Killer Instinct (Instinct #2)(74)

“There!” I said, pointing. “There they are.”

The van was on the highway almost right in front of us. We’d narrowed the gap. Now we had to close it.

Shit! We had company.

A cruiser parked up ahead hit its siren. We blew by them, Foxx not even giving them so much as a glance. He was fixed on the van, nothing else.

“We need them to take the bridge exit,” he said. The highway would soon become my familiar Henry Hudson Parkway, well before the bridge.

“Why?”

Foxx didn’t answer. The entrance to the George Washington Bridge was a few miles north, a peel off to the right.

“Why?” I asked again.

We were going a hundred and ten and closing fast on the van. Behind us, the cruiser was chasing us both. Foxx leaned forward as if squeezing every last horsepower from the engine. He still hadn’t answered me.

“Wake up Julian,” he said instead, handing me his sat phone. When I hesitated, it knocked the calm right out of him. He yelled. “Now!”

Another time, another car chase, I maybe would’ve held my ground. But there had to be a reason Foxx was keeping me in the dark, and only when he was good and ready would he let me in on it.

I called Julian, putting him on speaker. The guy never slept.

There were no hellos, no setup beyond Foxx stating that I was with him. He cut straight to what he wanted. “I need you to hack someone,” he said, “and you’ve got only two minutes.”

“Who is it?” asked Julian.

“Me,” said Foxx.





CHAPTER 105


AS HE slashed back and forth between lanes, staying right on the tail of the van, Foxx told Julian his password. Of course, if it were only that easy. He wasn’t exactly asking Julian to hack his Book of the Month Club account.

Even without Foxx saying it, I knew the server he was referring to. So did Julian. As the CIA’s New York section chief, Foxx had access to the Agency’s tactics and operations protocol, including standing counterterrorism measures—most of them having been created and implemented after 9/11.

But the Agency took extraordinary measures to ensure that Foxx was actually Foxx. In addition to a password, he needed a simultaneous fingerprint and voice match. With Foxx on the phone, the voice wouldn’t be a problem for Julian. The challenge was the fingerprint.

“Your iPhone, Dylan. Give me the serial number. It’s listed in the settings,” said Julian.

I quickly found it, reading it off to him. He then asked for my IMEI number. As soon as he did, I knew what he was trying to do.

“I’m resetting my Touch ID,” I said. “Tell us when you’re ready.”

The FBI was limited by privacy laws, not to mention the likes of Apple, when it came to unlocking the phones of suspects. The CIA, however, really hates to be told no. By anybody.

Julian was setting up my iPhone’s Touch ID to take Foxx’s fingerprint. “Okay, ready,” he said.

I held out my phone to Foxx, trying to steady my hand as he whipped the steering wheel left and right. He was mimicking the van’s every lane change, zigzagging between cars with only inches to spare. “Thumbprint,” I said.

His thumb was on my phone before I’d even finished saying print.

“Got it,” said Julian. “I’m in.”

He now had access. The question was why.

“Homeland Security, DOT override,” said Foxx.

I knew DOT was the Department of Transportation, but I still had no idea what Foxx was planning. Julian did, though.

“You want the exit ramp or before the bridge?” he asked.

“Exit ramp,” said Foxx.

“The timing has to be perfect,” said Julian.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” said Foxx.

“Or maybe tell me what the hell is going on!” I said.

Pushing over one twenty, Foxx slid in right behind the back bumper of the van in the middle lane. Like a NASCAR driver, he was drafting them. The exit for the GW Bridge was only hundreds of yards away.

For the first time, he glanced over at me. “You ever try to back out of a rental car lot?”

Before I could ask what on earth he was talking about, he swerved into the left lane and pulled up alongside the van. We weren’t just close. We were touching. Metal grinding against metal, as Foxx began forcing the van toward the exit.

“Tell me when,” came Julian’s voice.

“Not yet,” said Foxx. “Not yet …”

The van tried to straighten out, but Foxx wouldn’t let it. Like a battering ram, he kept pounding the side panels, riding it harder and harder off the highway. The van had two choices, crash into the median or take the exit.

“Now!” yelled Foxx. “NOW!”





CHAPTER 106


IT HAPPENED so fast. It was as if I hadn’t seen it. I had to piece everything together in reverse.

You ever try to back out of a rental car lot?

The tires of the van exploded, all four of them, strips and chunks of rubber flying through the air. Followed by the van itself.

I whipped my head around as Foxx skidded to a stop in the breakdown lane by the exit. That really just happened, didn’t it?

Right before the tires ruptured, right before the van crossed into the exit lanes, the row of spikes had popped up from the pavement like magic. Only it wasn’t magic. It was real.