The Forbidden Tomb

34

As luck would have it, a passing rider stopped at the crash site to see if the first biker was injured from his fall. Unbeknownst to him, this random act of kindness might have saved his life. Of course, it probably didn’t seem very fortunate when McNutt pulled out his gun and stole the Vespa in the middle of the street, but at the very least it prevented him from being tackled from his speeding scooter.

‘Sorry,’ McNutt apologized, ‘I need it more than you.’

Then he grabbed the handlebars and sped off toward Cobb.

They followed the path of the ambulance, jumping the curb and speeding down the sidewalk. When they reached the end of the block, they slowed and frantically searched the street for any sign of the ambulance. It should have been easy to track — the ambulance was not only painted in bright orange and green, it also had flashing lights and a blaring siren — yet the vehicle was nowhere in sight.

McNutt’s stomach rolled at the thought of losing Jasmine. Cobb’s blood boiled at the idea of her kidnappers surviving the night without suffering intense pain.

Both developments were simply unacceptable.

Fortunately, their fears were a bit premature.

Cobb spotted the ambulance in front of a large truck. ‘There!’

The ambulance swung wide and swerved through an intersection, running through a red light as the oncoming cars screeched to a halt. From its acceleration, it appeared that the driver had found some room to move.

McNutt gunned the throttle, launching the mini-bike toward the crossing. It was the same approach they had used when tracking their target at the blast site: McNutt would follow the ambulance directly while Cobb looked for a way to get ahead of it. Following McNutt’s lead, Cobb did his part, tearing off in the same direction as the van.

Cobb zipped in and out of his lane, dodging slower cars and oncoming traffic as he tried to keep pace with the ambulance. The unrelenting stream of cars on both sides of the centerline forced him to focus on the road ahead. As the spaces between the vehicles grew tighter, Cobb knew he needed more room to operate.

He found it on the sidewalk.

Terrified pedestrians jumped out of his way as Cobb motored down the footpath. Building after building whizzed past as he sped through the city. The alleyways and cross streets offered fleeting glimpses of his target, but he needed to narrow the gap.

Cobb ducked low to lessen the drag and tried to squeeze every last bit of power from the small motor. From his rekky earlier in the week, he knew the upcoming parking garage provided his best opportunity to close the distance between himself and the kidnappers. It was a risky move, but their time was running out. If the ambulance made it to the highway system, there was no way that they could keep up.

Not on tiny scooters.

McNutt chased the van on the main street as Cobb swerved left and steered his bike up the entrance ramp of the massive structure. At the top of the incline, he cut diagonally across the garage’s uppermost level. Had it been earlier in the day, the spaces would have been filled with cars, but at this hour the floor was virtually empty.

With no traffic to slow him, Cobb pulled in front of the ambulance. Unfortunately, his view was over the side of a building, looking down to the pavement below.

Under normal circumstances, Cobb never would have risked a shot. The streets were full of innocent bystanders, and Jasmine was inside a speeding vehicle. And yet he sensed that this was his best opportunity to stop the van in the city.

It was a risky move, but one he opted to make.

Cobb steadied his aim, knowing that it should have been McNutt taking the shot. When it came to weapons, Cobb was highly skilled, but he wasn’t on McNutt’s level. Cobb knew all the variables — speeding vehicles, uneven pavement, varying elevations, wind, even temperature — but precisely compensating for their effects was a different matter. The calculations involved were staggering.

Unfortunately, McNutt was more than a block behind.

Cobb alone had the tactical advantage.

He took a deep breath then squeezed his trigger several times.

His first shot missed wide, but the windshield of the ambulance exploded on the second. The van lurched to the side, veering across the street through oncoming traffic. Other motorists were forced to take evasive action as the van swerved in front of them. The booming gunshots were followed by the sounds of brakes screeching and cars slamming into each other, one after the next. The groans of metal shearing against metal were accented by high-pitched cracks of shattering windows.

Cobb had hit the ambulance, but he had failed to stop it.

Worse, he had inadvertently created even more destruction.

He watched in horror as the day’s injury count grew in the massive pileup. Only McNutt’s quick reflexes saved him from becoming a casualty of the aftermath. As it was, he was merely immobilized, hemmed in by wreckage.

But the ambulance pressed on.

As Cobb reloaded, the driver pushed the accelerator to the floor and steered the ambulance down a narrow one-way alley. A moment later he turned sharply and the van disappeared behind the buildings one block over.

Cobb cursed as he gunned his scooter and looked for an exit.

By the time he reached street level, Cobb feared the worst. Five seconds can make all the difference in a chase. Thirty seconds was an eternity. The time had allowed McNutt to extricate himself from the traffic jam, but it had also put them at an even greater disadvantage. There was simply no way of knowing what had happened when they lost sight of the ambulance. As they sped down the one-way alley, Cobb knew they needed a break if they hoped to pick up the trail.

Ironically, their break was a trail.

At the end of the alley, they found torn chunks of rubber. Just beyond that, a scorched line had been burned onto the pavement. It started near the alleyway and haphazardly meandered down the street into the distance.

Cobb had seen similar markings before. He knew the rubber was a tire that had been torn from its wheel and that the ambulance was now riding on a rim. It was the grinding of metal on asphalt that had left the scarring. The zigzag pattern in the road meant the driver had never experienced losing a tire and was having trouble with the lack of stability.

More importantly, it meant they could follow the kidnappers.

Cobb and McNutt tore down the street in pursuit, their eyes pinned to the trail that led the way. Like the spark at the end of a fuse, they would inevitably reach the end. And when they did, they expected fireworks.

Not only had the missing tire made the ambulance hard to drive, but it had severely limited its speed. Only a few blocks from where they had first picked up the trail, they found the disabled vehicle stranded in the roadway.

Cobb and McNutt dismounted their bikes and approached on foot, using parked cars, garbage cans, and lampposts as cover. Neither liked the situation as they sensed they were charging into an ambush, but each accepted it was a chance that they had to take if they hoped to get to Jasmine and the bombers before the police arrived.

‘Cover me,’ Cobb said as they ducked behind an SUV less than twenty feet from the ambulance. ‘If they rigged the van to blow, you’ll be safer here.’

‘Screw safe,’ McNutt growled. ‘I want blood.’

‘You can get it from here. Now cover me.’

‘Yes, sir.’

Cobb took a deep breath and sprinted toward the ambulance, ready to return fire, but there was no sign of the man in black, the medic, or the driver. Still, he knew he wasn’t out of danger. There were a thousand different ways for the bombers to rig the rear doors. He realized any action he took from here on in might be his last.

Still, he had to know.

He carefully pulled the latch, hoping that the next sound he heard was a simple click rather than the deafening roar of a bomb followed by the singing of angels.

Instead the door swung open, revealing nothing.

The ambulance was empty.