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We’re okay.”
    Not so fast,
Jack thought.
    He curled his legs until his knees touched his chest, took a deep breath, then mule-kicked the driver’s seat. Balaclava lurched forward, his head smacking the steering wheel. The van skewed to the right, wheels thumping on the road’s berm.
    “Get him, get him,” Balaclava yelled.
    Jack spun on his butt, curled his legs again, and kicked the back doors. Knowing it would take more than one try, Jack kicked again, grunting with the effort, then again and again, until finally the rear doors burst outward. The thrum of the tires and the red glow of the taillights filled the interior. The van veered left. Jack bounced off the side wall.
    He rolled onto his side, got his feet under him, and stood in a half-crouch. His head banged against the van’s roof. He felt a pair of hands on his hips, pulling him backward. Headlights flooded the interior. A horn began honking. How close, Jack couldn’t tell. With his eyes squinting against the glare, Jack twisted sideways, broke free of the hands.
    “God damn it . . . !” the American shouted. “Get back—”
    “Grab him!” called Balaclava.
    Jack curled himself into a ball and heaved himself out the doors.
    •   •   •
    HE HIT THE ROAD HIP-FIRST. The impact jarred his spine and knocked the air from his lungs. He barrel-rolled over the road, stones gouging and scratching his arms, his eyesight filled with snatches of dark sky, dirt, tall grass alongside the road, and headlights. Behind him an engine roared. Tires skidding. A gust of air buffeted him as the car swerved around him. Jack felt himself plowing through grass, then down an embankment. He stopped rolling, faceup and staring at the sky. His stomach filled his throat and his eyesight sparkled. He rolled onto his belly, got his bound hands beneath his chest, and pressed himself up, then onto his knees. Down the road he saw the van’s brake lights flash as it skidded to a stop amid a cloud of dust. Thirty feet behind, the trailing car was also sliding to a stop.
    Damn,
Jack thought.
Frying pan to fire.
Now he had at least three pursuers to elude.
    The van’s driver’s-side door swung open and Balaclava hopped out.
    Jack got to his feet, started to turn to run. He stopped.
    The trailing car’s engine revved, veered sideways around the van, its nose aimed at Balaclava, who flung himself back into the van. The car plowed into the open door; it tore free and skipped over the car’s hood and roof in a shower of debris. The car skidded to a stop, the reverse lights came on, and it backed up until it was even with the van. As it passed, out the passenger window came a trio of orange muzzle flashes.
    “What the fuck?” Jack muttered.
    Spewing a rooster tail of gravel, the van surged forward, its rear doors banging open and shut. The brake lights went dark and faded into the dust cloud.
    The car kept backing up, picking up speed, then did a J-turn and skidded to a stop across the road from Jack. The car was black, a Mercedes E-Class.
    From the driver’s window a female voice shouted, “Get in!”
    Jack didn’t move.
    “Get in before they regroup and turn around!”
    No choice,
he thought.
    Half stumbling, half running, Jack crossed the road, went around the car’s rear bumper, then opened the passenger door, threw himself inside, and slammed the door shut. A moment before the dome light went dark and the car sped off, Jack glimpsed long black hair, and manicured nails on the steering wheel.
    •   •   •
    WITH THE CAR’S HEADLIGHTS OFF, the Mercedes’s powerful engine ate up the gravel road until they reached the intersection. The woman turned left onto pavement. In the flash of headlights Jack glimpsed a square, white-on-blue sign: a single number
3
. The woman floored the accelerator and within seconds the speedometer swept past 140 kph.
    In silence they drove on, the woman’s eyes flashing between the windshield and the rearview mirror. She was in