Free The Lawless Kind by Matt Hilton Page A

in the hood. Rink ducked and dived, avoiding bits of heated metal thrown through the open window.
    ‘Drop that motherfucker with the machine-gun or we’re dead!’
    ‘That’s what I’m trying to do!’
    I leaned fully over the passenger seat so I had a clear view through the windshield, and loosed a close grouping of three rounds at the machine-gunner. Whether I hit him or not, I wasn’t sure, but he disappeared, ducking down behind the safety of the cab.
    Then we were swerving around the truck and I caught the pale flashes of passing faces both inside and on the rear of the truck. Four men in total, plus the bogus cop. Our odds weren’t looking much better than before. We had to change things in our favour.
    Rink pushed the car forward, steam now billowing out from under the buckled hood. I craned round, watching the truck driver perform a decent one-eighty turn. The gunners were up again and firing. It would take time to catch up with us, unless the damage to the engine of our car stalled it within seconds. Something under the hood was making a regular knocking noise, but then that could have been the bullets hitting the road beneath our wheels.
    Kirstie struggled to move, but was jammed by my knees. She was reaching for her purse, and I had an idea she wasn’t looking for her lipstick. ‘Leave it alone, Kirstie. It’s more important you keep out of the way than join in the fight.’
    She struggled free, snapping at me, ‘No one is going to stop me saving Benjamin!’
    ‘A bullet in your goddamn skull will,’ I snapped back, and I shoved her down, just as we came in range of the bogus cop. He was driving much slower, wary that we might try to ram him, and had poked the muzzle of the shotgun out of his window. Flame erupted from the barrel and lead peppered the rental. Something incredibly hot burned a furrow across my scalp and I knew that I’d been hit. Thankfully it was a glancing blow and the shot didn’t embed itself in my cranium. Still, it was as if I’d taken a punch to my forehead and white sparks flashed through my mind. Blood began pouring across my features. I questioned the validity of the man’s bloodline, cursing viciously as I batted blood from my eyes. Immediately I squared the muzzle of the SIG on the spot behind the shotgun and fired. My shots were wild and designed to halt a second blast from the shotgun. The driver hit the brakes, swerving on to the hard shoulder, then on to the soft sand: unfortunately he didn’t collide with the cliffs the way his first buddies had.
    In our engine something shrieked, and more steam hissed banshee-like from under the hood. The car bucked as it began to lose power. Then it bucked again and the engine went silent.
    ‘Shit,’ I said against the new hush.
    The other truck was barrelling up behind us; on the back the gunmen rose up and the machine-gun and rifle spat fire.

Chapter 12
     
    The cliffs were our best hope of refuge, but at that moment we were rolling on tyres alone, and though Rink angled off the road we only made it a few yards before the front sank in the loose sand. Rink piled out of the door, pulling his gun from his shoulder rig, while I grabbed hold of Kirstie and yanked her up.
    ‘OK, get your gun. Things have changed now.’
    Kirstie snatched her purse, and I was already ducking out of the door. Our saving grace was that we still had the car side on to the approaching gunmen, but that advantage would last seconds only. I helped Kirstie out, then pushed her down behind the wheel, to offer some protection: the car’s body wouldn’t halt a round, and Rink had already claimed the spot behind the engine.
    I took a quick look over the trunk, saw the truck had slowed and the men on the back were searching for targets. Beyond them, the bogus cop had abandoned his vehicle and was jogging towards the fight. But that was all I got of the scene; I snatched my head down as bullets caromed from the roof of the car, spinning wildly away among the