Let’s not get too comfortable, Kelly, he told himself. Now you know that there’s two bad guys up there, one armed and well concealed in that doorway. He settled in his seat and locked his eyes on the potential threat, watching for patterns of activity. The one in the doorway would be the real target. The misnamed ‘lieutenant’ was just a hireling, maybe an apprentice, undoubtedly expendable, living on crumbs or commission. The one he could just barely see was the real enemy. And that fit the time-honored pattern, didn’t it? He smiled, remembering a regional political officer for the NVA. That job had even carried a code name. ERMINE COAT. Four days they’d stalked that bastard, after they’d positively identified him, just to make sure he was the one, then to learn his habits, and determine the best possible way to punch his ticket. Kelly would never forget the look on the man’s face when the bullet entered his chest. Then their three-mile run to the LZ, while the NVA’s reaction team headed in the wrong direction because of the misleading pyro-charge he’d set up.
What if that man in the shadows was his target? How would he do it? It was an interesting mental game. The feeling was surprisingly godlike. He felt like an eagle, watching, cataloging, but above it all, a predator at the top of the food chain, not hungry now, riding the thermals over them.
He smiled, ignoring the warnings that the combat-experienced part of his brain was beginning to generate.
Hmm. He hadn’t seen that car before. It was a muscle car, a Plymouth Roadrunner, red as a candy apple, half a block away. There was something odd about the way it –
‘Kelly …’ Pam suddenly tensed in her seat.
‘What is it?’ His hand found the .45 and loosened it in the holster just a millimeter or so, taking comfort from the worn wooden grips. But the fact that he’d reached for it, and the fact that he’d felt a sudden need for that comfort, were a message that his mind could not ignore. The cautious part of his brain began to assert itself, his combat instincts began to speak more loudly. Even that brought a surge of reflective pride. It’s so nice, he reflected in the blink of an eye, that I still have it when I need it.
‘I know that car – it’s -‘
Kelly’s voice was calm. ‘Okay, I’ll get us out of here. You’re right, it’s time to leave.’ He increased speed, maneuvering left to get past the Roadrunner. He thought to tell Pam to get down, but that really wasn’t necessary. In less than a minute he’d be gone, and – damn!
It was one of the gentry customers, someone in a black Karmann-Ghia convertible who’d just made his transaction, and, eager to have this area behind him, shot left from beyond the Roadrunner only to stop suddenly for yet another car doing much the same thing. Kelly stood on his brakes to avoid a collision, didn’t want that to happen right now, did he? But the timing worked out badly, and he stopped almost right next to the Roadrunner, whose driver picked that moment to get out. Instead of going forward, he opted to walk around the back of the car, and in the course of turning, his eyes ended up not three feet from Pam’s cringing face. Kelly was looking that way also, knowing that the man was a potential danger, and he saw the look in the man’s eyes. He recognized Pam.
‘Okay, I see it,’ his voice announced with an eerie calm, his combat voice. He turned the wheel farther to the left and stepped on the gas, bypassing the little sports car and its invisible driver. Kelly reached the corner a few seconds later, and after the briefest pause to check traffic, executed a hard left turn to evacuate the area.
‘He saw me!’ Her voice hovered on the edge of a scream.
‘It’s okay, Pam,’ Kelly replied, watching the road and his mirror. ‘We are leaving the area. You’re with me and you’re safe.’
Idiot, his instincts swore at the rest of his consciousness. You’d better hope they don’t follow. That car has triple your horsepower and –
‘Okay.’ Bright, low-slung headlights made the same turn Kelly’d executed twenty seconds earlier. He saw them wiggle left and right. The car was accelerating hard and fishtailing on the wet asphalt. Double headlights. It wasn’t the Karmann-Ghia.
You are now in danger, his instincts told him calmly. We don’t know how much yet, but it’s time to wake up.
Roger that.
Kelly put both hands on the wheel. The gun could wait. He started evaluating the situation, and not much of it was good. His Scout was not made for this sort of thing. It wasn’t a sports car, wasn’t a muscle car. He had four puny cylinders under the hood. The Plymouth Roadrunner had eight, each one of them bigger than what Kelly was now calling on. Even worse, the Roadrunner was made for low-end acceleration and cornering, while the Scout had been designed for plodding across unpaved ground at a hot fifteen miles per hour. This was not good.
Kelly’s eyes divided their time equally between the windshield and the rearview mirror. There wasn’t much of a gap, and the Roadrunner was closing it rapidly.
Assets, his brain started cataloging. The car isn’t completely useless, she’s a rugged little bitch. You have big, mean bumpers, and that high ground-clearance means you can ram effectively. So what about the coachwork? That Plymouth might be a status symbol for jerks, but this little baby can be – is – a weapon, and you know how to use weapons. The cobwebs fell completely from his mind.
‘Pam,’ Kelly said as quietly as he could manage, ‘you want to get down on the floor, honey?’
‘Are they -‘ She started to turn, the fear still manifest in her voice, but Kelly’s right hand pushed her down towards the floor.
‘Looks like they’re following us, yes. Now, you let me handle this, okay?’ The last unengaged part of his consciousness was proud of Kelly’s calm and confidence. Yes, there was danger, but Kelly knew about danger, knew a hell of a lot more than the people in the Roadrunner. If they wanted a lesson in what danger really was, they’d come to the right fucking place.
Kelly’s hands tingled on the wheel as he eased left, then braked and turned hard right. He couldn’t corner as well as the Roadrunner, but these streets were wide – and being in front gave him the choice of path and timing. Losing them would be hard, but he knew where the police station was. It was just a matter of leading them there. They’d break contact at that point.
They might shoot, might find a way to disable the car, but if that happened, he had the .45, and a spare clip, and a box of ammo in the glove compartment. They might be armed, but they sure as hell weren’t trained. He’d let them get close … how many? Two? Maybe three? He ought to have checked, Kelly told himself, remembering that there hadn’t been time.
Kelly looked in the mirror. A moment later he was rewarded. The headlights of another, uninvolved car a block away shone straight through the Roadrunner. Three of them. He wondered what they might be armed with. Worst-case was a shotgun. The real worst-case was a rapid-fire rifle, but street hoods weren’t soldiers, and that was unlikely.
Probably not, but let’s not make any assumptions, his brain replied.
His .45 Colt, at close range, was as lethal as a rifle. He quietly blessed his weekly practice as he turned left. If it comes to that, let them get close and go for a quick ambush. Kelly knew all there was to know about ambushes. Suck ’em in and blow ’em away.
The Roadrunner was ten yards behind now, and its driver was wondering what to do next.
That’s the hard part. isn’t it? Kelly thought for his pursuer. You can get close as you want, but the other guy is still surrounded by a ton of metal. What are you going to do now? Ram me, maybe?
No, the other driver wasn’t a total fool. Sitting on the rear bumper was the trailer hitch, and ramming would have driven it right through the Roadrunner’s radiator. Too bad.
The Roadrunner made a move to the right. Kelly saw its headlights rock backwards as the driver floored his big V-8, but being in front helped. Kelly snapped the wheel to the right to block. He immediately learned that the other driver didn’t have the stomach to hurt his car. He heard tires squeal as the Roadrunner braked down to avoid a collision. Don’t want to scratch that red paint, do we? Good news for a change! Then the Roadrunner snapped left, but Kelly covered that move also. It was like sailboats in a tacking duel, he realized.