Sharks, Matt Rogers [shoe dog free ebook TXT] 📗

They left the two bodies on the ground as they leapt back into the jeep.

Its front end was dented, most of the paint stripped off as Vince had ground the Crown Vic along its framework in his desperation to escape. But it still drove fine. King had his foot on the accelerator before his rear end touched the seat, and he threw the vehicle in reverse and whipped it round the same way Vince had done seconds earlier.

Their windshield lined up with the lot’s exit, and King saw the Ford fishtail wildly out into the middle of the road, avoiding a head-on collision with a passing car by a couple of feet.

Slater levered up and over the lip of the passenger door, hanging his upper half out of the jeep, but he had to aim and fire with his bad arm.

He loosed a couple of shots at Vince’s rear tyres.

He missed, striking asphalt.

Nobody’s perfect.

Vince roared away from the walk-up, heading east along Settlers Way. From there he could go north up Coral Road, get onto Grand Bahama Highway and bomb all the way to the far west or east of the island. If they lost sight of him, they’d lose him for good.

That couldn’t happen.

King gave the jeep all it had as he slid out onto the road, well aware that a collision would spell disaster for both them and the unfortunate vehicle they crashed into. But he navigated through the congestion of a few passing cars and then he was doing sixty, seventy, eighty miles an hour, climbing rapidly.

Churches and convention centres and shops whipped past on either side.

Above the howling wind streaming into the open top, he shouted, ‘What the hell was that?!’

‘Sometimes you get unlucky,’ Slater shouted back. ‘He had a hidden piece.’

‘That doesn’t mean he should have got the jump on you.’

‘Something tells me he would have made an excellent candidate for Black Force in another life. He was just as fast as me.’

‘Didn’t realise he was a government assassin too.’

‘That gets your rocks off, does it?’ Slater said. ‘Kicking me while I’m down?’

‘That should have been a cakewalk,’ King said, then slammed a palm on the wheel. ‘Fuck!’

‘It’s my fault. End of story.’

‘You think he has a past we didn’t factor in?’

Slater shook his head, putting pressure on the makeshift tourniquet. ‘No. He just moved like lightning. That’s the only way I can describe it. He knew his life was on the line. Did you do any damage?’

‘Shot him in the hand and the leg.’

‘That’ll do it,’ Slater said. ‘Now we catch up or wait for him to slow down.’

‘Slow down?’

‘I saw the blood on the ground. You hit his artery.’

‘Maybe this guy defies physics or something,’ King said. ‘After all, he got away from us twice.’

‘Because we underestimated him.’

’Speak for yourself.’

‘You know you did, too. We were treating him like a deadbeat loan shark. It’s a wake-up call if I’ve ever seen one.’

King thrashed the jeep faster, both hands on the wheel.

A hundred feet ahead, the Crown Vic tore into the approaching roundabout fast enough to kill someone if it collided with traffic.

But it didn’t.

Vince spun left and went up Coral Road, just as King thought he would.

A couple of cars in the roundabout slammed on their brakes, skidding to a halt to avoid what they probably guessed was an out-of-control drunk driver.

They came to rest blocking King’s entry.

‘Shit,’ he snarled. ‘Hold on.’

Slater gripped the top of his door.

King twisted the wheel left and went off the road at ninety miles an hour.

54

Violetta had never been so scared.

They’d done everything right. Surveilling in all directions, keeping practiced eyes on the beach and the perimeter wall, one hand on their Glocks at all times, no matter how safe it seemed. Until King and Slater got back that’s how they’d remain. You could never be too careful, and their partners were out there razing hell across the island, so the least they could do was stay diligent until it was over.

Then the front door came in like it had been struck by a police door ram, and suddenly there was a tall skinny man in the living room with them, eyes bloodshot and teeth bared. All Violetta could think was that the guy had a surreal likeness to a violent pimp in Las Vegas named Armando Gates before he started charging across the room.

Automatic training kicked in.

Her gun came up and she locked on the target and fired, but he was moving faster than she’d anticipated. What was supposed to hit him in the chest tore into his shoulder instead. He didn’t seem to notice.

In her peripheral vision Violetta saw Alexis frozen in front of the couch.

‘Shoot!’ she screamed.

Neither Alexis nor the intruder heard her. There was horrified recognition in Alexis’ eyes, and then the guy was on her, driving her down into the sofa cushions, crushing her beneath his weight. The gun spilled out of her hands and she pawed at his rippling forearms, but she was no match. He had an animalistic hunger Alexis had never experienced before.

Violetta nearly panicked, but didn’t.

She’d have to shoot, despite how close together they were.

The alternative was unthinkable.

She leapt round the corner of the kitchen island and refocused her aim and fired. The bullet shredded through the intruder’s torso, going in his left lumbar, pulverising his spinal cord.

He barely registered it.

His eyes nearly bulged out of his skull as he pinned Alexis beneath him, dug his long dirty fingernails into her throat and squeezed with every ounce of pressure he had in his body.

Alexis’ eyes bulged.

Her mouth flapped and croaked.

She went bright red immediately, and her face twisted in pain. His fingers were breaking through the top layer of skin. His face was inches from hers, teeth bared. He laughed in her face. He whooped and hollered, despite the fact he should have been paralysed. Maybe he already was — maybe he’d lost all feeling in his legs, and didn’t care.

Violetta had two thoughts