“Oh, whatever. You were—”
Lily slumps forward heavily as a thick splash of blood explodes across the windshield.
Fuck me!
Time reduces to a crawl. I look behind us. There’s a small, neat hole in the rear window, with thin cracks branching out from it. Beyond that, I see the Suburbans. I see Pierce standing up through the sunroof of the one in front, holding a sniper rifle. Well, it clearly wasn’t a serious gunshot to his shoulder…
I turn back and stare down at Lily, dumbstruck. Her body has sagged against the center console. Half her head is missing, and her lifeless, empty eyes are wide and unblinking, staring up at me.
For what feels like a lifetime, I’m gone. I’m wandering through my own purgatory somewhere far away from here. Every moment I’ve shared with Lily flashes before my eyes. From meeting her for the first time in Kuala Lumpur, when she hit me with the door… How relaxed she made me feel after my first contract in the restaurant… Drinking together in the bar… When she kissed me in front of those blondes… The attraction I felt that I couldn’t explain, vehemently denied, and still feel guilty for… My heartache and anger when I thought she was trying to kill me, and my relief I felt when I realized she wasn’t… To right now, staring at the inside of her head as she’s slumped beside me.
That’s a lot to absorb in what was actually about three seconds.
I snap back to the here and now and look over at Kaitlyn. She’s just beginning to register what’s happened, flicking her gaze between the road and Lily’s corpse. The blood on the windshield has obscured the view in front of her. She’s shaken, panicking. She frantically turning the wheel to her left. I reach over to her, but I’m too late. We’re doing nearly sixty as we approach the exit for the airport’s security checkpoint. The Range Rover doesn’t even slide, it just flips.
Holy shit!
The world barrel rolls outside. I push my left hand against the dash on instinct, bracing against the inevitable impact. Kaitlyn brings both hands up to cover her head, but as time resumes its usual speed, she’s thrown against the wheel and ricochets back hard against her seat.
Uh!
Fuck!
Ah!
Shit!
Uh!
Uh!
Fuck!
The size of the vehicle has helped limit the roll, and we’re sliding across the road on our side as it doglegs right, branching off toward the main entrance of the construction site. Kaitlyn’s fallen down into me, pressing me against my door as it grinds and screeches along the ground like nails on a chalkboard.
I bring my right arm around Kaitlyn and hold her as tight as I can to my body. I’m trying to protect her as much as possible, but I can already see a thin trickle of blood coming from a head wound. Must’ve banged herself when she—
Shit!
The hood just hit something. The sound of metal twisting and warping from the impact feels like it’s making my ears bleed. We’ve spun around, so I’m now facing right instead of left. I can feel us slowing down, which is something.
We screech to a gradual halt.
I can’t hear much of anything, and I’m too disoriented to check if anything’s hurting. My only instinct right now is to get Kaitlyn and run. Pierce and his men will be on us any second, and…
What’s that smell?
I sniff hard. I’m trying to focus my mind long enough to identify the odor.
What the hell is—
Shit.
That smell… it’s gas. The fuel tank must be damaged. If we’re leaking gas everywhere, we need to get out of here now, before—
FWUMP!
That sounded suspiciously like a fire starting somewhere outside…
Kaitlyn’s laying on her side against my chest. She stirs. “W-what… happened?”
My eyes dart in every direction, desperately searching for a way out. I’m pinned against my door, between my seat and the dash. The window’s all kinds of cracked, but still intact. The driver’s side door is above us. Lily’s body is sagging over the edge of my seat. I can’t see her legs, but her torso and head is resting on Kaitlyn, which is adding more weight on me. My left arm’s trapped beneath me, and my right arm hurts like hell.
Oh, not good… not good…
Pierce and his merry band of assholes will be here any moment. Or maybe not, thinking about it… Our crash would have caught the attention of anyone nearby at the time, so emergency services are bound to be en route. He might want to save himself some time and avoid going through the motions of dealing with the authorities, however it is The Order deals with them in situations like this.
Either way, we have to go. Right now.
I lift my head. “Kaitlyn, are you okay?”
She groans. “Yeah, I… I think so.”
“Okay, good. Now… listen to me very carefully. You need to push Lily’s body off you and… kick the windshield out.”
I see her move her head to look at Lily. She screams.
Shit.
“Kaitlyn, did you hear me? You need to move Lily and… kick the glass out of the windshield right now, or… we’re gonna die. I can’t move until you do. Please… I know it’s hard, but… I need you to focus.”
She nods frantically, like she’s trying to convince herself it’s a good idea, despite every natural urge she has saying otherwise. “Okay.”
She lets out a low grunt of effort as she pushes Lily’s body up. She guides it back onto the rear seat, and uses the edge of my seat to heave herself up. I hear the unceremonious thud as the body lands hard against the rear door, level with me on the other side of the seat, out of sight.
I’m sorry, Lily. You deserved better than this.
Kaitlyn shifts awkwardly, trying to move her legs behind her so she’s essentially standing over me. I move my right arm up and rest it over my face to free up some space at the side of me so she can—
Ah!
She just stood on my chest…
She looks down and sucks air apologetically through her teeth. “Sorry!”
I shake my head. “It’s fine, just… get us outta here.”
She leans to the right and rests both hands on the windshield. She pushes a couple of times and I hear a creak as the entire pane of glass opens out like a door.
Huh… that was easier than I thought it would be.
Not that I’m complaining!
She looks down and carefully steps around me, then ducks as she shuffles herself out and onto the road. Once she’s clear, I push against the seat, first with my hand, and then with my legs, sliding out on my back and shimmying along on my elbows as quickly as I can.
I… hate… only… having… one… hand…
My body’s clear. I feel Kaitlyn tuck her hands under my arms and drag me out the rest of the way. The second my feet are clear, I’m on them. I grab her hand and we run.
What the…?
My face feels very warm and wet.
Oh, shit…
Head wound.
Fuck it, I’ll bleed later.
We keep moving. There’s a barrier running along the outside of the road. We climb over it and set off as fast as we can across the sun-scorched wasteland that sits between the expressway and the large construction site, which is maybe five hundred yards ahead of us.
I’m counting in my head how long we’ve been sprinting. Five seconds… ten…
An explosion erupts behind us, and we both drop to a crouch as a wave of heat rushes over us. We glance over our shoulders and see what’s left of the Range Rover’s metal frame engulfed in a hungry fire, blackened and torn from the initial blast. One of the wheels lands a few feet to my right and rolls for a moment before falling on its side.
Fuck, that was close!
The smoke is thick and dark, and the slight breeze is blowing it left, which is good — it’ll obscure Pierce’s view if he’s kept his distance, at least for a minute or so. Every second counts right now.