Mike yelled back, “The driver took them with him into the hospital.”
Nicholas dove across the front seat and smacked the butt of the Glock, once, twice, and the plastic panel cover under the steering column split off. He ripped out the wiring harness, heard Mike yelling, “Hurry, hurry,” as two shots smashed into the windshield at eye level.
He sparked the two wires together and the Mercedes engine roared to life.
“Got it. Get in, get in!”
Mike slammed the passenger-side door closed. Nicholas jammed his foot on the gas, and the Mercedes shot from the curb. The Land Rover was coming head-on. He sliced the car to the left, catching the Land Rover’s bumper on the grille with a rending screech.
The force spun them around and he worked the wheel smoothly, allowing the car to turn one hundred eighty degrees, and now they were behind the truck.
Nicholas said, “Take them out,” and floored it, bringing the car closer. The shooter on the passenger side stuck his head out the window and sprayed them with bullets.
The driver gunned through an intersection, leaving skidding cars in his wake, and Nicholas shot through behind him, the wheel alive in his hands.
“Take the shot, Mike, go for the tires.”
“I’m trying,” Mike said. “Hold the damn car steady.”
“Where the devil are they headed?”
“Toward the Jet d’Eau, I think.”
Northwest, then. He saw the Credit Suisse building to their right, then the Land Rover whipped across the bridge on Rue des Moulins, then turned right onto the Quai du Mont-Blanc.
He said, “The road will open up in a minute. Try not to kill any tourists.”
She pointed at a police car swinging out in front of them, flashers going wild. Nicholas swerved around the car and caught sight of the Land Rover again.
He urged the Mercedes closer, gunning the engine to the red line, thanking all that was holy the car was an automatic.
He got his left hand out the window and squeezed off a few shots, which hit the tail of the truck and did no damage to the tires. He cursed and tried again, ducking back into the car when he saw a black semiauto come out the driver’s-side window.
“AR-15 fire incoming. Can you take out the driver?”
He swung the car wide to the left so Mike could angle for a shot, ducked as the machine gun sprayed bullets across the front of the Mercedes, pockmarking the windshield and hood.
Nicholas began to laugh. “It’s bulletproof glass. What luck. Mike, stay behind the glass and take them out.”
As they flew through the city they were gathering cop cars like a magnet to filings, a stream of wailing building behind them. The shocked faces and angry horns of oncoming drivers flashed by, but Nicholas ignored everything except the bumper of the truck in front of them, getting closer and closer.
The driver of the Land Rover was good, swerving all over the road to keep them from hitting anything vital, but Nicholas was better. He maneuvered the Mercedes right behind them, then shouted, “Hold on,” and gunned it, slamming into the tail of the truck. The Land Rover veered off to the left but held it together, shooting back at them.
The road opened up, and they accelerated so fast Mike was forced to brace one hand on the dashboard to keep herself upright. Nicholas backed off a bit, evened the car’s direction, and then yelled, “Do it!”
Mike took careful aim and pulled the trigger, and the Land Rover’s back left tire blew with a squeal and a puff of white smoke.
Nicholas shouted, “Now! Get the right one.”
“I’m trying,” she yelled back. She shot a good dozen times but missed.
The lake was on their right; the blue-gray winter water looked cold and forbidding. Boats bobbed off their docks, and Mike realized they’d left downtown Geneva.
“There’s a sign up ahead; it says sixty kilometers to Lausanne.”
Nicholas was surging up toward the Land Rover again. “The road’s going to get tight up ahead as we go into Bellevue. When I pull next to them, Mike, I need you to hold the wheel.”