Hawke sighed. “Absolutely bloody fantastic. I hope the gold disc’s not in there.”
“That’ll flush the bastards out though.” Lea checked the Smith & Wesson. “Only three rounds left.”
“I’ve still got all seven,” Hawke said. “And Rupert here hasn’t fired any either, have you Rupert?”
Pedestrians scattered away from the burning engine, but stayed close enough to film it on their phones.
Meanwhile. the stationary U-Haul truck in the middle of the junction was causing heavy tailbacks along Central Park West. Drivers were getting out of their cars and leaning over their doors to see what was going on, expressing themselves with the usual New York niceties.
“And you can fuck off, too!” Hawke said to one of them as he climbed out of the ageing Ford. The man began to remonstrate with him until the moment Lea and Ryan got out to join him and all three brandished their Smith & Wessons, at which point he bid them good day and shrank back into his Chevrolet.
“They’re trying to escape!” Lea shouted.
Vetsch and his men were now clambering dazed and confused from the burning wreck of the Mercedes. They fired a few shots randomly in the direction of the junction to keep Hawke at bay.
Hawke, Lea and Ryan ducked down behind the hot rod and winced as they heard bullets slam into the other side of the car with a deep metallic plunking sound.
“We have to get that golden fragment,” said Hawke.
“Easier said than done,” Lea said, craning her head over the hood and firing another shot at Vetsch and his men.
Hawke heard Vetsch screaming a command at his men, and seconds later they ran back to the burning car.
“They’re trying to get the golden arc out,” he said. “Now’s our chance.”
“What are you going to do?” Ryan asked.
“I want you two to put as much fire as you can on them,” he said, handing Lea his pistol. “I’m going to get that piece of gold back. Whatever it is, we need it, and we don’t want Zaugg to have it.”
Ryan stared at his gun with incomprehension, while Lea leaned confidently over the hood, a gun in each hand, and started firing at the men.
She hit the man who had returned to the car, and he collapsed screaming to the ground, clutching his upper leg. Seeing his comrade fallen, the other man retreated, despite Vetsch screaming for him to return.
Hawke was in a forward position now, covered by a parked Toyota just a few yards from the Merc. He heard the sirens of the emergency services as they closed in on them, and doubted Sir Richard Eden had all that much influence with the NYPD but guessed he’d find out one way or the other.
One of the men stepped forward, but Hawke lunged toward him and grabbed the man’s weapon in one hand, disarming him, while thrusting his other hand forward in a lethal tiger-punch which landed with a sickening crunch in his windpipe. He fell to the ground wheezing, purple-faced as the pedestrians looked on with a mix of horror and entertainment.
Another man ran toward Hawke, but the Englishman whirled around just in time to fire a classic double-tap into him and he lurched forward like a tailor’s dummy, tumbling onto the sidewalk and rolling into the gutter.
Vetsch fired at Hawke, but he was prepared for the volley of Uzi fire and ducked behind another car for some instant cover. He raised the gun over the hood to return fire when he saw Vetsch was trying to take a passer-by hostage to save his own skin.
Vetsch’s heavy hand gripped the woman around her waist and pulled her toward him with the ease of a bear flipping a salmon out of a river.
But seconds later she spun around, effortlessly slipping out of his grasp and brought her right knee up into his groin with eye-watering power and accuracy while simultaneously raising her clenched fist into the downward trajectory of his face.
The results weren’t pretty, but she cleared things up with a well-aimed crescent kick that launched him backwards down the ramp of a multi-storey car park.
Hawke was speechless.
The woman shrugged her shoulders. “Self-defense classes,” she said, and picked up her bag.
Hawke knew they had to get the golden arc and get the hell out of there before the cops came or they would be in jail until cockroaches took over the earth.
Lea fired and struck Vetsch’s last man in the upper body, exploding his chest and throat and propelling him through the air like a doll until he crashed down on the hood of a silver BMW. Hawke whistled through his teeth: “Remind me never to get on the wrong side of that girl.”
With all of his men down and Lea’s fire now turned on him, Vetsch cursed and ran deeper into the underground car park.
Hawke seized the moment and sprinted toward the burning wreckage. Dozens of people were filming him on their phones as he shielded his eyes from the heat and smoke and peered into the Merc for the golden fragment.
The sound of the sirens grew louder — almost at the junction, he thought. Then he saw the gold, lying on the rubber mat in the front passenger’s footwell. The flames were now inside the car, licking at the walnut-veneer dashboard and leather steering wheel, and the cab was filling with pungent, toxic fumes.
He dropped the gun and leaned in to grab the fragment, shoving it into his pocket, and then turned to the pedestrians. “Get out of here before she blows, you bloody idiots!” And with that he sprinted back to Lea and Ryan who were waiting back with the hot rod.
He held up the piece of gold and smiled. “They were actually very obliging in the end.”
“Are you sure about that, cowboy?” Lea gestured over his shoulder.
Hawke turned to see Vetsch exiting the car park at speed on a vintage Harley-Davidson. He skidded to a halt alongside the body of his dead comrade and picked up his Uzi before turning the handlebars in the direction of the hot rod, his face a rictus of hatred and revenge.
CHAPTER NINE
“So you were right there and you forgot to pick up the Uzi?” Lea asked.
Hawke gave her a sideways glance, but said nothing.
“But I thought you were perfect, Joe Hawke. I’m so disappointed.”
“I got this thing, didn’t I?” he said, waving the strange golden semi-circle at her.
“Er, guys,” Ryan said, pointing at Vetsch. “Psychotic gunman on a Harley coming this way fast.”
“Sometimes he makes a good point,” Hawke said.
They climbed back into the battered hot rod and mounted the sidewalk in order to get away from the traffic. A block later they were in another car park, which they traversed with as much speed as they could, but Vetsch was behind them and closing fast.
Hawke drove onto Columbus Avenue amidst a hail of automatic fire from Vetsch, almost upon them now as he easily outmanouvered them in the faster and more agile Harley.
“Brace yourselves!” Hawke shouted. He slammed on the brakes, slowing rapidly and causing the Harley almost to go into the back of them.
“Get down, Ryan!” Lea shouted.
He ducked and a second later she blew out the back window. “Only two more shots left,” she said coolly.
“And with your aim that’s no joke,” replied Hawke.
Vetsch dropped back, the deep tones of the Harley’s shovelhead V-twin engine roaring against the Columbus Avenue Brownstones. Somewhere behind him they heard yet more sirens as the NYPD worked out where the trouble was and gave chase.
They weaved the hot rod neatly in and out of the traffic on Columbus and then Hawke swung the wheel hard to the right and skidded into West 86th Street so fast they nearly tipped the thing over.
The Harley made the corner more easily, and seconds later was alongside them. Vetsch was laughing maniacally as he casually pointed the Uzi at the Ford.
Hawke waited a split second then skidded into the Harley. The gun fired, spraying bullets up the front wing and into the cab before they collided with the bike and sent it flying off haphazardly toward a line of parked cars on the right side of the road.