Free Island of Thieves by Josh Lacey Page A

air rifle. His dad has a shotgun. But this was the first time in my life that anyone had ever pointed a pistol at me.
    I didn’t like how it felt.
    There was nowhere to hide. Through the windshield, I was staring at the black barrel of a gun. If Miguel pulled the trigger, it would all be over.
    But before he could fire, we were upon him. The bumper was about to crack into his kneecaps. Just in time, Miguel threw himself out of our way and rolled across the road.
    Uncle Harvey yanked the wheel to the left. Our little red Honda swerved and headed for the narrow gap between the Toyota and the mountainside. I shouted at him to stop—I knew we couldn’t get through such a small space—but he took no notice.
    I could see the other man tugging at his gun.
    Where was Miguel? Why hadn’t he shot us yet?
    Then I was thrown forward in my seat as we crunched into the flank of their enormous car. Metal scraped against metal. The windows cracked. The engine roared. Uncle Harvey forced our car onward, ignoring its protests, jamming his foot on the floor.
    I thought we’d come shuddering to a halt in a spaghetti of shredded metal, but our heroic little Honda shoved the Toyota aside, both cars howling in protest, and then we burst out the other side and accelerated down the hill, leaving a trail of glass and paint and metal and mirrors, one of theirs and both of ours.
    Behind us there was a sound like an exploding firework.
    I looked back.
    Miguel was standing in the middle of the road. His right arm was raised.
    I ducked.
    There were two more bangs and the car swerved.
    The cliff loomed up ahead of us. The brakes screeched. Uncle Harvey yelled and struggled with the steering wheel. I put my hands over my face and we smashed into the hillside.

14
    I must have blacked out for a few seconds.
    When I next opened my eyes, Miguel was standing by the side of the car, pointing his gun at my face. He said something in Spanish. I tugged at the door and stumbled out.
    Uncle Harvey was waiting for me with his hands in the air. A line of blood was trickling down his face. He asked, “Are you hurt?”
    â€œI’m fine,” I said, rubbing my head. “What happened?”
    â€œHe got the tire.” Uncle Harvey nodded at the car.
    I turned to look. The back tire was shredded into skinny rubber strips.
    Miguel snapped an order at me and gestured with his pistol. He was speaking Spanish, so I didn’t know what he was saying, but I could guess what he meant:
Shut up and put your hands in the air.
And that was exactly what I did.
    There were three of them: Miguel and two other thugs, who could have been his brothers; they had the same thick neck and broad shoulders.
    Miguel kept us covered. One of the others pulled our bags out of the car and dumped them on the ground. I was waiting for him to unzip my uncle’s bag and find the bundle of papers, but he didn’t bother. The third thug leaned in to the driver’s seat. He fiddled with the parking brake and the steering wheel. Then the two of them put their shoulders against the Honda, braced themselves, and shoved the little red car toward the edge of the precipice.
    As soon as my uncle realized what they were doing, he yelled, “Hey! You can’t do that!”
    Miguel raised the pistol.
    â€œNo problem,” said my uncle. “You can do whatever you want. I never liked that car anyway.”
    They wheeled the Honda to the side of the road. The front wheels bumped over the edge. They kept pushing. The little car tipped forward, nose first, and wavered for a moment as if it were deciding what to do, then slid over.
    There was a series of crashes, each quieter than the one before. When the noises had stopped, Miguel motioned for us to have a look.
    A couple of hundred yards below us, at the bottom of the valley, the car was lying upside down, a tangled heap of glass and metal. One of the wheels was spinning. Another had been torn off and