a man who had been targeted by an implacable assassin. They might doubt what Chapel had to say. They might think he was trying to sabotage the detail. But there was no excuse for not being cautious and heeding what he said.
“We have to assume a few things,” Chapel told her, picking his words carefully. “We have to assume they have orders not to listen to us.”
“I’ll go that far,” Young replied.
“We have to assume they’re not going to take any action,” he went on.
“That’s what I’m seeing,” she said.
Chapel nodded. He had a couple more assumptions he wasn’t going to say out loud. He had to assume that Reinhard — and his entire security crew — already knew that Quinn was in car three, and that they were on his side. On the side of the Voice and the chimeras. They were in on the assassination plot.
Chapel also had to assume that Young wasn’t in on it, too. If she was, this was going to be over very quickly.
“The judge is in danger,” Chapel said.
“Yep.”
“Are we going to do something about that?” he asked.
“We sure as hell are.” Young flipped on her lights and sirens and stamped on the brakes.
IN TRANSIT: APRIL 14, T+58:59
The sedans — cars two and three — shot past the cruiser as Young maneuvered them back to the rear of the convoy again, straddling the two lanes. Chapel saw her plan immediately — she was leaving the right lane open so car three could move across to the shoulder, but not leaving any room for them to fall back. As soon as the cruiser was clear of car three’s bumper she picked up speed again, until they were separated by only a single car length’s distance.
She grabbed the microphone and switched on her loudspeakers. “Car three, break off from the convoy immediately,” she said, and Chapel heard her voice repeated so loud outside the car it made the windshield rattle. “Move to the shoulder and stop your vehicle. You have ten seconds to comply.” She switched over to the radio, but held her palm over the microphone. She glanced over at Chapel. “I know I can trust my fellow troopers. I’ve worked with some of ’em for years.”
Chapel remembered the judge saying he’d worked with Reinhard for years, too. But they needed allies. There were three troopers on motorcycles in front of the limo, screening its advance, and two more well behind them keeping an eye on their tail. “Call them,” he said.
Young flipped some switches on the radio and got on a state police restricted channel. “This is Sergeant Young, calling all motorcycle units. Have identified that car three is a threat, repeat, car three.”
“Tell them to screen the limo and get it off the road if they can,” Chapel told her.
“Forward units, protect the principal, and get it to safety,” Young said into her microphone. “Rear units, close this road to traffic! Fall back and deploy flares. Calling headquarters, calling headquarters. We have an immediate need to close the northbound lanes of I-36 south of Broomfield. Repeat, we need an immediate road closure of I-36 northbound south of Broomfield.” Almost instantly the units ahead of the limo called in to report they had received Young’s orders and would do what they could. At least the troopers were paying attention.
Chapel leaned forward to peer through the windshield. Car three hadn’t changed its speed or position at all. Neither had the other sedans. All three of them had rolled up their windows, though. He couldn’t see anything through the tinted glass.
“Do we hail ’em again, give ’em another chance?” Young asked. “I don’t want to start shooting out tires or running anybody off the road if we don’t have to.”
“I think—” Chapel said, but he didn’t get to finish his thought.
Up ahead the rear passenger-side door of car three popped open, and a man in a black suit flew out. He bounced off the asphalt and came caroming straight toward the patrol cruiser.
“Mother Mary!” Young shouted, and whipped her wheel over to the side, narrowly avoiding rolling right over the security guard.
Chapel spun around in his seat to watch as they raced past the man. He was struggling to get to his feet in the middle of the fast lane of the highway. It looked like he had a broken leg.
Chapel guessed immediately what had happened. Quinn must have panicked. The other guards in car three must have tried to mollify him.
Chimeras didn’t take well to attempts to calm them down.
“Shotgun, mounted behind your head,” Young said, her voice tight with worry.
Chapel looked for and found the shotgun where it was held behind the headrests by a pair of metal clips. He grabbed it and broke it open. “Shells,” he said.