Up front, the Marshal in the passenger seat leans forward to adjust the air. He lowers his window a crack, and air whips in through the slit.
He says, “I could use a cigarette.”
The driver, keeping his face tilted forward, grunts in agreement.
A billboard looms ahead, only a couple hundred yards away. It’s the only thing marking the landscape, one of those full-size billboards that goes right down to the ground. There isn’t even an ad on it, just a message saying that the thing is for rent with a number to call.
I find myself focusing on the billboard for some reason, and it’s only a moment or two before I understand the reason why.
Movement beside the billboard, what appears to be somebody stationed there, and the sun is angled in the sky just right that it glints off what I instantly realize is a scope lens.
I shout, “Look out!”
The windshield spiderwebs and half of the driver’s head disappears. Blood and bits of brain tissue splatter the inside of the car.
The passenger reacts at once, pulling his gun while he leans over to grab the wheel.
That’s when I hear an engine coming up behind us and glance back through the rear window. A massive pickup truck is right on our tail. Two men sit up front, both wearing balaclavas.
The pickup swerves into the next lane, inches closer, and immediately swerves back into our lane, striking the back of the Caprice.
The passenger tries to hold onto the wheel, but he can’t do it with only the one hand. He drops the gun, grabs the wheel with both hands, starts to slide himself over to the driver’s side so he can press his foot down on the gas.
The billboard is less than fifty yards away, coming up fast.
The sniper steps out, rifle in hand, and sights on the remaining Marshal.
The Marshal, maybe realizing that there’s no escape, makes a split-second decision.
He whips the wheel toward the right, and the Caprice veers off the highway and barrels straight into the sniper.
I’m briefly aware of the sniper going under the car and the SUV parked behind the billboard as we zoom past, but the ground here is rutted, unsteady, and as the Marshal tries to veer us back onto the highway, he loses control of the wheel and the Caprice starts to spin, whipping up a dust cloud in its wake.
Even before the car has come to a complete stop, I dive for the closest door, but it’s locked from the outside. I try the other door, and it’s the same.
Up front, the Marshal ducks down for his gun. He punches the gas, too, and the engine roars but we don’t move, and it takes the Marshal an extra second to realize the Caprice has shifted out of gear.
Before he can shove the Caprice back into drive, the pickup skids to a halt in front of us. The pickup’s passenger jumps out, an M4 in his hands. He moves at an angle, so that he’s not facing the car straight on but rather from the side, and fires twice through the driver’s window, the Marshal raising his gun to fire back but not getting a chance to let off any rounds.
By now I’ve leaned back, with my feet pointed at the rear passenger window, and I kick the window as hard as I can—once, twice, three times—and it’s on the fourth kick that the window finally gives way, and I jerk forward, as quickly as the shackles will let me, and despite the shards of glass sticking up from the windowsill I fling myself through the opening and hit the ground on my side, hard, a flash of pain shooting everywhere, but I ignore it as I struggle to my feet and start hopping away.
Behind me, a voice shouts, “Do you want your family to die?”
I stop at once. Stare at the foothills off in the distance.
Turning around, I watch two men in balaclavas hurrying toward me. Both carry M4s. One of them straps the rifle over his shoulder as they near.
“Don’t struggle.”
The man picks me up and carries me fireman-style back toward the billboard and the SUV idling beside it. The world is upside down, but I see the Caprice from the corner of my eye, and I hear the passenger inside, the Marshal still alive. One of the men in balaclavas runs up to the Caprice with a gas can and starts to douse the car. The Marshal inside shouts no no no no as he tries to crawl from the car, but the man with the gas can uses his boot to shove him back inside as he lights a road flare and tosses it into the car. The Marshal starts to scream as the Caprice goes up in flames. I want to do something, somehow help him, but before I know it we’ve reached the SUV and I’m upright again, the man having deposited me so my feet are back on the ground. The back door is opened and I’m pushed inside. I hear one of the other men asking what they should do with Daniel, and another man saying they can’t leave him here so load him up, too. Another man leans forward, right at me, and I can’t tell what’s in his hand at first—the entire world feels like it’s spinning, on fire, a man screaming as he burns to death—but I realize it’s a needle, that
