The pickup’s driver, alerted by the police lights in his mirror, saw Giordino lunge out of the van. He immediately tapped his brakes. Giordino just managed to duck back inside his window to avoid colliding with the truck’s cab. For an instant, the two vehicles traveled alongside.

“Almost got it,” he said to Pitt. “Give me one more try.”

Giordino sat nearly face-to-face with Juan, who was desperately lowering his window.

Pitt matched the truck’s braking, then looked ahead and saw a cement mixer rambling down the road directly in front of him. “Make it quick!” Pitt stepped harder on the brakes.

The pickup accelerated, and Pitt fought to match it before facing a head-on collision.

As the van again pulled alongside the pickup’s bed, Giordino was true to his word. Hanging half out the window, he snared a handle on one end of the box. With a hard pull, he yanked the box out of the bed, letting it dangle alongside the van. “Got it!”

Pitt had no room to accelerate past the truck, so he braked hard. But the truck also slowed, keeping him hemmed in the opposite lane with the cement mixer just yards away. A narrow side street appeared on his left, and Pitt stomped on the accelerator and turned the wheel hard over.

Inside the truck, Juan finally lowered his window. He climbed halfway out and aimed a Glock 22 at the van. He fired a wild volley of shots—until the pickup driver shouted, “Look out!”

Too late, Juan turned to see the front fender of the cement mixer a heartbeat before it clipped him just beneath his collar. His clothes caught on the fender and he was plucked out of the truck. Both legs were smashed as he was ripped backward.

Swerving left, Pitt barely escaped a collision of his own. As the van screeched across the cement mixer’s path, just missing its front bumper, a spray of bullet holes opened along the side panel and up the passenger door. Only the last bullet did any damage, splintering the crate and nicking Giordino’s hand. Nerve reflex caused him to release his grip, and the crate plunged to the pavement.

Panicked, the cement mixer’s driver slammed on the brakes. Briefly clutching the fender, Juan slid off and under the left front wheel. The opposite tire found the dropped crate, and the mixer bounced over both. The massive vehicle skidded to a halt, but only after flattening the remains of Juan and the crate under its dual rear wheels.

Stunned by the sight in his rearview mirror, the pickup’s driver lost rein of his own vehicle. He drifted right and barreled into a Chevy Cobalt parked at the curb. The four-door pickup rode up onto the little car’s trunk before grinding to a halt. A bang filled the air as the pickup’s front tire cut into the car’s shredded body and burst.