AllFreeNovel
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We go around a curve. There are no other vehicles. Just us and the black car. I push the speed just under where I’m sure I can keep us on the road. Our altitude is climbing. We aren’t on the side of the mountain, but going off the road at this speed would end in certain death.
“Cann—”
“Quiet.” I’m about to maneuver around another curve when the car lunches forward and rams us.
Fuck.
We fishtail around the stretch, and Penelope cries out. She grabs the handle by the window and presses her other hand to the roof.
“Cannon!” This shout isn’t angry or righteous. She’s terrified.
I increase the speed even more. The black car races behind us but doesn’t ram us again. Our only hope is to make them crash or lose them. I’m not sure I can do either.
Penelope presses into her seat but hasn’t let go of her handholds. “Is it him?”
“I don’t know.” It’s not fucking Roman. Did he hire better guys to do his dirty work this time?
We’re on the descent. A few cars pass. Will they call the cops? Tell them that two cars are driving like maniacs? It’d both help and complicate things. The black car stays on my tail.
When we hit a flat stretch, the black car creeps up. This is what I get for driving a fucking family sedan. The car behind us has more horsepower.
I press the gas, but the reaction is sluggish. The car’s giving me as much as it can.
I try to swerve, but the front of the car clips my rear bumper and sends me fishtailing again. The only way to get control is to let off the gas and slow down. We’re rammed again. I jerk forward, and the seat belt catches. An oomph from Penelope tells me the same thing happened to her. I manage to keep us on the road.
A turnoff’s coming up. I can’t outrun the black car, but maybe on the dirt road, I can outmaneuver it.
I slam on the brakes, and the black car flies past us. Before I stop completely, I spin the wheel. We bounce through part of the ditch and rock onto the rough road.
Trees close in. Penelope’s bracing a hand on the door and one’s pressed into the roof again. This is probably a long driveway to someone’s house. I don’t fucking care. I need to get Penelope somewhere safe.
I spot the black car in the rearview mirror, and it’s catching up.
Shit.
There’s a sign about poor road conditions, and I don’t have time to react. We hit a depressed section of the road. The front end slams into it, lurches over, then hits a large washed-out section, and slams to a stop.
Penelope’s cry is cut off as the airbags puff open. Yellow smoke filters through the air as I blink, trying to orient myself from speeding to a complete stop against an exploding pillow. My heart’s hammering. I shake my head and only make the disorientation worse.
Penelope’s coughing against the chemical smoke when her door’s wrenched open. Panic freezes the blood in my veins.
Shit. The locks disengaged. I reach for her, desperate to do something to get us out of this situation, but my door is ripped open and a cold barrel is pressed against my ringing head. I raise my hands. I can’t go for my weapon, and I don’t want a gun going off near her.
“What are you—” Penelope stops struggling against the man in black. She blinks at the gun against my head.
“Unbuckle and get out,” the man growls. Both men are dressed in black shirts and black jeans. Innocuous enough if they have to be seen in public, but enough to tell me they’re hired guns. Unlike the earlier fumbling attempts outside the massage place and at Brittany’s house, these guys know what they’re doing.
What the hell are they doing? Roman paid me. He knows I know. Is he getting rid of me too?
Fuck! I should’ve looked harder, figured out exactly what Roman’s goal was. I thought he was predictable, but whatever’s driving him has made him unpredictable.
Penelope looks at me, eyes wide. I nod. If these guys had wanted to kill her, they’d have kept trying to run us off the road around the curves. They wanted me to get off the public roads and onto the back roads. I should’ve seen it.
“Get out, Ms. Hughes,” the guy on her side says. “We’re here to help you.”
She swings her head around. “Help? You’ve got a gun on him.”
“I’ll explain when you get out.”
