‘Nothing more than expected.’
‘Good.’ The driver nodded. ‘We should move fast, before they cordon off the whole town.’
They pushed Dutch into the rear of the limousine with the Englishman on one side and the Russian on the other. The limo accelerated with smooth precision, the driver visible through a smoked-glass partition. They made several fast turns that left Dutch appreciative of the driver’s obvious skill. Streetlights smeared yellow through the windows, and from time to time she heard the distinctive thump-thump of helicopter blades passing overhead in the opposite direction.
The limousine turned onto a motorway and left the town behind, the driver navigating his way in and out of gaps between long trains of self-drive cars. Dutch upped her respect for the driver, until it occurred to her the limo must be equipped with a traffic override. Even so, he clearly had skill.
‘Hey,’ she shouted through the partition. ‘You ever race?’
No answer, although the Englishman made a conspicuous point of placing his Taser on his lap.
Dutch turned to look at him. ‘Tell me where you’re taking me,’ she said in a more reasonable tone of voice, ‘and I promise not to cut off your dick at the first opportunity.’
The Englishman favoured her with a small, tight grin. ‘You’re welcome to try.’
‘How about telling me who the hell you are?’
The Englishman turned away, staring fixedly out of the window.
She sat back, nothing to see outside now except motorway lights and occasional road signs. Dutch tried to think about what kind of people would be willing to stage a commando raid on a prison in order to break her out, and came up blank.
She could draw some conclusions, though. The only people who still owned manual-drive cars these days were billionaires, politicians and cops. She’d have bet serious money on the window-glass being bulletproof. The chassis and shell were most likely battleship steel, making it less a car than a streamlined tank.
* * *
The sky had begun to lighten by the time they turned off the motorway, driving down a narrow country lane and pulling to a halt next to an untilled field. A private jet—one of the new Chinese VTOL’s, although she couldn’t be sure since all its lights were off—sat in the centre of the field, its engines emitting a low hum.
The driver got out and pushed a gate open before driving the limo up next to the jet. Two men in bomber jackets armed with RPK’s stood guard by a boarding ladder. The driver and the Englishman led Dutch up and inside the aircraft while the Russian stayed behind.
Inside, Dutch saw a bar and a cluster of couches surrounding a low table. The couches were upholstered in what looked like authentic Kaiju-skin. An elderly Asian man with wisps of white hair neatly brushed against his skull and wearing a dark silk suit with a Mandarin collar sat on one of the couches, a smoothness to his cheeks suggestive of plastic surgery some time in the recent past. The barest hint of a fading gang tattoo peeked out from beneath one sleeve of his suit.
‘A delight to meet you at last, Miss McGuire,’ said the old man, his voice still carrying a trace of a Teijouanese accent.
Dutch took a step towards him. ‘Wu Changxing,’ she said, grinding the words out. ‘Are you the reason I’m here, you son of a bitch?’
‘He’s the reason you’re out of jail,’ snapped the Englishman from behind her. ‘How about you show a little respect?’
‘I don’t care,’ she spat. ‘Everything I know about him shows he’s just as much of a snake as Strugatsky. Now tell me what the hell is going on!’
The Englishman pushed her onto a couch facing Wu. He made sure she could see the Taser still in his hand.
‘Please get comfortable, Miss McGuire,’ said Wu. ‘I’m sorry about all the subterfuge, but we’re in something of a hurry.’
Dutch turned to see the driver bring in the boarding ladder and close the door before sitting on another of the couches. The engines built to a steady roar and the VTOL lifted upwards, the early morning sun rotating past the windows of the jet as it turned. The whine built higher, the acceleration smooth and steady as the jet picked up speed.
‘Now tell me what the hell is going on,’ Dutch demanded.
‘I would prefer to begin with a question of my own,’ said Wu. ‘Why did you try to rob Strugatsky—hadn’t he been paying you well enough?’
‘None of your damn business.’
Wu chuckled as he picked up a tablet computer from the table before him. ‘According to what I have here, Strugatsky sponsored you in the Devil’s Run back in ’51 with Jack Burton as your navigator. Eighteen hours into the race, a Spine-back sprayed poison in Mr Burton’s face and he died in agony two months later in a Tokyo hospital. Six months after that, you were the getaway driver during a raid on a Moscow branch of Strugatsky Securities that went wrong, leading to your subsequent incarceration. I don’t suppose there’s a connection between those two facts?’
‘Strugatsky owed me,’ said Dutch, her voice tight. ‘He owed Jack. He wanted Jack in that race, but he didn’t do a damn thing for him when he got hurt. There were clinics that could have saved him. He didn’t need to die.’
‘You were close to Mr Burton,’ said Wu.
Dutch said nothing to deny it.
This time, Wu’s smile appeared almost human. ‘How would you like to race again, Dutch? The next Devil’s Run starts three days from now.’
Dutch stared at him. ‘That’s why you shut a whole prison down?’
‘I had no choice. Any other, more legal way would have taken far too long and attracted far too much attention—not to mention the Russian penal system isn’t what you’d call efficient. You’re here because no one else has taken part in the Devil’s Run as often as you have and survived.’ He leaned towards her. ‘Do this for me, Dutch, and within forty-eight hours I’ll
