Hunt Through the Cradle of Fear Read Online Free Page B

glass into the driver’s face at a relative velocity of somewhere north of fifty miles per hour. Realizing this, the driver pulled the wheel violently to the right, and this time he succeeded in avoiding the missile, though only by inches. What he didn’t succeed in avoiding was the curb, which vanished under his right front tire as the Audi leapt onto the sidewalk; or the fire hydrant by the curb, which crumpled the frontof the car like it was made of tinfoil. The driver and his passenger were both hurled forward and would have collided painfully—maybe fatally—with the steering wheel in one case and the windshield in the other, had it not been for the car’s airbags, which deployed with showroom precision.
    Safe cars, Audis.
    Gabriel carefully crawled backwards, ducking back into the cab and collapsing in the backseat. He saw Narindra eyeing him in the mirror.
    This was the moment of truth—would he stop the car and insist that Gabriel get out, which in practice would mean losing the other car, and Sheba, possibly permanently? Or would Narindra keep going, to help save a young woman’s life?
    “You say you will pay?” Narindra said.
    “Anything,” Gabriel said. “Name your price.”
    “A thousand dollars?”
    “Five thousand,” Gabriel said.
    “You are crazy,” Narindra said. But he kept driving.
    The black car was half a mile ahead by then, but they made up some distance when it turned crosstown and began plowing through the slightly denser traffic on the way to the Lincoln Tunnel. They reached the tunnel entrance just a few hundred yards behind the other car and spotted it again the instant they emerged.
    They were on the highway now, barreling through the wilds of northern New Jersey, and could really put on some speed, but at Gabriel’s request Narindra hung back, leaving several car lengths and at least one lane between them and the black car at all times. From the rear they presented an unusual sight, with the missing windshield and the trunk riddled with bullet holes, but from the front there was nothing out of the ordinary—just a New York cab taking someone on a short hopoutside the city—and Gabriel was counting on their being able to go unnoticed, as long as they didn’t get too close.
    It was the only choice. Gabriel couldn’t see trying to run the other car off the road or bring them to a stop in some other way, not with Sheba’s life at stake and Narindra at risk, too—especially not when the occupants of the other car were almost certainly better armed than he was. The thing to do was to find out where they were taking her; he could regroup then, return with the proper equipment and help, maybe even involve the police. Or maybe he’d mount a solo rescue the way he had in Hungary. There were all sorts of options. But first he needed to know where they were planning to stash her.
    It was with a sinking feeling that Gabriel saw the airfields and hangars of Teterboro Airport loom at the horizon.
    Narindra said, “They seem to be headed for the—”
    “Yeah,” Gabriel said, “I see it.”
    Stashing didn’t look like it was in the cards.
    He fingered the cell phone in his pocket. He hated the things, but even he had to concede there were times when they were indispensable. He speed-dialed Michael’s number and, while it rang, dug a handful of hundred-dollar bills out of his pocket. He passed three to Narindra across the tattered back of the front seat. “A down payment,” he said. Then, to Michael: “Two things, Michael, and I don’t have much time to talk. First: I need you to take care of someone for me…a cab driver, his name is Rajiv Narindra, he’ll be calling you…five thousand dollars…he can tell you that himself. Just make sure he gets what he needs—it’s got to be enough to repair his taxi plus some extra. That’s right, on the Foundation’s tab.” Gabriel paused while Michael peppered him with questions, most of which he couldn’t have answered if he’d