Defy (Brothers of Ink and Steel Book 3)(36)

The Red River meanders to our right. I’m only about two hundred feet away from the bridge when the actual Lousiana State Police come racing onto the scene to block my path.

I turn a sharp left, knowing they’ll follow—I have to lose them, or at least throw them off my course long enough to get Farrington safe—into a crowded shopping center.

“I’m going to be sick,” she cries, her head resting between us on the seat.

“You can sit up now.”

“Where are we?” She looks out the window. “Oh look, a Famous Footwear, I could use a new pair of heels.”

“Really?”

“Not really!” she yells at me. “What the hell are you doing?”

I grin at her snark, then swing right and cut through the space between the buildings. We shoot back out quick, and I pivot to the right again, taking a back road that will bring me up and around so I can spin up onto the bridge.

“There’s a US Marshall behind you. Are you going to stop now? Let them help us!”

“Hmm . . . let me think.” I peer into the visor mirror.

“Ryder!?”

“Don’t know him, so nope.”

“Oh my God.” She shakes her head and curls her hands into frustrated fists.

I hook through a liquor store lot. The black SUV comes barreling in from the other side and races head-on towards us.

Farrington starts screaming. I don’t blame her—we’re hemmed in on the right by parked cars and on the left by the building itself.

Braking hard, I spin to face the other way but see a black and white waiting for me.

I’m going to have to create a hole and push around him. Or . . .

“Hold onto something.” I shift into first, power rev the engine, drop the clutch like a brick and spiral hard. White smoke comes billowing up from the tires.

The Hemi growls and the rubber squeals and burns. Our car spinning in a circle creates a massive distraction of noise and smoke. Farrington’s still screaming her head off, and I think to myself this would be a lot more f*cking fun if she’d just embrace the ride.

“You’re going to kill us!” she cries, holding the dashboard.

“Highly unlikely.”

My book-ends take a minute to wait and watch suspiciously. That also means people will stop from a safe distance and watch too. Going past the cop car will be the easiest—he’s the lightest of the two vehicles and easier to push out of the way.

Just before I do, a car on the other side of an empty space pulls out, leaving a hole right in the middle—nice!

Wrenching up the e-brake, I glide into position and slide like the lucky devil I am through the opening and take off like a shot back to the bridge.

Farrington turns in her seat and watches as the cop and SUV square off in the midst of the burning cloud, before bringing her eyes back to shoot me an incredulous stare.

“They told me you were just in this for the bounty. Is it true?”

“Does it look true, Farrington?” I shake my head. “I don’t give a f*ck about any bounty.”

“I’m so confused! I don’t really even know who you are.”

“Yeah, and now you’ll never forget me.” I smile.

That’s when I see the barrier on the onramp to the bridge. That must’ve been tricky—the bridge is divided into two separate sections going over the Red River—each section of bridge is three lanes and one way.

Time to adapt, improvise and overcome. I drive up and onto the median.

She cries, “What are you going to do?”

“You have an issue with trust. We should work on that,” I say as we drop off the curve and accelerate onto the bridge going against the oncoming flow of traffic.

Zero to sixty; sixty to eighty-five. “Hold on, baby.”

“RYDER!” Farrington yells as I shift into sixth gear.

“Right? I love the sound of the Hemi V8—gets me all hard and tingly.”

“IT’S ONE WAY!”

“Oh, you noticed.” I snake through the cars as they blare their horns and rush to the side. “No choice, Farrington.”

To my right on the other portion of bridge are a few cop cars following parallel to us.

“We have to step it up a notch.”

“A notch.” She groans, holding her head.

I punch the gas. Can’t have them erecting a barricade on the other side.

Speaking of erections—one hundred and ten MPH.

As soon as we’re over the river—which is f*cking fast and I’m grateful for the midday traffic, since this could have gone a lot worse—we cross over to where the roads merge over dry land, and I slide back into traffic.

“Barksdale Air Force Base?” she scans the road ahead. “Why are you going there?”

I’m ahead of her and have already activated the Bluetooth call. “Rodriguez, we’re coming in like triple ghost pepper salsa.”

“Yeah, Ax-man, it’s all over the talk box.”

“Talk box is a scanner,” I tell Farrington, who smiles exaggeratedly.

“I got that.”

“We have your back.”

“I can see the welcoming committee.” There’s a line of military police Humvees across the gate with an open space for us to get through.