As he shifted into drive, lights exploded out of the darkness behind them. He floored the Lincoln, felt it hesitate and then lunge forward. Slow. Too slow.

At first he thought the tire had blown out, but the wheel stayed steady in his hands, and the booms continued, and he realized somebody was shooting. Not Carling; she had turned to face backward, but was only starting to raise her gun.

Jesus, she’d been right, she’d been right all the time. He wondered if he’d ever have a chance to apologize.

He took the uphill turn too fast, skidded, felt the back end of the car slide and bounce off a concrete stanchion. Carling steadied her right hand with her left, sighted, and fired straight through his back window. It exploded in a network of stars. The noise was like a slap, a physical sting on his skin and a punch to his ears; he gagged on gunpowder. She fired again, two shots he thought, or three. His ears rang too much to be certain.

They picked up speed in the straightaway and he touched the brake for the curve, not too much, just enough; the tires screamed and shimmied, but held. He couldn’t see the car behind them through the cracks in the rear window, but he heard them hit something with a thick metal crunch.

“Did they stop?” he yelled. The wind cut through the shattered window and blew Carling’s hair back like a wind sock, revealing the stark pallor of her face, the fixed wide eyes.

“Drive!” she shouted back. He hit the gas hard and saw the EXIT light ahead, a beacon in the dark. The fluorescent gate was down.

He fumbled for his card, dropped it, fished frantically. What are you doing? he thought. In the middle of a car chase, he was trying to pay his toll.

He put his foot all the way to the floor. The Lincoln growled and hissed forward over the concrete.

The barrier had a core of metal; he heard the squeal as it bent and slashed a screaming cut down the side of his car. More booms. He pulled his head in toward his shoulders like a turtle, and the Lincoln slammed down the short ramp. The front end hit the street in a shower of sparks, but then the tires grabbed and the building fell away behind them, the dark mouth of the parking garage closing in the distance.

Martin became aware that his chest hurt. He let his breath out and gasped in a fresh sweet lungful of air, and looked over at Carling.

She was still facing backward, one hand clutching the headrest, the one with the gun hanging at her side. She still looked chalk-white, hair wild around her face.

“Are you okay?” he asked. She didn’t seem to hear him. “Carling, are you—”