The taxi driver crawled around them and managed to pick up my bag from the road.
“I’ve got it,” he yelled. In a panic, he ran toward the sidewalk and heaved it as far as he could, away from the two fighting men. The bag sailed through the air and landed on the other side of an ornate iron gate that locked off a lane from the main thoroughfare.
Everyone stopped moving. And then the motorcyclist was back on his bike, spinning his wheels so hard there was smoke when he took off.
“What the hell?” Viktor yelled at the driver.
“Sorry,” he yelled back. “I was trying to help.”
“My passport is in that bag,” I told Viktor in a panic. “And so is Lucy.”
Viktor stretched his arm through the gate, but he couldn’t reach it. “That little fucker is going to drive around the block and come at this from the other side. We have about forty-five seconds.”
There was a narrow passage between the gate and the wall. It was a long narrow space that extended about five feet before it opened to the other side. I watched as Viktor tried to fit himself in the space, but he was too big. “Blaire, sweetie, can you fit through here? We need your passport.”
I blinked at him and then looked at the space. “You want me to go in there?”
“Yes.”
I could feel my heart begin to pound in my chest. The entire world got bigger, and that space got so small. Too small to squeeze into.
He put his face in front of mine. “You can do this. In and out. Five seconds each way.”
“Okay.”
“You’ve got a whole thirty seconds to do this. Can you manage this?”
“Yes.”
I was working on my breathing. I stepped toward the wall and the fence. I could feel the cold stones of the wall on my back and the mental bars of the fence near my face.
It’s squeezing me.
“I can’t,” I sobbed.
“It’s okay.” Viktor reached in and pulled me back to safety. He kissed me hard on the lips. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. My passport is in there.” We could hear the whine of the motorcycle approaching.
“Come here.” Viktor grabbed my arm and yanked me back toward the taxi. He holstered his gun and then shoved his bag in my arms. “Go wait inside the airport—near security, okay? Wait for me there.”
“What are you doing?” I tried to hold the door open.
“Get her out of here!” Viktor yelled before he shut the door.
I spun around in the seat, looking out the back window. I could see Viktor sprinting down the sidewalk before he disappeared around the corner.
The driver looked at me in the review mirror. “Your boyfriend is badass.”
I slunk down in my seat. I had seen the fight at the night market, and I was terrified that Viktor would catch up to the man—I feared for his safety.
“I know.” And then I looked out the window and worked not to burst into tears.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
VIKTOR
The second the taxi wheels were rolling, I started to sprint toward the road. I needed to get that fucking bag back. The first motorcycle that passed I waved at the driver, shouting.
Human nature made him slow down in concern, giving me an opportunity to grab the handlebars of his bike. As the driver stepped back, trying to gain his balance, I jerked the bike, knocking him off-balance, and, in a supreme asshole move, I shoved him to the ground before swinging my leg over the bike.
“Are you hurt?”
The stunned driver shook his head.
“Sorry. I really need your bike,” I told him before I spun the bike around and headed one street over. Ahead of me, driving through a traffic circle, I saw the guy on the back of the bike with Blaire’s bag over his shoulders.
I worked to stay out of his line of vision by driving behind a truck until I was nearly upon him.
One look over his shoulder and he saw me. Then he gunned his bike. He had the advantage of a faster bike and a bike helmet. He weaved dangerously between traffic, forcing me to follow. I chased him over a bridge, through a pedestrian park, down three sets of stairs, through an outdoor mall and then onto the wrong side of another road.
He turned into a wet market which was nothing more than narrow walkways lined with kiosks selling fish, fruit and vegetables. He was moving much faster than me, but the crowds ahead of him were slowing him down. I could hear the pedestrian cries ahead, but I basically drove in his wake, trying to keep the bike upright on the slippery tiles.
I came around the corner, face-to-face with him at the end of the aisle. He was standing over his bike. When he twisted around, there was a semiautomatic gun in his hand.
Shit. I dove off my still-moving bike as he fired. Everything he shot seemed to explode on impact. Glass, liquid and ice cascaded around me. As I slid, I got one shot off, at his bike, before I moved out of view.
People screamed and stampeded around me.
I groaned as I kicked the heavy bike off my leg. Son of a bitch. Fuck, that fucking hurt. There was blood, my blood, creating a growing dark stain on my other pant leg. Motherfucker shot me. I righted the bike and backed it into the aisle. It was a carnage of busted-up fish and ice, and water was pouring everywhere, but miraculously, no one seemed to have been hit.
Except me.
I fired up the bike and gunned it. I followed him up a flight of cement stairs that led to the pedestrian cross park that connected the train, buses, a pond, and the market. In the distance, I saw him slowly driving toward the pond. My shot had miraculously hit its mark because now there was something wrong with his bike. It was smoking heavily. He kept looking over his shoulder at me. Aware that he had a pretty decent gun at his disposal, and I had limited coverage, I kept my distance. When his bike gave up, he dumped it and turned around, looking for me.
I pointed my gun at him, but I wasn’t necessarily interested in shooting the fucker.
When the crowd in the park saw our guns, pandemonium ensued as people ran screaming in all directions. But in a surprising act of retreat, he dumped the bag and raised his hands over his head.
I gunned my bike over to the bag and kept my weapon trained on him. “Do you speak English?”
“Yes.”
“Toss me the bag.”
He kicked it over to me.
I picked it up. Blaire’s passport was still in the front pocket. I looked down at my leg. The bullet had skimmed the very outside of my thigh, taking off a thick layer of skin. Blood was pouring out of my leg, but I was lucky the bullet hadn’t gone through muscle or bone.
“Who are you?”
“Just some guy doing a job.”
“Who hired you? What was the job?”
He gave me a cold smile. “Some French dude hired me to make your life difficult.”
“Difficult how?”
“He told me to pick a fight, but not to kill you. He also told me to separate you from the woman.”
My blood went cold at that statement. In the distance, I heard sirens.
“Get lost,” I told him.
Without hesitating, he turned and bolted toward the train station. I gunned the bike toward the road and eased into traffic, heading in the opposite direction of the sirens.
I had stupidly fallen for his ruse to separate me from Blaire. Had the taxi driver been part of the whole thing? Had they taken her?