Read Empty Bodies (Book 5): Damnation for Free Online

yards back or so. How the guy in the truck had hit Thomas from that distance was somewhat of a miracle. It had either been a lucky shot, or they were packing the proper artillery and skill for such a shot.
    Another minute or so passed before the men fired again. After a few shots, each spaced wide apart, there was a loud pop. Gabriel’s control on the SUV dissipated, as one of the rear tires blew out.
    “Shit!” Gabriel yelled. “They hit a tire!”
    He looked down to the speedometer, and it had dropped from 120 all the way down to 95, and continued falling. He looked in the rearview mirror and saw that the truck was now between the two sedans. The man standing in the back pumped his fist, his rifle now pointed to the air.
    But Gabriel wasn’t going to give up easily. These men would kill them, he was sure. He kept his foot down on the gas, all the way to the floor. In the rear, Thomas still groaned, and Gabriel’s control of the SUV continued to weaken.
    “You two have to get up in your seats,” Gabriel said to Claire and Jessica. He was worried about a bad accident now. If that happened, the girls would be thrown around the SUV like clothes inside a dryer. When neither girl moved, he yelled, “Now!”
    Jessica moved first, before she realized that Claire was remaining still in the floor. She went down and said something into the girl’s ear, and then Claire finally got up into the seat. No more gunshots came, and they were each able to make it into their seats and get buckled in.
    “Duck your heads,” Gabriel said.
    “What about Thomas?” Jessica asked.
    Gabriel didn’t answer. He could only hope they didn’t get into an accident, tossing Thomas around the inside of the SUV.
    Another round of gunfire came from the pursuing caravan. There were three shots before the other tire in the back of the SUV blew.
    This shot was the fatal one.
    Cruising at 90 miles per hour and losing another tire, Gabriel lost all control of the SUV. The back end got away from him, and by instinct, he slammed on the brakes.
    The vehicle fishtailed, and then it flipped.
    When the SUV finally stopped rolling, Gabriel groaned. Everything hurt. He clutched at his ribs as he tried to cough. Though the seat belt had saved his life, it had constricted his midsection. Gabriel now found it hard to take in even a single breath.
    Outside, tires squealed and the smell of burning rubber permeated the air.
    “Jessica?” Gabriel asked. “Claire?”
    No one responded.
    Car doors slammed and men laughed.
    Gabriel reached around, trying to find a weapon. He looked for the shotgun Jessica had handed him, but he couldn’t even gauge in what way the SUV had landed.
    One of the doors opened, and as he stretched to try and look, his side screamed at him and he cried out.
    “We got one movin’ in here,” a man said.
    Another said, “Get his ass out.”
    A set of hands reached down, and Gabriel’s vision was too blurry for him to even see them clearly. He was on the verge of blacking out. As his seatbelt unbuckled, he slapped at the arms in front of him, but it was of no use.
    “Get your ass up,” a man said, and began to lift.
    Gabriel cried out as the man tried to pick him up, and his entire body fell limp. He now realized that the SUV had come to a stop on its side. He looked up, and the sun shined into the cab of the truck, blocking out the face of a man.
    The man said something, which sounded muffled.
    The last thing Gabriel saw before he was out cold was the man’s fist coming down into his face.

CHAPTER SIX

    “Are we sure we can trust them?” Holly asked.
    Will shook his head. “Let’s just wait it out and see what they have to say.”
    Karl and Laurie had stepped away from the group to talk amongst themselves. A couple of minutes passed, and they finally returned to Will and the others.
    “All right,” Karl began. “It’s clear that if that boy doesn’t get some attention soon, he’s going to be in serious trouble. We have