He shifted into sixth gear, leaned low over the handlebars, and blanked his mind. At lower speeds Hayes had felt every bump, every defect in the road, but at eighty miles an hour the Ducati settled in and all it took was the slightest shift of his weight to send the bike cutting to the left.
Hayes centered the front tire on the white dotted line and shot the gap, the engine echoing off the line of cars on either side. At this speed he knew all it would take was for one driver to open his door or veer out of his lane and he was done. Finished. But with a mile between him and the target vehicle, it was a risk Hayes had to take.
In the distance, the driver of the Excursion swerved into the right lane, and knowing that he had to get over, Hayes downshifted, slowing the bike while searching the line of cars for a break in the vehicles. He squeezed the brake and dropped into fourth gear, knowing that if the truck turned while he was boxed in it was game over.
But the line of cars remained unbroken, the traffic bumper to bumper for as far as he could see.
The Excursion’s brake lights flashed; it was about to turn, and Hayes was still stuck in the center lane and unable to get over.
He was about ready to start shooting out tires when the engine gave out on an overloaded work truck twenty-five yards in front of him. The driver of the injured truck hit the brakes and the moment Hayes saw the hole in the traffic, he was back on the throttle.
Hayes let the RPMs rise, waiting until the engine was screaming beneath him before shifting gears, and then he was leaning left, slicing around the work truck and into the right-hand lane, rushing after the Excursion.
He pushed the Ducati hard, careful to keep the tires to the left of the seam that demarcated the roadway from the shoulder and rocketed after the massive SUV as it made the right-hand turn off the highway.
Don’t lose them.
As Hayes neared the turn, he let off the gas and downshifted, using the transmission to slow the bike.
You’re too fast, the voice warned, but Hayes was already committed.
He leaned into the turn, shoving hard on the inner bar, knee hovering dangerously close to the asphalt. With his eyes locked on the spot he wanted the bike to go, all he had left to do was hold on.
There was nothing natural about taking a turn at a high rate of speed, and while Hayes knew the laws of physics were on his side, his brain screamed at him to slam on the brakes. But he resisted the urge, all too aware that this far into the turn, even the slightest touch of the brakes could send him flying off the bike.
Hayes held his line, carving the Ducati around the apex of the turn, waiting until the road straightened out before shifting his weight back to the center and rolling the throttle.
Two hundred yards ahead, the Excursion chugged sluggishly down the road. The heavy SUV was still trying to regain the speed it had lost negotiating the turn.
Got you.
Up to that point his only concern was catching up with his prey, and now that he’d done it, Hayes realized he had another problem.
How the hell am I going to stop that thing?
The easiest and most effective way to stop a car in motion was to kill the driver, but with Zoe unsecured in the backseat, he couldn’t take the risk. Shooting out the tires posed the same risk, and Hayes realized the only option that didn’t end up with Zoe in the morgue was to get inside the truck.
But how in the hell am I going to pull that one off?
Then he saw it, the gaping black maw that had once been the Excursion’s back window.
You’re not really going to . . . ? the voice began.
“Oh, yeah,” he answered, twisting the throttle.
In Hayes’s experience, the key to pulling off a high-risk maneuver had nothing to do with the plan and everything to do with his ability to execute before his brain caught up with his balls.
Wishing he had a helmet, Hayes set the cruise control and brought his feet up to the seat. The bike wobbled beneath him, but he got his balance and inched up into a crouch. Still holding on to the handlebars, Hayes cleared his mind.
He blocked out the road racing beneath him and the buffeting crosswind threatening to swat him off the bike, focusing on nothing but the impossibly small rectangle of shattered glass that was his target.
Timing was everything, and at the last instant, Hayes shifted his gaze to the Ducati’s front tire and the rapidly diminishing space that separated it from the Excursion’s back bumper. Knowing that if he didn’t get the jump right, instead of sailing into the SUV, the collision would pile-drive him into the rear end.
Wait for it . . . wait for it . . . now!
Using the handlebars as an anchor, Hayes catapulted himself over the windscreen a split second before the Ducati slammed into the back of the SUV. And then he was airborne, the added force of the collision slingshotting him through the shattered window and into the back of the Excursion.
At fifty miles an hour, he had barely enough time to brace for impact. He turtled his head into his shoulders and brought his hands up to cover his face before slamming into the pair of kitted-up goons who were trying to get a zip-tie around Zoe’s wrist.
Hayes bowled them over and went pinballing through the gap between the driver and passenger seat, thumping hard against the dash. The only thing that saved him from a broken back was the bulging assault pack strapped to his shoulders.
“Shit . . . that . . . hurt . . .” he grunted.
The sudden arrival of the bloodied man in their midst threw the Excursion into an uproar and Hayes took advantage of the confusion, bringing his leg up to his chest and slamming a size twelve hiking boot into the passenger’s face. He ricocheted the man’s head off the window hard enough to shatter the glass.
“Adam . . . help me!”
“Get to the door!” Hayes yelled.
He crunched up into a sitting position and was reaching for the wheel when the driver hit him with a backhand to the face that laid him flat. The blow starred his vision, but he was quick to recover. While the driver went for the pistol holstered on the front of his kit, Hayes snatched the Microtech Troodon from his pocket.
“Too slow,” he said, pressing the thumb release on the spine of the knife.
The blade deployed with a snap, and Hayes spun the handle, flipped it into an underhand grip, and buried the blade in the driver’s thigh. The driver’s first reaction was to pull away from the blade, and he let off the gas, hand still going for the pistol.
Hayes yanked the knife free with a hard twist, brought it up to center, and spiked it through the man’s forearm with enough force to bury the tip of the blade into the PMAG on the man’s chest.
“That’ll hold ya for a second,” Hayes said, reaching down between the man’s legs and grabbing the seat adjustment bar.
He yanked up and, using his shoulder, pushed the seat toward the rear, feeling the Excursion slow as the pressure on the accelerator was relieved. He was reaching across the floorboard, trying to engage the emergency brake, desperate to stop the SUV, when Zoe’s captors recovered.