The passenger-side door flew open. A dark-haired man half climbed out holding a semi-auto pistol in his hand—some kind of Glock. He started firing wildly in our direction, pointing the pistol without aiming down the sights.
One bullet went whizzing by overhead. Another hit the car behind me with a deepthunk.
I fired back once, but the gunman was moving, ducking behind the door, and I’d aimed for his head. The guy screamed twice as loud as Sofia and half-fell, half-ducked back into the car. I cursed at my miss.
There was no mistaking the sound of so many gunshots out in the open. The police would be on their way here very soon if they weren’t already. As thrilling as it might be, I couldn’t stick around to enjoy a gun fight in a motel parking lot at six-thirty in the morning on a Saturday. With no goddamn coffee, either.
I crouched, turning to glance at Sofia, half-expecting her to be running for the hills. But she was in the passenger seat, cowering low. A quick once-over showed me that she wasn’t bleeding from anywhere. Her eyes were wide with shock and fear but not pain.
I had to get her out of here if I didn’t want her hurt, and I didn’t want her hurt. My next two shots went into both of the Seville’s tires. The other car’s front end was crumpled and the driver sported a hole in his head, but I didn’t want the remaining triggerman coming after me once I raced the hell out of here.
My ears were ringing as I finally dropped into the leather seat and slammed the door. I threw the car into gear, grateful I’d backed in to park. I stomped on the accelerator, and the Audi shot forward.
We raced past the crashed car. The guy inside seemed more interested in staying in cover than shooting. The gunfight had rattled him. He must’ve believed they would roll up and use surprise to make us easy prey to gun down.
I braked hard at the end of the motel’s lot, turning to the right as the car reached the street and using the handbrake to let the rear end slide. We got lucky. One of the oncoming cars saw me flying out of the parking lot like a bat out of hell. They were driving defensively and braked; otherwise, things might not have gone smoothly as I fishtailed into traffic and accelerated like a rocket.
“Are you hurt?” I demanded as I wove through traffic, then swerved onto a side street, desperate to put distance between us and that ridiculous firefight at the motel.
“No,” she said, clearly shaken.
I risked a glance at her. She was sitting up and buckled in. Her face was very pale, with dark circles under her eyes so dark they looked like bruises. She was breathing fast, nearly panting. Her hair was still wet from her shower. But I still didn’t see any blood, so that was a win.
My attention returned to the road. I needed to get far enough fast enough that I could start driving nice and casual again. People paid attention when you were speeding and weaving through traffic. In this day and age of a million and one smartphones, the police were only a quick call away, and every phone was a camera.
I kept glancing in the rearview mirror to see if there was a second car in pursuit. A second car would indicate more elaborate planning than the majority of half-assed mob hits, but somehow,someonehad found us. I’d done something wrong. Been sloppy. Made some mistake. I couldn’t afford another.
Following a few turns down side streets, I ran a stale yellow light to see if anyone behind would follow. But no one ran the red, so no one was after us.
My pounding heart slowed a little, and I loosened my strangle-grip on the steering wheel. I desperately needed to ditch this car and get another. For that, I needed Ryan. He was in the stolen car racket with a chop shop in Newark and another in the Bronx. Ryan had been the one to hook me up with this Audi S4 with its clean plates, but they wouldn’t be clean for long.
I took a couple more random streets, then slowed to get my bearings. We were in Winfield, heading to Clark and miles from the shooting, but that didn’t mean I was out of the woods yet.
“Where are we going?” Sofia asked, the life starting to come back to her as the adrenaline-rush of terror drained away. She sounded rattled, and her hands were shaking. That was normal, but it made me feel bad. As if I’d failed her somehow. It made no sense, but hell, there it was.
“Somewhere safe,” I said, slowing to a stop at a light.
“Wasn’t the motel supposed to be safe?”
I didn’t say anything. She was right. There was no way they could’ve found us there, miles from New York. That had me in a cold sweat. I was used to being the hunter, not the hunted.
“Did you call anyone?” I asked. Not angry. Not accusing her. Just a question. I’d quickly searched through her suitcase last night and hadn’t found another phone or anything that could connect to the internet. Although, maybe I’d missed something…
“Of course not. You took the only phone.”
Very true. In fact, the motel phone was still in the car, down near her feet. Apparently, I was guilty of stealing it. But there had to be something I was missing. Either Sofia was lying or we were being tracked somehow.
I kept driving until I found an alley near a construction site. The site was empty on the weekend. I pulled around back, out of view of the street. I needed to sort some shit out. Because if Sofia was telling the truth, I was starting to think we’d been tagged with a tracking device somehow.
After turning off the engine, I glanced at Sofia. She looked young enough to make my heart ache at the fear in her eyes. Ruthlessly, I stomped down on those feelings. That kind of shit would make me weak. It would cause me to slip up, make more mistakes. I’d already fucked something up, or those goons would’ve never tracked us to some random motel so far from New York.
“Can I trust you to behave?” I asked her, my voice clipped.
“Yes,” she shot back, just as curt.
I nodded and reached for the door handle, but something she said froze me in place.
“I knew him…”
