Hellbent

Seventeen bullets.

The lead car crept up alongside him, nosing parallel to the Caddy’s rear tires.

The PIT maneuver, or precision immobilization technique, was adapted from an illegal bump-and-run strategy used in stock-car racing. The pursuing car taps the target vehicle just behind the back wheel, then veers hard into the car and accelerates. The target vehicle loses traction and spins out.

The lead cop car was preparing for it now.

Unfortunately for him, so was Evan.

He waited, letting the cruiser ease a few more inches into position at the rear of the Caddy.

Then he hit the brakes.

He flew backward, catching a streak of the driver’s Oh, shit face as he rocketed by.

The cars had perfectly reversed positions, the do-si-do taking all of half a second.

Evan crumpled the sturdy prow of the Caddy into the rear of the cruiser, steered into the crash, and stomped on the gas pedal.

The cruiser acquiesced to the laws of physics, sheering sideways. It wrapped around the grille of the Cadillac in a series of elegant mini-collisions before fishtailing off. As Evan motored ahead onto open road, he watched in the rearview as the cruiser wiped out one of its confederates, wadding them both into the roadside ditch, where they steamed in a tangle of bent chassis and collapsed tires.

One set of headlights held steady, navigating through, sticking to the Caddy’s rear.

A quarter mile flew by, then another, as Evan and the last cop standing gauged each other.

The cop finally feinted forward, trying to steer into position, but Evan held him off by veering squarely in front of him. They kept on that way, swerving unevenly across the sodden road, the cruiser coming on, Evan answering with avoidance maneuvers.

The Caddy was growing weary, the reaction time a little worse by the second. Evan was pushing it to the limit, but it was a low limit.

He eyed the mirror. The cruiser gathered itself on its haunches, readying to dart forward again to deal a decisive blow.

All right, Jack. What next?

First of all, get off your heels, son. The Ninth Commandment: Always play offense.

“Right,” Evan said to the empty passenger seat.

He raised his 1911, turned away, and shot out the windshield. It spiderwebbed, but the laminate held it in place. With the heel of his hand, Evan knocked out the ruined glass, and rain crashed in over him, a wave of spiky cold. Evan stomped the brake hard and whipped the wheel around. The boat tilted severely as the back swung forward, sloughing through mud. For a moment Evan thought it might flip.

But it righted itself into a sloppy 180, Evan jerking the transmission into reverse and letting the wheel spool back through his loose fists. Gears screamed.

So did the girl in the trunk.

Already he’d seated the gas pedal against the floor, capturing what forward momentum he’d had, except now he was driving in reverse.

Nose to nose with the cruiser, their bumpers nearly kissing.

The young cop at the wheel blinked at him.

They hurtled along the road, two kids in a standoff on a seesaw.

Except the seesaw was traveling fifty miles per hour.

Wind howled around the maw of the windshield. Driving backward protected Evan from the rain. He had a clear view over the top of his pistol and no bullet-deflecting glass between him and the target.

Before the cop could react, Evan jogged the wheel slightly, offsetting the vehicles, opening up an angle to the side of the cruiser.

He shot out the front tire.

Fifteen rounds left.

As the cruiser wobbled and lost acceleration, Evan braked in time with it, holding it in his pistol sights the entire way.

Both cars slowed, slowed, gently nodding to their respective halts. They faced each other about ten yards apart.

Pistol locked on the cop, Evan got out of the Caddy. His boots shoved mounds in the soggy ground. The rain had stopped, but the air still felt pregnant, raising beads of condensation on his skin. His shirt felt like a wet rag.

The cop was still buckled in, fingers locked on the steering wheel, collecting himself.

“Out,” Evan said. “Hands.”

The cop unbuckled and climbed out. Sweat trickled down his face, clung to the strands of his starter mustache. He stood in the V of his open door. Evan indicated for him to step clear of the car, which he did. He looked earnest and stalwart standing there before the block lettering of his cruiser: HILLSBORO PD. A holstered Glock rode his right hip. His hands were shaking, but only slightly. He wore a wedding ring.

A muffled voice yelled from the Caddy’s trunk, “Don’t do it! Don’t you hurt him!”

The cop stiffened, licked his lips. “Who’s that?”

Evan said, “I’m not sure yet.”

The cop inched his hands down a bit.

“You have a family,” Evan told him.

The cop said, “And you’ve got a girl in the trunk of your stolen vehicle.”

“I’ll admit there are rare occasions on which there’s a reasonable explanation for that,” Evan said. “This is one of them.”