That woke up her friend. Riley twisted in her seat and looked out the back window. “How long?”
“I noticed them about an hour ago. They’ve sped up since the sun came up.”
Riley turned to her. “You think it’s them?”
“I think we’d be stupid to assume it’s not.”
Riley grabbed her pack off the floor and pulled out the pistol she’d taken at Ragged Point. It was the only weapon they had. Noreen’s and Craig’s were in the bags their kidnappers had taken.
“Where are we?” Riley asked, looking around. “Los Angeles?”
Noreen nodded. “The Valley. If we’re lucky, we’ll get to the survival station before they reach us.”
Riley glanced out the back again, then looked at Noreen. “How much farther?”
“I don’t know. Ten miles, maybe?”
Riley again looked toward their pursuers. “We’re not going to make it.”
“We’ll make it.”
“I don’t know.”
“Riley, we’ll — no. No!”
A few hundred yards ahead, a multi-car accident covered all lanes. Worse yet, there were no exits between them and the blockage.
She looked left. A strip of land covered with trees and shrubs separated the north- and southbound lanes, but those lanes were blocked, too. Through a break in the foliage, she could see a strip of uneven ground leading down to a lower road that ran perpendicular to the 101. It had to be the 405. And it looked clear.
Without another thought, she turned the truck toward the strip.
“Hold on!” she yelled as the wheels went from asphalt to dirt.
Brush scraped loudly against the undercarriage as Noreen jerked the truck side to side, trying to find the best path.
“What’s going on?” a groggy Craig asked from the back.
“Just hang on,” Noreen told him.
After swinging right, she found a clear path that took them the rest of the way off the hill. At the bottom, they sped across a transition road and a short, raised divider onto the main lanes. Noreen whipped the wheel to the right, planning to head over the Sepulveda Pass, but their momentum carried the truck into the center divider, slamming the driver’s side against the concrete. Both wheels on the passenger side lifted several feet into the air before falling back down.
For a moment, Noreen sat there, stunned. Remembering they were still in danger, she shoved down on the accelerator but then realized the engine had died. She turned the key, got a few whines, but the damn thing wouldn’t turn over.
“They’re coming!” Riley said.
As Noreen tried the key one more time, she looked up the hill. The other truck was pulling off the 101 and heading down the slope at a saner rate than they had taken it.
“Dammit!” she said when the engine failed again. “Everyone out! Get over the divider and run! They can’t drive over that.”
Riley climbed out and opened the crew cab door to help Craig do the same. Noreen tried her door but it was jammed shut, so she scooted across to Riley’s side and got out.
“Take it,” Riley said, pushing the gun into Noreen’s hand. “You’re a better shot.”
Noreen had no idea if she was or not, but she took the weapon and said, “Keep moving!”
They circled behind the vehicle and climbed over the three-foot-high barrier. Once they were on the other side, Noreen glanced back at the other truck. It was almost to the freeway, just seconds behind them. She could see the driver now.
It was the bald bastard who’d punched her.
“Noreen!” Riley yelled.
Noreen jerked away from the divider and ran after her friends.
Martina couldn’t help feeling a sense of déjà vu as she sped down the freeway, following the truck and the SUV. The last time, she’d been chasing a Jeep — Ben’s Jeep. When she’d finally caught up to it, there was only the strange woman inside.
She hoped Jilly was right and Noreen was indeed in the truck.
Ahead, beyond a curve in the freeway, she saw a cloud of dust rise into the air. Its distance and timing coincided with where the vehicles should be. For a second, she wasn’t sure what they were doing, and then it dawned on her.
The accident.
They must have been trying to find a way around it.
As she swung around the bend, she could see where both vehicles had gone off the road. She raced over, stopping at the top for a quick look.
What she saw stunned her. The truck that Noreen was supposedly in had crashed against the center divider. The SUV had stopped next to it and men were piling out of it.
Armed men.
Martina looked around for her missing friends. The pickup truck and the area around it were deserted.
One of the men from the SUV shouted and pointed down the road. Martina turned her head and spotted Noreen, Riley, and Craig on the other side of the center divider, running under the overpass.
The crack of a gun was followed by one of the men shouting, “Next one won’t be a warning so you might as well stop running now!”
“We have to do something,” Jilly said.
“Get off,” Martina told her.
“What?”
“Get off!”
As Jilly climbed from the bike, Martina pulled her pistol out of her backpack and then handed the bag to her friend.
“You can’t go down there,” Valerie said. “They’ll kill you.”
“Those are our friends. I’m not going to just leave them.”
Martina gunned her bike. But instead of going down the hill where the others had, she raced across the freeway and maneuvered through a dirt divider to a transition lane leading to the southbound 405. As she reached the lanes, another gunshot boomed.
Followed by a scream.
Noreen caught up to Riley and Craig as they reached the underpass.
“Keep moving!” she urged them.
“I’m trying,” Craig said, out of breath. “I’m just…I’m trying.”
Noreen threw an arm around him, taking some of his weight. When Riley started to do the same on his other side, Noreen said, “No. I’ve got him. You keep going!”
Behind them she heard the other truck skid to a stop, and soon after the sound of feet hitting the road. Seconds later, a bullet screamed through the air above them. A voice yelled for them to stop.
As Noreen and Craig continued forward, she heard another sound behind them.
Dammit. They have a motorcycle.
How would she and her friends outrun that?
She looked around, and then pointed ahead to where the bridge ended. “Over there, into the brush.”
If they could get through that and into the city, they might be able to find someplace to hide before the motorcycle discovered them. But as they angled across the freeway, Noreen heard the bike again, ahead of them this time. They were being squeezed in a vise.
Boom!
Something hit Noreen’s shoulder, knocking her forward. For a split second, she thought it was a rock, but then searing pain engulfed her.
She screamed.
Riley twisted around at Noreen’s cry just in time to see her friend fall to the road. Craig staggered forward, almost falling with her, and then lowered to his knees next to her.
As Riley ran toward them, she saw that the kidnappers had passed into the shadows of the overpass. Focusing back on her friends, she noticed her pistol lying on the ground a few feet in front of Noreen.
She raced to it, scooped it up, and fired down the road. The men scattered, looking for cover, but there was none between her and them. She continued to pull the trigger until the pistol clicked empty.
When the shooting stopped, all but one of the men stood back up.
“Riley! Down!”
Startled, she whirled around and saw Martina standing about twenty feet behind her, aiming a gun in her direction.