Conviction

steeper, at least thirty degrees, which meant the downward slope would be just as dramatic.

Time to throw a wrench into the works.

Fisher reached the trough and started up the incline. When the Range Rover’s engine began to protest and he began bleeding speed, he downshifted hard and stomped on the accelerator. The Rover lurched ahead, topped the crest, and started down the backside. Fisher let himself get a third of the way to the bottom, then slammed on the brakes. The steering wheel shuddered in his hands and the Range Rover yawed, first left, then right, before straightening out. He came to a stop. The side road was a hundred yards ahead, marked merely by a gap between the trees. He turned off the headlights and waited.

Fifteen seconds. No more. He started counting.

At twelve seconds, the first set of headlights popped over the crest. As soon as the headlights angled downward again, Fisher flipped on his headlights, tapped the brake lights twice, then shifted into reverse and jammed the gas pedal to the floor.

The tires let out a squelch, and then the Range Rover began accelerating toward the oncoming headlights.

12

Fisher’s gambit was a double-edged sword. If his pursuers were not quick enough to react, they would rear- end him, and if they reacted quickly but poorly, they might lose control and crash into the trees bordering the road. He wanted them off his trail, not dead.

He’d closed to within fifty feet of the car before its driver reacted, sending the car into a skid, turning it broadside as it slewed past the Range Rover and onto the right shoulder. Fisher could now see that the car was, in fact, an Audi, a black A8 twelve-cylinder model, which explained how it had gained so much ground so quickly. Just as the Audi slipped off the dirt shoulder and down into the ditch, the driver corrected, got the nose pointed back toward the road, and accelerated back onto the blacktop and screeched to a stop. Fisher slammed on his brakes, shifted into drive. Behind him, a second Audi crested the hill. This driver reacted just as quickly as the first, braking hard but then overcompensating, sending the car into a flat spin that took the Audi down into the left-hand ditch. As its taillights disappeared over the berm, Fisher punched the accelerator and aimed the hood of the Range Rover at the first Audi, which sat at a forty-five-degree angle, front tires on the blacktop, back tires on the shoulder.

A split second before he slammed into the Audi’s front door, Fisher gave the steering wheel a jerk to the left. His headlights filled the side window, and he caught a glimpse of Ben Hansen’s face squinting at the oncoming lights. The Range Rover hit the Audi broadside, side panel to side panel, shoving it sideways over the shoulder and down into the ditch. The Range Rover glanced off the Audi like a billiard ball as Fisher gave the steering wheel one more jerk; then he was accelerating again, straightening out and heading for the side road. As he drew even with it, he tapped the brakes twice, turned the wheel again, and shot into the gap between the trees. Within seconds the headlights of the Audis faded behind him.

* * *

None of the occupants was injured, Fisher guessed. Shaken up, yes, but uninjured. Having not seen how it came to a stop, he didn’t know if the second Audi was drivable, but the first one certainly was, and with any luck, they would spend some time trying to get the second car back onto the road rather than piling into the first and giving chase.

The road ahead was narrower than it had looked on the OPSAT screen — barely fifteen feet wide and slightly overgrown by tree limbs that slapped at the Range Rover’s hood and side panels. Fisher had the vague sensation of moving through a car wash. The rain had started falling again, light but steady. Ahead, his headlights illuminated a tree directly in front of him, and he spun the wheel, taking the left-hand turn too fast. The Range Rover’s wheels stuttered, then found purchase again, sending up a rooster tail of dirt and gravel. Over the next hundred yards the road zigged four more times, each turn at a right angle to its predecessor. Fisher glanced out the side window, and in the amber glow of the Range Rover’s side lights he saw a wall of dirt and foliage appear as he moved into a ravine. The branches that had been clawing at the windshield rose up and began scraping at the roof.

He caught a glimmer of light in the rearview mirror; then it was gone. He craned his neck around to look out the rear window. Nothing. Five seconds later the glimmer was back. Fisher turned again and saw headlights slicing through the trees; the lights blinked on, off, as the Audi negotiated the hairpin turns.

“Damn it!”

They’d recovered more quickly than he’d anticipated.

He depressed the gas pedal another inch, pushing the Range Rover harder. His headlights picked out a basketball-sized rock in the middle of the road. He swerved right. The Range Rover’s front right quarter panel plowed into the berm, coughing out a horizontal rut; mud and gravel and vegetation pressed up against the side window. His front tire bumped against the rock and he corrected, bringing the Range Rover back onto the center of the road. He glanced at the rearview mirror, saw headlights — two sets of them now — then returned his attention to the road.

Rock! This one was bigger, roughly the size of a lawn chair.

This time there was no time to swerve. Fisher slammed on the brakes. The Range Rover bucked. A cloud of dirt enveloped him, obscuring the road, then cleared in time for him to see the rock looming before the hood. With a crunch of fiberglass, the bumper hit the rock. Though Fisher was half expecting it, the pop- hiss of the air bag expanding caused his heart to lurch. He was pressed back against the seat. A plume of talcum powder effluent filled the car.

Knife… knife…

He groped with his right hand, down his leg to his calf, felt the sheath, then drew the knife and began hacking at the air bag, holding his breath and squinting against the powder. The air bag collapsed like a sun-warmed, partially deflated balloon, and Fisher kept slicing until it came free of the steering wheel. He tossed it aside and glanced at the rearview mirror. The Audis were coming on fast, only two hairpins behind.

Fisher shifted the Range Rover into reverse, stomped on the gas, then the brake, and then shifted into drive and accelerated around the boulder. Give them something else to think about. He slammed on the brakes, rolled down his window. He plucked the M67 fragmentation grenade off his harness and pulled the pin. He checked the rearview mirror. The lead Audi had cleared the second closest turn and was accelerating. This would be a lot easier with real bad guys, Fisher thought. He counted three more seconds, then let the M67’s spoon fly, let the grenade cook for one second, then hurled it into the dirt berm. He hit the accelerator and lurched forward. As he skidded into the next turn, the grenade exploded. Fisher heard the skidding of tires on dirt, then the familiar crunch of fiberglass.

Another deposit lost, Fisher thought with a grim smile.

* * *

He pushed the Range Rover as hard as he dared on the dirt road, which was growing muddier with each passing moment. The four-wheel drive helped, but with the road so narrow, Fisher found himself glancing and bumping off the dirt walls, leaving sod and branches and shredded foliage in his wake.

Suddenly the road widened into an oblong clearing covered in mulch and chopped tree branches. A loggers’ dumping ground, Fisher thought. Ahead, the road split — the center branch continuing straight, west, the other two heading to the north and the south. Though he’d seen no signs, he assumed he’d crossed the German border. The sooner he could find a major highway, the sooner he could widen the gap between himself and Hansen’s team. He slowed, letting the Range Rover coast, and checked the OPSAT map. The L1 highway, which ran north to Neuscheuerof and beyond and south to Obersgegen and Korperich, lay two miles down the center road. He needed a highway, and they probably knew he needed a highway. Take the road less expected, Fisher’s instincts told him.

He spun the wheel to the left and accelerated out of the clearing and onto the north road. Again he found himself immediately bracketed by trees. This road was narrower than the previous one by at least two feet but so far appeared less winding. He accelerated to 80 kph, just over fifty miles an hour, and didn’t slow for a quarter mile until the road veered right. He eased into the turn, then followed the road back to the right and onto another straightaway. Ahead, the road started up an incline. When the Range Rover was twenty feet from the crest, he took